#all kinds of Hemingway

[venomousray]

Yeah I’m posting this picture again

[hanzajesthanza]

I saw a take that was like “Lady of the Lake” is a complete mess and barely even a Witcher book because by then Sapkowski just wanted to write Arthurian legend fanfiction and write and essay about meta text into the book

are you me?! lol, because i was on r/fantasy a couple of days ago and saw witcher catching stray bullets there too 😭

anytime i do hear this take, i want to say: “… and what’s wrong with that 😅🥲 and what’s wrong with that?!”

because, to be honest, i also didn’t really care about any of the arthurian stuff… but then i actually went and read his opinions on why it’s important; which turned out to be just as interesting as the book, so i see it as like… own author analysis of his characters and world… like this is the kind of thing you typically beg authors to explain about their series and he just did it 🤷🏻‍♂️

the problem with my take is that i didn’t read it when it came out in 1999 (probably due to not being born yet) so i have no abilityto judge it as it was “in the moment”. i also didn’t even read the series chronologically, and played witcher 3 before i read the books, so i suppose the ending had a reduced effect on me…

however; i was a mess at the ending… so i don’t want to know how i would have reacted had i read it free of spoilers… i probably would have been like the ‘99 fans and been pissed all the same. i get the frustration: “our heroes are dead and you’re prattling on about some old legend…”

but i feel like lady of the lake is a fine wine for how it ages well. well, maybe not the… library bit, or forest gramps bit. but it ages well if you reread it and do so with patience.

the nice thing about writing and reading is that it’s asynchronous. you have all the time as a reader to pause. if you don’t understand the references, use your time to look them up. you don’t need to understand it perfectly, you don’t need to be like sapkowski and become an arthurian fanboy.

you just have to understand what he was getting at: that in his view, the arthurian myth is the genesis of all the modern fantasy genre, and by not only intentionally writing parallels to it in his work, but writing his character into that world, he is humbly (hehe) submitting his work into the fantasy canon and sending it off after it's been completed; like ciri with her parents. if you understand it this way, it becomes very beautiful indeed. it’s not just “arthurian fanfiction” because in his view, ALL fantasy writing is “arthurian fanfiction.”

(and this is even more interesting from a cultural perspective btw to me because… well it’s better explained by paulina drewniak in her thesis, but arthurian legend (in welsh and anglo-saxon forms) is “western european”, same with the modern fantasy genre being english-dominate. and witcher is… well, poland is in central europe (look at a map), but characterized as “eastern” for socio-political, historical reasons. so witcher is absolutely insane genius because sapkowski took this western format and myth and mixed it with some polish history and sensibilities of the ‘90s audiences, as well as influences from polish romanticism, making something that ends up being intriguing to many more cultures than just the one. the internationality of the witcher began way before witcher 3 snagged game of the year 2015! hehe, also geralt as a character taking from american genre fiction—hardboiled crime, western genres. and at the same time he became a polish hero. (bold claim maybe, but i mean it like… well, i’m working on the essay for that now, so you’ll see i suppose 😅)

witcher is just so damn unique for this reason. i think many works try to stay monocultural, but witcher is like this big soup that sapkowski throws a bunch of different ingredients into—and skillfully, not randomly. anyways this paragraph is really off topic but i think this was really cool :) i’ll write more on this later, at some other time. but to connect it back to topic: what i mean is, the arthurian legend makes witcher all the more richer. and then for me as a “western” reader reading it, it’s like this big full circle (even though idk crap about arthurian legend before i read the witcher :’D ))

i think that lady of the lake made me a better reader because i realized that fantasy and genre fiction, aka what i understand as "entertainment" and "reading for pleasure" is much, much more similar to "high literature" and "serious reading" than i had initially received it to be. sapkowski said it something like: “all writing is literature, everytthing except the tv guide and A to Z nutria breeding.”

the way i separated them in my mind was that entertainment books were to just entertain, and serious books were to hold an author’s message, so you should work at what they’re getting at. the witcher showed me that “entertainment books” ALSO hold the author’s message and you should work at what they’re getting at;

in other words, it’s not just about you, the reader, your pleasure; this is a two-way street. this is a game, for the enjoyment of both parties. it’s a bit like charades, or pictionary. the author is saying something, thinking something, it’s your side of the game to figure it out. and i found that figuring that out is much more fun when you also at the same time are receiving a story that you’ve become emotionally attached to and makes you giddy. but it’s not JUST about that story, the joy is not limited to just this world and these characters.

i adored english classes for this kind of game, but because we read stand-alone novels, the characters always felt a bit flat—and of course because most of the time they’re just vessels intended to carry the story. but with the witcher, with this saga, you get the benefit of a “low” work: the stakes which feel personal and intimate, the long standing development of the characters, the fandom excitement and buzz, and also the benfit of a “high” work: the allusions and intertextuality, the hidden meanings, the cleverness and play. it’s really the best of both worlds.

and the hussite trilogy takes this farther because it’s a historical fantasy so sapkowski could include as many historical and literary references as he desired… if they existed by the mid-15th century and were known in central europe. but that’s a LOT of sources to draw from already, pretty much an unimaginable well of context. and did i understand everything, no. i didn’t understand much. but i was pleasantly surprised because i understood more than i expected, and when i didn’t understand i could figure the intended meaning out through context clues. i mean, this proved to me that these references to other works are all just extra sauce anyways, to make the dish a bit richer and fuller…

it’s just nice metaphor, and a lot can be done with this. if you compare geralt to arthur or reynevan to lancelot (well… as HE believes himself to be…) … that makes the meaning sooo much deeper. i like this with “electra” most of all. i think we should all adopt classical or mythological psuedonyms that we feel represent us; these are shorthand for what we stand for and what we believe in, who we are. if you know a bit about just a few myths, you can extrapolate so much from just one name. this is also the case with fictional characters from the modern fantasy genre, so i see what sapkowski was getting at when he draws lines connecting the two.

the only reason i DON’T like it when he does this is because… i do feel a bit like: i went into a library to return a book, but instead of taking my book back, the portly old librarian wordlessly shoved two NEW stacks of books into my arms, then pushed me out the door back onto the street. because andrzej sapkowski is basically the offline version of a guy on forums who recommends you twenty new books every time you mention you enjoyed one. i cannot keep up! so now i have a reading list ten miles long. i think his recommendations and what he intertwined into the witcher will literally keep me occupied into my 30s. but that’s ok, i know what to bring now if i ever get abandoned on a deserted island.

for this reason, i think witcher is both the worst and the best introduction back into reading i could have asked for. if you dig for two seconds are basically handed a road map to not only the entire genre, but the wide open world of european literature, both western and eastern. and american literature too, which i think i’ll be giving a second go…

[icapturedthecastle]

Sarah what are you doing Sarah what are you up to Sarah what have you been working on

nothing

I'm listening to 'Dark, Twisted and Cruel' on repeat

[an-ruraiocht]

90% of the time when i see reviews and posts saying "this book needed editing" i don't think the reader have any idea what editing actually entails. usually this is actually code for one of several "problems" with the book:

it's too long, or it's slower paced than this reader's preference. they believe "editing" would mean making it shorter

it has a heavily descriptive style, which the reader doesn't like. they believe "editing" means paring every sentence down to hemingway-style prose with no adverbs

it doesn't follow the very rigid "save the cat" style 3-act story structure, disrupting the reader's sense of narrative tension. an editor, they believe, would've made sure it did

there were a few typos or formatting errors, and they believe it's the editor's job to catch these (it's not, it's typically the proofreader and the typesetter who have responsibility for that kind of thing)

and finally, most often:

the author had different narrative priorities than the reader, who thinks an editor would have made the author change their priorities.

the thing is, there are actually issues with editors in trad publishing being overworked to the point where things aren't getting the thorough, thoughtful editing that they need to be the best version of themselves. there are plenty of badly-structured, poorly-researched, and clumsily written books out there. moreover copyediting is typically freelance and perhaps because of that, this is the area where i see the largest number of issues: continuity issues, grammar issues, factual errors etc that someone should've spotted and didn't.

but this is not typically what people's "this needed an editor" reviews are focusing on. most often it just means they didn't like the book and they've decided editing is an all-powerful force that would have transformed it into a book they liked. but that's not how it works. and disproportionately what this comment means is that the book doesn't match what current fashions have decided is The Correct Style to write in

"this book needed an editor" if it's traditionally published, it had one. like. by definition. it was an editor who bought the book. that doesn't mean the editor did a great job but they definitely existed. there were probably at least two (acquiring editor who does the dev edits; copyeditor who does copyedits), and the proofreader, and a bunch of other people besides.

also i think people think editors are the ones who like. implement the changes. but they don't. they give comments and recommendations and ask questions and the author is the one to act on them. the editor will not rewrite the book. they will not fix the problems themselves, they will highlight the problem and the author will figure out a fix for it, or they will decide they don't agree that it's a problem and leave it as it. and a lot of the sentence-level style stuff is entirely on the author so if they don't have an ear for the rhythm then nobody's going to fix that for them. editors do a lot less than people seem to imagine they do, tbh

anyway

for reference—

structural/developmental edits: is this chapter in the right place and does the plot make sense and is the characterisation consistent and effective

line edits: is this sentence in the right place and is it as stylish as it could be

copy edits: is this sentence grammatically correct and consistent/factually correct within the story/its world and do the spellings follow the publisher's stylesheet

proofreading: are there any typos in this sentence and was the formatting preserved correctly when it was typeset

[the-joy-of-knowledge]

Becoming an Intelligent Woman

My Dears,

There is no greater goal than being a fine woman who is intelligent, kind, and elegant. As much as we all want to be described with these adjectives, it takes a great amount of discipline to get there. It is very doable only if you are ready to put in the work.

Here are steps you can add to your routine in the next 4 weeks that will make you 1% more intelligent than you were before. This is a process that should become a habit not a goal. It is long term, however, I want you to devote just 4 weeks into doing these steps first and recognize the changes that follow.

Watch documentaries: This is the easiest step, we all have access to Youtube. Youtube has a great number of content on art, history, technology, food, science etc that will increase your knowledge and pique your curiosity. I really did not know much about world history especially from the perspective of World war 1 & 2, the roaring 20s, Age of Enlightenment, Jazz era, monarchies etc but with several channels dedicated to breaking down history into easily digestible forms. I have in the last 4 weeks immersed myself into these documentaries. Here are a few I watched:

The fall of monarchies

The Entire History of United Kingdom

The Eight Ages of Greece

World War 1

World War 2

The Roaring '20s

The Cuisine of the Enlightenment

2. Read Classics: I recommend starting with short classics so that you do not get easily discouraged. Try to make reading easy and interesting especially if you struggle with finishing a book. Why classics? You see, if you never went to an exclusive private school in Europe or America with well crafted syllabus that emphasized philosophy, history, art, and literary classics, you might want to know what is felt like and for me this was a strong reason. Asides that, there is so much wisdom and knowledge available in these books. In these books, you gain insights to the authors mind, the historical context of the era, the ingenuity of the author, the hidden messages, and the cultural impact of these books. Most importantly, you develop your personal philosophy from the stories and lessons you have accumulated from the lives of the characters in the books you read. Here are classics to get you started:

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald

Candide by Voltaire

Paradise lost by John Milton

3. Study the lives of people who inspire you: I dedicate one month to each person that fascinates me. I read their biography (date of birth, background, death, influences, work, style, education, personal life) For this month, I decided to study Frank Lloyd Wright because I was fascinated by the Guggenheim Museum in New York. I began to read about his influence in American Architecture (Organic architecture, Prairie School, Usonian style), his tumultuous personal life, his difficult relationship with his mentor (Louis Sullivan), his most iconic works etc. By the end of the year I would have learned the ins and outs of people I am inspired by through books and documentaries. Here are other people I plan to learn more about:

Winston Churchill

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Ada Lovelace

Benjamin Franklin

Helen Keller

John Nash

Isabella Stewart Gardner

Caroline Herrera

Ernest Hemingway

Catherine the Great

Ann Lowe

My dears, I hope you enjoyed this read. I cannot wait to write more on my journey to becoming a fine woman. I urge you to do this for four weeks and see what changes you notice. Make sure to write as well, it is important to document your progress.

Cheers to a very prosperous 2024!

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Cocktails

"Cocktail," like many words, has evolved over time, broadening its meaning.

While it once indicated a narrow range of drinks—perhaps originally a single drink—it is now customarily used to cover nearly the full range of mixed drinks available in the bars of the world.

Purists may insist that a true cocktail include at least 3 ingredients, two of which are distilled liquor and bitters. Others may argue that any drink mixed on the spot from two or more ingredients, at least one of which is alcoholic, is a cocktail.

The first known references to drinks called cocktails come from the late 18th and early 19th centuries. At that time, alcoholic beverages were largely served in inns and public houses, and weary travelers and thirsty locals would order concoctions.

LONG DRINKS

Also known as tall drinks, are simply drinks in tall glasses with larger amounts of mixer than short drinks.

Some, like highballs, are simple and straightforward; others are complex concoctions.

What they have in common is a relaxed quality, in that they present a relatively low concentration of alcohol and, often, an easy-drinking accessibility.

SHORT DRINKS

A drink served in a tumbler or old-fashioned glass.

Since they contain a higher concentration of alcohol than long drinks, they tend to be built more for slow, deliberate sipping—but there are no hard and fast rules here.

UP DRINKS

The classic image of a cocktail: shaken or stirred with ice and served, almost always strained, in a cocktail glass.

The most elegant of the cocktails, and not only because of their presentation.

Subtle or intense, austere or rich, they tend to have distinct personalities.

SHOTS & SHOOTERS

The most recreational of cocktails.

Despite their popular image, most of them are actually rather low in alcohol; the danger of shots lies in the temptation to drink too many, too quickly. Given how delicious many of them are, that can be all too easy to do.

HOT & FROZEN DRINKS

Hot cocktails have a long history, having been used for centuries to warm chilled travelers and bar customers.

Frozen cocktails are a more recent development, but they offer a bracing kind of refreshment that is perfect for steamy summer evenings.

Some Cocktails

Classic Cocktails

Some drinks have become timeless, iconic libations of cocktail culture:

THE MARTINI Despite a myriad of variations since its first appearance in the nineteenth century, the classic Martini remains the quintessential elegant cocktail: a cool, somewhat austere drink, not showy, but certainly powerful.

THE MANHATTAN The richness and power of whiskey gives the Manhattan slightly rougher edges than the Martini. It gained prominence in the 1930s as one of the five Borough cocktails of New York.

THE OLD FASHIONED Long before Don Draper of Mad Men revived interest in this classic, adding bitters and sugar to whiskey was a mainstay of cocktail culture and one of the most basic drink preparations.

THE DAIQUIRI The classic rum cocktail, the Daiquiri was a favorite of Ernest Hemingway and John F. Kennedy, and has spawned a host of variations.

Seasonal Drinks

Though most cocktails inhabit the perpetual season known as cocktail hour, many capture—or help create—the distinct mood of each quarter of the year.

SPRING & SUMMER Light, refreshing cocktails dominate the spring. Consider such classics as slings, smashes, lemonade drinks, and colorful coolers. Go-to cocktail: a French 75 Summer is, of course, the season for clear and tropical cocktails. Fresh fruit fills the market stands, the sun pours down through long days, and a cold, sweet-and-tart drink is what you crave. While you could always go for a Gin and Tonic, for a bit more personality try one of the great Caribbean drinks—a classic Daiquiri will keep you cool.

FALL & WINTER As Keats put it, autumn is the “season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,” and that vibe is what you’ll want in a cocktail. Deeper, richer drinks come to the fore. Any drink involving apple juice or apple brandy chimes with sentimental visions of autumn. Go-to cocktail: a Sidecar. When winter comes, linger over an Irish Coffee or Hot Toddy; or brace yourself against the cold with a potent whiskey drink—stay toasty warm with an Old Fashioned.

Champagne Cocktails

Occupy a distinct niche in cocktail culture.

At once colorful and elegant, festive and intimate, they lend themselves not only to romantic settings but also to expensive parties.

Source: The Ultimate Cocktail Encyclopedia by Walter Burns More Writing References: Wine-tasting ⚜ Drunkenness ⚜ Drinking

[elvisqueso]

"Our warriors fought with courage, but none as bravely as Kocoum."

Pocahontas (1995)

long, rambling meta under the cut:

you know i've taken some light dips into the tags looking for content on kocoum and i never see anyone going into depth about him as a character. sure you see the posts that are all "omg he was so hot pocahontas should have picked him instead :p" but that has little to do with his character or his place in the narrative or anything. in fact, it's a further objectification of a guy who is already dehumanized in-narrative, which is so very sad to me. kocoum is a lot more than his looks, which is why they're the first thing about him you're meant to notice. he's handsome, and he doesn't smile. he's a warrior and a stoic kinda guy. but that's all surface-level stuff. he's a very complex person with an intense internal turmoil that circumstances aren't allowing him to deal with properly.

like, you really can't come to an understanding about his character and go on to say "and he should have been with pocahontas" bc the fundamental aspect of their relationship as characters is that they would have been terrible for each other. you could feasibly make an argument that, on some level, kocoum would have been good for pocahontas (the "handsome, sturdy husband" who could ground her), but there is no way in any universe that pocahontas would have been good for him, bc the one who actually needed and wanted a steady, reliable partner is kocoum and pocahontas is the opposite of that (which is one of the reasons she and john smith kind of deserved each other but that's a whole other post).

see, kocoum is like a hemingway protagonist. remember, at the start of the movie, everyone is returning from war; it's important to note how much emphasis the movie places on family as a representation of "the ordinary world." the same is done with the virginia company members at the top of the film. there, they say goodbye to their normal lives and start an adventure. here, the powhatan warriors are returning to theirs. but who does kocoum, the celebrated warrior, have to return to?

kocoum doesn't have a normal life yet. he still belongs to the battle. there's a lot to be said about PTSD as a character motif in this film: it affects a lot of the major characters in different ways. for kocoum, it means he's not allowed to depart from his wartime mindset until and unless he can start a family of his own, and for that he pins his hopes on pocahontas. why exactly he likes her goes unsaid; it's implied they aren't particularly close, but may be familiar with each other. pocahontas being the chief's daughter may be an element, but it may also be that he's harbored an admiration for her from afar for some time. whatever the reason, kocoum has a misplaced idea that being with pocahontas will bring him peace. like a hemingway protagonist, he's taken up with the notion that being with a woman, an angel, will fix him; but the woman he wants is neither interested in doing so nor able to do so, whether or not she cares for him.

and this is why his outburst of emotion when he finds pocahontas and john in the glade is so understandable. he's watching his hopes for the future being ripped apart before his eyes. he'll never get peace, and that breaks him and then kills him.

and when i say he's dehumanized, i'm talking about the way characters talk about him and then how he dies. he's fierce, like a bear. he's handsome, but doesn't smile. he's a tool, an obstacle, and ultimately fodder for both pocahontas's and thomas's character development (mostly thomas's). there's something to be said about how both kocoum and his foil john smith are objectified so differently. where john is the subject of pocahontas's female gaze, kocoum is also objectified through a masculine one (the tension-filled lens that marries fear and admiration for athletic, warrior men and rivals). and then, again, he gets 'fridged for plot reasons because he's also the paris to pocahontas's juliet.

basically what i'm saying is kocoum really needed someone to take care of him, and no one did nor could. and that's why he's so tragic and tbh deserves better treatment by the fans, too.

[sufferingsokkatash]

THAT famous zukka hug in the atla north and south comic : an essay you did not need, by me.

i was thinking about how, in writing, there should be no accidents or coincidences in how and why something is described, or the detail the writer chooses to use. for example, zuko tapping his hand on his desk would be used to show that he is impatient or anxious about something.

so THEN i decided to apply this to the zukka hug, because why not be delulu about these things idk.

first of all, here are the zukka hug pages for context:

disclaimer: i don’t really know how the fandom feels about the comics. personally i like them, so i will proceed with that bias in mind. also please take this with the humour that is intended, it’s more fun that way.

i go down a sabre tooth moose lion hole below the cut.

this whole scene to me is largely what we all love about atla - humour and good characterisation combined with serious subject matter. king kuei and bosco are the comic relief and oblivious party in the face of quite a complicated issue, as zuko himself acknowledges. this humour then extends to kuei offering zuko the chance to join in on his hug with bosco, which zuko politely refuses. obviously, there is the clear issue of zuko being afraid of being eaten by a bear, but we’ll pretend that ernest hemingway is grading our papers here, okay.

it is a very deliberate writing choice and contrast to have zuko refuse hugs from one person/animal and then immediately and happily accept one from sokka. (see also: sokka running excitedly with a big grin on his face at the bottom of page 17 to greet them, naming zuko first, but remembering that he is a good ambassador to the swt and using their proper titles despite his excitement. more silliness mixed with seriousness. see also, also: HE RAAAAAN!) zuko may be touch averse and not a huggy person, but screw that when it’s sokka who’s offering the hug.

remember there are no accidents in good writing. kuei happily says: hello friends! to which, in both that panel and the next, he is clearly ignored. sokka and zuko are so absorbed in hugging each other that sokka neglects his duties in welcoming them both properly. zuko : 2 swt ambassador role: 0. also ignored is the fact that kuei brought his bear, which would normally be subject to some kind of smartass comment from our boomerang boi, even if he knows he’s obsessed with his pet from the ba sing se episodes.

this could be an actual mistake, but sokka ran towards zuko, who was standing in front of kuei. but in the hug panel, sokka is between them. that means kuei walked all the way around them trying to get their attention, and it still didn’t work. sokka, nor zuko, say a further word to kuei. like exactly how much tunnel vision is there in this, my goddddd.

bosco is protecting kuei and sokka is protecting zuko. could be why they mirrored them and their positions in the hug panel, so not a mistake. a swt person says: protecting foreigners, sokka?! but that is exactly what he does by ignoring the protesters and telling zuko not to worry about them. despite wanting to do his duty to everyone sokka puts zuko first, basically, and doesn’t care about what they all think of him. that’s kind of huge for sokka.

yes, hakoda is injured at this time and yes he’s proud of sokka, but surely as chief he would have gone to meet the earth king and firelord? why did the writers go to so much effort making sure that sokka was there to meet zuko and have them hugging take up a third of an entire page when printing and space in the comics is such a consideration? it is clearly important, y’all.

their faces when they see each other. sokka can’t stop grinning and zuko closes his eyes in relief he’s so happy. enough said.

sokka says: thanks so much for coming! like he doesn’t already know zuko would travel the world just to make him happy or help in what’s important to him. have you forgotten boiling rock, sokka? because that dude you’re wrapped around, acting like he’s been starved of you, sure hasn’t.

this comic is all about nations coming together and traditions being upheld and shared. in other words, marry him sokka. it is in your diplomatic interests to do so.

in utterly insane conclusion:

i am always surprised at how much they made the effort in the writing for this one scene. i don’t see the comics as something that tease ships, they aren’t natla. what i do see is two guys who clearly care about each other, almost to the detriment of their roles and responsibilities, and their relationship was worth the effort taken in the writing and artwork to show that. it is super heckin sweet. does this mean i think zukka is canon or could be? no. maybe did i have fun pretending and overanalyzing every detail? yes.

ps in all seriousness, the answer is that this is about my fav boy and how far he has come in his character growth journey - exhibit a from ‘the avatar returns’ episode:

the end, i am getting blocked and going to jail but it’s okay because zukka is my bosco hug.

[radical-revolution]

Ernest Hemingway once said: You cannot save anyone. You can stand beside them, offering your presence, your stability, and your peace. You can share your own journey, offer the lessons you've learned, and provide a loving perspective. But their pain is their own to face, their path is their own to walk, and their answers are theirs alone to discover. No matter how deeply you care, you cannot shield someone from their struggles or force them to see the light if they are not ready.

What you can do is be a safe haven in their storm. Your groundedness can serve as a reminder that peace is possible, even in chaos. Your presence can offer reassurance that they are not alone. But the healing? That is theirs to undertake. True transformation comes from within. You cannot carry their burdens for them, no matter how much you might wish to, because to do so would rob them of the strength and wisdom that comes from facing their own journey.

Loving someone through their pain means respecting their process, even when it’s hard to watch. It means holding space without trying to control the outcome, trusting that they are capable of finding their way in their own time. You can offer encouragement, insight, and compassion, but ultimately, their growth requires their own choices, their own breakthroughs, and their own inner work.

It can be painful to feel powerless in the face of someone else’s suffering, but remember: it is not your job to fix them. It is your job to love them, support them, and believe in them. And sometimes, the most profound act of love is to step back, let go of the need to save, and trust that they will find their path—even if it looks different from what you imagined for them.

When you release the pressure of trying to save others, you free both yourself and them. You allow them the dignity of their own journey and the opportunity to rise stronger. You conserve your energy for being a calm, steady presence rather than burning out trying to control the uncontrollable.

So, be there. Be kind. Be understanding. But know that their growth, healing, and peace are theirs to claim. The best gift you can offer is your own balance, your own light, and the unwavering belief that they, too, can find their way. Because they can. And when they do, it will be all the more powerful because it came from within.

***

[sungnxxn]

Mięso | Meat |

[sad!parksunghoon x fem!character]

Genre: Angst

Warnings: smoking, emotional detachment, profanities, mention of having a family, Sunghoon needs a hug AND therapy, self desctructive jokes, mention of diagnosis

Word Count: 1,7k (1722)

Actually wrote this based on the song 'Mięso' by Taco Hemingway, yet it does not necessarily fit but the vibe of the instrumental surely does sooo give it a listen if you want

!!! DO NOT REPOST NOR TRANSLATE WITHOUT PERMISSION !!!

It is not like he planned on going into that cafe. He had not. He just passed by and his feet led him there automatically. He really did not plan that. Within a minute he found himself sitting at the table that was near the big window. If you were a passerby you could see the whole cafe from the outside if you decided to take a look through that window. 'Cozy setting' he thought to himself. The single lightbulb casting a small light right onto his table. In the whole cafe there were like twenty more of them though.

And it hit him. 'Why am I even here?' furrowing his brows he took his keys and a pack of cigarettes out. Placing them onto the table he could not mind of letting a frustrated sigh and leaning into the chair while confusingly scanning the whole room he found himself in. Seeing all the people - weirdly happy people - chatting, smiling, gesturing with their hands, as if they were having any kind of oral exam and the teacher asked them suddenly a tricky question, made him oddly uncomfortable. Not to an extent where he could not hold it anymore. Just a normal kind, you could suppose at least.

Rolling his eyes he looked out of the window wondering how could somebody be still smiling when the weather could be compared to aboslutely dog shit. It has been cloudy and rainy all week and today seemed like the worst day. Suddenly single rain droplets appeared on the window. 'Just great.' Taking a cigarette and a lighter out of the box, Sunghoon sighed once again. He promised he would quit. Seemed like not today at least. Positioning the cause of his long term addiction between his lips, he took a look around the room once again. Pacing his eyes among the people, he made eye contact with a child. Literal child. Just a child. Somebodys pecious and favourite human being.

The youngster smiled at him, yet he could not care less and roll his eyes away. 'Don't look at me like that.' She used to joke about having a kid with his eyes. His hair and his last name. ''One hell of disaster would that be.'', he told her back then. He would never want to see another version of himself in this world.

Finally lighting the cigarette and taking a drag, he could not help but note that the taste changed. Oddly nothing. No satisfaction. No relief. No comfort. No nothing. Just a cigarette with weird light mint taste.

Fidgeting with the lighter in his left hand, his eyes paced around the room once again. He made eye contact with the child. Again. 'What's his problem?', annoyed that somebody was watching him, Sunghoon tore the eye contact once again. 'Obnoxious little shit.'

Could have been his obnoxious little shit. Yet he was not build for that life - nor was she. Not then, not now, not even in the future.

Licking his lips, he shook off the ashes out of the cigarette. Darting his eyes to the world outside of the cafe. He saw her. Blinking calmly he looked out again. It was her. Her. Her. Her. Her. Her.

Suddenly his head started to hurt and his stomach had an unsettling feeling at the bottom. Yet the time did not stop, nor did the world. Spinning just like before. Spinning just like his head one and half years ago. Just like that time when she told him she wants to leave. She needed to leave. Needed to leave to pursuit the love she deserved, not the one she was getting from him at that time.

She was laughing even though she was soaked in the rain from head to toe. Laughing with somebody else. Somebody that actually made her laugh. Somebody that she did not have to fake her laugh around. Somebody that seemed to make her better. They did. Somebody that is just the right amount of love, respect, understanding, happiness and the right amount of sad for her. She could not handle Sunghoon. Even when she tried, he was too emotionally draining. If he ever showed his emotions in the first place.

He knew that something was wrong with him back then as well that something is wrong with him now, yet he does not see the sense of fixing it. It will fix itself with time. It surely will. It has to.

Just within a moment seeing her made him feel empty. Nothing. He was not jealous. Heck, of what? Of finding somebody that treated her how she should have been treated? It wasn’t jealousy that coiled in his chest, but something colder — acknowledgment and pure understanding, happiness even. She deserves this. Hell, maybe he did too, in some other timeline where he hadn’t turned his back on her dreams of something bigger, brighter, warmer. And maybe if he hadn't turned his back on his own dreams and health too.

'Great to see her genuinely smile. Suits her.' he thought. He started to shake his head. She is over him. He is over her. They are over. And so are her dreams that included Sunghoon. Her dreams probably contain the person standing just right beside her. The person she's smiling to. The person she really loves.

Sunghoon could never give her what she wanted. Not in this timeline and not in any other. He was just too blind to see, too numb to feel and too hopeless to live. He does not know any of it now either, he is just existing. Yeah, existing is the right word.

The right amount of vowels and consonants. E X S I S T I N G. What a lovely word. If you are existing you are not obliged to commit to anything. Family relations, friends, love, life. You just don't care… about anything in particular.

Sunghoon did not care if he had food in the fridge. He did not care if he smoked or not, or if he even had anything to smoke at all. He did not care if tomorrow he will be kicked out of his apartment, if he even has somewhere to live.

He kinda wished he was in his grave already. Obviously he would not say that out loud - except for those unfunny jokes that whenever the topic were ropes or something similar, he would just say ''Yea, perfect noose for a head.'' Or if the topic would be high buildings, it was natural for him to say that he would just love to try to fly. Just for those goddamn science reasons. Right??

The truth is, he does not know why he suddenly started to feel or think like that. He turned 14 and poof, no reason to live available. It is safe to say that him not talking about any of his very concerning thoughts did not help for his character development.

But it is safe to say that he tried to change or fix whatever was wrong with him when she entered his life. He went to therapy, secretly but he did. Maybe that was one of the reasons for their break up, when she would accuse him of cheating when he did not tell her where he was going for one hour every three days. He did not want to tell her anything that he himself did not know. Or maybe he was just ashamed. Of not being normal. Of not being perfect. Of not being the right amount of love, respect, understanding, happiness and sadness.

Or maybe the real reason for their breakup was his later shortly diagnosed emotional detachment. Towards her, his family, friends, coworkers. He was cold. No empathy. He kept all his sadness and anger inside. He kept his opinions inside. He was very objective. Even when he should take sides. The side of his partner. He should have been emotionally available for her when she needed it. He wanted but he did not know how to be vulnerable. Well,, we will never know. (?)

He learned that showing your emotions was showing weakness. He certainly did not want to be seen as weak. He loved her even when he did not feel anything in his chest. The only emotion that he felt physically was fear. And that is how he thought every emotion should feel like. Physically. He did not have any physical pain when he was supposed to feel adoration for her. Back then he convinced himself that he was feeling something. He was hoping it would come with time. It had to come with time.

The only thing that came was fear. Fear of not being able to love her, fear of not being able to feel anything. Anxiety.

Shortly after their breakup, Sunghoon decided that his therapy was going nowhere and it did not help him. He checked out. Told his goodbyes to his therapist that saw that idea as bad. Right before he was about to exit the counselling room, his back then therapist told him his concerns. How he was near the diagnosis of emotional detachment, depression and self destruction. Sunghoon called them money-greedy afterwards and never came back.

He obviously thought of that 'near' diagnosis, and decided to only accept the first one. 'Pure bullshit of a dignosis, I'm not depressed nor self destructive, what the hell.' A lovely mindset of his admitting to only one.

He could not pinpoint when exactly he got startled by a waitress telling him that smoking in a cafe was not allowed. Apparently he stared out of the window for solid 3 minutes causing his cigarette to nearly burn out. And stating the obvious, the smoke and smell alarmed a waitress.

He blinked at the woman working in the cafe and out of the window once again. He did not see her anymore. She vanished into the crowd of people running away from the rain. Then again, he looked at his cigarette or more like ashes piled in a stick, if ever, shaking them off into the ashtray and immediatly putting out the rest of the remaining cigarette.

Suddenly Sunghoon stood on his feet while startling the waitress, hiding his box of cigarettes and keys into his pockets. He left the cafe without a word.

[pynkhues]

Speaking of Louis, Lestat and masculinity, I think a point that people always ignore is that Louis' masculinity is important to him and he's attached to gender roles/preconceptions far more than Lestat/the way Lestat is not. I think it's communicated in the show pretty well. It's why he feels comfortable in the role of the successful businessman to Lestat's supporting spouse, but not when the power dynamic is flipped, and why Lestat feels comfortable to be the supporting spouse as well. Your recent post reminded me of the "Come to me" lyrics, and I think Lestat placing himself in the feminine role of Mélisande is another example of that. Plus the Marie Antoinette dress (note Louis being kind of uncomfortable with the camp of it all lol).

I totally agree, anon. I think the show's pretty deliberate with the fact that Louis' at his most comfortable in his relationships with both Lestat and Armand when he's acting as the businessman / breadwinner and they're acting as the supportive spouse. I mention it in the post I think you're replying to, but Lestat playing host at The Azaelia and helping to manage the staff - presumably without being paid - very much plays into that sort of dynamic, and it's one Louis seems to be repeating with Armand in Dubai given Armand's helping to effectively administrate the sales of Louis' art investments. It's a form of unpaid domestic labour which in a loving relationship, can be completely fine, but does often come with (perceived or real) connotations of roles and a certain power dynamic.

A huge part of that I think is tied to Louis' sense of masculinity and the role he wants to take in his relationships, but I also think it comes from a genuine place of wanting to be the provider, which has likely been borne out of the role he took with his mother and siblings as a young man. I talk about that more here, but I do think he needs to feel like he can look after those he cares about, and I actually do think it comes from a pure place even though it can be and is often corrupted by the fact that he's capable of real cruelty and vindictiveness when he feels scorned (i.e. he wants to provide for Grace because he loves her, and he buys her that holiday for her honeymoon, and he wants her to have the house to raise her family in, but when she disowns him, he doubles down on that out of spite not because he's letting her go and moving on, but because he's holding her to it. He knows she and Levi could never afford it without him, and he really rubs that in her face at their mother's wake. She'll always be living in his house, and that once meant something pure and good and loving, albeit paternalistic, and now it fundamentally does not).

I didn't really go into it in that last post, but I also think Louis being a voracious reader is something that gets misread a bit sometimes. Like these days, it can feel like being well-read is more common with women, particularly in online spaces, but I absolutely see the connotations on the show of it being partially a performance of class and masculinity. That's not to say I don't think he genuinely loves reading - I really think he does, and I love that about him - but this is the 1910s through 1930s when hypermasculinity and wealth was very much tied to being well-read, and a lot of contemporary authors from William Faulkner to Ernest Hemingway to Joseph Conrad, were both depicting and exploring manhood in ways that were pretty formative for a generation of men.

On top of that, reading was a symbol of class because the only people who had the time or capacity to do it were people who were both educated and had money. Louis sitting on a park bench in a three piece suit reading Charles Darwin of all people is absolutely a show of class and masculinity, and the fact that it dovetails into a conversation about diet, again, is a broadcast of wealth and status. Sure, we're talking about eating people, but if you're looking at it as a metaphor, it's symbolic of Louis having' choices about what he eats when, which is inherently about having the means and status to do so.

Plus I feel it's pretty important context for Louis and Lestat's bickering in 1.05 when Louis' reading Madame Bovary - Lestat calls Louis a snob, and Louis goes in by basically calling Lestat shallow and uncultured, which is a) very funny to me, personally, I love it when they're mean to each other, haha, but also b) I think very much evident of Louis' feelings of masculinity, particularly given it happens directly after he cites Claudia calling him the unhappy housewife. Again, Louis' rejecting that role - the house is a mess (so they've either fired their staff, or they've quit), Louis' not going to do it and neither is Lestat, and Louis' sprawled on the couch reading from his husband's library and dragging him for being too frivolous to read them.

Again, I think Louis genuinely loves reading, but I also do think for him it's fundamentally a part of his identity as a Cultured, Intellectual Man. It's why he doesn't take to the campiness of the Theatres des Vampires, or as you said, get involved in lestat's Mardi Gras performance (I'm always sooo fascinated by the fact that we don't get a reaction shot of Louis to that sequence at all - again! It feels loaded!) I think his sense of masculinity is, well, pretty traditionally masculine, and I think it's pretty vital to his self-image.

[soracities]

oooh please tell us what writing rules are garbage I would love to hear more

it's not that they're garbage, which isn't what i said, just that they annoy me and even then what annoys me is not the "rules" themselves (because i do believe they can be useful depending on what you're writing) but when some of them are put out as the only way to write something as if storytelling is a one-size fits all approach, as if you can reduce the millenia-long history of literature into a fail-proof formula that will work for all writing across all cultures with no room for experimentation.

i think there are as many ways to tell a story as there are stories and how you tell something and the kind of language you use will vary depending on what language actually means to you as a writer. hemingway and faulkner both famously took digs at each other for their styles (even though i think there was a lot of admiration between them) but they are also two very different writers with two completely different approaches to language and how they use that language to say the things they want to say: neither is inherently better, or more right, than the other--their approaches were just right for them; if faulkner wanted to write using the "older, simpler, better" words hemingway loved, he would have. if james joyce wanted to depict dublin the way dickens depicted london, he would have done so. but they didn't.

someone once posted an excellent breakdown by jeff vandermeer of the different writing styles employed by different authors which i was silly enough not to save at the time, but in it he gives an overview of the structure of their sentences, and how complicated or "rich" the language is, without pitting one style against the other. and to be honest, i think writing advice that encourages you to examine and look at that relationship with language, and what it holds for you (and others) and why, is probably more helpful than blanket statements like "stay away from ambiguity" or "avoid long sentences" because neither of those actually mean anything--a sentence is a vessel but it's also a tool, like a hoghair brush or a palette knife; the value of its impact is not an essence that exists in and of itself, but entirely dependent on how you use it, otherwise all literature would just read the same way.

strict adherence to a particular form or structure within a language does not automatically make for better writing, especially not when so much literature actually consists of, and is built from, works and authors actively rebelling against those same traditional forms and structures (but which is also not to say that those forms and structures are inherently useless, either). you can say that long sentences "risk distraction" or are "ineffective" but then where does that leave someone like laszlo krasznahorkai, whose prose runs on like some kind of breathless, hypnotic incantantion for 20, 30 pages without a single full stop in sight? or a book like solar bones by mike mccormack which is made up of a single sentence going on for 200 pages? i'm not saying long sentences can't be boring or tedious, but in all honesty so can short sentences--so can any writing that follows the "rules" to the letter. if something is poorly written, the "rules" matter very little; if it's well written, they matter even less.

all that said, telling people to "avoid long sentences" is not inherently a bad thing because i think the core of it is wanting to ensure your writing remains clear, which is a fair point--but it's an issue, to me at least, when it turns into one of those dictums or pronouncements that actively narrows the potential range language can actually have. clarity is not always about length, or whether or not you cull all of your run-on lines--mihail sebastian drew a very nice distinction in one of his novels when he said "[is] there’s a single way of being clear? A notary can be clear, or a poet, but they don’t seem to me the same thing". a long sentence can be clear, but its clarity exists on different terms to a sentence that is five words long, because its relationship to its content is different. and at the end of the day, that relationship is really what it's about for me and it's distinct to each work and its author.

writers use the language and form they use that best allows them to say what they want to say. no one in their right mind is going to dismiss zadie smith for not writing like angela carter or angela carter for not writing like hemingway or hemingway for not writing like beckett or beckett for not writing like mallarmé. robert frost and sara teasdale were no more correct than the beatniks were. i love pared down, beautifully concise prose, but i also adore books that relish in language and all the various, multi-coloured layers of it, books that eschew (traditional) plot and books that question their own form and the reality of that form, and books that tell a story as straightforwardly as possible.

to be honest i think one of the most formative things i came across, years ago now, was this piece by gary provost, which really sums up the whole notion of "writing rules" for me:

this is not about do's or dont's. it even breaks the first writing rule i learnt in school ("never begin a sentence with 'And'"). but what it does is center an intimate understanding of language, where it can go and how it can get there, and what you want that to do. that's where it's at for me!

[postnuclearophelia]

“Sometimes during the night I'd look at my poor sleeping mother cruelly crucified there in the American night because of no-money, no-hope-of-money, no family, no nothing, just myself the stupid son of plans all of them compacted of eventual darkness. God how right Hemingway was when he said there was no remedy for life - and to think that negative little paper-shuffling prissies should write condescending obituaries about a man who told the truth, nay who drew breath in pain to tell a tale like that! ... No remedy but in my mind I raise a fist to High Heaven promising that I shall bull whip the first bastard who makes fun of human hopelessness anyway - I know it's ridiculous to pray to my father that hunk of dung in a grave yet I pray to him anyway, what else shall I do? sneer? shuffle paper on a desk and burp rationality? Ah thank God for all the Rationalists the worms and vermin got. Thank God for all the hate mongering political pamphleteers with no left or right to yell about in the Grave of Space. I say that we shall all be reborn with the Only One, and that's what makes me go on, and my mother too. She has her rosary in the bus, don't deny her that, that's her way of stating the fact. If there can't be love among men let there be love at least between men and God. Human courage is an opiate but opiates are human too. If God is an opiate so am I. Thefore eat me. Eat the night, the long desolate American between Sanford and Shlamford and Blamford and Crapford, eat the hematodes that hang parasitically from dreary southern trees, eat the blood in the ground, the dead Indians, the dead pioneers, the dead Fords and Pontiacs, the dead Mississippis, the dead arms of forlorn hopelessness washing underneath - Who are men, that they can insult men? Who are these people who wear pants and dresses and sneer? What am I talking about? I'm talking about human helplessness and unbelievable loneliness in the darkness of birth and death and asking 'What is there to laugh about in that?' 'How can you be clever in a meatgrinder?' 'Who makes fun of misery?' There's my mother a hunk of flesh that didn't ask to be born, sleeping restlessly, dreaming hopefully, beside her son who also didn't ask to be born, thinking desperately, praying hopelessly, in a bouncing earthly vehicle going from nowhere to nowhere, all in the night, worst of all for that matter all in noonday glare of bestial Gulf Coast roads - Where is the rock that will sustain us? Why are we here? What kind of crazy college would feature a seminar where people talk about hopelessness, forever?” ― Jack Kerouac, Desolation Angels

[whencyclopedia]

Oheka Castle

Oheka Castle, built by the industrialist Otto Herman Kahn (l. 1867-1934), is one of the best-known luxury hotels of Long Island, NY, USA today. In its time as a private residence, it was the site of the kind of lavish parties which inspired the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel The Great Gatsby and continues to offer that same experience.

You step into the immense expanse of the foyer and there's the Grand Staircase ahead, wrought iron railings gracefully curving up from the stone landing on which fresh flowers rest on a marble altar. Your footsteps echo loudly across the stone floor and again up the steps to the second floor where a long carpet-runner muffles them as you pass by paintings of various sizes on the walls and statuary on pedestals, all quietly bathed in soft golden light.

Halfway down the hall, you open the door on your left and walk into a room ornately decorated with a silk embroidered couch beneath a gilt-edged mirror, flowers in a vase on a marble pedestal. Sunlight streams in through the window on the far wall and you move past the receiving vestibule with the couch to the bedroom area, draw back the drapes, and look down upon the manicured gardens and fountains. Off beyond the gardens you see Long Island Sound, and, in the silence, you can hear the deep booming of the ship’s engines and the long, low bellow of a tug's horn.

If you feel yourself a character in The Great Gatsby, well, you are not far off. Fitzgerald's novel is set on the so-called Gold Coast of America in the 1920s - the area of Long Island, NY where the wealthy elite built their summer homes between c. 1900 and 1920. Many of the most famous names - Vanderbilt, Phipps, Woolworth - had grand estates here and some have been preserved and are open to the public for tours. The one you have walked into is different from the rest in a number of ways, however, and, most notably, you can stay there. You are in Oheka Castle, formerly the home of investment banker and philanthropist Otto Herman Kahn which, today, is a luxury hotel in Huntington.

Time Travel to the 1920s

Although famously known as a "castle" the building is actually an early 20th-century French-style Chateau designed by the famous Olmstead Brothers Firm (which included Frederic Law Olmstead, the architect who designed New York City's Central Park) who also planned the intricate lawns and gardens. Originally an estate of 433 acres, the site is now comprised of only 23, most of it a golf course, though the French gardens and much of the statuary of the original estate remains.

A weekend at Oheka Castle is time travel back to the 1920s. The owner, Gary Melius, has carefully renovated and preserved the building to reflect the interests and tastes of the original owner. Vintage artwork hangs on the walls and one passes by statues and busts of Socrates, Plato, Epictetus, and Epicurus in the second-floor hallway. Walking down the winding back staircase from the second floor to the bar you feel like Gatsby about to throw another of his famous parties. The wood-paneled library, shelves lined with volumes, looks out through floor-to-ceiling French doors onto the gardens and the lawn and you cannot shake the feeling that Hemingway or Gertrude Stein or T.S. Eliot could stroll into the room any moment.

We were there for a wedding for which we would be staying the weekend and arrived on a Friday. Guests are encouraged to enter through the main gate though one can also access the grounds through a back road. A gatekeeper radios one's arrival and opens the gates. The drive up to the parking lot is impressive enough, passing manicured hedges, statues, carefully cultivated ivy on the archway, but once you pull in to the spacious parking lot, the impression of the hotel is stunning. Oheka is a commanding presence and even before you set foot inside you understand you are experiencing something exceptional.

On this trip, as on most, my wife Betsy and daughter Emily were along, and we all experienced the same sensation of stepping back in time as soon as the high wooden front doors were opened for us and we set foot in the foyer. The lighting from an opulent chandelier high overhead and wall sconces illuminates the grand hall in a soft blush of gold as from candles or oil lamps.

After checking in at the small office just inside the door, we were directed to our room on the second floor and took the ancient elevator up. It should be kept in mind that one is staying in a vintage hotel and the elevator will not operate at maximum 21st-century speed. Remember, you have stepped back in time; everything moved a little more slowly in the 1920s. The elevator opened on the long hallway decorated with artwork and sculpture under soft lighting, noted above.

Our room, previously described, was spacious with bathroom en suite complete with a vintage claw-foot tub and modern shower. There is a television and telephone in the room, neither of which we used, and WIFI is available and password-protected for guests. Modern amenities are never our priority when travelling, however, as we always opt for the time-travel experience in full when we can. Gazing out the window of our room down at the intricate gardens, fountains, and statues under the high blue canopy of a June sky, I thought of the original owner and the people of the past who had stood where I was standing.

Continue reading...

[ofliterarynature]

TBR TAKEDOWN: GOODREADS, WEEK 7b

Nabokov's Favorite Word is Mauve: What the Numbers Reveal About the Classics, Bestsellers, and Our Own Writing by Ben Blatt

I'm trying to trim down my tbr list(s) and I'm asking for your help! Descriptions and more info under the cut. Please reblog and add your thoughts!

* * * * *

What are our favorite authors’ favorite words? Which bestselling writer uses the most clichés? How can we judge a book by its cover?

Data meet literature in this playful and informative look at our favorite authors and their masterpieces. There’s a famous piece of writing advice—offered by Ernest Hemingway, Stephen King, and myriad writers in between—not to use -ly adverbs like “quickly” or “fitfully.” It sounds like solid advice, but can we actually test it? If we were to count all the -ly adverbs these authors used in their careers, do they follow their own advice compared to other celebrated authors? What’s more, do great books in general—the classics and the bestsellers—share this trait?

In Nabokov’s Favorite Word Is Mauve, statistician and journalist Ben Blatt brings big data to the literary canon, exploring the wealth of fun findings that remain hidden in the works of the world’s greatest writers. He assembles a database of thousands of books and hundreds of millions of words, and starts asking the questions that have intrigued curious word nerds and book lovers for generations: What are our favorite authors’ favorite words? Do men and women write differently? Are bestsellers getting dumber over time? Which bestselling writer uses the most clichés? What makes a great opening sentence? How can we judge a book by its cover? And which writerly advice is worth following or ignoring?

Date added: 2017

Goodreads: 3.84

Storygraph: 3.85

PRO:

Sounds very interesting! I love these kinds of fun facts.

Available from the library in my preferred format (audiobook)

CON:

Is this going to be interesting enough to hold my attention for an entire book? (audiobook is 5.5 hours, so fairly short at least)

I'm afraid of all the numbers 😅

[gatabella]

“You can’t imagine what it was like; parties that took weeks of planning, the great decorators like Billy Haines who would re-do a house for just a party. Marion Davies once turned her beach house into a circus tent and the guests came dressed as clowns, bareback riders, acrobats, etc. Imagine Marlene Dietrich, Clark Gable, Norma Shearer dressed for a circus party ! Marion also gave great parties at San Simeon, that fantastic palace of William Randolph Hearst’s.

They were incredible days . . . like a gorgeous, magnificent movie, with all kinds of people, the Jock Whitneys and Nelson Rockefellers, politicians from Washington, people from Europe. And there were the famous parties at Chaplin’s . . . exclusive, small parties for the more intellectual set … Somerset Maugham, Noel Coward, John Steinbeck, mad people like Fitzgerald and Hemingway.”

-Dolores del Rio