“there Is Nothing Outside Of Yourself That Can Ever Enable You To Get Better, Stronger, Richer, Quicker,

Miniature English Drawing Room of the Late Jacobean Period, 1680-1702

Narcissa Niblack Thorne & Unknown Artisans

c.1937

Art Institute of Chicago (Reference Number: 1941.1189)

Lenu’s Florentine Apartment (L’Amica Geniale)

i've come to realize there are only two kinds of tragedies: preventable and inevitable. preventable tragedies are the kind where everything could have maybe worked out if only. if only romeo had gotten the second letter. if only juliet had woken up earlier. if only creon had changed his mind about antigone sooner. if only orpheus hadn't turned around.

inevitable tragedies are the kind where everything was always going to end terribly. of course macbeth gets deposed, he murdered his way to the throne. of course oedipus goes mad, he married his own mother. of course achilles dies in the war, he had to fulfill the prophecy in order to avenge his lover.

both kinds have their merits. the first is more emotionally impactful, letting the audience cling to hope until the very end, when it's snatched away all at once leaving nothing but a void. the second is more thematically resonant, tracking an inherent fatal flaw in its hero to a natural and understandable conclusion, making it abundantly clear why everything has to happen the way it does.

Ocean Vuong, “A Letter to my Mother that She Will Never Read” The New Yorker, May 2017 

when ethel cain said “i tried to be good am i no good am i no good am i no good” which started with her self-loathing after being abused by her father and neil perry said “i was good. i was really good” and then he killed himself because he knew that he would never be good enough for his father

thinking about elena ferrante and the neapolitan quartet and the line — 'if nothing could save us, not money, not a male body, and not even studying, we might as well destroy everything immediately.'

Led Zeppelin in 1970:

humans are so beautiful

faces dated from 2,000 years ago carved in stone at the Lajes Archaeological Site in Manaus, Brazil

I’m obsessed

Photos of Ethel taken in Paris by fans via her Instagram story

Photos by hollysdigital and groovymochi