#kw reads books too

[katrinapavela]

A thoughtful review of Kerry Washington’s Memoir: Submitted by a reader

——————————————

Your Questions as a Lens Into Thicker Than Water

Katrinapavela, because you set up really excellent questions about Kerry Washington’s book, I’m taking the liberty of writing to you in a non-public way (at least I hope it’s non-public; I am not much of a Tumblr maker) since I’m especially interested in the questions that you posed about “Scandal” and what might be explored in the book, and about her “comfort” with Tony Goldwyn. But these are not things that I want to have a “public” conversation about. And I will, of course, understand if you don’t have time to read this and/or don’t want to respond. I think that I just need to get this off my chest, and your questions were an invitation to me to think deeply about the book.

I’ve read the book now and see that your questions are a great doorway into the reasons why I’m so disappointed with the book. In many ways, your questions are so much more interesting than much of the book.

The parts of the book where she talks about her younger self and the trauma she endured, the problems with her body dysmorphia, the complicated family dynamics including the difficulties of her parents’ relationship and the revelation of the sperm donation that made her existence possible—all of those things are fascinating, compellingly written about, and even revelatory.

But so much of the book is superficial to the point that there are parts that read as though written by a not especially interesting ghost writer for a politician’s narrative of the self.

I found troubling the lack of attention to any of her relationships outside of cursory mentions and some details about her acting—in movies with Jamie Foxx (for example), the almost non-existent adult friendships that have been so much a part of her life, and the short shrift given to her “Scandal” time—the things your question about the show sets out, and especially her inattention to what everyone knew and endlessly wrote and talked about: the romantic core of the show, Olitz. And amidst the superficialities to which I just alluded, the lack of depth in her descriptions of her time with Nnamdi—including their wedding and their parenting of Isabelle and Caleb—jumped off the page. Well, if such enormous omissions can be said to jump off a page (but then I’m a poststructuralist so lacunae are endlessly fascinating to me).

In other words, I did not expect a tell-all given how guarded KW is, but I’m actually shocked by how little—again, apart from her attention to her very young and her college aged self and her parents—this book offers as a doorway into KW’s thinking and feeling. She has been more open in some interviews and even in “Scandal” cast panels at PaleyFest, for example. She has been a more interesting commentator on her life and personality in some magazine articles when she has talked about her journey to understanding her arrival at a sense of possibilities. I’ve read a lot about her, and much of this book lacks the depth that her articulate summations of herself have hinted at in those places.

 Finally, and I know that I’ve gone on much too long to be writing to someone I only know from Tumblr, it was the one-two-three punch of seeing her skip over David Moscow entirely, of her offering renditions of her conversations with Nnamdi that could have come from a fanzine (especially their dating and their wedding), and her choosing to mention Tony Goldwyn only twice in 305 pages when he, more than anyone else associated with “Scandal”—including Rhimes herself—was instrumental in “making” the Kerry Washing/Olivia Pope narrative that built her into the star that a vast audience came to know.

 Your question about their comfort, the “physics” at play in their observable connections, was a beautifully worded way for me to think about the conundrum represented by the book: there are vast mysteries of work, of character, of connections with people who were and are central to the public and private Kerry Washington, yet they are curiously missing from a memoir that she and interviewers in the past weeks have touted as open, as revealing a great deal of vulnerability.

 I teach literary and cultural studies, and I know just how much a “memoir” plays fast and loose with memory, with reconstructions of the details of a life, with walking a careful path between what one can bear to say and what one chooses to hold close. And perhaps my disappointment would be less had I not had my expectations raised by how smart she has been over the years in managing the interstices between how she responded to often unreasonable public demands of her and how she wanted to craft her image.

This book, again with the exceptions of her attention to her younger self’s traumas and her parents’ difficulties, was a real let down for me.

 Anyway, thank you, for your work on this blog.

#kerry washington #thicker than water memoir #celebrity memoir

[sunskate]

Kaitlyn Weaver says the powerpoint TSL posted was just for preliminary discussion purposes and Tim Koleto’s hilarious Twitter post I think reflects the bafflement a lot of skaters and coaches and fans are expressing. So it might still get ditched. I mean, usually rhythms are set by Worlds and everyone has known the pattern was Paso for two months so I’m not convinced these discussions were *that* preliminary, but if the feedback isn’t good then there’s still time just to set a paso/flamenco/rumba/tango RD for next season. I think 21st century music will stay in some form for the Olympic season though, because that’s when you want skating to be the most accessible.

i guess we'll see if they dig in or change -

the commenter could have been diplomatic, but KW's answer too 💀

KW: read a book and understand our high minded vision!

pls poll skaters and let us know how many of them had women's rights, technology or liberation in mind during their twizzles 😅

#the original tweet above these 2 is deleted #so maybe there was more context

[jellogram]

I have been writing stories, mostly horror, since I was a kid and I credit a lot of things to this interest (mostly Twilight Zone and scary stories for kids books) but there is one story that was such an insane 1200 kw light bulb flicking on above my head. And that is The Land-Lady by Roald Dahl.

It's about a young man who needs a place to stay the night so he goes into this woman's bed and breakfast and they begin to talk. Piece by piece, clues are revealed: he recognizes the names of two boys in her check-in book but can't place them, there's taxidermy around the room, and she tells him the boys are still there, but they're very quiet.

Shortly before the story ends, he remembers that he knows the boys' names from news reports of missing people. He comments that the tea tastes like bitter almonds, and the story ends.

I read this in fourth grade and my mind exploded. I didn't know you could write stories like that. It did what most stories we show to children refuse to do: end on a sour note. But the main thing that stayed with me was the way that the information was revealed. At no point does the story say "He realized the woman was killing and taxiderming young men and now she's poisoned him too!" It didn't need to. It wrote around that and gave the reader all the clues, but it didn't spell it out.

Most of the time we assume two things are required in the books we give children. #1 they must have happy endings and not be too dark and disturbing, and #2 they must be simple and spelled out for them. This story did neither of those things and because of that it completely blew my 9 year old mind.

I don't think I'm overstating when I say that this book is a huge reason I became a writer. It showed me how powerful words could be, and what they could do. That you had more options than simply describing action after action.

Anyway I think you need to let children read weird, scary, and challenging books. Some of them might swallow it up like you've finally given them a drop of water in the desert.

[kmze]

I was on reddit the other day and I saw some people say that Plec had complete control over tvd s4 onward along with Dries and that's why plots like sire bond happened.I thought Plec was the sole showrunner of tvd during s3 when KW was gone even though he was credited as executive producer.In fact,I have also heard Plec and Kevin both decided to introduce the sire bond plot in s3 through Tyler because they wanted to sire Elena once she transitioned.Is there any truth to any of those claims about Plec?I don't think Plec single-handedly made all the decisions.The network was involved too.Ian had once said network shut down Bamon as early as s2 to protect the triangle.Klaus was originally gonna die in s3 which was Julie's decision but the network & KW prevented that from happening.Just so you know I'm not excusing Plec for her shitty choices like the forest flop or how Bonnie's storylines were handled.She was not a pushover but she was also definitely not in complete control of everything that happened.That's not how shows work.Your thoughts?

Hey anon, so I'm going to do my best to answer based on how I understand things but as far as what's said on Reddit lol, those people are a lost cause. People read one thing and they think that's the be all end all, and for whatever reason that sub is majority SE fans so they tend to look at KW with rose colored glasses. So please take everything I'm saying with a grain of salt just because I don't work in the film/tv industry so I don't know how much networks affect shows storylines but I do have a good idea of which showrunner was in charge each season and who was probably making the decisions. Under the cut because as usual I wrote a lot.

There were three showrunners for TVD and for the most part their order of decision making went Kevin > Julie > Dries. Kevin left after he wrote 3x01 to do the Secret Circle (the book is in the same universe as TVD but I don't think the show was). Once Kevin left to do that I don't think he was as involved in the storyline on TVD, I'm sure Julie and him kept in touch but mostly he let her steer the ship. So for 8 seasons here's how I see it:

Kevin and Julie

Kevin and Julie

Julie and Dries

Julie and Dries

Dries (but still reporting to Julie)

Julie and Dries

Dries (until Julie took over when Dries left cause she fucked everything up)

Julie (but Kevin affected the ending and possibly some of the storyline)

While I do think the decision on Klaus was a network thing I don't think the sirebond or Bamon was them. With Klaus it's the network because it's about saving a character for a spin-off, I know at some point they were going to do a Tyler/Caroline spin-off instead and they scrapped that for TO. I cannot find an article to back me up but I thought Joseph said once that they wanted to chemistry test him with Candice when they were thinking about keeping Klaus alive and that's where the KC birthday scene was born. So I think that's a mix of both, the network wanted to keep Klaus and they needed to soften him up a bit and picked Caroline for that.

The sire bond was Julie and Dries I believe, they kind of said as much here. It was done in order to move Elena onto Damon faster and since the show was always about a love triangle I don't think the network cared how it was done. I think it is possible Kevin and Julie talked about the sire bond as a way to speed up DE because I know they said they had Damon kill Jeremy in 2x01 to slow down Damon from being too heroic (which don't even get me started on RME). As for Bamon that I think was all Julie and probably Dries, because Bonnie's treatment started really going downhill in S3 after Kevin left and didn't get better until S6. I know that Kevin helped Julie plan out some of S6 so he might have been the one who rescued Bonnie and had the prison world idea. I know he made sure she wasn't killed in the finale too, I mean I am 100% of the notion that Julie and Dries hated Bonnie because they're racist (or at least internalized racism). I don't know if the network had much to do with that, not that they couldn't be racist as well I just think that was more a showrunner thing and maybe they used the networks as a scapegoat with Ian.

I have a theory about the showrunners and why the show's direction changes based on who's in charge. Basically I think each showrunner has their OSG (one-special-girl) and their decisions tend to revolve around that girl. For Kevin its Elena, that's why Elena gets all the high-cachet male attention in S1 & S2 (Stefan, Damon, Elijah, Matt). For Julie it's Caroline which is why in S3 Caroline starts getting more love interests and why I think Julie picked Caroline for Klaus' chemistry test instead of Elena (which is what Kevin would have done). I also suspect Julie wouldn't let Kevin kill or hurt Caroline's endgame to prop SE back up in the finale. Instead Caroline got Stefan AND Klaus' endgames and Elena got the chin kiss. Then there's Dries who I actually think her OSG is Katherine BUT she'll use Elena if she must but a lot of time she'll do it in spite. That's essentially why I think S5 went the way it did. Dries loves Katherine and gave her the human plot and also Stefan for a bit. Then she came up with Kathlena which ended up being a hit against SE because Stefan couldn't tell it was Katherine when before he always figured it out first.

I do agree that Julie isn't a pushover, I definitely don't love a lot of the stuff she's done and the show has ALWAYS had bad consent issues. Sometimes I think people act like the consent issues started in S4 with the sire bond but Caroline in S1 and Andie in S2 were repeatedly raped, compelled and abused by Damon and that was all under Kevin. The sire bond was just the first time Elena got that same treatment and people started to notice. Ultimately I think much of the direction of the show was Julie because she was in charge the longest, even 5&7 where she worked on other shows, she had final say. The only reason she let Kevin switch the death in S8 was he was the one who got TVD greenlit (since he was a bigger name) so she did owe him. I've also seen it speculated that since she said no to DJ on Dawson's Creek for PJ she didn't want to take another endgame away from him.

#anon for ts #tvd showrunners theory #julie plec for ts #cd for ts #kw for ts #bamon for ts

[ananglishliker]

A further step with Anglish

Folk like Anglish for it doesn't brook the borrowed words, for it is a lutterer English. But there's something that unformithely comes along when swaping out ellandish words with those from the same tongue kinfolk: foroldness.

And this seems to be something Anglish-followers like, for I found an almost fulwrought foroldening of English staffcraft. And I'm not going to hide that I'm one of those who like foroldening, and that I liked to know about this deeper back-to-the-roots.

I'll be talking about was changed in this forolder Anglish here. I'll be reckoning the links to a more throughgone writ in the end of this writing.

Staffrow

Only two bookstaffs are eked: Ƿƿ (/w/) and Þþ (/θ/, /ð/). Yes, it's not that gripping, but things truly get started with the switches!

⟨c⟩ as /s/ > s (cinder > sinder)

⟨ch⟩ & ⟨tch⟩ as /tʃ/ > c/ce (chin > cin/choke > ceoke)

⟨dge⟩ as /dʒ/ > dg (bridge >A curious mind is a terrible curse bridg)

⟨gh⟩ as yoreloreish [x~ɣ] > g (high > hig/night > nigt)

⟨ie⟩ as /i/ > ee (field > feeld)

⟨le⟩ as /əl/ > el (neetle > neetel)

⟨o⟩ as /ʌ/ > u (son > sun/some > sum)

⟨ou⟩ & ⟨ow⟩ as /aʊ/ > u/ue/uCe (hound > hund/sow > sue/loud > lude)

⟨ough⟩ as /aʊ/ & /ʌf/ > uge (plough > pluge/tough > tuge)

⟨qu⟩ as /kw/ > cƿ (queen > cƿeen)

⟨sc⟩ as /sk/ > sk (score > skore)

⟨sh⟩ as /ʃ/ > sc (ship > scip)

⟨th⟩ as /θ/ or /ð/ > þ (the > þe)

⟨u⟩ as yoreloreish /ju/ > eƿ (hue > heƿ)

⟨u⟩ as /ɜ/ > e/i (bury > berry/burden > berden)

v as /v/ > f (leave > leaf/over > ofer)

w > ƿ (water > ƿater)

⟨wh⟩ as yoreloreish /hw/ > hƿ (whelp hƿelp)

y as /j/ > g/ge (yes > ges/yore > geore)

⟨z⟩ as /z/ > s (graze > grase/fizzy > fisy)

Retchings for why it was switched to that in the link reckoning below.

Can you already see the forolderlooking from this? Here's a wordset I'll be brooking as forebisen:

Unforolded: The tough errand to dodge through the crowded boughs of a fern oak tree thared skill and lastingness. Forolded: Þe tuge errand to dodg þruge þe crueded buges of an fern oak tree þared skill and lastingness.

That truly pleases me and is aslaking seeing English truly looking like a Germanish tongue. I thought about writing in a more and more forolded way as I reckon the changes, but, for the sake of a flowsome reading for the reader, I'll leave this list aside, but, if you'd like to read wordsets looking as such, there are sere in the from leaf at the end of this upload.

This switching might be enough for some, but there are those, like me, who would like to go even further and see, too, a forolded speechcraft.

Theedness and some throughnesses

Before we get started with theedness, we understandendly will be brooking the forename "thou". A forolded theedness may be known for all, since it can be outlined through the twoth and the third atell:

Twoth: anward > -est; forthwitten > -edst

Third: anward > -eth

And that's all, hence you can make any wordset:

"The man giveth the boy a book"

"A woman walketh through the woods"

Underyet: there are some sunderly shapes: doth (does, spoke /dʌθ/), hath (has), saith (says, spoke /sɛθ/).

Asking

To make asks, we will leave out the ask markers "do" and "does". Instead, we'll put the tideword in the beginning of the wordset, as one does in Deutsch:

Does he know the answer? > Knoweth he the answer?

Where do you live? > Where livest thou?

Ofolder and chirten.

Naying

Also in naying wordsets "do" and "does" swind. Instead, we use "not" after the main tideword:

I know not.

He came not.

With wrayingly, the ea is putting "not" after a wrayingly forename, but before a meanname:

I love him not.

I have not the book.

If the wordset has a underwordset, "not" will be right before the latter:

The king thought not that he was in any danger.

Byings and kins

Here is the knottiest thing to learn, though not the hardest - you'll only need some time. Byings and kins are a widegale ken, which, for me at least, is the most gripping thing in speechcraft, for it's where the tongue shapechanges the most.

The first thing we need to know is that English wonted to have kins: werely, wifely and neither. And byings: nemmeningly, wrayingly, streeningly and forgivendly. And it turns out not only the meannames, but also the beckoningly forenames, lithwords and ekends had their own kin and bying bendings. Although Anglish doesn't brook the forgivendly bying.

Unheeding the thoughts of how these bendings would have grew and going right to the retching way English would look like today, we have:

Markoff lithword

Unmarkoff lithword

Ekends

But ekends are not that ofold though. It's said the strong-weak shed would have likely been kept. So ekends can be either strong or weak, and their bending changes for it. Although we can overlook the weak one and brook the strong one only, I'll be brooking both for the sake of a rawer forolding.

On the other hand, the ea to bend it is easy: weak ekends are those whose meanname is with a lithword, kithing forename or it's in streeningly; strong ekends are those that are unmarkoff. Here is the bending:

With these changes, let us take a look at what our bisen wordset looks like now:

Unforolded: The tough errand to dodge through the crowded boughs of a fern oak tree thared skill and lastingness.

Forolded: Þe tuge errand to dodg þruge þe cruededen bugen annes fernes oakes trees þared skill and lastingness.

Dealnimmends

Dealnimmends are like the ekends, and as such they would be bended with the same endings, if there were not an unbiseniness in them:

Kithing

The kithings, since they are also ekendish, also are bent:

Rimes

Believe it or not, rimes wonted to be bent in the past. The rimes "one, for some ground, were the only ones that are bent. Rimes are either mainly or endbirdly. And, since they can be brooked with lithword, they can also be either strong or weak. The mainly's benting is:

The endbirdly's benting is:

Ownerly forenames

And going even further, we forolden the ownerly forenames:

The shapes "mine" is now brooked before words beginning with a clepend as "a(n)". The same for "thou", which becomes "thine".

Askinglies

And, alongside with it, the askinglies are also bent!

Kinshiply

Forget we not the kinshiplies:

And since "that" and "which" have now a streeningly bying, there's no more anyet in brooking "whose" for unmanly words, so:

Þe dog hƿose oƿner is far aƿay > Þe dog þas oƿner is far aƿay In þe ƿoods þere ƿas a birdling, hƿose huse was red > In þe ƿoods þere ƿas a birdling, hƿices huse was red.

---

There are still other changes that make it even more forolded, reliving raw shafts of the tongue, but I think this is enough for now. It's not like you would be wrong brooking only a stitch of the forolding anyway, since it's clearly underfangendly to not fully forolden. I shall likely make another upload on these foroldenings in the toward.

---

Froms:

Staffrow: https://anglisc.miraheze.org/wiki/Anglish_Alphabet

Theedness: https://anglisc.miraheze.org/wiki/Archaic_grammar

Byings and kins: https://anglisc.miraheze.org/wiki/Archaic_case_%26_gender

#anglish #anglish language #english language #anglo-saxon #linguistics #archaism #old english

[zalrb]

Where do you think the disconnect comes from between a creator’s intentions and how the work actually is?

Like take TVD for example; we’re told that Damon is broken, that he’s a caring and devoted brother and boyfriend, that despite his snarkiness and attitude he would do anything for his friends, and even when confronted with all of the canon evidence that none of these things are true, there are so many people who cannot accept that Damon is narratively unsympathetic. Same goes for Elena and her supposedly being warm and compassionate.

But for other shows, there’s more of a consensus on characters. Is it a writing issue or a fandom issue?

For something like TVD, it's absolutely a writing issue. I think the fandom issue is refusing to believe the writing for Damon or for Delena etc. is canonically bad. I have always said that I felt like JP and co wrote the show like they were fans and not like they were writers.

There was a post where I put what Caroline Dries says in interviews and then what's shown onscreen:

Like this is what CD was talking about in terms of 5x20: 

“We purposefully threw them into a world together where they can’t help but be literally on top of each other. They can’t be away from each other. They can’t be close to each other,” Dries said. “We’re trying to play into the drama of them now being in this weird purgatory in the relationship where it’s like, how can we act when we can’t escape each other?”

Legit, in 5x20 Elena was fine

it’s not like she was like this (and with the exception of SE I am purposefully using gifs of couples I do not ship or don’t care much about)

and he was like this:

So HOW exactly is it tension filled? Because of this?

and throughout the series, I would read things like, but what you're talking about isn't onscreen and it reminded me of workshop where there would be instances in all of our stories where a character would do something like pick up a Sprite and other people would be like "so I don't know why the Sprite scene is in there? Like it doesn't really add anything to the story" and then we would be like "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND THAT PICKING UP THE SPRITE IS SYMBOLIC OF HER RELATIONSHIP WITH HER MOM" and then the prof would be like you didn't show that anywhere in the story for us to understand the context of this Sprite scene, it's just a girl picking up a Sprite.

So I would read what they said and would be like, is anything you're saying actually in the script, actually onscreen, or do you just like Ian and expect us to go along with it because according to you, we'd all sit and watch him read the phone book?

And I have already gone off on Caroline Dries and her fucking chapter format and her not knowing what an arc was and for JP, I think she's too impatient to build a story, she wants to already be there

[themist4ke]

Tagged by @sewercentipede thank u!

Last song: whammy by death grips

Last movie: ginger snaps

Currently watching: yellowjackets

Currently reading: nothing yet I'm waiting on a couple books to get here which are the heavenly table and the devil all the time by donald ray pollack and american psycho. I'll probably read american psycho first since I've seen the movie so many times so it's about time I read the book already yk.

Currently craving: literally craving no food rn it's too early in the day for me but I'm always in the mood for drugs and a blunt and probably a benzo sounds good rn

I tag @e2019 @jellimoth @yf3l @bruisesonmyknees @psychicpsilocybin @goreshitdreambreakmix @kw-b @narcomensaje @122mgg @icrywithyou

[by-kilian]

KW HOW ARE YOU!!!! I hope you’ve been good and that you’re taking care of yourself. I’ve been checking my email bc i get ao3 updates and HFJDJFJF YOUVE BEEN WRITING SO MUCH THANK YOU FOR LETTING US READ YOUR STUFF 😩😭💕💕💕

I haven’t been interacting at all recently I’m so sorry :(( I was going through IT with spring semester but everything’s good now :>

life update: I’m quitting my job 🫡🥳🥳🥳 idk if you remember but when we talked about it and you were like you have your whole life to work I Should’ve listened 🤡🥲🥲 oh WELL lmao I’ll be giving them my resignation letter or whatever its called this week 😚 I’m currently trying to tackle this phone addiction! And am trying to start reading more books. I made the wrong decision to start one million books at the same time but one I’m really hoping to finish this week is Disfigured: on fairy tales, disability, and making space by Amanda Leduc. OH I FINISHED SEASON 2 of (90s) sailor moon and 🥹 MY HEART I think it’ll be a comfort anime now it’s so cute and wholesome!!! I didn’t expect the scene where SPOILER mamoru and usagi break up to pull at my heart strings so bad!! But it did lol OK SORRY THIS WAS SO LONG I’m excited to read what you’ve been posting 💕💕💕 TAKE CARE!!!

Hi honey!! I'm doing so well, thanks for asking, I hope you are too! And PLEASE lol, you are too cute. It's my pleasure. Thank YOU all for reading and supporting my stuff, truly and honestly. ❤️

You have nothing to apologize for btw. I don't expect anyone to interact with me and I'm honestly really poor about it myself. Life happens! I completely understand. I am glad you made it through the semester though.

Also I AM SO HAPPY TO HEAR THIS LMAO!! Fuck that job! I will always support quitting jobs because they really don't deserve your time, especially not when they're shitty. Best of luck with quitting! :3 You got this.

I am also wishing you the best of luck with all these new things you're trying to tackle, but I am mainly very happy you caught up on Sailor Moon. No spoiler alert needed, I am an original stan/fan from the 90s 😂. I KNOW IT ALL. I am thankful that that show raised me to be who I am TODAY. Thank you for checking in and I hope you are well! <3 Take care of yourself. xo

#asks

[whenpraxisbecomesunbearable]

Interview with Kenneth Wain

Kurt Borg interviews Kenneth Wain on his latest novel, K: The Letter Writer (Book One: Felice), published in 2023 by Austin Macauley Publishers. The interview was conducted in January 2024.

KB: Your novel, K: The Letter Writer (Book One: Felice) is the first of a projected trilogy that focuses on the life of Kafka, particularly three of his loves: Felice, Milena and Dora. What motivated you to approach the subject – or, rather, the person – of Kafka in this way?

KW: My acquaintance with Kafka goes way back to the early 1960s when I first encountered him or, more accurately, picked up a small selection of his stories from a shelf in a Valletta bookshop. The name Kafka was new to me and its sound intrigued me. And that curiosity has continued undiminished since then.

In an interview with me from 2016, you had said that “one of my ambitions has always been to write a book about Kafka. Kafka is very special for me. ... The problem is that I don’t know quite what kind of book on Kafka I want to write.” Why was it hard for you to settle for the type of book you wanted to write about Kafka? What other types of book did you consider writing on him? And why did you settle for this type?

In 2016 I was struggling with what to do with the vast amount of reading I had done on Kafka over the years, biographical and critical, and everything available he had written, of course, and drawn; stories, diaries, letters, aphorisms, reflections, sketches, and so on – so much did he intrigue me. In the process, I had accumulated notes I made of all kinds, and I felt that I had to do something with them. My first idea was to write a philosophical book about his work. I struggled then, and decided to write this trilogy of novels first instead. But I still have my notes and still want to put them together in a philosophical book eventually.

Why is Kafka so important to you? How has he been relevant to your own formation as a philosopher, as a writer, as a human?

Kafka it was who first got me interested in philosophy. I discovered selections from his writing, ‘The Bucket Rider’ and ‘The Metamorphosis’ for instance, included in collections of Existentialist literature, including philosophers such as Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Jaspers and Sartre, besides. This got me interested in Existentialism which, with its concern with the absurdity of the human condition, ties philosophy with literature. I thought, in the late 1960s, of writing an Existentialist novel that would bridge the two – the yet to be published Sirocco. Before that, I had self-published a book of short stories, Tall Buildings, which didn’t do terribly well, sales-wise – perhaps I gave up on it too early. In any case, I tried a publisher for Sirocco, Hutchinson, in the UK who rejected it. The experience greatly discouraged me. I decided to turn to philosophy to help sophisticate my writing and try again. By the way, Kafka himself was deeply interested in philosophy in his student days, and once defended Nietzsche’s merits against Brod who defended Schopenhauer’s.

The book is described as a ‘biographical novel’. To what extent do you agree with this characterisation? How would you describe the book in your own terms?

I described it that way myself, but it is unfamiliar to many. Still, it’s an accurate description of the genre I’m interested in. The historical novel is, on the contrary, well-known and popular. A biographical novel is historical in the sense that individual events are historical of a life, and to the extent that the individual’s story always evolves in a historical context – as mine does with Kafka. But the context is only the story’s setting, not its protagonist, and the hero is a real not a fictional individual as it usually is in a historical novel. Biographical novels can be scripted for the cinema, a very different medium. I watched one featuring Chaplin last week, a couple of weeks ago I watched another on Oppenheimer, and I’ve watched others too. Scripts are frequently cinematic or theatrical renderings of biographical novels. I think it would be delighting if someone was tempted to do a script for a film from the book, fictional parts and all, naturally – it would be quite a challenge for anyone who undertook it, I think.

Were you inspired or influenced by any other similar attempts to write a novel about a writer’s life?

No, not really. Though I am aware that there are some, I’ve not read a biographical novel written by someone else. Certainly, I know of no other written about Kafka beside mine, though I have read four or five biographies about him – which are an altogether different matter. I think that if the object is like mine, to bring him to life to the reader, to appeal to the reader’s imagination rather than to her curiosity, the novel is a better medium than a biography.

So much has been written about Kafka: from literary criticism to philosophical texts (such as Gilles Deleuze’s) to commentaries about his sketches (such as Judith Butler’s) to cinema and theatre adaptations of his life and works. What does K: The Letter Writer add to that voluminus literature? How does your approach to Kafka differ from the more scholarly approaches?

My answer coincides with the one I’ve just given to your previous question. Nobody before me, to my knowledge, has attempted a biographical novel of Kafka. And that, I think, makes it a unique addition to the ‘voluminous literature’, in being a literary creation of him rather than a critical commentary on his writing, or a scholarly or theatrical work. Other fictional writers have used Kafka for their fiction in interesting ways, Philip Roth repeatedly, W. G. Sebald, and J. M. Coetzee, for instance, but that’s very different from what I’ve done.

Could you describe your writing process for this novel?

I wrote it much the way I write everything else. In this case, it being a novel, my first concern was to get the story down from beginning to end, just as it came to me – that always relieves me of the tension of uncertainty whether the project is actually doable. Kafka’s negative experience with his three unfinished novels, opened my eyes to this danger. Then the usual re-writings of this first text followed, several of them, honing it into a novel form; adding, deleting, modifying, refining, transposing texts until I was satisfied with it. Or, more accurately, until I decided that enough was enough and published what I had.

What drew you to Kafka’s letters? Or, rather, why did you choose to foreground Kafka as a letter writer? To what extent did you draw on the actual letters in your novel?

I was drawn to them by my interest in his writing. Reading his letters provides clues for understanding his writing because they include much about it. Meanwhile, I read his diaries and note-book too besides the letters and stories. These too, as well as his letters, are literary works, a part of his literary oeuvre not something apart from it. Kafka was one of those who shows that letter writing could be a literary genre. One that we have sadly largely obliterated today thanks to our computer technology. Not just his letters to Felice are published, there are the letters to Milena, to members of his family and friends, to his publishers. His copious correspondence with Felice compensated, very badly, for their very rare meetings; it literally constituted their relationship. That was how he knew her mainly until that fateful ten-day tryst in Marienbad when he finally discovered her in every way and proposed to her a second time. Hence the novel’s title. Of course, the story draws substantially from the letters, but also from his diaries with which they ran parallel.

What’s the criterion of truth and truth-telling that applies to your novel? Is it loyalty to episodes from Kafka’s life that can be corraborated with evidence? Is it your own playful engagement with real events? Or is it something in between? That is, to what extent can a reader of your novel say they know the real Kafka after reading it?

There is no ‘real Kafka’ waiting to be known, to be excavated through diligent scholarship, no truth about him that critics can uncover – as the likes of Benjamin, Deleuze and Guattari, and Blanchot, among others, tell us. There are episodes in his life that that are recorded in biographies. They provide the bare skeleton of my novel, its factual truth if you like. The challenge of the novel is to flesh them out with necessarily fictional accounts of what happened in them. And to devise incidents that never happened but that serve its literary purposes. The inventing and fantasizing that goes on, the use of the imagination, the poetic licence employed, distinguish the book as a novel not as a biography, which is primarily concerned with factual precision. ‘Playful engagement’ is, I suppose, how one could describe it.

Do you think that something is lost in today’s world where – in the age of immediate communication, texting and emailing – letter-writing does not occupy the position it once did in sustaining human relationships at a distance?

I already remarked about the loss of letter-writing to the world as a literary genre earlier on. What I think is lost to today’s world more generally is the value of the ‘at a distance’ you refer to. We are used to seeing distance as a negative condition, a barrier or impediment to communication we need to overcome – and that’s true to an extent. But I think pursuing its elimination can diminish the quality of our lives because it can give rise to an excess of its contrary, immediacy. People today are impatient with distance because it delays, defers, creates gaps, spaces in their lives that they desperately try to fill with their activity on their mobile phones, messaging, texting and so on. Texting is the activity that has replaced letter-writing. Has the change improved the quality of our human communication, has it improved human relationships? It has certainly democratized communication but I doubt that it has improved human relationships or the quality of human life generally, never mind the quality of the actual communication or the quality of how people communicate and what they communicate about, given the technology’s inbuilt constraint of telegraphic brevity.

What do you think that Kafka, the writer who went to such lengths to try to prevent his fiction from seeing the light of day, make of your novel publicising his life, and especially his private letters, in this way?

I don’t think he was that determined to destroy his unpublished writings really, otherwise he could have done it himself while he still lived. I think that, in his heart of hearts, despite his low self-esteem, he knew enough about literature to sense their value. The responsibility he laid on Max Brod was terrible because Brod sensed that value too, and thankfully disobeyed him. If, unlike Brod, I wanted to abide with his wish, I wouldn’t have written a novel that goes deep into his life and relationships of course, or even read his literary work. But then, I’m not the first to publicize his life or his relationships. Brod must take that responsibility. So, I feel no guilt about it – I am only retelling what was already known. On the other hand, it would be very interesting to have his literary opinion on the novel were he able to speak to us from his grave. But that won’t happen.

You dedicate the book to Franz Kafka: the writer and the man. What is the meaning of such a distinction?

The ‘and’ can be a distinction, but it can signify an inclusion too. Indeed, at bottom, the novel brings out the impossibility for Kafka to be both, given the kind of writer he wanted to be, however ardently he wanted it to be possible. My novel wants to do justice to how he lived that impossibility.

As I opened the book to start reading it, right after the dedication to Kafka, I stumbled upon the copyright notice and that standard, perhaps legalistic, note saying that “names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead or actual events is purely coincidental.” I smiled as I read this note. How is the reader to interpret this note of caution?

As you rightly say, the note is standard and designed to protect the publisher from any possible legal action by surviving relatives – and that is how, I think, anyone who bothers to read it will regard it. On the other hand, it could arouse the curiosity of some about the history of the characters themselves in real life, what happened to them later, though obviously they are long dead now. Felice herself and Brod escaped the Holocaust that was to come, one by escaping with her family to England, the other to Palestine. But, tragically, Kafka’s sisters and their families, and many of his friends died in the extermination camps in World War II. A fate he would have suffered too had he lived.

Your writing output includes anything from academic articles and books, reflections on policy documents, art critiques, poetry and short stories, and now a novel. Do you, or would you even want to, see this writing as having anything in common, besides their author? Do you draw on different forms of writing in order to tap into different facets of your self? Is writing a style of living for you?

To reply to your last question first. Yes, of course, writing and everything that goes with is a style of living with me – a large part of who I am. I write nearly every single day when my laptop is about. What my writings have in common I think, is that they are all reflections, in both senses of the word, on what interests me in life. In this respect they reflect different facets of myself – I’m not sure that the process is best described as ‘tapping’ into. But they certainly narrate how I have evolved as a human being, challenged by my humanity and the different roles I have taken up or fallen into over the years, as we all are, in my times and circumstances, and how I have experienced them, trying to make sense of it all.

How is the work on the remainder of the trilogy progressing?

I’m working on my second novel now, which coincides with the period of Kafka’s relationship with Milena – a very different woman from Felice, a much shorter relationship (and volume of letters) – problematic for him in a different way; a way that is making it more challenging to write, I think. On the other hand, my novel-writing machine is much better oiled now than it was when I started out with Felice – the process is a bit smoother in that respect. I have written some preliminary drafts for the third, about Dora too, but they are very partial. My first plan at the outset was to write one novel, before I realised that that would create a volume of impossible dimensions. So I broke the one novel into three.

K: The Letter Writer (Book One: Felice) can be purchased online or in bookshops in Malta.

#kafka

[astrologyangelmediums]

Happy Wednesday, lovely souls! Here's my little meme dump for the vibe I am feeling today. This week feels... long and sticky. I have been so tired and worn out. I think the universe is telling me I need a bit of a pause to catch up and regroup. I am grateful to have a couple of days off this week to try to honor the sacred cycle of rest. I will be trying to make time to journal today after work and to do more of my ancestral work, too. I have been connecting to myself in new ways that allow me to feel so much better and supported in new ways. As someone who doesn't have contact with a lot if my family (especially my parental unit), it has been deeply healing - I am a Cancer Moon, and always craved closeness to mother like figures, but have never been blessed enough to have one. I see how these patterns have created, ruined, grown, affected, and sabotaged my relationships with other women. So that's where I am at lately. Just girly things. Lol. Anyway, it wouldn't be Pisces without some emotional dumping and overthinking. Hope you have a divine day filled with lots of magic and fun! Also.. it isn't me in your DMs bothering you about doing a reading. Sessions can only be booked via my website. I love you. Always. All ways. https://www.instagram.com/p/Co-KW-8O3Q3/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[kythwena]

That got less touching as you went. The Magicians | S03E12: The Fillorian Candidate (2018)

“After you,” Janet said. “Oh, fuck off.” If you rode with a queen, the queen must enter the Queenswood first. That was the rule. ​​The Magician's Land (The Magicians, #3) by Lev Grossman

#the magicians #themagiciansedit #eliot waugh #long of a human #kw makes gifs again #3x12 #2018edit #the fillorian candidate #i love el the unhealthy amount #quote time #kw reads books too #the magician's land #lev grossman #fantasy #the magicians books #the prettiest

[slvtbible]

G O L D

chapter one

summary: [y/n is a young stripper who is adored by many men. harry styles is a man who loves to carry danger with him]

word count: 4222

pairing: stripper!y/n and gangleader!harry

warnings: violence, vulgar language, sexual acts, alcohol and drug

to be honest, i was a little hesitant to post it here and i don’t know if this story will blow up on tumblr or get many notes but that’s the last thing on my mind right now. i just want to share what i’ve been working on that kept you guys waiting for almost a year lol sorry about that. But yes, she’s finally here!! I posted first on wattpad before i put it here, I felt like the only way to reach out more people to read it it’s through that. And also, i decided to use a name on wattpad but I’d use the term ‘y/n’ on tumblr. Enjoy it all my loves! Give me feedbacks!💜

*

*

Harry fixes the collar of his sheer black shirt before tucking it neatly inside the black trousers he's currently wearing. He normally goes something more extravagant for going out. His closet is filled with colourful ruffles and Hawaiian shirts along with 'more than one colour' suits. However tonight, he needs to lay low for a bit. Especially when he's about to step into one of the most famous strip clubs in New York in an hour to meet up with the manager.

He's very much aware of the reputation he has put on himself out there. Though there's no use of camouflage and hiding, he still doesn't want a cause a scene,

Yet.

His hand lifts a bottle of Tom Ford from the dresser before spraying it twice on his neck. Stepping away from the full length mirror, he grabs his cross necklace from the bed before putting the accessory around his neck as he walks out of the room.

"Talk to me Reece" his heavy accent echoes the hallway as he walks downstairs, watching his few men pocketing their weapons,

Reece, the brown skinned man with tattoos nods. "He's there. Just got a word from Bianco. He appears isn't expecting you, Boss. However I do believe he knows you're coming soon. The club is far too crowded than usual but Bianco is taking care of that right now." He informs, showing him the message on the phone,

Harry can only scoff, nodding at him as a thank you. "That son of a bitch should've. Owes me more than fucking money." He mutters, inserting the .45 ACP inside his gun holster. "The car's ready?"

Nodding, Reece leads Harry down towards the basement. "As requested. Lamborghini Murcielago in blue hera. Pack with 640 PS and 471 kW, rules around 213 mph if you consider on hit and run. Still, I pack a standard Aeropack wing if you wanna go slow tonight. The windows? Bulletproof. In case anyone tries to kill you." Harry knows he's only joking about the last part. No one dares try to kill him before he does it. It's a pattern that everyone knows by now.

Harry lets out a low whistle, softly shaking his head as the machine beauty appears. Tracing lightly with his ring cladded fingers along the hood of the car. "Not planning to hit and run tonight, Reece. Not even thinking about racing down the street with my weapon outside the window. You don't have anything more. . . Less attractive?" He questions, still staring at the gorgeous car ahead of him,

"You know I don't do less, boss." Reece winks playfully, laughing to himself as he watches Harry roll his eyes. "Besides. Who knows you'll get yourself a bird tonight, eh? Take her out on a stroll before bringing her home to your place. Women love fast cars." He comments, pressing the button on the keys as the door opens,

Humming as a response, Harry walks towards the driver's seat, "I don't date anymore, thought my right hand man knew tha' " He speaks, words laced with seriousness while grabbing the keys from Reece's fingers,

He can only sigh and nod his head. "Understood. Yet, Kendra is like what? Two years ago? Gotta get yourself something better, boss. You deserve it. So do it tonight." He suggests, watching him going inside the car before shutting the door,

Harry smiles a bit, inserting the keys inside the ignition before starting the car. "Noted."

The dark haired man steps away from the car. Giving Harry a salute. "I'll be right behind you. See you there."

*

*

*

Y/N Y/L/N stands in front of the mirror as she applies another layer of red lipstick on her plump lips. Securing the tube back as she puckers her mouth to see if it fits the colour for tonight. She twirls, watching carefully how the gold lingerie clads perfectly around her breasts and down to her curvy hips and thick thighs.

She stops once her plump ass is facing the mirror, admiring how beautiful and big her bum is in the lingerie. It's a compliment really. She loves working out to give her bum a bit bigger. It's not that she hopes she'll gain attention from people, she just loves her body. She worships every piece of it despite what other people think of it. Insecurity was her biggest enemy but not anymore. After reading lots of books and poems about self love she learns that there's nothing she should be ashamed of.

Grabbing a bottle of lotion from her table, she squeezes the bottle into her hand before rubbing her bum with the cold cream, rubbing it neatly to make sure she doesn't miss a spot.

Another thing, she loves moisturizing her plump flesh before the show. It's sexy

"Joe is asking for you." She hears a voice coming from behind, craning her neck to see her closest co-worker Violet, already in her usual purple wig and attire as she stands beside Angelina. "I love working as a stripper but he really needs to learn to be patient and. . . shut up, i guess?"

Y/N releases a small laugh, moving her long dark wavy hair to rest on her chest. "I know, I know. Jesus, I've told him fifteen minutes prior that I'll take longer than usual." She slips on her gold heels and turns to face Violet, who's biting her lip as she stares at Angelina's body up and down. "Okay, how do i look?"

Violet raises her eyebrow, as if it's something her friend shouldn't be asking. "You kidding? You look like a sex goddess. Gonna get all the men on their knees for you, girl"

Scoffing, she shoots her a wink and a flirtatious smile. "Old men with beer bellies? No thanks. I'd rather make out with Gordon." She replies, seemingly disgusted about the thought of grinding on an old man's lap tonight.

"Is that a bet I hear?" Violet questions, leaning towards her a bit as she waits for her friend’s response. "Please tell me that it is so I can earn extra cash tonight."

Gordon is a perverted bartender that always keeps his eye on Y/N throughout her routine. He's 40 and is always asking Angelina on a 'date' and by date, he means her ass on his lap. Clearly something Y/N isn't too fond of. Him specifically. Violet and Y/N have always made a joke about him, something they could make a playful banter in every chance they get.

Plus, she heard he's married. Isn't he supposed to find another job rather than here? If his wife found out what kind of a sleaze bag she married, she would be crushed,

Rolling her eyes, Y/N shoves her playfully by the arm. "Ha ha, very funny" she answers, resuming to untangle her hair from knots.

Violet laughs, pinching her on the hip as she lets outa small squeal. "Just messing with you, baby. Good luck out there. Put the rest of us to shame tonight. . . Like any other night"

Y/N flips her off, yet knowing it's the truth. She's not trying to sound like a condescending bitch here but none of the girls here are actually capable to do what Y/N does. That's what makes men attracted to her. She knows what she's doing. She knows how to make a man hard.

"By the way, you heard what Joe's talking about earlier?" Violet asks, toeing off her heels as she exhales a relief sigh. "Damn those heels are killing me" She mumbles,

"No... What's about?" She turns her head to face Violet for her to explain, causing her to shrug her shoulders,

"Don't know much about it. . . But i hear Harry Styles is coming here to meet up with him. Something about transaction or shit" She waves it off, whispering it to Y/N, looking around to make sure no one is eavesdropping,

She almost chokes on her saliva after hearing Violet says the name. "Harry Styles?! The. . . mafia boss of New York..?" Her eyes widen at the possibility of the most dangerous man in the city paying a visit to the place she works at,

Nodding, Violet answers, "Yup. That Harry Styles. He's the devil. Let's hope this place doesn't turn into a war zone."

Y/N has heard about this Harry guy. The most feared man of New York. She does know a little bit of the relations between Joe and Mr. Styles. Almost every night she could hear Joe freaking out about this man. She may not know him that close, hell she had never even met him in person but people talk. One thing she learned about hearing his reputation, you don't ever want to mess with this guy.

Violet snaps her fingers to snap Y/N out of her thoughts. "Less worrying, girl. Come on, you got a show to put on yes?"

"Y-yeah. Fuck. . . now i'm scared" She breathes out, looking at her reflection in the mirror one last time. Calming down her mind.

After giving Violet a kiss on a cheek and receiving a tap on her ass, she takes a deep breath as she opens the beaded curtain and walk out to the club. Jhene Aiko is playing through the speakers, thanks to her who chose the music for tonight. She can already feel all eyes on her as she struts down confidently, putting on a smirk and winking at couple of men here and there. As much as it disgusts her, she grazes her hand along a man's arm who's biting his lip and looking at her up and down.

'What the fuck did i do to deserve this?' she thinks to herself, staring at the man in front of her who's probably the same age as her father. The thought of it makes her gag,

She gives the man a wink before getting up on the stage, hearing a few hollers from behind. reaching out to wrap her hand around the silver pole and her leg hooking up to support her body. Slowly twirling with her head thrown back and closes her eyes with money being toss at her direction before letting go and crutching down on her knees, moving close towards the same man earlier. He slips in a couple of hundred dollar bills inside her panties, causing the others to do the same.

This may be not how she pictures her success but damn, by the end of the week, her bank account can go from three to six digits.

She's definitely gonna hold on to that,

*

*

*

It takes Harry close to thirty minutes to get here. He blames it all on the traffic, cursing to himself every time he stops at red lights. He parks his car close to the entry before he exits from the vehicle. He looks over his shoulder to find a familiar black car driving towards her, noting to himself it's Reece's. Seeing him wave his hand to make sure he's coming in later.

He clears his throat, clenching his jaw as he walks into the club. Reece wasn't lying, the club is too packed for tonight. As if God knew what is about to get down tonight and isn't going to let him get away with witnesses. He really needs to play safe for a while tonight.

As he strides through the room to find a table he has reserved for, a few half naked girls walk right pass him, stroking his exposed chest and grabbing his shoulders. Most of them are gorgeous and he's tempted to touch their soft skin yet he has to hold it. Not that he isn't interested because he's definitely taking someone back to his place tonight--fucking Reece had to be right-- but he needs to get his head in the game for at least an hour before planning to do so.

Gently, he pulls back a chair for him to sit. He specifically asks for the furthest table so no one can figure out what he's about to do tonight. A glass of whiskey has been set on his table before he got here, waiting for Joe's arrival. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Reece and Bianco walking over to his table. One of them gives him a nod to acknowledge his presence.

Harry lifts the glass up to his lips and take a sip of it. Honestly, he hates doing all of this dirty work. Sure, he's the boss. But he despises complicated things. He should've known not to trust Joe about anything, yet when he begged on his knees with a gun knocked against his head as he spat out a bunch of threats to the weakened man, he thought why not? If Joe didn't get to fulfill his demands, he gets to kill him either way. It's always a pleasure for him to do so.

"Mr. Styles! Ay, i'm so happy to see you. You look a lot cleaner than i saw you the last time, eh?" Joe's voice causes Harry's green eyes averts from the scene on the crowd. His eyebrows are knitted, jaw tightened as he taps his fingers against the table, causing the rings he's wearing to knock.

He owes him money worth $50,000. And this man had the nerve to walk in and act like nothing happened.

He is definitely going to kill him.

"Stop with all that shit and sit the fuck down. You owe me something Joe." Harry warns, pointing at him as Harry's men forces the dark haired male to sit down making him gulp. "You owe me 50 grand for that package you piece of shit."

Joe couldn't feel more terrified as he catches a glimpse of Harry's gun on the table, facing towards him. "I know Harry, I know. I didn't forget, okay? It's just the money is tight right now. The girls aren't getting the amount of money they used to be getting." Joe tries to reason but Harry isn't having any of it,

"Stop being a fucking pussy and blame your girls for the money you've lost. I'm running out of patience here, Joe. If you don't give me the money by the end of the week, you're a dead man. I still have one body bag left in my car and I wouldn't mind writing your name on it." Harry grits his teeth, looking at him with a dark look in his eyes. Hand gripping tightly around the glass

"No man, I need more than that. Please, I'll do whatever you ask me to. You will have your money man I promised." Joe begs, looking at Harry with hopeful eyes.

Harry finds it quite disgusting to see someone like him beg for mercy-- for the second time--or anything at all to be honest. He find that gesture is weak and vulnerable which makes him very easy to manipulate over. "I don't give out second chances."

Joe hears a gun clicks behind, he doesn't need to know what's going on. He knows one of the two men behind him is ready to blow his brains out. "Harry man. . . One more. . . Give me one more"

Harry isn't a patient man. He doesn't want people beg. He doesn't want him to beg. But he finds it interesting to see how it goes, playing along this little game of his.

"Fine. you give me your best girl and i'll give you two months." Harry offers, cocking his eyebrow as he leans back to relax himself. "No more than that."

Joe's eyes widen at Harry's demand. It's impossible to collect a 50 grand in two months, especially when he's short on it. He needs more than that. Still, he thinks two months is better than nothing. "Okay. . . Agreed. Just tell me which girl you want or-or i could bring one or two here, man. Take your pick."

Harry can only hum in response, scanning his eyes over the scene. Dozens of girls dancing on stage, few of them even has their bras taken off. It seems to him, none of these girls on the room is his type.

Until his green eyes fall on a certain slightly curvy woman with her leg wrapped around the pole.

Her long dark hair brushing lightly against the floor as she bend her back a bit. He observes the way her body move so dirty yet gracefully around the pole,  the way she bites onto her pink glossed lips and how her brown eyes manage to flirt with the crowd and had them lure into her eyes including himself. He swears this girl just steps out of his daydreams. She looks perfect.

He admires how she circle her hips painfully slow, jealous how he isn't close enough to watch her plump flesh near his strong figure.

"Her. I want her" Harry points at the girl he can't take his eyes off. His voice sounds too possessive but he doesn't care if he does. He's too enhanced with the way she moves on that stage and he loves how she swats those dirty hands who seems desperate to cope a feel with a dirty look on her face.

'Seems like a fighter' he thinks to himself

"Y/N? You want her?" Joe asks after he realises who Harry's pointing at.

"Y/N? That's a gorgeous name. She's not taken is she? Not that i care anyway. She's a dime from what i can see here." He says, not tearing his eyes off of her while he sips on his drink. "You're gonna give me her to me aren't you?" Harry asks, his eyes are threatening enough for Joe so he nods his head as a response.

"Yes. Of course. If that's what you want."

"Fuck yes i do. Bring me to one of your rooms. I want a private from her" He demands before gulping down his drink, standing up to head over to the back. Not before glancing at the gorgeous woman one last time who stuffs a few dollar bills in her panties.

*

*

After what it feels like forever dancing on stage and have men whistling at her to go over and give them more, she finally sit herself down on a chair in her dressing room and take a deep breath. Moaning in relief as she pulls her heels off while setting her timer on because she only has thirty minutes to rest before going back out there again. She leans back against the chair, sighing in a pure bliss.

She can hear a few girls talking and laughing while preparing themselves for their performance tonight, wishing she could just join in because Violet informs her earlier there's some juicy gossip she needs to talk about but she cant take it. She's too tired.

She has only closes her eyes for 10 minutes until a familiar voice speaks out,

"Where's Y/N?"

She groans internally. Can never mistake that voice soon as she hears it. Her manager, who sounds like he's panting, voice firm as if is an emergency to call her out like that. Y/N still has her eyes shut as she raises her hand up, not having the energy to respond.

"Okay, good. Y/N. You don't need to go back out there again. There's a special guest I need you to entertain. He's already waiting in the red room."

She nods and hum, only to realize what he means as her eyes bugs out.

Wait, what?

She's quick to turn around, brows furrows and mouth hangs open, not believing what she has just heard. "Pardon?"

"There's a man. A guy who I work with, waiting in one of the rooms. He specifically asked for you. I need you to at least give him an hour." Joe notifies, running his hand over his face as if he's stressed about something,

"You want me to give a lap dance to your co-worker?" She raises her eyebrow, not believing what he just asked her

Joe sighs angrily, "it's technically not--Y/N... please. No more questions, just go over there."

"Who's the guy?" she ignores his orders as she stands, crossing her arms across her chest. "Jesus, fuck. I really need my hair to breath" she mutters, brushing down her long dark brown hair,

"Harry Styles."

Y/N freezes in an instant. Looking up to stare at Joe in the eye to see if he's joking, he can only nod his head to confirm her questioning look. " you're shitting me."

"I'm not," Joe replies, walking over to her, not wanting the other girls to hear. "Y/N, I owe him money. I haven't got them yet and--"

She scoffs, rolling her eyes and continue messing with her hair a bit more. "Not my problem."

He reaches out to grab her elbow, pulling her harshly causing her to stumble a bit. "Y/N, please... He wanted to kill me out there earlier. The guy brought a gun for God's sake. He gave me a month but until then... he wants you."

"You know i'm not a hooker" Y/N defeatedly sighs. She wants to help him, she does but it sounds like he's selling her off for a month to this notorious and dangerous guy who is named to be the deadliest man alive by the people of New York.

She loves money but no fucking way she's willing to die for it.

"I didn't say you were" He roughly says, hand gripping tightly on her arm. "Just... do it" He let her go, tired of the waiting because he doesn't want to make Harry pissed off now,

The girl sighs angrily, squeezing her eyes shut as she hesitates for a while. What the fuck did she get herself into?

"Fine. just give me a moment."

Giving her a smile, Joe thanks her by giving her a kiss on the cheek, telling her the door number Harry is in before walking out of the room. Soon after he walks out, she feels sick in her stomach. How could she ever go face to face with a man with blood in his hands? She's about to give this man a lap dance. Who knew he might've ask for more?

So now, as she finishes re-applying a layer of red lipstick, she heads out. Walking to the back of the room in a slow pace. Heart beating loud and fast as she's about to come face to face with this man. Still, she needs to play it cool. God really fucking hates her,

If he really does exists.

She takes a deep breath before opening the brown door carefully, pushing it open. Her knees almost buckle at the sight of Harry Styles, lounging on the leather couch. A cigarette squeeze between his fingers. legs spread open as if it's an invitation already made for her. His head turns towards the door, a smirk graces upon his face.

She's not going to lie. He is indeed dashingly handsome. With his arms resting on the back of the couch making his biceps look a bit bigger. He's got killer looks too. she studies. Sexy smile, and stubble which creates a sexier look on his face. She catches a glimpse of a silver cross necklace resting against his broad chest. His eyes are sharp. Looking at her up and down with his bottom lip bitten between his teeth.

"My, my" he lowly whistles, watching her every move as she enters the room. Locking the door behind her. "I wasn't wrong. You are a fucking dime."

Y/N giggles-- though feeling scared shitless-- and run her hands over her hair as she struts her way towards his figure. Purposely swaying her ass side to side a bit to tease him. "Mr.Harry Styles. . . I heard a lot about you. Word on the street is that you're a man that likes to carry a danger" she smirks seductively as she stands in between his open legs, dragging her finger slowly down her chest.

Her angelic voice is like music to his ears,

"Yeah?" he smirks, eyes falling to the curve of her breasts. "Hope that doesn't scare you, doll. All i want is a dance from you, that's all. I also heard that you are their favourite girl. After seeing you danced on that stage, I now know why."

Again, she giggles. A small blush creeping on her cheeks, hopefully he doesn't see it. "You're a flirt aren't you, Harry? You do this to every girl?"

He places his hands slowly on her plump ass, he doesn't know if he's allowed to touch but he doesn't give a shit. She seems isn't bothered by it. He wants this girl and he wants her now.

"Only to those who i find interesting, baby. Now, are you going to show me what you got?" He asks, looking up to meet her brown eyes as he squeezes her flesh.

With a devilish smirk, she slowly sets herself down on his lap which causes him to let out a soft groan. She runs her hands down to his tattooed chest and toys with his cross necklace for a bit before whispering in his ear, "sit tight and relax, Mr. Styles. I'll be your good girl for tonight"

next chapter

*

i really don’t want to write a super long chapter, because i’m afraid it’ll bore you guys so maybe--i hope-- this is enough. anyway, i hope you guys enjoy this first chapter, let me know if you guys hate it or love it! I’ll appreciate it. love you guys!

#harry styles x reader #harry styles blurbs #harry styles imagines #harry styles angst #harry styles fluff #harry styles fanfictions #dom!harry #dom!harry styles #mafia!harry #mafia!harry styles #gang!harry #gangleader!harry #daddy!harry #daddy!harry styles

[uss-protostar]

Hi! I love your blog! I’m a fairly new kraftwerk fan and i didn’t realize there was a small tumblr community which i’m so glad exists hehe. I noticed some of the kraftwerk blogs seem to be “anti ralf” or so i read, i was a little confused but if you could please explain i would really appreciate it!

Hehe, welcome! I’m glad you like my blog :)

I’m going to start off by saying that I’m not anti-Ralf. I think that he had some major cringe moments, especially in the 90s (which is why I might say sometimes that I don’t like 90s Ralf), but honestly? I think he’s tried to make himself a better person, and I think he’s past a lot of the stuff he did in the past. I’ll try and go over the major things that he did that people point to, but I can’t say I’ll hit everything.

Let me start with the court cases, because while I don’t know all the people Ralf has sued, I know the main cases. Hütter v Pelham is infamous just because of the fact that it’s been going on for over 20 years. Now, a lot of people will argue that this shows all Ralf cares about is making sure he gets all the money from his music, making sure sampling isn’t allowed, blah blah blah. BUT. What they don’t see is that Ralf has won the case almost every. single. time. The case would have only lasted a few years if it weren’t for Pelham appealing to the higher courts. The other case that people talk about is Ralf suing that phone startup for naming themselves Kraftwerk. This was a cringe moment, I don’t like it. Then there’s also the whole I Was A Robot court stuff, but that’s just a whole other mess. Plus, while I’ve tried to find my information about it, I haven’t been able to, so I don’t feel like I could properly talk about it here.

Speaking of IWAR, let’s talk about it a little more. One of the things Wolfgang says in this book is that Ralf and Florian only gave Karl and Wolfgang a small share of the money that they made with Kraftwerk. Which honestly? While that might have happened, I think it needs to be taken with a grain of salt (like everything in that book). IWAR in general is just another complete mess. There’s stuff Wolfgang shouldn’t have included in it (personal stuff about Ralf and Florian) he takes stabs at Ralf and Florian every few pages, etc etc. But also I think Ralf and Florian overreacted a bit with its release.

Another thing that I think pisses people off about Ralf is his cycling obsession. It very obviously took over every area of his life, and it ended up being first over music. For me personally, I don’t care about it too much because it’s his life and he doesn’t owe us music. On the other hand, it did get taken over into the studio, like that one day in 1990 where he didn’t even notice Karl.

I think all of it is very morally grey. He’s treated his former band mates with little respect (except Florian), he’s gotten in petty arguments, but he isn’t the only one. Everyone in the classic KW lineup has made some dumb mistakes. I know you may be new to the KW community, but it’s one of those things where you kind of have to figure it out for yourself. There’s lot of different opinions out there on it.

TL;DR: Ralf has made some bad moves and overall could be a bit of a bitch at times, but he’s human and made mistakes. Everyone does that.

#if anyone has anything to add #feel free #long post #i guess? #sorry for rambling anon

[killian-whump]

@wyntereyez replied to your post “When you’re scrolling through your super old fics and find that...”

Ooh, was it whumpy, at least? Now I'm curious what kind of fic high school KW wrote.

Okay, so this reply turned into story time, and I’m not sorry XD

Before high school, Young KW actually fancied herself an author-in-the-making. I always had a story in my head, and was constantly filling notebooks with hastily scribbled tales of childhood adventures and talking animals and heartfelt friendships. My friends liked my stories and my teachers loved my stories, even to the point of allowing me to turn in “free writing” stories in place of the more structured assignments the rest of the class was given. (In retrospect, I have mixed feelings on whether this was actually good for my writing education or bad for it - but that’s another whole subject.) I dreamed of being a rock singer, mind you, but I think I (and those around me) just sort of assumed that “author” was probably where I’d realistically end up ;)

Ah, but then high school came. And I just assumed that as I grew out of reading children’s fiction (or so I thought at the time - it’s still one of my favorite genres today), I should also grow out of writing it. I dearly wish someone had steered me out of that line of thinking, but I never really vocalized what was going on in my head. At any rate, I stopped writing the stories I loved writing... and started trying to write “grown-up” stories. Or, at least, young adult stories.

Well, ONE story. It was such a complete and utter failure that it shook my confidence as a writer and made me feel like my writing would never “mature” past children’s lit and, therefore, I couldn’t be a “serious” author. Yes, I know that’s stupid NOW, but I assumed that was just reality back THEN.

But that story... marked a huge step forward in me becoming the whumper I am today, and is the point where my writing past and my whump past become irrevocably intertwined. Because IN that failure of a young adult thriller, there was a scene where the MC’s crush (the teen heartthrob of her high school, of course, who else?) gets attacked by the killer. He’s left to bleed out in his family’s bathtub, in an apparent suicide attempt, but the female lead manages to save him just in time. It was the only scene of that failed novel that I liked writing and felt good about.

Umm. But maybe a little too good. I really, really enjoyed it in a way that kinda scared the ever-loving crap out of me. Writing anything else just seemed dull in comparison, so the story completely stopped right there. In fact, I realized the entire story up to that point was mostly just thrown together to get me TO that scene. It was passionless tripe because it was all just an excuse to write that one scene... and I knew it.

So I came to two realizations: (1) Writing was only fun for me anymore (and only something I felt I could do well) when it involved the torture and peril of young men and (2) Obviously, there was something super duper wrong with me (see 1).

I had to come to terms with (2) before I could revisit (1). And in that time... I didn’t write. I only wrote what was necessary for schoolwork, and nothing else. And my coming to terms with (2) is a whole other subject. But suffice to say, I did come to terms with it - enough so that while I wasn’t ready to share my interests with others, I was comfortable letting my imagination run free within the confines of my own head, and willing to seek out and even dog-ear scenes in mainstream novels that piqued my interest. And it was at that point that I sat down in front of an old word processor and started writing again.

At first, it was just me re-typing my favorite book scenes, replacing the names with my favorite celebrities or high school crushes. And then... one day I opened a new document, stared at it for no less than a half an hour (probably more) and then started typing. And I couldn’t stop. I was like a woman possessed or something. I just dumped out every dirty, naughty, wicked, evil little fantasy in my head - each whumpier and dirtier and kinkier than the last one - and kept coming up with more. And more. And more. Fanfic. RPF. Original tales. All as whumpy as could be, all for my eyes only, and all so very, very precious to me.

ANYWAY, the story in question, 2010, was an RPF about two of my favorite musicians’ unfortunate adventures in a matriarchal future where all men were slaves. In this case, they were very, very poorly treated slaves. In fact, in every case, and in every story, you can rest assured there are men being very, very poorly treated XD The only other things I’ve written in the past, oh, 20+ years have been the few fluff pieces I’ve written on here. And I’m insanely proud of them, because they mean I CAN still write about mainstream things when I set my mind to it. So maybe someday, if I can stop writing whump long enough lol, I might just try my hand at doing more of that.

So yeah. It was whump. That’s my jam XD

#responses #wyntereyez #about me #writing #whump meta

[zalrb]

In your humble opinion, would you say that KW leaving tvd after s4 is what ruined the show? I personally feel that way and if you as well, I would love to know your thoughts. I just feel like after he left, Julie wanted to create HER own fantasy on the show vs we have already been given with the character (hence how de was created). I just feel like Julie and Caroline Dries were lowkey excited he was gone.

I think that when Kevin was around he pushed back against JP’s flights of fancy to create a more cohesive show. Like for instance, in season 1, JP wanted Damon to actually kiss Elena and Kevin was like, no, it’s too soon:

I’m most proud of the cliffhanger [at the end] of season 1. I remember sitting in the room and Julie’s like, “No, Damon and Elena have to kiss. That has to be the cliffhanger. Don’t you remember Dawson’s Creek? You’ve got to do it.” And I’m like, “No, they can’t. You cannot.” We were already fighting about Elena being with Damon or Elena being with Stefan. I saw it clearly: This is season 1. This is about Stefan and Elena. Elena is not at that place yet where she would kiss him. She’s not drunk; she’s not crazy. She’s our heroine; we cannot sacrifice her character and have her make that move against Stefan. Unless —I’ll never forget that moment in the writers’ room — it’s Katherine.

which makes sense because next to the fact that Damon is Damon, Damon and Elena essentially spend no time together in season 1, it’s very minimal screentime and when they do spend time together it’s 99.9% about Stefan

so it never made sense for her to kiss him/be with him but it would especially not make sense then.

I also think that with Kevin around he pushed for heartbreaking moments that would make for compelling TV, things that Julie wouldn’t have done:

The good storylines start churning, and I just want to be surprising, all the time. I think, “If I do this, how would I earn it?,” and I have to backtrack and figure out the storyline and figure out how to do it

and in season 3 she didn’t want to kill anyone but Kevin said that she had to:

Julie and I still talk at 4 o’clock in the morning. I go, “Who are you going to kill?” I’ve let her decide this year ‘cause I killed enough people. She called me up and said, “I think we’re not going to kill anybody,” and I said, “Oh, no. No, you’ve got to kill somebody.”

without Kevin to talk about stakes, then you get things like the Other Side and body switches so that no one really has to die,

So I thought about it from the point of view of an audience member  saying you know what yes, to be a good writer, your deaths should feel  permanent, but our audience that has been watching our show faithfully  and sobbing along with us every time somebody dies, there is something  beautiful about getting to revisit them every now and then and in   Jeremy’s case, it was actually about bringing him back into Elena’s   world so that she could find herself again.”  

And when you read about what the writing room was like in the series finale, Kevin challenges JP on her ideas

And then Kevin walked into the room and he’s like, “What’s Stefan’s life going to be like?” I said, “He’s going to be happy with Caroline and uh uh… uh, I don’t know.”

He pauses, then continues, “If there was any other conversations, we ended on this one. This show was always about Stefan being the hero, and if Stefan could not have Elena, Stefan could do this very nice thing of giving his brother the chance to live with Elena.”

I’m like, “You’re right, it needs to go the other way.” It was so funny because we had thought about it in the room so much that we had talked ourselves into one path, but all we needed was him to walk in and be like, “But… isn’t it cooler the other way?” And so we switched it. He gets all the credit for that.

and I think after he left, no one did that and that’s why stakes are gone, consequences are gone, which then starts turning the show into fanfiction because it just becomes JP and CD doing whatever they want to do and making last minute changes that aren’t well thought-out because it makes no sense for what they’ve already established (like the Katherine-Elena body swap) which gets into the fact that they’re actually bad writers. Caroline Dries admitted to not knowing what an arc is:

Caroline Dries: I don’t know what the definition of arc is, but we have cool new mythologies that we’re introducing this season.

More than that, she implemented a “chapter” format that doesn’t make sense:

“We’re five seasons in – we learn a little bit every season – and last year was the season of the cure, the year before that was the moonstone and the sacrifice. When we found that we were stretching that out over 22 or 23 episodes, the mythology gets so dense and hijinks-y that the audience is like, “Wait, what?!” So we were like why don’t we break things down into chapters, a little cleaner, so we’re not having springs pop out of our ears every time we’re pitching something to the studio or the network or the audience. That’s what we’re trying to do. We wrapped up the doppelganger thing with Silas and Amara, but the travelers are still around in the ether. They still have an agenda that they haven’t carried out yet. Not to say things won’t come back that we haven’t seen. They certainly will. But it’s more about trying to make the stories have a beginning, middle and end. Have a conclusion.”

But that isn’t how a season works! It is supposed to be the season of the tomb vampires, the season of the moonstone, the season of the Originals, each season is supposed to be a chapter in the book which is the series. If you think that the mythology gets dense because you’re spending 22 episodes on one thing, you can focus episodes on the B-plots for more breathing room like season 2 was about the moonstone but it was also the introduction of werewolves and Katherine was back in town, Bonnie’s power was growing, they could’ve focused on that more if they didn’t want it get to so dense, same thing with season 3 and season 4; it’s the show’s inability to focus things on characters other than Damon and Elena and sometimes possibly Stefan that makes season not broken up into “chapters” too dense to follow because they don’t really expand to the other characters. Furthermore, when you have chapters within a season then the arcs happen too quickly and abruptly, you don’t have enough time to form attachments to the new characters or the new storyline because it’s done within 3 or 4 episodes and when you move on to the next chapter, the show doesn’t bring the effects of the previous chapter into it — for instance, in season 5 Stefan had amnesia for three episodes and then it stopped and became about him having PTSD for two episodes and then that stopped and his character went through absolutely no growth because those chapters were “over.” This season the Lily chapter ended and Damon was a dick to her on her deathbed fine that carries over to his “hell” which lasts for one episode and he admits to being sorry and wanting his mother and then it became about him burning Elena and “spiralling” so what about his revelation in the Phoenix Stone? What bearing does that have on his character? Nothing. Because that chapter is over. It’s RIDICULOUS. Everything within a season should connect seamlessly, which should add to the world you’ve created in the series because that’s what a television show IS. You need direction and you need the flexibility to move shit around, it’s a balance that the show is severely lacking.

Which just means that the show went downhill fast.

#stelena #anti caroline dries #anti julie plec #kevin williamson

[annashipper]

Discerning Anon

Hi Anna! 

I went to the 92Y preview screening and discussion with Michael Shannon and the director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon on the 20th. The moderator, a Columbia University film professor who has been doing these discussions for 30 years gushed that this was THE BEST film she had seen this year!!! She also hadn’t seen any of the earlier versions.

I have to say the AG-R Director’s Cut is a greatly improved version! It runs tighter and quicker and Tesla is now an actual 3rd character. Katherine Waterston’s name should absolutely have been included on the poster!! I thought Michael Shannon as Westinghouse was terrific. As for BC, Edison being a difficult person that people don’t understand and/or like, this is his specialty character, he plays it very well as he usually does.

The director said when he first read the script he wasn’t sure if he was interested because he didn’t really know a lot about electricity, but reading it again he picked up on the characters and how one was obsessed with being remembered and the other was more interested in integrity rather than self-promotion which drew him in. BC was already attached to the project when AG-R signed on - it is a Sunnymarch production - and AG-R went to Brooklyn to see if he could get Michael Shannon onboard who originally gave him a firm hard No, also due to not really knowing a lot about the subject matter. AG-R gave him probably the only book written by people who actually knew Westinghouse, MS read it and signed on because he thought the character was an important one especially in this day and age. Once MS was onboard, I forgot who mentioned Katherine Waterston to the director but he thought that KW and MS would be a fantastic pairing! He was really thrilled to get her signed. AG-R then approached Nicholas Hoult about Tesla, and that he envisioned Tesla as a Bowie type character. NH already knew a lot about Tesla and was in.

AG-R said it was Westinghouse who he most identified with personally. There’s also a new scene where Tesla is reminded that he is just an immigrant and should go back where he came from which also hit a note with him.

AG-R also talked about how historically accurate the movie can really be when there’s not a lot of material about Westinghouse, and how there are real people who have been omitted (Edison had a 2nd wife) and other people were combined into one character. Adding everyone would have taken the movie in a few different directions than how he intended and been a lot longer.

There is an elephant in the movie however I assure you it does not come to any danger or harm. 😉

So what does Martin Scorsese have to do with this? When the project was coming together AG-R was advised to add him to the project as a backup just in case anything should happen, which drew a gasp from the audience. Apparently, there were concerns about HW coming to light before things actually did. Scorsese was the guardian angel in getting this off the shelf it was put on and if worse came to worse Scorsese was going to do the final cut himself, however he believed in AG-R and gave it to him to do as he originally envisioned.

There were lots of questions for MS about how he chooses roles and what he thinks of acting. A lot of people who were part of the production were in the audience along with the director’s mom who also got a round of applause. As for the audience - I think I was the youngest person there!

The problem is the subject matter. You either get into it or you just don’t. Not everyone will find how to build the better power distributor that interesting, although this older crowd did. I don’t think it would necessarily appeal to those who like period pieces if they aren’t engineers. The characters are interesting if you’re interested enough in the subject matter but I don’t think the characters make you interested in the subject matter itself.

It’s not a bad movie. I really enjoyed it because I’m a fan of 5 of the actors and I actually do find machines interesting. However with even the most recent reviews, I might be one of the few who did.

I also went to the NYC movie premiere Monday! The closest I got to the red carpet was walking by it to get in line for the movie which was a block and a half long! Thankfully I was towards the front of the line. They showed the film in a couple theaters, but I’m not sure everyone in line was able to get in.

While BC was doing interviews after their spin on the red carpet, I passed Weirdo who was upstairs chatting with a few people. In heels, she’s taller than me.

All the showings including the Studio/VIP theater let out at the same time. I wandered through and found BC shaking hands and hugging people as they were coming out of the VIP showing. He happily took a few quick pics with some people and kids who were most likely related to the studio execs. He then went over to MS who just came out of the theater who was also in good spirits. You could tell they were both very excited about everyone’s response to the film. Weirdo was there too standing there pleasantly and patiently and then wandered off until it was time for them to leave. Dave wasn’t there but there was a very discreet bodyguard keeping an eye over BC, with Karen not often far from his side.

It looks like the film is going to do well in NYC, people leaving the theater were all talking about what they really liked about it and Edison, even on the bus home. We’ll see how well it does elsewhere.

I do have to say congratulations to AG-R for winning his own war in getting his movie out from under HW and released as he intended. The Director’s Cut really is a much better movie because of it.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Thank you so much for sharing your opinion on how the film has progressed Discerning Anon.

Given how unimpressed you were with the 2017 version you’d seen, I was really looking forwart to getting your take on the director’s cut.  

The film opens tomorrow in Greece, so I can’t wait to see for myself if AGR was actually able to turn what sounded like a horrible liability into something good.

Thank you also for allowing me to share these pics you took at the premiere with the rest of the class:

Showmance-wise, what I’d really like to know is why Ben didn’t give Weirdo his own suit jacket, instead of her having to borrow David Birkin’s for warmth.  By the time she needed it, he was done taking pictures.

Did he forget about the one other time he had to be noble at the 2015 BAFTAS afterparty, a few hours after Ms Ballsy kept pointing out that a real gentleman would have offered his heavily pregnant wife his jacket to keep her from freezing to death on what was a very cold night?

#Discerning Anon #submission