#scurf 90: on shaping this newsletter, its three year anniversary and my mangled reading habits

a little bit of reworking of this newsletter has been on the cards. as it turns three (!!!) i am going ahead with the rework and give it a more definite shape.

now the letter will be a bit more focused on my what I am reading, which will compose of long form, creative nonfiction, memoirs and essays. occasionally i will also throw in a book of essays that i am currently reading and how the things in these books, essays, make me feel.

this week i will talk about this essay by Hanna Cohen in The Offing. it is an essay about writing nonfiction and fan fiction: https://theoffingmag.com/insight/the-last-fanfiction-i-ever-wrote/

this took me to the weird, long lost and beautiful places that good writing is meant to take one. but these places were more meaningful because i had been through them all. their serpentine ways, always leading back to the one before, the ways writing and the world around it can be contrived. cohen treads carefully while also calling a lot of writing unfulfilling. almost a year into publishing my kind of nonfiction, i can vouch for that feeling of disillusionment. not a day goes by when i don't fret about not having written, brainstormed or pitched. not a night goes by when i don't lament the fact that i am not reading enough. pandemic or no pandemic, people who have known me, know how much i hate stepping outdoors and not reading. but there are days these days when i just don't read or write or think. i hit a brick wall over and over again, and i come around to respecting it.

i have only one small thing to add to Cohen's anxieties, the constant feeling of being ungrateful, of being an impostor, of being insufficient as a writer, as a woman writer. i have to take a few hundred steps back, rethink, revaluate, rejig my priorities every now and then. more so, since i am woman. as much as i love my independence and lack of any immediate responsibilities, i shudder to think of the tribulations of the writing world at large. perhaps i should give it all up and not write at all, i think to myself. but the next moment a thought bubble opens itself up and a part of me leaves to attend to that chain of thought.

the problem with us writers as a breed is that we think a tad too much, or we think nothing at all. the cold detached-ness is as wretched and harmful as the overemotional responses to seemingly banal things. as much as i wish for a balance, i also am thankful for this skewed perspective. i'm listening to bob dylan's nasal careening while typing this out, and it wants to rip my hair apart. i think, since a lot many things are not in my control, i will start with switching to joan baez, and settling for her diamonds and rust.

readings for the last couple of weeks have been staggered, in bursts or not much at all. after june-july 2020, i have discovered my reading abilities back, and in a way i am inhaling books. samantha irby's book of essays meaty is on my list now, as is cusk's trilogy. but before it all, i snorted this little book which has left me with a mountain of thoughts -- Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata. it is equal parts funny and deep, calls for a way of looking at things and that will tell you a ton about your own self.

writing is extremely lonely and frankly what no one tells us about it, its pretty sadness inducing. and all the rum and cognac in the world makes us beholden to this habit all over again, we return to it, like cherubic little angels looking for absolute ablution. as much as i wish for literary companionship, i know to be able to keep up with 'friends' will take a person bigger, larger than me. so i stay ample and sufficient in the drinks, the pencils and all the new books my pals are sending my way. here's a list of things i read and enjoyed this month. i also run a monthly reading thread on twitter, feel free to give me a follow:

january reading thread:
https://twitter.com/anandi010/status/1345050999858204673?s=20

my recently published essay:
https://www.essaydaily.org/2021/01/anandi-mishra-case-for-twitter-as-mfa.html

all of my writing:
https://anandimishra.contently.com/

essays to read:
https://granta.com/having-and-being-had/
https://lithub.com/the-deep-connection-of-west-virginias-indian-community/
https://www.frieze.com/article/brief-history-sweetness-america

music recco: joan baez' diamonds & rust (and almost everything by her)
follow me on twitter: https://twitter.com/anandi010