I'd Prefer To Sit Awhile

I would love to see a collection of quotes about the moon/moongazing. Thanks

"We looked at the moon and the moon looked at us."

— Helen Oyeyemi, from ‘White Is for Witching’

"How bright, glaring-bright, the moon […] Shreds of cloud blowing across it like living things."

"A cold-glaring full moon suspended in the sky like the unblinking eye of God."

— Joyce Carol Oates, from ‘We Were the Mulvaneys’

"There is something haunting in the light of the moon; it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and something of its inconceivable mystery."

— Joseph Conrad, from 'Lord Jim'

"As the moon’s shadow passes over you—like a rush of gloom, a tornado, a cannonball, a loping god, the heeling over of a boat, a slug of anaesthetic up your arm…"

— Anne Carson, Decreation: Poetry, Essays, Opera; from ‘Totality: The Colour of Eclipse’

"Under the shield of night, / let me unburden the moon."

— Forugh Farrokhzad, Reborn; from ‘Border Walls’, tr. Sholeh Wolpé

"The moon is my mother. She is not sweet like Mary. / Her blue garments unloose small bats and owls."

— Sylvia Plath, Ariel; from 'The Moon and the Yew Tree'

"The brimming moon looked through me and I could not move."

— Ted Hughes, Recklings; from ‘Keats’

"The full moon is out, casting her equivocal corpse-glow over all."

— Margaret Atwood, from ‘The Testaments’

"I never go walking in the moonlight, never, without being met by thoughts of my dead, without the feeling of death and of the future coming over me."

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, from ‘The Sorrows of Young Werther’ tr. David Constantine

"And the moon is wilder every minute."

— W. B. Yeats, Michael Robartes and the Dancer; from 'Solomon and the Witch'

"A moon loosened from a stag’s eye,"

— Theodore Roethke, Praise to the End!; from ‘Give Way, Ye Gates’

"Moon full, moon dark,"

— Sylvia Plath, Collected Poems; from ‘Goatsucker’

"Let’s order one last round and kiss in front of god and the rest of the drunks, then pour ourselves out into the night, following the moon anywhere but home."

— William Taylor Jr., from ‘Literary Sexts: Volume 2′

"In the window, the moon is hanging over the earth, / meaningless but full of messages."

— Louise Glück, A Village Life; from ‘A Village Life’

"while from the moon, my lover’s eye / chills me to death"

— Sylvia Plath, Collected Poems: Juvenilia; from ‘To a Jilted Lover’

"The moon has a strange look to-night. Has she not a strange look? She is like a mad woman, a mad woman who is seeking everywhere for lovers."

"Look at the moon! How strange the moon seems! She is like a woman rising from a tomb. She is like a dead woman."

"Oh! How strange the moon looks. You would think it was the hand of a dead woman who is seeking to cover herself with a shroud."

— Oscar Wilde, from 'Salomé'

"The moon has nothing to be sad about, / Staring from her hood of bone. / She is used to this sort of thing. / Her blacks crackle and drag."

— Sylvia Plath, Collected Poems; from ‘Edge’

"Where, indeed does the moon not look well? What is the scene, confined or expansive, which her orb does not hallow?"

— Charlotte Brontë, from 'Villette'

"And the tarnished sliver of moon glows / Like an old serrated knife."

— Anna Akhmatova, Seventh Book: from ‘In a Broken Mirror’, tr. Judith Hemschemeyer

"In the full moon you dream more."

— Margaret Atwood, Morning in the Burned House; from ‘The Ottawa River By Night’

"…the moon appeared momentarily […] her disk was blood-red and half overcast; she seemed to throw on me one bewildered, dreary glance, and buried herself again instantly in the deep drift of cloud.

— Charlotte Brontë, from ‘Jane Eyre’

"It is not so much moonless as the moon is seen nowhere / And always felt."

— Dorothea Lasky, Black Life; from ‘Poets, You Are Eager’

"If the moon smiled, she would resemble you. / You leave the same impression / Of something beautiful, but annihilating."

— Sylvia Plath, Ariel; from ‘The Rival’

Colette, translated by Antonia White from “Gribiche,” written c. February 1937

some highlights from my writing seminar with honestly one of my favourite authors of all time who shall remain nameless bc i dont want her to know i was spilling her secrets online

The first trick is to detach yourself from your idea. You don’t have just one novel inside you, and it’s not a big deal if you don’t finish this novel.

She was skeptical of the common advice “just write!!1!” - she talked about how long ideas for her most popular novels were marinating inside her before she properly wrote them

As a continuation of that, she was a big believer in knowing what you want to write before you write it. Not what you’re going to write, what you want to write. 

The first thing she decides about a novel is what the mood is going to be, and this informs every other decision (e.g. the mood for Shiver was bittersweet)

Ideas should be personal, specific, exciting and they should exclude secondary sources. A personal idea isn’t necessarily autobiographical (which should be avoided), but it speaks to your emotional truth. 

She said she had been read Ronsey fanfiction and she couldn’t view her car in the same way since. 

Story is the thing that seems most important to reader but is most changeable to the author - story is subservient to your mood and your message. Change what you like in the plot as long as your book retains its sense of self.

Story is conflict, exploration and change. A good story has active tension -the characters want something, instead of just wanting something not to happen (e.g. wanting to kill an enemy instead of simply defending a stronghold against an enemy) 

A story needs to have a concrete end, something to be done. 

Satisfaction is important - deliver what you promise to the reader. The other shoe has to drop. Ronan Lynch doesn’t ever talk about his feelings, so its rewarding when he does. 

Earn your emotional moments (she threw shade at Fantastic Beasts lmao)

Forcing a character to be passive is dissatisfying to the reader. 

Characters are products of their environments, consistent/predictable, nuanced and specific, moving the plot, and subservient to other story elements. 

She always starts with tropes for ensemble casts like sitcoms. Helpful for building good character dynamics.

Write scenes with characters saying explicitly what they’re thinking and then go back and make them talk like real people in the edit. 

An action can also prove what they’re thinking, instead of making them say it or another character guess it (e.g. Ronan punching a wall). 

Move the reader’s emotional furniture around without them noticing. 

All her books follow the three act structure. Established normal -> inciting incident -> character makes an Active Decision -> fun and games -> escalation -> darkest moment -> climax. 

Promise what you’re going to do in the first five pages. 

Read your book out loud. Record yourself reading it. 

If you have writer’s block, it’s because you’ve stopped writing the book you want to write. She likes to delete everything she’s written until she gets back to a point where she knew she was writing what she wanted to write, and then carrying on from there. 

'The earliest Cinderella figures emerged within aristocratic milieus. Basile’s was prepared for academicians or their highly placed friends and acquaintances; Perrault’s was written for a princess of the blood; and d’Aulnoy’s was crafted for fellow salonières. In all three seventeenth-century tellings, Cinderella reproduced and represented aspects of aristocratic imaginaries.'

Ruth B. Bottigheimer, 'Cinderella: The People's Princess' in Cinderella across Cultures, ed. M. H. D. Rochere (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2016).

I don’t know where I’m going. Where I came from is disappearing. I am unwelcome. My beauty is not beauty here. My body is burning with the shame of not belonging, my body is longing. I am the sin of memory and the absence of memory.

Warsan Shire, from Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head; “Home”

How about in 2024 we stop it with reading books with the goal in mind to finish the book so you can add it to your list of read books and start reading books slowly and intentionally with the goal to rip it into pieces with your mind and be touched by it and formed by it and changed by it

💫 ANNOUNCEMENT: my first book is here! 💫

you can buy 𝘮𝘦𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘢 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘬𝘺 𝘸𝘢𝘺 through the link below if you're interested (and if you do like it, please consider leaving a review if you've the time).

it has been a dream of mine for so long and now it's a reality (though it does still feel a bit surreal, even as i hold it in my hands). with the help of my talented illustrator—my brother—i am finally able to share it with you all!

this book is essentially my heart and soul and i do hope you find a place for it in yours. thank you for all of your support; your sweet words and appreciation for my poetry has made this journey even more worthwhile.

available formats are paperback and kindle on Amazon. i hope you enjoy! 🥰💫