#samuel emerson

[marmidas]

Little Emerson is doing his best! 

[lxnelysxul]

[sidonius5]

ℐ𝓃 1982 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝒾𝓇𝑒𝒸𝓉𝑜𝓇 𝐒𝐚𝐦𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐫 𝓇𝑒𝓁𝑒𝒶𝓈𝑒𝒹 𝒶 𝒸𝑜𝓃𝓉𝓇𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓈𝒾𝒶𝓁/𝒹𝑒𝒻𝓎𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒻𝒾𝓁𝓂 𝓉𝒾𝓉𝓁𝑒𝒹 𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐃𝐨𝐠. 𝒯𝒽𝑒 𝓂𝑜𝓋𝒾𝑒 𝒷𝑒𝑔𝒾𝓃𝓈 𝒶𝓈 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓃𝑔 𝒶𝒸𝓉𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝒶𝒸𝒸𝒾𝒹𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓁𝓎 𝒽𝒾𝓉𝓈 𝒶 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓉𝑒 𝒢𝑒𝓇𝓂𝒶𝓃 𝒮𝒽𝑒𝓅𝒽𝑒𝓇𝒹 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓋𝑒𝒽𝒾𝒸𝓁𝑒, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒶𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝓃𝓊𝓇𝓈𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒾𝓉 𝒷𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝓉𝑜 𝒽𝑒𝒶𝓁𝓉𝒽 𝓈𝒽𝑒 𝓈𝑜𝑜𝓃 𝒻𝑒𝑒𝓁𝓈 𝒶𝒻𝒻𝑒𝒸𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝑜𝓌𝒶𝓇𝒹𝓈 𝒾𝓉. ℰ𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓎𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓈𝑒𝑒𝓂𝓈 𝓉𝑜 𝒷𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝑔𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝗝𝘂𝗹𝗶𝗲 𝗦𝗮𝘄𝘆𝗲𝗿 (𝐊𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐲 𝐌𝐜𝐍𝐢𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐥) 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓃𝑒𝓌 𝓅𝑒𝓉, 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝒾𝓈 𝓊𝓃𝓉𝒾𝓁 𝒶𝓃 𝓊𝓃𝒻𝑜𝓇𝓉𝓊𝓃𝒶𝓉𝑒 𝒶𝓉𝓉𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓅𝑒𝓃𝓈. 𝗝𝘂𝗹𝗶𝗲 𝒾𝓈 𝓈𝓉𝓊𝓃𝓃𝑒𝒹 𝒷𝓎 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝑔𝓇𝓊𝑒𝓈𝑜𝓂𝑒𝓃𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝑜𝑔 𝓈𝒽𝑒 𝒽𝑒𝓁𝓅𝑒𝒹 𝓇𝑒𝒸𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝓈𝒽𝑜𝓌𝑒𝒹 𝓉𝑜𝓌𝒶𝓇𝒹𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒶𝓉𝓉𝒶𝒸𝓀𝑒𝒹 𝓋𝒾𝒸𝓉𝒾𝓂 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓁𝒶𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝓌𝒶𝓃𝓉𝓈 𝓉𝑜 𝓈𝑒𝑒 𝒾𝒻 𝒾𝓉 𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝒷𝑒 𝓊𝓃𝓉𝒶𝓊𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒾𝓃 𝒶 𝓈𝓅𝑒𝒸𝒾𝒶𝓁 𝓌𝒶𝓎. 𝒪𝓃𝑒 𝒻𝒾𝓃𝒶𝓁 𝓅𝓁𝒶𝒸𝑒 𝓂𝒶𝓎𝒷𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓈𝓅𝑜𝓉 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝒾𝓈 𝓅𝑜𝓈𝓈𝒾𝒷𝓁𝑒 𝓉𝑜 𝒽𝑒𝓁𝓅 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝒸𝒽𝒶𝓁𝓁𝑒𝓃𝑔𝑒, 𝓈𝑜 𝓈𝒽𝑒 𝓂𝒶𝓀𝑒𝓈 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓌𝒶𝓎 𝓉𝑜 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝑒𝓍𝑜𝓉𝒾𝒸 𝒶𝓃𝒾𝓂𝒶𝓁 𝓉𝓇𝒶𝒾𝓃𝑒𝓇𝓈, 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗿𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝗞𝗲𝘆𝘀 𝓅𝓁𝒶𝓎𝑒𝒹 𝒷𝓎 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓁𝒶𝓉𝑒 𝐁𝐮𝐫𝐥 𝐈𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝐏𝐚𝐮𝐥 𝐖𝐢𝐧𝐟𝐢𝐞𝐥𝐝. 𝒜𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝓋𝒾𝓈𝒾𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗿𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀, 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝑜𝑔 𝒶𝓉𝓉𝒶𝒸𝓀𝓈 𝒶 𝑔𝓇𝑜𝓊𝓃𝒹𝓈 𝓌𝑜𝓇𝓀𝑒𝓇, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓈𝒽𝑒 𝒽𝑒𝒶𝓇𝓈 𝒽𝒾𝓂 𝓈𝒶𝓎 𝓈𝒽𝑒 𝒽𝒶𝓈 𝒶 "𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓉𝑒 𝒹𝑜𝑔" 𝒷𝓊𝓉 𝗠𝗿. 𝗞𝗲𝘆𝘀 𝒾𝓈 𝓌𝒾𝓁𝓁𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝑜 𝓉𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒸𝒽𝒶𝓁𝓁𝑒𝓃𝑔𝑒. 𝒯𝒽𝑒𝓎 𝒹𝑜 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓎𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓎 𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝓉𝑜 𝒸𝑜𝓇𝓇𝑒𝒸𝓉 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒷𝑒𝒽𝒶𝒾𝓋𝑜𝓇 𝓉𝑜𝓌𝒶𝓇𝒹𝓈 𝒷𝓁𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝓅𝑒𝑜𝓅𝓁𝑒, 𝒷𝓊𝓉 𝓊𝓃𝒻𝑜𝓇𝓉𝓊𝓃𝒶𝓉𝑒𝓁𝓎 𝓃𝑜𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝑔𝑜𝑒𝓈 𝒶𝓈 𝓅𝓁𝒶𝓃𝓃𝑒𝒹. ℬ𝑒𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒶 𝓉𝓇𝓊𝑒 𝓈𝓉𝑜𝓇𝓎 𝒻𝓇𝑜𝓂 𝒶 ℋ𝑜𝓁𝓁𝓎𝓌𝑜𝑜𝒹 𝒶𝒸𝓉𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝐉𝐞𝐚𝐧 𝐒𝐞𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐠 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝒽𝓊𝓈𝒷𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝐑𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐫𝐲. 𝒜 𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓇𝒾𝒷𝓁𝑒 𝒾𝓃𝒸𝒾𝒹𝑒𝓃𝓉 𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓅𝑒𝓃𝑒𝒹 𝓌𝒽𝑒𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓎 𝒷𝓇𝑜𝓊𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒽𝑜𝓂𝑒 𝒶 𝓁𝒶𝓇𝑔𝑒 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓉𝑒 𝒹𝑜𝑔 𝒻𝓇𝑜𝓂 𝑜𝒻𝒻 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓈𝓉𝓇𝑒𝑒𝓉, 𝒾𝓉 𝓈𝑒𝑒𝓂𝑒𝒹 𝓁𝑜𝓋𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒻𝓇𝒾𝑒𝓃𝒹𝓁𝓎 𝒷𝓊𝓉 𝒾𝓉 𝓈𝑜𝑜𝓃 𝒷𝑒𝒸𝒶𝓂𝑒 𝒶 𝓋𝒾𝒸𝒾𝑜𝓊𝓈 𝒶𝓉𝓉𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝒹𝑜𝑔 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝓉𝒽𝑒𝒾𝓇 𝒜𝒻𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝒜𝓂𝑒𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝑔𝒶𝓇𝒹𝓃𝑒𝓇, 𝒾𝓃𝒿𝓊𝓇𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒽𝒾𝓂 𝑔𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝓁𝓎. 𝒯𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝒷𝑒𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒶 𝓉𝓇𝓊𝑒 𝓈𝓉𝑜𝓇𝓎 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓅𝓇𝑜𝓂𝒾𝓃𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓁𝓎 𝒹𝓊𝓇𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒜𝓂𝑒𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝓈𝓁𝒶𝓋𝑒 𝑒𝓇𝒶 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓌𝒶𝓎 𝓉𝒽𝓇𝑜𝓊𝑔𝒽 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒞𝒾𝓋𝒾𝓁 𝓇𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉𝓈 𝑒𝓇𝒶 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒷𝑒𝓎𝑜𝓃𝒹, 𝓈𝑜𝓂𝑒 𝒞𝒶𝓊𝒸𝒶𝓈𝒾𝒶𝓃𝓈 𝓌𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝓀𝓃𝑜𝓌𝓃 𝓉𝑜 𝓉𝓇𝒶𝒾𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝑒𝒾𝓇 𝒹𝑜𝑔𝓈 𝓉𝑜 𝒶𝓉𝓉𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝒜𝒻𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝒜𝓂𝑒𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃𝓈. 𝒯𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝒾𝓈 𝒶 𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓎 𝒹𝒶𝓇𝓀 𝓉𝒾𝓂𝑒 𝒾𝓃 𝒜𝓂𝑒𝓇𝒾𝒸𝒶𝓃 𝒽𝒾𝓈𝓉𝑜𝓇𝓎 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝓂𝑜𝓈𝓉 𝒹𝑜𝓃'𝓉 𝓌𝒶𝓃𝓉 𝓉𝑜 𝒹𝒾𝓈𝒸𝓊𝓈𝓈 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝒸𝒽 𝒾𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓈𝑜𝓃 𝓌𝒽𝓎 𝐒𝐚𝐦𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐫 𝓂𝒶𝒹𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒻𝒾𝓁𝓂.

[jaanie]

The McNeils

Samuel McNeil || Firefighter Super Hero \ Athletic, Virtuoso, Daredevil, Hydrophobic, Ambitious, Light Sleeper

Charlotte (Dawson) McNeil || World Reknown Surgeon \ Genius, Natural Cook, Vegetarian, Light Sleeper, Ambitious, Friendly

Emerson McNeil || Couch Potato, Good, Irresistible, Cat Person

Shawn McNeil || Shy, Hopeless Romantic, Artistic, Easily Impressed

Noah McNeil || Absent-Minded, Vehicle Enthusiast, Loves the Heat

Autumn McNeil || Good, Genius, Frugal

James McNeil || Brave, Easily Impressed

[enquiringangel]

idea for a little drabble, and you can take whatever tone you want with it, dark or lighthearted: Max seeking out Michael or, oof, Sam, to talk to alone. Putting on airs of 'well, I just want to get to know my possible future step-sons'. Alternatively, Max wanting to introduce His Boys to Lucy and how that goes down lol. Just some ideas!

(for the record I love both of these and may do the second one later.)

paterfamilias

Sam couldn't believe his mom was making him do this. "Do I have to?" he whined, dragging his heels on the way from the car to the door of his mother's workplace.

Max may not be the head vampire, but this small redeeming feature did nothing to increase Sam's desire to spend time alone in the man's company. Which both his mother and the dork in question were keen for him to do.

Sam was aware of the irony of someone with nerdy interests like him calling someone else a dork. But if Michael were here, then he would definitely have pegged Max as a loser from fifty paces away. (Mike hadn't come home last night. Sam was worried sick about him. He didn't have time for this bullshit when he needed to be looking for his brother so he could save him before he did something stupid and irreversible.) "Yes, you do," Sam's mother said firmly as she zipped her car keys securely into her purse. "It's the least you can do to make up for your recent behavior." She gave him a look that let him know that yes, he was still definitely in trouble for that. "I thought it was incredibly sweet of Max to offer, considering that he barely knows me." His mother smiled to herself and tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear.

"But mom, what if he's a weirdo?" Sam tried to argue. "You've spent my whole life telling me not to take candy from strangers, now you're sending me off to go get ice cream with one?"

"Samuel Emerson." The sound of his full legal name from her lips was like the crack of a whip. "I don't want to hear you implying that kind of thing about Max again. He's been nothing but kind, he doesn't deserve that. Am I understood?" "...yes, Mom. Sorry." With no way out of the situation, Sam trudged after his mother feeling vaguely like someone marching to his own execution. When they got inside, Max was at the counter talking to the pretty cashier and gesticulating at one of the displays with a pen. At their entry, the bell above the door jingled and he turned. "Ah, there you are," he said, bestowing Sam's mom with a beaming, crooked smile. She ducked her face slightly and smiled coyly in return. Gross. Old people shouldn't be allowed to make eyes at each other, especially not his mother. (Even if she did look happier than he'd seen her in ages.) It was bad enough when both people involved were actually his parents, never mind this weirdly tall guy who looked like his suits were all made out of old tablecloths. Sam hovered behind his mother as she smiled and chatted with Max for a few moments, scuffing the toe of his shoe against the carpet boredly. He let his eyes wander around the video displays, lingering on a section labelled 'ADULT'. ...Wait, they rented out porn here? Sam was immediately wildly curious, having never seen anything of the kind other than dirty magazines his friends in Phoenix had swiped from their older brothers. (When Sam had gingerly searched around Michael's room all he'd found was a bunch of men's health magazines full of oily beefcakes lifting weights. Lame. There had been no time to search beneath the mattress because Mike had been coming back up the stairs and he would've shown no mercy if he'd caught Sam snooping in his room.)

He was surreptitiously craning his neck for a better look at the titles in that section when the sound of his name abruptly dragged him back to reality.

“—to go, Sam?" Max was blinking at him expectantly, a polite smile still in place.

"Uh, yeah," Sam replied, trying to sound like he'd been paying attention. He must have done okay because his mom gave him a small smile and a wave as she told them to have fun.

He doubted that, somehow.

The ice cream parlour wasn't far, just around the corner. Max gestured for him to sit in a booth and ordered them both sundaes without even consulting Sam on what he'd like on his. Rude. His righteous indignation was dampened somewhat at the sight of the towering confection Max set down in front of him - a smorgasbord of gelato, whipped cream, fudge brownie pieces, sprinkles and a drizzling of chocolate and strawberry sauces.

"Bon appetit," Max said, raising his spoon. He scooped a mouthful of ice cream into his mouth and hummed approvingly. "Mm, still good. It's been a while since I've come here. My boys are too cool to be seen with me these days."

"You have kids?" Sam asked, curious despite himself. His mom had never said anything about it.

"I have a family," Max agreed. "Five boys."

"Oh. I didn't know that." That was a lot of kids. It seemed weird Mom hadn't mentioned something like that.

"There's a lot we don't know about each other," Max said patiently. "It's why I wanted to do this. I wanted to clear the air after last night and to let you know that I'm not angry about your sabotage. I understand. Believe me, my boys have been very difficult on the matter too." He shook his head slightly and sighed.

Sam looked down at his sundae. He didn't really want anything to do with this guy and his 'I just want to be your friend' bit, but it's not like there was anything actually wrong with him other than the fact that he wasn't his father. And that their father hadn't cared enough about them to fight for visitation.

"You should eat that before it starts to melt," Max said, watching Sam closely.

Reluctantly, Sam swiped his spoon through the ice cream, making sure he got a good amount of sprinkles, both sauces, and a chunk of brownie on it before popping it into his mouth. At first contact with his tongue there was an unexpected flavor, something a little tangy and kind of salty. Maybe caramel or something? After a moment it passed, replaced by an exquisite sweetness. This was easily the best ice cream he had ever tasted - it was quite possibly the best thing he had ever tasted. Sam dug his spoon back in and leant forward, shoveling ice cream down the hatch with a soft hum of pleasure.

Across from him, Max leant back against the booth and watched him eat with a satisfied smile. "I have to say you did surprise me though, Sam. Though for future reference, garlic doesn't work that way."

Sam froze, spoon still between his lips.

Max regarded him benignly. "Bulbs of garlic don't do squat against vampires. It's the flowers that do it."

He felt light-headed and strangely incapable of the panic he should be feeling. Sam blinked down at his half-eaten and partially melting sundae, and at the streaks of brown and red sauce smeared against the glass. Not sauce.

He raised his eyes to the window and saw himself sitting alone at the booth, his reflection growing fainter by the second.

[marypsue]

@mickeymagpie said: i thought you were making star and david 1880s murder siblings and mike the novelist they draw in

Since you mention it...

...

“Estelle,” Michael says, as he swirls the captivating, mysterious Englishwoman around the dancefloor. “Seems old-fashioned, for someone as young and as pretty as you are.”

Estelle, Lady Sharpe – is she due the title? If her father was a baronet? Michael’s not certain, but he’ll need to find out, if he intends to keep courting her – blushes a little at the compliment, turning her dark, liquid eyes from Michael’s face. But only for long enough to be appropriately modest before she catches his gaze again, looking up through dark lashes in a way that makes Michael catch his breath. “My brother calls me Star.”

The reminder makes Michael look up, scan the crowds around them for the baronet’s menacing presence, a smudge of dusty black against all the glitter and light of the McMichaels’ ball. There’s no doubt in Michael’s mind that Lord Sharpe is the only reason why his sister has not yet married.

“Star,” he says, deliberately, turning back to the woman in his arms. Focusing on the burning points where their bodies meet, the lit candle held precariously between their clasped hands. Testing the shape, the colour of the word on his tongue. Savouring its taste. “Yes, that suits you far better. Star.”

The way Star smiles up at him makes Michael feel a little dizzy, a little drunk. It’s a slow, languorous smile, her eyes catching the candlelight and sparkling with the light of a thousand of her namesake as they whirl through the dance so fast and smoothly that the flame they hold together barely even flickers.

So fast, so smoothly, that it almost feels like flying.

…

“Read it. You’ll thank us.”

Samuel looks down at the pamphlet the bookseller’s pushed into his chest, and then back up at the bookseller’s face. “You seem to have mistaken me for someone with an interest in penny dreadfuls.”

“Oh, you’ll find plenty to interest you in this one.”

Sam barely manages to suffocate a long-suffering sigh. He’s already regretting volunteering to run this errand for his grandfather. The trip into town, the temporary escape from the confines of the grounds, was certainly not worth this hassle. Nor, in his estimation, is the copy of the literary journal that his grandfather receives monthly. The old man never reads any of the books reviewed or discussed, anyway. Believes that reading the journal removes the necessity.

“You are the second Emerson son, aren’t you?” the bookseller continues, looking Sam up and down. It’s an insolent look, judgmental, especially coming from such a petty tradesman. Especially one who can’t be much older than Sam himself. Especially one with the dubious blessing of such a countenance. To say nothing of his attire.

It’s true that Sam’s family have had…difficulties, since the unexpected departure of his father for Italy without them. And that his mother’s faced some censure lately, been denied invitations, for entertaining Maxwell McMichael’s attentions while still legally a married woman. But still. Sam’s grandfather may never have been a true baron of industry, but he’s still well known and respected in Buffalo, if quickly gaining a reputation as something of…an eccentric. A reputation that Sam, unfortunately, can’t entirely deny he’s earned.

People will of course form their own thoughts, their own opinions, of his family. But they might at least make overtures toward refraining from so clearly revealing them to Sam’s face. Especially when asking for his custom in the same breath.

So, since the bookseller doesn’t bother trying to conceal his judgment, Sam doesn’t bother trying to conceal his irritation. “What is it to you if I am?”

“Your brother married that Englishwoman? The one who was here with her brother the Lord So-and-so for the last season?” The other man arranging stock on the bookshop’s cramped shelves answers Sam’s question with a question. He nods in the direction of the pamphlet his associate had pressed on Sam. “You want to read that.”

“I don’t think much of your sales tactics,” Sam says, looking down at the cover of the pamphlet. Varney the Vampire. Sensationalist, fantastical claptrap, just as he’d believed. He can’t imagine what possible bearing it might have on Michael, his new bride, and the Lord Sharpe. Or, if it did, what purpose it could possibly serve to have Sam, living an ocean and a continent away from his in-laws’ beloved Allerdale Hall, read the thing.

“For you,” the first bookseller says, “free of charge.”

Sam casts him a sharp look. “And the catch?”

“Your grandfather’s been a good and loyal customer of ours,” the second bookseller offers. “Take it for his sake.”

“Or for your poor lady mother’s,” the first bookseller agrees.

“You have some gall, to speak of my mother. Be grateful I don’t speak of yours.” Sam glances over to the woman slouched insensate on the shoulder of the man who must be her husband, a hookah pipe forgotten between them. “Although I’m certain there’s no need for me to add my voice to the chorus.”

The first bookseller holds out a hand to stop the second from advancing on Sam. He ignores the insult as though Sam hadn’t spoken, lowering his voice instead like a sepulchral warning. The boyishness of that voice mostly ruins the effect. “She’ll thank us, in the end. When your brother and his bride return from their European tour. You all will.”

Sam looks down again at the cheap woodcut illustration gracing the cover of the pamphlet. The skeletal form of a man, face distorted in a grotesque snarl, crouches bestially over a slender swooning lady. It’s nearly comical in its exaggeration.

Sam can’t quite account for the little chill that shivers through him.

“Oh, I’m quite certain my family will thank you,” he agrees, slowly. “For my grandfather’s literary journal. It has come in, has it not?”

The second bookseller makes a face as though he’d love to tell Sam off. But he retreats behind the counter and emerges with the desired journal.

When Sam leafs through it, in the carriage headed for home, careful not to dog-ear the cover in the way his grandfather hates, he’s unsurprised to find the vampire pamphlet with its grotesque cover slipped between the pages.

…

Not for the first time, Michael dreams of David.

The dream – though in truth, it might be better called a nightmare – is much like the others. Michael wakes, in dread, in fevered anticipation, his sweat chilled and tacky against his back beneath his nightshirt, the room black as pitch and freezing cold around him, the chimneys of this thrice-accursed hulk of a collapsing manor-house all wailing out their lost-soul song. He reaches for Star, for where she should be warm in the bed beside him. But the sheets are empty and cold.

And as his eyes adjust, as though coalescing from the shadows, he sees the baronet watching him, from the foot of the bed.

No words are ever exchanged between them. This vision of David has never once answered any of Michael’s entreaties, or, indeed, his screams. The most he’s done to acknowledge a word Michael’s said in any of these dreams is that low, self-satisfied chuckle at the few times Michael’s been naïve enough to try to utter threats.

No matter what Michael says, no matter what he does, the dream always ends the same way. Gloved hands pinning him effortlessly back against the bed. A solid, cold weight on his chest, crushing the air from his lungs. Clammy breath close against the sensitive skin of his exposed neck, raising the fine hairs below his nape and all along his arms, sending delirious thrills of quivering terror through every inch of his body.

Sharp teeth slicing effortlessly through his flesh.

When Michael wakes, heart pounding, a shout dying on his lips unheard, the fire in the grate is low, its ruddy embers casting the vast room in a hellish light. Shadows cluster thickly and in strange configurations around the little island of precarious safety formed by the bed.

Perhaps it’s only Michael’s imagination, or the caprices of the embers, that makes those shadows writhe like living things wracked in agonies of torment.

Michael pushes the coverlet back, shaking his head to try to clear it. The fog of sleep still lies heavily upon him, his heart still rabbit-quick in his chest. It had seemed such a good idea, at the time, to humour his new wife’s desire to share her ancestral home with him before she would be forced to part from it for a new continent. Now, though, he regrets ever setting foot within these moldering walls. The sooner they continue on to Paris, the sooner they continue their honeymoon tour, the better.

Preferably without Michael’s new brother-in-law haunting their every step.

Star lies peacefully slumbering with her chestnut curls spilled out across the pillow beside Michael. He reaches out a hand to clasp the ivory skin of her bare shoulder, reassure himself of its warmth and solidity.

But stops himself.

There are spots of something dark flecking the back of his hand. And his palm. And the snow-white cover of his pillow.

Star stirs, as Michael stares. “Mm. Michael? Are you all right?”

Michael doesn’t know.

He coughs, once, into his hand, and tastes blood, bright and metallic at the back of his throat.

[grandvhs]

lista de nomes masculinos que estava no meu bloco de notas e eu só lembrei agora

starting with A ;;

aaron.

adair.

adam.

aiden.

ajax.

alec.

alfie.

allistar.

anderson.

andrew.

andy.

angus.

antonio.

anthony.

archer.

archibald.

archie.

aries.

arlo.

arthur.

ashley.

ashton.

austen.

avery.

axel.

starting with B ;;

bailey.

beau.

beckham.

beckett.

bellamy.

benjamin.

bennett.

bentley.

blade.

blake.

blaine.

blaise.

blue.

bobbie.

bodhi.

brad.

brandon.

braxton.

brayden.

brent.

brett.

brock.

brody.

brooke.

bryson.

starting with C ;;

caleb.

callum.

calvin.

cameron.

carlisle.

carlos.

carson.

carter.

casey.

chad.

chandler.

charlie.

chase.

chaz.

christian.

christopher.

cody.

colby.

cole.

cooper.

colton.

connor.

conrad.

corbin.

corey.

starting with D ;;

dakota.

dallas.

damien.

damon.

dante.

darian.

darron.

darryl.

david.

dawson.

declan.

demetri.

dennison.

denver.

derek.

diego.

diesel.

dimitri.

dixon.

dominic.

donovan.

drake.

drew.

dustin.

dwayne.

starting with E ;;

eason.

eaton.

eddy.

edmund.

edward.

elijah.

elior.

ellias.

elliot.

ellis.

elyas.

ember.

emerson.

emery.

emilio.

emmett.

enzo.

eric.

ernie.

ethan.

ethaniel.

evan.

everett.

everson.

ezar.

starting with F ;;

fabio.

fallon.

farah.

felix.

fernando.

ferris.

felton.

finn.

finnegan.

finnick.

fitz.

fitzgerald.

fletcher.

floyd.

flynn.

foley.

forest.

francisco.

franco.

frankie.

franklin.

fraser.

frasier.

freddie.

fredrik.

starting with G ;;

gabe.

gabriel.

gale.

gallagher.

garcia.

gareth.

garrett.

gary.

gavin.

gene.

george.

gerard.

gilbert.

giovanni.

glenn.

gordon.

grady.

graeme.

grant.

greggory.

gregor.

greyson.

griffin.

gus.

guy.

starting with H ;;

hadley.

hale.

haley.

hamilton.

hamish.

hansel.

harley.

harris.

harrison.

harry.

harvey.

haven.

hayes.

heath.

hector.

hendrix.

henrik.

henry.

holton.

howard.

hudson.

hugh.

hugo.

hunter.

hyde.

starting with I ;;

ian.

ibrahim.

icarius.

idris.

igor.

iman.

immanuel.

imran.

indi.

indiana.

indigo.

indra.

inrique.

irwin.

isaak.

isaiah.

isaias.

ishmael.

isobell.

israel.

ivan.

ivey.

ivor.

ivory.

izzy.

starting with J ;;

jack.

jacob.

jagger.

jai.

james.

jamie.

jason.

jaspar.

jaxon.

jaydon.

jed.

jeremy.

jesse.

jett.

joel.

jameson.

jonathon.

jordan.

jose.

joseph.

joshua.

jude.

julian.

junior.

justin.

starting with K ;;

kade.

kai.

kalen.

kameron.

kane.

kasey.

kayden.

keaton.

keegan.

keenan.

kellan.

kendall.

kendrick.

kevin.

khalil.

kian.

kiefer.

kieran.

kingsley.

kingston.

klaus.

kohen.

konrad.

kristoff.

kyle.

starting with L ;;

lachlan.

lamar.

lambert.

lance.

landon.

langston.

lawrence.

lawson.

leeroy.

lennon.

leo.

leonardo.

levi.

lewis.

liam.

lincoln.

lionel.

logan.

lorenzo.

louis.

luca.

lucas.

lucky.

lucis.

luke.

starting with M ;;

mackenzie.

madden.

maddox.

malaki.

malcolm.

manuel.

marco.

marcus.

marley.

marshall.

martin.

mason.

matteo.

matthew.

max.

micah.

michael.

miguel.

mike.

miles.

miller.

milo.

mitchell.

morgan.

moses

starting with N ;;

nadir.

naiser.

nasir.

nate.

nathan.

nathaniel.

naveen.

naydon.

ned.

nico.

neil.

nelson.

nero.

nicholai.

nicholas.

nila.

niles.

nixon.

noah.

noel.

nolan.

norman.

north.

nylan.

nyle.

starting with O ;;

oakley.

ocean.

octavius.

odell.

olaf.

oliver.

ollie.

omar.

omari.

orion.

orlando.

osborn.

oscar.

o’shea.

osten.

oswald.

otis.

otto.

owen.

oxley.

starting with P ;;

pablo.

page.

palmer.

parker.

parrish.

patrick.

paul.

paulo.

pax.

paxton.

payton.

penn.

percy.

perry.

peter.

phineas.

phoenix.

pierce.

pierre.

prescott.

presley.

preston.

prince.

princeton.

puck.

starting with Q ;;

qadim.

qadir.

quain.

quenby.

quill.

quimby.

quincy.

quinn.

quinten.

starting with R ;;

randy.

raymond.

reese.

reid.

remy.

reuben.

rhett.

rhys.

richard.

richie.

ricky.

riley.

robert.

robin.

roger.

roman.

romeo.

ronan.

ronnie.

ross.

rowen.

ryan.

ryder.

ryker.

rylan.

starting with S ;;

sage.

sailor.

salem.

samson.

samuel.

sascha.

sawyer.

saxon.

scott.

sean.

sebastian.

seth.

shane.

shiloh.

simon.

sinclair.

skyler.

sonny.

spencer.

stanley.

stefan.

steven.

stevie.

storm.

sullivan.

starting with T ;;

tamir.

tanner.

tate/tait.

tatum.

taylor.

teddy.

theo.

thomas.

timothy.

tobias.

toby.

todd.

tommy.

tory.

trace.

travis.

trent.

trevor.

trey.

tristan.

troye.

tucker.

tyler.

tyrone.

tyson.

starting with U ;;

umair.

umar.

urien.

usama.

starting with V ;;

valentine.

valentino.

vance.

vaughn.

victor.

vincent.

vinn.

vinnie.

vladimir.

starting with W ;;

wade.

walden.

wallace.

walter.

warner.

warren.

warrick.

waylan.

wayne.

wendall.

wes.

wesley.

west.

whitley.

wilbert.

william.

willis.

wilmer.

windsor.

winslow.

winston.

wolf.

wren.

wyatt.

wynter.

starting with X ;;

xachary.

xan.

xander.

xavier.

xeno.

ximen.

xylon.

starting with Y ;;

yahto.

yakub.

yasin.

yasi.

york.

ysrael.

yuri.

yusef.

starting with Z ;;

zachary.

zahir.

zander.

zane.

zavier.

zed.

zeke.

zion.

zolten.

[grandhotelabyss]

What are your favorite essays/collections of literary criticism?

Some favorite single essays:

Percy Bysshe Shelley, "A Defence of Poetry"

Ralph Waldo Emerson, "The Poet"

Herman Melville, "Hawthorne and His Mosses"

Matthew Arnold, "The Function of Criticism at the Present Time"

Henry James, "The Art of Fiction"

Sigmund Freud, "The Uncanny"

Walter Benjamin, "Franz Kafka: On the Tenth Anniversary of His Death"

T. S. Eliot, "Tradition and the Individual Talent"

Viktor Shklovsky, "Art as Technique"

Mikhail Bakhtin, "Epic and Novel"

Jun'ichirō Tanizaki, "In Praise of Shadows"

G. Wilson Knight, "The Embassy of Death: An Essay on Hamlet"

Simone Weil, "The Iliad, or, The Poem of Force"

Jorge Luis Borges, "Kafka and His Precursors"

Ralph Ellison, "The World and the Jug"

James Baldwin, "Everybody's Protest Novel"

Leslie Fiedler, "The Middle Against Both Ends"

Iris Murdoch, "The Sublime and the Beautiful Revisited"

Flannery O'Connor, "Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction"

Gilles Deleuze, "On the Superiority of Anglo-American Literature"

George Steiner, "A Reading Against Shakespeare"

Derek Walcott, "The Antilles: Fragments of Epic Memory"

Toni Morrison, "Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The Afro-American Presence in American Literature"

Louise Glück, "Education of a Poet"

Camille Paglia, "Junk Bonds and Corporate Raiders: Academe in the Hour of the Wolf"

Michael W. Clune, "Bernhard's Way"

Some favorite collections:

Samuel Johnson, Selected Essays

Oscar Wilde, Intentions

Virginia Woolf, The Common Reader

D. H. Lawrence, Studies in Classic American Literature

George Orwell, All Art Is Propaganda

Susan Sontag, Against Interpretation

Kenneth Rexroth, Classics Revisited

Guy Davenport, The Geography of the Imagination

Cynthia Ozick, Art and Ardor

V. S. Pritchett, Complete Collected Essays

Gore Vidal, United States

Joyce Carol Oates, The Faith of a Writer

Tom Paulin, Minotaur

J. M. Coetzee, Stranger Shores

Michael Wood, Children of Silence

James Wood, The Broken Estate

Edward Said, Reflections on Exile

Gabriel Josipovici, The Singer on the Shore

Clive James, Cultural Amnesia

William Giraldi, American Audacity

[marmidas]

[fundiepredictions]

What happend in 2023

A overview of all the things that happend in 2023

January

Jeremiah&Hannah Duggar (Wissmann) announced the birth off Brynley Noelle on christmas day 2022

Lincoln Bontrager announced during a concert that he is in a relationship with Susanna (maybe Helferich)

February

John&Alyssa Webster (Bates) announced that their baby boy will be named Rhett Alan Webster

Nathanael&Katrina Wissmann (Sahlstrom) announced they are expecting baby #1 in august

Zach&Whitney Bates (Perkins) announced they are expecting baby #5 in august

Jill Rodrigues announced that her son Timothy and Heidi Coverett are courting

Hailey James Clark was born to Katie&Travis Clark (Bates)

Jill Rodrigues suffered a miscarriage

Jessa Seewald announced she suffered a miscarriage in december

March

Trace&Lydia Bates (Romeike) announced baby #1

Jackson Bates proposed to Emerson Wells and she said yes

Justin&Kristen Young announced baby #5, a boy

Rhett Alan Webster was born to Alyssa&John Webster (Bates)

Zach&Whitney Bates (Perkins) announced baby #5 is a girl

Edwin&Francesca Morton (Tuggle) had their son, Adam

Jill Rodrigues announced that her daughter Renee is courting a mystery men

April

Trace&Lydia Bates (Romeike) announced their baby is a boy

Susanna Wissmann and Drew Jerred got engaged

Jesse&Anna Maxwell (Graig) are expecting baby #1

Lillian Scout Morton was born to John&Cambell Morton (Roberts)

May

Kaylee&Jonathan Hill (Rodrigues) announced their baby is a boy

Trace&Lydia Bates (Romeike) announced their baby will be named Ryker Cruise

Rachel&Alan Businitz (Wissmann) announced they are expecting a rainbowbaby in september

Chad&Erin Paine (Bates) announced they are expecting another miracle baby

Matthias&Michelle Wissmann (Kingery) are expecting their 3th in july

Gunner Forsyth was born to Austin&Joy Forsyth (Duggar)

Apperently Josiah&Lauren Duggar (Swanson) had a 3rd child, a boy

Mary Maxwell and Samuel Hook got married

Lincoln Bontrager and Susanna Helferich got engaged

June

Nora Duggar was born to Jed&Katey Duggar (Nakatsu)

Apperantly Christopher&AnnaMarie Maxwell are expecting baby #7

Owen Wissmann was born to Matthias&Michelle Wissmann (Kingery)

Dietrich Sanders was born to Dorothy&Noah Sanders (Morton)

July

Susanna Wissmann and Drew Jerred got married

Gideon Daniel Hill was born to Jonathan&Kaylee Hill (Rodrigues)

Paul Morton got engaged to Helena Mucciolo

August

Theodore James Wissmann was born to Nathanael&Katrina Wissmann (Sahlstrom)

Josie&Kelton Balka (Bates) announced they are expecting baby #3

Lily Jo Bates was born to Zach&Whitney Bates (Perkins)

Erin&Chad Paine (Bates) announced their 6th child will be named William Gage

Lincoln Bontrager and Susanna Helferich got married

September

John&Esther Shrader (Keller) announced they are expecting #14

Jessa&Ben Seewald (Duggar) announced they are expecting #5*

We finaly learned the name of Duggar-Caldwell #4, it's Justus

Jill Dillard released her book

Ryker Cruise was born to Trace&Lydia Bates (Romeike)

Ruth Bourlier (Wissmann) had a miscarriage

Audrey Ann was born to Rachel&Alan Businitz (Wissmann)

Paul Morton and Helena got married

October

Esther Marie was born to Christopher&AnnaMarie Maxwell

Timothy Rodrigues proposed to Heidi Coverett who said 'yes'

Bobby&Tori Smith (Bates) announced they are expecting #5

Jackson Bates and Emerson Wells got married

Maverick James was born to Justin&Kristen Young

William Gage was born to Chad&Erin Paine (Bates)

November

Jeremiah&Hannah Duggar (Wissmann) announced they are expecting baby #2

Edwin&Francesca Morton announced they are expecting baby #2

Nathan&Nurie Keller (Rodrigues) announced they are expecting baby #3

December

Lawson&Tiffany Bates (Espensen) announced that they suffered a miscarriage earlier this year

George Augustine was born to Jessa&Ben Seewald (Duggar)

Susanna&Drew Jerred (Wissmann) announced they are expecting baby #1

[study-with-aura]

Monday, April 1, 2024

April Fools' Day is it? My school curriculum website kept going invisible on me! At first I thought something was wrong, but then I realized the prank.

I have been listening to the tracks that BABYMONSTER released. They are all good in my opinion, but I have loved DREAM since I first heard it. I have it on repeat. Don't judge me. It is living rent-free for a while.

Tasks Completed:

Geometry - Reviewed the counting principle + learned about probability of independent events + practice + honors work

Lit and Comp II - Copied Unit 22 vocabulary + read chapter 48 of Emma by Jane Austen + read another list of poetry terms + learned about the prepositional phrase + ungraded quiz

Spanish 2 - Listened to a story in Spanish + reviewed vocabulary

Bible I - Read 1 Samuel 2

World History - Watched Wartime Farm episode 1

Biology with Lab - Completed dichotomous key lab

Foundations - Read more on sincerity + completed the next quiz on Read Theory + looked at more advertisements

Piano - Practiced for one hour

Khan Academy - Completed High School Biology Unit 7: Lesson 3 (parts 8-10)

CLEP - None today

Streaming - Watched Hitler’s Circle of Evil episode 6

Duolingo - Studied for 15 minutes (Spanish, French, Chinese) + completed daily quests

Reading - Read pages 240-287 of Beneath the Wide Silk Sky by Emily Inouye Huey

Chores - Cleaned my bathroom + cleaned windows in my bedroom and in the study + took the trash and recycling out

Activities of the Day:

Personal Bible Study (2 Corinthians 5)

2 hours volunteering at the library

Ballet

Contemporary

Journal/Mindfulness

-

What I’m Grateful for Today:

I am grateful so many boops!

Quote of the Day:

The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

🎧DREAM - BABYMONSTER

[boldlycrookedsalad]

Literary Canon (from kissgrammar)

The Holy Bible, Authorized King James Version [At a minimum, the books of Genesis, Exodus, Job, Psalms, from the Old Testament; Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Apocalypse from the New.] Whether or not you are Christian is irrelevant. The civilization in which we live is based on and permeated by the ideas and values expressed in this book. Understanding our civilization, the world in which we live, is probably impossible without having read -- and thought about -- at least the most famous books in the Bible. Historically, the King James Version is considered the most artistic, and thus has probably had the most literary influence.

Homer, The Iliad

Homer, The Odyssey

Sophocles, Oedipus the King (Oedipus Rex)

Sophocles, Antigone

Plato, The Republic, especially "The Myth of the Cave"

Ovid, Metamorphoses

Saint Augustine, The Confessions

Dante, The Divine Comedy

Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

Giambattista Vico, Principles of a New Science

Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote

Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales

Romeo and Juliet

King Lear

Hamlet

Othello

Macbeth

John Donne, "Holy Sonnet XIV"

John Donne, "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning"

Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress"

John Milton, Paradise Lost

Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels

A Modest Proposal

Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe

Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Michel de Montaigne, Essays, especially "Of Experience"

Francois Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel

Moliere, The Misanthrope

Blaise Pascal, Pensees

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile

Voltaire, Candide

Erasmus, In Praise of Folly

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Parts One & Two

Honore de Balzac, Old Goriot (also translated as Pere Goriot)

Stendhal, The Red and the Black

Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary

Emile Zola, Germinal

Henrik Ibsen, A Doll's House

William Blake

William Wordsworth

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

Lord Byron, Don Juan

John Keats, "Ode on a Grecian Urn"

Robert Browning, "My Last Duchess"

Charles Dickens - Oliver Twist

A Tale Of Two Cities

Hard Times

A Christmas Carol

Matthew Arnold, "Dover Beach"

John Stuart Mill, On Liberty

Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights

Francis Thompson, "The Hound of Heaven"

Samuel Butler, Erewhon

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

George Eliot- Silas Marner

Middlemarch

Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Friedrich Nietzsche - Beyond Good and Evil

The Will To Power

The Birth of Tragedy

On the Genealogy of Morals

Alexander Pushkin - Eugene Onegin

The Bronze Horseman

Nikolai Gogol -The Overcoat

Dead Souls

Mikhail Lermontov, A Hero of Our Time

Ivan Turgenev, Fathers and Sons

Fyodor Dostoevsky -Notes From the Underground

Crime and Punishment

Leo Tolstoy -The Death of Ivan Ilych

War and Peace

Anton Chekhov, The Cherry Orchard

James Fenimore Cooper, The Deerslayer

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays

Emily Dickinson - "Because I Could Not Stop For Death"

"The Tint I Cannot Take"

"There's a Certain Slant of Light"

Walt Whitman  - "Song of Myself"

"The Sleepers"

"Crossing Brooklyn Ferry"

"As I Ebbed With The Ocean of Life"

"Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"

"When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomd"

Nathaniel Hawthorne - Young Goodman Brown

The Scarlet Letter

Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

Edgar Allen Poe - "The Raven"

The Cask of Amontillado

Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Kate Chopin -The Story of An Hour

The Awakening

Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage

Henry James

Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Luigi Pirandello

[zpl1nt3r3d-b0n3-zhardz]

hi! maybe names similar to remington that dont sound to ‘nerdy’ ?! thanks lmao TuT

hope these work!!

rennox

Rexford

Templeton

Samuel

remmie

braxton

rexton

Sawyer

everete

grayson

maddox

Wyatt

Oakland

Oakley

lennox

Lennon

kysenin

Kizer

bryton

ryder

Finnigan

Sutton

Colton

sterling

Bently

Bennett

Jameson

Emerson

Lincoln

Sullivan

Graham

hunter

Samson

Malcolm

Sabastion

Roswell

maxwell

Maximilian

Phineas

porter

Montgomery

[biboocat]

Vladimir Nabokov’s Brutally Honest Opinions on 63 of the “Greatest” Writers to Ever Write (1973). I got this from a literature FB group; I can’t verify its authenticity. Even if the source is authentic, it seems to me a very subjective exercise, so take it in that spirit.

Auden, W. H. Not familiar with his poetry, but his translations contain deplorable blunders.

Austen, Jane. Great.

Balzac, Honoré de. Mediocre. Fakes realism with easy platitudes.

Barbusse, Henri. Second-rate. A tense-looking but really very loose type of writing.

Beckett, Samuel. Author of lovely novellas and wretched plays.

Bergson, Henri. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, and thereafter.

Borges, Jorge Luis. A favorite. How freely one breathes in his marvelous labyrinths! Lucidity of thought, purity of poetry. A man of infinite talent.

Brecht, Bertolt. A nonentity, means absolutely nothing to me.

Brooke, Rupert. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, but no longer.

Camus, Albert. Dislike him. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up. A nonentity, means absolutely nothing to me. Awful.

Carroll, Lewis. Have always been fond of him. One would like to have filmed his picnics. The greatest children's story writer of all time.

Cervantes, Miguel de. Don Quixote. A cruel and crude old book.

Cheever, John. “The Country Husband.” A particular favorite. Satisfying coherence.

Chekhov, Anton. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter. Talent, but not genius. Love him dearly, but cannot rationalize that feeling.

Chesterton, G. K. A favorite between the ages of 8 and 14. Essentially a writer for very young people. Romantic in the large sense.

Conan Doyle, Arthur. A favorite between the ages of 8 and 14, but no longer. Essentially a writer for very young people. Romantic in the large sense.

Conrad, Joseph. A favorite between the ages of 8 and 14. Essentially a writer for very young people. Certainly inferior to Hemingway and Wells. Intolerable souvenir-shop style, romanticist clichés. Nothing I would care to have written myself. In mentality and emotion, hopelessly juvenile. Romantic in the large sense. Slightly bogus.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Dislike him. A cheap sensationalist, clumsy and vulgar. A prophet, a claptrap journalist and a slapdash comedian. Some of his scenes are extraordinarily amusing. Nobody takes his reactionary journalism seriously.

Dreiser, Theodore. Dislike him. A formidable mediocrity.

Eliot, T. S. Not quite first-rate.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. His poetry is delightful.

Faulkner, William. Dislike him. Writer of corncobby chronicles. To consider them masterpieces is an absurd delusion. A nonentity, means absolutely nothing to me.

Flaubert, Gustave. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter. Read complete works between 14 and 15.

Forster, E. M. Only read one of his novels (possibly A Passage to India?) and disliked it.

Freud, Sigmund. A figure of fun. Loathe him. Vile deceit. Freudian interpretation of dreams is charlatanic, and satanic, nonsense.

García Lorca, Federico. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up.

Gogol, Nikolai. Nobody takes his mystical didacticism seriously. At his worst, as in his Ukrainian stuff, he is a worthless writer; at his best, he is incomparable and inimitable. Loathe his moralistic slant, am depressed and puzzled by his inability to describe young women, deplore his obsession with religion.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. A splendid writer.

Hemingway, Ernest. A writer of books for boys. Certainly better than Conrad. Has at least a voice of his own. Nothing I would care to have written myself. In mentality and emotion, hopelessly juvenile. Loathe his works about bells, balls, and bulls. The Killers. Delightful, highly artistic. Admirable. The Old Man and the Sea. Wonderful. The description of the iridescent fish and rhythmic urination is superb.

Housman, A. E. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, and thereafter.

James, Henry. Dislike him rather intensely, but now and then his wording causes a kind of electric tingle. Certainly not a genius.

Joyce, James. Great. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, and thereafter. Let people compare me to Joyce by all means, but my English is patball to Joyce's champion game. A genius.

I. Ulysses. A divine work of art. Greatest masterpiece of 20th century prose. Towers above the rest of Joyce's writing. Noble originality, unique lucidity of thought and style. Molly's monologue is the weakest chapter in the book. Love it for its lucidity and precision.

II. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Never liked it. A feeble and garrulous book.

III. Finnegans Wake. A formless and dull mass of phony folklore, a cold pudding of a book. Conventional and drab, redeemed from utter insipidity only by infrequent snatches of heavenly intonations. Detest it. A cancerous growth of fancy word-tissue hardly redeems the dreadful joviality of the folklore and the easy, too easy, allegory. Indifferent to it, as to all regional literature written in dialect. A tragic failure and a frightful bore.

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Second-greatest masterpiece of 20th century prose.

Kazantzakis, Nikos. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up.

Keats, John. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter.

Kipling, Rudyard. A favorite between the ages of 8 and 14. Essentially a writer for very young people. Romantic in the large sense.

Lawrence, D. H. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up. Mediocre. Fakes realism with easy platitudes. Execrable.

Lowell, Robert. Not a good translator. A greater offender than Auden.

Mandelshtam, Osip. A wonderful poet, the greatest in Soviet Russia. His poems are admirable specimens of the human mind at its deepest and highest. Not as good as Blok. His tragic fate makes his poetry seem greater than it actually is.

Mann, Thomas. Dislike him. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up.

Maupassant, Guy de. Certainly not a genius.

Maugham, W. Somerset. Mediocre. Fakes realism with easy platitudes. Certainly not a genius.

Melville, Herman. Love him. One would like to have filmed him at breakfast, feeding a sardine to his cat.

Marx, Karl. Loathe him.

Milton, John. A genius.

Pasternak, Boris. An excellent poet, but a poor novelist. Doctor Zhivago. Detest it. Melodramatic and vilely written. To consider it a masterpiece is an absurd delusion. Pro-Bolshevist, historically false. A sorry thing, clumsy, trivial, melodramatic, with stock situations and trite coincidences.

Pirandello, Luigi. Never cared for him.

Plato. Not particularly fond of him.

Poe, Edgar Allan. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, but no longer. One would like to have filmed his wedding.

Pound, Ezra. Definitely second-rate. A total fake. A venerable fraud.

Proust, Marcel. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, and thereafter. In Search of Lost Time. The first half is the fourth-greatest masterpiece of 20th-century prose.

Pushkin, Alexander. A favorite between the ages of 20 and 40, and thereafter. A genius.

Rimbaud, Arthur. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter.

Robbe-Grillet, Alain. Great. A favorite. How freely one breathes in his marvelous labyrinths! Lucidity of thought, purity of poetry. Magnificently poetical and original.

Salinger, J. D. By far one of the finest artists in recent years.

Sartre, Jean-Paul. Even more awful than Camus.

Shakespeare, William. Read complete works between 14 and 15. One would like to have filmed him in the role of the King's Ghost. His verbal poetic texture is the greatest the world has ever known, and immensely superior to the structure of his plays as plays. It is the metaphor that is the thing, not the play. A genius.

Sterne, Laurence. Love him.

Tolstoy, Leo. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter. Read complete works between 14 and 15. Nobody takes his utilitarian moralism seriously. A genius.

I. Anna Karenina. Incomparable prose artistry. The supreme masterpiece of 19th-century literature.

II. The Death of Ivan Ilyich. A close second to Anna Karenina.

III. War and Peace. A little too long. A rollicking historical novel written for the general reader, specifically for the young. Artistically unsatisfying. Cumbersome messages, didactic interludes, artificial coincidences. Uncritical of its historical sources.

Turgenev, Ivan. Talent, but not genius.

Updike, John. By far one of the finest artists in recent years. Like so many of his stories that it is difficult to choose one.

Wells, H. G. A favorite between the ages of 10 and 15, and thereafter. A great artist, my favorite writer when I was a boy. His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, but his romances and fantasies are superb. A far greater artist than Conrad. A writer for whom I have the deepest admiration.

Wilde, Oscar. Rank moralist and didacticist. A favorite between the ages of 8 and 14. Essentially a writer for very young people. Romantic in the large sense.

Wolfe, Thomas. Second-rate, ephemeral, puffed-up.

https://twitter.com/Essayful/status/1729559047102153008?

[hungwy]

Urn Burial has been admired by Charles Lamb, Samuel Johnson, John Cowper Powys, James Joyce, Jorge Luis Borges, Derek Walcott, Herman Melville and George Saintsbury, who called it "the longest piece, perhaps, of absolutely sublime rhetoric to be found in the prose literature of the world", while Ralph Waldo Emerson said that it "smells in every word of the sepulchre".[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydriotaphia,_Urn_Burial

[people-are-strange-87]

What If Michael Was Gayer?

The Frog Brothers and Co didn't succeed in ambushing and assaulting the Lost Boys. The boys tied their assailants up and waited for Max to arrive. Let's just say Michael didn't react very well when Grandpa killed Max.

Mr William Arthur Emerson

16th July 1915, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

Vampire Hunter

Mr Maximus Charles “Max” Lawrence

21st July 1943, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by William A. Emerson

Owner, Max’s Video Store

Ms Lucy Emerson

28th March 1948, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

Manager, Max’s Video Store

Miss Star Grünberg

28th October 1965, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

Cashier, Max’s Video Store

Mrs Maria Weaver née Lawrence

24th September 1966, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

Cashier, Max’s Video Store

Mr Alan Stephen Frog

2nd April 1970

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

High School Student

Mr Edgar Patrick Frog

16th July 1971

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

High School Student

Mr Samuel Andrew “Sam” Emerson

23rd December 1971, Santa Carla

31st July 1987, Santa Carla

Killed by Michael T. Emerson

High School Student