On the last day of December, 2009 Kate Zambreno began a blog called Frances Farmer Is My Sister, arising from her obsession with the female modernists and her recent transplantation to Akron, Ohio, where her husband held a university job. Widely reposted, Zambreno’s blog became an outlet for her highly informed and passionate rants about the fates of the modernist “wives and mistresses.” In her blog entries, Zambreno reclaimed the traditionally pathologized biographies of Vivienne Eliot, Jane Bowles, Jean Rhys, and Zelda Fitzgerald: writers and artists themselves who served as male writers’ muses only to end their lives silenced, erased, and institutionalized. Over the course of two years, Frances Farmer Is My Sister helped create a community where today’s “toxic girls” could devise a new feminist discourse, writing in the margins and developing an alternative canon.

In Heroines, Zambreno extends the polemic begun on her blog into a dazzling, original work of literary scholarship. Combing theories that have dictated what literature should be and who is allowed to write it–from T. S. Eliot’s New Criticism to the writings of such mid-century intellectuals as Elizabeth Hardwick and Mary McCarthy to the occasional “girl-on-girl crime” of the Second Wave of feminism–she traces the genesis of a cultural template that consistently exiles female experience to the realm of the “minor,” and diagnoses women for transgressing social bounds. “ANXIETY: When she experiences it, it’s pathological,” writes Zambreno. “When he does, it’s existential.” By advancing the Girl-As-Philosopher, Zambreno reinvents feminism for her generation while providing a model for a newly subjectivized criticism.

[forthcoming from Semiotext(e)/The MIT Press in November 2012]

• I am of the nature to grow old.
There is no way to escape growing old

• I am of the nature to have ill health.
There is no way to escape ill health.

• I am of the nature to die.
There is no way to escape death.

• All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change.
There is no way to escape being separated from them

• My actions are my only true belongings.
I cannot escape the consequences of my actions.
My actions are the ground upon which I stand.

(Anguttara Nikaya 5.57)

Marina Abramović, “Self Portrait with Skeleton” (2003)

We also need to let go of our expectations of a good or bad outcome regarding pain. Sometimes something can be done to alleviate our pain. Sometimes there is nothing to be done about pain, except to experience it. So be it. Our expectations of being pain-free can fill us with anxiety and disappointment. Our practice is to learn to accept pain, bear witness to it, and remember that it will change for better or for worse. Pain then reminds us to open to not-knowing.

When I sit with a dying person, I try to do whatever I can to help relieve pain and suffering. Sometimes there is something that can be done: kind words, medication, meditation, physical touch, or simply bearing witness and being present. But maybe there is nothing but suffering and misery. I need to respect this experience of being trapped in misery. At the same time I know that suffering and pain are transitory, and if I look deeply enough, I see that beneath the misery is an unconditioned realm that is free of ill-being.

I try to open to both suffering and freedom from suffering. If I see only suffering, then I am caught in the relative nature of existence: we are nothing but suffering. If I see only the pure and vast heart, then I am denying the truth of our human experience. I also need to let go of my expectations of a good outcome, even though they may give inspiration and energy to my practice. I have learned that my attachment to a pain-free outcome can cause more pain and suffering. At the same time, I do the best I can to help.

Imagine sitting with a dying person, someone in intractable pain. Imagine feeling his pain and suffering with compassion and kindness. Now look through the pain and suffering to the very ground of this one’s being, that unshakable heart, where all categories, dualities, cravings, delusions, and dislikes have never been. See her true nature, free from all ill-being, and at the same time, see the truth of this one’s suffering.

For many of us, our pain has brought meaning and depth to our lives, and guided us to our spiritual practice. Our willingness to be with pain and suffering and at the same time see the dying person’s or our own true nature is one of the most important capacities of a caregiver.

This is why you are encouraged to explore your own pain and suffering as a way to uncover the unmoving truth within your own being. This may lead you to see in a pure way the basic goodness that is the true heart of all beings, that which connects us in the spirit of non-duality. You will see the truth of suffering and the truth of well-being—and the truth of their interdependence. Your own willingness and practice foster your ability to look through the pain deeply, with stability. So please become a good friend to your pain and try not to reject it.

Sometimes sitting with people who are in pain and suffering is pretty hard to take. We want so much to do something; we may feel helpless, heartbroken, and even angry. What can we offer? The treasure that many of us forget is our compassionate and equanimous presence. This presence also exists within the one who is suffering. Often there is nothing to do but be present for pain and suffering just as it is. Our ability to be present for suffering can help the sufferer also be present. Remembering our strong back and soft front, we can offer equanimity and compassion and perhaps inspire the same for the one who is suffering.

[from Being with Dying by Joan Jiko Halifax]

[artist & painter Alexandra Eldridge, who lives/works in Santa Fe]

It’s something people are so powerless over, and so often they want to make it your fault.

It’s nobody’s fault. I started thinking of suicide when I was 10 years old—I can’t believe that that’s somebody’s fault. Like, “Oh, you’re just an attention getter.” Mental illness isn’t seen as an illness, it’s seen as a choice.

Slate: Or a weakness.

Bamford: Yeah. I have a joke about how people don’t talk about mental illness the way they do other regular illnesses. “Well, apparently Jeff has cancer. Uh, I have cancer. We all have cancer. You go to chemotherapy you get it taken care of, am I right? You get back to work.” Or: “I was dating this chick, and three months in, she tells me that she wears glasses, and she’s been wearing contact lenses all this time. She needs help seeing. I was like, listen, I’m not into all that Western medicine shit. If you want to see, then work at it. Figure out how not to be so myopic. You know?”

Slate: Right. And then people who suffer from mental illness feel ashamed, making it even harder for them to talk about it with other people—where if you had a “regular” illness, people would speak much more openly about it.

Bamford: Yeah, it’d be like, “Let’s pink-ribbon it up!”

Slate: By talking about these things in your act, you’re countering some of the silence that otherwise clouds them. Is that something you’re conscious of as you work on your material?

Bamford: Well, a lot of it is selfish, I think. If I talk about it, then maybe somebody will talk about it to me. I don’t know if there’s as much much nobility in it as I would hope.

Slate: Maybe it’s not intentional nobility. Maybe it’s accidental nobility.

Bamford: Maybe. But….at least I can try to change it for myself. Because I feel super insecure and embarrassed and ashamed about mental health issues. That’s why I want to talk about it.

“Stand-up Comedy and Mental Illness: A Conversation with Maria Bamford” by David Haglund, 10 May 2012

And back it slid – and I alone –
A Speck upon a Ball –
Went out upon Circumference –
Beyond the Dip of Bell –

Georgia O'Keeffe, "Black Abstraction" (1927)

Tell It Slant portrays the little-known story of Emily Dickinson as a young woman, tracing an emotionally volatile love triangle involving  Emily, her brother Austin, and their intimate friend Susan Gilbert. Set in the Dickinson family’s Amherst home and environs, the play follows Emily through her formative years. Inwardly rebellious, but outwardly obedient, she continually finds herself at odds with the social expectations of the time. Calling herself “a boy,” Emily bands together with her older brother Austin against the authority of their parents and the oppressive evangelism of the 1840s.

As Emily tries to define herself in a world that has few options for women, she experiences uncertainty and finally a betrayal that plunges her into deep despair. The play explores the creative process through which Emily discovers her remarkable poetic voice. For her, the process of creation is playful, curious, rebellious, dangerous, unexpected, and finally redemptive.

I’m in the middle of my research prospectus in a coffee shop with ridiculous “classic rock” playing (um, Phil Collins is not classic rock?) and so daren’t listen to the sound files; but, note to self, this exists! I really like the look Emily is giving Austin in that picture. Kind of like: Yeah, and your point is?