The Tragedy Of The Monster Lady

Lorde // Hop Along, Queen Ansleis // Frank Dicksee // Anne Carson // Lady Bird // Denise Levertov

Hearing “I’m so proud of you” when you feel like you aren’t doing enough really does lift a lot of weight off of you.

i am somehow clair de lune, gymnopédie no.1, lacrimosa and danse macabre all at once.

Brother

TW: CSA

Tell me how does darkness feeds on an unsullied soul;

Am I the one to be blamed for your viciousness?

Or was it the gratuity of my parents' sins?

Or was it the ode of innocence that tempted you?

An ode you consumed.

You shredded me to ribbons so that you could use them

to tie the knots of your selfish yearnings;

Morphed me into an infernal machine in the pursuit

of your eternal fantasy.

Unbloomed; I was cradled in the soft bed of childhood

Yet, you stripped me away from that delectation;

And impelled me into the wretched abyss of unholiness.

Suffocated I was, as you took advantage of a frail heart,

and ruptured it from its hollow.

Yet I am the one they blame, I blame.

For being tainted, ruined.

Abhorrence filled in their gazes.

But, if to taint me is to ruin me, then let the gods be blamed for bestowing such wickedness on my existence,

For I was nothing but a child,

Slaughtered because of vulnerability and pestering naivety.

Tell me why does darkness feed on an unsullied soul, brother?

“i read the book you recommended” is a love language.

—female rage

? // medusa by caravaggio // gregory radionov // artemisia gentileschi // monstrous flesh: on women’s bodies in horror by rebecca harknis-cross // carrie (1976) // corruption by camille norton // midsommar (2019) // helen of troy does countertop dancing by margaret atwood // medusa in her throne by reza sedhi

10 inventions created by women.

I agree with you SO MUCH. The core value of the dark academia subculture is academics, hunger for knowledge, love for knowledge. It is disheartening to see people completely ignore that part, and focus on the 'aesthetic'. At this point it has just become a fashion trend.

I find it funny that it is widely believed that the dark academia phenomenon was born on tiktok. Maybe I’m too old now (even though I’m not) and I’m starting to think like bitter old people who observe the changes around them and stubbornly can’t accept them? I remember when dark academia reigned supreme on tumblr, when we used to read, watch, listen, take photos and share it all while getting deeper and deeper into the dark corridors. Years later, I get the strong impression that we were doing it tired of the world around us growing so fast - a reality that was slipping more and more out of our hands, that was harder and harder to keep up with. We were just kids on the internet sharing sad quotes and “aesthetic” photos on our blogs. Dark academia was some sort of universe to escape to after a hard day. Something along the lines of video games. Today, dark academia is a negation of everything it originally carried with it. Once again, tiktok has appropriated it as an online aesthetic and subculture to spend more money, to pressure others to spend more money; to make certain demands and set the bars. The moment dark academia went beyond tumblr, it automatically ceased to be this imaginary universe, created for fun, and became a capitalist game. 

I hate that I’m taking this tone, but it’s hard for me to stop myself. After all, tumblr has always been a place where you can be mad, sad, happy all you want, without the specter of being cancelled. Ok, we’re anonymous here, but most of us are also total individuals who didn’t care too much about this platform besides our own blog. So yeah, I’m disappointed that dark academia reigns supreme on tiktok, and stores are starting to have special “dark academia fashion” tabs. I guess the only positive aspect of this is that it only raises the discussion of eurocentrism and elitism in literature and filmography that is identified with dark academia. Now that it has gone out into the real world some of the items in the “dark academia syllabus” can have negative effects if approached uncritically. And we all know how critically one approaches things on tiktok….

I’ve always wanted to complain about it a little bit. Am I alone in this? Do I sound pathetic and oh god - like a boomer? I just hate tiktok SO MUCH. And I used to love dark academia, SO MUCH. 

Lets say, hypothetically, my lover's got humor and for the sake of debate... lets say, she's the giggle at a funeral.

He asked me when I fell in love with him and I knew it sounded dramatic to say the moment I saw him, so I told him this story of my grandma who had Alzheimer's- she forgot her name and the words for fruit and food, she forgot her address and how to use the washroom, all her life lost to the disease. The only thing she remembered was her son's name and when that began to fade, the one thing she always remembered was that she loved him, even in illness, even in insanity. She saw this 6 foot 2 man with a scrubby beard and she didn't know him but she said she trusted him, she asked him to hold her hand when she died. When does memory end and love begin? All I know is- she loved him before she remembered him.

-Ritika Jyala, excerpt from The world is a sphere of ice and our hands are made of fire