Do Not Go Gentle

I want to spend the day with you, if at all possible, I want to spend as much time with you as I can, unless I'm coming on way too strong right now and scaring you, in which case I'll begin back-pedalling immediately!

[curseblessmenow]

THE CONSTRUCTIONISTS timeline notes

--leukemia Katie should be 1998

--Paley is 13 years younger at intro but somehow in Lua’s grade during the princess arc. (also lua is eight years older than jace so write cynical travel thing)

--mission impossible and harry potter quotes predate texts

--max is intro’d 2008, should be 2011

[strandbooks]

But What If Instead You Didn't Read Another White Dude

So it’s Women’s History Month, and you’d like to read some female authors. “But where do I start?” You cry. Your high school reading list was a long line of white dudes and your college syllabi weren’t all that different, and you can only reread Pride and Prejudice so many times. It’s okay: we’ve got you covered. As a starter pack, here’s a few famous books by male authors, paired with a book by a female author you could read instead.

Jack Kerouac, On the Road → Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost

Kerouac’s famous stream-of-consciousness ode to the beat generation is one of the classic travel narratives of American literature. Solnit also contemplates travel, but from a very different perspective. Her book addresses the issues of wandering, being lost, and the uses of the unknown. Less a work of theory than a conversation with a friend, Solnit draws to the heart of what compels us to wander - “a series of peregrinations, leading the reader to unexpected vistas.” (New Yorker) 

Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms → Djuna Barnes, Nightwood

Ernest Hemingway’s first novel is about the romance between an expatriate ambulance driver and an English nurse, thinly based on his own experience during World War I. Nightwood, published in 1936, is also a modernist novel focusing on Robin Vote and the American Nora Flood, two women seeking inner peace in their relationship with each other. Djuna Barnes dwells on both the glory and isolation that come with being an outsider, and her novel is also based partly on Barnes’ own life.

Jonathan Franzen, Purity → Rachel Cusk, Outline

Franzen’s most recent novel focuses on the journey of young woman Pip (real name Purity) and her journey to figure out her identity. Rachel Cusk’s novel, told in ten conversations, draws a spare portrait of a novelist teaching creative writing in Athens, seeking to come to terms with a tragedy in her past. Her elegant prose and highly intelligent writing create a compelling portrait of how we hide ourselves from others.

Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian → Gil Adamson, The Outlander

Like Cormac McCarthy’s dark, hyper-violent Western, The Outlander takes place in the early 19th century in southern Alberta. About a woman who flees into the wilderness after murdering her husband, Adamson also dwells on the hardships and brutality of the American West, but from the point of view of a female protagonist trying to escape her vengeful pursuers, retreating ever deeper into the wilderness of both the mountains and herself.

John Updike, Rabbit, Run → Elizabeth Strout, My Name is Lucy Barton

Updike is well known for writing portraits of the lives of the small town middle class. My Name is Lucy Barton is a book about the relationship between an estranged mother and daughter and the complicated love between them. Her style is undramatic and never sentimental, focusing on that which is often unspoken and only implied to create a subtle portrait of two small town women.

Norman Mailer, An American Dream → Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

Frequently both called authors of “creative nonfiction”, Norman Mailer’s book follows a decorated war-hero as he descends into murderous insanity, while Joan Didion writes about an unfulfilled New York actress telling her story from a psychiatric institute after a mental breakdown. Joan Didion dwells compellingly on themes of alienation and the breakdown of the elite, and the disintegration of American culture and morals.

Charles Bukowski, The Pleasures of the Damned, Poems 1951-1993 → Anne Sexton, The Complete Poems

Anne Sexton’s deeply personal, confessional poetry can be compared with Bukowski’s writing on his relationships with women, alcohol, and writing. Anne Sexton’s poetry was frequently daring, dwelling on taboo topics such as abortion, menstruation, adultery, and drug addiction in a dramatic, sometimes rough voice.

John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath → Carola Dibbell, The Only Ones

In the 30s, John Steinbeck addressed economic injustice in his story of a family of Dust Bowl migrants struggling to make their way. Carola Dibbel writes a modern day story grappling with modern inequality, set in a near future plagued by disease and disparity, centering around a woman who finds herself at the mercy of dubious experimentation just to survive.

Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land → Octavia Butler, Lilith’s Brood

Instead of picking up Robert Heinlein’s science fiction story about a strange man from Mars who teaches Earthlings his customs, try Octavia Butler’s Xenogenesis Trilogy (published in one volume as Lilith’s Brood) about Lilith Iyapo and the Oankali, an alien race seeking to save the Earth by merging with mankind, and the struggles of humankind of maintain their own culture and identity while mercing with another species. Lilith’s Brood exhibits all of Butler’s deep understanding of human strengths and flaws.

George R.R. Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire → Robin Hobb, Farseer Trilogy

An epic fantasy that, like the A Song of Ice and Fire series, features complex and treacherous politics and deeply flawed characters, Robin Hobb’s series tells the story of a prince’s bastard son, trained as an assassin, who finds himself caught up - and overwhelmed by - the intrigues of the powerful people around him - all while the strange menace of the Red Ship Raiders continues to threaten the Six Duchies.

[lastnightsreading]

Sam Lansky at the Strand, 1/11/16

[academla]

hey guys! so i have a giant and growing masterpost tag, but due to my own obsessive need to keep everything organized, i thought i would make a current list of all of the masterposts in that tag, so people can reference them all from one post! i’ll probably come back and update in a month or two as i discover more :) 

general college masterposts

the college masterpost (grades, organization, essays, packing, stress reduction, apps, study plan, etc) by @saralearnswell 

college/university masterpost by @areistotle​

the ultimate masterpost (ultimate being an understatement! this is phenomenally comprehensive!!) by @studylikecrazy314159​

2014 help post (still applicable in 2015) by @abercrombier​

yet another studyblr masterpost of masterposts by @astrophyscs

a guide to starting college on the right foot by @collegerefs​

college (reply to an ask) by @studyhue​

ready for 2016 by @gryhffindors​

college guide (time management, bing a morning person, budgeting, balance) by @sara-laughed

studying

how to study for a test by @tbhstudying​

study tips by @nostalgic-tripartite

guide to studying (well) by @scholarlysquad

guide to aesthetically pleasing notes by @areistotle​

notes, studying, and self-study resources by @areistotle​

note-taking masterpost by @studyclear​

learn more outside of class! by @studypea​

online study guides by @back-to-school-series​

organization masterpost by @elkstudies​

how to make flashcards by @lattesandnetflix​

how to study from textbooks by @strive-for-da-best​

note taking methods by @studyign​

how to study like a straight a student by @collegerefs

2015 study posts by @strive-for-da-best​

note-taking tips by @studyfulltime (courtesy of cambridge university)

annotating fiction and nonfiction by @collegerefs

subject/class specific

chemistry resources by @litearature​

biology tips by @studyingthenightanddayaway​

english masterpost by @enchantedstudyblr​

language learning tips + resources by @study-ings

guide to political bias in major news outlets by @lambergeier

synonyms by @writeworld

educational youtube channels by @stvdyghost

back to school

back to school by @studyign (this is a response to an ask)

diy school supplies by @caffeinequeenstudies​

school supplies by @areistotle

back to school masterpost by @ib-studyblr​

back to school masterpost by @studyandprosper

lifestyle

sleeping/getting up early by @coffeesthetics​

anti procrastination masterpost by @elkstudies​

where to save up to $1600 in college supplies by @blua

lazy nightowl school survival guide by @kawaiistudy​

balancing a healthy lifestyle with studying by @joolshallie

how to overcome procrastination by @academicmind

resources for mentally ill students by @chemistry-hoe​

masterpost for success by @studydudes​

things to avoid doing by @portiastudies​

studying on a low budget by @studyace​

self care masterpost by @ib-studyblr​

apps

apps for language learners by @studysthetics​

apps for a better life by @areistotle

study habit apps by @my-little-studyblr

best apps for students by @a-student-life

miscellaneous

writing, art, beauty, movies, etc. by @alliaofrph​

how to protect your home against break-ins by @howtogrowthefuckup​

hobbies masterpost by @killyouranxiety​

listen while studying by @lmaostudy​

beginner’s guide to starting a studyblr by @studyign​

tips & resources for auditory learners by @academla​

bullet journal by @theblacklocus​

how to stay awake in class by @study-studymore-studyhard

[curseblessmenow]

Every Little Thing

Dear Leo, Every time I write a letter, the shape of your absence becomes more apparent. I wonder if it will ever be done, and there will be a complete, man-shaped vacuum to fall into. There is a problem with trying to create the literal, because everything is imaginary. But: absence is not imaginary. Maybe it can get away with not being imaginary by not being a thing, everything does not (apparently) include nothing. This week I am surprising my mom by flying to see her in Chicago for her 60th birthday. I will take the CTA and hug my sister.  This week I hear back from the Brooklyn Public Library about whether or not I am going to be a full time public librarian. They liked me but public institutions can get real logistical with their hiring practices, and I am also a grad student. Tomorrow I am going to propose a paper on French Marxism and graffiti in NYC. Today I sent an email to an author of a journal at Anamesa, based on a series of edits the committee I was on came up with. The email was good, but the committee may have been far from on point, I don’t know what the quality of our joint readership is. I am a little afraid that I am a sham grad student, but even that is okay, as long as I slowly become less of a sham. I remember that I definitely meant to feel stupid, it was my intention and I’m sure I had a good reason for it.  But now, I would like to feel comforted. And I think - not without wonder - about how lucky I am, and how completely terrible, as if “completely terrible” could actually every describe something that was completely terrible, it must be to have problems that are not because you’re stupid, but random dumb bad luck. That is really heinous, when you think about it. And yet, I cannot get past my own anxiety, even though there is no doubt that I am lucky. -Joanna Tova Price

[curseblessmenow]

Dear Leo, The words are often swallowed by a sense of waiting, which proves, upon even barest of examinations, to be an illusion. Or, perhaps, to re-state: there is only one thing all life waits for, that is death, and the choice is always to wait for death or to do something else with one’s attention. But the illusion is that one can be waiting for something else, and so many people spend their whole lives waiting, they just cannot perceive that the moment thing they are awaiting for arrives, at last, it will be their death - that is what they wait for. Yet, it’s not as simple as deciding to cease, this thing is not possible, truly - to only live in the moment, also it’s foolish. The next moment might (often does, not always though) benefit greatly from reflection in the previous moment. Rather, one must then organize one’s waiting, and that is nothing short of spellcraft. That is the belief in something non-methodological, that is... the putting certain thoughts into place, and tying them there with whatever the mind requires, and then waiting, like planting seeds. Like casting a spell. Often the methodological is set in opposition to the philosophical, but it resides also in opposition to the irrational, to art.  Heavy is the heart that has no philosophy, heavier still if it has no relationship to the unknowable, if it denies its own sort of wisdom. ** I did an accounting today of younger Joanna, here are some things that came out of the dark: -The world is speeding up. Joanna has always been slow, but the disparity between Joanna’s speed and the world’s speed grows disproportionately. -The tools of Joanna’s trade have been co-opted. Younger Joanna had been deeply involved in the game of information, but now those skills are in high demand, they are worth money, and therefore all the other things they were or could be worth have been subsumed. This is the trade of the soul that I speak of, and it has been co-opted by the market. -Joanna’s father died, and Joanna’s mother never truly ascended into an adulthood that could function independently. There is a continuum of homelessness, Joanna is more homeless than younger Joanna, less homeless than others, still. -Joanna is much more anxious than younger Joanna, much less interested in having other people around - they seem to current Joanna to be unaware, liabilities. Younger Joanna felt the opposite.  -Joanna is interrupted more often than younger Joanna, by signals and signs and beeps and boops. Joanna’s attention is therefore also compromised by the systems that occur “behind men’s backs.” -Joanna doesn’t really want to spend time with people she doesn’t like, younger Joanna wanted to like everyone, and be liked by everyone. Therefore, it was easier for younger Joanna to make friends. -Joanna chose the right profession, younger Joanna didn’t realize how absent social intelligence would be in tech. -Joanna went back to the school for the humanities, probably, because it’s one of the last places left where there is a certain respect for doing things slowly. Younger Joanna was able to live more easily in her own slowness. -Younger Joanna believed many impossible things without thinking too hard about it. Joanna feels as though these impossible things have abandoned her. The irrational is no longer on her side.    

[yuricema-deactivated20230814]

Do not allow your loneliness to lower your standards.

[byetomselleck-deactivated201702]

READ IT AGAIN.

[curseblessmenow]

On Baudrillard’s cynicism

Dear Leo, I think it is evident that the ECSTASY OF COMMUNICATION is actually just a DEEP SEATED FEAR OF DISAPPEARING. Look at the facts: -When information scarcity (relative, obviously) was a thing, information was precious. -Now that we have a glut of information, it has the opposite effect on our attention. -The perceived self is made up entirely of information. -The ecstasy of communication is not the ecstasy of, say, reading articles on the internet, it’s communication, the process by which one is recognized and paid attention to. -If a tree falls in a forest, and no one is there to hear it, did it make a noise? Bam: The frantic nature of Baudrillard’s ecstasy is (like all ecstasy?) is really fear based- the forest is information and the noise is the self trying to (ex)claim its own existence. Further, post-structuralism will always fail when it finally reaches the last social construct - perspective, because though it is a social construct, its construction does not wholly belong in our own jurisdiction. Perspective is natural and constructed, and this duality itself gives rise to “the constructive.” Post-structuralism is excellent for providing a critique of structure but from a purist perspective, it is a destroyer of civilization because it promotes a just world by deconstructing the self to the point where justice is simply no longer necessary, where all is de-contextualized bits of information, one no more valuable than the next. There are no people as such (thanks Barthes), there is only data floating around in space. BLERGH, Joanna 

[yukierres]

Day 6 of BPC : Favourite Book Cover

[curseblessmenow]

OKAY BOOKLR YOU WIN, I put a hold on /I’ll Give You The Sun/. It will be my first ever check out from Brooklyn Public Library!

[curseblessmenow]

I’ll love you, tomorrow.

We fast approach Monday, the first full week at NYU - here is my schedule. Monday: 11-12:15 Elementary Greek 6:20-8:20 Intro to the City Tuesday: 11-12:15 Elementary Greek 6:20 - 8:20 Digital Humanities Collections & Connections Wednesday: 11-12:15 Elementary Greek 6:20-8:20 Digital Humanities Topics: Electrical, Physical, Digital Thursday: 11-12:15 Elementary Greek 7-9:30  Philosophy Works (not an NYU class) Friday: DAY OFF Shabbat services at Romemu In addition, I will have to pick up a part time job and I am going to be an associate editor at anamesa, either in fiction or non-fiction (TBD tonight!). Lastly, there is a place like Hull House (which recently shut down, alas) in NYC that I intend to volunteer for. 

I applied to a few positions today for part time reference librarians, which would be nice in that they would pay more than a student job would, and I could keep it after I graduated if I needed something while I looked for full time work. I think I’m pretty well qualified for the jobs I applied to but I did write the cover letters on the fly.

But so life finally begins next week, along with the high holidays because it never rains, but it pours. 

[curseblessmenow]

Notes for Draft #4 of Fearful Symmetry

-Change Max and Aaron hair scene to Max and Aaorn discuss the relative creepiness of Katie having a wedding in the second grade? (or whatever) -Rewrite Darwin Foundation from the perspective of visitors, Vera Billings, and Chris Grier’s brother. Hagar/disinheritance  -Delete jail scene -Add fake spring metaphor to end of Tim/Spence scene. -Title (something to do with inheritance of narrative – Heirs? The Odysseus Contract? Become? Wherefore Scion? The Scions’ Disposition? American Scions? Dreams of Scions?) - Line edits as necessary, re: Max’s edit (remember grumpiness)

-rewrite Lua/Levi Starbucks scene

-take sophie out of scene where tim/darwin get together

more title ideas: Amidst These Remnants, Scion Amidst These Remnants Building in the Ruins Anarchy

[curseblessmenow]

NYU, N WHY ME

Humor me, Leo, laugh at my jokes (Pedro always laughs at my jokes, “I’m easy,” he says - I wish I was easy, too.) I just read (for my class this evening) an interesting summary of a critique of technocratic thinking by a French philosopher (I suppose you would call this philosophy). He criticized not merely technology, but also technique as the dominant or preferred way of “thinking,” and that seems to me to be a common fear response. That is to say, there is no real way to assess the thinking capabilities of many people, because they don’t really think - rather they lay their dilemmas at the alter of “technique,” to avoid owning the large abyss in the postmodern soul. And speaking of the abyss, one dominant feeling I have in NYC is loneliness. I spend a lot of time with Pedro, Emily and Max, but I have no community to speak of. Today, I had my first class - the ancient Greek class I am auditing. It’s not easy, but it’s not too hard either, just the right amount to be interesting. Unfortunately, there are three graduate students auditing, and I was the only one who the professor was expecting. As a result, our status as auditors is up in the air, because three may simply be too many (there are only ten normal students). But I see from the first section of class that it is the professor’s intent to simply do every section of the text book for the first 20 units, so if I must, I can resort to doing the same on my own. There is still the loneliness though, from the casual abandonment as I have begun to call it, as that carries more weight than “flakiness.” I will have to be more proactive, socially.

[curseblessmenow]

New Yawk, New Yawk

Dear Leo, I’ve been in NYC for just over a week. It’s a whole new world. Probably then newest thing is a concept of “home.” By way of example, before I walked out the door this morning, Pedro (the subletter) reminded me that we need to be home at 6:30 because he is cooking dinner and we are watching Birdman. That would be me, my other roommate Emily, and him. This sort of intentional community is new, and kind of weird, and so far, good.  Yesterday, Pedro and I saw an Italian movie with English subtitles called “human capital.” Emily asked us what it was about this morning and I said “people screwing up,” and Pedro said, “but the point is, how it was made.” He’s a cinema studies grad student. He isn’t wrong either way - the key thing to understand about screwing up is how it’s designed. My apartment is in Bushwick, which is the hispanic neighborhood, like Pilsen in Chicago. It’s been very interesting the number of people who were wigged by the lack of white people in my neighborhood. But as I put it, gentrification has to start somewhere and the buck stops here (so far no one has laughed at that joke, sigh). I have to be real, I honestly have zero idea if its unsafe. My middle aged aunt thinks its fine, my roommate who moved from Manhattan thinks its fine, Pedro thinks its fine, and there does seem to be an increasing number of white hipsters in the mix, and our building is all middle class kids, but its obvious that this neighborhood was - not very along ago at all - not this way, and also possibly not very safe.  I have seen a bunch of theater, and I’ve already met one middle aged Jewish woman who wanted to introduce me to her son who graduated from the University of Chicago, because that is apparently my destiny.  Thursday, I will finally meet the other people in my program at NYU, and sometime this week I also hope to acquire a couch. Pedro and Emily insist that watching movies on the floor on cushions is fine, but my butt says differently. -Joanna

[curseblessmenow]

Tithe

Dear Leo, Lately, I have felt the rise and ebb of pain, dogged emotional grief, deep and constraining anxiety. Too, around me I find people who suffer more and people who cannot be said to experience anything approximating empathy. I suppose I will write this here, tithe: I have been very very very stressed about moving to New York because absolutely nothing is guaranteed. Will we have a third roommate? Will we find a lease? I have emailed some places and heard nothing. I am due to arrive in NYC on July 26th and will attempt to sign a lease starting between August 1st and August 20th, either two bedroom or three if we can find a third (a third would make our budget a lot more manageable). In addition there is a lot of money upfront, approximately 4-6 thousand dollars, depending on the number of rooommates, and in addition that addition, it’s just me in New York by myself and will have to arrange paperwork to go back and forth between various people. I am, after all, the social one. But such security as once I had disappeared when my father died, as my mother is unreliable, often appears childish to me.  In two separate discussions on the same weekend that I was putting together financials for the move, I mentioned to her that if I were much wealthier, I would begin a local (to Chicago) social venture and at another time, referring to a friend who has been looking for a job for quite some time, that she had a trust fund to keep her from starving on the streets in the meantime.    Now my mother comes to me and says, “I see you are upset. It is because your friends have money and you don’t.” The profundity of the failure of consideration in that assertion frankly astonishes me. Have I ever been the jealous, let alone competitive sort? Certainly not. This is the second time this year she as attempted to assert something about my character because people are like that, despite having ample evidence that I, myself, am not like that. The depth of that failure, to rely on prejudice so wholly as to not recognize her own daughter’s character, is something obscene to me, the daughter.  But besides the wrongness of it, what is mostly consuming is the loneliness of it. I miss my dad.

[aseaofquotes]

Anne Tyler, Back When We Were Grownups

[aseaofquotes]

[aseaofquotes]

Simon Van Booy, Everything Beautiful Began Again

[wnq-writers]

You’re allowed to miss the people who were bullets to you, but you’re not allowed to let them shoot you again.

(via myinkstainedheart)