So, this snuck up on me, like most things do, these days. I knew the anniversary was coming up, but I thought it was four years, not five. I set up the sale (41% in the US, 52% in the UK, Kindle version of Magic Beans), I scheduled all the social media posts, but I was just celebrating the anniversary in general. It was meant to be a sort of farewell to the Covid era that derailed my writing and publishing schedule, not anything special. But then I did the math, and it turns out- hey, did you guys know that it’s 2023 already?? That’s kind of a big deal!
A beautiful maiden is cursed by an evil fairy to fall into a deep sleep from which only true love’s kiss can wake her.
History of the story
Like a lot of our most recognisable fairytales, this one was first published in more or less its current form by Gianbattista Basile, later adapted by Charles Perrault, and ultimately printed by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, before being animated by Disney.
The earliest form was included in a set of stories called Perceforest, which had a very Celtic theme, drawn and inspired by the chroniclers of Arthurian legend. This version involved impossible tasks, outlandish curses, a notorious sexual assault, and a removal of an enchanted flax seed as the thing that woke her.
Basile’s version is very dark, and is called, ‘Sun, Moon, and Talia.’ Talia’s father asks soothsayers to predict her future, and is told that flax will be dangerous to her. Flax is a grain, spun to make linen. She does indeed prick her finger on a splinter of flax and falls into a deep sleep, which her father thinks is her death. In his grief, he boards up the palace and leaves. Sometime later, a passing king enters the palace and comes across sleeping Talia. He assaults her, and leaves her there. She eventually gives birth to twins, and one of them sucks the flax out of her finger, waking her up. She is startled to find that she has children, as anyone would be, and she names the children Sun and Moon. The king, like the absolute worst kind of creep (remember, he thinks she’s dead, which makes him not only a rapist, but a necrophile), returns to her. Somehow, they fall in love, despite… all of that, and he promises to come back again for her.
Back in his kingdom, the queen, his actual wife, overhears him sleeptalking about Talia, Sun, and Moon, and she gets the royal secretary to tell her what’s up. She forges a letter to Talia, asking her to send the children for a visit, and when they get there, instructs the cook to kill them and cook them for the king. The cook, understandably, does not do that, and hides the kids, cooking lamb, instead. The king enjoyed his dinner and the queen mocks him for eating his own children. Later, she invites Talia herself to come over to be burned alive, but the king figures it out and instead, burns the queen and her co-conspirators. The cook is fine though because he was cool, and the king eventually marries Talia.
Yeah, so that’s a gross one.
Perault’s version starts off pretty recognisably. A king and queen welcome a baby girl and invite seven fairies to bless the child. An eighth, older fairy shows up, and is aggreeably seated with the others. She had been living alone in a tower for so long, everyone had thought her dead, so that’s why she wasn’t invited initially. Six fairies gave their blessings for grace and beauty, and by then the old fairy was pissed. So she cursed the girl to prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel, and DIE.
The last fairy amended this by transmuting the death into a very deep sleep that would last a hundred years, and could be broken at that time by a prince. Kiss not specified.
Naturally, all the spinning wheels in the kingdom are destroyed, which we have to assume impacted the textiles economy because spinning my hand take a long time, y’all. The princess lives her life, but in her teens comes across an old woman, spinning on a spinning wheel in the palace. She reaches out to touch it and pricks her finger, fulfilling the curse. The princess is carried to the finest room in the palace and the king orders the last fairy to appear. She guesses that the princess will be freaked out in a hundred years to wake alone, so the fairy puts everyone to sleep, and builds fortifications around the palace: trees and brambles, etc.
A hundred years pass, and a prince stumbles upon the palace. His men tell him the legend of a beautiful princess trapped inside. The prince does what princes do and hack’n’slashed his way in and finds the princess. Overcome by her beauty, he falls to his knees, which breaks the spell.
Cuter, right? Basile needed help.
The princess falls in love instantly and the two chat while the palace attendants wake up. The two marry in secret, and she has two kids Aurora (aww) and Jour, or ‘dawn’ and ‘day’ in English.
Unbeknownst to the prince, his mother was part ogre, so when the prince becomes the king, the queen mother orders the cook to kill and cook Jour, but again, the cook is cool and cooks lamb instead. She then orders him to cook Aurora, but he cooks a kid (goat) instead. She orders him to kill the queen, but he serves a hind (deer) instead. The queen mother eventually catches on and gets a tub together full of snakes and bugs and all sorts, but the king returns home, sees the absolute chaos going on, realises that his mum is an ogress, and she throws herself into the tub, and is eaten. The king, queen, and children live happily ever after.
Now the Grimms called theirs Little Briar Rose, and it doesn’t have the second part with all the cannibalism, though they did include a cannibalistic evil mother-in-law in a separate story. Scholars think that was inspired by St Brynhild, and despite being German, they didn’t really like it. And they departed from the Germanic-ness again, by having the waker kiss the beauty, which was not an element of Germanic stories at the time. The also converted the fairies into wise women.
Tchaikovsky
The Tchaikovsky version follows the Perault version pretty closely, with a few glorious exceptions. The fairies all have delightful names, with the most important being the Lilac Fairy. The evil fairy is called Carabosse, the prince is named Desirée, and notably, the princess is name Aurora (which Disney copyrighted in 2007, causing quite the uproar). The Lilac Fairy chooses the prince herself, and Puss in Boots is at the wedding. Tchaikovsky really was a madman.
But mostly, I just wanted to talk about a piece in Act 1 (Les Quatre Fiancés de le Princesse Aurore), called No. 6, Grand Valse Villageoise (The Garland Waltz). Or as we’ve known it since 1959, ‘Once Upon a Dream.’ That’s right, folks, even if you’ve never seen The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, or any of the ballets that Tchaikovsky actually liked, you are at least familiar with this one.
Sleep
So why is this relevant (besides me just professionally appreciating fairytales)? Well, the next book in my series is called Sleep, for now, and explores many of the same themes. We have a maiden shut away from the world for her own good, we have a powerful evil, deep enchanted sleep, and a battle to uncover hidden secrets.
That’s all I can say for now. You’ll just have to wait and see. But not a hundred years, I wouldn’t do that to you 😉
The last few years, there has been a lot of discussion about diversity and representation in media, particularly around how race and gender are written in movies, tv shows, and books. Because of this, a lot more people from marginalised communities are speaking up and having their voices heard. Not only are their criticisms and calls for change being listen to and acted on, they themselves are becoming a larger and more visible demographic in those spheres. We love to see it.
So, how do you get in on it?
Number one, if you’re not a member of a historically silenced group: the best thing you can do is listen genuinely and honestly. Take the feedback you receive and act on it. Also, avoid writing about issues that those groups struggle with. For instance, if you are white, you can -and should!- write a racially diverse cast, but the story and those characters’s whole purpose, should not be ABOUT race. Write about love, greed, ambition, loss, friendship, etc- but not racial identity and struggle. That’s not an area you’re close enough to, and you need to step back and leave room for a more qualified person to speak their truth.
If you ARE from a historically silenced group, write your truth. You should also avoid writing about the struggles of people outside of what you have experience with. You don’t have to write about struggle, of course, you are more than your otherness and more than your trauma, but that well of identity is powerful, and your experiences and feelings could fill a void and be validating for someone else who has been waiting to see their story in print. If you don’t see the book you want to read on the shelf, write it. If you want to be a writer because you have a story to tell, don’t be scared and don’t hold back. Say it with your whole chest. The world needs your story.
So how much should you tell? If you’re not writing an autobiography, you likely don’t want to tell every detail of the story. And you’re right, not every little detail is necessary, in fact, a lot of it will just bog everything down.
So, how do you decide what to say?
Well, first of all, remember that a book follows certain guidelines. First and foremost is plot. Story comes before everything else. So, cut the funny lines that don’t add anything, or the quirky little coincidences. Real stories are meaty enough that you can streamline them without losing the complexity. one or two moments of irrelevant flavour here and there are fine
What about characters?
Real people are so complex and multifaceted that it’s overwhelming to think about what virtues and vices to give fictional ones to bring them to life. Recently, I was asked to list my hobbies, and I almost cried. Now, I’m a real person- I have decades of life to fill up, but a fictional character only has so many pages, most of which are dictated by the plot. You need the reader to understand who they are at their core very quickly for the events of the story to feel real.
So pick one trait to be your main quality, the one that guides all of the mundane decisions. After that, three positive or neutral traits which inform the small decisions. Lastly, two flaws which- and this is the important part- decide the major choices. That sounds backwards, I know, but think about it.
Let’s say your character is Ambitious, first. She might also be healthy, honest, and friendly- she’s a real go-getter. But she also can be a bit petty and maybe has a temper.
She goes about her day like champ, mowing down her routine like it’s nothing. Her coworkers want to go to a new pizza place for lunch. She’s trying to eat lighter because it makes her feel better, and she says so, so she checks to see if the place had lighter options. They do, so everyone goes out. She even decides to invite the new girl who everyone is awkward around, the more the merrier. However, at lunch, the new girl mentions that she doesn’t see the point in going to a pizza place just to order a salad. Your character gets irritated and considers not invite the girl out again, or snubbing her altogether.
Your mundane choices, like whether or not to do everyday tasks, those are low stakes, there’s no dilemma, so your higher angels are in control without even thinking about it. For small choices, we can usually rely on our other traits to take care of that. But when we really struggle to do the right thing, it’s because our worst traits are in direct conflict with what we know the right thing is. If it wasn’t, the choice wouldn’t be be difficult. This is what creates conflict, which is the driving force behind plot.
I know it’s difficult to trim your glorious multifaceted complexity down to what feels like a paper doll, but it makes the story much more crisp and clear. If the story doesn’t have to do with gaming, you don’t need to mention your favourite video games. Unless fashion is important to the plot, you don’t need to describe what you are wearing. You can be fit into the story without losing your authenticity.
It takes some trial and error to get the balance right, but try to highlight what is relevant to the plot and subplots, and sprinkle the rest in very conservatively, for flavour.
So, every so often (usually when Facebook won’t let me share posts to my author page), I poll the Misfits about the kind of posts they’d like to see me write about. One of the most popular ideas was mythology related to gods and spirits ruling over the domain of creativity. So, who better to start with than the actual Muses?
*sigh* Full disclosure, I’m not an ancient historian or a classicist. Yes, I have a degree in archaeology; yes, I’m a big nerd whose favourite hobby is research; and yes, I am a pagan who kinda-sorta works with one of the Muses. None of that makes me an expert in Greek mythology or history. There is so much, you guys. The problem with ancient stories and religion is that their history is long, complicated, and shifts wildly over time and region.
Just thinking about someday having to talk about Thoth (or, really, any Egyptian) makes my chest feel tight and my eyes moist. I mean, I’ll do it, but the dread is real.
So, with that in mind, let’s lower the expectations, and move forward.
The Muses, like a lot of figures in Greek mythology, likely predate Greek culture, and might come from the Thracian Empire, which recognised 3 Muse-like figures. It seems like we decided ultimately on 9, mostly because famous poets like Homer said there were 9.
HISTORY OF THE MUSES
The Nine Muses we know today are Calliope, Clio, Euterpe, Thalia, Melpomene, Terpsichore, Erato, Polyhymnia, and Urania. They are said to be children of Zeus and Mnemosyne, who is, yes, Zeus’ aunt. It’s fine, let’s move on.
There is way too much history and way too many myths to go into, so if this area interests you, please let me know, and I can set aside time to write a longer post. The important takeaway is that they are the personifications and patronesses of specific forms of art.
This post, I’m going to just focus on some general overview, how to appeal to them, and the Queen of the Muses, Calliope. There is a lot to say about all nine, and I don’t have the time or energy to devote to all of them in one post. Plus, Calliope is my fave, and I want to give her her own post.
Calliope
Bonus Athena and Arachne, which is my fave myth
Calliope is my very, very favourite. I have a print of her that I bought in Athens, above my writing chair.
Named Chief of the Muses by Hesiod and Ovid, Calliope is the Muse of eloquence and epic poetry. She is argued to be the muse that Homer invokes at the beginnings of the Iliad and Odyssey; Ovid’s Aeneid; and, one has to assume, the one Shakespeare meant at the beginning of Henry V.
Her name means, ‘beautiful voice,’ and her symbols are traditionally a lyre, and also a tablet and stylus, and she is often depicted wearing a red shawl. Sometimes, she has books or scrolls, like a nerd, or wearing a crown, and often posing with her children. She is said to be the wisest and most assertive of the Nine Muses.
She is the mother of Orpheus (yes, that Orpheus) and Linus (possibly by her half-brother, Apolo, or Oeagrus, a king of Thrace (though her sisters, Clio and Polyhymnia are also sometimes listed at the boys’ mothers by King Oeagrus. Confusing, right?)). She also apparently has a bunch of daughters by Oeagrus, called Oeagrides. Sometimes she is credited with bearing the Corybantes by Zeus (yes, her father). Some call her the mother of the sirens by Achelus, which I personally love, and possibly also Rhesus by Strymon. Both of these fathers are river gods.
She was prolific.
How to honour or invoke Calliope in modern life for your writing
If you are writing a book, an epic poem, or you need help choosing your words carefully and being assertive, call on Calliope. You can do this, as the classics did, by invoking her at the beginning of your piece. You can also make an offering of wine and honey, or by reading or writing an epic poem in her honour.
Every year, I poll my Misfits on Facebook and ask what topics they’d like me to cover in the coming year. Inevitably, someone will ask about time management. My very best advice is the Pomodoro Method, but sometimes, despite your best intentions, you just can’t seem to find the time.
*Content warning, this post deals with themes of death- including that of animals- and grief. None of it violent, but it may be upsetting to some, all the same*
January
January started, honestly, the best it has started in years. I got some energy in my stocking for Christmas and used it to batch and plan all of my social media for the whole year, including all of my blog posts, Facebook and Instagram posts, YouTube scripts, and newsletters. I even wrote a little on January 1st. I honestly haven’t had so good a January, in years.
February
February 7 was one of the worst days of my life.
Even now, writing this at the end of March, I’m struggling to find the words. I’ve written and talked so much about it, but so much of it stills doesn’t feel real.
A friend of mine had had a rough weekend, so I had spent the Monday wrapped up with him, trying to get to the bottom of what was going on with him. However, I realised that I hadn’t heard from my best friend, Breanna, in a while. That wasn’t fully unusual- we all knew that we’d been muted years ago and that sometimes she would do a social media detox for 24 hours or so to deal with her anxiety. When my messages were still going unseen more than 24 hours later, I started to get worried.
Breanna had therapy on Tuesday mornings, but my worry was getting too much for me, so I got my mum to go with me early to check on her. When we arrived at her house, I found her front door unlocked, and her sitting in her chair by the door, passed away.
The next few days are a blur. We called 9-1-1, and I got to work notifying as many people as I could think of. Our friend, Katrina, came up from LA the next day to help us catch and find homes for Breanna’s cats. I’m so indebted to Katrina and their Kitten Rescue Los Angeles connections, that I can’t adequately express it. Breanna loved the hell out of those cats, she wouldn’t have wanted them to just be abandoned.
Also, the day after we found Breanna, her house was broken into, and all of her electronics and her purse were stolen. I didn’t care about the value of the items, but her list of medications were on her phone and tablet, and she would have been signed into Tumblr on her laptop, so that was a whole community of people who wouldn’t know what happened to her. Not to mention the My Favorite Redhead episodes that she had yet to edit and upload. I had hoped to finish them as a tribute to her.
To this day, March 31, we don’t know what happened to her. As far as we know, the coroner hasn’t even started investigating. She is a big hole in my life that is impossible to navigate around. I cannot exaggerate how much of my life she was involved in. RenFaire, mermaiding, rollerskating, our religions, our podcast- she was even the editor for my books. I saw her 4 days a week, we’d been friends for over 20 years, she spent holidays at our house.
March
While all of this was happening, Cassie was rapidly losing weight. She had had digestive issues and was on a special diet, but around Christmastime, she started losing weight and I was just keeping an eye on it. The loss became dire at the beginning of February, and every day was a struggle getting her to eat anything at all. Eventually, I took her to the vet for an appetite stimulant and the vet instead found an enormous tumour attached to her liver. In her weakened state, we didn’t think she would even survive the car ride to LA to see a specialist, even if we could afford it. And she had zero chances of surviving the operation. In the end, I had to make the decision to say good-bye. I had had her for 13 years, from the day she was born in our pool shed to the day she passed at the vet’s office. In the end, I lost my two best friends inside a month.
From the day I announced on Facebook about Breanna’s passing to today, the outpouring of love and affection has been overwhelming. The way we deal with grief in our society is so strange. So many people offered to help in physical ways like offering to bring us food, even more offered to be available emotionally. So many people asked what they could do to help, and I just…I didn’t know what I needed, I wanted desperately to ask for help, to let these people hold me up and carry me, but I didn’t know what to ask for. I can cook and do laundry- grief doesn’t stop me doing that. And I can’t keep saying the same thing over and over in each individual chat. So, how can they help? Just by default, I had to isolate. I didn’t want to, I didn’t feel like a burden who had to carry the weight alone, I just didn’t know how to identify what I needed, let alone form the words to ask.
Luckily, some friends I do have in town took the reins. One friend invited me to a pizza party to meet his friends, and another decided that we were going to join a book club. Both things were very fun and I enjoyed myself very much.
Since then, I have lost a cousin, and another friend lost their dog who I loved very much. Also, one of Breanna’s cats, her beloved Mochi, was too ill from a long illness, and couldn’t be saved, even after he made his long journey to the FELV suite at KRLA. So, it’s just not been a great time, really.
But it’s not all bad news. A couple of days after Cassie passed, I made the decision to adopt another cat. Some people wait a while to get a new baby, but the silence and the emptiness of my room was just shredding my mind. I couldn’t take it, I’m built to have a cat. I already had Cassie when my previous cat passed, I had never been without a cat for 25 years. So, I did some research, and friends and family kept and eye out, and eventually, we found a little all black soot sprite in Fresno. I filled out the adoption form, and the next day, we went and picked her up. My little Artemisia feels like a fresh start, a new beginning. I call her my voidbaby, not just because she is solid black, but because she works hard to fill a void in me. We were told that she was shy almost to the point of having special needs, but almost immediately, she started purring and making biscuits, and in just a few days, she was exploring and playing. Shy, yes, but she is trying hard to settle in with us, and I’m just so happy to have her.
Finally, last week, I catsat for my Katrina, while they were showing at WonderCon. It was a delicious little vacation, with beautiful weather, darling babies, and all the rose matcha boba floats I could keep down. They also talked me into starting Stardew Valley, so that was an even deeper escape.
So, the beginning if 2023 has been a rollercoaster with gradual inclines and steep drops. I’m not ok, and I’m not going to be for a long, long time. I may never be. But I’m not alone, I have a fantastic support network, I have a therapist, I have a new love, and I have my work. I’m not sure I would say things are looking up, but I’m working hard to keep my head above water. And before you worry about me pushing everything down, I am taking time to grieve and feel my feelings when they come up. I’m just not letting them paralyse me. I worked too hard to claw my way out of my Covid depression, and I don’t want to go back there.
Back in 2021, I made a video on YouTube about Napoleon’s letters to Josephine, and it is far and away the most viewed video on my channel. It was so popular, it made me want to make a tradition of reading overblown and cringey letters from famous people. You can watch the original video here:
Brace yourself, it’s a lot
~This post contains an affiliate link. If you’re interested in this book, please consider purchasing through the link provided. It gives me a little bit of Jeff Bezo’s filthy, filthy lucre because writing full time is expensive, and he doesn’t need the money for more joyrides in space. :-)~
Making the rounds lately has been an interesting post, regarding the nature of the relationship between two of literature’s heavyweights, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville. When I first heard about it, it felt like a real life fandom crossover. Like, how would these two ever cross paths? I honestly didn’t realise that they were contemporaries. And it turns out that they were equally as surprised-and pleased- to have found each other. So, let’s have a look at one of American literature’s great friendships, possibly even great romances.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
You know Nathaniel Hawthorne as the author of The Scarlet Letter, The House of Seven Gables, and Mosses from an Old Manse (if you don’t know the last one, it’s ok, we’re gonna talk about it). He also had a collection of shorts called, Twice Told Tales, which annoys me because that’s what I wanted to call my publishing house, and he beat me to it by like 150 years. I mean, it is a Shakespeare reference, so hardly original to either of us, but still. (We’re gonna talk about Shakespeare, too.)
Hathorne [sic] was born in 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, to a family prominent in US history. Most notably of these was his great-great-grandfather, John Hathorne, who was a judge during the Salem Witch Trials. This Puritan heritage informed much of his writing, especially evident in his most famous works. Indeed, he added the w sometime in his early 20’s, probably to distance himself from the family reputation.
When he was 12, his family boarded with some farmers in Maine, and when he was 16, he hand wrote and published a little newsletter, which he delivered to family members. At 17, he attended Bowdoin College, where he met future president Franklin Pearce and my personal favourite poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He described himself as an idle student, preferring to study his own interests than the curriculum.
In 1828, he started self-publishing his early work, which didn’t sell well. That’s fine, though. We love a self-published king. He also served as editor of the American Magazine of Entertaining and Useful Knowledge, which is an objectively awesome title. He also accepted a job as a weigher and gauger in the Boston Custom House and roomed with some movers and shakers, like poets, congressmen, and naval officers. What a time to be alive.
In 1841, he joined a Utopian society so he could marry Sophia Peabody, a transcendentalist illustrator. The couple married in 1842 and moved into Old Manse, a historical house, where one of their neighbours was Ralph Waldo Emerson. The two were deeply in love and compatible and had three children, Una, Julian, and Rose, very quickly together.
Mosses from an Old Manse is a collection of 23 previously-published short stories that Hawthorne compiled and named in honour of this house. Many of these stories were already known, so it enjoyed some commercial success. He sent a copy to Poe because he literally lived my dream, and Poe was like, ‘the guy is a genius writer, but his friends suck,’ and then Emerson wrote his own review, declaring that Hawthorne was underpaid. Looks like he was paid $75 in 1846, which would have been $2,902.69, by 2022 money. So, yeah, that’s not much. But the real meat about this book is Melville’s response.
Herman Melville
You recognise Herman Melville as the author of Moby-Dick (yes, hyphenated), ‘Bartleby the Scrivener,’ and ‘Benito Cereno.’ I recently read the last one, and if you haven’t, holy shit, you should. It’s good, y’all. Like, genuinely genius (though, content warning for fairly racist language, because it was 1855).
Melville was born in 1819 in New York City, to an equally prestigious family. Both of his grandfathers, Major Thomas Melvill and General Peter Gansevoort, fought during the Revolution, with Melvill participating in the Boston Tea Party, and Gansevoort defending Fort Stanwix in 1777.
A mediocre student, though a good writer from an early age, Melville dropped out early, most due to his father’s poor money management. He went through a series of jobs, including as a bank clerk, working at his father’s fur store, and as a teacher, all the while trying to continue his studies, where he could. Eventually, the need for more gainful employment led him to the sea.
In 1839, he got a job on a merchant vessel, St Lawrence, from New York to Liverpool. He briefly returned to teaching, but didn’t get paid, so he joined on with the whaling ship, Acushnet. Much of his work concerning sailing was inspired by this job. In 1842, he and another crew mate jumped ship, participated in a mutiny, was jailed, and broke out. In August of 1843, he joined the US Navy, and was discharged in October.
So, from all of this, he developed a mistrust of authority, a drive for freedom, and a deep self confidence, with the feeling that life and the universe had imposed unnecessary hardships on him, which held him back from achieving his full potential.
In 1845, he began writing, starting with Typee, which was inspired by that time he and a buddy jumped ship in Nuku Hiva. Notably, this book drew the attention of one Nathaniel Hawthorne, who heaped upon it glowing praise.
In 1847, Melville married Elizabeth Knapp Shaw, who he had only known a few months, and in 1849, their first child, Malcolm, was born.
Their friendship
In August of 1850, the two crossed paths at a picnic in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. While other famous people were also in attendance, Hawthorne and Melville found themselves caught in the rain, took shelter together, and had a deep and personal conversation.
Melville had been given a copy of Mosses from an Old Manse, though he hadn’t read it. But after meeting Hawthorne, he read the book and published an anonymous review, titled, ‘Hawthorne and His Mosses,’ where he heaped purple praise on his new friend. Hawthorne did write a review of Typee, but I can’t find a date for that, so I don’t know if he wrote it before or after they met.
About Mosses, Melville revels in Hawthorne’s ‘blackness,’ or seldom-seen dark side, which ‘so fixes and fascinates’ him. He also openly compares him to Shakespeare, while offering very vague and surface level criticism of the actual pieces. It very much reads like doing your buddy a solid and leaving a 5-star review because you love them SO FUCKING MUCH. (Btw, if any of you feel compelled to do that for me, I will absolutely write you a sickly-sweet love letter)
About Typee, Hawthorne praised the youth and vigour of the writing, as well as the sumptuous setting details, and the delicacy with which Melville handles cultural portrayals. Hawthorne himself recognises that American and European society wasn’t ready for the way that Melville dealt with the people of Nuku Hiva, and lifted him up for it. It also very much reads as ‘my buddy is so cool and smart, you gotta read this book!’
Their personal correspondence was constant and fervent, and they visited each other often, with and without their families, and often without warning. From their first meeting in 1850 to their last in 1864, they each would have a huge impact on the other. During these years, they both published their biggest works. Indeed, Moby-Dick is dedicated to Nathaniel Hawthorne, and many have speculated that in addition to being inspired by real life events, the white whale himself represents Melville’s obsession with Hawthorne.
It’s not hard to imagine what the two saw in each other. Hawthorne was fifteen years older, plagued by a family curse and surrounded by artistic and political luminaries. Possessing a sensitive and poetic nature, and described by Melville as being beautiful almost beyond belief, he was a true tragic romantic hero in the style that any Bronte would approve. Melville, by contrast, had lived a life of adventure. The grandson of two heroes of the Revolution, he had lived a life on the sea, from which he developed a dashing, adventurous nature. Yet, he was also an accomplished poet, who, like Hawthorne, had eschewed the structure of a formal education in favour of artistic freedom. Both men were progressive, in their own way, for the time. The Scarlet Letter is lauded as a proto-feminist novel, and Typee seemed to be an early attempt at anthropology.
Other keyboards will speculate on the exact nature of their relationship, whether it was romantic and sexual, or simply a deep and profound platonic friendship. I personally cannot say, and it feels inappropriate for me to do so. They certainly lavished affection on each other, but as we only have letters for evidence, and people did write like that in the 1800s, it doesn’t feel like strong enough proof for me. Whatever the relationship, it was strong and beautiful, and they made no attempt to hide it, and I love that for them.
But I promised you letters, so here are a few. Unfortunately, I can only find Melville’s letters to Hawthorne, and none from Hawthorne, from a book called, Divine Magnet, compiled by Mark Niemeyer. However, I have to assume they were equally rapturous, given that Hawthorne is the one who held onto his. Read them to whoever you love.
If you want to hear me read even more, check out my new video, below:
Please, if you know of any more real-life OTPs, or any cringy historical love letters, feel free to send them my way! I’d love to get a series going.
Last year’s list was ambitious. In my defense, I read A LOT of books, just like, only one of them was on the actual list. So, I will post a list that needs to be reviewed, books currently in progress, and the ones I have stacked up and waiting.
~This post contains affiliate links. If you’re interested in these books, please consider purchasing through the link provided. It gives me a little bit of Jeff Bezo’s filthy, filthy lucre because writing full time is expensive, and he doesn’t need the money for more joyrides in space. :-)~
Finished in 2022 that need to be reviewed
Finale, by Stephanie Garber
Our Crooked Hearts, by Melissa Albert
The Crimson Thread, by Kate Forsyth
Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen (unabridged, and the audiodrama)
Once Upon a Broken Heart, by Stephanie Garber
Legendborn, by Tracy Deonn
Ramona, by Helen Hunt Jackson
Josefina series, by Valerie Tripp
In progress (I DO NOT LIKE reading more than one at a time, but 2022, amirite)
Tower of Ravens, by Kate Forsyth
The Silmarilion, by JRR Tolkien
A Feast for Crows, by George RR Martin
Bloodmarked, by Tracy Deonn
The Mysteries of Udolpho, by Ann Ward Radcliffe
Rogue Wave, by Jennifer Donnelly
To read in 2023
Dark Tide, by Jennifer Donnelly
Sea Spell, by Jennifer Donnelly
Witches, by Brenda Lozano
The Book of Gothel, by Mary McMyne
The Mermaid of Black Conch, by Monique Roffey
As with last year’s list, this is mostly to keep myself honest. But you’re welcome to keep up with me. What are your reading goals for 2023?
I don’t know if it was for you, but it sure was for me. It started off strong, and I even had some personal breakthroughs. My social life was top notch, my hair and skin really came through for me, I made some money on the side, and I even traveled abroad! Twice!
I know!
It was really my year, right? Well, no. Most if that time was spent in a pretty deep, dark hole. Shortly after I posted my One Word, I lost my grandmother, with whom I was very close. The night she passed, we watch Encanto, and I listened to, ‘Surface Pressure’ on a loop for months. It felt like every time I got my feet under me, I got knocked down, and it all snowballed. I buried myself in my second job because I just didn’t have the spoons to be creative. I couldn’t even keep up on my blog posting schedule, which is just one a month. However, I did do a hell of a lot of reading, more than any year since I was in college. That couldn’t be escapism, could it?
But even when I’m knocked down, I don’t stay down for long. So, here we are. Another year, another One Word post lowering the bar of expectations.
I don’t want to go into the history, YET AGAIN, so if you want to see where it all began, start here. This year, my word is, ‘Progress.’ Like last year, I’m embracing the notion of ‘any progress is good progress,’ and, ‘progress over perfection.’ I know it sounds like a cop-out, but it really isn’t. I am optimistic, for a number of reasons I don’t want to go into just yet, and risk jinxing it. Just watch this space, ok?
If 2022 was great for you- if you finally got out of your cave, if you felt the sun on your face, if you finally, finally rejoined the world, rested and refreshed, and ready to take everything on, I am so happy for you. You’re a survivor, and you earned the right to rock that.
But if you poked your head outside, got jumped and mugged and left for dead, then I am also proud of you. You survived. Even if you’re still struggling to pick yourself up and dust yourself off, you’re alive and fighting. So, take it easy, be gentle with yourself. You’re doing your best. Keep putting one foot in front of the other, no matter how long it takes.
Any progress is good progress.
Progress over perfection.
How was your 2022, and what is the word you’re taking with you into 2023?
Once upon a time, there were three bears- a papa bear, a mama bear, and a baby bear- who all lived in a cottage in the woods. One day, they made porridge for breakfast, but it was too hot to eat, so they decided to go for a walk in the woods while it cooled down.
Meanwhile, in the village, a pretty little girl with shiny blonde curls was acting far too naughty for her poor mother, so she was cast out of the house. With nowhere else to go, she set off into the woods, where she stumbled upon the Bears’ home.
This Jane Austen blog brings Jane Austen, her novels, and the Regency Period alive through food, dress, social customs, and other 19th C. historical details related to this topic.
