Art/Work Podcast

This is corny, but I’m looking for corny in my life! The true work of art isn’t in the end result, even though that would be super nice. It’s in the patience and beauty that is found in carving out those five minutes to do what you love, amidst all that f*****g pressure. And, over time, those five minutes, twenty, compound, and they create a life full of richness. Full of art. If we shift our attention to the everyday, to the practice of working on something for the sake of the work itself, I think we’ll find that every day will gain a new sacred flavor.

In the end, you, the artist, through time and patience, become the diamond. You are the gift you give to yourself.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

I’ve been writing a book about romantic love for the last few years. Essentially, I’ve wanted to answer the question: why do humans do this to each other?!?!? I get familial love, I get love as a force in the universe, but romantic love can feel like a real pain in the ass sometimes. You can listen to some of my early discussions about love here ⬇️

P.s. You can scroll to the end to see my working/unrefined theory of love

When I was researching love, I noticed how often words like witness or seeing are often interchangeable with love. On my quest, I discovered Dante through Rahim Redcar and his epic music video La Vita Nuova. It was February 2020, and I was pretty depressed about my romantic relationship at the time. I was alone in our apartment, outside it was brittle and cold, but when I opened my laptop, I was transported to a rooftop in autumn. I watched as Redcar danced across the parapets, haunted, pounding on his chest.

If you disappear, then I am disappearing too, if you fall apart, then I’m falling behind you.

The song People I’ve Been Sad, became my most-played song of 2020. It’s the first song out of five. I was curious about the music video—something about it felt so intentional, like Redcar wasn’t just trying to create a viral moment, but attempting to convey a deeper truth.

I googled La Vita Nuova and discovered it was a poem written by Dante, a medieval poet, about his love for a woman named Beatrice. The same Beatrice would be his guide in Paradiso, the least read of Dante’s Divine Comedy trilogy. But before he wrote his famous Inferno, Dante wrote La Vita Nuova. This book has been carried through 825 years of Western culture for a lot of literary reasons, but most people know about it is believed to be one of the first “love stories.” It’s part of the tradition of courtly love, like Lancelot and Guinevere, where a knight is devoted to a noblewoman. The whole point of these stories is that it’s unconsummated. If it was consummated, it would ruin the whole affair. You could argue it started the whole trend of “I want you but can’t have you” thing. Dante loved Beatrice, but he didn’t marry her because if he married her, he couldn’t love her (humans are weird).

One of my favorite artists has a beautiful painting of their love. In it, the two lovers face each other, their eyes closed. They’re together but separate.

What interested me most about La Vita Nuova, aside from the romantic lore, was the way Dante referred to his encounters with Beatrice. He repeatedly states that it is through her greeting that he experiences bliss.

She turned her eyes to where I was standing faint-hearted and, with that indescribable graciousness for which today she is rewarded in the eternal life, she greeted me so miraculously that I seemed at that moment to behold the entire range of possible bliss.

And:

And for this reason, that is, the exaggerated rumors which made me out to be a vicious person, my most gracious lady, scourge of all vices and queen of the virtues, passing along a certain way, denied me her most sweet greeting in which lay all my bliss.

The word that Mark Musa has translated as “greeting” is salute, which has three meanings: greeting, salutation, and salvation.

So let’s redo these and replace greeting with salvation:

She turned her eyes to where I was standing faint-hearted and, with that indescribable graciousness for which today she is rewarded in the eternal life, she granted me salvation so miraculous that I seemed at that moment to behold the entire range of possible bliss.

Or:And for this reason, that is, the exaggerated rumors which made me out to be a vicious person, my most gracious lady, scourge of all vices and queen of the virtues, passing along a certain way, denied me her most sweet salvation in which lay all my bliss.

Throughout the book, famously considered to be about love, Dante is really just trying to get closer to God. And he can get there because of Beatrice. When she sees him, she saves him.

This belief that when we’re seen, we’re saved is present throughout thousands of years of literature.

When we’re seen, we’re saved—a jaunt through literary and philosophic history

In Sappho’s fragment 31, she writes:

He seems to me equal to gods that man

whoever he is who opposite you

sits and listens close

   to your sweet speaking

and lovely laughing—oh it

puts the heart in my chest on wings

for when I look at you, even a moment, no speaking

   is left in me

no: tongue breaks and thin

fire is racing under skin

and in eyes no sight and drumming

   fills ears

and cold sweat holds me and shaking

grips me all, greener than grass

I am and dead—or almost

   I seem to me.

According to Sappho, the man who has the woman’s attention is equal to the gods. And what are gods most known for? Living forever. So basically, a woman’s attention grants the lover immortality.

In Phaedrus, Plato, states that it is through seeing that we connect to ultimate being

Once upon a time, our souls were great feathered beings who existed beyond the heavens. In this place, our souls glimpsed pure, unadulterated knowledge. This knowledge was existence itself.

No poet among us has ever sung of the place beyond the heavens, and none will ever sing of it worthily, but this is what it is like—for one must dare to tell the truth, especially when it is truth one is speaking about. This place, the province of true knowledge, is occupied by the kind of being that is in the fullest sense, the intangible being that has no colour or shape and can be beheld only by the intellect, the steersman of the soul… not the knowledge that has any connection with becoming, and is in any way different when applied to different things among those which we now call beings, but the knowledge that is in and of the kind of being that is in the fullest sense. And when it has in the same manner beheld and feasted upon the rest of the beings that truly are, it sinks back into the interior of the heavens and goes home.

Then some of us lost our feathers and became entombed in bodies, like pearls condemned to their shells. But our souls remain immortal! And we still have memories of that place of true being. The problem is, it’s difficult to remember our true, immortal selves, the inner beings who have feasted upon pure knowledge.

The only way we can experience that transcendence again and remember what our souls have forgotten is to look at beauty.

But it is not easy for every soul to recollect those beings from the things here…Few are left in whom an adequate recollection is present, but these few, when they lay their eyes on any likeness of the things there, are bowled over and can no longer control themselves, but they do not understand what they are experiencing because of the inadequacy of their perception. In these likenesses of justice and moderation and all other things that are precious to souls, there is no radiance, but a few souls, when they come upon these images, see with difficulty through cloudy sense-organs the nature of their originals… Let this, then, be our tribute to memory, delivered at extended length now for its sake out of a yearning for the things of that earlier time. But we are speaking about beauty, and saying that, even among those beings, it shone out conspicuously, and since we came here we have apprehended it most clearly through the most distinct of our senses. For sight is the sharpest of the senses that reach us through the body, through the world, though wisdom is not seen by it—wisdom would arouse frightening passions of love if a clear image of it were given to us as comes to sight—nor are the other lovable beings visible. Beauty alone allotted that prerogative, and thus it is the most crystal-clear and love-inspiring of them all.

Basically, Plato, via Socrates, is saying that through seeing beautiful people or beautiful things, we can remember a place beyond the heavens. When we see our beloved, our souls begin to itch, and feathers begin to sprout once more. And! The power of sight is so incredible that not even the pursuit of knowledge can match the transcendence afforded by witnessing beauty.

In the Symposium, Plato says, that the ultimate act of love is creation.

Socrates talks to a wise woman, Diotima, about the nature of love. I like to imagine her as a young priestess, like the oracle at Delphi. She’s sexy, and she’s bossy, and she totally schools Socrates on the nature of love. She begins her theory of love by telling a young, misguided Socrates that love is wanting the good to be yours forever. But how is that possible? How can someone pursue love if they want good to be theirs forever? That is the question.

Her answer is that a lover pursues love by creating under the influence of a beautiful thing.

Diotima says:

‘Well, then, I will tell you,’ she said ‘it is bearing offspring in the presence of a beautiful thing, by means of the body or the soul.

…All human beings are pregnant, Socrates, both in body and in soul, and when they reach a certain age, the nature within us brings an urgency to give birth…

For Socrates,’ she said, ‘love is not for the beautiful, as you think it is, but for generating and bearing offspring in the presence of the beautiful…because generation is something eternal and immortal within what is mortal. It necessarily follows from the things that have been agreed upon that there is a desire for immortality along with the good… The mortal nature is seeking to be, as far as is possible, everlasting, and mortal.

So, according to the wise woman, Diotima, because we are pregnant in our souls, we climb the ladder of love. First, we pursue a beautiful body. Then we realize that any beautiful body is pretty much as beautiful as any other, so we move on to loving all beautiful bodies. Then we realize that the real beauty is to be found in the soul. Then we start to love the beauty found in knowledge, so we try to read and study and make laws and design cities. Finally, we come to the highest form of loving, which is love for beauty itself.

‘Don't you realize,’ she said, ‘that it is only in that place where he can behold the beautiful with the sight by which it is visible, that he will attain the ability to give birth not to phantasms of virtue, since it is no phantasm that is in his grasp, but to true virtue, since it is the truth that is in his grasp? True virtue is what he gives birth to and nurtures, and he will gain for himself the love of the gods. If any human being has a way of becoming immortal, it is he.

So basically, it doesn’t matter which specific body we look at, it doesn’t matter which specific piece of knowledge we covet; when we really look at all beautiful things, and when we witness them and love them just as they are, we are free to move towards a higher pursuit of loving all beauty, and once we can love beauty itself, we give birth within our soul to something immortal.

The entire plot of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves is about the power of an attentive soul and how it remakes us and erases our separateness.

How there is no singular me or you—only an us that can be felt through witnessing. There’s a scene that will stick with me forever. A young man named Neville watches his crush, Bernard, walk towards him:

Something now leaves me; something goes from me to meet that figure who is coming, and assures me that I know him before I see who it is. How consciously one is changed by the addition, even at a distance, of a friend. How useful an office one’s friends perform when they recall us. Yet, how painful to be recalled, to be mitigated, to have one’s self adulterated, mixed up, become part of another. As he approaches, I become not myself but Neville mixed with somebody—with whom? With Bernard? Yes, it is Bernard, and it is to Bernard that I shall put the question, who am I?

In The Art of Loving, Erich Fromm states:

“What does one person give another? He gives of himself, of the most precious he has, he gives of his life… he gives of that which is alive in him; he gives him of his joy, of his interest, of his understanding, of his knowledge, of his humor, of his sadness… In thus giving of his life, he enriches the other person, he enhances the other’s sense of aliveness by enhancing his own sense of aliveness.”

What Fromm is saying here is that the greatest act of love is to be generous with our attention. If we give our most authentic awareness and aliveness, we enrich the lives of those we love and ourselves.

In the beautiful book Our World by Mary Oliver, she writes of her life with her partner Molly Cook:

“It has frequently been remarked, about my own writings, that I emphasize the notion of attention. This began simply enough: to see that the way the flicker flies is greatly different from the way the swallow plays in the golden air of summer. It was my pleasure to notice such things, it was a good first step. But later, watching M. when she was taking photographs, and watching her in the darkroom, and no less watching the intensity and openness with which she dealt with friends, and strangers too, taught me what real attention is about. Attention without feeling, I began to learn, is only a report. An openness — an empathy — was necessary if the attention was to matter. Such openness and empathy M. had in abundance, and gave away freely… I was in my late twenties and early thirties, and well filled with a sense of my own thoughts, my own presence. I was eager to address the world of words — to address the world with words. Then M. instilled in me this deeper level of looking and working, of seeing through the heavenly visibles to the heavenly invisibles. I think of this always when I look at her photographs, the images of vitality, hopefulness, endurance, kindness, vulnerability… We each had our separate natures; yet our ideas, our influences upon each other became a rich and abiding confluence.”

One or one thousand, it doesn’t matter

I know I was being melodramatic in The Work of Art Part 6 about my Instagram friends not buying my books. But really, the truth is: if anyone, like literally one person, reads my poem or my book, I am honored.

What a true gift that person has given me—they have offered me their time. They have offered me their attention.

And when someone sees us, they offer us salvation. Not in the Christian biblical sense, but a salvation of the spirit. How could I ever take that for granted? The power and force of that gift does not change whether 10 people read my book or 10,000.

There is only one important time, and that time is now

Whenever my friends have a baby, I give them this book called The Three Questions. It’s a beautiful retelling of a Tolstoy story. The book is about a little boy who wants to know the answers to three questions.

* What is the best time to do things?

* Who is the most important one?

* What is the right thing to do?

Leo, the turtle, tells him:

“Remember then, there is only one important time, and that time is now. The most important one is always the one you are with. And the most important thing is to do good for the one who is standing at your side. For these, my dear boy, are the answers to what is most important in this world. This is why we are here.”

The most powerful gift we have to offer the world is our present attention, and yet there are powerful forces at work motivated to take what little attention we have and turn it back on us, like some metastasized monster.

In this modern society, the most radical and revolutionary thing we can do is put away our devices, stop checking Instagram every three minutes, and do good for the one standing at our side.

So go forth! Be present. Pay attention.

If you only read one book this year, treasure every page. That’s enough. If you only write one poem, make sure that the act of writing it is delicious and sweet. That’s enough.

I will leave you with this lovely Mary Oliver poem:

THE WHISTLER

All of a sudden she began to whistle. By all of a sudden

I mean that for more than thirty years she had not

whistled. It was thrilling. At first I wondered, who was

in the house, what stranger? I was upstairs reading, and

she was downstairs. As from the throat of a wild and

cheerful bird, not caught but visiting, the sounds war-

bled and slid and doubled back and larked and soared.

Finally I said, Is that you? Is that you whistling? Yes, she

said. I used to whistle, a long time ago. Now I see I can

still whistle. And cadence after cadence she strolled

through the house, whistling.

I know her so well, I think. I thought. Elbow and an-

kle. Mood and desire. Anguish and frolic. Anger too.

And the devotions. And for all that, do we even begin

to know each other? Who is this I’ve been living with

for thirty years?

This clear, dark, lovely whistler?

BONUS:

Working theory of love (that, it turns out, has been recorded by nearly every great thinker for the last 5,000 years ha ha—so much for originality)

* Love is beyond thought; it is sensations, it is presence. Desire exists only in the mind.

* You enter Love through Eros, or desire.

* Because desire exists only in the mind, you can think yourself into desiring or not desiring anyone, so you can think yourself into loving or not loving anyone.

* Who you love, therefore, doesn’t matter so much. It’s a figment of your imagination anyway. Obviously, don’t love an a*****e because it will make your day-to-day miserable, but it’s really not the point of love to choose the “right person.” Our minds are powerful and can make anyone right or wrong.

* How you love matters a great deal.

* Most of love is a mystery. It is unknowable, and that’s the point. The trick is to accept the mystery and not seek to understand it.

* Desire exists in reaching for something. You can’t desire what you already have.

* You can’t seek to know what you already know.

* Humans take the most pleasure in hunting for love, hunting for knowledge, but not in loving or knowing.

* Love, or what I call Elevated eros is to experience love without searching.

* What is love without searching? It is just being. Love, therefore, exists in attention. In witnessing.

* Love, therefore, exists, while watching, being with, but not trying to possess.

* God is ultimately the being that can “see us” no matter what. God is the ultimate witness. With “god” there is no veil, only presence. We can embody “god” in our ability to “see.”

* We’re super depressed and seek love because we’re scared to be alone (existential loneliness, the prison of our flesh bodies/consciousness).

* But we’re scared not to be alone. Because if we were “one” like all the myths suggest we desire, we wouldn’t be us any longer. We don’t actually want to disappear. It’s our greatest fear.

* We can only truly Love when we exist beyond thought, and to exist beyond thought is to have the self disappear. Which is, effectively, to die.

* To Love is to die.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

"Time is not only money; it is the key to health and safety."

In this installment of The Work of Art, we dismantle the romanticized "starving artist" trope and look how much it actually costs to live in the US. We will explore why the choice between "selling out" and "suffering for art" is a false dichotomy.

We'll discuss:

- How Leo Tolstoy and Richard Wagner described a world of massive social investment in art that feels like fantasy today.

- Why even "fully funded" MFA programs often fail to meet the basic living wage, leaving artists to choose between debt or no time.

- Why the most innovative writers are often coming from countries with universal healthcare and social safety nets (Canada, Argentina, Germany), while Americans are buying time with student loans.

- Confronting the reality of the "privilege gap" in the creative industry—who is actually paying for those trips to Europe and those Brooklyn co-ops?

- Why working in tech or taking a corporate 9-to-5 doesn't make you a "traitor to art," but a person seeking the dignity of security in a system without a safety net.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

- Why do we actually seek publication?

- A breakdown of Marx, Socially Necessary Labor Time, and why your 10-year lyrical novella is valued the same as a book written in three months.

- Why romance and mystery are more likely to be published because they act as dopamine delivery systems to our exhausted brains.

- How the "speed of creativity" has been standardized by platforms, turning artists into content generators who can never stop feeding the beast.

- Why getting a book deal doesn’t actually make you free, and why you might still be selling your labor time just to survive.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Over the next few weeks, I will be sharing a series of essays that delve into the work of art: the labor behind making art and what art does and does not reveal about this labor.

I wrote this to better understand my own life choices and struggles.

What follows is an exploration into what it means to be an artist in America in the age of capitalism.

Together, we’ll discover what it means to value our work for ourselves and without playing into the market.

I hope you will come out feeling that, while the reality is that most of us are working class in a capitalist world, there is still a way to do this labor and maintain artistic integrity.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Before we begin… Denver folks! Mark your calendars!

When Darcy Met Lizzy is coming your way!

✨ Join Alyse Knorr and me in conversation at Petals and Pages on June 7th at 12pm ✨

About this episode:In March, a friend let me stay in her little house in Oysterville, WA so I could finish editing the audiobook for When Darcy Met Lizzy. Sequestered in that little house as the wind and the rain beat down upon the windows and roof, I learned more about writing, craft, and my own particular human wounds than I have in ten years of workshops.

Writing is scary, and facing what you’ve written can sometimes feel like looking at the ugliest, most shameful parts of yourself. But if you want to complete something, you can’t allow yourself to run away. You have to work through the shame and fear, otherwise, you’ll never get to the other side. But sometimes that process is unbearably painful! All of this sounds incredibly cheesy and cliche but that’s because it’s SO TRUE.

My good friend, the talented and ingenious poet, essayist, and novelist, Alyse Knorr, often helps me with my revision fears, and I wanted to share our conversation with you all in hopes that she may be a guiding light to you, too.Live long and prosper,

Sammie

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Hi beautiful humans!

I’m continuing to experiment with the video essay. Mostly because I am tired and don’t have much time—

(although I know that’s not really true. We all have time, it’s just a matter of what we choose to do with it and I am choosing to work a day job that takes up a lot of my time so that I have health insurance and can afford to buy my dog way too many toys, but… I digress)

If you’re not into video essays, you can listen to the essay on Spotify. Or you can read the (unedited) transcript below.

TL:DR

Humans are narrative beings. We tell stories to bolster and justify our actions and beliefs. So, even the most innocuous stories have power and we should be very careful about which stories we choose to repeat or create.

That’s all folks!

❤️ Sammie

✏️ 💌 p.s.

For those of you who have watched/listened, my mom brought up the point that my book is “stuff” too. Isn’t the act of printing this book part of a bigger system that I am condemning? Which I guess is what I was saying about the point of art—at what point do we think “stuff” or “art” has value? And if we understand that our art, too, has consequences, what do we do with that information?

The unedited transcript:  

Hello, beautiful humans.

Long time no see. I've been wanting to do an update about When Darcy Met Lizzie for a while, but my day job has been incredibly busy, and I can't just not do it. So that's why I'm recording this late at night. And if I look haggard and tired, it's because I am haggard and tired, but I wanted to do a little post about the progress of When Darcy Met Lizzie and talk about some things that are on my mind. I think the inner school perfectionist in me is struggling with the fact that I'm not writing these essays anymore and that I am just kind of speaking.

I think there's something about me that really likes to do an in-depth research paper. And also, I'm sorry if you hear my dog in the background. She's having a moment. But I like to do a really in-depth research paper, and I really like to make an argument and take it all the way through. But honestly, who's got time for that nowadays? And I have other things that I want to work on. The time that I want to spend writing, I want to be writing other things, not stuff for this Substack. Not that I don't value this Substack, it's just more that the in-depth research I want to do is for projects that are just beyond here.

So anyway, I'm trying to realize that perfect is the enemy of the good. And I'm just trying to stifle my little Virgo, teacher's pet, Hermione Granger, and just try to get some stuff out there. So, actually, let me do a little show and tell.

Welcome to my office. So, ta da! This is the cover. Oh, not this is the cover. This is the real shebang. This is When Darcy Met Lizzie, designed by Jesse Broom. The layout on the inside is from this lovely human named Alyssa Natosi. I don't actually know how to say her last name. I should have double-checked. It's got a beautiful spine. My previous novella couldn't be sold in a lot of bookstores because it didn't have a title on the spine, so this is a huge win for me. The back, so great. I know that this is backwards in your view, and that's because I have flipped the video horizontally. Yes, I have done that, and it is true. I did it because I am Bane, and I prefer one perspective of my face. And I'm giving that perspective that I prefer to you. Even though it's not the real perspective. But you know what? I can do that if I want. Okay, so this is the test one. And I just wanted to make sure that it was good before I bought a bunch of copies and shipped them all out to everyone who pre-ordered. And the answer is that it is good. It's, I'm very impressed with it. I am annoyed by certain indentation issues in it. And I'm trying to not let it bother me because really it doesn't matter, but I think some of it really... you know how there's that one typo that really pisses you off? There's a lot of indentation issues. So I'm just trying to... this is a process. Accepting the process has been a little hard for me, but I am very proud of it. And I'm glad it's going to be out in the world shortly. And anyone who pre-ordered should expect it soon.

So, the topic of today's Substack is the responsibility of writers and art. What did I think about when I was writing this book? Did I think I had a responsibility, or was it just pure fun? And the short answer is that yes, while I had so much fun writing this, I did take it very seriously because I take everything very seriously. Unfortunately, it's kind of a bummer, but I realized that if you have a classic, a beloved classic, and you're going to retell it and make it queer... You can't just plop queer characters in. You can't just make people gay in a world that wasn't forgiving of gay life or gay love. Because that really does a disservice to queer people and queer stories. And as much as I want to support the magic and the beauty of just imagining your own life and your own world and just imagining we all live in a frolicking, magical land where everyone loves each other and there's no harm, and no hatred... That is not the world we live in, actually.

So, I had to balance this. This book that I wanted to really revel in queer joy and love and sex and make it really special. I also had to balance the realities of what it was like to be a woman in the 1800s and potentially be gay. In the Culture Study podcast by Anne Helen Petersen, she has a four-part series about romance that I thought was really great, but she has one episode, "The Expansive World of Queer Romance." And it came out on December 11th in 2024 with Adib Karam. He wrote I'll Have What He's Having—love the title—but something Adib said is that it's really thoughtless to just create a magical realism world without understanding the consequences, and that historical fiction has a tough job to do if you're going to take a speculative approach to it.

So, what I did to respect the cultural confines of Regency England while also subverting them was two things. So, first of all, I had to figure out, what does it mean to be free in this world? And what does it mean to have power in this world? And why would Darcy have it, theoretically, and why wouldn't Elizabeth? And what are the ways in which power and freedom are exchanged in this world? And I came upon the idea that money grants us freedom and power. So, I made it so that in this world, if you are a woman and you are the eldest child of a lord or a lady or someone who's wealthy, theoretically, you can be a woman gentleman. And this was a way of basically saying that power and rights and freedom go hand in hand with money. And so, the more money you have, the more freedom and the more rights you have. Which is why Mr. Darcy, with her 10,000 pounds a year, would be theoretically free in this world. However, that doesn't mean that she's free totally or liberated, because she's free in this system that, even though she is a woman, it's a system that upholds the patriarchy and upholds this idea that to be powerful, you must be a man, or you must have manly occupation, meaning you have to be a landowner, or a lot of these people had slaves, or were part of this colonial world, and that's how they got their money. So, there's this idea that money and freedom aren't necessarily inherently free.

So then I was also in a plot problem. So, the second part came from a plot problem, but also from an ideological problem. But the plot problem is I couldn't just have Darcy be the only gay woman in the book because that makes no sense. That would be a boring book. And also very weird to just have one random gay character. I wanted to really embed queer culture into the whole story. So then I had to make a list of characters and think: who could be gay in this world? And then of course I came up with Colonel Foster, who is loosely mentioned in Pride and Prejudice. He is the one who takes Lydia, the youngest sister, off to Brighton and all hell breaks loose afterwards. And I was thinking, wow, there's a lot of cosplay that could come with a military queer woman. And I liked the idea, especially because I think when you're coming out and you're queer, a lot of women want to be EMTs or firefighters. I remember I went through a firefighting phase where I was living in Tahoe and I was like, 'I'm going to be a wilderness firefighter.' And I think there's something very attractive and sexy about being this outdoorsy, woodsy, 'I can take care of myself in survival mode' type. So I thought, 'Oh, Colonel Foster is going to be that sexy EMT/firefighter character, and it's going to be great.' But then I thought, how does Colonel Foster, if I've equated power and freedom to money, how is Colonel Foster going to be, how is she able to be free? And how is she able to marry a woman, walk around with men, and how is she able to be in this life? And I was thinking, well, I thought about the fact that in modern-day culture, the military is often pandered to people from low economic circumstances, and basically it's shown as your ticket out. 'Oh, you can use the GI Bill, you can get your education, you can make a name for yourself.' It's an escape from the circumstances from which you were born, but all you have to do is join the army. And I do think that that happens a lot. I think there are a lot of people who have no other opportunities. They're stuck. And they see the military as their way out.

Back in the day, if you were wealthy, you could buy a position in the army. You didn't have to be really good. But in this position, in this story, Colonel Foster is actually very good. She's very capable and she's earned her way to become a colonel all by her own merit.

So then I was faced with this other plot problem where Elizabeth Bennet, the character that I've painted for her, is a very feisty, independent, strong woman and she does want to be free and why would a woman who's incredibly feisty and independent and brave not choose to go into the army if that was available to her? Because I really don't see Elizabeth Bennet being very scared of very much. She's funny, she's charming. I think she could, theoretically, go into the army if she wanted to. So, I was in this plot problem where I've created a world in which Elizabeth Bennet, theoretically, could have been free on her own if she wanted to and she didn't need Mr. Darcy. And because part of the whole problem with Pride and Prejudice is that Elizabeth Bennet needs Mr. Darcy.

The moral of the story is, they don't have any money. Their property, their estate is entailed away. Theoretically, if their dad dies, they would literally have nothing. And, on top of that, because they don't have an education, and they weren't trained, they don't really have any skills. I say this with love, I'm not trying to diss the Bennet sisters, but they don't have any skills. So they couldn't... they don't have any practical skills. They couldn't even work in an inn if they wanted to. There was very little available to them, but they also couldn't be a governess, which is this thing that we all always see. In Jane Eyre, in these old novels, these women are going off to be a governess. So really, they're screwed. If their dad dies, they're screwed. So why would this girl, who's precocious and wonderful, not take an opportunity to save herself or protect her family? And put herself in a position where she does need to be married to essentially save herself from prostitution. They don't say that explicitly, but that is pretty much the only thing that would be available to them if they didn't get married, which is why Mrs. Bennet's pressure for them to get married is less of a funny joke and more of an act of care and an act of love. She's got her own problems, but it's an act of care.

So I was thinking about this, and this is where art, this is where I think that maybe I deviate from other writers, and I would be curious in the comments (not that anyone ever comments, but if someone should) how I deviate from other writers about the responsibility of art and how much an artist, how much a writer should show their influence and what is our role. And so my opinion of art, which I understand is incredibly controversial and borders on censorship (which I got into a discussion with a friend of mine about this and I realized I was coming across as Nancy Reagan, which is not cool because I don't want to be Nancy Reagan)... However, my personal value system is that stories have power and words have power and what we repeat is magnified. And I take that very seriously. On a daily basis, I try really hard not to share things that are negative and harmful. And I do think that a story can be violent. I really do. I really do think that words and stories can be violent. And I don't support art that is violent for no reason. I'm trying to find an example of art that feels where the violence feels purposeful versus just not. And this is where I think I really deviate, but I truly believe that it is through stories that we will change culture and we will change the world. And if the world is to be changed, if the world is to be saved, I do think the stories need to change. And I think our stories, our narratives right now are so rooted in trauma and revenge and violence. There's just violence everywhere. And I mean, I'm not even talking about murder and serial killers. I'm talking just harm in the way we speak about other people. Anyway, so I decided I was going to use this opportunity to make Elizabeth Bennet my little totem girl for nonviolence.

And I say this knowing that I may wish that I was a nonviolent person. I may not believe in violence. I don't believe in violence. I think violence begets more violence. I don't believe in war. I don't believe in it. And I know that I have some extreme, more militant friends and I understand their views, but that is not my personal view. I think that we need to eradicate violence on all levels. And I say this knowing (if you want to go back to my previous post about heroism and the fact that no one is going to be a hero)... I say this knowing that we are deeply enmeshed. As a white American, I am deeply enmeshed in violence and that my life is buoyed and supported by acts of violence. And that just by living my daily life—this computer I'm recording this on, this phone—everything is rooted in some harm across the world. I'm spiraling. Anyway, I'll get back to it. So I understand that I want to be nonviolent. However, I am violent in my existence. So I understand that's a confusing dichotomy. However, I do feel that... and I'm not trying to absolve or liberate myself from violence or try to wash my hands of it like Lady Macbeth saying, 'Out, damned spot!' I'm not trying to do that. However, I do think that it's important to aspirationally dream the world in which you want to live, or somehow change the story. And maybe this is me being naive, but this is where I'm at. Where I feel that I don't want to live in a violent world anymore and I want to raise awareness to the fact that we are living in a violent world every day. And so I decided to make Elizabeth Bennet not want to join the army because she doesn't want to kill or murder anyone and she has a line, which I probably should have saved earlier, but she's talking to (I'm not going to spoil it) some other colonels in the war... and I can't find it anyway, but basically she states her opinion right there. Which is that she's not going to take her freedom. She can't be free if she takes her freedom from somebody else. And so that is an explanation of how you're faced with a plot problem. The plot problem was, how do I create more gay people in this world? And then I'm forced to answer it with an ideological answer. So it's twofold. Plot problem, enter sexy firefighter EMT soldier lady Colonel Foster. Then, creates another plot problem, which is, why wouldn't Lizzie just join the army and be free? And I was able to share my ideological perspective that I don't think anyone should kill another human being. I just don't, I think it's wrong. I don't think we should do that as human beings. And so that was my, that's my story.

So anyway, you might be reading When Darcy Met Lizzie and you might think that it's just a story, just a story about two ladies getting it on. But really, you're reading my propaganda. My non-violent propaganda. No, I'm kidding. But really, I do think it's important, when you are given the opportunity to create and write, to consider the repercussions of your story. Even if literally 50 people read your book. Even if three people read your book, I think writing and creating forces you to think about things and question things and it forces you to take a stance and create a perspective and a story. So, that gets back to the responsibility of art. Should art be moral? Is that the responsibility of art? Or should art just be art, art for the sake of art? And I'm not going to go so far as to say that art should be moral, but I think that we should all understand the weight of stories and how powerful they are.

I also read this book, Parallel Lives, by Phyllis Rose, which was very good. It's about Victorian marriages, but she talks about John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor, and Harriet Taylor was married to a man and she fell in love with John Stuart Mill and this was in the 1850s, and remarriage was off the table. She basically wrote—she contributed to—that famous piece called On the Subjugation of Women. And this is a quote: She says marriage appeared to her 'no more than the transfer of a sexual commodity, with men getting all the pleasure and women getting all the disagreeables and pains.' Which is crazy. It's hard to think about this from this generation, that a woman would be thinking about this. But basically back in the day, you couldn't—I mean, still to this day, a lot of women can't say no—but if you're married, your husband... you just... you are literally his sex slave, which is what Harriet Taylor is saying in On the Subjugation of Women. And we don't think about it, right? But marriage and romance is a story. It's this idea of a monogamous marriage, this idea that we are bound to one person for life is a story and a lot of us are participating in it every day, and this story was created as a power dynamic and, in a lot of ways, for capitalism and property. So we can think, 'Oh, this is just a romantic storyline, this is just a really fun, nice story about two people who end up together.' And sure, that's true, but a lot of these stories of finding your one true love in your husband or your wife was literally a story used to force women into this property arrangement, right? And I think when you know the story, and when you see the inner workings of the story, you can choose, you can decide whether you want that story for yourself. I don't really know any woman alive who wants to be the sex slave of their partner, like Harriet Taylor was, but there are plenty of people who think that marriage is worth it for their own purposes. So anyway, this is an example of all of us engaging in a story that was told and created for us a long time ago. And if we don't expose the structure of the stories or choose to tell our own, better, different stories, we're basically just giving away our power. And no one wants that. Why give away your power? I mean, any more than we already have to.

And another thing that I was going to mention is that I read this book. I'm currently reading it. I'm not finished with it. Salvage: Readings from the Wreck by Dionne Brand. And I wish that this book just came out. And I wish that it had come out before I had written When Darcy Met Lizzie. Except sometimes thinking too much can be the enemy of creativity. But something I didn't address in When Darcy Met Lizzie was race. I didn't address it. For Darcy, I based her physical appearance on my girlfriend, who's Brazilian and she was born in Rio and she has traditional mixed Brazilian heritage. So I described Darcy as having her physical attributes, which are really curly, coarse hair, very tan skin. And obviously that wouldn't have been Darcy back in the day. Darcy would have been a white woman. But, so anyway, I subvert race a little bit by just making Darcy and her family look the way that my girlfriend looks and the way her family looks, and that was just a subtle way of basically saying that not everyone in this world is white. But I didn't address it. I didn't talk about colonialism. I didn't talk about slavery. I didn't deal with it. I know that Bridgerton deals with it in its own way in the TV show and it's not satisfactory to a lot of people. But anyway, I wanted to talk about this in terms of stories, because Dionne Brand is basically talking about how the reading culture, the canon, and reading things like Pride and Prejudice (she talks about Mansfield Park in this book) actually did her harm. As a person of color, this canon, this literary canon that we're all supposed to read, just bolsters and further supports this culture of whiteness and colonialism. And let's read this section that I thought was good.

One second. She says (so she's talking about Vanity Fair, which is another book from that time), 'I propose that the colonial event is the aesthetic, that its pleasures, tastes, manners, consist of this juxtaposition. What is pleasing, what is in beautiful form, is the violence.' And what else does she say? She says, 'the wealth is a given, not the subject in question.' So, talking about the fact that all of these people in Vanity Fair—and, specifically in Mansfield Park, the Bertram family—get all their money from slave plantations. But it's implied this money's coming from somewhere. I don't know where Darcy's money came from, but in my world, it doesn't come from slavery. Anyway. She says, 'everyone, meaning individuals and companies, had their hands in slavery and colonial exploitation. Just as today, individuals and corporations have their hands in extracting oil or minerals and producing electronics as they destroy the earth on which we live and the oceans, waterways, and air, while describing their actions in terms of jobs, livelihoods, and wealth as a right of the rich.' And then 'the colonial conquest embedded in the book without any of the actors from those places speaking, but rather appearing as immutable.' What she's trying to say, and which I just wish this book had come out when I was in high school... I think it would have changed my perspective on things. But what she's trying to say is that these books that we so treasure are really holding up a violent ideology, and that these stories, the stories of Pride and Prejudice, this colonial wealth that we all kind of romanticize like the Cinderella story, is really just upholding these colonial views that we are engaging in today.

My girlfriend said something that I thought was really profound the other day, which is that this war on immigration is similar to the war on drugs, which is just this idea that in the Northwestern Hemisphere, we are addicted to commodities. We're addicted to s**t. We're addicted to stuff. And in order to get this stuff, we need to funnel more stuff in at a really high rate, which we just can't. We can't get our stuff. We can't generate this much s**t on our own. And as a result, we need cheap labor. We need a story. We need a story to support this addiction, right? Because it's just not sustainable. We can't, you and I can't live in this world where we have really fancy devices and cheap groceries if we don't engage or partake in some version, essentially, of slave labor. And our modern-day way of getting that slave labor is through undocumented migrants, right?

So, another example, besides marriage, of a story that we're living in today, is the story of the undocumented, illegal alien. And that they are a criminal, and that they're bad for America. And why is this story so important? Why would so many people care that there are these undocumented—not even undocumented, illegal—aliens? They're everywhere. They're criminals. They're coming, why do we f*****g care? Who cares? Why do we make anyone a villain? Why do we make anyone a bad guy? It's because if you make someone a villain, or if you make them a bad person, or if you make them a monster, you take away their rights. Monsters don't have rights. The dragon dies, Godzilla dies, Sauron dies, monsters have no feelings, they're not free, they don't have liberty, right? So the first thing you want to do if you want to take advantage of someone, if you want to strip them of their rights, is you tell a story, you tell a really f*****g good story that they are a monster. And if you tell that story good enough, well enough, suddenly you have an entire population that believes that there are all these monsters out there that don't deserve basic human rights. And what happens when you have a whole population of people who don't deserve basic human rights is then suddenly you have all these people that you can just exploit and no one cares if you exploit them because they're monsters. They have no rights. You can not pay them. You can have undocumented child migrants working in meatpacking plants that are eight, nine years old, doing all sorts of dangerous labors. And no one f*****g cares because you have told a story so well that they are bad, right? So, it's funny, it's honestly laughable to me. I mean, it's not laughable, it's horrendous, it's awful. But all these people out there who think that Trump was saying that he built a border wall. If you look at a map, the wall is literally a piece of fiction. It is a story piece. Yes, there are pieces of the wall that were built, there are. I've seen the wall, yes, it does exist. There are pieces, but there are also huge gaps in the wall. It was never completed and it was never intended to be completed. The whole point is that they want people to come in to America. We need undocumented labor. America runs on undocumented labor. We could not function. The reason America has cheap groceries (everyone's complaining about the price of groceries) is because we have undocumented labor, right? And that's just the state of affairs, but you tell the story of this big wall, right? Suddenly you have... that is literally out of a fairy tale, like Sleeping Beauty. The big bad witch built the wall of brambles or something.

So anyway, that's the point of stories, right? We can, to bring it back to my point, the point is that stories matter. We live stories every day. You and I are participating actively in a story right now where the world is trying to tell us that undocumented migrants in the United States of America have no rights and that they're monsters. And the reason we're doing that is so that we can exploit them and use them so that we can live our lives without having to understand that our lives have consequences and are unsustainable, right? But you tell a good story that marriage is good for women, and suddenly you have women like Harriet Taylor exposing the truth that, actually, women are commodities.

Anyway, so the moral of the story is, I take stories very seriously. I think it's important for everyone to take stories seriously. And I don't think we should be naive and just assume that when we're creating art, we don't have the potential for propagating and perpetuating harm.

This is why I should just write an essay and not just talk, because clearly this is a rambly piece. But the flip side is, obviously: should we make art that only has a good moral? Because no one likes to be preached at and obviously no one, it's not very productive to constantly just be writing things that are about good people doing good things. No one wants the Ted Lassos of the book world to just be the only books we have available. We need complicated rich stories. So where does it lie? What do we do?

So the truth is I don't really have an answer to this question of what is the responsibility of the artist and what do we owe the audience, real or imagined, even if it's just ourselves. I don't have, I wish I could tell you a prescription, but I guess that's the whole point that we can't prescribe other people's experiences or lives. But I did want to share with you all something that has brought me solace over the last few years, that my friend Sheila Heti wrote to me in an email in 2020. And I have this printed and it's sometimes just a really helpful touchstone for me when I feel dark and lost. And I think I just wanted to share it with you all. And this was something that was sent in an email. So, here it is:

I know what you mean about feeling like the books have to help people in some way. I think it's the times we're living in. We live in such "non-fiction" times where everyone seems to be a journalist or online with some agenda, and also we know more about the horrible realities and problems that other people are experiencing, and we know the world needs us for a million things, and we can easily forget the value of art (which is a form that doesn’t always know what it’s saying) in the midst of all this. Maybe this has been the case in every era in history, but it seems especially so now.

Everything we make, we have to imagine into some huge river of information and utility and talk, and that can also be intimidating: how does it fit into this rush of words and pictures; a lot of it with a very legitimate moral claim? How do we come to feel that our art, or art at all, has a moral claim, or a right to take up time and space?

I think the only answer to that is to think of the art that has had value in your own life, the books you've loved, that have stayed with you or formed you, and just see what they are when you look at them all together: What is art? What is a novel? What does it give us? Did the writer mean to help us, or can we be helped even if they didn't, and isn't there something outside of help that is valuable? I don't think books "help" me, not the ones I love best. I think they just stretch the universe I'm living in, so that it encompasses more. Like those dreams where you visit a house you know and then there are suddenly more rooms? A great novel is like the world we're living in, which we think we know, but look—now it suddenly has more rooms!

At least, that's how I feel about it today. I think that's always worth something. I think it's not clear what makes a novel one of those "more rooms" versus what makes it flat and just the same room as the one that you've been living in. We just don't live in a time that knows how to say what the imagination or art is for. But surely a world without the products of the human imagination wouldn't be worth much. I guess some of us have to be the fools who make these rooms, who have that as their faith, that it’s genuinely worth something.

I just find that so comforting. And so, I think she has an interesting thing to say, which is: I don't think art is there to save people or help people. But I do think it's there to make more rooms. And I do think, as a writer, even of a silly fan fiction remake of Pride and Prejudice, I do think I want to build more rooms. I want to make the world a bigger, safer, more expansive, more beautiful place. And I do think that that's what writing is for. Anyway, if you've made it this long, you deserve a treasure, and I will give you one in your subconscious right now. Okay, bye!

P.S. I just watched it and I think it's worth explicitly stating, even though it was implied, but I don't think I explicitly stated it. I one hundred percent don't think undocumented immigrants in the United States are monsters. I think that what is happening is that our government and the political world as well as people like business owners and the economic system that we're in is deeply committed to telling a story that undocumented migrants and immigrants to the United States are monsters, so that we, the American public, especially white Americans, can benefit from their exploited labor. So I'm saying that we are living in a story. We are complicit in a harmful story. That's what I'm trying to say. I don't believe that anyone is a monster. That's another belief that I have. Okay. And then the other thing I wanted to say, because it occurred to me when I was doing this, I was just speaking off the cuff. But I did want to explain a little bit about why it is impossible for me as an aspiring nonviolent person to claim that I am nonviolent. And this is a tangible explanation that I wanted to share with you.

So I wanted to explain the hypocrisy of ideology versus reality. And so there's this article that came out in The Atlantic. 'The Trump administration accidentally texted me its war plans.' And the goal of the article is basically to talk about the security breach that happened, which is crazy and I don't even want to get into it. What I find more enlightening, or not even enlightening, but what should be the focus is the fact that the United States government orchestrated attacks on Yemen, and the Houthi terrorist organization. Supposedly, we blamed terrorism and national security. But in the text messages or in the Signal messages, JD Vance... Well, let me just see who is exactly saying it. It might not be JD Vance who said it specifically. Pete Hegseth says, basically they're debating whether or not they should bomb Yemen, bomb a country with bombs. He says that there are two benefits to it. One is restoring freedom of navigation, a core interest, and reestablishing deterrence. So what they're saying about the freedom of navigation is essentially that because of these Houthi—basically resistance, arguably justified resistance—there has been (let me quote) a 70% decrease in trade. Let me just confirm. 70% decrease in trade volumes, shipments basically, as a result of these strikes. So there was a 70% decrease in volume. So essentially the United States, we were experiencing, I think, 5% decrease in trade because of this shipping blockade, navigation blockade, and then Europe was experiencing a 40% decrease in trade. So essentially what is happening is that there was shipment for f*****g products. So products, it is s**t, it is stuff. It is that people and human beings were bombed by the United States of America in order for us to get shipments of products. That should be the headline. It should not be that the Trump administration texted the war plans. It should be the fact that in order to get our products and in order to get our things, they were—human lives were lost. And I think that that is the thing that we don't understand sometimes is that our lives are so buoyed (and I'm speaking as an American here right now; I'm not trying to put this on the world), but our access to these things is creating destruction and death. And so I don't even know why I'm laughing, but the point is that I think as much as I want When Darcy Met Lizzie to be this totem of nonviolence, I also think it's equally important to recognize our complicity in this world, and I don't have an answer. I think that the answer that I have is the same answer as before, which is that in our lives, in our daily lives and in our work, whether it's stories or actual work, I think it's important for us to try to live truly with as much integrity as it is possible to live in a darkly enmeshed, entangled life.

Anyway, so I thank you for listening to this Postscript, but I just wanted to clarify a few things because I had to do it. Okay, for real though. Goodnight. Bye.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Hi lovely people 👋

Here’s a little fireside chat that details my motivations for writing an open door romance. If you’ve ever wondered why anyone would want to write a spicy, lesbian retelling of Pride and Prejudice, this video contains the answers! I talk about our largest sex organ, imagination, stories, and this iconic scene.

In this video, I reference:

* Come As You Are, Emily Nagoski

* OMGYES

* The Blue Hour, Laura Pritchett

* Dipsea

* Culture Study Podcast, The Expansive World of Queer Romance

This little fireside chat is NSFW, but I hope my vulnerability will help enable us all to live the healthy and satisfying lives we deserve ❤️ Welcome to my Island.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Dear Internet,

Meet the cover of When Darcy Met Lizzy, designed by my very talented friend Jessie Broom.

Isn’t she beautiful?!

First, some housekeeping.

Thank you all for contributing to my previous Kickstarter for When Darcy Met Lizzy!

Unfortunately, I didn’t meet my fundraising goal. Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing platform, meaning that your project isn't funded if you don’t meet your goal. This is a good thing and protects artists from having to deliver something if they don’t get funding.

GOOD NEWS! I will still do preorders for When Darcy Met Lizzy via Kickstarter, but instead of printing a limited edition hardback, which would cost $4000 😬, I will stick with a paperback version. I was also generously supported by some of my friends, which will help lower the overall costs. This means that instead of raising $9800, I need to raise $3000 to cover the audiobook cost.

BAD NEWS! If you preordered your copy the first time, you’ll have to order again. This is a major pain in the ass, I know! But you weren’t charged for your previous preorder, and if you still want the book or audiobook, you’ll need to do this anyway, whether it’s on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Audible. So, no matter what, if you want to hear Darcy and Lizzy get it on, you’ll need to do this again 🥵 (p.s. I have never used this emoji so much in my entire life lol).

The moral of the story: sometimes you make budgeting mistakes, and you need to recalibrate. Listen to Angie McMahon tell you it’s okay to make mistakes. I listen almost every day, highly recommend.

So, why preorder via Kickstarter?

You’ll still get the book or the audiobook. If you buy them both together, you get five dollars off. But the only real difference is that if you contribute through Kickstarter and not via Amazon, Jeff Bezos and his cronies won’t get extra money 💸 Don’t get me wrong, they will still get money. But not nearly as much. And I’d rather keep the money raised from queer joy out of the hands of big corporations.

How can I preorder?

Click this link and select the product of your choice! Options include an audiobook performed by the lovely Lilli Hokama or a signed paperback copy.

Now for the good stuff!

Here’s another teaser for When Darcy Met Lizzy. This is the third chapter of When Darcy Met Lizzy. I chose this chapter because it explicitly explores the speculative spin WDML takes on this classic. It’s told from Mr. Darcy’s perspective and focuses on her experience as a “woman gentleman.”

I repeat! I will not be reading the final audiobook. My talented friend, Lilli Hokama will be doing the honors!

So, without further ado, Chapter 3, folks!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.artworkpodcast.io

Hi lovely humans,

I thought I’d give you a little teaser of When Darcy Met Lizzy! Here are the first two chapters ❤️

If you like what you hear, consider pre-ordering the book. Pre-orders are super important in the publishing industry, and they’re even more essential for indie authors. You can pre-order the audiobook, the paperback, or the limited hardback edition.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sammiedowning.substack.com