Lawrence Ytzhak Braithwaite

Lawrence Christopher Patrick (aka Ytzhak) Braithwaite
Born(1963-03-17)March 17, 1963
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
DiedJuly 14, 2008(2008-07-14) (aged 45)

Lawrence Christopher Patrick (aka Ytzhak) Braithwaite (March 17, 1963 – July 14, 2008[1]) was a Canadian novelist, spoken-word artist, dub poet, essayist, digital drummer and short fiction writer.

Born in Montreal, Quebec, he has been called "one of the outstanding Canadian prose writers alive" (Gail Scott) and linked to the "New Narrative" movement,[2] a term coined by Steve Abbott.[3] He was the author of the legendary cult novel Wigger.[4]

Braithwaite's work has been praised by Dodie Bellamy for its "sublime impenetrability".[5] and is fueled by a modernist and Fredric Jameson-influenced late modernist approach to writing and recording. His work is influenced by the musical and social realism of punk rock, opera, musique concrète, noise, hip hop, rap, industrial, black metal, country music and dub.

Braithwaite utilized the intensity of the New York City No Wave scene and the Los Angeles and Montreal hardcore punk music subcultures to compose his narrative. His family has laid him to rest in Notre-Dames-des-Neiges Cemetery, Montreal, Quebec.

Braithwaite was openly gay.[4] He was a vocal critic of the LGBT community's sometimes inadequate response to issues of racism.[4]

Bibliography

  • Wigger (1995) ISBN 1-55152-020-6
  • Ratz Are Nice: PSP (2000) ISBN 1-55583-554-6
  • Speed, thrash, death: Alamo, B. C. (with illustrations by Krista E. McLean & Max)
  • More at 7:30 (Notes from New Palestine)

Anthologies

  • Queeries: An Anthology of Gay Male Prose (ed. Dennis Denisoff, 1994): "Spunk"
  • Role Call: A Generational Anthology of Social & Political Black Literature & Art
  • Dodie Bellamy and Kevin Killian's Mirage #4/Period(ical)
  • Bluesprints: Anthology of Black British Columbian Literature and Orature *Redzone zine,
  • Of the Flesh: Dangerous Fiction
  • "Vanilla Primitive".[1] in the e-journal Sleepy Brain
  • Nocturnes 3 Review of the Literary Arts 2005
  • Biting the Error: Writers Explore Narrative
  • Sidebrow e-journal.[2] Archived 2007-08-23 at the Wayback Machine and [3] Archived 2008-10-06 at the Wayback Machine
  • New Standards: The First Decade of Fiction at Fourteen Hills.[4]
  • The World Crisis Web (ed. Danny Dayus) Revolution is Bloody
  • Black Ice. [5]
  • The Rain Review of Books[6]

Recordings

See also

References

  1. ^ "Lawrence Braithwaite Obituary", Montreal Gazette, July 30, 2008.
  2. ^ Gail Scott, "In the Future, Where Prose is Going", Matrix 62: a special issue on New Narrative edited by Gail Scott and Corey Frost.
  3. ^ Aleander Lawrence's Free Williamsburg interview with Dennis Cooper[permanent dead link‍]
  4. ^ a b c "Wigger world: angry, black and gay". The Gazette, May 27, 1995.
  5. ^ Dodie Bellamy, "Body Language", Academonia (San Francisco: Krupskaya, 2006): p. 82; available online in Fascicle 2 (Winter 2005–2006) "Dodie Bellamy". Archived from the original on 2006-09-10. Retrieved 2007-03-14.