An Invitation: What Is Missing?

Beginning in this new year, which today has dawned on the present generation and its thoughts, I will be editing a new series of pamphlets with The New Pamphleteer press called “What Is Missing?” As in that cliche: “I was going through my life or looking at my world and couldn’t escape the feeling that something was missing.” Their purpose shall be to make daring, evocative, and eloquent statements about spiritual conditions in the world today. I invite you to create a pamphlet for this series.

Each pamphlet should be an abrupt introduction to truth, or some aspect of it, for consumption by the masses. Fascinate them. Bare your soul or tell on others, as you like. Whatever you care about deeply or whatever pisses you off. Tell a story. Manifesto-ize. Together, the series will announce the undercurrents of our time that have gone yet unnoticed.

The pamphlet medium blasts from the past. Pamphlet wars built the groundwork of the American and French revolutions. They were the blogs of times before the internet, and they’re better than the internet because you can hold them in your hand. Pamphlets have a special place among religions. You’ve been offered thousands of them in public places of all sorts, with a smile and a prayer for your eternal soul. Many go so far as to say, “If this pamphlet has changed your life the way we want it to, CALL NOW AND RECEIVE YOUR FREE [whatever].” That’s how powerful they’re supposed to be, and that’s how powerful they are. Think of this series as a big opportunity to shake the world out of its dogmatic slumber.

These pamphlets will be classy. ISBNs, professional design, publicity, and distribution far and wide. Five bucks a pop or less. The length we’re looking at is around 50 small pages. Six to eight thousand words, give or take. Fewer, obviously, if pictures are involved (any black-and-white, 2-d media welcome). You’ll earn royalties on sales.

To join in, send me a short proposal about what you’d like to create, and we’ll go from there. If you know someone else who may be interested, feel free to pass this invitation along.

Happy New Year!

Nathan Schneider (nathan [at] therowboat.com)
Editor, “What Is Missing?”


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6 responses to “An Invitation: What Is Missing?”

  1. […] ways to keep intellectual and civic discussion alive. I’m not staying at the Times, but I am testing out the pamphlet as a new/old medium for exchanging crazy ideas. Not to mention some websites here and there and […]

  2. I try to tie big questions into a 4D worldmap: what is/was missing (when and where) that wasn’t missing other times or places. What was missing once that’s less-missing now. When and where have individuals experienced ‘enlightenment’ that (temporarily) filled an emptiness. What forces of darkness have sought to replace enlightenment with illusion. (just brainstorming/contextualising)

  3. That’s wonderful. Feel free to write to me if you’d like to discuss more!

  4. What’s missing? Blake’s “How do you know but ev’ry Bird that cuts the airy way, Is an immense world of delight, clos’d by your senses five?”

  5. Life can be missing: nutrients, assured supply of nutrients, safety, confidence of safety, reproduction, challenges, sense of superiority, …the sweet release of death?

  6. That would be a good one that we can all relate to: “the sweet release of death.”