#feel like the highlighted section is a reference to another poem????

[fwoopersongs]

Poetry + Names? :D!!!! Can't resist adding ~

Stacking on to Hunxi's 晓星尘 example

How to search for possible poetry references Another great resource that I love a lot besides gushicimingju and gushiwen (highly recommend the gushiwen app for its clean and user friendly interface if you're interested in reading poetry/exploring classics and keeping track of what you've learnt) is sou-yun.cn, which is particularly useful for searching up names and possible references because there are lots of parameters for advanced searching to chose from - like exact vs approximate match, position, dynasty etc.

Results are returned in their full poems with the text highlighted per the image below this paragraph. With the textual instability of ancient poems and all, you sometimes get alternate words - this site also displays them and their source, as you can see in the first example.

What's even cooler is that, hey, they may recognize me but I sure don't know them! What do these characters mean together? Click into the poem, select the word and you get both the pinyin and examples of usages in other poetry.

(I try to look at this only after doing the legwork for poetry club though, because this is seriously too much of a golden finger and my searching skills may grow rusty LOL)

Gushicimingju is fantastic for the purpose of telling us how many instances does the word show up. Gushiwen actually returns results from texts as well as poetry which is also desirable because name inspo for Chinese characters is not limited to poetry and auspiciousness. If you select the 古籍 tab (indicated with a red dot below) and if the search term actually exists in any of the texts within the site's archive, then it will turn up. In this case for 星尘, there is none.

But besides all these bells and whistles, the difference between these sites is the pool of works available. Gushiwen only returned 5 results with 星尘 across the Song to Qing Dynasties. Sou-yun.cn gave me 9 from Song to Late Qing, and a further 7 from the Republican Era to our times. See below xD

/got sidetracked LOL

Oh, ctext is another of my fav go-tos as well!!!! But we all know that the search function there can be a little bit broken sometimes. So when you suspect that it's not working for you, a workaround is googling like this: "the characters you're looking for" ctext.

But let's say we're looking for something different, so you want to search within the site. And if for some reason, you want to know if a particular usage of a word was more popular in older texts (like Pre-Qin and Han) or later ones (like Wei-Jin and after), then use the search box like this!

星辰 with 'Pre-Qin and Han' selected returns 177 results. 星辰 with 'Post Han' selected returns 385 results.

Another method of researching a name Looking at the words themselves! Sometimes a return to simplicity works just as well (or maybe I just like digging many rabbit holes).

The Chinese baike.baidu (like wikipedia) these days has this cool etymology section 字源解说 at the beginning of the article for most words.

If you've ever wondered how people from the Shang Dynasty wrote the same word (ok it's not as simple as that xD but for the sake of not making this a long ramble let's go with this), there we go.

For 晓

And since this is a surname, don't forget to check out its origins!

For 星

For 尘

What did the words mean originally? How did they extend and drift to other meanings and when were these drifts becoming popular? Does it fit in with what you know of the character?

Does the conclusion you're drawing about the meaning of their name feel a bit forced, or does it make perfect sense and you're happy to make this your headcanon / share it as a possible fun fact?

Happy searching!

so I know that a lot of chinese names are references to specific poems. Is there a way to determine this (vs general auspicious meaning) and which poem specifically? I'd love to be able to figure this out for character names and I haven't been able to find any resources (in case it's helpful, I'd say I'm my understanding is maybe HSK4-level so I can clumsily make my way through the chinese internet with the help of a dictionary)

feel free to make this public so that others can benefit if you have any suggestions

oof... unfortunately I suspect that this, along with one's repertoire of chengyu, is something that one simply Just Learns with reading more. my personal repertoire of poetry is embarrassingly thin, so the horrible horrible process I've been going through is, well, throwing the name into a search bar and hoping for the best.

here's an example of how I (think I) went about doing this for Xiao Xingchen's name, way back when I wrote this post:

I went ahead and dropped "星尘 诗词" ("Xingchen poetry") into the search bar, which turned up this:

Generally speaking, I'll only put the name (minus the surname) because putting the character's full name into a search bar will probably turn up the character themselves, and if someone's name is being derived from a poem, it's usually independent of the surname anyway.

Xiao Xingchen's name is an interesting example because it doesn't quite come from a poem, but it doesn't not come from a poem. you can see that the search engine has automatically assumed that I am looking for poems about constellations, as "星辰" and "星尘" are homonyms, and one of these is more commonly seen. I usually consider that a solid indication that "星尘" (the name) is a novel formation of characters in a name, and not likely a poetic reference.

but! in for a penny, etc. I'm a huge fan of the first search result, gushicimingju, since it's a solid database of poetry and some prose. clicking into that listing informs me that gushicimingju is turning up. oh my. 119 possible matches:

note that these are matches for "星辰" (constellation), not actually our character's name. still! you can click in and peruse the selection if you'd like.

now that you're on gushicimingju's site, you can also use the search function within the site to search for more exact matches, without worrying that you'll accidentally activate the fandom itself.

looks like there's a few matches for "晓星," but nothing for the full name.

so! gushicimingju is a solid database I like to refer to most of the time. if for some reason I'm feeling particularly academically rigorous, I might also do some searches on ctext as sometimes names will come out of famous turns of phrases (a la Zhao Yun 赵云 / Zhao Zilong 赵子龙 from that post I linked earlier) rather than poems. searching the dictionary sometimes (Pleco, or zdic) doesn't hurt either. basically, I throw spaghetti at the search engine wall to see what results come back for these characters in this particular order to try and get the original referent (if any) to show up; I'll probably give up after a few permutations of search terms if nothing is actively jumping out at me

but back to the search results: sometimes, if your character is famous enough, straight up searching for "what poem is this character's name from?" will help you find like-minded people on baidu zhidao (basically yahoo answers):

although of course, take baidu zhidao result with all of the salt you would take with any yahoo answers (look for alternate sources to validate, good for a laugh most of the time)

best of luck!

[cappymightwrite]

ASOIAF & Norse Mythology

PART 2: The ‘Long Night’ and the Fimbulvetr

In PART 1 of this meta, from looking at just a few fan question answers, it seems rather clear to me that GRRM has more than just a passing interest in Norse mythology. One of the most fascinating and haunting myths in the Norse canon is the lead up to and resulting fallout of Ragnarök. In the show, the ‘Long Night’ appears to be just that, one night, and not even an awfully long one. In the books, however, it seems likely this will play out very differently. As a Norse nerd, the similarities to Ragnarök are just too obvious not to sit up and take notice, in particular, the similarities between the ‘Long Night’ and what is called the Fimbelvetr — which in my Old Icelandic dictionary translates to ‘the great and awful winter.’

Before I really get things rolling, lets take a moment to go over which Old Norse-Icelandic sources are traditionally used by medievalists to reconstruct the pagan conception of Ragnarök:

The Eddic poems Völuspá ‘The prophecy of the seeress’ (st. 40–51) and Vafþrúðnismál ‘The lay of Vafþrúðnir’ (st. 44–53) — these two poems provide us with quite a lot of information, with some sections being more comprehensive than others. Additionally, other Eddic poems, such as Lokasenna, Hyndluljóð, Grímnismál, and a few others hint at motifs, stemming from the ideas of Ragnarök.

In the Gylfaginning section of the Prose Edda (ch. 51–53), Snorri quotes many of the relevant stanzas from Völuspá in support of his own writing, though he also adds information that is unknown to us from other sources.

There are also a few skaldic* poems which give us minor hints regarding the incidents that will take places during Ragnarök.

NB: Eddic poetry is the term given to the poems primarily contained within the Icelandic Codex Regius manuscript, known as the Poetic Edda (written c. 1270, but arguably containing remnants of an older oral tradition). These poems are of unknown authorship. As for Skaldic poetry, these poems were written by known Icelandic skalds (ONI: skáld, ‘poet’), often in the courts of foreign kings, typically Norwegian, praising their patrons in exchange for royal favour; they span approx. c. 800–1300, so in some cases predate the recording (though not necessarily the composition or oral origins) of the Eddic poems.

According to Jens Peter Schødt, the Gylfaginning and Völuspá ‘are certainly the most extensive’ written sources we have on the Norse myths, as they ‘have played the most crucial role in the history of research.’ It is quite possible that GRRM has read much of the available textual sources on Ragnarök to help inspire his own work. That being said, if I had to bet on one being the touchstone source for him, it would be the Gylfaginning, since not only does it include detailed prose accounts of the events leading up to, during, and following Ragnarök, it also includes relevant Eddic poetry (notably Völuspá) in order to authenticate those descriptions. It really is a one of kind, unique source.

So, how about we begin with chapter 51 of Gylfaginning, where it is asked outright by Gangleri (aka King Gylfi) ‘what is to be said about Ragnarök?’ to which High answers:

There are many important things to be said about it. First will come the winter called Fimbulvetr [Extreme Winter]. Snow will drive in from all directions; the cold will be severe and the winds will be fierce. The sun will be of no use. Three of these winters will come, one after the other, with no summer in between. But before that there will have been another three winters with great battles taking place throughout the world. Brothers will kill brothers for the sake of greed, and neither father nor son will be spared in the killings and the collapse of kinship.* So it is said in The Sibyl’s Prophecy:

Brothers will fight,

bringing death to each other.

Sons of sisters

will split their kin bonds.

Hard times for men,

rampant depravity

age of axes, age of swords

shields split,

wind age, wolf age,

until the world falls into ruin.

The above translation is by Jesse Byock from the Penguin Classics Prose Edda — the translations in square brackets are his and included in the text, and he also uses a translated title for the Eddic poems, in this case, ‘The Sibyl’s Prophecy’ in place of Old Norse-Icelandic: Völuspá.

Several things are striking about this passage, chief among them, the fact that the precursor to Ragnarök is the Fimbulvetr, ‘the great and awful winter’ or ‘Extreme Winter.’ But before that, ‘another three winters’ in which much social upheaval will take place, circumstances that feel quite at home in ASOIAF. I would be hesitant to argue that GRRM is using the above description as an exact blueprint, but that being said, some of the circumstances described do feel very familiar to readers of his series:

‘Brothers will kill brothers for the sake of greed’ / ‘Brothers will fight’

This is perhaps suggestive of the Baratheon brothers, Stannis and Renly. Although, I’d say that the motivations/cause of the latter’s death is a little more nuanced than just ‘greed.’ But this is worth noting: the Norse source might offer us the seed of an idea, but it is GRRM who then “waters” it, effectively imbuing these dynamics with a deeper meaning and complexity.

Also, if we think of ‘brothers’ in a less literal sense, this could also apply to the ‘killing’ of Jon Snow by the black brothers of the Night’s Watch.

‘Neither father nor son will be spared in the killings’

Ned and Robb Stark fit into this category quite well, as both their deaths are gut-wrenching moments in the series. But also, more generally, this highlights that anyone, even beloved family, even heroes, can fall.

‘The collapse of kinship’ / ‘Rampant depravity’

In his footnotes, Byock observes the word sifjaslit to mean ‘the breaking of kinship bonds, but there is also the connotation of incest.’ In my ONI dictionary, sifja-slit translates to ‘adultery,’ since it is a compound of the nouns sifjar ‘affinity, connection by marriage’ and slit ‘rupture, breach’ — the latter most likely derives from the verb slitna, meaning ‘to break’ or ‘snap.’

The breaking of marriage bonds is present in ASOIAF, as in the case of Robert and Cersei’s respective adulteries. But we could also view Robb Stark’s marriage to Jeyne Westerling as a breaking of a betrothal bond as well.

Overall, I would say that there is room for both interpretations, and as we know, GRRM is pretty found of incest, prime cases currently present in canon being Jaime and Cersei Lannister, as well as the Targaryens.

‘Wolf-age’

Wolves feature a lot in Norse mythology, so it is interesting that the Starks, who are really the heart of ASOIAF, are so heavily associated with them.

Furthermore, the provisional title for the last book in the series, A Dream of Spring, was A Time for Wolves. The phrasing of this is just another way of saying ‘Wolf-age’, as found in Völuspá. But to potentially understand GRRM’s change in titles, it should be remembered that wolves in Norse mythology are often associated with war and violence — see, for instance, the kennings ‘wolf-wine’, ‘the river of Fenrir’, ‘the warm ale of the wolf’, which all mean blood. As someone familiar with Old Norse poetry, A Time for Wolves suggests to me a period of violence, whereas A Dream of Spring offers more hope and the potential for rejuvenation, perhaps paralleling the events that follow Ragnarök, as described in the Prose Edda and Völuspá (which I might get into further down the line).

‘Until the world falls into ruin’

It is strongly predicted, and alluded in the text itself, that the Wall will at some point fall, an event that will act as a precursor to the second ‘Long Night.’ The Wall is also considered by some people to be the end of the known world, so its destruction is strongly linked with the collapse of the social structure of Westeros as a whole.

As we can see, certain parallels can be made, though it is also worth noting that there are instances where they can’t be. For example, ‘sons of sisters will split their kin bonds’— I can’t really think of a relationship to compare this to in ASOIAF, unless it hasn’t happened in the text yet, and then who would it be? Robert ‘Sweetrobin’ Arryn and…Bran Stark? There are obvious similarities and ways in which we can link these descriptions to GRRM’s text, but we should be cautious to avoid shoehorning.

Indeed, it is fun to make these comparisons, but I think the main take away from this chapter of the Gylfaginning is that during the time closely preceding the Fimbulvetr, there will be ‘hard times for men’ with much social upheaval, including bloodshed, betrayals, and incest. In my opinion, the ‘Long Night’ has been heavily inspired by the Norse Fimbulvetr, and this is reflected in the way ASOIAF characters describe the ‘Long Night’, closely paralleling its Norse source.

To summarise from the above quotation, during the Fimbulvetr:

‘Snow will drive in from all directions; the cold will be severe and the winds will be fierce.’ (Gylf)

‘The sun will be of no use.’ (Gylf)

‘Three of these winters will come, one after the other, with no summer in between.’ (Gylf)

In ASOIAF, the earliest mention of the ‘Long Night’ is in AGOT, Bran I, in which Bran recalls the ‘the hearth tales of Old Nan’ detailing the apparent savagery and cultural difference between the northerners and the wildings, noting that ‘their women lay with the Others in the Long Night to sire terrible half-human children’. This evokes the above quotation from Völuspá, the reference to ‘rampant depravity’ in particular. But it is later, in Tyrion III, that we get the first real parallel between the Long Night and the Fimbulvetr:

Lord Mormont moved to the window and stared out into the night. “These are old bones, Lannister, but they have never felt a chill like this. Tell the king what I say, I pray you. Winter is coming, and when the Long Night falls, only the Night’s Watch will stand between the realm and the darkness that sweeps from the north. The gods help us all if we are not ready.

From the description in Gylfaginning, we know that the Fimbulvetr is preceded by three winters, ‘one after the other, with no summer in between’. Without taking it too literally, this description at the very least suggests that a move towards cold weather will herald the coming of the ‘Extreme Winter’, as this is foreshadowed as early as AGOT in this Tyrion chapter when Jeor Mormont states that he has ‘never felt a chill like this […] Winter is coming’. Directly following this statement is the foreknowledge that the Long Night is indeed on its way.

The reference to a ‘darkness that sweeps from the north’ is noteworthy too, as although most often associated with freezing weather, the Fimbulvetr is also crucially connected with the disappearing of the sun (‘the sun will be of no use’, Gylf). Indeed, the very name the Long Night suggests much the same phenomenon, as explained to Bran by Old Nan later in AGOT, in Bran IV:

Fear is for the winter, my little lord, when the snows fall a hundred feet deep and the ice wind comes howling out of the north. Fear is for the long night, when the sun hides its face for years at a time, and little children are born and live and die all in darkness while the direwolves grow gaunt and hungry, and the white walkers move through the woods.

[…]

Thousands and thousands of years ago, a winter fell that was cold and hard and endless beyond all memory of man. There came a night that lasted a generation, and kings shivered and died in their castles even as the swineherds in their hovels. Women smothered their children rather than see them starve, and cried, and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks.

I mean…this might as well be a description for the Fimbulvetr, it is THAT similar! Indeed, as we know, in the world of ASOIAF the seasons work a bit differently, as alluded to by Old Nan when she refers to ‘a night [i.e. a winter] that lasted a generation’. Similarly, the Fimbulvetr is unusual in that it is preceded by ‘three winters’, which suggests an extended winter lasting up four years, culminating in the ‘Extreme Winter’, aka the Fimbulvetr. It seems likely that the timespan of ‘a generation’ has been exaggerated for the sake of myth making. That being said, we would expect the Long Night to still be noteworthy in its duration. So, perhaps it is possible that, were GRRM to emulate the Norse source, his Long Night could potentially last for a similar amount of time (four years). Either way, I think we all expect it to last longer than it did in the show!

In conclusion, the way in which the Fimbulvetr is described in the Norse sources bears a striking resemblance to the descriptions of the Long Night in ASOIAF. Futhermore, and most interestingly to me, it seems entirely possible that, like the Fimbulvetr, and like the first Long Night that went before it, the next Long Night will include the disappearing of the sun...an important feature that I will discuss further next time! So stay tuned!

References/Bibliography (excluding ASOIAF):

Snorri Sturluson, The Prose Edda, trans. and intr. by Jesse Byock, (London: Penguin Classics, 2005)

Jens Peter Schødt, ‘The Ragnarök Myth in Scandinavia’, in Finding, Inheriting and Borrowing?: The Construction and Transfer of Knowledge in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 2019, Vol.39, p.365-384

END OF PART 2…

I haven’t quite decided if I will include my stuff about the sun disappearing in Ragnarök and the ‘Red Comet’, or if I’ll give it its own separate part...we’ll see! I would also like to talk a bit about the significance of storytelling as a way of recording history in ASOIAF... Basically, I have a lot of thoughts on things!

[thewhitefluffyhat]

Witches and Fragments in Original Higurashi

<< Introduction

If we want to talk about witches, we actually need to start with Higurashi proper. Bernkastel and the Sea of Fragments are introduced in the original Higurashi visual novel, but they were almost entirely left out of the anime. This section covers anything anime-only viewers may be missing.

Reading List: Highlights

Matsuribayashi Secret Ending [ Video ]

Bernkastel grants young Miyoko a miracle in advance.

Bernkastel-Birth and Poems [ Video ]

A roughly six minute compilation of the Bernkastel references in Saikoroshi plus all of her Higurashi poems.

Reading List: I want it all

Minagoroshi-hen / Massacre Chapter

Matsuribayashi-hen / Festival Accompaniment Chapter

Saikoroshi-hen / Dice Killing Chapter

Wiki pages

https://07th-expansion.fandom.com/wiki/Sea_of_Fragments

https://07th-expansion.fandom.com/wiki/Frederica_Bernkastel/Character

The Sea of Fragments

-In the prologue to Minagoroshi, it is revealed that all of the previous arcs are "Fragments" (aka “shards” or "カケラ / kakera") - separate, parallel worlds that appear as crystals floating in an abstract void.  

-The general term for this void space is the "Sea of Fragments."

-In Higurashi, the only characters who usually exist in this space are Rika(s) and Hanyuu. The Minagoroshi prologue confusingly implies there are many Rikas in this space, but this gets retconned by how it is depicted in Umineko. (I’ve heard the Higurashi manga matches the Umineko depiction.)

-The start of Gou Episode 2 takes place in the Sea of Fragments, as does part of Episode 14 and the last part of Episode 20.

-Gou is the first time the Sea has had the Furude Shrine floating in the background.  Or any ground to stand on, for that matter.

-The Sea does not contain just Higurashi timelines; presumably it contains infinite variations of infinite worlds.

-In both Umineko and Gou Episode 14, characters leave to explore further reaches of the Sea. In particular, Bern and Lambda’s games are created out of sections of the Sea, either a single Fragment as seen in “The First and Last Gift” or many related Fragments as in Higurashi and Umineko.

Frederica Bernkastel in Higurashi

-First "introduced" as the attributed author of the poems that preface each Higurashi arc.

-There is a (very old) character guide that includes “Message from Frederica Bernkastel” where Frederica teasingly denies being Rika. See this Reddit discussion for more context.

-However, in Minagoroshi, we see Rika recite one of "Bernkastel's" poems, as well as Rika making several references to thinking/acting like a "hundred year old witch."

-The Saikoroshi arc explores this contradiction in detail:

While being trapped in a dream of a perfect Fragment, Rika begins to consider her mature personality - essentially her memories of other worlds - as a separate being from the “Furude Rika” she replaced in this Fragment. She names her current, looping-aware persona "Frederica Bernkastel".

After Rika reawakens in the Matsuribayashi Fragment, she resolves to abandon thinking like “Frederica Bernkastel” and live fully as the “Furude Rika” who only has this one world. However, she speculates that her other persona might still live on in a higher plane of existence.

At the end of Saikoroshi, Hanyuu ambiguously mentions making a new friend. It’s possible to read this as implying that “Rika” and “Bernkastel” have fully split their consciousnesses.

-Because of that “higher dimension” idea, most people use "Frederica Bernkastel" to refer to the Rika that appears in the Sea of Fragments, i.e the narrator at the beginning of Minagoroshi who names each arc.

-This same narrator also talks to the reader/Hanyuu during the Connecting Fragments puzzle in Matsuribayashi, even going as far as to describe Hinamizawa and the characters within as a game board and pieces.  

-She also appears in the secret ending to Matsuribayashi, where she enters a Fragment as a mysterious adult woman who sets young Miyoko on a path to a life where her parents don't die.

Lambdadelta

Neither Lambdadelta nor Featherine appear by name in Higurashi.

With Lambda, in hindsight, you could perhaps argue that some scenes in Takano's backstory (where she references wishes and the power to write fate) might be alluding to and/or influenced by her. However, in interviews, Ryukishi07 has poked fun at the idea of Lambda existing in Higurashi. For example:

“I admit there's a character named Bernkastel in Higurashi, but I don't remember there being a character named Lambdadelta. Why does anyone think [Lambda] has appeared in Higurashi? When human beings encounter an unknown thing, they would automatically regard it as something that exists in their memory. Those who've played Higurashi might have directly fallen into a trap.”

(Source: Interview with Ryukishi07 (2009))

Featherine

With Featherine, the absence is complete (before Gou) - while Hanyuu and Featherine share some similarities, even Hanyuu’s adult form from the past had no direct connection with witches. (At least as far as I’m aware - people familiar with the console arcs or Kamikashimashi, feel free to correct this!)

However, those similarities are vague but intriguing.  Most notably, in Saikoroshi, Hanyuu says that the “her” of the dream Fragment ascended after being satisfied with how the human world. It is then implied that she may have done the same herself at the end of the arc, allowing Rika to live a normal life. (Another case I’ve heard is more explicit in the manga.)

In addition to likely being the explanation for Hanyuu’s disappearance in Gou, this ascension is something referenced in Featherine’s backstory as well...

Next (Witches and Fragments in Umineko) >>

[jenner-benjamin]

Everything that I’ve wanted to say but haven’t had the confidence to until now

‘Everything that I’ve wanted to say but haven’t had the confidence to until now’ publication.

The ethos of this module has been to discover creative ways in which I can connect with my audience. Since the cancellation of this year’s end of degree show I have been conflicted at the prospect of a digital showcase and have been researching ways in which my work can be received in the physical sense. In a world where we scroll past artwork and give thoughtless ‘likes’ and ‘thumbs ups’, I wanted the reception of my work to be more considered and thoughtful and make my audience slow down for just a moment.

For months I had thought about making a publication at the end of the year that would consolidate my third year work in the form of a newspaper. My interest in the newspaper as an object was peaked by Guy Bigland’s workshop where he explained that the newspaper was a dying medium. I think this resonated because of the research I have carried out with handwriting falling under this same seemingly antiquated umbrella. On reflection, I felt that the newspaper carried with it connotations of either formality and seriousness or gossip and celebrity culture. These associations are difficult for audiences to disassociate with, despite what the actual subject matter of the publication may be, and so I decided to rethink my ideas of how to present this collection of works. I think because this publication is taking the place of an exhibition I had ideas of it needing to be grand and formal, when in essence this would detract from what the work is actually about.

I had samples from The Newspaper Club sent to me in the post which gave further insight in to how my publication might look. One such sample was of a zine, which I began to think might be more appropriate for what it was I was trying to say. The paper quality is of the same standard as a newspaper, so the audience reception would be similar to how they might approach this traditional form of relaying information. However the size is smaller, and as a result is much more intimate. 

The works found in the publication are a personal account of the pandemic. This includes the relentless lockdowns and periods of isolation, the loneliness that ensued as a result of these, the dire predicament of working in the hospitality industry throughout the whole ordeal and my feelings towards this, and finally the rare moments of quiet in between the anxiety, and how my creative practice has been a constant crux right from the beginning of the pandemic.

I feel that experiencing this work in a tangible way is paramount to reading the emotive content it offers. Contemporary society is oversaturated with digital media across a great many platforms and I did not want my story to get lost in a split second of someone’s screen time. Social media and virtual showcases will be used to share the work but these will only communicate so far. The publication will undoubtedly exist on multiple platforms, but I would like it to predominantly be experienced in the physical. 

‘Everything that I’ve wanted to say but haven’t had the confidence to until now’ is how I described this collection of drawings, prints, poetry and performances in a presentation that I gave earlier in the year. I noted it down as I really felt that it rung true to where I currently stood, not only as an artist but within myself as well. 

‘Everything that I’ve wanted to say but haven’t had the confidence to until now’ publication front cover - monoprint on paper.

The format of the zine itself communicates various aspects of my practice. It is divided in to two sections, Side A and Side B, a reference to cassette tapes. Dividing the publication in to chapters alludes to the sense of narrative that is present in all aspects of work. Side A addresses the negative moments of the pandemic and Side B has a much lighter tone. At the beginning of each section is a playlist, a reference to the layout of my sketchbooks. At the beginning of each sketchbook I begin a playlist that is personal to that book. When I reflect on past sketchbooks I know how I was feeling and what I was thinking by looking through the playlist. Side A is comprised of songs that I listened to when I was feeling down, and Side B was during the times I felt more optimistic and motivated. I have also made a QR code for each playlist so that the reader can further interact with the zine and listen to what I was listening to when when making the works that they are flicking through. QR codes are also very topical at the moment as they have become a part of our every day life, from checking in to locations with the NHS Test and Trace app to reading and ordering from a menu at a pub or restaurant. The inclusion of the QR code adds another dimension to the publication that combines traditional ideas with contemporary purposes. 

‘Side A’ playlist - monoprint on paper.

The zine contains a narrative of asemic works that respond to the current global crisis, some of these responses address the days where I struggled within myself and became outward reflections of inner feelings, and some respond to the hierarchical dynamic that became apparent in the hospitality industry. A few of the asemic works have been paired with poems that I have written in the last year. I chose to appropriate these as monoprints, a nod to the work I made before I rejoined the course (and have continued to explore throughout),  a further reminder of how far I have come and how much work has progressed. 

Side B offers works from my performative explorations, where I began to utilise my practice to cope with and overcome my lockdown struggles. The first of which is from the ‘Exhale’ performances and the second from the ‘Letter of Resignation’ performances. I wanted to include screenshots from the videos so there was a feeling of animation and movement as the reader journeys though the pages, but did not want the appearance of these to distract from the aesthetic of the publication. Therefore I printed these on the offset lithography press. The finished prints almost look like mid-20th Century American high school year book portraits - adding to the traditional tone I was hoping to achieve. 

Screenshot from the ‘Exhale’ drawing performance - offset lithography on paper.

I understood that in order for the publication to be assessed and meet the criteria for the newly adopted blended learning approach to teaching that I would have to decide upon a method of digitising the zine somehow. I thought that scanning in each individual page or submitting it as a .pdf document would completely undermine what I was intending to achieve, and so I collaborated with filmmakers, Tom Crane and Lianna Denwood who documented the zine in their own creative voice. I gave Tom and Lianna a copy of the zine and allowed them to produce a short narrative that highlights the quiet tone of the book. They included fragments of songs from the playlists that give prominence to how the audience might engage with the QR code playlists, in effect the soundtrack is both narrational and instructional.    

I am incredibly proud of this piece of work. It is my largest edition to date, sitting at 150 copies. I intend to circulate these amongst my audience as invitations to a moment of reflection and poignant human think time, away from internet instantaneity. I am unsure as to the reception that the publication will meet, but it would be my hope there are moments in the pages that encourage the reader to consider and muse on.

[aatgeog2260]

Human Geography Researcher Potential!

It is wild to think that this is the last blog post in this class! When I chose this class for this semester I wasn’t really excited about it - it was just another required course. I’m happy to say that I really appreciated this course and learned so many things as well as met some more people in geography!

These three things I know for certain about human geography research:

1. Human geography research is not just one thing. It is interconnected with so many other types of geography like the ones presented in our last class and more! My favourite part of this course was attending that final class and watching all of the videos about different subtopics under human geography that students in this class created. It helped identify connections and relations as well as how these are relevant in the real world. When combined together, they form this incredible subject of geography. 

2. It is essential! Human geography research provides patterns and connections between people and places which is vital for living today. It helps us understand the world better which can aid the development of moving forward in a positive direction while respecting the past. In the summary of chapter one in the textbook, it states that “human geographers are bringing new and effective approaches to the fundamental questions of societal structures and individual experiences (Hay 2016 p. 26). Human geography will continue to help find answers to these questions about the world we live in.

3. It is a delicate process. All research is a delicate and complex process as there are numerous things to consider and be aware of, but because human geography deals with real people, their lives, culture, religion, families, etc., I know that we need to be so careful to respect and acknowledge others and who they are. Chapter three of the textbook includes a poem by Barabara Nicholson, titled Something There Is… that highlights the necessity of consent and privacy in research. Just because someone is classified as a researcher does not give them the right to invade a person's life (Hay 2016 p. 48). Below is a sketch I did after I read the poem for the first time: (I am not an artist but it was something I did afterwards to reflect upon the reading)

In general, it’s a researcher looking through a magnifying glass at these people who feel exposed from the “research”. 

These three things I am still confused by:

1. Analyzing surveys. This was one of the larger lectures we had live in class and I think I was having a hard time keeping up after we had so many lectures online in which I would pause, rewind and go back. It was my fault that I never went back to the recording to review so I’d still like to clarify this content. I know that if I were to be asked about each data type: nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio, I would not be able to explain them all clearly (Hooykaas 2021 Week 5). 

2. The following phrase was used in the week 6 lecture: “Testimony by itself is a relatively weak form of evidence” (Hooykaas 2021 Week 6). I’m unclear with how or why this is. When we watched documentaries in this course I thought this involved testimony and it was used in research. Maybe they are classified more as a case study. So I wonder, what are the differences between a case study and a testimony? Or is a testimony involved within a case study? For example, in week 3 we watched the documentary Surviving in the Siberian Wilderness for 70 years produced by VICE. I believe that this was a case study, but within it, Agafia Lykovs shares her story. Is the research incomplete unless you unpack and verify this testimony? 

3. I am a little confused with the concept of triangulation. The week 6 lecture provided this image: 

I am not sure if triangulation means having one of these sections, for example, researchers but having multiple of them, or if it is putting these sections together, for example, both multiple researchers along with multiple theories (Hooykaas 2016 Week 6). I have a feeling it would be the second option, simply because if you have multiple researchers then most likely you would get multiple theories and methods, however, I would like to clarify in order to understand it better.

These three things I know for certain about me as a human geographic researcher:

I created a word-cloud of things I’ve felt I’ve gained from this course and things that I enjoyed to help me come up with this section of the blog:

1. There is potential! I remember writing my first blog post in this class and describing how I used to really dislike geography and didn’t want anything to do with it. After this class, I know that I have the potential to become a researcher and possibly find it enjoyable! I surprised myself when I enjoyed working on the DSP. It was fun coding information with all of the colours and although it was challenging to go through the information, condense, review, condense some more, etc., it felt so rewarding to show that final product to others and to think that other people could learn valuable information useful in the world based on what you provided to them! I think if I ever did become a researcher I would enjoy participatory action research since it allows people in the community to become “co-researchers and decision-makers in their own right” (Hay 2016 p. 350). This is really important to avoid that idea of invasion of privacy.

2. I learned more about my interests. I used to think the biggest goal in geography was being able to sing this song called Nations of the World: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pOFKmk7ytU 

I thought research in geography was only about analyzing piles of data and I didn’t realize you could bring creative outlooks to it. I enjoyed the poem we read in the textbook, the documentaries we watched, the opportunity of interviewing for the DSP, the creativity with the final DSP videos, etc. I am intrigued by those forms of media to learn more about and analyze/reflect on geographical concepts.

3. I have more appreciation for geography and others. The topics of critical reflexivity and ethical considerations apply to research in human geography of course but it also floods into all aspects of life. It helps consider other people’s backgrounds, lives, privileges or no privileges, and just creates better communication and respectful relationships between people (Hooykaas 2021 Week 2). It’s also worth thinking about whether you’re an insider or an outsider before you interact with different groups so that you can build a good rapport with trust (Hay 2016 p. 40). 

These three areas I need to spend time developing/learning in order to feel more confident in my skills:

1. Patience. When working on the DSP, after my group and I had found our resources, I just wanted to dive in and write the script! Then we learned about coding in the week 8 lecture and my group members expressed how they would feel better going through the information quite a few times before writing anything. Of course, this worked extremely well even if it was time-consuming! In the future, I would like to make sure I take the process only one step at a time and make sure I hit every part of the research process in order to create a robust and accurate end result. Once again, this applies not only to human geography research but also the real world. Chapter 18 in the textbooks states that “Being in the world requires us to categorize, sort, prioritize, and interpret social data in all of our interactions”  (Hay 2016 p. 391). There is always room for improvement here so that misinterpretations and miscommunication can be avoided.

2. During the research with the DSP, I had a challenging time determining when my group should move forward and how much research we should gather especially with the course deadlines in mind. I know that you can move forward when you reach a “point of saturation” and concepts begin to be repetitive, however, because I am detail-oriented, I was not great with grouping similar ideas if one tiny thing distinguished them (Hooykaas 2021 Week 9). I would like this to improve so that I have a clearer sense of when enough is enough.

3. I would like to clarify and learn more about the list of three things that still confuse me. It’s good to identify what confuses you and what you are unsure of but it’s even better to then go and clarify those things and understand them so that you develop your understanding and skills even more. I want to fill in those gaps of information so that everything makes a bit more sense.

Final Remark

Overall, I am really glad that I took this class and hope everyone has a great end of the semester! It was nice interacting with everyone through these blogs!

-April 

References

Hay, I. (2016). Qualitative Research Methods in Human Geography. Fourth ed., Oxford.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Week 2: Philosophy, Power, Politics and Research Design.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Week 3: Cross-Cultural Research: Ethics, Methods, and Relationships.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Week 5: Literature Review.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Week 6: Data Collection - Interviews, Oral Histories, Focus Groups.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Week 9: Writing Qualitative Geographies, Constructing Geographical Knowledge Data Analysis, Writing, and Re-Evaluating Research Aims Presenting Findings.

Nicholson, Barbara. (2000). Something There Is....

Vice (April 2013). Surviving in the Siberian Wilderness for 70 Years. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt2AYafET68 

[streetcartoonist]

Empedoclean Pluralism

Most of the time it is unfair to see someone’s life work as being entirely reactionary to their predecessor, but the pluralists are uniquely reactionary. The entirety of their belief system is a response to the Eleatic rejection of change and the world of flux as portrayed by Heraclitus. Until then, the dominant world view in Greek philosophical circles was that there was a substance called the arche that differentiates into everything you can see. The Ionians disagreed on what this substance was or how it became everything else, but it is clear that Parmenides vehemently disagreed with him.

The exact views of Parmenides are unknown and the scholarship behind his work is surprisingly contested. There are several views on what he actually advocated for, but his central criticism of change is not one of those contentious points in Parmenidean scholarship. Put simply, Being is and consequently Being cannot not be. The idea that if something exists that it must continue existing is the central assumption of Parmenides. It leads to his rejection of change because if something were to change then its previous form would have to cease to exist and the new form would have to come into being, which is impossible. The traditional reading of Parmenides then argues that he thought the world was an unchanging sphere, an eternal Being that would never cease to be or ever change. That everything exists in a single undying moment. The short story is that people agreed with Parmenides that things don’t change, in the way that the Milesians advocated for change, and rejected the idea of an arche, thus rejecting monism, but they were not keen on thinking that we exist in a homogenous blob and that everything we know is a lie. This partial acceptance of Eleatic philosophy is where the pluralists come onto the intellectual scene. This week we are going to be highlighting one of them, Empedocles.

He is a lot like Pythagoras in the sense that he was a man that is now shrouded in legend and has a lot of myth and ridicule tied to him. Most famously, there is an apocryphal story that he jumped into Mt. Etna in order to destroy his body so people would think he was whisked off to heaven and became a god. The story also goes that he left his slipper on the mountain which exposed his rouse. This legend is almost universally rejected as a malicious rumor spread by the thinker’s opponents. But Empedocles would certainly have liked to be thought of as a god. His supporters sincerely advocated that he was able to raise the dead and perform miracles. He allegedly was expelled from the Pythagorean cult and was banished from his home in Sicily. The likely truth was that he was heavily influenced by the Orphic mystery or Pythagoreanism, was politically active in supporting democracy, and that he left Sicily to never return. It is common in the secondary sources to mention that he was banished by his political rivals (those who opposed to democracy). His writing style is similar to Parmenides in that he wrote in hexameter and is often cited as a poet. However, unlike Parmenides his work is divided into two starkly different poems instead of a poem with different sections and he did not invoke a goddess. There is also no reason to think as much about Empedocles’s choice of writing style as you would Parmenides, because Empedocles did not claim divine revelation. Empedocles was a poet and wrote in response to Parmenides which could sufficiently explains his choice of using hexameter.

Empedocles wrote two poems that have only survived in fragments, and we likely have less than a quarter of the original work. However, from these fragments and other ancient sources addressing his work, we have an idea about what his views were. The commentaries written in the 20th century, such as A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell, talk far more about his scientific poem titled On Nature. As you may have noticed this is the same title that Parmenides titled his work. Empedocles’s On Nature according to Russell is clearly a scientific work where he outlines his metaphysics and view which we now know as pluralism. The second poem written by Empedocles was religious in nature and is titled as Purifications, which is an obvious reference to the Orphic mystery religion. Russell does not discuss the second poem much but does state that Empedocles’s religious views were similar to the views of the Pythagorean school. From reading various commentaries it is apparent that Empedocles’s scientific poem was more influential and more widely discussed. In it the pluralist view of the world is laid out.

Pluralism is a lot like monism in that both belief systems advocate for the existence of substances that are eternal and original. In the Milesian school, all that there is springs from the arche through various processes of change. In Empedocles’s pluralism there are four original and eternal substances called roots. In addition to having more than one original substance, Empedocles believed that these substances did not change. The idea that the original substance does not change, cannot change, is due to influence of Parmenidean monism on the ancient world. It is unclear if Empedocles was extending the ideas of Parmenides which is what a predicational monist reading would indicate or if Empedocles rejected the ideas of Parmenides because their final derivations were unpalpable, such as the notion motion is impossible, which would be in line with a strict monist reading.

Empedocles had an explanation for how a small number of original substances called roots could result in the perceived diversity of matter that is evident by sense perception. He advocated that the roots were earth, air, fire, and water and that these substances would either mix or separate to form everything else. This belief was likely another response to Parmenides in that it advocates the world is as it is perceived rather than it being contrary to what it seems. The use of a process to explain the diverse reality we live in is probably influenced by the Milesian school, which in several instances argued that the world is formed by processes. It could be said that advocating for multiple roots was just a way to work around the Parmenidean challenge to change so that ancient thinkers could justify a belief in a world that seems to change. It is important to emphasize that Empedocles would say that he does not believe that things change, he would say that he thinks everything is a combination of eternal unchanging substances that are either separating or mixing.

In Empedoclean pluralism, the separating and mixing process has a mystical element to it. He refers to the process as Love and Strife or untranslated as Philotes and Neikos. Philotes and Neikos are the Romanized names of personified deities in the Greek religion. They are not only forces that are as eternal as the roots themselves, but they are literal Beings. Neikos or the Niekea represent strife or conflict that causes people to move away from each other but in this system of viewing the world, it represents the force that causes the roots to separate from each other and move to their purer form. Philotes in mythology is the living embodiment of love and friendship, here Philotes is Love the force that causes the roots to mix and become intertwined.

Empedocles viewed that reality was a sphere, no doubt another reference to the Eleatic school, and that this sphere was in a constant cycle of being dominated by either Love or Strife. During the cycle, one of the forces would almost completely occupy the sphere while the other force was on the outside. He advocated that humanity was likely born during a time when the sphere was full of Love, and the roots were becoming more intertwined. The movement of the forces, like the roots, is an eternal and unending process. It could be said that Empedocles was at least in some sense advocating a teleology, the idea that history has a distinct direction or pattern, and in some ways that opinion would be correct. However none of the primary or secondary sources I have read point this out, so it would be more conservative to assume that the idea of a teleology came later and could have been influenced by the Empedoclean cycle of love and strife.

Thank you for reading and please feel free to comment your responses or suggestions!

Suggested readings

Early Greek Philosophy – John Burnet

Greek Philosophy: Thales to Plato – John Burnet

The History of Western Philosophy – Bertrand Russel

History of Philosophy – William Turner

A History of Philosophy, volume 1 – Frederick Copleston

[justforbooks]

More than 60 years ago, Lawrence Ferlinghetti wrote,

I am anxiously waiting for the secret of eternal life to be discovered.

By most counts, he seems to have discovered it.

Ferlinghetti — the poet, the scholar, the champion of Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl,” the co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers, the tireless critic of political ills — turned 100 on March 24.

He has not mellowed. At all.

In 2017, Ferlinghetti told The Washington Post, “I never wanted to write an autobiography because I don’t like looking back.” Evidently, he overcame that reluctance, but, of course, the autobiography he’s releasing this month is entirely on his own terms. “Little Boy” isn’t really a memoir. The publisher calls it “a novel,” but it really isn’t that either. As his literary ancestor Walt Whitman would say, it’s a “barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”

A few months ago, Ferlinghetti claimed, “The little boy is an imaginary me,” but the broad outlines of his real life appear here, particularly in the early pages, which are the only ones that tell something like a coherent story. We learn of his tumultuous childhood: His father died before he was born; an aunt whisked him to France and then back to the United States; the aunt’s wealthy employer, descended from the founders of Sarah Lawrence College, adopted him.

He may have lived like “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” but “it was a very lonely life for Little Boy,” Ferlinghetti writes, “with the nearest neighbor out of sight and no children of any age to play with.” In a mansion some 20 miles outside New York City, his new guardians spoke to one another in courtly tones and dressed in Victorian garb. They sent him to a private school, and, more important, they possessed a fine library, which he was encouraged to use.

As the pace of “Little Boy” accelerates chaotically, whole years fly by in a phrase or two — from high school to college with a major in journalism, and then the Navy, where he participated in the Normandy landing and saw Nagasaki just a few weeks after it was destroyed. Discharged, he earned an MA in literature at Columbia University, a PhD at the University of Paris and “emerged as a reasonably miseducated product of high culture and not all so irrelevant as rebels might imagine.” And then, around Page 15, the wheels bust off this narrative, and we’re airborne: “Grown Boy came into his own voice and let loose his word-hoard pent up within him.”

What follows for the next 150 pages is a volcanic explosion of personal memories, political rants, social commentary, environmental jeremiads and cultural analysis all tangled together in one breathless sentence that would make James Joyce proud.

Do I recommend it?

Yes I said yes I will Yes.

You may think you’re in good shape, but before long, you’ll be panting after this irrepressible geezer. “Little Boy” is full-on stream-of-consciousness: “A Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man.” As he swoops back and forth through the impressions and highlights of his long life, Ferlinghetti spits on conventional grammar and mocks the very idea of linear coherence. A Beat sensibility? Sure, but there’s also a dose of Robin Williams’s manic comedy here: the hairpin turns, the interior voices bantering with each other, the constant spinning of an idea till it ricochets off to another. He’s the silliest, angriest, kindest, smartest man you’ve ever heard — a whirling dervish of scholarly asides, literary allusions, corny puns and twisted aphorisms drawn from “an echo chamber of everything ever said or sung in the history of man.”

The inevitable annotated edition of “Little Boy” will have to be four times longer just to explain all the references. Any page might offer a bastardized phrase from Genesis, Shakespeare and Matthew Arnold, while criticizing Christianity, condemning American capitalism and warning of the climate apocalypse.

No one alive carries the history, the writers, the personal experience of 20th-century literature in his mind as Ferlinghetti does. “I was all the mad wandering tattered poets rolled into one sleeping under the bridges of the world,” he writes, “I met all the other great writers and poets and great articulators of consciousness.” Allen Ginsberg, Dylan Thomas, Samuel Beckett, William S. Burroughs and so many others flit in and out of these pages so casually that when he mentions Don Quixote, it took me a moment to realize that he didn’t know the knight personally . Indeed, scholars and fans of the writers who passed through Ferlinghetti’s San Francisco bookstore and publishing house may hope for a compendium of colorful anecdotes, but “Little Boy” has no ambitions in that direction.

“What is the plot of this novel,” he asks in one of many self-referential passages, “if not the remembrance of things still not past for the past is but a cautious counselor of what has yet to come what has yet to transpire or expire so farewell final albatross as time ticks on and all of us like insects in an anthill seen from space all nebulous figures dancing in a tropic night through the night-mazes singing a lyric escape again then and why not Are we to live in despair all the time thinking only of our certain deaths so why not live the highs and ignore the lows. . . .”

Yes, this can feel like trying to set the table while falling down the stairs, but there’s something hypnotic about Ferlinghetti’s relentless commentary, a style that amuses him, too: “Every sentence the last sentence I’ll ever write but then there’s always another thought to be spoken or written and we can’t go on but I do.” If you’re willing to let go, he’ll win you over. “Perhaps there is no meaning there is only existing just as a poem or a painting does not mean but Is and there are only episodes that don’t add up to any meaning but exert in themselves the pith of living.”

It’s that “pith of living” that “Little Boy” offers up so frequently and unexpectedly. Grab hold of any section, break it apart like a pomegranate, and you’ll find delicious bits randomly spread about.

Stick with this book long enough, and you’ll start to hear the central concerns of Ferlinghetti’s life. They revolve around the disastrous conspiracy of our fecundity and our selfishness, what he calls “me-me-me.” “Oh for a little erectile dysfunction before the earth bursts its latitudinals with overpopulation,” he cries, “the spaceship earth overloaded and no end to the eternal rutting and breeding a primeval instinct that will not be denied and no politician dare touch it and don’t tell me I can’t have a baby.”

That concern for the fate of the Earth clearly haunts this thoughtful man as he contemplates “the ravenous maw of eternity.” He may be, as he calls himself, a “dissident romantic or romantic dissident,” but he feels in his own approaching mortality the larger calamity barreling down on us all as we fritter away these final chances for salvation. “The cries of birds now are not cries of ecstasy but cries of despair.”

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[nox-lee]

My Beloved is Mine and I am His: 13x02 and Song of Solomon

One of the first things I wrote when I was brand new to the fandom was a short fic with Castiel reading and re-enacting sections from the Song of Songs to Dean. At the time, I thought it was too cheesy and trite to fit within the realm of Supernatural, and I deleted it in a bout of frustration. I am regretting that today like you wouldn’t believe.

I’m a bit of a bible nerd. I took a lot of theology and religion classes in my undergrad. That was nearly a decade ago though, so my current knowledge is a bit shaky. Here’s what I can recall about Song of Solomon that may or may not inform your reading of 13x02 and SPN in general.

A disclaimer: I am sick and drug addled, so please forgive any incoherent rambling. There is a lot of irrelevant gibberish, so I’ve tried to highlight the bits relevant to SPN.

To begin!

Solomon is the heir of King David (whom you may recall had a passionate same-sex relationship with Jonathan.) Solomon’s reign is idealized, much like David’s was, and it was under Solomon that the First Temple was built. Solomon is famous for his wisdom and his large concubine of women. Notably, he settled a dispute between two women who were fighting over a child. He offered to cut it in half, revealing the true mother who could not bring herself to see the child hurt. This bears resemblance to Jack’s situation right now, torn between two fathers.

Song of Solomon (also known as Song of Songs, or the Canticles) is often attributed to Solomon because he is mentioned. However, the text is dated much later, and certain Persian words and influences in the text suggest a post-exilic era as the earliest possible date. Some scholars date it even later.

Song of Solomon is part of the collection in the Hebrew Bible known as The Writings (or the Kethuvim). It’s the third major division in the Hebrew Bible, and one of the last to be adopted into canon. It’s a bit of a catch all category that contains vastly diverse content including poetic works (Psalms, Song of Songs), and wisdom literature (Proverbs, Job, Ecclesiastes), to name a few.

Most of these writings (including Song of Songs) date to the post-exilic era. That is, after the Babylonian conquest, and during Persian rule. The nation of Judah perished in the fires that were set to Solomon’s temple. Post-exile, Judea was experiencing a theological crisis in the face of the apparent absence of Yahweh, or God. David’s dynasty has collapsed, and we see theological despair reflected in writings like Job and Ecclesiastes that ponder the problem of evil, the absence of God, and undeserved suffering. Song of Solomon, and other writings like it, were written at a time when things felt hopeless and there were fears that God has abandoned his people. It is oddly fitting then, that Jack should open to this particular part of the bible. 

The Kethuvim mark a shift in religious thought. Previous writings centred on an independent kingdom involved in international politics. After the fall of the temple, we see an exiled, diasporic religion now led by priests instead of divinely appointed kings. Religious leaders and writers had to adjust and re-envision their scriptural teachings. Gone was the simplistic thesis that equated prosperity with religious obedience and misery with sin. The authors of the books known as The Writings were questioning conventional scripture of the time and creatively refocusing their theology.

Persian rule also introduced new religious ideas, namely Zoroastrianism, which came to influence later Judeo-Christian ideas. Zoroastrianism viewed the world as dualistic, ruled by two opposing powers of good (light) and evil (dark) and had hierarchies of angels and demons. Until this time, most biblical literature did not give name or ranks to angels, nor did they depict satan as an actual autonomous figure. We have Zoroastrianism to thank for that, and its influence on biblical writings can start to be felt around the post-exile period (i.e. the time during which Song of Solomon was written). The book of Daniel, for example, names the angel Gabriel, and the Book of Tobit names the demon Asmodeus. (In Tobit, Asmodeus is a jealous demon who kills each successive husband of Sarah on her wedding night and is later exorcised. He is someone who keeps lovers apart and keeps them from consummating their love.)

Songs of Songs is essentially a collection of erotic love poems. The book defies any easy interpretation or classification, and it stands out in stark contrast to the rest of biblical canon. It’s a completely unabashed, uninhibited celebration of sex, with little evidence to suggest that the lovers are married. They do not live together, and yearn intensely for one another when apart. It’s the subject of numerous feminist readings, as it’s one of few books of the bible to give a voice to women’s thoughts and feelings. Here, those are romantic and erotic feelings.

Don’t believe me? Read this:

My beloved thrust his hand into the opening, and my inmost being yearned for him. I arose to open to my beloved, and my hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with liquid myrrh, upon the handles of the bolt. (Song of Solomon 5: 4-5)

This is some raunchy stuff for the bible! And all of this is sharply contrasted with the sexual ethos elsewhere in the bible which imposes harsh penalties for sexual misconduct, and places great emphasis on the institution of marriage. Deuteronomy (a book of the bible about sexual and social control) calls for the death penalty in many cases

There was understandably some debate as to whether this particular bit of writing warranted inclusion in the biblical canon of scripture. Rabbi Akiba was a key figure in the development of the Hebrew canon. While he argued strongly against the inclusion of certain books of the Apocrypha, he advocated for the Song of Songs, calling it the Holy of Holies. Its sanctity was preserved by interpreting it as an allegory for the love between Yahweh and Israel, and later by Christians as the love between Christ and the Church. Interestingly, God is not mentioned once in the entire book. (The only other book of the Bible where God is not mentioned even once is Esther.)

And yet, this book was called the Holiest of Holies. Love is championed here above all else.

I really don’t think we’ve seen the last of Chuck. Someone (I’m sorry, I can’t remember who!) pointed out the rainbow glare that happened in 13x01 when Dean was praying as a sign of God’s promise. (Edit: I’m an idiot. I reblogged the damn thing and it was just a couple posts down. It was @gneisscastiel who made the beautiful post about lens flares and pointed out the rainbow as God’s promise.)  The inclusion of Song of Solomon in 13x02, besides being a blatant callout to Dean and Cas, suggests this is also about God and his people. I’d also like to suggest that Song of Solomon is a book that asks us to think broadly about canon. What constitutes canon? How is it formed? And I do mean canon here in the sense not just of biblical canon, but of fandom canon. Who decides what canon is? Is there room in canon for outliers like the Song of Solomon? The answer, as the show has just demonstrated, should be a resounding yes.

Onto the destiel side of things, which I’m sure has been discussed already. Song of Solomon contains some of the most beautiful poetry in the Bible. It is full of similes and references to nature (and arguably Eden/Paradise). It is deeply rural and pastoral, with an appreciation of agriculture, nature, and animal life. The multiple reference to sheep in 13x02 were no coincidence, I’m sure. Castiel has long been associated with natural, rural things: flowers, bees, goats, fish, etc. (If the Void is depicted as a garden and Cas has been spending his time under apple trees, I’m going to lose my freaking mind.) Is he being associated with sheep now? As someone who has been led by God, other angels, duty, Dean, Jack… perhaps this is time for Cas to choose a direction for himself. Sheep and lambs in the bible are also frequently marked for sacrifice. They represent symbolic innocence, and in the New Testament, Christ is called the “Lamb of God.” I definitely think Cas is being set up as a Christ-like figure with his death and anticipated resurrection. If 13x02 made anything clear, it’s that Cas is the answer the whatever problem faces Dean, Sam, and Jack alike.  

Lamentations might have been a more appropriate choice for the episode. It’s also a book of poetry, but one that evokes pain and loss. But they chose instead to give us the book that celebrates love and hope amidst despair. That’s a choice that feel very deliberate, and makes me cautiously optimistic for Dean and Cas.

 In closing, here are some passages from Song of Solomon, and the ones I feel are most closely tied to a destiel narrative.

“You have ravished my heart with a glance of your eyes.” (Song of Solomon 4:9)

 “Set me a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm…”   (Song of Solomon 8:6)

  “… For love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame.” (Song of Solomon 8:6)

“I will seek him whom my soul loves. I sought him, but found him not.” (Song of Solomon 3:2)

 “My beloved is mine and I am his.”  (Song of Solomon 2:16)

[quarantinemusiccalendar]

Day 216: David Gray - Mutineers (2015)

David Gray is an introspective subtle British singer / songwriter, instantly recognizable for his raspy voice, poetic lyrics and signature quiet / build-up melodies. Twenty years ago, he was all over the radio air and his song Babylon was a huge hit. Now not so much. But I have discovered him when I was about 16-17 and he has remained on my playlists ever since. The difference is, that now I appreciate different parts of his discography more. Less of the pop leaning, more of the poetic and intricate.

To be honest, I knew already four months ago, that I want to write a blog post / article or whatever this is about David Gray. But it took me all this time to figure out which one of his albums to pick. I went through his complete discography several times and at the end I had to go album by album, put down notes for each album and rate each song. And at the end it was a very close top 3 selection: White Ladder (1998) is a classic, it’s his most famous album and songs like Babylon, This Year’s Love, Sail Away and Please, Forgive Me are the ones he’s known for even to wider public. But they have been played over and over so many times and I probably wouldn’t be introducing you to anything new. Foundling (2010) is the quiet double album, warm, minimalist and majestic in an intimate way. And I love it, but the one which came on top and which I want to introduce you to is his (currently) penultimate record: Mutineers (2014). Listening to the whole Mutineers album, it does feel like the best parts of all his previous albums. The quiet songs are on par with the best songs of his Foundling and Life in Slow Motion albums. The general vibe feels a lot like the White Ladder era, but it’s more polished. The only song on the album I don’t like is the duet with LeAnn Rhymes, Snow in Vegas. Too many country vibes to my taste.

Listening to the whole Mutineers album, it does feel like the best parts of all his previous records. The quiet songs are on par with the best songs of his Foundling and Life in Slow Motion albums. The general vibe feels a lot like White Ladder era, but it’s more polished. And it’s more accessible, a tad more mainstream, then the records from his “middle era”. The album is an optimistic one, it’s projecting a combination of balance, contentment and pursuit of joy that only come with age, knowing who you are and finding your place in world.

Mutineers is a track about loosing oneself in a moment. Its rocking rhythm and melody give it a comforting quality. And yet, quite typically for Gray, it grows steadily into a thunderous almost tribal finale featuring a wild harmonica part. Interestingly, even Gray doesn’t know what the lyrics of the song mean. The song came as a product of Andy Barlow (producer) taking a chord sequence of one of the songs that David written recently and brought to the studio, making David cut both the verse and chorus and creating a new song by expanding that short section they both liked. playing with almost random ideas and building a song out of them. You can watch David explain it here.

Birds of the High Arctic is sublime song with beautiful intertwining vocals, piano and strings. Listening to it, it’s actually so easy to imagine yourself sitting on a seashore somewhere up north watching birds flying and gliding in the wind currents above a cold sea. You can tell that it was written by an amateur birdwatcher.

Gulls is another song on this album that features windswept landscapes and birds. It’s a moody and atmospheric one, almost a musical sketch to a coastal scene. Its lyrics are inspired by a Belgian poem by Herman de Coninck called Just As This Island Belongs to the Gulls which Gray took and simplified and added some of his own lines.

Last Summer is a simple song about physical longing. It features a tiny toy harp and prominent cello line that plays almost a Chinese-like melody. It has a warm golden veneer of memories someone made with a loved one.

This album is both comfortable and comforting at the same time. The only song on the album I don’t like is the duet with LeAnn Rhymes, Snow in Vegas. Too many country vibes to my taste.

One song I want to add to this list, although it is not on this album, is Enter Lightly. It’s from the same era. It features as a new song on his 2016 Best Of album and came out as a stand alone single in the same year, two years after the Mutineers album. It features all the things I love about his music. The dynamic, the build up, a bridge in a different key and the rolling rhythm, but all of it jazzed up with a bit more electro parts then in his average song. It’s a driving songs and it makes me happy every time I hear it, so I tend to use it as a mood lifter as well.

Happy Monday, relax and enjoy.

Highlights: - Mutineers - Birds of the High Arctic - Gulls - Last Summer - Enter Lightly

Playlist:   shorturl.at/fEUX4

Links and references: - David Gray - Wikipedia - Mutineers (album) - Wikipedia - J. Carney (4 August 2014), David Gray - The TVD Interview. The Vinyl District.

[the-witty-kitty]

hello! i was scrolling through the a-level history tag on tumblr just in hopes of finding some inspiration to do work - although i still don't have the motivation to do so, is there any tips you could give me? i'm doing a-level history focusing on South Africa and America but am dramatically failing both, with very little knowledge retention. i have coursework coming up that i also have no idea how to accomplish.

((Oh hello low key shook that you’ve come to me because lmao I’ve had no idea what I’m doing throughout my sixth form life so far and high key flattered

Honestly, I relate to you on such a spiritual level because history modules have so much content in them that it’s overwhelming and makes me want to deck myself. Fortunately, the history department of my Sixth Form provide a content guide for us which, that and my exercise book, is the of base my revision.

Notes // Revision Book

Personally, I prefer to have all information for topics and sub-topics in one place which is handwritten out again in another book. These notes would be written into my own words and condensed down massively. Literally the most time-consuming element of my life, I wanted to scratch my eyes out. (Pretty colours kept me sane.) I’d also recommend bolding any key dates, historical characters, facts and figures and any key words that would help you.

Flash Cards // Mindmaps // Timelines

For me, physically writing revision on paper or in mindmaps or flash cards tend to help me to remember which is why I prefer it to re-reading notes or textbooks. (Some science bullshit in active memory or something idk) (Making them look #aesthetic helped to make the task less gruelling and insta worthy.)

Honestly, I would scribble notes and revision down on anything. I re-did mindmaps, notes, timelines, mindmaps, essays, questions, miNDMAPS. The repetitive element is the only thing that helped me to remember; it’s boring but I’d recommend it. Any A3 pads of papers are hella useful as well; I had a shit ton of these mindmaps and timelines up on my walls during March-May and it wasn’t pretty and looked pretty bleak but I guess it helped? After doing my flash cards and mindmaps, I’d re-do scruffy ones but without the use of my previous revision notes, that way I’d be using memory instead of regurgitating textbooks and notes.

Staff // Friends // Family

Exploit your teachers. Exploit the department. I feel pity for them after dealing with me, espesically after I spent the year sucking up to all possible staff members of the history department. A little bit of banter here, a little bit of teasing there and they were always there for me. They must hate me by now. I’d ask for anything and everything. Mark questions, mark essays, re-mark said essays and questions, ask for the mark scheme, sample essays, dates, figures, stupid knowledge that I didn’t need but interested me. Albeit I love history and the periods that we studied (Russian history oioi) but I would have not gotten any of it without some of the staff. A fav of mine - who doesn’t even teach me history this year but taught me a year prior through my GCSEs - sat with me 3 hours before the exam and went through everything on the Cold War and then it came up in my exam. He is a godsend. Use them, I’m sure they’re rad people.

I also babbled so much crap to my family, explaining all of the periods that we studied, all of the policies, strengths and weaknesses and all keys events. They had no idea what I was on about and most probably didn’t even listen but that’s fine I guess forget about me but it helped me to revise through memory not just repeating from my notes. Upcoming to my exams I would take on a teacher-esque role and repeat all of the content back to my friends; it was a two-way system: I’d think on the spot and they’d listen like a normal revision lesson.

(Wow man I’m such a nerd wtf I only just realised. I’m so sorry how long this is frick.)

Documentaries // Youtube

I’m so lazy wow. They help if you’re a lazy piece of shit like me, just actively watch them and even take notes so that you know you’re getting the most out of your time. I’d personally recommend CrashCourse on youtube. It’s got tons of subjects and topics and they’re between 10-15 minutes so it’s a quick burst of info that’s not too overwhelming. (Also I’m such a nerd and laugh at the inside historical jokes wow.)

Questions // Essays // Past Papers

Just do ‘em. My hand would cramp up so bad after doing one of these bad boy essays but gradually I saw improvement.

Make sure you 101% understand what you have to do in the question. Description? Analysis? Explanation? Comparison? The only way you’ll master identifying what to do and the technique is if you do past questions and get feedback. If you teacher doesn’t address faults as for them. (My ego was crushed so many times it hurt man. It hurt.)

Coursework

Unfortunately, I haven’t started my coursework yet - we’re starting straight way and it’s on Martin Luther King so quite the topic considering the modern day cough dickhead trump cough - however, I’m aware that we have to conduct our own research and gather quotes etc.

From past coursework related experiences, again I’d recommend using the heck outta your teachers. If you’ve got the time, do re-draft after re-draft. And if it’s a crap ton of work to do reduce it into sections of analysis of one historical source or on one topic, that way you have more accomplishments when you finish a piece and you’ll receive constant feedback as you go along, in which you can adjust your work accordingly.

If you are required to do research try and mix it up with written sources, accademic articles and historiography. Google Scholar is pretty rad and prevents you from seeing articles or sites that are bias and have bias opinions. I’d also recommend any government offical websites (typically with .gov) if you’re researching contemporary history within the last hundred years or so and need figures such as birth or death rates at the time etc. Your teachers most likely have a ton of physical book resources at their disposal which they’ll allow you to use. Again, that fav teacher of mine allowed me to borrow 5+ books on Russian 20th century over the summer for my Welsh Bac project so I’m sure you’ll find a kind sole like this one somewhere.

Although coursework is agonising, it’s arguably better than exams and allow you to have some control over the outcome so if you keep on top of it you can grab a nice grade before the summer and easily helped raise your overall grade.

(Pretty sure my coursework will be the final death of me because my exam board has a rule on teacher intervention and if too much help is given out marks are taken away which is such horseshit?? So check to see if there are any rules.)

Summary

Reduce school work and textbooks into your own language and book.

Make revision materials from your own notes - flash cards, mindmaps, timelines, poems, acronyms - literally anything just write.

Repeat repeat repeat - try not to turn stir crazy!

Highlight dates, historical figures, numerical figures, facts, and events.

Documentaries and videos are a time and energy saver.

Learn the question styles and technique and hand in essays.

Use any feedback given. Even read the examiner’s report if you can access it.

Coursework - try to get any feedback if possible. Bookmark any sources or websites used as you may have to reference if it’s a written piece.

Google scholar is exceptional at providing articles and therefore you’re not prone to any historical bias when researching your topic.

Government sites are scary but nice for juicy facts and figures.

Break it down into little easy chunks such as dates, policies, location or historical evidence/sources so it’s easier to see and handle.

Coursework will inevitably affect your grade and its more or less the only thing you can control so constantly improve it whenever and you’ll do amazing!

I hope at least one of these things help with your revision as everyone learns and revises differently. Honestly, I’ve only adopted this technique this school year and I’m sure next year I’ll have something new. I won’t shy away from the fact that history is my favourite subject and therefore revision for this area is not too gruelling, but I’m a lil nerd and mini revision freak so pls don’t be too overwhelmed.

I wish you all the best for the upcoming year and your exams! I’m always around if you ever want a chat so hit me up!

- Soph

[beckettsthoughts]

Poetry

Poetry: If you have one, name a favourite book or poem.

This is the best question, I love poetry so much and I have some definite favourites. I also have couple of favourite books, or at least books I love with all my heart and will always recommend, so I’ll note those at the end. I apologise for this taking a while, but there’s no way I could go short on this one. No way whatsoever. I really needed a distraction and I felt like this was the kind of ask I could drag out into an essay-length epic of rambling about literature, so I hope you don’t mind that I kind of took this and ran with it.

I read it in your word, and learn it from, by Rainer Maria Rilke

This is my favourite poem from Rilke’s collection Poems from the Book of Hours, a book I bought several years ago from an adorable little shop in Paris. “I read it in your word, and learn it from/ the history of the gestures of your warm/ wise hands,” this poem so perfectly describes a feeling I cannot otherwise put into words. Something like listening to a person and understanding them, learning from them and appreciating them. 

The Yellow Palm, by Robert Minhinnick

I studied this poem for GCSE, which by all rights should mean I hate it. Instead, this poem has become one of my favourites. With rich sensory description and a complex emotional impact, this ballad describes Minhinnick’s experiences walking the streets of Baghdad in the late 1990s. It’s political in a more subtle way than some, but you can truly empathise with both the people the poet describes and the poet himself. It stuck in my head for a long time after I first read it.

Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out, by Richard Siken

I have not read that much of Siken’s work. I have read this and maybe one or two others, so I cannot claim to know much about Siken. This poem, however, really caught my heart when I discovered it some years ago and it has not released it since. Siken’s writing is captivating, in all honesty, and the structure of the poem is nothing short of genius. It’s an analysis, a musing, a conversation, a letter and a lesson. I could possibly talk about this poem for hours.

The Lost Leader, by Robert Browning

This is another of the poems I studied at school, this one for my A Level course. Again, my reaction to school-sanctioned texts was not so typical, because my teacher’s enthusiasm netted me and Browning is now one of my favourite poets. The Lost Leader is actually not so typical for Browning, definitely the most unique from the collection we studied, and I love it as much for the political and social context as I do for the phrasing and the rhythm. This poem is, in all honesty, Browning grousing about Wordsworth for selling out to the monarchy and betraying the liberal cause. “Just for a handful of silver he left us/ Just for a riband to stick in his coat.” It’s like the Romance poets’ equivalent of a modern day celebrity Twitter feud, complete with name-dropping and petty accusations.

Dulce et Decorum Est, by Wilfred Owen

Okay, I know this is another typical school poem, but I didn’t actually cover this one in any of my English classes. Not even when we had an entire year studying war and conflict poems. No, this poem has entered my consciousness many times over the years and eventually it stuck, as poems seem wont to do. This poem is a scathing criticism of political attitudes to conflict and the glorification of war. The brutal descriptions and imagery are drawn from Owen’s own experiences, and the honesty behind it is one of the reasons this poem is as powerful as it is. The last line refers to a famous phrase, “Dulce et decorum est/ Pro patria mori”, meaning ‘it is sweet and honorable to die for one’s country’, as “the old Lie”; arguing against the perception of war as a noble thing and instead highlighting the cruelty and brutality instead. This poem is revolutionary, and it changed many people’s attitudes towards war, and that is why I love it as much as I do.

The Laboratory, by Robert Browning

And another one from Browning, another one I studied in school. This is one of a group my class dubbed ‘the murder poems’ and for good reason, as this poem details one woman’s plans to poison her ex-lover and his new paramour in the setting of the aristocratic, feudal Ancien Régime of France. It’s written in iambic pentameter, making the rhythm deceptively bouncy and upbeat compared to the subject matter, and the descriptive language is just luscious. The narrator describes the poisons in the laboratory with such fervour, the “gold oozings” and “exquisite blue”, and her wicked excitement about it all is what drives that fast rhythm. It’s hard not to enjoy this poem, honestly.

Angel with a Fiddle, by Bette Wolf Duncan

This is probably the most obscure of the poems I’m talking about, as I have only seen it on one website and even that’s unreachable now. For that reason I considered leaving it off the list, because it’s kind of torturous to describe it without you having any real way of finding it, but I’m going to talk about it anyway. This poem is really what drove my love of folk poetry, not so much because it is a folk poem but instead because the language used is so damn good at evoking the feeling of a folk poem. “Tall n’ lean n’ lanky,/ With a fiddle neath his chin…/ The days weren’t quite so cruel/ When he played his violin.” As a violinist and lover of folk poetry, this just calls to me. It has an air of mystique about it which I love, but it’s just such a sweet little verse. I hope it can find it properly again, some day.

Special shout-outs go to the many poems of Leonard Cohen, all of which I love but could not choose a favourite from; the poems of Pablo Neruda, all of which make my heart ache in the best way, and also to any and all of the comedy poems I grew up hearing and loving. That includes the works of Hillaire Belloc, The Kings Breakfast and other assorted works of A.A. Milne, and T.S. Elliot’s Book of Practical Cats. I really do love poetry. 

Now, onto books:

The Raven Cycle, by Maggie Stiefvater

This is just the perfect fantasy series for me. Every character seems so genuine and so alive, fitting into this epic of magic and wonder and just plain weirdness. It’s hard to believe that every character in an ensemble cast could be quite so endearing, but it’s one of the reasons this book tops my favourite fantasy list and my favourite Y.A. list. There’s humour, there’s magic, there’s mystery and there’s relationships. I love it.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Neil Gaiman

This book is kinda scary. Moreso to adults than children, I think. I first read it the year it was released, in my early teens, and I’ve made it a mission to read it every now and then just to see how differently I interpret it each time. This is one of the few instances I’ve enjoyed a child narrator outside of a childrens’ book. It doesn’t come across as cheesy or dumbed-down, but it’s still appropriately and realistically naive. The magic and surrealist horror elements are very well-handled, and it captures a very genuine feeling of childhood curiosity. This is the kind of book I wish I could write.

Gray, by Pete Wentz (and James Montgomery)

I almost cheated and put this in the poetry section, because the language in this book is so beautifully poetic that it may as well be there. But no, this is a semi-autobiographical novel, a favourite genre of mine, and so I will write about it here. This book is very honest and brutal experience of mental illness and how that impacts your sense of self and relationships with others. It must have made me cry at least twenty times. It hurts, it hurts so hard, but I feel like recommending it anyway because I think it’s a good book for when you want to understand things and understand people. One of the reasons I love it, actually, is that it’s so rare to read something so introspective without it coming across as self-centred, but I came away from this book feeling like I understood Pete Wentz as a person way more than I could from any other media. 

Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

Lastly, a book I love for having the best humour and characters I can imagine, is Good Omens. Anyone who knows me outside of the internet knows how much I love this book. If anyone mentions anything even tangentially related to Good Omens or any topics or themes within Good Omens, I will talk about it. For a long time. Until I am situationally and circumstantially forced to stop talking about it. I raved about it enough to convince my best friend to read it and now, now he loves it just as much and we can rant about how good it is together. I would recommend this to anyone, regardless of what you usually read or don’t read, because I guarantee that at least 90% of people will love it. 

Anyway, thank you for making it all the way to the end of this, I had a lot of fun writing it and distracting myself from what has otherwise been a downright awful day. Thank you so much for sending me this question, and once again I apologise for going so completely overboard. Thank you

[paulisweeabootrash]

Book Review: The Tale of Genji (well, part of it)

So the "weeaboo" part of the name of this blog is obvious.  But the "trash" part?  I'm going to say this is an example of that, since, while writing this, I felt something I’ve felt many times before: like I’m not capable of Serious Analysis because I don't really understand Serious Literature.  In my reading habits, I gravitate much more towards speculative fiction — sci-fi and dystopias — that is not often filed under "literature" in stores or libraries, or even by cultural commentators.  But I feel like writing another review this month, and I'm running low on month, so today for your enjoyment(?), I'm tackling a book for the second time, and it's quite different from the previous book I reviewed in just about every way.

It's Japanese, it's very old, and it's "serious literature": The Tale of Genji (original c. 1021, this translation 1929).  Or the first 9 chapters, anyway, since I did not realize that’s all this version included when I bought it.

I seem to have a habit of just serendipitously stumbling into interesting things.  I first heard about The Tale of Genji by Lady Murasaki Shikibu from, of all things, the 1997 Windows edition of "Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego?".  I knew very little about it other than it being considered one of the earliest novels, so when I recently found, for an absurdly cheap price, a paperback of the Dover Thrift Edition, I bought it.  Turns out this edition contains only the first 9 chapters — "Kiritsubo" through "Aoi" — out of the full 54, as translated by Arthur Waley in 1929.  So that's all I'll talk about here.

Genji, our main character, is a son of the Emperor of Japan, but not the heir to the throne (in fact, as a member of the Minamoto Clan, he is not part of the line of succession at all), so he seems to enjoy wealth and an entourage but very little actual responsibility for governing.  He is granted a couple of military offices, but they do not seem to entail much beyond his initial training.  He spends his teens paying unsolicited visits and sending unsolicited letters to women he's attracted to in the hopes of getting some of them to respond well to his advances, sort of a high-class equivalent of Straight White Boys Texting.  But he's actually pretty good at it, since his main traits are being (1) very handsome and (2) good at poetry.  The plot of the chapters discussed in this review is largely concerned with his secret sexual exploits as a teenager, which range from genuine romantic relationships to behavior we'd now recognize as horridly entitled abuses of power.

The first chapter, which reads a bit differently than the others because it was a standalone work in a deliberately archaic folkloric writing style rather than the literary style of the time, briefly describes Genji's childhood, heaping nauseating praise on his intrinsic good looks, and ending with his political marriage at age 12 to his 16-year-old cousin Princess Aoi, an arrangement which neither has any interest in.  Jumping forward an unspecified amount of time, but still clearly sometime in Genji's teens, the next episode we see in his life is a lengthy discussion with Aoi's brother, To no Chujo (or, rather, Tō no Chūjō, 頭中将, which Google Translate renders as “Head General" — most characters in the book are referred to by either a title or a nickname, not their given names) and a couple of other aristocrats comparing the behaviors and virtues of various types of women, involving discussions of both personality and social class.  This provides a little bit of insight to the modern reader into the class system and attitudes on gender of the place and time, and narratively sets up Genji's behavior for the rest of the story.

Some of Genji's affairs are one-night stands, wherein he seduces or uses his status to impose himself upon relatives or servants of noblemen he is visiting.  Others are ongoing relationships, and declarations of belief in destined meetings and the exchange of flirty poems of varying quality are often involved.  These "relationships" such as they are end badly.  One successful one-night stand with a married woman leads Genji to hire the woman's 13-year-old brother as a messenger to try to arrange future encounters with her unsuspiciously, then because she is repeatedly not available, he decides the brother looks enough like her to be "no bad substitute for his ungracious sister".  Another, Genji neglects to the point of nearly ghosting her, although he seems at first to genuinely love her — once no longer feeling the "spark" of being in love, Genji stays in contact with her but rarely visits her.  Another is killed by a ghost, or possibly by fright at the belief that there is a ghost.  He is nearly caught multiple times, including by To no Chujo, and there is implicitly a looming threat of terrible damage to the reputations of Genji and his lovers and/or victims if he is ever exposed, but the whole series of events is merely suspected by acquaintances, never conclusively discovered.

All the while, in the background, Genji has been pining for Fujitsubo, his father's concubine.  This infatuation has been going on since his childhood, and plays itself out in an extraordinarily creepy way throughout the remaining chapters.  Genji, having fallen sick, travels to a monastery where Fujitsubo's mother is a nun, seeking healing.  Several orphans are being raised at the monastery, and one of them, Murasaki, looks strikingly familiar.  Genji discovers that she is the daughter of Fujitsubo's brother, born out of wedlock to a woman who since died, hence her presence at the orphanage.  He offers to adopt and tutor her, and there is a bit of miscommunication (that's actually kind of funny) in which he repeatedly tries to assure people that he knows she's a child and really is attempting to adopt her, not marry her.  He is turned away until he learns that Murasaki is to be sent off to live with her father, whom she does not know, at which point Genji returns to kidnap her and her nurse and bring them back to his palace to live with him.  Yeah.  He does tutor Murasaki and treat her in a parental sort of way, and his feelings are portrayed as initially innocent, but... it's clear he does actually intend to eventually marry her, which is horrifying, and the nurse is surprisingly in favor of this.  And within the confines of the story, the whole thing is "justified" by Genji's belief that they must have been lovers in a past life.

While Genji, by now I'm pretty sure somewhere in his late teens although I lost track of exactly how old, is grooming tutoring Murasaki (making her too outspoken and forward to be properly ladylike, it is mentioned, highlighting again the strict gender roles involved here), he also manages to finally hook up with Fujitsubo, fathering a child which, much to their relief, the Emperor unquestioningly accepts as his own.  Fujitsubo is then elevated from concubine to Empress, although she is not the mother of the Heir Apparent, and they cannot continue the affair.  The Heir is arranged to marry Oborozukiyo, who is his aunt, whom Genji of course also pursues, and then we skip ahead again to see that the Heir has ascended the throne and Genji's secret son by Fujitsubo is the new Heir Apparent.

Rokujo (the woman Genji seemed to love, then neglected) makes public their on-and-off relationship, and Genji, now 22, is reprimanded by his father, not for having the affair but for treating Rokujo so thoughtlessly and indiscreetly, risking both of their reputations.  After a confrontation at a religious ceremony that Rokujo takes as a personal insult, Genji and Aoi (hey, remember her? Genji’s wife?) finally start to spend time together, and Aoi gets pregnant but also terribly sick.  Rokujo believes she has inadvertently cursed her with the power of her jealousy — and is apparently proven right when she somehow possesses Aoi while the latter is in labor.  Aoi lingers for a while, but dies.  Genji mourns and regrets dramatically, and in the midst of his grief, just when he looks like he'll reform into not-a-creep, gets engaged to Murasaki (who is at this point, what, 14 or something?).  I'll just let this quote from the last chapter explain itself: "In Murasaki none of his hopes had been disappointed; she had indeed grown up into as handsome a girl as you could wish to see, nor was she any longer at an age when it was impossible for him to become her lover.  He constantly hinted at this, but she did not seem to understand what he meant."  Ew.  And so this book ends with sorting out Aoi’s estate and preparing for Genji and Murasaki’s wedding.

So... that's the beginning of the Tale of Genji.  There’s a lot more to it than that, and a lot worth talking about about, such as the frequency with which the real cause of events is left ambiguous, reporting only different people’s assumptions about them, or the depictions of Genji genuinely enjoying spending time with women in non-sexual contexts, neither of which is something a naïve reader, especially one with as dim a view of humanity as I usually have, would probably assume is contained in a thousand-year-old book.  But I’ve highlighted the things I have above because I'm left with one overarching question/feeling by all this.  I find the story interesting, but Genji himself usually repulsive.  I'm wondering whether he would've come off unsympathetically to the audience at the time or whether this is severe values dissonance.  I suspect the latter, but I'm not sure.

On the one hand, in the last chapter of this section, there is the reprimand about his behavior and a sort of demonstration through Rokujo of the havoc caused by Genji's behavior, and he shows apparently genuine sadness if not actual remorse throughout when the affairs that seem to involve actual romantic feelings fall apart.  Earlier on, we the audience do see the women’s feelings explored a bit, and they make Genji look like he doesn’t understand what he’s doing.  In the part of the story not contained in this book, there is a later exposed affair that he actually suffers some kind of social consequences for.  But on the other hand, I suspect that Genji's behavior would've been recognized as something like "boys will be boys" — the narrator certainly describes his behavior as if it’s inevitably how men are...  And maybe the raw feeling of entitlement to sex and the grooming of Murasaki (not to mention, if you chart out character relationships, a lot of incest) would be taken as acceptable or at least unavoidable behavior for aristocrats.  (At least, that's what I gather from what I've read of how European nobility behaved — I don't know if that translates for sure to other places and times, but it seems in line with modern research on power leading to disregard for others.)

This was written in Heian-era Japan, about which I admittedly know almost nothing except that it was when "the palace turned into such a dreamworld of art that they really didn't give a shit about running the country".  The class system is discussed explicitly in some places in the book, with characters making matter-of-fact assumptions and statements about what men and women of various classes are like.  If not necessarily the beliefs of the author, they probably reflect beliefs real people held.  This book would've been a subversive condemnation of a predatory ruling class if published in, say, France in the 1700s, but the Shogunate was still almost 200 years in the future for Lady Murasaki and her target audience.  This is contemporary, not historical, for her, and Genji as a person probably looks much worse in retrospect and through the eyes of modern audiences who don't believe in different behaviors being appropriate for people's "stations".

I'm curious to see whether other English translations are also written in such a convoluted and indirect style, and whether maybe they have more extensive translator's notes beyond citations to some of the quoted poems, explanations of characters' nicknames, and the occasional reminder who a rarely-mentioned character is...  I'm convinced that this is an interesting story, because I can enjoy an unsympathetic protagonist, but I'm not convinced that this is a great rendition of it.

------

Revised W/A/S Scores: 15 / 2? / 3? / yuck

Weeb: The original definition of a score of 10 on the weeb scale was that the work "assumes the audience possesses a PhD in Japanese cultural studies".  Even by that standard, I'm fairly sure that the book goes far beyond the intended top of the scale — not only resting deeply on Japanese cultural tropes and assumptions, but written in the court culture of the Heian-era aristocracy, which contains footnotes noting that even the translator is unsure of the sources of some of the quotes that appear to be from poems or songs of the time.  The past is definitely a foreign country, especially when you're separated by a millennium and reverence for a different regional power's traditions (at the time, Japan deeply romanticized China, and in fact many of the poetry quotes that are sourced are from influential Chinese poets).

Ass: For the amount of sex that happens in this book, there is certainly very very little actual sexual content.  But, like, maybe be an adult who is reading this.

Shit (writing): The vast majority of character interactions are believable, but it sort of falls flat with the barely-explained reconciliation between Genji and Aoi, and Genji's engagement to Murasaki seems to happen just because he and Murasaki's nurse expect it to more than because of any real romantic feelings or even political considerations.  I'm unsure whether this is a product of the original text or of the particular translation, but the writing style is stilted and convoluted even by my standards — and I like H.P. Lovecraft, not an author exactly known for being concise or unpretentious.  Other than just plain difficulty of understanding certain passages, I feel unqualified to judge the quality of writing at all.  Despite being characterized as a novel by modern audiences, it also feels much more episodic than you'd normally think for the word "novel", like a compilation of short stories about the same character, which I suspect based on the translator's introduction is how the book was actually written.  I was surprised and delighted to see some metacommentary in here — Murasaki goes off on asides several times, breaking character as the narrator, including to comment on how other authors would describe something but she doesn't want to, which was shockingly modern of her and reminded me a bit of the asides in the original novel of The Princess Bride about removing tedious sections.

Shit (other): not applicable, I'm pretty sure?

Content: Genji is a creep.

-----

Stray observations:

- "Minamoto" and "Genji" have the same kanji, according to the Wikipedia article linked above for the Minamoto Clan, which would make the implication that he was excluded from the line of succession immediately obvious to readers at the time, but I had to go look it up.

- This book also includes an interesting foreword giving some biographical information about Lady Murasaki, and I am intrigued by quoted excerpts from her diary, in which she talks at length about the beauty of her "great friend" Lady Saisho (to whom, says the translator, "she was evidently very strongly attached") in very similar terms to those quoted on the previous page in her description of Fujiwara no Michinaga, secretary to Emperor Ichijō, with whom she apparently had an ongoing sexual, if not necessarily romantic, relationship.  Is this a cultural misunderstanding on my part about how it was acceptable for people to describe each other's appearance in different times and places, or was Murasaki possibly bi?

- Possession by ghosts is a broadly cross-cultural idea, but I don't think I've ever heard of possession by a living person before!

[thewhitefluffyhat]

Bernkastel

What is this guide?

<< Previous (Witches and Fragments in Umineko)

Reading List: Highlights

Umineko Episode 2/Turn “??? Tea Party” [ Video / Text ]

Bernkastel explains some of her origins. And does Rika’s “nipah~”

”The Witches' Tanabata Isn’t Sweet”  [ Video / Text ]

Lambda cajoles Bern into granting a wish, which Bern does in her own way. (A good introduction to Bern’s personality.)

Umineko Episode 6/Dawn "Logic Error Backstory" scene

Video [Scene starts roughly 16:04, stop before 28:07]

Text [Skip the first two scenes by searching on “Erika, who wanted to savor the memory of her perfect victory”. Scene continues to end of the page.]

Lambda explains her and Bern’s origins to Erika. (This one scene contains the majority of information we have on all three witches’ connections to Higurashi.)

Umineko Episode 8/Twilight “Tea Party”  [ Video / Text ]

[Spoilers for several characters' fates at the end of Umineko, though not the solution to the core mystery.] Bern and Lambda in the aftermath of a hard-fought game. (A look at what the witches are like when not actively playing a role in a game.)

Reading List: I want it all

”Whose Tea Party?” [ Video / Text ]

Bern gets invited to a tea party. (A simple and silly scenario, but also a window into the differences in how Featherine and Lambda think of Bern.)

”Bernkastel’s Letter” [ Video / Text ]

Bernkastel writes a letter to (maybe) Featherine, explaining what she’s discovered about the rules to Beatrice’s game. (This is a bit of a strange one - to me it feels like some details of Bern’s relationships in this early work were retconned by the time of Umineko Episodes 6-8.)

Brief appearances/mentions in “Memoirs of the ΛΔ”, “The First and Last Gift”,  and “Jessica and the Killer Electric Fan”

All of Umineko, but particularly Umineko Chiru.

07th Theater and the Last Note of the Golden Witch from Umineko Saku.

Like Higurashi, Umineko has a questionably-canon fighting game (Golden Fantasia). Bern has playable routes and dialogue there.

If you really want to be thorough, and consider Higurashi’s Rika to be the same character as Bernkastel in Umineko, congratulations! All of both Higurashi and Umineko are now on your reading list. You should probably toss Ciconia on the pile just in case too. Good luck~!

(Also, I know there’s a Rika/Bern lookalike in pretty much every Ryukishi07 work, but unless someone tells me otherwise, then for the sake of everyone’s time I’m going to assume lookalikes are different characters.)

Wiki Links

https://07th-expansion.fandom.com/wiki/Bernkastel [Not recommended: major Umineko spoilers!]

Quick Facts

-The Bernkastel of Umineko is heavily implied to be the same character as the “Frederica Bernkastel” in Higurashi. You can theoretically construct a reading where she isn’t but… now you have two Bernkastels in the same Sea of Fragments.

Here’s Ryukishi07’s comment on the matter:

Q: What is the relationship between Rika and Frederica Bernkastel? A: Bernkastel is composed of all the negative emotions and memories from the Rika that endured 100 years of torment in Higurashi. On a side note, he mentioned that Rika was BT’s favorite character, so he greatly enjoyed making Rika evil to see BT’s reaction.

(Source: ACen 2015 07th Expansion Panels) [Warning: major Umineko spoilers!]

-In Umineko, the character always goes by her last name or a shortening thereof; the "Frederica" part is only ever referred to indirectly in some PS3 art and as the author of a poem in “Bernkastel’s Letter.” (This was actually true in Saikoroshi as well.)

-Physically, she has same eye/hair color as Rika, though her eyes lack highlights and she seems slightly older.

(Bern and her piece Erika share several physical similarities, and in Umineko Episode 5, Erika is described as a high schooler who looks more like a middle schooler. So that description may be true for Bern’s “age” as well.)

Personality

-Bern has completely dispensed with the cutesy Rika act - she’s all dark Rika, all the time. At her best, Bern is as cold and cynical as Rika after she's given up on a timeline.  At her worst, she's  a vicious and abusive bully, arguably even more sadistic than Takano.

There are some interpretations you can take that soften her behavior, but she is not, under any stretch of the imagination, a good person.

(When people say "maybe Gou is a Bernkastel origin story!" this abrupt change to her character  may also be what they're referring to - not just the story behind where Bern came from, but potentially the story behind "when and why did Rika turn evil?")

-In the present of Umineko, Lambda is repeatedly noted to be Bern’s only friend. (More on their relationship in Lambda’s section.) Part of that is, well, the above bullet points, but the second part is that she just tends to avoid other people. She’s mostly retreated back to being an observer, not an active participant on the stage. (Another difference from Rika.)

-Bern’s relationship with Featherine is less affectionate than that of Rika and Hanyuu. Bern is much harsher and more disrespectful towards Featherine, but on the other hand, Featherine isn’t bothered by it and instead appears amused by her antics.

-Despite all these differences, Bern does keep some of Rika’s minor quirks -  her love of extreme foods, her narration’s fondness for odd and/or longwinded metaphors, and of course her trademark emo poetry.

-Still, Given Gou Episode 19, it’s worth mentioning that there’s a bit of a gap between Rika’s tastes and Bern’s.  Bern acts more reserved/refined, she’s more often seen drinking tea than wine, and her “home” (in as much as she has one) is in a giant library.

I’d previously chalked these differences up to merely the change in aesthetics between Higurashi and  Umineko (all witches love their fancy tea parties), but now...

That being said, in Umineko, Bern’s just as scornful of high society markers as she is everything else. Champagne tower bowling, anyone?

Abilities

-Bern’s title is the “Witch of Miracles,” and she has the power to “cause success without fail, 'as long as the odds are not zero'.”

-What exactly that means in practice is hard to define. Could Bern use miracles to cause someone to, say, die of a lightning strike? Probably. But what she’s actually doing is sifting through millions of Fragments until she finds a world that matches what she wants. It’s a power that functions at the meta level.

(So your guess is as good as mine as to whether she could pull off Rika’s “I literally caught a bullet barehanded while inside a Fragment” miracle at will.)

-Bernkastel and Rika are both associated with black cats. Unlike Rika, Bern can and does literally shapeshift into one. She and Featherine also use black cats as messengers.

-In magical battles, Bern usually fights with a black scythe and summons hordes of aforementioned black cats. She also really loves her teleports and that “dodge via interposing magical duplicate” trick.

-When acting as Featherine’s miko, Bern is able to grant “Theatergoing authority” (basically the ability to compel and watch other characters’ significant flashbacks) to pieces on a game board.

-Bern can kludge multiple worlds together into one Franken-Fragment, a perhaps less elegant version of what Hanyuu does to create the Matsuribayashi Fragment.

-In the silly 07th Theater crossover stories, Bern is also shown to use the “power of voyage” to pluck pieces from one game and place them in others. (If you thought Featherine was unlikely in Gou, note that technically, even Beatrice has been to Hinamizawa!)

Next (Bernkastel’s Umineko Origins) >>

[pjstafford]

David Duchovny's HOHW Tour Fan Girl Experience: Seattle

David Duchovny HOHW Tour Fan Girl Experience: Seattle: This is the first of five blogs on select topics related to my trip to Seattle to see David Duchovny. This one is about the over-all experience. Others will speak about the information provided at a book discussion, a review of the concert and music, the question to video or not to video, and the movie New Year’s Day. The last is a stretch but doing a separate blog will keep me from digressing on it in this blog. Brief recap. I wrote a blog related to the treatment of dark subject matter in David Duchovny’s written works across television, movies, novels and music lyrics. He quoted the tweet related to the blog and said the appreciation moved him. Many within the fan community of Duchovny including the Duchovniacs liked what I had written and wanted to be sure I made it to a concert this tour which I could not afford. Fans from around the world arranged for airfare. Cathy, a friend who I had connected with in Duchovny chat groups, offered concert and book discussion tickets, a place to stay, and incredible hospitality. Suddenly I was going to Seattle. I arrived Saturday late afternoon. What a delight to meet Cathy in person after six months of almost daily contact on Twitter! It was both of our first time seeing and meeting Mr. Duchovny. For the rest of this blog I will refer to him as David so I don’t sound like Darin Morgan. If you don’t catch the reference, then that's a great example of how nice it is to be with a person that speaks the language of the specific fandom. Neither Cathy nor I have that in our daily life away from social media. I see the Duchovny fandom and X-Files fandom as distinct but intersecting. The Darin Morgan reference is an X-Files reference. Cathy is an X-file enthusiast. I will never know as much as she does on the topic of the X-Files. I have seen more of David’s movies and read and listened to more interviews and articles than she has. It's a nice compliment to each other when you have a week-end of Duchovny planned. Both of us have similar experiences of being a fan in the 90’s of the X-Files without any fandom obsession, watching seasons 1-9 again to prepare for season 10, falling in love with X-files on a new level, but falling truly and completely in love with David’s music and novels. Neither of us have a history of fan girling since the Bobby Sherman/ Donny Osmond's days. Our first time meeting in person there was hardly any awkwardness at all- we were already friends. Now our friendship has deepened. It was great to meet her husband as well. We share an interest in science fiction, but I have sadly fallen decades behind. Definitely have things to read and stream on his advice. Sunday morning we took the ferry to Seattle, parked close to the Croc, went to find a marquee or poster on the Croc but didn’t. Found only his name on a calendar. It was a 25 minute walk to the book discussion. I wore my Lick My Face Shirt from Target Zero since I never am brave enough to wear it in public in Albuquerque anymore. The first couple of times it elicited some rude comments. I thought David Duchovny fans would know the reference. No…not a single one seemed to know the reference which makes me sad for Target Zero. I do have suggestions that Target Zero send little cards out with the shirt that can be passed out to explain to people the reason for the shirt. I would wear it more if I could easily deliver a card and it would increase awareness. I found in Seattle a complete different attitude towards this shirt from people who did not know the reference. I never felt uncomfortable. I received a lot of comments which started a lot of conversations. A very young man just stopping me telling me he loved it and a member of Keaton Simon band saying it was the best shirt ever when I was waiting in line are stand outs. I’m curious why they liked it so much without knowing the reference, but neither compliment was suggestive just sincere about their appreciation of the sentiment. I digress. It was a light rain overcast day which was perfect for the Seattle experience. Cathy and I kept saying “Let it Rain.” When we got to the book discussion an hour before the doors were opening there were four persons already there. Cathy and I went to get a cup of coffee and granola bar and then came back. By a half hour before the doors open the lines were forming down the street. They would end up with 600 people in attendance. The center section was reserved for members. Cathy and I found front row seats off to the side and felt so excited about how close we would be to David. It was nothing compared to how close we would be as the day progressed, but- not knowing that at the time- we were excited. Jess Walter, a writer from Washington, facilitated the discussion. Cathy was familiar with his writings and excited to see him as well. It turns out that David and Jess are longtime friends and so the discussion had this beautiful relaxed bantering and good questions from one writer to another. At one point Jess said, “I am the world’s foremost Duchovny scholar.” Cathy said she immediately thought “no you are not, Pam is.” I thought that was grand! Cathy took pictures and a couple of brief videos. I took a total of 10 minutes of video not in order but with different question and answers through-out the session. I took a lot of notes trying mostly to write all the quips David was saying. I am writing another blog on that so will just say the discussion piece was delightful. Then, came audience questions. Some personal history here is that six months ago while reading a passage of Bucky Fucking Dent related to the nature of America in 1978 and loving the way David had written about Carter losing the nation and a good-looking monster in California was waiting to take his place, I had told Cathy I would love to drink a glass of red wine with the man and discussed the American Protestant Work Ethic. Over the months we have referred to this as “my dinner with David” which is all in my head, of course, but I have developed a list of questions which I feel strongly I need to ask him – no, none on the X-Files. I say that because when Jess asked David about the most common question he is asked on his novel he said, “What’s your favorite episode of the X-files?” Cathy had always said she would never be able to ask him a question because she would be too shy. She had a good one she wanted to ask though. We were sitting in front of the microphone and she jumped up to ask a question. She asked the second question of the session. No hesitation. I was so proud of her. Her question was since the previous two books had been scripts turned into novels was his next novel, expected in 2018, “Miss Subways” first a script. The short answer was yes but the longer answer was in depth. Another highlight for me personally was a fan asking about one of David’s original poems. During the answer, Jess mentioned Eliot and David said “April is the Cruelest Month.” People who know me well know I love Eliot’s poetry and Mulder had once quoted this exact line while looking at a playboy. If it makes me a little geeky to remember that …well. There is one more element of questioning in this event important to a later piece of the blog. I don’t remember if it was in the discussion or the audience questions David was asked about why he toured. He feels it is a different way of expression and celebrating music which allows for audience interaction in a way he has never experienced before. As I described the audience participation later, you will see how important that piece is to him. He said it is unique for that audience and for just that time. He then said but everyone has a fucking phone and then it’s on you tube and then it is forever. Later in the QA before the concert he made a remark that showed his disdain for phone videos. I was going to ask a question at the book discussion, but didn’t have a chance. My question would have been about a difference in BFD between the main novel and the epilogue. They both have an omnipotent narrator but in the main novel you are in the action and in the moment. In the epilogue there is a distance that is controlled by come close, come closer still, come closer yet again. I’m curious why he wanted the distance in the epilogue portion of the novel. Alas, a question for another time. Once the questions was over, I looked at Cathy and said “we’re moving.” Great job of keeping up with me. I wanted to be sure we were through the book signing in time to not be too far behind in the line for the VIP concert experience. As you will see we did great with that, but it could have been a hard decision – stand in line for the book signing or get to the concert venue. We got from front of the theater to the lobby for the signing quickly to be within the first 100 in line (remember there were over 600) for the signing. We did well moving to get to that position. Fan Girl clapping all around. They had announced rules for the signing. He would sign only his books or CDs. No memorabilia. No personalization in the signature. I have both books in Kindle and Audible. I do not need a hard edition. Also, given how my adventure to get to Seattle had started with the blog and his retweet and people donating for me to attend, I really wanted him to sign a printed version of his tweet response to me. I know he had already responded in the tweet, but just because of the trip experience I wanted a signature on that tweet to frame. I didn’t think of it along the lines of memorabilia from X-Files. It was about his writing. So I braved the line to see what I would get with my breaking the rules approach. While waiting in line we had an opportunity to thank Jess Walter. I would certainly read his books. He is very funny. I was really appreciative for such a relaxed interview to see that side of David. First gate keeper was primarily responsible to make sure people were all set on the right page ready to hand it over in order to speed up the process, but was also checking what was being signed. She told me he would not sign the tweet, period, end of sentence. It was not happening. She was doing her job, but I persisted and she agreed that I could go up and try if I wanted, but he was not signing. The next gate keeper was right before David and Cathy was before me so I could not witness her experience, but she indicated that when he saw her he immediately said “Good Question.” He recognized her and her question. She was happy with her interaction and then turned to watch mine. I was struggling a little to get through the second gate keeper but she said “will you can show him.” This made me somewhat flustered and nervous when I met the man. I was asking him to break the rules for me which was selfish. I handed him the printed tweet and said I had written you a “fan letter.” He immediately remembered. “Yeah, that was you?” Picked up a pen to sign the tweet. I should have taken this intensely close up opportunity to look at his face, interact, but I became very shy and could only look down. When I realized he was taking the time to write and was stopping to think about what to write (breaking another rule) I was really touched. He handed it to me and I put my hand on my chest, looked in his eyes and said “thank you so much” and started to walk away. I heard him say “Yeah” and realized he was still talking to me. I turned back around and he was looking at me smiling. His eyes smile with his face and he said in a deep, sincere voice “It was nice to meet you.” I said “You too.” Turned and walked on realizing that I had rushed the moment- not him- and that he clearly remembered the blog I had written and was still appreciative. I was glad I had been persistent. OK- novelist experience over get ready for some hard old lady fan girl rock and rolling experience. Cathy and I were both elated with our experience and the walk from the venue for the book discussion back to the Croc was much faster. We checked and there was no one in line at the Croc yet so we went to get Pizza. We got the pizza to go and went back to the Croc. The doors were confusing to us because what looked like the main door to us said go to main entrance on the other street and that door said Back door bar. Where should we stand? Out what seemed to be the front door a man came out who said he was the photographer. He didn’t know where we should stand. He was nice and we chatted briefly. I said I know we must seemed crazy. He said he was sure we were not the only ones that were going to get crazy that night. He was right. e went to the back door and ate our pizza. It was three. Cathy had gotten an email saying to be there no later than 5:15 p.m. It might have been a bit much to get there so early. By this time it was raining a little harder. We ate our pizza in the rain and I am happy because it is part of the experience, but in retrospect, we could have sat in a restaurant ,not stood in the rain, and had been fine with being first in line. I noticed a man was in the box office and rang the bell. He was obviously annoyed with us and came out told us not to block the door. He hit a spot on the wall and said this is where the line starts and went back inside. That gave us some amusement as one of us made sure to always stand in that exact spot. Here, here is where the line starts. Several people walked by and we interacted with them. Many asking who was playing there tonight and then saying “the x-files guy?” A couple of highlights is that the opening band Keaton Simon and his band members came and stood, blocking the door, for a while because they were confused about the side door/ main door dilemma as well. While they were texting and finding out we had some slight interactions (such as the comment about my shirt and them laughing that we were there so early). In one interaction with one of the people during the first hour we were there someone had a spliff. Cathy is ignorant of drugs and drug terminology so I was able to point it out to her and tell her that in BFD when Ted has a fantastic free streaming sequence in his brain which starts out something like I was crossing the Hudson with Walt Whitman in a spliff the size of a canoe, that is what a spliff looks like. Street education to better enjoy literary masterpieces. It began to rain harder. We stopped saying “Let it Rain” and came up with the idea that the DavidDuchovnymusic.com web site should market Let it Raingear. It was a full hour before anybody else came to stand in line. A full hour. About 4:30 there were ten of us in line and they opened the bar and told us to come into the bar- we could buy food and drink- and they would make an announcement when the VIP experience would start. We had lost our front line place and more people would come and crowd into the bar before 5:30. The best part about being in the bar was the opportunity to meet the Dutch Duchnovniacs. They compared the Amsterdam concert with the Portland show which they had been to two nights before. They said it was clear David had worked on his voice since the Europe tour. Later in the QA they gave David a pair of wooden Dutch shoes slippers. It wasn’t long before people started lurking near the opening between the bar and lobby which would lead to the theater. Cathy said she was willing to lurk so we did. Finally the bouncer sent everyone back into the bar and wouldn’t let people lurk. I went to the bouncer and said that we had been there at 3 and had waited in the rain to be first in line. He said yes, but they would just make an announcement and we should go back to the bar. I touched him on the arm, gave him my best puppy dog eyes, and said “and you will remember that we’ve been here since 3 in the rain waiting to see him and make sure we are not at the end of the VIP line.” He said, “oh just chill and stay here.” For the remainder of the wait he would not let anyone else lurk near the door and we were able to wait with him. As he let us in first I was so thankful to him. Here is for me the funniest part of this story about waiting in line. We walked in and there were some areas toward the side of the bar where there was a bar so you could lean and be comfortable. Cathy said “oh, let’s go to the side.” Cathy doesn’t like to be in the front of a crowd or the middle of a crowd or in a crowd. She would have stayed in the back. I just thought – we’ve been here in line since 3 in the rain and I just practically offered to blow the bouncer and you don’t want to be up front. So funny! Imagine if after all of that we had stayed in the back. She must have seen my look and said – wherever you want. We went up front. She enjoyed the experience and I don’t think neither of us would have as good of a time without being in front. I decided not to be center stage. I wanted to see the guitar player and the drummer. I had told myself that before the concert. David has world class musicians. I was going to watch a little of them. I also wanted to be on the side because – full fan girl confession here – he has a scar on one of his eyes and I wanted to be able to see that scar. I love that scar. I know it makes no sense. It is a flaw on an otherwise perfect face. I loved that scar on Mulder when you seldom saw it except in certain camera angles and when he grimaced and suddenly smiled. It’s like a perfect profile as he stares directly at a clue and then the moment of clarity comes for him and the scar pops out. A sudden flaw that made it clear he wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t every episodes, but those episodes it does! As an older man, it has deepened and is usually visible but still pops out more in certain expressions when he sings. Those of you who are not a fan can laugh at me. I love that scar. Managed in the 90’s to miss the red speedo (yellow pajama bottom, grey sweat pants), but I noticed the scar. Go figure. The sound check began with the guys in the band coming out first. Then David came out. He made a general acknowledgement of crowd and immediately walked and looked at the stage. He found a spot on the stage and moved his hands measuring stage to ground. He had already decided he was going to dance in the crowd that night and was finding his spot to do that. He waved slightly at a young woman standing near us who was insistently waving. We will be talking about her some in this blog. He stood then in front of where Cathy and I were with his side turned. Head bowed as if waiting for someone to speak in his ear set. Soon as the voice sounded in his ear he jumped to it and went to the mic. It was fun to be part of the sound check. There was a horrendous noise at one point and David said is that feedback. Pat said no I was playing really bad. David said it was really loud we should turn it down and Pat said in case I play bad again. Quite amusing. The lights were blinding on stage and David said they’re not going to be that way all night are they. It was fun. Next the QA. I enthusiastically raised my hand and Brad said with a laugh the woman right in front. Yeah, they might have been talking about the crazy old ladies so determined to be up front. My question was about the song Lately December. It’s the least played song on tour from the first album and is so beautiful. David repeated the question – I am soft spoken so no one else really heard me and said you like it, so do I, but we do a rock concert and it’s a contemplative song. Then he thought a little and said we do slower songs but that one is more complicated and difficult to play or maybe I don’t sing it very well on tour. He then called the band lead Colin on stage and asked him who said “Oh, that’s a hard song.” So that’s the reason. The young girl next to me asked who he had written “the rain song” about. He said a person. Later in introducing the song he said a friend. He had said previously in concerts his ex-wife loved rain so we should assume that’s the person and friend. They weren’t doing that one either but agreed to change the set list since they were in Seattle. Someone else yelled out “Let it Rain “and he said we always do “Let it Rain.” A good question was from a high school literature teacher who wanted to know what he would teach in class if he was still teaching. David said he is a big fan of teaching the classics and justified why. A bad question was “You’re in my top five (people I would have sex with). Who are your top five?” He said I’m not answering with a man recording that. He answered a question did he prefer playing Moody or Mulder thoughtfully and well, similar to answers he had given before. Someone asked about Aquarius. Cathy and I have been part of a #SaveAquarius group and even though he does not think it will come back we were happy to hear him speak about Hodiak with affection. In answer to another question he told a story about babysitting Keaton, the opening act, and that it was Keaton who had suggested he could record the songs that David had originally written just for himself. I got to ask the final question. Two questions – almost a dinner with David! I said I wanted to ask about “Stars”. He said “Stars? We’re not doing that one either. We’re killing you not doing your favorite songs.” Not especially happy with myself that at that moment I gushed. “Anything you do tonight I will love.” That remark got the response it deserved- an eye roll from David. Could I have said something like – ok I’m out of here. That might have been amusing. Or something after I love anything you do like –really even “Baby Snatcher”-(but no, not really, not “Baby Snatcher.”) Baby Snatcher was one of his early and excessively bad movies. Instead I gushed. Then I asked the question which started with I recently watched “New Year’s Day.” David interrupted with “Wow” and made a surprised face with his eyes wide. Eye roll and face in one question- I was distinguishing myself here. See, I could really digress now if I was not writing a distinct blog about “New Year’s Day”. It is an early Duchovny movie. My question pertained to the monologue at the end of the movie by the main character played by the brilliant director, Henry Jaglom. The monologue is related to how stars we see now died years ago and David asked if I was accusing him of plagiarism. I was on a roll boy in my extended conversation with David. I said no I was wondering how much that early movie had influenced him. He said he thought he knew about the dying stars before he was in the movie. I nodded and then he said was it Henry in the monologue? I said yes it’s Henry and refrained from telling him how it summarizes the whole movie in such a poignant manner, how my favorite scene is the unscripted one between him and Henry, and asking what it was like to work with this brilliant director. I refrained. He looked like he was thinking about something and said thank you for reminding me that was in there. So as it ended I didn’t get the impression that he was really annoyed by a Stars question that was really a New Year’s Day question. I wonder if he realizes there is also a significant mythology piece in X-files about Stars where Mulder delivers a similar speech to Scully as Henry had said at the end of New Year’s Day. I get the feeling that David had some influence on New Year’s Day and X-files in this regard and that the concept of dying stars has been with him through-out most of his adult life as meaningful imagery. However, I did not get that response from David. I love the song Stars. Then it was time for group pictures which I don’t really get. Like a picture with a bunch of people you don’t know with a celebrity in the middle. It felt a little rushed, unpleasant, uncomfortable. Cathy, however, had the opportunity to tell him thank you again and to have him say thank you back so I was glad for her. Pictures are on DavidDuchovnymusic.com if anyone is interested in seeing them. I’m wearing the Lick my face shirt. We had to struggle a little again for our space when we got back from the shoot. A woman who had snuck in with the VIP despite having a general admission ticket had kept our space but wanted to be between Cathy and I and I kind of got stuck in back. That was not going to work for me and I told Cathy I was moving down stage a little further but still in front. The young women there were so accommodating to that and pleasant to me. Then the venue was open for all concert ticket holders. The concert had been the first one on the toured sold out and it was packed. It was an intimate venue. I estimate maybe 500 there- really packed in like sardines. Cathy and I talked about the fact that we couldn’t really drink because if we had to go to the bathroom we would never get back. We decided to go to the bathroom one last time before it wasn’t possible. I was going to keep my spot though so I announced loudly (yes, I did) I am leaving for a few minutes but am coming back to this exact spot (pointing to the floor). I then pointed one by one at all the eager fan girls around me, pointed to me and the spot, and did the watching you gesture. (In my defense I am really short and kind of need a front spot to see anything.) A man about five rows back was laughing at me and when I walked by he said “Hey she’s coming back to that spot.” He did the watching you gesture to all the people around him. It was hard to come back and he did the same thing as I came back – laughing the whole time. I brought back a glass of water for Cathy and myself and that was the only liquid we drank for the next several hours. We had a great conversation with several young girls around us – all of who were very familiar with David’s music. The young girl who had asked the question about “the rain song” said that she was thinking of getting a tattoo of lyrics either from the “rain song” or “Let it Rain.” She asked me if when those songs play if I would let her get in my place since she was behind me and I said of course. Who wouldn’t? I spent some time looking at the stage and thinking what songs I would watch the guitar player and drummer on. I was excited to see the bongo’s. I pointed them out to Cathy and we knew we would be hearing “When the time comes.” Keaton and his band came out and certainly warmed us up. High energy, rap style including a little rendition of “Staying Alive”. It was very fun. As Keaton was gathering stuff he up, Cathy and I had an opportunity to tell him how great he was. Anticipation for David got a little much. The girl behind me kicked me and hit me several times. She was annoying everyone. I turned around and just hugged her. She is there to see a man 35 years older than her whose music she loved. I thought it was beautiful, but I also wanted to settle her down a little with some tactile touch. They came out and put down the set lists which the front row could read. We were excited to see the encore Sweet Jane and the Weight as the only covers but had heard the reports from earlier concerts about how good the covers were. We were really impressed that they had not put down any set list for David. Did he memorize them every night? Then they came out with three sheets of large print set list to tape down for him. It had to be bigger and on three pages so he could see it. We found that endearing. David started with the high energy and fast “3000.” Since I am writing another blog specifically about the concert I will only tell in this blog those highlighted moments specific to the experience. One of the first thing during that song is he how much he was sweating. At one point he moved his head and I watched a bead of sweat fall from his face to the floor. Among the other many talents which David has, add the ability to work a room of 500 so every individual believe they had personal interaction with David. Possible every person did. That experience of the communication and audience interaction which David said is the reason he does the tour is something he delivers for the fans very well. I had decided that I was going to watch some of Pat McCusker’s guitar and Sebastian’s drum despite the fact that it meant not watching David. Obviously I was going to watch Sebastion on the bongos during “When The Time Comes.” At one point he looked up and we made eye contact and I nodded and he nodded back. Obviously the best time to watch McCusker would have been “Unsaid, Undone” but no I felt strongly about watching David. Luckily there were many times through-out the night when he moved directly in front of me. Whenever I clapped, I tried to clapped “around.” Pointing my hands to each band member. I hope the band knows that David’s fans are aware that David’s expression of music is only possible because of their incredible playing and that we love them because of it. The point came for the young woman who loved the songs about rain to go to the front. Think of how hard I had fought for the spot. Do you think I would have given it up if I knew she was going to take off her bra, threw it on the stage and then keep her shirt off exposing her breasts to David? No I would not have. Cathy said her immediate reaction was just concern that David would avoid our side of the stage because of her. He made at one point a slightly stern face and shook his head at her and she covered up. Cathy was upset about it at first but now says that it was part of the experience and is the only time in her life she will ever have that experience. My concern was with David eyesight and knowing that he knew where I had been standing he would not realize it was not me flashing her, but Cathy assured me that he would be able to tell the difference between a 21 year old breasts and mine…yeah, probably. This young woman did tweet to David the next day with a picture of a bra on stage. I found that impressive. She is owning the moment as well without embarrassment. While I was annoyed so much at first, since then I have mellowed about it. But ladies keep your clothes on. There is no indication that David likes panties or bras being thrown at him. “Unsaid, Undone” is my favorite song off the album (any song that can reference Dylan’s Idiot Wind and quote obscure Latin text cannot fail to make me happy) and it is loud and rocking. This was his best song of the night by far. At the end of the song he was by my section of the audience, he bent down so it seemed like he was inches from our face when he sang/ yelled “I said I’m done.” Then he did something I have not seen in any videos. Still bent near our faces, his face went cold (he is a great actor after all, isn’t he?), he put his hands up so they were just below his eyes – kind of walling himself off except for the eyes, and then while maintaining eye contact and still bent he walked backwards. It was chilling. The most spectacular concert moment I have ever experienced. I don’t know how he could maintain eye contact with everyone in that area, but it felt as if he was staring directly at me and Cathy said the same (staring directly at her). OMG. I have a love hate relationship with “Positively Madison Avenue” which I will get into more in another blog. But the love is stronger than the hate. He stood right by me and again and was bending down when he sang the lyric “a beleaguered Pete Seeger got to hitch his way to heaven.” So cool. I will say that there were moments when I realize my fan girl love might be a little different than others. He was introducing a song early in the set and nonchalantly took off his jacket and everyone screamed. I was like “what did he say” and Cathy was like he took off his jacket. Then after he stood up by the beleaguered Pete Seeger line to run across stage singing “you can sell panties and still remain a genius “women yelled because he said the word panties. That’s not me- but did you see that scar? I also noticed the nice hair on his arms. We each have our fan girl kicks I guess. Oh yeah, and he had the perfect amount of scruff. He left and came back for encore. I was excited to see the Pink Pussy hat in his pocket. The band puts them on for “The Weight.” Keaton came on to sing with him. This was a moment. David had told a story about babysitting Keaton. It was Keaton last night on the tour and they had not sang together. I will rave about this performance in a later blog about the concert. They went off stage and we screamed for the next encore – which we were obviously going to get –it was already on the set list. The band did an extended opener on “Sweet Jane” and then David ran out, to the spot he had scoped out way back in sound check and jumped off stage for a dance with the audience. There was a sudden rush to him. I was so close that I could feel the physical displacement of air as women rushed him. I did not and why it would have been great to have felt his back muscles or touch the hair on his arms, I was glad to be that close and take in the scene. I have a framed picture in my head of David with his butt stuck out wiggling, his hands up dancing, his eyes closed, women around him touching all around his back wiggling too and this delightful look of joy of his face. Going back to the discussion of audience participation and David’s motivation to perform. I will never think of that statement and not see this picture in my mind. How insulated must David have become in his fandom with all the crazy fan girls like me out there. This is his chance to give some loving and receive some loving from his fans. It is beautiful, but scary and I hope he never gets hurt. He seems kind of a pro though at positioning his body to make sure no vital areas are touched. Then he was back on to finish the song and then he was gone. People immediately grabbed for his set list. I just wanted a set list. Note to DavidDuchovnymusicc.com –post set lists, look at Bob Dylan.com set list posting. I like to know what songs were played in the order for the concerts I’ve been to. I’ve never wanted a set list before, but there no one else this set list will be stored. I saw a set list far back on stage and asked someone if I could have it. He shook his head. A bouncer came and told us to move on because the concert was over. I took my stuff over to one of the benches I had mentioned earlier and started to layer up. I watched until the bouncer was gone and then went to someone else and asked if I could have the set list. He gladly gave it to me. Cathy and I started back to the vehicle in rock and roll and Duchovny heaven, but with aching old lady legs. Back at her place we went to bed about three a.m. The next morning at 7 we realized we were both awake and posting on twitter. A friend sent us a tremendous screen cap from the concert taken of the back of David on stage with Cathy and I in front gazing at him. It had never occurred to us that we would be videotaped in the audience, but we were delighted. Cathy found another picture of him looking away from us up at the upper level of the bar, but our face are lighted in the same way as he is lighted. These pictures mean more to us than the VIP group pictures. We found vids of “the Weight” with Keaton Simon and David. I screen capped one and posted it and Keaton liked it. Then we found video from the other side of that song to see the interaction we had missed. Beautiful. We must have watched the video of “the Weight” like a hundred times. Cathy and I are in several chat groups together. We sat with each other as we twittered, tumblred and instagramed asking what chat group should get what pictures and stories and which of us were going to post it. #SaveAquarius has a fan girl for another of the show’s stars so we didn’t want to overload them but there were Duchovny fans in that group not in any other. Of course, our concert group needed pictures and stories. Then there is our Moody group. Finally there is a small intimate group of five who had to get our most intimate details and stories. At some point Cathy put on her HOHW shirt. I stayed in pajamas most of the day. We had a late brunch with champagne. It is what you do the day after. About 6 p.m. we were pretty done and had to take a break. What could we possibly do to distract us? It turns out Cathy had the X-files Season 10 special features which I had not seen. Ok – does that sound silly? But we both agreed we had not seen Mulder, Moody or Hodiak – not at one moment did we think – oh, that’s …we saw Duchovny- or we saw the Duchovny persona he puts on as novelist and the persona he puts on as rock star, but we did not see Mulder. A girl can only go so long without Mulder. We went to bed about 10 p.m. exhausted. By the next morning the pictures and vids of the girl who had flashed her breasts were making the round so we started watching video’s all over again. At one point I said to Cathy “I have to say. I just, I know I shouldn’t, but I just have to say, I just have to say” and then I said something I am not going to put here. Cathy is a real concerned voice said “exactly who are going to say that to?” I said, “Just you. You are the only one here.” We both then laughed hysterically at how into the social media we were that even in our private conversation she was concerned I would post something inappropriate. Cathy’s husband was tremendous during this period. Letting us fan girl away as much as we wanted. Then Cathy took me to the airport and my fan girl experience was over, but the next day the pictures from the Boston concert started popping up everywhere. What’s a fan girl to do?

[blogwritetheworld]

The Write Place: Where to Submit Your Work

Looking for the right advice on pursuing the writer’s life? You’ve come to the write place!

by Lisa Hiton

PUBLICATION SENSATION

For many, being a writer involves that ever-strange relationship between unknown readers and your work. You may never meet the people who’ve read your work or know what they think about it. After all, you’ve been that reader, falling in love with sentences, learning to empathize with the harshest of villains, and feeling that a protagonist in a story is a real friend of yours. There is a great power in the mystery of that intimacy, all fabricated from a writer’s mind and brought to you in the form of a printed or digitized page (or in some cases, as an audio retelling).

The point of writing is the writing itself. But after a lot of practice and knowing when a story is finally finished, there is an impulse to share stories. This impulse is human. We tell stories at our dinner tables. We go to the theater or the movies on the weekends. We listen to podcasts. We sit around campfires in the summer. All of this to dedicate time to thinking about being human. Storytelling is a form of entertainment, yes, but the shared experiences of stories–whether it’s reading a book in a classroom, seeing a story unfold on a stage or screen, or gathering at a dinner table–have the power to transcend history and time, to change us as individuals and communities. And so that impulse to share our work as writers is not just about fame or the permanence that comes with publication, but to participate in that grand collective of human consciousness.

As discussed in last month’s blog, you’re now ready with a cover letter and a piece of writing or two that you’d like out in the world. Now it’s time to figure out who might love it as much as you do and give it a space in the world of their magazine.

GETTING ORGANIZED

First you’ll want to get organized. The life of a writer is not an easy one. You’ll need to be prepared for overwhelming amounts of hard work in the forms of reading, writing, thinking, and imagining. You’ll also need to be prepared for hardships. Writers deal with rejection all the time–rejection letters from magazines, publishers, agents, college campuses. And for the writers lucky enough to get a book deal, there is always a critic waiting to take your book down with skepticism. But the lasting effects of reading and writing are what keep writers going forward. The best thing to do is expect many rejection letters and stay organized as a means to defeat this system of discouragement.

The first thing to do is come up with a way of keeping track of your submissions. You can do this digitally or by hand. I happen to do both. You’ll want to keep a log with pertinent information. It might look something like this to start:

NAME OF JOURNAL  |  NAME OF PIECE(S) SUBMITTED  |  DATE OF SUBMISSION  |  DATE OF RESPONSE  |  RESPONSE

Here are some recent submission entries of mine:

Denver Quarterly Ancestry, The Houses of Frankfurt, Portrait in a Jewelry Box, 2/23/2016, 12/28/2016 Acceptance

Poetry Magazine Intrusion, Patriot’s Day, Scoring the Death of the Firstborn 7/22/2016, N/A Submission Pending

Like I said, this can be done digitally or by hand. Here is a screenshot of recent submissions, which I track using Duotrope:

I also keep a separate log by hand called “Poetry Has Value” which specifically tracks my submission costs month by month. I was inspired to do this after Jessica Piazza’s blog of the same name. Piazza and another poet friend decided to ONLY submit to magazines that paid poets for accepted poems (you poets out there, be prepared to not get paid much, if at all, for your beautiful poems). As you start submitting more work, you’ll see how quickly submissions, contests, and book contest fees can add up! While I don’t exclusively submit to markets that pay for poems, I did want to see just how much I was spending to get my poems and my first book into the hands of publishers (and what, if anything, I was making in return). 

Another key organizing factor is to keep file folders of your submissions by magazines. These can by physical or digital. This way, you’ll always be able to reference what you’ve sent over the months and years it might take to get your work in a given magazine. I also keep a folder for submission responses. Otherwise, your mailbox or inbox can quickly become a flurry of papers that you aren’t sure where to put!

WHERE TO SUBMIT

The pleasure of submitting work comes when considering the magazines that might someday publish your work. The easiest way to see where your work might fit is to read lots of magazines and journals. See what you are drawn to and why. Think about if those pages influence your work. Can you get a sense of how the editors put an issue together? All of these ideas might help you figure out the publication path you’d like to take.

Of course, you’re at the beginning of the journey. It would be a pretty wild miracle to submit to, say, The New Yorker and get your work in right off the bat. But even that ultimate dream can be a guiding light to see a path your work might take over time. So let’s say you do hope to be in The New Yorker someday. What about that magazine makes you crave being in its pages? Where else did those writers first publish their work? You might find your favorite writer’s first book of short stories, essays, or poems and look at the acknowledgements page. Which magazines first published those works? For example, Crush by Richard Siken is one of my favorite books of poetry. When I first submitted poems, I looked at the acknowledgments page in that book and saw which magazines and journals first published those poems. I had never read the Indiana Review, but they had published one of my favorite poems in the book. So I took a shot and sent some of my finished poems to them. By some magic, they accepted one of them!

Write the World is made up of all kinds of writers at all stages of writing. Here are some magazines you might investigate based on what you’re working on now:

Adroit Journal: I love the Adroit Journal so much that I’ve become a recent poetry editor for this magazine. The journal was founded by Peter LaBerge when he was a high school student. The magazine is run by high school and college students. You can submit work in the “21 and under” section of the submissions page. Keep up with the Adroit Journal on social media or through their newsletter to hear about mentorship and contest opportunities for young writers as well! They also host an international contest for young writers each year.

Bazoof!: Bazoof! publishes works in all genres by young writers of all ages from all over the globe!

Canvas: Canvas is an online literary space for and by teens. The editorial team of teens accepts work in all genres and in hybrid genres–video poems, audio poems, visual pieces, fiction, poetry, and plays.

Cricket Media: Among other things, Cricket has a group of magazines for young people. Though not every piece is written exclusively by young people, they often take work in many genres by young people. Their magazines are Babybug, Ladybug, Spider, Cricket, and Cicada. These magazines are tiered by age group. Let’s say you have a few haikus that your three year old brother just can’t get enough of. Those would be perfect to submit. They also have branchout magazines that focus on history, science, and the like. The primary magazine for writers 14+ is Cicada. They also accept comic strips.

Ember: Ember is a semiannual journal of poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction for all age groups. Submissions for and by readers aged 10 to 18 are strongly encouraged.

Highlights: Perhaps the most famous magazine for young people sitting in the waiting room of most dentist’s and doctor’s offices, Highlights accepts work in all genres.

Iris: Iris is an online magazine that exclusively publishes works on LGBTQIA themes for teenagers.

Lip Magazine: Publishes articles, essays, short stories, poetry, reviews and artwork on a variety of topics relevant to 14-25 year old females.

Merlyn’s Pen: This magazine was made with teachers in mind. Teachers understand the importance of young readers and writers in our culture. Merlyn’s Pen allows the world to see who teens are through what they read and write. The magazine accepts fiction and nonfiction on topics related to pop culture, media, advertising, and their impact on the lives of teens.

Moledro Magazine: This non-profit, global literary magazine is run by high school students and accepts work of fiction and poetry by teens.

Native Youth Magazine: Native Youth Magazine publishes works by those of Native American descent. More generally, the publication serves as a resource about Native American culture.

Parallax: Edited by the Creative Writing Department at Idyllwild Arts Academy, Parallax is one of the premiere student-run magazines in the world. They accept submissions from high school students all over the globe.

Sugar Rascals: This Canada-based literary magazine published twice a year features teen works of poetry, short fiction, and art. Submissions are accepted from teens all over the world.

Teen Ink: Teen Ink is a cultural magazine featuring writing by teens in all genres–literary and cultural! Publishing categories include: fiction, poetry, art, sports writing, opinion pieces, environmental pieces, health and lifestyle, travel and culture, reviews (books, music, movies, etc.), articles, and even interviews.

Voiceworks: Out of Australia, Voiceworks is a national, quarterly literary journal made up of work by Australians under the age of 25. From fiction, to poetry, to comic strips, Voiceworks relies on contributions from readers.

Write the World: Among other things, we at Write the World publish an annual print journal. We always call for nominations from all writing within the year written by you, dear writers!

There are many more magazines for young writers with different focuses. From history writing, to poetry, to writing by Jewish girls age 9-14, to writers of New England, there is a magazine out there for your work and NewPages is the most comprehensive resource to date for young authors looking for open reading periods and contest submissions–for homes for their work.

SHELF LIFE

The hardest part about submitting work is waiting to hear back from all of these magazines. During the wait time, you’ll want to be reading these magazines and supporting the work of your peers, writing new work, and keeping up with your homework. As you hear back from magazines, be sure to file their responses in an organized fashion. If you get a rejection letter, immediately send a new packet of work to that publication (maximize the number of submissions per open reading period at these places that you can!). And if you get an acceptance letter, celebrate big time! It’s rare that anyone gets work published and it’s important to celebrate your words whenever they make it through the slush pile and into print! I personally like to celebrate by treating myself to a cold-pressed juice and hugs from fellow writers. As I get magazines and journals with my work in them, I keep them all in the same place. Eventually, I hope to have a full shelf of magazines with my poems, and maybe someday a long time from now, a whole bookcase!

About Lisa

Lisa Hiton is a poet and filmmaker. She holds an M.F.A. in poetry from Boston University and an M.Ed. in Arts in Education from Harvard University. Her poems have been published or are forthcoming in Linebreak, The Paris-American, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and LAMBDA Literary among others. Her first book has been a finalist or semi-finalist for the New Issues Poetry Prize, the Brittingham & Felix Pollack Poetry Prize, the Crab Orchard Review first book prize, and the YesYes Books open reading period. She has received the AWP WC&C Scholarship, the Esther B Kahn Scholarship from 24Pearl Street at the Fine Arts Work Center, and two nominations for the Pushcart Prize. Her chapbook, Variation on Testimony, is forthcoming from CutBank Literary. She is the Interviews Editor at Cosmonaut’s Avenue and the Poetry Editor for The Adroit Journal.

[travel-study]

hey friends! this is the first post of a new series of masterposts i am going to do on shakespeare’s major works. i have a degree in history & english literature from one of the top unis in the uk and i’ve covered a hell of a lot of shakespeare in my time, so hopefully i can offer some help to you guys. please let me know if there’s anything you want different in future posts, feedback would be great. hope i can help, and happy new years!

themes

sex, if love be blind, it best agrees with night

romeo & juliet is absolutely chocked full of sexual overtones, it’s basically about two kids getting a bit carried away trying to get into each others pants

3.2.13-16 highlights this link between juliet’s sexual inexperience and her sexual eagerness. she is ‘unmann’d’ in that she has yet to take a husband, as well as in that an unmanned falcon would fly free if taken outdoors were a hood not pulled over its head

3.2.21-23 stresses the heartbeat rhythm, ‘come night, come romeo, come thou day in night’. it’s a fast rhythm, stressing her desire for him to come to her. her boldness is born in her desire and her separation from innocence, which could also form the base for a point about femininity and docility being tied to innocence and virginity if you fancied taking that route

mercutio has been described as ‘sex-obsessed’, but i’d say he’s a pretty archetypal teenage boy in this respect. he makes lewd references to rosaline’s ‘quivering thigh’, and mocks romeo’s ‘love’ 2.1.9-24 generally, setting up the argument that romeo can’t distinguish between love and lust. romeo also makes reference to juliet’s thighs on their wedding night, although saying that they’re ‘like jewels, the work of a master hand’ is rather nice compared to his remarks about rosaline and how she refused to ‘ope the gap’. i would say this repeated mention of thighs distinguishes the difference between the laddish chat between the boys and the conversations between a man and wife, another break from innocence and youth.

mercutio also reduces love to merely sex in 2.1.36-41, and his fruit based metaphor could easily be linked to the fruit of eden and sex being a product of the birth of sin if you wanted to go down that route

there is of course the famous pun on ‘maidenhead’, equating sword fighting with raping women, at the opening of the play, establishing and linking the consistent themes of sex and violence 

 essentially these two are horny teenagers and sex is a huge theme in the play. it is easy to tie to love, innocence, femininity etc. 

useful articles on sex in r&j: 1. 2.(ctl+f sex for ease) 3.(partic. interesting commentary on rape in r&j) 4.

masculinity, thy beauty hath made me effeminate  

this is, i think, one of the more interesting topics covered in r&j, and as a result there’s a shitload of useful sources for it

in romeo’s hypermasculine society he is expected to either violently defend his family and his name or master his own self-control and autonomy and love. he attempts to do both simultaneously and it doesn’t pan out so well for him. 

all the deaths of the young men in the play stem from them trying to fulfil these expectations of them. 

unlike benvolio, mercutio and tybalt, who maintain their masculinity in death, romeo’s suicide is seen as weak, even effeminate. 

appelbaum’s article in shakespeare quarterly is particularly important, i think, in critically addressing this conflict of gender, and i would strongly recommend it if you’re hoping to cover this theme

1. 2. (this one covers the coming of age process in r&j, but i think it’s useful to tie this in with the development of masculine ideals and expectations)

love & death, thus with a kiss i die

one cannot write about one without writing about the other when covering romeo & juliet, i think 

along with fate and society, love and death are pinpointed as key themes in the prologue, setting the audience up to tie the two ideas together

the paradoxical notion of love in death fuels these characters motives, and could potentially link to a religious theme if you wanted to take that angle (as a protip if you wanna study english or history just learn as much as you can about religion and it’ll cover you for 90% of your essays)

this article extensively covers the times in which death is mentioned in the context of love, or vice versa. it’s interesting if a bit oddly formatted 

this article talks about the context of joint burial, a physical manifestation of these tied themes, in a sense

chapter 21 on shakespeare’s early tragedies in this book is useful, and there’s a whole subsection for romeo and juliet that’s a handy read

fate, i fear... some consequence yet hanging in the stars

the elizabethan world view was shaped by a common belief in fortune, fate and the power of the stars, astrology being considered a science amongst the nobility at the time

bertrand evans noted that in r&j ‘fate is the controlling practiser, and the entire action of the play represents her at work’ in shakespeare’s tragic practice, essentially arguing that every choice made by the plays characters is just chipping away their path to their predestined ends

this article is generally great, and the third angle focuses on r&j as a tragedy of fortune. i’d recommend reading the whole thing but i’ve linked straight to the third point so that it’s focused on the theme of fate and fortune. 

i would also recommend this book, you can search for specific references to romeo and juliet, but there’s some good stuff about fate and predestination around p.55 and for the next 20 or so pages i think? i didn’t count oops

form

all of shakespeare’s plays are written in iambic pentameter. an iamb is a foot that consists of one unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. pent means 5, so there’s 5 iambs in each line

as is pretty typical for shakespeare, he uses blank verse to indicate that a person of a lower social class is speaking, or to show informality. for instance, the nurse speaks in blank verse, and mercutio does when in the informal setting of hanging around with his friends. stricter rhyme tends to come into play with characters of a higher social standing, like capulet

the play is an early example of shakespearean tragic structure. this generally fits within the 5 act structure that’s been a playwrights favourite since horace built on aristotle’s 3 segment structure. 

this is an interesting article that i’d recommend if you were hoping to look at tragic form in romeo and juliet 

more on tragic form: 1. 2. 3. 4.

language

i’m not gonna go through quotes or sections one by one here because that basically makes the process of doing your own essay redundant, but i am gonna give some tips on analysing language

the first time you read the play, enjoy it, don’t overthink it. the second time you read it pick out the sections or the lines you think are most pertinent to what you want to write about. if you have 9 books to read this week and don’t have time for this i feel you man i really do, you can just pick key phrases the first time but it kinda fucks with the flow of your understanding if you get me

worst case scenario, sparknotes will have key quotes. i only started using them when i was half way through uni because i thought i was too good to rely on sparknotes. no one is too good for sparknotes trust

anyway, compile your chosen segments according to theme and then start working out how you’ll shape your paragraph on that theme. carefully select which quotes you’ll use to back up your points, as textual evidence is crucial to building your case

close analysis of language is kind of something you need to improvise, i find. i generally don’t think there’s actually anything there and then just make something up. e.g. ‘my bounty is as boundless as the sea,/ my love as deep; the more i give to thee/ the more i have, for both are infinite’ 

so ignoring whatever else and focusing purely on language, i’d highly here rhythm and rhyme, and the obvious effort that romeo is making to use poetic language. the alliterative ‘b’ and the ‘ea, ‘ee’, ‘ee’ sounds both create a bounding rhythm reminiscent of that of juliet i mentioned earlier, building on both the sexual energy with the whole heartbeat feel and the anticipation and excitement, cos you can’t deny that boys rhythm sounds eager. ‘more’, ‘more’ again reiterates this point. ‘my’ ‘my’ ‘both’ i would say signifies romeo transitioning from being an individual to being a pair cos joining with juliet in marriage and physically etc. etc. you can just chat any old shit you fancy as long as there’s some plausible way to link it to the text

long story short, success in english is as limited as your own creativity. which isn’t limited, go crazy with it, trust yourself and your argument skills

this is such an unhelpful section i’m sorry i don’t even have any good secondary sources other than the general companions which i will now do

general reading

these are some books i would recommend you read that don’t very precisely pertain to the stuff i’ve already said. remember, though, that it’s super important to read as much of the secondary material as possible, and to grow your own opinions alongside everything that you’ve learnt reading other ideas. they aren’t designed to tell you what to think about the play/book/poem/whatever, but rather to expand your understanding of it

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

i really hope this has helped any of you, and please feel free to ask me any questions about romeo and juliet or anything else english related that you’re struggling with! best of luck, and remember to enjoy it as much as you can!