#36 Embracing the winter within you

On 'wintering', feeling out of sync with everyday life, and a poem to soothe your soul.

Dec 10, 2021

I was listening the other day to an abridged version of “Wintering” by Katherine May, a memoir about the author’s struggle to deal with her own bad times, feeling low, overwhelmed, and out of sync with everyday life. She calls it “wintering”: “a fallow period in life when you’re cut off from the world, feeling rejected, sidelined, blocked from progress or cast into the role of an outsider.”

We’ve all experienced what May describes, perhaps even more this year, adjusting to new ways of socialising, working or studying amid a pandemic that doesn’t show any signs of winding down (hi, Omicron!). Maybe “wintering” is a good opportunity to rest, slow down, and recharge your batteries – things you’ve heard before but that you do not give much attention to. (guilty as charged!) No room for misery; just acceptance.

Let’s reframe the way we view winter: it’s not only cold frosts and darkness but also a time for contemplation and renewal, for comfort, good food and a talk beside the fire. Let’s even go as far as to romanticise it: get in your PJs, curl up with a warm blanket and soothing hot chocolate, and pick a book or watch your favourite film.

“I recognised winter. I greeted it and let it in...Nature shows that survival is a practice” – Katherine May, “Wintering”

Here’s my choice for you – a poem about light, hope, and freedom from one of the most influential and widely read 20th-century poets of the Americas – Pablo Neruda, “Horses.”

Hope you enjoy it … and it makes you smile. :)

“From the window I saw the horses.
I was in Berlin, in winter. The light
had no light, the sky had no heaven.
The air was white like wet bread.
And from my window a vacant arena,
bitten by the teeth of winter.
Suddenly driven out by a man,
ten horses surged through the mist.
Like waves of fire, they flared forward
and to my eyes filled the whole world,
empty till then. Perfect, ablaze,
they were like ten gods with pure white hoofs,
with manes like a dream of salt.
Their rumps were worlds and oranges.
Their color was honey, amber, fire.
Their necks were towers
cut from the stone of pride,
and behind their transparent eyes
energy raged, like a prisoner.
There, in silence, at mid-day,
in that dirty, disordered winter,
those intense horses were the blood
the rhythm, the inciting treasure of life.
I looked. I looked and was reborn:
for there, unknowing, was the fountain,
the dance of gold, heaven
and the fire that lives in beauty.
I have forgotten that dark Berlin winter.
I will not forget the light of the horses.”

📣 Coming up:

News on the oddest book title of the year, the classic dystopian novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, fake book editions on Amazon, and more. Plus, eco“liquid trees,” camels enhanced with Botox, and pancakes!

Until next Friday …

Happy reading, happy learning,

Teodora x

🥁 📚 The latest in the literary world

In case you were wondering why some books have odd titles, it might be because they’re keen to win the “Oddest Book Title of the Year”. 🤷 Yep, it’s a real thing and readers have a say in this. The 2021 winner is Roy Schwartz’s “Is Superman Circumcised?,” a study of the superhero’s Jewish influence, which secured the victory after competition from second-placed “The Life Cycle of Russian Things: From Fish Guts to Fabergé.” Other contenders for the prize ranged from “Curves for the Mathematically Curious” to “Hats: A Very Unnatural History.” 🤦‍♀️
A feminist retelling of “Nineteen Eighty-Four”? Yes, please! 🙌 I’ve always wondered how the story would be from the perspective of Winston Smith’s lover, Julia, and now – finally – American writer Sandra Newman is going to do it! The book will be published after Newman’s upcoming novel “The Men,” which chronicles the events following the disappearance of every person on earth with a Y chromosome. 🤔
Journalist Chris Cuomo’s forthcoming book, “Deep Denial,” will no longer be released by HarperCollins after his CNN firing. 🤨 Cuomo has been accused of helping his brother, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, to fight accusations of sexual misconduct that led to the governor’s resignation earlier this year. Of course, the host of Cuomo Prime Time isn’t a saint either; he is facing his own allegations of workplace sexual harassment. 😒 “Deep Denial” was set to be published in the fall of 2022 after its initial January publication date was pushed back.
Science fiction thriller writer John C. Boland is suing Amazon for selling fake editions of his books, listed as “centuries-old”. The novelist has found copies of his book, “Hominid”, priced between $907 and $987 – the book’s actual price is $15. Another book of his was listed on Amazon for $1008, when Boland himself sold the book for $7. 🤯 “When a seller claims to have a 1602 edition that it’s charging nearly $1,000 for, it’s defaming me by implying that the book existed before I wrote it — i.e., that I’m a plagiarist,” Boland told the New York Times. Unsurprisingly, Amazon has denied responsibility. 🙄
Investigative reporter Patrick Radden Keefe is donating his £10,000 prize cash to charity after one of the award’s sponsors was McKinsey & Co. 💰Keefe, who won the Baillie Gifford prize for nonfiction in November for “Empire of Pain,” an investigation into the Sackler family, said on Twitter that it woud be “hypocritical” to accept the award from the consultancy firm which advised the Sacklers on how to “turbocharge” sales of OxyContin. 👏

🎧 📰 👀 My media diet this week

Millions of Followers? For Book Sales, ‘It’s Unreliable.’ | The New York Times. Why read this? An insightful article on how a large social media following doesn’t always translate into book sales, and the risks publishers take when deciding whether to acquire a book.💡Plus, how Billie Eilish’s self-titled book has performed since its release in May this year. Spoiler alert: not that well! 😬
BBC World News presenter Yalda Hakim talks personal taste | Financial Times. Why read this? Yalda’s house is pretty. She is pretty. Also, exemplary taste in literature 📚, food 🥘, fashion 👜, and art 🖼️ – on top of being a brilliant journalist. Basically, I’m fangirling. #sorrynotsorry BONUS: Take a look at Yalda’s recent reporting from Afghanistan, her country of birth, where she returned for the first time since the Taliban swept to power in August.
The Terror Queue | The Verge. Why read this? The article reminded me, in some parts, of my time at TikTok, as it explores the damaging and long-lasting consequences content moderators take upon themselves when working for giant companies such as Google and YouTube. 🙈 From personal experience – and I have fortunately managed to break free from that environment – is that regardless of the amount of training, benefits, and apparent support, the content you are exposed to is disturbing. Once you see it… you cannot unsee it. 🙃 “Every day you watch someone beheading someone, or someone shooting his girlfriend. After that, you feel like wow, this world is really crazy. This makes you feel ill.”

📌 Random news in brief

Belgrade has come up with a “liquid tree” to fight back against air pollution.🌳
What do “cheugy,” “omicron,” and the Greek tennis player Stefanos Tsitsipas have in common? They’re all among the most mispronounced words of 2021, according to the U.S. Captioning Company. 🤭
More than 40 camels have been disqualified from Saudi Arabia’s beauty contest for receiving Botox injections and other cosmetic enhancements. 🐪 👄
The world’s only maple syrup strategic reserve in Quebec will be unlocked to keep up with the soaring demand given by the pandemic. 🍁 There’s one thing to have toilet paper shortages, but can you imagine no maple syrup in pancakes?! 🥞

Before we say goodbye… 🥺

If you liked this issue of the newsletter, please click on the 💜 button, so I know I’m doing a good job. There’s always the option to leave a comment with your feedback. I promise I’ll always reply!

The Culture Worm

Discussion about this post