Spring is, like revolution, a state of mind. Issue #8 considers new beginnings and radical departures. Jim Pletcher and Oonagh O’Hagan imagine the textiles of the future, and former German chancellor Helmut Schmidt tries to name the new century. But the darling buds of revolution are doomed to wither and fade, as in Jonas Schooler-Bendiksen’s grim portrayal of Birobidzhan, the Jewish Autonomous Region established by Stalin. Max Andrews twists the pseudo-revolutionary language of critical theory into a word spaghetti and in Michael Neff’s essay on Neo Tokyo, the future is a wistful dream as unobtainable as the anime cyborgs he yearns to hold. Malu Halasa’s short story ironizes the miracle of birth in its portrayal of the inner city sperm bank.
