I've been thinking about Elizabeth Bishop's poem The Man-Moth, which is a really interesting poem but also has interesting origins: A typo from a newspaper- the writer meant to use the word mammoth. "The misprint seemed meant for me," she later explained. Inspiration is a slithering thing - you never know where it might be … Continue reading “The misprint seemed meant for me.”
Tag: Literature
Narrative prosthesis
As someone who has a chronic illness that technically qualifies me (by law) as disabled, I think a lot about how much I dislike fighting language - I'm not a fighter or a warrior, bravely battling this disease. If anything, I'm an ally. We have to live together, so we need to get along. Really … Continue reading Narrative prosthesis
Unwise Sleeper
"...there are bad dreams for those who sleep unwisely." - Bram Stoker This line, from Chapter 3 of Stoker's Dracula, is the part of the novel (also seen in the 1992 movie) where Dracula warns Jonathan Harker not to fall asleep in any other rooms of the castle but the ones he has been given. … Continue reading Unwise Sleeper
When the narrative just won’t evolve
They say art reflects life, and the older I get, the more I turn to it and see within the very same lessons that I've learned, or am grappling with myself. I realized recently that there's a reason why two of my favorite books are The Great Gatsby and Love in the Time of Cholera. … Continue reading When the narrative just won’t evolve
Prime
There's a book I come back to periodically throughout my life - a strange piece of Scottish literature called The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. I encountered this book when I was quite young. I didn't completely understand it the first time I read it, but it stuck with me. The main character, Jean Brodie, … Continue reading Prime
What can you do with an English degree?
When I first had to grapple with this question years ago, I told people, "I can apply to law school!" I was, as a very young adult, skilled in the art of telling people what they wanted to hear in order to temporarily cover up my true designs. If I'd told them that I had … Continue reading What can you do with an English degree?
Transcendental confusion
I was in high school when I first read Walt Whitman. I remember being introduced to the idea of Transcendentalism, finding something about it intriguing, and liking something I read by Whitman. He's lumped in with both the Transcendentalists and Romantics, but if you think of Transcendentalism as the American spin on Romanticism, or as … Continue reading Transcendental confusion
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