Graham Greene in KX with Station Model Violence

On A Burnt-Out Case

Graham Greene’s A Burnt-Out Case sweating in my sauna

I recently published a piece of writing here about lifting heavy things for a living called Sun & Stainless Steel. I spoke there of the tonic effects of drinking gin in the sun after a days lifting. I did not speak there of the sauna, and recently I’ve been hitting the gym every couple of days chasing a Dolph Lundgren Summer look. I follow these sessions with a solitary bout in the infra-red sauna and I want to tell you a little about what I’ve been reading while I sweat.

The sauna has been a constant since I started taking the gym seriously, in Melbourne, about a decade ago, recovering from a back injury from the lift and completing a useless graduate certificate in philosophy. I spent almost every night at the gym for a year, trying to rebuild a broken body while I was trying to rebuild a damaged brain, and would follow up with a sauna, one of those crowded saunas next to a pool that smells like a bleached-out football boot, surrou…