Blog Posts
It takes destiny for a human to tame a beast
Dear Yan Ge, Your Strange Beasts of China (2020, tr. Jeremy Tiang. Original: 异兽志, 2006) reads like a collection of entries from a bestiary: the city of… Read more “It takes destiny for a human to tame a beast”
Yan Ge
Yan Ge (pen name of Dai Yuexing, 1984) is a Chinese author. She grew up in a small town in Sichuan, and earned a PhD in comparative… Read more “Yan Ge”
You created me in the abyss of nonexistence
Dear Carmen, The Book of Anna (2020, tr. Samantha Schnee. Original: El libro de Ana, 2016) takes off a couple of years after Tolstoy had left us… Read more “You created me in the abyss of nonexistence”
Commonplace book
“It is best for us to continue in the belief that Eve actually ate an apple, and immediately ruined Adam in consequence! I like this belief, too, it speaks so well for the progressive power of women.” – 26 July 1857, ‘Early journalism’, in The Morgesons and Other Writings
The sadness of others one should leave alone. It is a small garden, a fragile delicate Arcadia, one should not disturb it. – I Am the Brother of XX
Menagerie of Authors
Yan Ge - Yan Ge (pen name of Dai Yuexing, 1984) is a Chinese author. She grew up in a small town in Sichuan, and earned a PhD in comparative… Read more "Yan Ge"
Carmen Boullosa - Carmen Boullosa (September 4, 1954) is a Mexican author. She grew up in a middle-class family in Mexico City and attended a Catholic school. Her mother died… Read more "Carmen Boullosa"
Tove Ditlevsen - Tove Ditlevsen (Tove Irma Margit Ditlevsen, 14 December 1917 – 7 March 1976) was a Danish writer. She grew up in an impoverished working-class family in Copenhagen. Her father… Read more "Tove Ditlevsen"
Elspeth Barker - Elspeth Barker (1940) is a Scottish writer. She attended Somerville College, Oxford, and, in the late 1960’s, married the poet George Barker, with whom she had five children.… Read more "Elspeth Barker"
Marita Bonner - Marita Bonner (née Marita Odette Bonner; married name Marita Odette Bonner Occomy. June 16, 1899 – December 7, 1971) was an African-American writer. She attended Brookline High School in… Read more "Marita Bonner"
About
About this [blank] garden
“I am younger each year at the first snow.”
– Anne Sexton, in a letter to W. D. Snodgrass, in 1958.
A Self-portrait in Letters, (2004)
This is my blank space. A white page, as good as a garden covered in snow, not yet cultivated, but with some strong Spring hidden within; something simple, clean, yet to be stained; a seed with some flower all curled up inside, first waiting, then slowly unraveling.
