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lesmisletters-daily · 4 months ago

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A Tempest In A Skull

Les Mis Letters reading club explores one chapter of Les Misérables every day. Join us on Discord, Substack - or share your thoughts right here on tumblr - today's tag is #lm 1.7.3

The reader has, no doubt, already divined that M. Madeleine is no other than Jean Valjean.

We have already gazed into the depths of this conscience; the moment has now come when we must take another look into it. We do so not without emotion and trepidation. There is nothing more terrible in existence than this sort of contemplation. The eye of the spirit can nowhere find more dazzling brilliance and more shadow than in man; it can fix itself on no other thing which is more formidable, more complicated, more mysterious, and more infinite. There is a spectacle more grand than the sea; it is heaven: there is a spectacle more grand than heaven; it is the inmost recesses of the soul.

To make the poem of the human conscience, were it only with reference to a single man, were it only in connection with the basest of men, would be to blend all epics into one superior and definitive epic. Conscience is the chaos of chimæras, of lusts, and of temptations; the furnace of dreams; the lair of ideas of which we are ashamed; it is the pandemonium of sophisms; it is the battlefield of the passions. Penetrate, at certain hours, past the livid face of a human being who is engaged in reflection, and look behind, gaze into that soul, gaze into that obscurity. There, beneath that external silence, battles of giants, like those recorded in Homer, are in progress; skirmishes of dragons and hydras and swarms of phantoms, as in Milton; visionary circles, as in Dante. What a solemn thing is this infinity which every man bears within him, and which he measures with despair against the caprices of his brain and the actions of his life!

Alighieri one day met with a sinister-looking door, before which he hesitated. Here is one before us, upon whose threshold we hesitate. Let us enter, nevertheless.

We have but little to add to what the reader already knows of what had happened to Jean Valjean after the adventure with Little Gervais. From that moment forth he was, as we have seen, a totally different man. What the Bishop had wished to make of him, that he carried out. It was more than a transformation; it was a transfiguration.

He succeeded in disappearing, sold the Bishop’s silver, reserving only the candlesticks as a souvenir, crept from town to town, traversed France, came to M. sur M., conceived the idea which we have mentioned, accomplished what we have related, succeeded in rendering himself safe from seizure and inaccessible, and, thenceforth, established at M. sur M., happy in feeling his conscience saddened by the past and the first half of his existence belied by the last, he lived in peace, reassured and hopeful, having henceforth only two thoughts,—to conceal his name and to sanctify his life; to escape men and to return to God.

These two thoughts were so closely intertwined in his mind that they formed but a single one there; both were equally absorbing and imperative and ruled his slightest actions. In general, they conspired to regulate the conduct of his life; they turned him towards the gloom; they rendered him kindly and simple; they counselled him to the same things. Sometimes, however, they conflicted. In that case, as the reader will remember, the man whom all the country of M. sur M. called M. Madeleine did not hesitate to sacrifice the first to the second—his security to his virtue. Thus, in spite of all his reserve and all his prudence, he had preserved the Bishop’s candlesticks, worn mourning for him, summoned and interrogated all the little Savoyards who passed that way, collected information regarding the families at Faverolles, and saved old Fauchelevent’s life, despite the disquieting insinuations of Javert. It seemed, as we have already remarked, as though he thought, following the example of all those who have been wise, holy, and just, that his first duty was not towards himself.

At the same time, it must be confessed, nothing just like this had yet presented itself.

Never had the two ideas which governed the unhappy man whose sufferings we are narrating, engaged in so serious a struggle. He understood this confusedly but profoundly at the very first words pronounced by Javert, when the latter entered his study. At the moment when that name, which he had buried beneath so many layers, was so strangely articulated, he was struck with stupor, and as though intoxicated with the sinister eccentricity of his destiny; and through this stupor he felt that shudder which precedes great shocks. He bent like an oak at the approach of a storm, like a soldier at the approach of an assault. He felt shadows filled with thunders and lightnings descending upon his head. As he listened to Javert, the first thought which occurred to him was to go, to run and denounce himself, to take that Champmathieu out of prison and place himself there; this was as painful and as poignant as an incision in the living flesh. Then it passed away, and he said to himself, “We will see! We will see!” He repressed this first, generous instinct, and recoiled before heroism.

It would be beautiful, no doubt, after the Bishop’s holy words, after so many years of repentance and abnegation, in the midst of a penitence admirably begun, if this man had not flinched for an instant, even in the presence of so terrible a conjecture, but had continued to walk with the same step towards this yawning precipice, at the bottom of which lay heaven; that would have been beautiful; but it was not thus. We must render an account of the things which went on in this soul, and we can only tell what there was there. He was carried away, at first, by the instinct of self-preservation; he rallied all his ideas in haste, stifled his emotions, took into consideration Javert’s presence, that great danger, postponed all decision with the firmness of terror, shook off thought as to what he had to do, and resumed his calmness as a warrior picks up his buckler.

He remained in this state during the rest of the day, a whirlwind within, a profound tranquillity without. He took no “preservative measures,” as they may be called. Everything was still confused, and jostling together in his brain. His trouble was so great that he could not perceive the form of a single idea distinctly, and he could have told nothing about himself, except that he had received a great blow.

He repaired to Fantine’s bed of suffering, as usual, and prolonged his visit, through a kindly instinct, telling himself that he must behave thus, and recommend her well to the sisters, in case he should be obliged to be absent himself. He had a vague feeling that he might be obliged to go to Arras; and without having the least in the world made up his mind to this trip, he said to himself that being, as he was, beyond the shadow of any suspicion, there could be nothing out of the way in being a witness to what was to take place, and he engaged the tilbury from Scaufflaire in order to be prepared in any event.

He dined with a good deal of appetite.

On returning to his room, he communed with himself.

He examined the situation, and found it unprecedented; so unprecedented that in the midst of his reverie he rose from his chair, moved by some inexplicable impulse of anxiety, and bolted his door. He feared lest something more should enter. He was barricading himself against possibilities.

A moment later he extinguished his light; it embarrassed him.

It seemed to him as though he might be seen.

By whom?

Alas! That on which he desired to close the door had already entered; that which he desired to blind was staring him in the face,—his conscience.

His conscience; that is to say, God.

Nevertheless, he deluded himself at first; he had a feeling of security and of solitude; the bolt once drawn, he thought himself impregnable; the candle extinguished, he felt himself invisible. Then he took possession of himself: he set his elbows on the table, leaned his head on his hand, and began to meditate in the dark.

“Where do I stand? Am not I dreaming? What have I heard? Is it really true that I have seen that Javert, and that he spoke to me in that manner? Who can that Champmathieu be? So he resembles me! Is it possible? When I reflect that yesterday I was so tranquil, and so far from suspecting anything! What was I doing yesterday at this hour? What is there in this incident? What will the end be? What is to be done?”

This was the torment in which he found himself. His brain had lost its power of retaining ideas; they passed like waves, and he clutched his brow in both hands to arrest them.

Nothing but anguish extricated itself from this tumult which overwhelmed his will and his reason, and from which he sought to draw proof and resolution.

His head was burning. He went to the window and threw it wide open. There were no stars in the sky. He returned and seated himself at the table.

The first hour passed in this manner.

Gradually, however, vague outlines began to take form and to fix themselves in his meditation, and he was able to catch a glimpse with precision of the reality,—not the whole situation, but some of the details. He began by recognizing the fact that, critical and extraordinary as was this situation, he was completely master of it.

This only caused an increase of his stupor.

Independently of the severe and religious aim which he had assigned to his actions, all that he had made up to that day had been nothing but a hole in which to bury his name. That which he had always feared most of all in his hours of self-communion, during his sleepless nights, was to ever hear that name pronounced; he had said to himself, that that would be the end of all things for him; that on the day when that name made its reappearance it would cause his new life to vanish from about him, and—who knows?—perhaps even his new soul within him, also. He shuddered at the very thought that this was possible. Assuredly, if any one had said to him at such moments that the hour would come when that name would ring in his ears, when the hideous words, Jean Valjean, would suddenly emerge from the darkness and rise in front of him, when that formidable light, capable of dissipating the mystery in which he had enveloped himself, would suddenly blaze forth above his head, and that that name would not menace him, that that light would but produce an obscurity more dense, that this rent veil would but increase the mystery, that this earthquake would solidify his edifice, that this prodigious incident would have no other result, so far as he was concerned, if so it seemed good to him, than that of rendering his existence at once clearer and more impenetrable, and that, out of his confrontation with the phantom of Jean Valjean, the good and worthy citizen Monsieur Madeleine would emerge more honored, more peaceful, and more respected than ever—if any one had told him that, he would have tossed his head and regarded the words as those of a madman. Well, all this was precisely what had just come to pass; all that accumulation of impossibilities was a fact, and God had permitted these wild fancies to become real things!

His reverie continued to grow clearer. He came more and more to an understanding of his position.

It seemed to him that he had but just waked up from some inexplicable dream, and that he found himself slipping down a declivity in the middle of the night, erect, shivering, holding back all in vain, on the very brink of the abyss. He distinctly perceived in the darkness a stranger, a man unknown to him, whom destiny had mistaken for him, and whom she was thrusting into the gulf in his stead; in order that the gulf might close once more, it was necessary that some one, himself or that other man, should fall into it: he had only let things take their course.

The light became complete, and he acknowledged this to himself: That his place was empty in the galleys; that do what he would, it was still awaiting him; that the theft from little Gervais had led him back to it; that this vacant place would await him, and draw him on until he filled it; that this was inevitable and fatal; and then he said to himself, “that, at this moment, he had a substitute; that it appeared that a certain Champmathieu had that ill luck, and that, as regards himself, being present in the galleys in the person of that Champmathieu, present in society under the name of M. Madeleine, he had nothing more to fear, provided that he did not prevent men from sealing over the head of that Champmathieu this stone of infamy which, like the stone of the sepulchre, falls once, never to rise again.”

All this was so strange and so violent, that there suddenly took place in him that indescribable movement, which no man feels more than two or three times in the course of his life, a sort of convulsion of the conscience which stirs up all that there is doubtful in the heart, which is composed of irony, of joy, and of despair, and which may be called an outburst of inward laughter.

He hastily relighted his candle.

“Well, what then?” he said to himself; “what am I afraid of? What is there in all that for me to think about? I am safe; all is over. I had but one partly open door through which my past might invade my life, and behold that door is walled up forever! That Javert, who has been annoying me so long; that terrible instinct which seemed to have divined me, which had divined me—good God! and which followed me everywhere; that frightful hunting-dog, always making a point at me, is thrown off the scent, engaged elsewhere, absolutely turned from the trail: henceforth he is satisfied; he will leave me in peace; he has his Jean Valjean. Who knows? it is even probable that he will wish to leave town! And all this has been brought about without any aid from me, and I count for nothing in it! Ah! but where is the misfortune in this? Upon my honor, people would think, to see me, that some catastrophe had happened to me! After all, if it does bring harm to some one, that is not my fault in the least: it is Providence which has done it all; it is because it wishes it so to be, evidently. Have I the right to disarrange what it has arranged? What do I ask now? Why should I meddle? It does not concern me; what! I am not satisfied: but what more do I want? The goal to which I have aspired for so many years, the dream of my nights, the object of my prayers to Heaven,—security,—I have now attained; it is God who wills it; I can do nothing against the will of God, and why does God will it? In order that I may continue what I have begun, that I may do good, that I may one day be a grand and encouraging example, that it may be said at last, that a little happiness has been attached to the penance which I have undergone, and to that virtue to which I have returned. Really, I do not understand why I was afraid, a little while ago, to enter the house of that good curé, and to ask his advice; this is evidently what he would have said to me: It is settled; let things take their course; let the good God do as he likes!”

Thus did he address himself in the depths of his own conscience, bending over what may be called his own abyss; he rose from his chair, and began to pace the room: “Come,” said he, “let us think no more about it; my resolve is taken!” but he felt no joy.

Quite the reverse.

One can no more prevent thought from recurring to an idea than one can the sea from returning to the shore: the sailor calls it the tide; the guilty man calls it remorse; God upheaves the soul as he does the ocean.

After the expiration of a few moments, do what he would, he resumed the gloomy dialogue in which it was he who spoke and he who listened, saying that which he would have preferred to ignore, and listened to that which he would have preferred not to hear, yielding to that mysterious power which said to him: “Think!” as it said to another condemned man, two thousand years ago, “March on!”

Before proceeding further, and in order to make ourselves fully understood, let us insist upon one necessary observation.

It is certain that people do talk to themselves; there is no living being who has not done it. It may even be said that the word is never a more magnificent mystery than when it goes from thought to conscience within a man, and when it returns from conscience to thought; it is in this sense only that the words so often employed in this chapter, he said, he exclaimed, must be understood; one speaks to one’s self, talks to one’s self, exclaims to one’s self without breaking the external silence; there is a great tumult; everything about us talks except the mouth. The realities of the soul are nonetheless realities because they are not visible and palpable.

So he asked himself where he stood. He interrogated himself upon that “settled resolve.” He confessed to himself that all that he had just arranged in his mind was monstrous, that “to let things take their course, to let the good God do as he liked,” was simply horrible; to allow this error of fate and of men to be carried out, not to hinder it, to lend himself to it through his silence, to do nothing, in short, was to do everything! that this was hypocritical baseness in the last degree! that it was a base, cowardly, sneaking, abject, hideous crime!

For the first time in eight years, the wretched man had just tasted the bitter savor of an evil thought and of an evil action.

He spit it out with disgust.

He continued to question himself. He asked himself severely what he had meant by this, “My object is attained!” He declared to himself that his life really had an object; but what object? To conceal his name? To deceive the police? Was it for so petty a thing that he had done all that he had done? Had he not another and a grand object, which was the true one—to save, not his person, but his soul; to become honest and good once more; to be a just man? Was it not that above all, that alone, which he had always desired, which the Bishop had enjoined upon him—to shut the door on his past? But he was not shutting it! great God! he was re-opening it by committing an infamous action! He was becoming a thief once more, and the most odious of thieves! He was robbing another of his existence, his life, his peace, his place in the sunshine. He was becoming an assassin. He was murdering, morally murdering, a wretched man. He was inflicting on him that frightful living death, that death beneath the open sky, which is called the galleys. On the other hand, to surrender himself to save that man, struck down with so melancholy an error, to resume his own name, to become once more, out of duty, the convict Jean Valjean, that was, in truth, to achieve his resurrection, and to close forever that hell whence he had just emerged; to fall back there in appearance was to escape from it in reality. This must be done! He had done nothing if he did not do all this; his whole life was useless; all his penitence was wasted. There was no longer any need of saying, “What is the use?” He felt that the Bishop was there, that the Bishop was present all the more because he was dead, that the Bishop was gazing fixedly at him, that henceforth Mayor Madeleine, with all his virtues, would be abominable to him, and that the convict Jean Valjean would be pure and admirable in his sight; that men beheld his mask, but that the Bishop saw his face; that men saw his life, but that the Bishop beheld his conscience. So he must go to Arras, deliver the false Jean Valjean, and denounce the real one. Alas! that was the greatest of sacrifices, the most poignant of victories, the last step to take; but it must be done. Sad fate! he would enter into sanctity only in the eyes of God when he returned to infamy in the eyes of men.

“Well,” said he, “let us decide upon this; let us do our duty; let us save this man.” He uttered these words aloud, without perceiving that he was speaking aloud.

He took his books, verified them, and put them in order. He flung in the fire a bundle of bills which he had against petty and embarrassed tradesmen. He wrote and sealed a letter, and on the envelope it might have been read, had there been any one in his chamber at the moment, To Monsieur Laffitte, Banker, Rue d’Artois, Paris. He drew from his secretary a pocket-book which contained several bank-notes and the passport of which he had made use that same year when he went to the elections.

Any one who had seen him during the execution of these various acts, into which there entered such grave thought, would have had no suspicion of what was going on within him. Only occasionally did his lips move; at other times he raised his head and fixed his gaze upon some point of the wall, as though there existed at that point something which he wished to elucidate or interrogate.

When he had finished the letter to M. Laffitte, he put it into his pocket, together with the pocket-book, and began his walk once more.

His reverie had not swerved from its course. He continued to see his duty clearly, written in luminous letters, which flamed before his eyes and changed its place as he altered the direction of his glance:—

“Go! Tell your name! Denounce yourself!”

In the same way he beheld, as though they had passed before him in visible forms, the two ideas which had, up to that time, formed the double rule of his soul,—the concealment of his name, the sanctification of his life. For the first time they appeared to him as absolutely distinct, and he perceived the distance which separated them. He recognized the fact that one of these ideas was, necessarily, good, while the other might become bad; that the first was self-devotion, and that the other was personality; that the one said, my neighbour, and that the other said, myself; that one emanated from the light, and the other from darkness.

They were antagonistic. He saw them in conflict. In proportion as he meditated, they grew before the eyes of his spirit. They had now attained colossal statures, and it seemed to him that he beheld within himself, in that infinity of which we were recently speaking, in the midst of the darkness and the lights, a goddess and a giant contending.

He was filled with terror; but it seemed to him that the good thought was getting the upper hand.

He felt that he was on the brink of the second decisive crisis of his conscience and of his destiny; that the Bishop had marked the first phase of his new life, and that Champmathieu marked the second. After the grand crisis, the grand test.

But the fever, allayed for an instant, gradually resumed possession of him. A thousand thoughts traversed his mind, but they continued to fortify him in his resolution.

One moment he said to himself that he was, perhaps, taking the matter too keenly; that, after all, this Champmathieu was not interesting, and that he had actually been guilty of theft.

He answered himself: “If this man has, indeed, stolen a few apples, that means a month in prison. It is a long way from that to the galleys. And who knows? Did he steal? Has it been proved? The name of Jean Valjean overwhelms him, and seems to dispense with proofs. Do not the attorneys for the Crown always proceed in this manner? He is supposed to be a thief because he is known to be a convict.”

In another instant the thought had occurred to him that, when he denounced himself, the heroism of his deed might, perhaps, be taken into consideration, and his honest life for the last seven years, and what he had done for the district, and that they would have mercy on him.

But this supposition vanished very quickly, and he smiled bitterly as he remembered that the theft of the forty sous from little Gervais put him in the position of a man guilty of a second offence after conviction, that this affair would certainly come up, and, according to the precise terms of the law, would render him liable to penal servitude for life.

He turned aside from all illusions, detached himself more and more from earth, and sought strength and consolation elsewhere. He told himself that he must do his duty; that perhaps he should not be more unhappy after doing his duty than after having avoided it; that if he allowed things to take their own course, if he remained at M. sur M., his consideration, his good name, his good works, the deference and veneration paid to him, his charity, his wealth, his popularity, his virtue, would be seasoned with a crime. And what would be the taste of all these holy things when bound up with this hideous thing? while, if he accomplished his sacrifice, a celestial idea would be mingled with the galleys, the post, the iron necklet, the green cap, unceasing toil, and pitiless shame.

At length he told himself that it must be so, that his destiny was thus allotted, that he had not authority to alter the arrangements made on high, that, in any case, he must make his choice: virtue without and abomination within, or holiness within and infamy without.

The stirring up of these lugubrious ideas did not cause his courage to fail, but his brain grow weary. He began to think of other things, of indifferent matters, in spite of himself.

The veins in his temples throbbed violently; he still paced to and fro; midnight sounded first from the parish church, then from the town-hall; he counted the twelve strokes of the two clocks, and compared the sounds of the two bells; he recalled in this connection the fact that, a few days previously, he had seen in an ironmonger’s shop an ancient clock for sale, upon which was written the name, Antoine-Albin de Romainville.

He was cold; he lighted a small fire; it did not occur to him to close the window.

In the meantime he had relapsed into his stupor; he was obliged to make a tolerably vigorous effort to recall what had been the subject of his thoughts before midnight had struck; he finally succeeded in doing this.

“Ah! yes,” he said to himself, “I had resolved to inform against myself.”

And then, all of a sudden, he thought of Fantine.

“Hold!” said he, “and what about that poor woman?”

Here a fresh crisis declared itself.

Fantine, by appearing thus abruptly in his reverie, produced the effect of an unexpected ray of light; it seemed to him as though everything about him were undergoing a change of aspect: he exclaimed:—

“Ah! but I have hitherto considered no one but myself; it is proper for me to hold my tongue or to denounce myself, to conceal my person or to save my soul, to be a despicable and respected magistrate, or an infamous and venerable convict; it is I, it is always I and nothing but I: but, good God! all this is egotism; these are diverse forms of egotism, but it is egotism all the same. What if I were to think a little about others? The highest holiness is to think of others; come, let us examine the matter. The I excepted, the I effaced, the I forgotten, what would be the result of all this? What if I denounce myself? I am arrested; this Champmathieu is released; I am put back in the galleys; that is well—and what then? What is going on here? Ah! here is a country, a town, here are factories, an industry, workers, both men and women, aged grandsires, children, poor people! All this I have created; all these I provide with their living; everywhere where there is a smoking chimney, it is I who have placed the brand on the hearth and meat in the pot; I have created ease, circulation, credit; before me there was nothing; I have elevated, vivified, informed with life, fecundated, stimulated, enriched the whole country-side; lacking me, the soul is lacking; I take myself off, everything dies: and this woman, who has suffered so much, who possesses so many merits in spite of her fall; the cause of all whose misery I have unwittingly been! And that child whom I meant to go in search of, whom I have promised to her mother; do I not also owe something to this woman, in reparation for the evil which I have done her? If I disappear, what happens? The mother dies; the child becomes what it can; that is what will take place, if I denounce myself. If I do not denounce myself? come, let us see how it will be if I do not denounce myself.”

After putting this question to himself, he paused; he seemed to undergo a momentary hesitation and trepidation; but it did not last long, and he answered himself calmly:—

“Well, this man is going to the galleys; it is true, but what the deuce! he has stolen! There is no use in my saying that he has not been guilty of theft, for he has! I remain here; I go on: in ten years I shall have made ten millions; I scatter them over the country; I have nothing of my own; what is that to me? It is not for myself that I am doing it; the prosperity of all goes on augmenting; industries are aroused and animated; factories and shops are multiplied; families, a hundred families, a thousand families, are happy; the district becomes populated; villages spring up where there were only farms before; farms rise where there was nothing; wretchedness disappears, and with wretchedness debauchery, prostitution, theft, murder; all vices disappear, all crimes: and this poor mother rears her child; and behold a whole country rich and honest! Ah! I was a fool! I was absurd! what was that I was saying about denouncing myself? I really must pay attention and not be precipitate about anything. What! because it would have pleased me to play the grand and generous; this is melodrama, after all; because I should have thought of no one but myself, the idea! for the sake of saving from a punishment, a trifle exaggerated, perhaps, but just at bottom, no one knows whom, a thief, a good-for-nothing, evidently, a whole country-side must perish! a poor woman must die in the hospital! a poor little girl must die in the street! like dogs; ah, this is abominable! And without the mother even having seen her child once more, almost without the child’s having known her mother; and all that for the sake of an old wretch of an apple-thief who, most assuredly, has deserved the galleys for something else, if not for that; fine scruples, indeed, which save a guilty man and sacrifice the innocent, which save an old vagabond who has only a few years to live at most, and who will not be more unhappy in the galleys than in his hovel, and which sacrifice a whole population, mothers, wives, children. This poor little Cosette who has no one in the world but me, and who is, no doubt, blue with cold at this moment in the den of those Thénardiers; those peoples are rascals; and I was going to neglect my duty towards all these poor creatures; and I was going off to denounce myself; and I was about to commit that unspeakable folly! Let us put it at the worst: suppose that there is a wrong action on my part in this, and that my conscience will reproach me for it some day, to accept, for the good of others, these reproaches which weigh only on myself; this evil action which compromises my soul alone; in that lies self-sacrifice; in that alone there is virtue.”

He rose and resumed his march; this time, he seemed to be content.

Diamonds are found only in the dark places of the earth; truths are found only in the depths of thought. It seemed to him, that, after having descended into these depths, after having long groped among the darkest of these shadows, he had at last found one of these diamonds, one of these truths, and that he now held it in his hand, and he was dazzled as he gazed upon it.

“Yes,” he thought, “this is right; I am on the right road; I have the solution; I must end by holding fast to something; my resolve is taken; let things take their course; let us no longer vacillate; let us no longer hang back; this is for the interest of all, not for my own; I am Madeleine, and Madeleine I remain. Woe to the man who is Jean Valjean! I am no longer he; I do not know that man; I no longer know anything; it turns out that some one is Jean Valjean at the present moment; let him look out for himself; that does not concern me; it is a fatal name which was floating abroad in the night; if it halts and descends on a head, so much the worse for that head.”

He looked into the little mirror which hung above his chimney-piece, and said:—

“Hold! it has relieved me to come to a decision; I am quite another man now.”

He proceeded a few paces further, then he stopped short.

“Come!” he said, “I must not flinch before any of the consequences of the resolution which I have once adopted; there are still threads which attach me to that Jean Valjean; they must be broken; in this very room there are objects which would betray me, dumb things which would bear witness against me; it is settled; all these things must disappear.”

He fumbled in his pocket, drew out his purse, opened it, and took out a small key; he inserted the key in a lock whose aperture could hardly be seen, so hidden was it in the most sombre tones of the design which covered the wall-paper; a secret receptacle opened, a sort of false cupboard constructed in the angle between the wall and the chimney-piece; in this hiding-place there were some rags—a blue linen blouse, an old pair of trousers, an old knapsack, and a huge thorn cudgel shod with iron at both ends. Those who had seen Jean Valjean at the epoch when he passed through D—— in October, 1815, could easily have recognized all the pieces of this miserable outfit.

He had preserved them as he had preserved the silver candlesticks, in order to remind himself continually of his starting-point, but he had concealed all that came from the galleys, and he had allowed the candlesticks which came from the Bishop to be seen.

He cast a furtive glance towards the door, as though he feared that it would open in spite of the bolt which fastened it; then, with a quick and abrupt movement, he took the whole in his arms at once, without bestowing so much as a glance on the things which he had so religiously and so perilously preserved for so many years, and flung them all, rags, cudgel, knapsack, into the fire.

He closed the false cupboard again, and with redoubled precautions, henceforth unnecessary, since it was now empty, he concealed the door behind a heavy piece of furniture, which he pushed in front of it.

After the lapse of a few seconds, the room and the opposite wall were lighted up with a fierce, red, tremulous glow. Everything was on fire; the thorn cudgel snapped and threw out sparks to the middle of the chamber.

As the knapsack was consumed, together with the hideous rags which it contained, it revealed something which sparkled in the ashes. By bending over, one could have readily recognized a coin,—no doubt the forty-sou piece stolen from the little Savoyard.

He did not look at the fire, but paced back and forth with the same step.

All at once his eye fell on the two silver candlesticks, which shone vaguely on the chimney-piece, through the glow.

“Hold!” he thought; “the whole of Jean Valjean is still in them. They must be destroyed also.”

He seized the two candlesticks.

There was still fire enough to allow of their being put out of shape, and converted into a sort of unrecognizable bar of metal.

He bent over the hearth and warmed himself for a moment. He felt a sense of real comfort. “How good warmth is!” said he.

He stirred the live coals with one of the candlesticks.

A minute more, and they were both in the fire.

At that moment it seemed to him that he heard a voice within him shouting: “Jean Valjean! Jean Valjean!”

His hair rose upright: he became like a man who is listening to some terrible thing.

“Yes, that’s it! finish!” said the voice. “Complete what you are about! Destroy these candlesticks! Annihilate this souvenir! Forget the Bishop! Forget everything! Destroy this Champmathieu, do! That is right! Applaud yourself! So it is settled, resolved, fixed, agreed: here is an old man who does not know what is wanted of him, who has, perhaps, done nothing, an innocent man, whose whole misfortune lies in your name, upon whom your name weighs like a crime, who is about to be taken for you, who will be condemned, who will finish his days in abjectness and horror. That is good! Be an honest man yourself; remain Monsieur le Maire; remain honorable and honored; enrich the town; nourish the indigent; rear the orphan; live happy, virtuous, and admired; and, during this time, while you are here in the midst of joy and light, there will be a man who will wear your red blouse, who will bear your name in ignominy, and who will drag your chain in the galleys. Yes, it is well arranged thus. Ah, wretch!”

The perspiration streamed from his brow. He fixed a haggard eye on the candlesticks. But that within him which had spoken had not finished. The voice continued:—

“Jean Valjean, there will be around you many voices, which will make a great noise, which will talk very loud, and which will bless you, and only one which no one will hear, and which will curse you in the dark. Well! listen, infamous man! All those benedictions will fall back before they reach heaven, and only the malediction will ascend to God.”

This voice, feeble at first, and which had proceeded from the most obscure depths of his conscience, had gradually become startling and formidable, and he now heard it in his very ear. It seemed to him that it had detached itself from him, and that it was now speaking outside of him. He thought that he heard the last words so distinctly, that he glanced around the room in a sort of terror.

“Is there any one here?” he demanded aloud, in utter bewilderment.

Then he resumed, with a laugh which resembled that of an idiot:—

“How stupid I am! There can be no one!”

There was some one; but the person who was there was of those whom the human eye cannot see.

He placed the candlesticks on the chimney-piece.

Then he resumed his monotonous and lugubrious tramp, which troubled the dreams of the sleeping man beneath him, and awoke him with a start.

This tramping to and fro soothed and at the same time intoxicated him. It sometimes seems, on supreme occasions, as though people moved about for the purpose of asking advice of everything that they may encounter by change of place. After the lapse of a few minutes he no longer knew his position.

He now recoiled in equal terror before both the resolutions at which he had arrived in turn. The two ideas which counselled him appeared to him equally fatal. What a fatality! What conjunction that that Champmathieu should have been taken for him; to be overwhelmed by precisely the means which Providence seemed to have employed, at first, to strengthen his position!

There was a moment when he reflected on the future. Denounce himself, great God! Deliver himself up! With immense despair he faced all that he should be obliged to leave, all that he should be obliged to take up once more. He should have to bid farewell to that existence which was so good, so pure, so radiant, to the respect of all, to honor, to liberty. He should never more stroll in the fields; he should never more hear the birds sing in the month of May; he should never more bestow alms on the little children; he should never more experience the sweetness of having glances of gratitude and love fixed upon him; he should quit that house which he had built, that little chamber! Everything seemed charming to him at that moment. Never again should he read those books; never more should he write on that little table of white wood; his old portress, the only servant whom he kept, would never more bring him his coffee in the morning. Great God! instead of that, the convict gang, the iron necklet, the red waistcoat, the chain on his ankle, fatigue, the cell, the camp bed all those horrors which he knew so well! At his age, after having been what he was! If he were only young again! but to be addressed in his old age as “thou” by any one who pleased; to be searched by the convict-guard; to receive the galley-sergeant’s cudgellings; to wear iron-bound shoes on his bare feet; to have to stretch out his leg night and morning to the hammer of the roundsman who visits the gang; to submit to the curiosity of strangers, who would be told: “That man yonder is the famous Jean Valjean, who was mayor of M. sur M.”; and at night, dripping with perspiration, overwhelmed with lassitude, their green caps drawn over their eyes, to remount, two by two, the ladder staircase of the galleys beneath the sergeant’s whip. Oh, what misery! Can destiny, then, be as malicious as an intelligent being, and become as monstrous as the human heart?

And do what he would, he always fell back upon the heartrending dilemma which lay at the foundation of his reverie: “Should he remain in paradise and become a demon? Should he return to hell and become an angel?”

What was to be done? Great God! what was to be done?

The torment from which he had escaped with so much difficulty was unchained afresh within him. His ideas began to grow confused once more; they assumed a kind of stupefied and mechanical quality which is peculiar to despair. The name of Romainville recurred incessantly to his mind, with the two verses of a song which he had heard in the past. He thought that Romainville was a little grove near Paris, where young lovers go to pluck lilacs in the month of April.

He wavered outwardly as well as inwardly. He walked like a little child who is permitted to toddle alone.

At intervals, as he combated his lassitude, he made an effort to recover the mastery of his mind. He tried to put to himself, for the last time, and definitely, the problem over which he had, in a manner, fallen prostrate with fatigue: Ought he to denounce himself? Ought he to hold his peace? He could not manage to see anything distinctly. The vague aspects of all the courses of reasoning which had been sketched out by his meditations quivered and vanished, one after the other, into smoke. He only felt that, to whatever course of action he made up his mind, something in him must die, and that of necessity, and without his being able to escape the fact; that he was entering a sepulchre on the right hand as much as on the left; that he was passing through a death agony,—the agony of his happiness, or the agony of his virtue.

Alas! all his resolution had again taken possession of him. He was no further advanced than at the beginning.

Thus did this unhappy soul struggle in its anguish. Eighteen hundred years before this unfortunate man, the mysterious Being in whom are summed up all the sanctities and all the sufferings of humanity had also long thrust aside with his hand, while the olive-trees quivered in the wild wind of the infinite, the terrible cup which appeared to Him dripping with darkness and overflowing with shadows in the depths all studded with stars.

#lm 1.7.3

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prehistoricmancunt · 1 year ago

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"Spells are mourning rituals, and mourning rituals can be spells. When you light a candle for your deceased loved one, when you make a cup of coffee with them in mind, when you write them a letter then burn, bury, toss or save it, when you make a Morning Altar or do any other grief exercises I’ve written about before; if you do them with a certain intention, they can all become spells.

And when you do any spell that centers on the life, death, and memory of your loved one, and the resulting grief, search for justice, peace, understanding, community, or fortitude to bear it all, you are engaging in a mourning ritual. Everything is everything.

In my dad’s house, he has my mom’s ashes, her funeral bulletin, her funeral card, sympathy cards, marathon medals, symbolic objects, trinkets, gifted art and books received after her death all on a shelf in his office. This is an altar, all it needs is intention.

Magic is in everything we do, whether we call it that or not. It doesn’t need to be the fairy godmother with her wings & wand, it can just be the kinetic energy of your body & love & intentions meeting the kinetic energy of herbs & stones & wind & candles & poems. Magic can be prayer & cooking & sweeping & kneeling & protesting & laughing & crying & grieving & mourning, it's doing it on purpose. Because my cells know their cells & your cells & those cells & its cells & her cells have all shuddered & undulated in the same big bang dust & universes & solar flares & the rain & the dinosaurs & & &&& …."

(excerpt from a substack post with a spell for justice, a spell for peace, and a spell for grief I'm working on)

#witchcraft #magic #witch #witchblr #grief #mourning ritual #spellwork #spellcraft #text post #w

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dendrite-blues · 7 months ago

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Lock In, Friends. We're the Resistance Now.

Things in the American left wing have been pretty gloomy this week. Lots of retrospectives, lots of “I told you so,” lots of doomy predictions.

I share the feeling. I understand it. It’s gutting to experience such a decisive defeat from a party who claims that caring for people is too expensive, but "there's no price tag” on harming them. We would have to sociopaths to not be upset about that.

However, I think we need to be mindful of how our emotions frame our reality.

I don’t think it’s particularly wise for us to invest too much energy into the news cycle. It only serves to exhaust and demoralize people by overwhelming them with a tsunami of problems. The sum total of the threats feels insurmountable, and so we throw up our hands and accept that the end is nigh.

I understand the camp of people who are willing to sit back and accept the suffering as long as the Y’all Qaeda suffers too.

We all feel frustrated and resentful, because in the course of fighting for freedom, leftists and liberals inevitably end up fighting for the rights of people who do not appreciate it, will not help defend it from future infringement, and are actively voting against it. And that fucking sucks.

But throwing up our hands and watching the world burn does mean that we will burn too, and I don’t know about you, but I like my flesh un-scorched.

Therefore, before all else, we must be willing to block out the noise. We must stop giving our attention to a mass media who are cosigning our destruction, and focus our attention on tangible, achievable, local action. We must ask ourselves, “What cause truly matters do me? What cause do I care for more than my comfort or safety?”

Some people will answer, “None,” and that’s okay. They would be poor allies anyhow. We let them go in peace.

For the rest of us, the people who care even in foul weather and terrible odds, we must gather ourselves around the campfires of those heartfelt causes. We must make close bonds with our true allies, and devise plans for how we can draw a line in the sand of our values and say, “No more. You will not take away our healthcare/our mutual aid/our ability to protest and exercise free speech/our right to exist and love who we do.”

It will feel alien to those of use who are accustomed to paying attention to everything. It will feel like we are letting our neighbors and their causes down. But we are not, we are actually helping them a great deal by ensuring that our campfire does not spread uncontained about the woods.

[Read and subscribe on Substack]

or continue reading below.

Because we are focusing on our fire, they can ignore it and invest that extra energy the spent watching our fire to defend their fire better. And we, likewise, can pay less attention to them and trust that they will handle it.

Which leads quite nicely into my second point with this letter; in our ongoing fight for freedom, the preservation of hope and our spirit must be the absolute first priority.

They have been working tirelessly for nearly a decade to break our spirits and push us into apathy. They are closer to succeeding now than they have been for a long time. The antidote to this psychic damage is psychic healing. We must take care of our own.

If you are holding a door closed against an intruder, you won’t last long with a broken ankle. You won’t be able to plant your feet if your socks are sweaty and the soles of your shoes have no traction. You would also fair much better with a friend who is also pushing.

People in our lives are hurting, and so we have to help them heal.

It sounds daunting when we’re all feeling so tired and wrung-out, when we feel deep in our hearts that this country deserves to go to the dogs. We think, “how could I possible support someone else when I’m barely staying on my feet already?”

There is some truth to that. That’s why I’m moving to a blue state. That’s why I’m cutting off people who I don’t think I can reach.

Put your gas mask on before assisting others. It’s common sense.

But at the same time, don’t take it for granted that helping drains you of energy.

Certain people are quite draining, and certain types of help can require a lot of energy, but we don’t have to do that kind of help all the time.

When you are feeling worn out, a hug can be a revolutionary act. A night of karaoke with friends. A cup of tea, an empowering conversation, one-line text message welfare checks—these are revolutionary acts, because they keep people motivated. They remind them that life continues even under oppression.

We lost the election, but the battle for our souls is still being fought. The legislature doesn’t determine how our movement goes forward. No candidates or conventions dictate how we gather and speak and coordinate.

Are we headed to another civil rights movement, where signs and song and massive, multi-cultural coalitions stand together and tell the government where they can stick it?

Or are we headed for a slow, self-defeating whimper that rolls effortlessly into an interminable era of rigged elections, single-party politics, and dissidents being disappeared from the streets in broad daylight?

Donald Trump doesn’t get to choose, and neither does Elon Musk.

We don't control the game or the rules, but we do get to decide if we're even going to try and win or if we'll just forfeit at the start.

It’s in our hands.

And we will absolutely surrender that choice if we give too much quarter to grief and anger. We will kneecap our own chances for freedom if we neglect our collective well-being and give our energy to the vampires on both sides of the punditry.

I believe the thought leaders on the left are well-meaning. I believe our bickering and pontificating flow naturally from our identities as intellectuals and humanitarians, and I think it’s important for us to have those conversations. But we need to have them at the right time, and we need to have them after we’ve patched up our wounded and put on fresh socks and tied our shoelaces good and tight.

We need to take care of our own and give them little bits of love to cling to, to remember the world we’re fighting for—a world where everyone is equal, everyone is whole, everyone is cared for and sheltered and connected to a community.

We have to give people a taste of the world they deserve, and it’s not even that hard to do because it turns out that when we make a space of healing for our community, that space heals us too.

In the face of oppression, survival is an act of rebellion. Gather your people close and ask them how you can help. When they tell you, take their answer seriously and do what you can to improve their situation. When you need support, don’t be proud. Go to your people and tell them.

Human beings are categorically shitty at imagining better times when their thoughts are steeped in depression and despair. In order to have any chance of a better future, we need good, hopeful ideas. Therefore, now and in the future, our first impulse should always be to care for our people. Nothing good can happen until our minds are free of our demons.

So go out today and find yourself some peace. Find relief, or get as close as you can. And when you’ve had enough relief to feel angry, to feel fired up and pissed off and impatient to take on the Horrors, channel that feeling into giving someone you love peace and relief.

And for fuck’s sake, turn off your phone notifications. You don’t need that shit activating your amygdala 24 hours a day. Check once in the evening so you’re informed, and then run far away. You’ll better off, and you’ll have more energy to improve the world around you.

The enemy is apathy. Don’t be an easy mark.

Let's all get our heads straight, and find the dim spark within us that still hungers for a better future.

The Horrors persist, but so do we.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

Den

#us politics #leftism #liberalism #civil resistance #newsletter #women writers #queer writers #journaling #civil rights

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nnthlss · 12 hours ago

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The Over-thinker

I came across an article on Substack talking about people who tend to overthink just about everything. As I was reading, I realized that almost everyone could probably relate to it in some way. But there’s one good friend in particular who came to mind, it honestly felt like the article was written just for her.

So to her and to all the overthinkers,

You think so much. Too much. You replay conversations, and try to read between lines that weren’t meant to be read. You anticipate needs, and plan for possibilities.

In the midst of all that caring and calculating, you forget yourself. You forget what it means to want something just because you want it. Your desires blur beneath layers of responsibility, empathy, and fear of letting others down. You hesitate to speak up, and to choose for yourself. Your value is in how well you understand, and how much you can give without breaking.

But sometimes, late at night, when the world goes quiet. You sense that something is missing, but you can’t name it. Maybe it’s peace? It’s joy? Maybe it’s just the simple freedom to be you, without feeling guilty for it.

You hold so much space for others, but who holds space for you?

May you learn to rest your mind. May you give yourself the same kindness you so freely give to others.

And may you finally believe that you don’t have to earn peace because you already deserved it.

#poetry #literature #writing #books #poetrycommunity #dead poets society #writers and poets

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dreaminginthedeepsouth · 14 hours ago

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Scott Horton‬ ‪@robertscotthorton.bsky.social‬ :: Bill Bramhall, New York Daily News

* * * *

Another week of resistance, another week of success.

June 21, 2025

Robert B. Hubbell

Jun 20, 2025

[I will host my regular Saturday morning livestream at 9 am PT / Noon ET on June 21, 2025. Open to all on the Substack App on your phone or tablet.]

We lurched to the week’s end with many stories seemingly marking time—an illusion that masks the increasingly unfavorable ratings regarding many of Trump's policies. His cruel policy of using armed thugs to seize productive, peaceful immigrants from workplaces and courthouses has turned popular sentiment against him. (As always, he doesn’t care; those who support him will answer at the ballot box.) MAGA is tearing itself apart over a potential attack on Iran. Red states are waking up to the likelihood that their rural hospitals will close and hundreds of thousands of their residents will lose medical coverage.

The resistance is making a difference, even when it may feel unsuccessful in the short term.

For example, on Thursday, ICE agents attempted to raid Dodger Stadium. The gun-toting, masked agents were turned away at the gates by LAPD. Until that provocation, the Dodgers had remained silent about the military occupation of LA and the militarized ICE raids. On Friday, the Dodgers announced that the organization would contribute $1 million to support immigrant families affected by the ICE raids. See KTLA, L.A. Dodgers pledge $1 million to support immigrant communities after ICE raid backlash.

Approximately 40% of the Dodgers’ fan base is Hispanic. I wish that the Dodgers acted out of concern for the families of their fans, but the sad truth is that the Dodgers were forced to take action by a coalition of Latino organizations. Those organizations--Little Latin America USA, California Rising, El Salvador Corridor Association, CD1 Coalition, and the L.A. Youth & Family Foundation--held a press conference in front of Dodger Stadium earlier this week, demanding that the Dodgers act. The team responded to the pressure.

The Dodger example shows the way forward. Corporations are nervously monitoring events—especially those events that affect their bottom lines. A boycott of Dodger home games by a Latino community fearful of ICE raids would quickly impair the value of the franchise. Just ask Tesla. And Target. And Elon Musk.

Trump knows he is losing the battle for the hearts and minds of the American people, especially in Los Angeles. Trump sent Vice President J.D. Vance to Los Angeles in hopes of creating raw meat to feed to the grumpy base. Vance failed spectacularly.

Vance is under the misimpression that he has a sense of humor and can tell jokes. He tried to make fun of the arrest of US Senator Alex Padilla for asking a question to the Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem. But Vance referred to Senator Alex Padilla as “Jose Padilla,” because in Vance’s bigoted mind, all Latino males are named “Jose.”

Senator Alex Padilla is an accomplished person of dignity and integrity who is highly regarded by most Californians. Insulting Senator Padilla by resorting to a racist trope will accelerate Trump's unfavorability in the Latino community in California and nationwide.

Equally bad for Vance (and Trump) is Vance’s statement that “[t]he “rioting has gotten a lot better” in Los Angeles since Trump sent in federal troops. Of course, ten million Angelenos can tell you that there is no rioting and hasn’t been for more than a week. Even then, “rioting” is a false characterization of peaceful protests where a few bad actors engaged in a handful of acts of violence and vandalism.

Speaking of “a handful of acts of violence and vandalism,” a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the order of Judge Breyer, holding that Trump must relinquish control of the California National Guard to California Governor Gavin Newsom.

In reversing Judge Breyer’s ruling, the three-judge panel ruled that a handful of acts of violence and vandalism constituted the inability of the president to “execute the laws,” justifying the federalization of National Guard troops.

The standard adopted by the three-judge panel is preposterous. It would allow the president to federalize the National Guard any time a fraternity party resulted in drunk undergraduates throwing beer bottles at police. [That was sarcasm, but just barely. The panel did concede that there was a de minimis limit that would not qualify as “inability to execute the laws.”]

Despite the ruling, there is still reason for hope, as explained in Democracy Docket, Appeals Court Upholds Trump’s Control of California National Guard.

First, the panel acknowledged that the president’s federalization of the National Guard is subject to judicial review. Second, the panel’s ruling related only to the temporary restraining order issued by Judge Breyer, but leaves open the possibility of a different result on a factual record developed on the preliminary injunction hearing—including the possibility that Trump violated the Posse Comitatus Act. Finally, the ruling is subject to review by the Ninth Circuit in an en banc hearing and by the US Supreme Court.

[Robert B. Hubbell newsletter]

#Bill Bramhall #NY Daily news #due process #ICE #rule of law #Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter #Robert B. Hubbell #Los Angeles #National Guard #illegal raids #immigration #The Dodgers

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partof-shan · 3 months ago

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Over the past year, I have heard about Stoicism on some of the podcasts I follow and in interviews with some of my favourite authors. This ancient philosophy, shared by these people from different countries and cultural backgrounds, really resonated with me. That’s why I started reading The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselmanand have been writing The Daily Stoic Journal for few months. I’ve never kept a diary before, but The Daily Stoic Journal feels different, Each day, it presents a question to reflect on, making it easy and fun to write. I won’t explain Stoicism here—instead, I’ll share the comic I created while answering the February 22nd question.

February 22nd, Am I certain what I want to say isn’t better left unsaid?

And my answers to this question are literally as follows:

I'm quite aware of this. Things that I want to say, which I know it’s better not to say it, and said it anyway, have become less and less - this seems to be able to turn into a comic! Frame 1. There are things I want to say... Frame 2. But it’s better that I don’t say it… Frame 3. But sometimes, I can’t resist saying them... Frame 4. has become less and less ...

Here is the comic:

I also want to share some more questions from The Daily Stoic Journal by Ryan Holiday, and my answers to them, and some quotes from the book The Daily Stoic.

January 1st, What things are truly in my control?

My answer: My actions and feelings.

January 7th, How can I keep my mind clear from pollution?

My answer: This is a really good question for today, as it's my first day back at work after travelling and resting for over two weeks. No matter what happens, I should remember my principles, what I seek, and what is beyond my control. Relax and don't overreact by being too vigilant. The faces of bad things are actually clear and easy to see. (My working environment could be toxic sometimes.)

January 12th, Where is the path to serenity?

My answer: Probably choosing the path to serenity is the path to serenity. I have been reading Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami recently, it has a lot to say about how the real world and the world of the mind are like parallel worlds, they can be completely unrelated or merged together. Probably the world we live in is also the result of our choices, and the same world is billions of different worlds for everyone on this planet.

February 5th, Am I thinking before I act?

My answer: I basically think twice before I act, I just sometimes don't act at all after thinking twice. There are a lot of things I could do and want to do that I don't do because I'm not sure how to do it. I need to be a bit more action-oriented rather than thinking twice.

I should think more before I play games or stay up late watching television though.

------------

“The single most important practice in Stoic philosophy is differentiating between what we can change and what we can’t. What we have influence over and what we do not.”

“Control your perceptions. Direct your actions properly. Willingly accept what’s outside your control.”

“Tranquility and peace are found in identifying our path and in sticking to it: staying the course—making adjustments here and there, naturally—but ignoring the distracting sirens who beckon us to turn toward the rocks.”

-The Daily Stoic, by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman

#stoicism #illustration #comics #comic #art #drawing #stoic philosophy #stoic quotes #daily stoic

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inkedwingss · 1 year ago

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For the ones joining my new writing-only blog, my baby Substack: I will upload one poem every day for the next 15 days, so expect some e-mails in your inbox! :)

If you have been here for a while, you must know I was in desperate need of a writing-only platform — in fact, if you remember, I even tried a side blog, but that didn't work for me (and the novel is cooking atm). So, for the sake of my peace of mind and my writing, I will upload all the poetry in here to this sparkling, brand-new Substack.

After a few days on that platform, though, I can already tell I'm not going to follow what I perceived to be the pattern. Do I feel like a fish out of the water? Yes. Do I plan to change? No. Is it good for ''marketing''? Nope! But I literally can't force myself into a non-authentic space. It gives me anxiety.

I believe in using the platform instead of letting the platform use me. I'm free. That is unnegotiable. So, I will do my best on my own terms, as many things annoy me about the writing culture of these times we live in and I refuse to wear the halter. Oh, I promise I'll never try to coach you, start mothering you, or try to sell you a "how to write poetry in 5 steps" guide. No hooking titles. I won't join the experts-on-shit FOMO cult to prey on other people's triggers or to feel ''good'' about myself at the expense of others. This type of thing actually creeps me out.

But I do promise we can just resonate and inspire each other by being honest and raw, by having a brave heart so we can keep being kind, and by pursuing truth, beauty and art... How about that? We can enjoy the vibe and cultivate this appreciation of words! We can even chat as writer friends, as reader friends or just as friends friends — and encourage each other through real, second-intention-free presence.

If my writing doesn't touch you, it's fine. If yours doesn't touch me, it's fine. It's not personal, it's not a bad thing. We are all finding our voice. The day you think you know everything, you're dead, so we have to keep searching, moving and growing together! How many times have I needed the words from @cssnder @goodluckclove @hersurvival or @remnantofabrokensoul, and so many others around here (iykyk)? And I'm very grateful for every word and idea you all shared here in this amazing space, helping me to keep going, to break from my shell and lay another brick in the foundations of what I want to create.

That is the beauty of it. Creation demands connection. That is respect and human experience. And I repeat it: sometimes what I create won't touch anyone but me.

Oh, but what if it does!

Well, that being said: I actually do have some crazy ideas for the Substack. At first, the focus was on creating some substantial and self-indulgent content about literature (I like to study). Although I still think that's important, exciting and valid, Poetry is making its way through my inked fingers more and more, demanding space, attention, and voice; so I will not neglect this calling.

What about the future? I don’t know. Paid subscriptions for specific academic literature content? Prophetic, devotional newsletters?Generating debates on books for the community? Just poetry that you can read for free and not engage at all because I can be quite antisocial at times? Digging around some old ancient advice on writing? None of the above? Anything is possible, really. For now, I will slow down and avoid contributing to the hamster wheel of modern despair for the speed of light living and likes.

For now, poetry, please.

And tea. Lots of tea, because it's raining.

The grass looks so green!

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cozywithanna · 2 months ago

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Coming back to myself

Dear cozy readers, I meant to send out this letter last week—but honestly, I was exhausted. Holidays are funny: they’re supposed to be relaxing but they sometimes feel like performance art with elaborate dinners, perfect church outfits…after a whole weekend, you just become too tired to even answer an email. Now that it’s all over, I find myself appreciating my quiet routine again and even spending some time refining my daily habits to be more consistent, more intentional, and more me. 📖 Soft Reading: “My life is mine? I can't believe it!” – Rosie Pink on Substack Have you ever read something and thought, “Wow, is this writer literally me?” This Substack post was that for me. Even as someone who thrives on independence and loves solo adventures, I still need the reminder: my life is mine. This quote especially made an impact: "There are so many things I’ve wanted to do that I’ve gone and done, and they’ve affirmed the faith I have in myself, reminded me that I do have autonomy, and made my life feel endlessly exciting and expansive." 🌎 Mindful Pastimes: Taking a mental health day Last week, I took a day off work and drove to Boston on a nice sunny day. I used to live there, and still waffle between being happy with my new life but missing my life before. And it turned out to be one of the most peaceful days I've had in a long time. I went to all my favorite places: my former go-to bookstores, the Esplanade, the Public Gardens. I felt at home, but I have to admit that being a tourist in my former city actually made me appreciate it more; and I couldn’t wait to get back to my actual home to relax and reminisce. 📱 Wholesome Scrolling: Fabienne Delacroix on Instagram Lately, I’ve been thinking all about my favorite European cities (old architecture + walkability + democracy = my dream). Fabienne Delacroix’s paintings of Paris are little portals into that dream: cobblestone streets, iconic corners and landmarks, and Haussmann-style buildings. Is it wholesome scrolling, or just jealousy because I’m not there? Honestly, it’s both. 📺 Calm Viewing: Conclave (2024) Did you think this newsletter would mention a movie about a pope dying? Me neither! Conclave follows the secretive, ritual-heavy process of selecting a new pope after the previous one passes (very timely). It’s not traditionally cozy, but it is fascinating—and honestly, pretty camp. If you like a little drama and intensity with your calm, this is worth a watch. 🍇 Simple Bites: DIY sour grapes One of the easiest, weirdly satisfying treats: frozen sour grapes. They’re like nature’s Sour Patch Kids. Perfect for holiday gatherings, giving your kids or little cousins an interesting snack, or just keeping in your freezer when you’re craving something sour. I used this recipe from Bon Appétit and everyone at Easter was either oddly intrigued or utterly obsessed. 🧺 Comfort Items: Author-signed books from independent bookstores Saturday was Independent Bookstore Day! I’m trying to be more mindful about spending lately, but I wanted to celebrate by supporting small businesses. I use my library for 90% of my reading needs, but treating myself to something signed feels meaningful and memorable. 💭 Warm Thoughts: “How lucky am I to be as insignificant as I am.” — Unknown I found this quote in a wholesome little webcomic once (and can’t find it anymore, sadly). But it’s stayed with me. In a world spinning with noise, war, injustice, and change, sometimes the smallness of our own individual lives is actually a blessing. Take care, and I hope you remember that your life is yours 🌿

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lesmisletters-daily · 5 months ago

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The Wisdom Of Tholomyès

Les Mis Letters reading club explores one chapter of Les Misérables every day. Join us on Discord, Substack - or share your thoughts right here on tumblr - today's tag is #lm 1.3.7

In the meantime, while some sang, the rest talked together tumultuously all at once; it was no longer anything but noise. Tholomyès intervened.

“Let us not talk at random nor too fast,” he exclaimed. “Let us reflect, if we wish to be brilliant. Too much improvisation empties the mind in a stupid way. Running beer gathers no froth. No haste, gentlemen. Let us mingle majesty with the feast. Let us eat with meditation; let us make haste slowly. Let us not hurry. Consider the springtime; if it makes haste, it is done for; that is to say, it gets frozen. Excess of zeal ruins peach-trees and apricot-trees. Excess of zeal kills the grace and the mirth of good dinners. No zeal, gentlemen! Grimod de la Reynière agrees with Talleyrand.”

A hollow sound of rebellion rumbled through the group.

“Leave us in peace, Tholomyès,” said Blachevelle.

“Down with the tyrant!” said Fameuil.

“Bombarda, Bombance, and Bambochel!” cried Listolier.

“Sunday exists,” resumed Fameuil.

“We are sober,” added Listolier.

“Tholomyès,” remarked Blachevelle, “contemplate my calmness [mon calme].”

“You are the Marquis of that,” retorted Tholomyès.

This mediocre play upon words produced the effect of a stone in a pool. The Marquis de Montcalm was at that time a celebrated royalist. All the frogs held their peace.

“Friends,” cried Tholomyès, with the accent of a man who had recovered his empire, “Come to yourselves. This pun which has fallen from the skies must not be received with too much stupor. Everything which falls in that way is not necessarily worthy of enthusiasm and respect. The pun is the dung of the mind which soars. The jest falls, no matter where; and the mind after producing a piece of stupidity plunges into the azure depths. A whitish speck flattened against the rock does not prevent the condor from soaring aloft. Far be it from me to insult the pun! I honor it in proportion to its merits; nothing more. All the most august, the most sublime, the most charming of humanity, and perhaps outside of humanity, have made puns. Jesus Christ made a pun on St. Peter, Moses on Isaac, Æschylus on Polynices, Cleopatra on Octavius. And observe that Cleopatra’s pun preceded the battle of Actium, and that had it not been for it, no one would have remembered the city of Toryne, a Greek name which signifies a ladle. That once conceded, I return to my exhortation. I repeat, brothers, I repeat, no zeal, no hubbub, no excess; even in witticisms, gayety, jollities, or plays on words. Listen to me. I have the prudence of Amphiaraüs and the baldness of Cæsar. There must be a limit, even to rebuses. Est modus in rebus.

“There must be a limit, even to dinners. You are fond of apple turnovers, ladies; do not indulge in them to excess. Even in the matter of turnovers, good sense and art are requisite. Gluttony chastises the glutton, Gula punit Gulax. Indigestion is charged by the good God with preaching morality to stomachs. And remember this: each one of our passions, even love, has a stomach which must not be filled too full. In all things the word finis must be written in good season; self-control must be exercised when the matter becomes urgent; the bolt must be drawn on appetite; one must set one’s own fantasy to the violin, and carry one’s self to the post. The sage is the man who knows how, at a given moment, to effect his own arrest. Have some confidence in me, for I have succeeded to some extent in my study of the law, according to the verdict of my examinations, for I know the difference between the question put and the question pending, for I have sustained a thesis in Latin upon the manner in which torture was administered at Rome at the epoch when Munatius Demens was quæstor of the Parricide; because I am going to be a doctor, apparently it does not follow that it is absolutely necessary that I should be an imbecile. I recommend you to moderation in your desires. It is true that my name is Félix Tholomyès; I speak well. Happy is he who, when the hour strikes, takes a heroic resolve, and abdicates like Sylla or Origenes.”

Favourite listened with profound attention.

“Félix,” said she, “what a pretty word! I love that name. It is Latin; it means prosper.”

Tholomyès went on:—

“Quirites, gentlemen, caballeros, my friends. Do you wish never to feel the prick, to do without the nuptial bed, and to brave love? Nothing more simple. Here is the receipt: lemonade, excessive exercise, hard labor; work yourself to death, drag blocks, sleep not, hold vigil, gorge yourself with nitrous beverages, and potions of nymphæas; drink emulsions of poppies and agnus castus; season this with a strict diet, starve yourself, and add thereto cold baths, girdles of herbs, the application of a plate of lead, lotions made with the subacetate of lead, and fomentations of oxycrat.”

“I prefer a woman,” said Listolier.

“Woman,” resumed Tholomyès; “distrust her. Woe to him who yields himself to the unstable heart of woman! Woman is perfidious and disingenuous. She detests the serpent from professional jealousy. The serpent is the shop over the way.”

“Tholomyès!” cried Blachevelle, “you are drunk!”

“Pardieu,” said Tholomyès.

“Then be gay,” resumed Blachevelle.

“I agree to that,” responded Tholomyès.

And, refilling his glass, he rose.

“Glory to wine! Nunc te, Bacche, canam! Pardon me ladies; that is Spanish. And the proof of it, señoras, is this: like people, like cask. The arrobe of Castille contains sixteen litres; the cantaro of Alicante, twelve; the almude of the Canaries, twenty-five; the cuartin of the Balearic Isles, twenty-six; the boot of Tzar Peter, thirty. Long live that Tzar who was great, and long live his boot, which was still greater! Ladies, take the advice of a friend; make a mistake in your neighbor if you see fit. The property of love is to err. A love affair is not made to crouch down and brutalize itself like an English serving-maid who has callouses on her knees from scrubbing. It is not made for that; it errs gayly, our gentle love. It has been said, error is human; I say, error is love. Ladies, I idolize you all. O Zéphine, O Joséphine, face more than irregular, you would be charming were you not all askew. You have the air of a pretty face upon which some one has sat down by mistake. As for Favourite, O nymphs and muses! one day when Blachevelle was crossing the gutter in the Rue Guérin-Boisseau, he espied a beautiful girl with white stockings well drawn up, which displayed her legs. This prologue pleased him, and Blachevelle fell in love. The one he loved was Favourite. O Favourite, thou hast Ionian lips. There was a Greek painter named Euphorion, who was surnamed the painter of the lips. That Greek alone would have been worthy to paint thy mouth. Listen! before thee, there was never a creature worthy of the name. Thou wert made to receive the apple like Venus, or to eat it like Eve; beauty begins with thee. I have just referred to Eve; it is thou who hast created her. Thou deservest the letters-patent of the beautiful woman. O Favourite, I cease to address you as ‘thou,’ because I pass from poetry to prose. You were speaking of my name a little while ago. That touched me; but let us, whoever we may be, distrust names. They may delude us. I am called Félix, and I am not happy. Words are liars. Let us not blindly accept the indications which they afford us. It would be a mistake to write to Liège for corks, and to Pau for gloves. Miss Dahlia, were I in your place, I would call myself Rosa. A flower should smell sweet, and woman should have wit. I say nothing of Fantine; she is a dreamer, a musing, thoughtful, pensive person; she is a phantom possessed of the form of a nymph and the modesty of a nun, who has strayed into the life of a grisette, but who takes refuge in illusions, and who sings and prays and gazes into the azure without very well knowing what she sees or what she is doing, and who, with her eyes fixed on heaven, wanders in a garden where there are more birds than are in existence. O Fantine, know this: I, Tholomyès, I am an illusion; but she does not even hear me, that blond maid of Chimeras! as for the rest, everything about her is freshness, suavity, youth, sweet morning light. O Fantine, maid worthy of being called Marguerite or Pearl, you are a woman from the beauteous Orient. Ladies, a second piece of advice: do not marry; marriage is a graft; it takes well or ill; avoid that risk. But bah! what am I saying? I am wasting my words. Girls are incurable on the subject of marriage, and all that we wise men can say will not prevent the waistcoat-makers and the shoe-stitchers from dreaming of husbands studded with diamonds.

Well, so be it; but, my beauties, remember this, you eat too much sugar. You have but one fault, O woman, and that is nibbling sugar. O nibbling sex, your pretty little white teeth adore sugar. Now, heed me well, sugar is a salt. All salts are withering. Sugar is the most desiccating of all salts; it sucks the liquids of the blood through the veins; hence the coagulation, and then the solidification of the blood; hence tubercles in the lungs, hence death. That is why diabetes borders on consumption. Then, do not crunch sugar, and you will live. I turn to the men: gentlemen, make conquest, rob each other of your well-beloved without remorse. Chassez across. In love there are no friends. Everywhere where there is a pretty woman hostility is open. No quarter, war to the death! a pretty woman is a casus belli; a pretty woman is flagrant misdemeanor. All the invasions of history have been determined by petticoats. Woman is man’s right. Romulus carried off the Sabines; William carried off the Saxon women; Cæsar carried off the Roman women. The man who is not loved soars like a vulture over the mistresses of other men; and for my own part, to all those unfortunate men who are widowers, I throw the sublime proclamation of Bonaparte to the army of Italy: “Soldiers, you are in need of everything; the enemy has it.”

Tholomyès paused.

“Take breath, Tholomyès,” said Blachevelle.

At the same moment Blachevelle, supported by Listolier and Fameuil, struck up to a plaintive air, one of those studio songs composed of the first words which come to hand, rhymed richly and not at all, as destitute of sense as the gesture of the tree and the sound of the wind, which have their birth in the vapor of pipes, and are dissipated and take their flight with them. This is the couplet by which the group replied to Tholomyès’ harangue:—

“The father turkey-cocks so grave

Some money to an agent gave,

That master good Clermont-Tonnerre

Might be made pope on Saint Johns’ day fair.

But this good Clermont could not be

Made pope, because no priest was he;

And then their agent, whose wrath burned,

With all their money back returned.”

This was not calculated to calm Tholomyès’ improvisation; he emptied his glass, filled, refilled it, and began again:—

“Down with wisdom! Forget all that I have said. Let us be neither prudes nor prudent men nor prudhommes. I propose a toast to mirth; be merry. Let us complete our course of law by folly and eating! Indigestion and the digest. Let Justinian be the male, and Feasting, the female! Joy in the depths! Live, O creation! The world is a great diamond. I am happy. The birds are astonishing. What a festival everywhere! The nightingale is a gratuitous Elleviou. Summer, I salute thee! O Luxembourg! O Georgics of the Rue Madame, and of the Allée de l’Observatoire! O pensive infantry soldiers! O all those charming nurses who, while they guard the children, amuse themselves! The pampas of America would please me if I had not the arcades of the Odéon. My soul flits away into the virgin forests and to the savannas. All is beautiful. The flies buzz in the sun. The sun has sneezed out the humming bird. Embrace me, Fantine!”

He made a mistake and embraced Favourite.

#lm 1.3.7

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rollercoasterwords · 2 years ago

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Hi! I found your blog through the female rage substack article that you posted and I’m curious about a couple things (so I hope the tone of this ask will read as genuine/non-confrontational etc).

I really liked the article and the anti-gender essentialist content, so I looked through the others and eventually found your jegulus article (which I read and also liked) but I was sort of surprised to see that you are a part of the hp/marauders fandom. For me personally, everything related to that franchise has just been tainted since the whole jkr terf debacle really took off. I was big on hp when I was younger and wolfstar is a ship/dynamic that I enjoyed back then, so I’d probably like your stuff if I were to read it. But I decided some time ago to give any and all hp content the chop, because to me it didn’t feel right to engage with it anymore. So I was just wondering how you feel in that regard, if you don’t mind sharing. I don’t have anyone in my internet content circle that still actively posts about hp and if irl friends still enjoy it then it’s not something we talk about, so I’d just like to know how you juggle the ‘two sides’ in that sense of your trans-positive/anti-essentialist beliefs and fandom content that’s still so intrinsically connected to jkr and her politics. (Also, sorry if you’ve answered a question like this before. I scrolled through your blog a bit, but if yes then not far enough.)

Anyway, hope you’re well and I’ll probably keep an eye out for any future essays on your substack even if I don’t follow you on here. cheers! (and thanks for the “playing the whore” book rec, I’ll be looking into that. a rec from my end would be paul b. preciado's "can the monster speak". it's the written version of a speech he tried to give at a Freudian psychoanalysis conference about the position trans people occupy in psychoanalysis before being booed off stage. it was short and pretty intriguing, in case you're interested/haven't heard of it yet.)

hi! happy 2 hear u enjoyed the female rage essay--i wasn't expecting it to spread as much as it did + had to turn off reblogs for my own peace of mind 2 keep terfs away from my blog, but it's nice to know there are still people getting something out of it. also appreciate the book rec--that definitely sounds up my alley + i'm excited to check it out!

and i'll do my best to answer your question about hp, but i'm gonna put it under a cut because i know this is a contentious topic + i have a feeling my answer's gonna get long--so if anyone doesn't want 2 read abt my conflicting hp-fandom thoughts, just scroll away please xx

so, quite honestly, i'm in agreement with you that the entire franchise is tainted by jkr. the truth is that it was never really my intention to join the fandom--i read a single fic because it went viral on tiktok, then decided to rewrite the fic from another character's pov just for fun. at that point, i hadn't read any other hp fic and had never been involved in any kind of online fandom space, and although i'd read the hp books + watched the movies growing up i hadn't touched them in years + was so far removed from the franchise that i vaguely remembered hearing jkr had said some terfy stuff, but wasn't aware of the extent to which her politics were like. actively and significantly causing real-life harm.

anyway, i'd done a rewrite for fun of another story i liked and had posted it on ao3, and that had received a handful of people commenting + talking about the story with me as i wrote but had remained pretty self-contained + small. i was expecting the same sort of thing with the hp fic i rewrote, but instead someone posted about it on tiktok and it went viral, and then suddenly there were thousands of people reading every ch update and hundreds of comments. like i said, i had never been involved in an online fandom space before, so i sort of awkwardly stumbled into it and tried to figure out what i was doing as i finished up writing the fic. this was at a point in my life where i'd recently moved to a different country and had to go back in the closet after being publicly out for years, and this online fandom space became my only queer community and a bit of a lifeline in that way. i started making actual friends and talking to people + getting more deeply involved in the community aspect of things.

at the same time, i started actually educating myself on jkr + her politics + her impact, and the more i learned the more uncomfortable i became with being part of anything hp-related. now, i've been writing hp fic for almost two years and 'active' in the fandom for ~one and a half, and despite being grateful for the friends i've made and treasuring the space i've been able to cultivate, i've become increasingly disenchanted with 'the fandom' as a whole and have increasingly found it to be a hostile space, so i've sort of taken a step back from broader engagement and more + more have limited my interaction to just my mutuals here on tumblr. unfortunately, i think many of the 'bad parts' of this fandom are somewhat built-in because of the source material; there are a lot of people who agree with jkr's politics to varying extents and that can make it kind of a miserable place to be sometimes. i know many people insist that hp can be completely removed from jkr, but i don't think that's the case, and i've talked on my blog before about the fact that her politics are built into the very foundations of the text, so i think it's necessary to acknowledge her influence if we want to actually engage with hp at all in a way that isn't just perpetuating her politics.

all that being said, the point i'm at currently is that i'm not really sure that this fandom is a space i want to be a part of forever. again--i understand how it can be lifeline for some people and a queer community they might not have elsewhere, because that's been the case for me. but for me personally, as much as i value my own carved-out space, it doesn't completely outweigh the negatives that i have found myself coming into contact with more and more in this fandom. writing hp fic is also something that i keep strictly separate from 'real life,' contained solely in this online space, because i know that any engagement with hp is a red flag for many, many trans people and i don't want to bring it outside of this space. within this online space, i don't keep it a secret that i write hp fic; it's right at the top of my blog so that anyone who wants to can easily block and unfollow me. i only post my fics on ao3, where they are clearly tagged as harry potter fanfiction, and i only post about hp fic + fandom stuff on this blog, which was specifically created for that purpose. i've requested that people no longer post about my hp fics on platforms like tiktok where the algorithm could send it out onto anyone's fyp, and that request is also in my pinned faq. keeping my hp fic as contained as possible to only people who are already engaging with hp fic is one way that i try to mitigate any harm that might be caused by my fics contributing to hp's ongoing popularity.

the other ways i try to mitigate potential harm are by actively discouraging people from giving any financial support to hp + jkr and by being very vocal about my politics on this page, so that anyone who is following me will be getting pro-trans and anti-gender essentialism politics along with any hp engagement. i also don't engage with hp uncritically; i am specifically critical of the shitty politics in the books both in my posts on this blog and my fics themselves. i don't make it a secret that i think the books are politically rotten all the way down through to the foundations.

none of this is to say that there's, like...a Right Way to engage with this content or a set of rules that, if followed, Absolve All Shittiness. this is just an explanation of the personal evaluations i've had to weigh when it comes to deciding how i'm going to interact with content that is fundamentally opposed to my own politics. and again, i don't blame people who think that any amount of engagement is morally untenable and completely block it out. this is a growing source of cognitive dissonance in my own life, and i'm increasingly considering whether/for how much longer i want to continue to write fic + be involved in hp fandom. but for the time being, i'm still here + still writing fic, and i guess my feeling is that any harm that fic causes is a drop in the bucket, and even if i were to stop writing it wouldn't necessarily have a huge impact either way. i'm just some random guy online like everyone else; even though i talk about politics, that doesn't mean that i'm asking to be held up as some sort of moral standard, nor do i think anyone should be expected to be 100% politically perfect in every action they take--like, for me, writing hp fic kind of falls into the same category as like...eating mcdonalds even though i think factory farming is fucked, or buying + wearing makeup sometimes even though i think the beauty industry is fundamentally corrupt, or paying to see the new guardians of the galaxy movie in theaters even though i think marvel movies are us military propaganda. i don't think "no ethical consumption under capitalism" is an excuse to completely abandon any attempt to mitigate the harm our actions might cause, but it does matter to me the way in which someone is engaging with a fundamentally broken/corrupt piece of media beyond simply whether or not they're engaging at all. at the end of the day, it's up to everyone on their own to evaluate where they draw the line on hp, and i am not looking to make that judgment for anybody else considering that my own thoughts + feeling about it are still changing.

#ask

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