a bi-weekly column
by michelle ampofo ‘25
managing editor
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ALL THINGS MUST GO
This column is mostly recommendations this week because I’ve abandoned thought, though not consideration. But first, a word. We’re so close to the end of the school year. SO close. But I feel increasingly contained and uninspired. So I want to leave. The best way I can describe it is the feeling you get when you’re reading a book and feel like the author should have cut the last chapter. Or watching a movie and feel like the movie would be better if they edited it about 30 minutes shorter. I wonder if there is a word for that feeling…
I wasn’t planning on writing an introduction portion for this column because I didn’t know what to write. But when I was laying down for a nap yesterday, before dozing off, the words ALL THINGS MUST GO came to me in all caps, as if it were a dream. I’m now wondering what exactly the words mean to me, and why I feel the need to write about it. For one thing, like I said, it’s the end of another school year, and — when looking back to the beginning of the year — it’s clear that so much has changed. I’ve grown out of bad habits and have chosen better ones. I have lost relationships with some friends and others have taken root in the vacant space. I have progressed and regressed in a multitude of ways. I no longer feel FOMO. And I now take note of little things. Another reason why the phrase might have occurred to me is because of my father’s birthday, which happened over break. It was a great birthday, very celebratory, but towards the end of the night I couldn’t help but feel a sadness. In all the pictures we took, my father looks very different than I remembered him to. Suddenly I saw his age and felt the weight of it. I was talking to my sister, and later a friend, about how as we grow older, our parents age. They age out of themselves. It’s scary to think about how a year could mean something much different to you as it does to someone you love. All Things Must Go.
Thus, All Things Must Go is first a lesson in impermanence.
But during this school year, I have also felt the most in control of my life. It feels nice to finally make my own decisions and to have the results, whether negative or positive, be entirely because of a choice I made. I came into this school year determined to be an active participant in my life (which sounds like a given but really is not), and to make things happen instead of letting things happen to me. Because All Things Must Go literally means that, all things continue to move in motion. In forward or backwards motion. And this is our lives—we get to choose. Somewhat similar to the spiral, nothing on earth ever stands still. We are all balls of energy in constant movement. Make sure you choose a forward momentum. Move forward, always. With naked intent and desire alone.
I’ve started to collect little things. Things as small as hazelnuts. God loves little things. And I might find, when I get good at collecting little things, that I will experience something like eternity in time. With the ease of pleasure. The problem with being human is that our existence is limited. And this is a problem I have stopped trying to overcome. This school year, I gained a twilight and daybreak knowledge, that only through the cloud of unknowing does one experience the divine. And the beauty in this is astounding.
This school year, I allowed myself to stop and consider, and the only decision left was to choose myself (slowly, but surely). It’s this freedom of self that we all pursue.
ALL THINGS MUST GO. And then what’s left? A burning—passion.
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Marie Howe Talk:
I went to listen to the poet Marie Howe speak at the Divinity School. She was amazing. Her poetry is simple in nature but broad in scope. She highlights everyday life while pondering metaphysical, philosophical, and spiritual questions. She explores themes such as solitude, death, life, love, and impermanence, and explores the difference between the self and the soul and the secular vs the sacred. My friend and I were talking about how refreshing it is to hear women in late middle age speak because, at that point in their lives, they are completely themselves and no longer feel the need to explain. At the reading I picked up two of her collections, Magdalene and The Kingdom of Ordinary Time, both of which I will try to read over the summer. (She also complimented my dark eyelids and said I have luminous eyes—she has my vote forever.)
✶✶✶ Watch:
Things to Come (L’avenir) dir. Mia Hansen-Løve (2016)
Would highly recommend this movie, not because it’s the pinnacle of cinema but because it is another scenic French film where nothing really happens! (Remember, in column four I said I was on the prowl for more “slice of life” films? This is for sure a good one.) The film stars Isabelle Huppert as Natalie Chazeaux, a philosophy professor (sexy) who adjusts to life after an unexpected divorce and other life dilemmas. This film is great because it is soft and quiet, driven by character instead of action, and you really feel like you’ve come to know and care about Natalie towards the end. It also has many shots of her French apartment, a summer vacation home, nature, books, coffee, simple but beautiful everyday life etc., so it’s good for visualizing if that’s what you want your life to look like as well.
Babette’s Feast dir. Gabriel Axel (1987)
Babette’s Feast: “Mercy and Truth Have Met Together” | Current | The Criterion Collection
This movie is so scenic and comforting. Homely visuals. The Wikipedia synopsis doesn’t quite do it justice but I’ll paste it anyway:
“Beautiful but pious sisters Martine (Birgitte Federspiel) and Philippa (Bodil Kjer) grow to spinsterhood under the wrathful eye of their strict pastor father on the forbidding and desolate coast of Jutland, until one day, Philippa’s former suitor sends a Parisian refugee named Babette (Stéphane Audran) to serve as the family cook. Babette’s lavish celebratory banquet tempts the family’s dwindling congregation, who abjure such fleshly pleasures as fine foods and wines.”
This is a great movie to watch on a rainy/gloomy day, or if you are a lover of delicate things. Also if you’re into cooking scenes or food in movies, definitely watch this; it is revered because of its visuals of, and attention to, food.
Gods and Monsters dir. Bill Condon (1998)
With Brendan Fraser fully in his resurgence era, this is the movie of his I started with! In this semi-biopic film, James Whale, the once famous director of “Frankenstein” and “Bride of Frankenstein” has been largely forgotten and withers away in his empty mansion. He takes an interest in his new gardener, much to his religious housekeeper’s displeasure, and the story follows both Whale’s troubled history and the complexities of their relationship. This movie was good, but honestly not great, and would be the one that I’d skip out of this movie list.
Frances Ha dir. Noah Baumbach (2013)
Frances Ha – Review | Cinema from the Spectrum
Wasn’t my favorite.
Barry Lyndon dir. Stanley Kubrick (1975)
Barry Lyndon: Time Regained | Current | The Criterion Collection
Barry Lyndon– Every Single Frame
Saw this movie at the HQ screening and although it’s sooooo longggg, it is unbelievably picturesque. The film is so renowned because its director, Stanley Kubrick, used only candles and moonlight to light his set (controlled lighting), picked visually astounding locations for the movie, and shot each scene as if it was a painting. In fact, there’s an entire website that showcases every single frame of the movie, called everysingleframe.com. I linked it above.
In simple terms, the movie follows a man named Barry Lyndon who goes from rags to riches to rags again. It explores the themes of fate, destiny, luck, and free will. If you enjoy period pieces, this might be a good choice for you, but it’s a long film that contains much. Not for the faint of heart.
The Chair created by Amanda Peet & Annie Julia Wyman (2021)
Sandra Oh’s Sense of Purpose | The New Yorker
‘The Chair’ Is Netflix’s Best Drama Series in Years – The Atlantic
If you are interested in academia, dabble in dark academia as an aesthetic, or enjoy literary/academic related media and/or books (or like The Secret History by Donna Tartt), then this show is for you. Also for people who love Sandra Oh. Most people fall under at least one of these categories. I loved the show for all of those reasons so decided to rewatch it over break. Admittedly, it didn’t hit as hard as a rewatch and is definitely more of a winter vibe but was still good! The story follows Oh’s character as she navigates being appointed the first woman of color chair of English at Pembroke University, a prestigious New England university.
Girls created by Lena Dunham (2012-2017)
Why Do I Keep Fantasizing about Being a Kept Woman? — Vogue
2023 is the Year of the Girls Renaissance — i-D Magazine
All Hail the Girlfailure — i-D Magazine
Girls… What can be said about Girls? I decided to watch the notorious show by Lena Dunham after learning that it is in its resurgence. I loved it and it is definitely now one of my favorite shows which is surprising because I remember it, along with its creator, being heavily despised (every episode, literally every episode, especially towards the end, has at least five think pieces that go with it) . I think Girls suffered mostly because it was a show that people invested too heavily in, and therefore wanted it to fulfill everything they wanted it to be. It’s now seen as revoltingly millennial, but in reality Girls was revolutionary for its time. Dunham created the show as a rebuttal to Sex and the City, another favorite show of mine, where the women in the show are beautiful, accomplished, and at least semi put together. The characters in Girls are the antithesis of this. They start off bad and only get worse. They are selfish, ungrateful, unaware, and often disgusting. They don’t even really care about each other. But this endears me to them. There is much comfort to be had in the depiction of women as not put together. These are women who choose themselves first and foremost, women who try and fail, women that are still trying to figure it out. I think if Lena Dunham was more conventionally attractive and skinny, the reception of this show would be similar to that of Ottessa Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation, but then again the show started in 2012, where “femcel-dom”, grotesque, and selfishness in women wasn’t a thing being considered. My only critique of the show (because I feel like I’ve been able to interpret every problem within the show) is that the lack of blackness, or any POC, really, is blatant. Dunham got a lot of rightful criticism for the dearth of color in the show and responded with this: “I wrote the first season primarily by myself, and I co-wrote a few episodes. But I am a half-Jew, half-WASP, and I wrote two Jews and two WASPs. Something I wanted to avoid was tokenism in casting. Not that the experience of an African-American girl and a white girl are drastically different, but there has to be specificity to that experience (that) I wasn’t able to speak to.” While this is one of the more reasonable responses I’ve read from controversies similar to this one, it is such an unfortunate thing that black people are forced to relate to whiteness in the media because there is an absence of everyday black experience in television. It is clear that while black people have no choice but to see themselves in depiction of white people, white people cannot at all see themselves in black people. There’s much more to say, but for now, that’s all.
Love Story dir. Arthur Hiller (1970)
This was a revolutionary film for its time. And one of those things that you don’t understand the significance of (ie. why it was so popular) because of how much it changed and influenced what is so mainstream today (ie. Frankenstein, Pride and Prejudice, etc). Keywords/descriptors of the movie: enemies to lovers (kind of), winter, ivy league (harvard and radcliffe), old money guy meets working class girl, 20 somethings, hockey, daddy issues, dark academia, law school. The main female character in this is a Cool Girl™ which quickly became annoying but never overbearing.
Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe dir. Les Blank (1980)
Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe Trailer (1980)
Seventeen: Les Blank, Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe
The subject of this short film, Werner Herzog, lost a bet to his friend Errol Morris, and is required to eat his shoe. The bet ruled, if Errol Morris finally finished and released his movie, “Gates of Heaven,” Herzog would eat his own shoe. So the movie features Werner preparing his shoe: tenderizing its “meat,” boiling it with garlic, herbs, and broth, and plating/garnishing it. He eats one of the shoes completely (except the soles, which he calls the bones) in front of a live audience. The nature and seriousness of the original bet is now contested (because seriously, who would force their friend to eat a shoe?) and some people think the whole thing was a publicity stunt. But nevertheless it was kind of interesting to watch. Kind of.
Stutz dir. Jonah Hill (2022)
NYT: ‘Stutz’ Review: An Actor’s Tribute to a Therapist
Jonah Hill’s mental health documentary consists of conversations he has with his longtime psychiatrist, Phil Stutz. The film chronicles Stutz’s life, his method of therapy, and his close relationship with Hill. I really liked this movie and think it is an example of a passion project gone right. In a lot of discourse online, people have said it was “life-changing.” I personally, didn’t have that strong a reaction to it, but did enjoy it and learned valuable therapy tools.
Party Girl dir. Daisy von Scherler Mayer (1995)
Vogue: 25 Years Later, the Makers of ‘Party Girl’ Reflect on the Cult Film’s Fashion Legacy
I LOVED this movie. The movie stars 90s indie icon Parker Posey as Mary, a 20 something NYC party girl who, at the start of the movie, ends up in jail. Her austere godmother bails her out, but in exchange, Mary needs to pay off her debt working at the New York Public Library. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Mary’s IDGAF attitude, free spirit, and unfamiliarity with Dewey Decimal System makes it hard for her to prove herself to both her godmother and coworkers, but eventually she finds her way. I love Parker Posey, party movies, movies that take place in NYC, and —perhaps most importantly — movies that take place in libraries. This one checked many boxes and was genuinely so fun to watch. Also this is the first movie I’ve seen with FERAL background characters. Instead of acting like usual quiet and docile NPCS, the people in this movie are completely unhinged (especially in the last party scene). They fight with each other and throw dirty looks at the main character, and never even stop dancing while doing it. All very funny to watch.
Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles dir. Chantal Akerman (1975)
The Revelatory Tedium of the New “Greatest Film of All Time” | The New Yorker
The Routine Pleasures of Jeanne Dielman | Current | The Criterion Collection
They were screening this at HQ and I unfortunately missed it 🙁 BUT it’s on both HBO Max and the Criterion Channel so hopefully I’ll be able to watch it soon and report back with my findings. Looking at the Wikipedia synopsis, though, it looks entirely promising:
“Jeanne Dielman (Delphine Seyrig), the widowed mother of a teenage son, Sylvain (Jan Decorte), ekes out a drab, repetitive existence in her tiny Brussels apartment. Jeanne’s days are divided between humdrum domestic chores — shopping, cooking, housework — and her job as an occasional prostitute, which keeps her financially afloat. She seems perfectly resigned to her situation until a series of slight interruptions in her routine leads to unexpected and dramatic changes.”
Other television/movies:
You Season 4
(I love Joe Goldberg in the same way I love Patrick Bateman. Take that as you will.)
Outer Banks Season 3
(I don’t care what anyone says about this show, I fkn love it and find the chaos so comforting. So head empty, but no less delectable.)
Ted Lasso Season 3
(I finally gave in and watched the show over break. And I really like it. It’s so sickly sweet and wholesome, but it’s a show where every character does the right thing. This is refreshing because conflict is easily resolved, everyone is (apparently) good and open to honest communication, and everyone likes each other! Obviously very idyllic but sometimes you need that.)
Succession Season 4
(Like every other bitch on this campus, I am happily keeping up with this though saddened that this will be the end. Though is it just me, or are they really hammering the point that this is the last season? It’s like okay, we get it.)
The Sopranos
(The mafia era is one that’s hard to get out of.)
White Hot: The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch dir. Alison Klayman (2022)
(Was mostly scrolling through my phone while watching this one, but remember it being good!)
Marie Antoinette dir. Sofia Coppola (2006)
(This rec is mostly for myself, it’s about time I watch this movie xx.)
Crooklyn dir. Spike Lee (1994)
(Grrrr I missed the HQ screening of this, but it is now on the top of my list.)
✶✶✶ Read:
*Books:
Brigitte Bardot and the Lolita Syndrome by Simone de Beauvoir (1959)
Brigitte Bardot and the Lolita Syndrome — Simone de Beauvoir
In her novel, Brigitte Bardot and the Lolita Syndrome, Simone de Beauvoir explores the ways in which society objectifies and sexualizes young women, especially in the entertainment industry. She uses Brigitte Bardot as a figure to illustrate her points and compares her image to that of the character Lolita from Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial novel. De Beauvoir argues that Brigitte Bardot became famous, not necessarily because of her talent, but because of her appearance and sexual allure. Thus, Bardot’s sex appeal was the foundation of her career and success in Hollywood, as seen in the public objectification of her body and her being type-cast into roles where she was portrayed as a sex object. Her function in Hollywood was primarily as a way to please men.
De Beauvoir uses Lolita as a comparison to Bardot in the way that they both represent the sexualization and victimization of young women at the hands and gaze of older men. Though both sex symbols, the depiction of Bardot was quite different from the most obvious example, Marilyn Monroe. While Monroe was blatant in her sexuality, Bardot was appealing because of her affected innocence and lack of carnality. She was evil basked in innocence. Unlike vampish seduction, which is explicit and easy to recognize thus consciously agreed by both parties, Bardot’s use of innocence is disarming and is seen as a trap that even wise men unknowingly fall into. This element of danger and subversion of roles (men as hunter, women as prey) provides an edge of fantasy, enticing the viewer to the character Bardot plays. Still, there is an illusion that Bardot isn’t even trying, that she seduces without effort.
Interestingly enough, any autonomy that Bardot’s characters seem to possess always falls in line with conventional morality of the time (24). As Bardot writes,
“A strange little creature, all in all; and this image does not depart from the traditional myth of femininity. The roles that her script-writers have offered her also have a conventional side. She appears as a force of nature, dangerous so long as she remains untamed, but it is up to the male to domesticate her. She is kind, she is good-hearted. In all her films she loves animals. If she ever makes anyone suffer, it is never deliberately. Her flightiness and slips of behaviour are excusable because she is so young and because of circumstances. Juliette had an unhappy childhood ; Yvette, in Love Is My Profession , is a victim of society. If they go astray, it is because no one has ever shown them the right path, but a man, a real man, can lead them back to it. Juliette’s young husband decides to act like a male, gives her a good sharp slap, and Juliette is all at once transformed into a happy, contrite and submissive wife.” (20)
Bardot’s characters are childlike in nature, they don’t know what they are doing, or their affect on men. They need someone to guide them, to be taught. Her face is “unreadable” and her image is malleable, men can project whatever fantasy onto her person and have the fantasy be true. (34) She was neither good nor bad. In fact, the idea of sin does not occur to men when they think of Brigitte Bardot. A woman with a quiet sensuality, fully formed in her body, yet doesn’t seem to think. Bardot was seductive only in the way a child would be—without trying. And that was the basis of her esteem.
Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste by Pierre Bourdieu (1979)
Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction, A Social Critique on the Judgement of Taste, 1984 translated edition
Distinction (sociology) – Wikipedia
This book is, although it’s gotten more difficult to read as I continue it, is immensely interesting in its argument. I initially picked it up when I was considering a major distinction between the rich and the poor—their skin. Rich people have a certain glow about them, an outward radiance that perhaps comes from not having to think too hard or too long about anything. From having people that you delegate tasks to or pay to solve your problems. They also have more time to tend to the little things—to get keratin treatments regularly, to get facials or massages every week, to always have perfectly manicured nails, whatever. This observation was confirmed by Gwyneth Paltrow during her trial (which I will talk more about later), it seemed like the sun shined directly on her. This, of course, was a direct contrast to the skin of her lawyers and the other people in the courtroom, including the judge.
In Distinction, sociologist of culture Pierre Bourdieu explains the origins of “good” taste. He explains how people both consciously and unconsciously use different strategies in order to distinguish themselves from those in lower classes, and place themselves at higher value. People have different cultural capital (ie. education, cultural knowledge, special skills, experience, etc.) depending on what social class they are born into, and are given a certain social education from birth. (This explains why people in higher classes tend not to have tattoos or piercings in the same way middle class people do, for example. They are not explicitly told that that behavior is unacceptable, rather it is a rule they pick up implicitly by looking at the way other people behave around them.) People perceive this wealth of knowledge and place culturally wealthy people in elevated positions. In this way, people in positions of power influence/become the authority on what is in and what is out, what we consider to be “in good taste.” Bourdieu also argues that people use cultural and conspicuous consumption as ways to signal their social status and align themselves with a higher social class. Overall, Bourdieu’s main argument in “Distinction” is that social class and cultural capital play a crucial role in shaping people’s cultural preferences and these preferences are ultimately used to reinforce social inequality. If you enjoy learning about high vs low culture this would be a really good book to read. It is also just a good book to know about in general because it is essentially the most referenced book when talking about social class and culture, because it is the first book to be written about the topic and there isn’t another quite like it. I linked the Wikipedia page because it does a much better job at explaining Bourdieu’s argument than I did and because I haven’t finished the book yet.
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka (1915)
Who was doing it like Franz Kafka? I read this first in high school and reading it again now, realize I didn’t understand or appreciate the text enough for what it is. For a high school paper, I wrote about how the true metamorphosis, or awakening, happens in Gregor’s sister. I’d like to find that essay and maybe update it… I remember it being quite good.
In the Penal Colony by Franz Kafka (1919)
Essential Kafka – In the Penal Colony
Putting this here as something I want to read, now that I’m into Kafka again. It’s a short story set in an unnamed penal colony that details the elaborate torture machine used on a prisoner over the course of a grueling 12 hours. It explores the questions of justice and punishment.
Articles:
“Anatomy of a Bimbo” by Sue Cameron (2000)
Anatomy of a Bimbo — Lebeau’s Le Blog
“We’re Living in an Ersatz Era” by Kyle MacNeill
We’re living in an ersatz era — i-D Magazine
“Welcome To The Age Of Yassifying To Maintain Anonymity” by Laura Pitcher
Welcome To The Age Of Yassifying To Maintain Anonymity — i-D Magazine
A Lost Interview with Clarice Lispector | The New Yorker
A new piece on Lispector, how could I not read it? This is the most conversational I’ve read Clarice, as she’s having a conversation with friends. But I have a major reservation about this interview, it being her insistence that every thought just comes naturally to her and that she is totally uninfluenced, especially by other authors. I find it very strange and inauthentic. When her friend asks if there is any author that influenced her most, she says, “Look, as far as I know, no.” She says she doesn’t read and isn’t a professional writer because she “only writes when she wants to.” She didn’t know Katherine Mansfield, at the peak of her popularity, was famous. She “found it all by herself.” She wrote a whole story in Portuguese without knowing Portuguese, but then later says that she was a Portuguese tutor in high school. She hasn’t read Virginia Woolf at all (but has), didn’t read James Joyce (but titles one of her books based on a line out of Ulysses), her books weren’t influenced by Kafka (although one of her short stories is eerily similar to his). She doesn’t care about the accolades. It’s all very ~not like other writers™~.
I wonder why she felt the need to do this. To take every chance to affirm that she has created her works all on her own, without the influence of any, in every way fully contained. It’s clear that Lispector was extremely conscious of her image and how she liked others to perceive her. But it’s sad because she is, and was back then at the time of the interview, highly acclaimed, respected, and revered as an author. She didn’t need to explain or overcompensate. I don’t believe we need to be prodigies in order to be valuable. I also don’t think writers are born. Sure, there are people who naturally have an interest in or way with words, and many of these people choose to become writers. But I don’t think anyone is born a writer, not necessarily. Writing is a muscle.
Aubrey Plaza in Real Life | The New Yorker
The Undeniable Royalty of Angela Bassett | The New Yorker
The Joy of Zero-Waste Cooking – The New York Times
I’m moving off campus next year, and I need to learn how to cook! But first, I need to learn how to like cooking because I currently hate it. Thus, I’ve been scouring the internet for cookbooks, scanning grocery store flyers, scrolling through Instacart, created countless pinterest boards that all revolve around food/groceries (ie. groceries in carts, groceries on countertops, groceries on cutting boards, food being prepared in pans, plated food, etc lmao), and reading all food related articles I come across as a form of exposure therapy. If you have any cooking tips or recipes please send them my way, I’ll need all the help I can get.
Scholarly articles:
“Was Eve the first femme fatale?” by Roche Coleman (2021)
Was Eve the first femme fatale? —Roche Coleman
Over the summer, I’m doing research that involves the femme fatale archetype—why not start with Eve?
“The People Inside My Head, Too’”: Madness, Black Womanhood, and the Radical Performance of Lauryn Hill” by La Marr Jurelle Bruce (2012)
(This can be found through Yale library’s quicksearch but I wasn’t able to paste the PDF here.)
It is widely known and agreed upon that Lauryn Hill was a victim of the music/entertainment industry, which led to her decision to essentially abandon her career (for a time) while she was at her most popular. It was nice to read an academic article that goes into the racial politics and exploitation of black artistry in the music industry (especially of black women), and I’m going to try to find more articles about Hill specifically. (PS if you haven’t listened to The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill yet, do so immediately. It is one of my favorite albums ever and is probably one of the best albums ever made.)
“Father Earth, Mother Sky: Ancient Egyptian Beliefs about Conception and Fertility,” in Reading the Body: Representations and Remains in the Archaeological Record, Alison Rautmann, ed. (Philadelphia, 2000), 187-201.
(I wasn’t able to find a free PDF of this online which is unfortunate because this is definitely one of the more interesting texts I’ve read recently. I read it for class.)
I found this text immensely interesting and am so glad to have learned more on the highlighted subject. In the piece, Roth explains the ancient conceptions of the difference between contraception and fertility and what sex/gender was responsible for which. While modern women are now complicit and almost entirely indicted/responsible for birth, fertility, and contraception, ancient Egyptian women were seen as the breeding ground for creation, not actually the actors of the process. They were the incubators of children, and more specifically, women “received” the children who were already fully formed by men without their assistance. As Roth writes, “Power of fertility and creation was identified almost exclusively as a male characteristic.” (187) There was the belief that semen provided intellectual qualities for the child as well as the stronger parts of the body. Later, women were credited with providing the baby with “softer” elements such as emotions, the skin, etc, implying that all structure and strength, in other words, power, was derived from the father. Menstrual blood was also said to provide material for the child. But in general, women were believed to have an almost completely passive role in the entire contraceptive process. Even Hathor and Isis, goddesses most associated with fertility, were actually believed to assist in fertility, not exactly responsible for creation. Semen was seen as the exclusive life force.
Despite this, men believed that women could control whether or not they conceived (almost as if they could turn it “off and on” as they wished). This idea is reflected in ancient myths, such as the one of Zeus, Metis, and Athena, where Zeus swallows his wife in order to give birth to their child. (189) The act of swallowing, which of course takes a sexual meaning, is what allows him to later give birth to Athena thus as a male taking on a feminine role.
When reading, I was especially interested in the idea of a “good husband” in ancient times. When talking about fertility and conception, a “good husband” might have also meant a man that is fertile (and wow, this idea has been entirely flipped on its head now huh? Men are not even taken into account nowadays). Women were the ones who got impregnated, men were the ones who did the pregnating. When men weren’t able to fulfill their function in this way, they were no longer seen as men. This is seen on page 190 when Roth cites a letter that says, “‘You are not a man because you cannot make your wives pregnant like other men.’” In marriage, wives had two roles as it pertained to fertility and childbearing: first, they had to stimulate fertility in their husbands (through sexuality and sexual acts), and second, they had to nurture the product of fertility before and after its birth (194). Thus, in marriage, wives were expected to maintain a sense of eroticism and sexuality as to stimulate their husbands fertility in hopes that they would be provided with children (195).
After reading this text and comparing it to modern times, it is clear that we need to find a balance as society of not erasing the role of women in the processes of birth, fertility, and conception while not completely erasing them either. These days, women are seen as the primary culprit in issues of fertility—doctors, family, women themselves are more likely to assume the women’s infertility before even suggesting to test male sterility. Though women were seen as passive characters in ancient birth practices, it is interesting that they still somehow got blamed for childlessness, whether that be they weren’t stimulating enough for their husbands or were purposely obstructing their own conception. It is a true example of how women are always seen as complicit, whether or whether not.
Journal Highlight:
OMG GUYS. The other day I struck gold on an academic journal. It’s called Celebrity Studies and it focuses on just that. It is the first of its kind, and though it was received pretty negatively upon its launch in 2011, it has helped legitimize the academic study of celebrity. Notable studies published in the journal include commentary on Pippa Middleton’s buttocks through Marxist and Freudian analyses, an exploration of Meghan Markle’s relationship to feminism, and an examination of what it means when a celebrity dies. I’ve linked some articles below, the journal is quarterly and still active, so I’m excited to read more in the future. The articles are also so fun to read because the authors are often fabulously snarky. (Also this is literally the reason why I love academia—being able to make a career out of writing essays on things so frivolous and having that be completely valid. At the same time, analyses of popular culture are really important, and it’s nice to have more of an academic lens to look through, rather than just general discourse online. (I’m not entirely sure that these links will work but there is access to the journal through Quicksearch, so if any of the titles interest you or you just want to check it out, I’d look there.)
“Persona as method: exploring celebrity and the public self through persona studies”
Full article: Persona as method: exploring celebrity and the public self through persona studies
“Death and celebrity: introduction”
Full article: Death and celebrity: introduction
“Celebrity myth-making: from Marilyn M. to Kim K.”
Full article: Celebrity myth-making: from Marilyn M. to Kim K
“The concept of an ‘anticelebrity’: a new type of antihero of the media age and its impact on modern politics”
“And bringing up the rear: Pippa Middleton, her derrière and celebrity as feminine ideal”
“Fetishising Pippa Middleton: celebrity posteriors, whiteness and class aspirationalism”
Full article: Fetishising Pippa Middleton: celebrity posteriors, whiteness and class aspirationalism
Other articles: (i’ve bolded the more interesting ones)
The Glass Essay by Anne Carson | Poetry Foundation
The Second Coming of Erykah Badu — Vogue
14 novels about college that aren’t The Secret History
What Was So Special About Greta Garbo? | The New Yorker
The British history of Burberry
Succession and the era of billionaire bore-core
Why Literature? | The New Republic (recommended to me by my friend audrey)
Kid Sister – Heavy Traffic Magazine
You Will Not Survive – Heavy Traffic Magazine
How to Read ‘The Waste Land’ So It Alters Your Soul
Irina Dumitrescu · Christ in Purple Silk: Medieval Selfhood · LRB 2 March 2023
Bee Wilson · Like a Bar of Soap: Work, don’t play · LRB 15 December 2022
Staying Home to Write: Talking Process with Sheila Heti
What Carmela Soprano Taught Me About Being a Woman
A Deep, Feminist Dive Into Autotheory
You’d Like This | Fátima Vélez & Hannah Kauders
My Weekend With the Martians | Ruby Sutton
The Fig Tree | University of Chicago Law School
If He Hollers Let Him Go – Believer Magazine
✶✶✶Curated book list:
Since this is my second to last column of the school year, I am jam-packing recommendations to last through the summer. Here is a list of poetry and prose that revolve around the theme of female interiority; next cycle, I will list the self-help books (along with other books) I plan to read over the summer to achieve more perfect zen. As always, I’ll report back with my findings. (AKA I submitted an application for the Van Sinderen Prize and didn’t get it, so am sharing it all right here :-))
This collection consists of mostly poetry, fiction, and a sprinkling of nonfiction that explores the interior lives of women. These books lean on character study instead of plot to delineate the women they follow. Cerebral in nature, they give the reader room to enter the minds of women who are strong, sharp, imperfect, but unequivocally themselves. The characters appear in different stages of their lives, hail from different places, and find themselves in various mental states. Often set in domestic spheres, this literature highlights the complex, active, and tempestuous landscapes women harbor even in everyday life. This variety shows there is no simple definition or experience of womanhood, nor is there singularity in women’s outlooks on life. Instead, the books reveal the mind of women as rich terrains of endless depth.
I have been building this collection since I was a junior in high school when the subject of Women’s Studies became of particular interest to me. Around that time in my life, I really began to observe the lives of women around me and instead of feeling happy from what I saw, I felt only sadness and discontent. I noticed that women were apt to defer to the men in their lives and, after only a bit of protest, accepted conditions that they were, at first, abjectly against. I wanted to be different and began to seek female characters who already were. I have made a home for myself through books and reading has become a lifelong habit. Reading has allowed me to enter places and times I’ve not yet experienced and to reimagine what it means to be a woman, helping me craft the woman that I am becoming. Reading has supported me in every state of being. If not for books, I would have accepted the belief that being a woman means living a life of compromise. But I want a different life.
Akhmatova, Anna. The Complete Poems. Grand Rapids, United States, Zephyr Press, September 1, 2000.
Carson, Anne. Glass, Irony, and God. New York, United States, New Directions, November 17,
1995.
Clifton, Lucille. Good Woman. United States, BOA Editions Ltd, November 1, 1987.
Clifton, Lucille. The Book of Light. United States, Copper Canyon Press, July 1, 1992.
Didion, Joan. The Year of Magical Thinking. New York, United States, Knopf Doubleday
Publishing Group, February 13, 2007.
Didion, Joan. Blue Nights. New York, United States, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, May
29, 2012.
du Maurier, Daphne. Rebecca. New York, United States, William Morrow Paperbacks,
September 5, 2006.
Ernaux, Annie. Happening. New York, United States, Seven Stories Press, May 14, 2019.
Ferrante, Elena. Days of Abandonment. New York, United States, Europa Editions, September 1,
2005.
Gyasi, Yaa. Transcendent Kingdom. New York, United States, Anchor, October 17, 2000.
(Hardcover binding)
Hak Kyung Cha, Theresa. Dictée. Berkeley, United States, University of California Press,
January 1, 2009.
Harris, Jessica B. My Soul Looks Back. New York, United States, Scribner, May 15, 2018.
Heti, Sheila. Motherhood. New York, United States. Picador USA, May 7, 2019.
Kaysen, Susanna. Girl, Interrupted. New York, United States, Vintage, April 19, 1994.
Lispector, Clarice. Soulstorm. New York, United States, New Directions Publishing, September
13, 1989.
Lispector, Clarice. The Complete Stories. New York, United States, New Directions, June 26,
2018.
Lispector, Clarice. Too Much of Life. New York, United States, New Directions, September 27,
2022.
Lispector, Clarice. An Apprenticeship or the Book of Pleasures. New York, United States,New
Directions, May 3, 2022.
Lispector, Clarice. Near to the Wild Heart. New York, United States, New Directions, June 13,
2012.
Lispector, Clarice. Agua Viva. New York, United States, New Directions, June 13, 2012.
Lispector, Clarice. Selected Cronicas. New York, United States, New Directions, November 17,
1996.
Maynard, Joyce. At Home in the World. New York, United States, Picador, August 15, 1998.
Machado, Carmen Maria. In the Dream House. New York, United States, Graywolf Press,
December 1, 2020.
Moshfegh, Ottessa. My Year of Rest and Relaxation. United States, Penguin Books, June 25,
2019.
Nin, Anais. The Diary of Anais Nin, Vol 1. United Kingdom, Mariner Books, March 19, 1969.
Oates, Joyce Carol. Blonde. Ecco, April 14, 2020.
Olds, Sharon. The Dead and the Living. New York, United States, Knopf, February 12, 1984.
Parker, Dorothy. Complete Stories. Hawthorn, Australia, Penguin Books, January 1, 2002.
Piercy, Marge. The Moon is Always Female. New York, United States, Knopf, March 12, 1980.
Plath, Sylvia. The Colossus and Other Poems. New York, United States, Vintage, May 19, 1998.
Plath, Sylvia. The Bell Jar. New York, United States, Harper Perennial Modern Classics, August
2, 2005.
Plath, Sylvia. The Unabridged Journals. New York, United States, Anchor, October 17, 2000.
Rich, Adrienne. Diving into the Wreck. New York, United States, W. W. Norton & Company,
April 1, 2013.
Sarton, May. Journal of a Solitude. New York, United States, W. W. Norton & Company,
October 17, 1992.
Shire, Warsan. Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth. Ilford, United Kingdom, flipped eye
publishing, December 29, 2011.
Suess, Diane. frank: sonnets. Saint Paul, United States, Graywolf, March 2, 2020.
Waller-Bridge, Phoebe. Fleabag: The Scriptures. New York, United States, Random House
USA, November 26, 2019.
Wurtzel, Elizabeth. Prozac Nation. United States, Mariner Books, June 6, 2017.
✶✶✶ Listen:
Playlists:
- listen to my “column seven” playlist on spotify:
(mind your business, i was healing my inner child over break)
7 Things by Miley Cyrus
Naturally by Selena Gomez & The Scene
Fly On The Wall by Miley Cyrus
Potential Breakup Song by Aly & AJ
Fabulous by Sharpay Evans, Ryan, Disney
Year 3000 by Jonas Brothers
Big Time Rush by Big Time Rush
Beggin’ On Your Knees by Victorious Cast
Falling for Ya by Grace Phipps
What Dreams Are Made Of by Hilary Duff
The Climb by Miley Cyrus
He Could Be The One by Hannah Montana
Wouldn’t Change a Thing by Demi Lovato, Joe Jonas
Leave It All To Me by Miranda Cosgrove, Drake Bell
Hoedown Throwdown by Miley Cyrus
Tell Me Something I Don’t Know by Selena Gomez
Ready or Not by Bridgit Mendler
Everything Is Not As It Seems by Selena Gomez
If We Were A Movie by Hannah Montana, Corbin Bleu
Bop To The Top by Ryan, Sharpay Evans, High School Musical Cast
Hurricane by Bridgit Mendler
Burnin’ Up by Jonas Brothers
Calling All the Monsters by China Anne McClain
She’s So Gone by Naomi Scott
Don’t Forget by Demi Lovato
Party In The U.S.A. by Miley Cyrus
Nobody’s Perfect by Hannah Montana
You’ll Always Find Your Way Back Home by Hannah Montana
Determinate by Adam Hicks, Bridgit Mendler, Naomi Scott
Rock Star by hannah Montana
Ordinary Girl by Hannah Montana
Starstruck by Christopher Wilde
TTYLXOX by Bella Thorne
Introducing Me by Nick Jonas
Hero by Christopher Wilde, Stubby
Boyfriend by Big Time Rush
Cloud 9 by Dove Cameron
Shake It Up Theme Song by Selena Gomez
- Lana’s new album, Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd
Lana Del Rey’s New Album Searches for Transcendence | The New Yorker
My thoughts on the album: DEFINITELY NOT my favorite album from Lana. I officially jumped on the Lana train circa the 2017 Lust for Life era, so naturally that album as well as the ones that came directly after it are the ones I’m most fond of. This album is so soft, slow, and vulnerable, giving it an almost heavenly feeling. I personally am more drawn to chaos and sorrow, so these songs didn’t do much for me. Although it may turn out to be one of those slow burn cases where it’ll grow on me the more I listen.
And while there is much value and nostalgia to be had in Lana’s full-fledged Priscilla Presley, Jackie O, Americana persona period, it is so nice to see that she has abandoned those pretenses and is now unmistakably herself. Because really, out of all the potential album titles one could choose, who would name theirs Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, especially sans question mark? Or, who would title an album called Blue Banisters, and have the album be glaringly brown? Miss. Lana fucking Del Rey. That’s who. And I’m 100% here for it. You get the sense that she is finally making music for herself and is unconcerned with whether fans like me understand or approve of what she’s doing. I’m excited to see how far this lack of inhibition goes and how far it’ll take her. So carry on Madam Del Rey 🧎♀️.
- The Rolling Stone’s playlist on “The 50 Best Lana Del Rey Songs”
- or lastly, my personal playlist “cypress & indigo”
Podcasts:
Forbidden Fruits with Julia Fox and Niki Tanesh
(they’re back!)
The Return – Forbidden Fruits with Julia Fox and Niki Takesh | Podcast on Spotify
The Psychology of your 20’s
(didn’t listen to this for the longest which is a shame because it’s really good)
53. The power of microhabits – The Psychology of your 20’s | Podcast on Spotify
75. Healing your inner child! – The Psychology of your 20’s | Podcast on Spotify
67. Embracing your authentic self – The Psychology of your 20’s | Podcast on Spotify
The goop Podcast
(GP is my FAVORITE nepo bébé and I’m a proud goop goblin)
Drawing Power from Your Shadow – The goop Podcast
Gwyneth Paltrow x Phil Stutz: The Power of Small Things – The goop Podcast
How to Become Your Future Self – The goop Podcast
Sea Moss Girlies
(this podcast is nice because it feels like you have a Gen Z wellness guru/nutritionist giving you health advice)
Episode 120: Stay hydrated, Seamossgirlies
Episode 117: What the F*ck is Clean Beauty?
Episode 90: Gut Health — Not for TikTok Dummies
dear diary,
(a podcast that feels like a hug)
things are sweeter than they seem
A question: Are celebrity trials the new celebrity sex tape?
This is a question I heard on a podcast I am genuinely forgetting the name of (maybe Forbidden Fruits? Probably Red Scare but idk) but is of course especially relevant now with all that was happening with the Gwyneth Paltrow ski crash trial and the Depp/Heard court case (both of which I kept up with religiously, sorry). There is an insatiable societal desire, and subsequent satisfaction, of being able to see celebrities at their most vulnerable and having the things that a person that tries to keep private revealed. I’d imagine it’s the same reason why people love to hear a juicy morsel of everyday gossip or gravitate towards tabloid magazines. The idea of obtaining unauthorized knowledge about the private life of someone else will always be appealing, and there is a sense of triumph or power when someone experiences that “aha!” feeling, even when (or maybe especially when) it’s at the expense of others.
For these reasons, I’m inclined to say yes, celebrity trials are the new sex tape especially since sex work is more accepted and mainstream, something was bound to fill it’s place. I just wanted to relay the question here because I found it quite compelling.
endnote: In honor of next column, the last column of the year, I will do a round–up of all of this year’s playlists, as well as the recommendations from this year that I most think you should check out over the summer. I might also share a couple things I’ve been gatekeeping (podcasts, substacks, etc.)… It’s probably going to be more rec heavy with a short introduction like this one because I really don’t see future me wanting to write so close to reading week, but I still want to finish the year off with a column anyways :,)
until then!
michelle
unauthorized syllabi is a bi-weekly column. beyond that, i’m not sure what it is. last cycle, i wrote about an encounter with a celestial being named T.
