Saul Williams : Martyr Loser King

Martyr Loser King, the debut graphic novel of poet, musician, actor and director Saul Williams, with art by Morgan Sorne, not only exists in the same world as his feature film Neptune Frost, but also that of three of his albums, one of his poetry collections and a touring dance performance called The Motherboard Suite. All of these works, in their respective disciplines, explore the distribution of power, the intersection of technology and race, and how our digitally-mediated lives are sustained by the crudest and cruelest of analog exploitations. In Martyr Loser King we follow two Central African protagonists—a miner of coltan, the trace mineral that powers our smart phones and laptops, and an intersex hacker with designs on the system extracting wealth from their country and people. To borrow words from Saul’s song and poem “Coltan as Cotton,” in today’s conversation we hack into land rights and ownership, faith and morality, masculinity, femininity and sexuality. We hack into the rebellious gene, the storyboard, and the history of revolutions. We hack into the database and the panel marked “survival.” If you enjoy today’s conversation consider joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. One of the many benefits and rewards you can choose from is access to the bonus audio archive, with contributions from everyone from Dionne Brand to Isabella Hammad, N.K. Jemisin to Danez Smith, Naomi Klein to Viet Thanh Nguyen. You can find out more at the show’s Patreon page. Finally, here is the BookShop for today’s conversation.