“But don’t most of us already know the basics of metallurgy? It reminds me of the time I saw my brother smoking cigarettes behind the garage. He had stolen them from my mother and didn;t really seem to be enjoying himself. But he smoked the whole pack. As he finished, I thought to myself, “what a loser.” But the fact was I had sat there for 45 minutes watching him smoke all those cigarettes. So, I guess I was even a bigger loser. A moniker that stayed with me most of my teenage life. I didn’t dislike school, I got to see a lot of pretty girls that would never have sat next to me anywhere else. I didn’t get good grades, as I was addicted to after-school cartoons like Tom & Jerry. Even well into my teens. If I see them now, I watch them in totality looking for what appealed to me when I was younger. I can’t find it. “

While Bean’s Welding Metallurgy review is to be commended for having attached itself to such an inspired book, I do find that it represents a decline in structural nuance: Bean’s Saxophone Colossus review returns, in the final sentence, to the actual merchandise at hand — if nothing else, this is a more successful attempt at hiddenness, which is the essence of all esoteric writing. And the Beanian narrative is, most certainly, esoteric.

Perhaps Bean’s most successfully esoteric piece is the tender Stiletto T114MC Titanium, Milled Face, Curved Handle Framing Hammer. Here Bean employs the circular structure so powerful in Saxophone Colossus, yet — in a subtle twist — makes the deviant narrative relate, tangentially, to the merchandise reviewed:

For a moment, the reader believes that he or she may have just read an actual review of the Stiletto T114MC Titanium, Milled Face, Curved Handle Framing Hammer. (Which is $69.99, and ought therefore to be a pretty fine hammer indeed.)

I must confess, however, that I found the actual sentiments expressed in Stiletto T114MC Titanium, Milled Face, Curved Handle Framing Hammer a touch less moving — less deeply considered, in fact — than those apparent in Bean’s finer efforts. While it stands as a superb example of hiddenness, Stiletto T114MC Titanium, Milled Face, Curved Handle Framing Hammer remains a slight opus — a triumph, finally, of mere technique. Compare it with the delicate The Massacre ~ 50 Cent, surely the most affecting piece in the Beanian ouvre:

“50-Cent is the grooviest. Early in my life I thought for sure I’d find someone who’d love me and I could love back. It hasn’t worked out that way. I’ve had a spell of bad luck that seems to have lasted for years. I hate my boss and I have thoughts about quitting, but fear grips me and I can’t do it. My gosh, what a failure I am. Working 35 hours a week, going home to an empty apartment, no friends. Heavy debt. My only outlets for creative expression are my synthesizer and watching late-night TV. Though I always wake up in a bad mood ’cause I stay up watching 1980s sitcoms that I didn’t even like the first time I saw them. 50-Cent is the real deal.”

This small jewel has also disappeared from the Amazon site.  If I accomplish nothing else with this blog, I will at least have rescued this piece. That will suffice.

It is impossible to overstate the importance of this body of work. Navy Bean has issued in a new era — not simply in genre, but in means of publication. We may soon see entire epic poems lying coyly hidden within CNET reviews; picaresque novels masquerading as users’ comments at various software sites; haiku inserted into responses on this very blog.