All very much fertile grounds for exploration in the manner we’re accustomed to with Kattke and, unsurprisingly, he doesn’t miss.
In my review of Flowers Blooming Fire, I noted that there was a strong hint of Kathy Acker in the writing owing to the harsh, mechanised imagery of systemic rape and violence, and this is also evident in The Sacrifices. Take this segment as an example:
It is my great ambition to be the owner and CEO of a rape factory.
The sledgehammer lands at the top of the crown, splitting the skull into several large pieces with sudden exclamations of pain reaching its conclusion until finally silence. I strike over and over in pointless fury imagining I am carving a statue from stone or breaking through a rebuilt Berlin Wall for my freedom.
The child weeps and tries to climb out of the pit but I refuse to let go, and with my free hand I grab them by the left eye socket where my nails tear through the flesh and peel it back. The child lets go of their escape in a desperate attempt to affix their face like a beloved Halloween mask stolen by a bully.
Extreme? Yes. Brutal? Of course. But that’s the point of confrontational writing after all.
Kattke is never going to be a writer who appeals to a mainstream audience, but his writing remains brutal, honest, thought provoking and impactful. Kattke is all too aware of this as he notes at one point:
When you take into consideration the many writers who have died penniless or by suicide it is perhaps worth considering why the general public tries to steer people away from work that is considered challenging in this context lest you become warped into believing that you should die for a cause (of your making). It’s almost like a wishing well, this craft called writing, where you die hoping you have achieved some level of eternity. And if you don’t, then the craft becomes darker and darker still, until you utilize the power of the Word and manifest all of the memories into the form of a lethal syringe injected into the frontal lobe of the naïve and disbeliever, infecting their memories with yours where their consciousness destroys itself. Because being meta in this way is another way of turning the gun on yourself.
In this current climate, such an outlook to be applauded for its audaciousness.
Alexander Kattke, 2025, The Sacrifices. Independently published. ISBN-13: 979-8265253057.
⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.
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