[Full Length] The Inner Lives of Fungi — with Sophie Strand
SYNOPSIS:
Woodchucks and bald eagles. Fungal fermentation. Compost heaps. Animism. Deviant animal sex. Disability. Jesus and Dionysus. Fungi, microbes, and the divine feminine critique.
It’s never a dull conversation with the brilliant and freewheelingly articulate writer, poet and philosopher Sophie Strand. Kick back and enjoy the ride.
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Inner Lives of Fungi - Sophie Strand
QUOTES:
The truth is that we can see in old mythologies, in plenty of Celtic fairytales, that it's often the smallest being that ultimately grants the biggest boon.
Your body is your ecosystem. You can make kin with your own disability.
Every morning, I summon every being that I want to know as part of my decision-making process. Indigenous beings, folkloric beings, land forms, microbes, infections, ancestors, secular saints, plants, invasive species. And I think that's the most important thing about it. By the time I enter into my public persona I know that everything I say, every decision I make, is not bounded by the fiction of individuality.
Fungi are relational. They live between species. They are interrogative.
Civilization may not be a purely human story. It may be a fungal story and even just a yeast story.
Compost for me is this moment where rot — where a slurry of everything, where no one's excluded, but also no one is highlighted, sprouts something new.