Despair

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  I needed a new dream. One so buoyant that it could float like a hot air balloon and pull me out of the depths. As a child I’d imagined pretty clothes, a crown on my head, or a chocolate candy tree to keep myself from despair. I’d visualized myself as a famous movie star whom everyone wanted to touch, so I wouldn’t care that no one touched me. I’d promised myself I would become a famous writer with her picture in a magazine, so it would no longer hurt that I was all but invisible. Later I’d imagined myself as a distinguished professor of literature so that people would have to respect me. But having failed at those dreams, it was harder now to put my faith in a ginned-up fantasy to comfort myself. Now I knew the charlatan’s gears behind my compensatory trick. But I did it anyway. I looked at my tear-ravaged face in the mirror and told myself: You will go to film school and become the most renowned woman film director in the world. You will no longer be the fragile woman who was dumped and fell apart. You will be powerful and admired and you will direct movies that will win Academy Awards. No one will know that you fell off the wall and shattered. No one will be able to see the million cracks. It will not matter that you were admitted to film school without qualifying. No one will guess that you no longer care and have no hope, because you will act so driven that you will fool even yourself. CHAPTER 30 Malibu, California, 1974-75 TRISTINE I WAS ABANDONED AND ABANDONED again, and then I abandoned myself. I abandoned my hard-won career, and once I’d returned to LA, I abandoned my body to one man after another, just for the thrill. When my plane landed at 5 a.m. at LAX, I hit the ground running on adrenalin. Arriving by taxi at the beach house at dawn, I cleaned the house, re-arranged the remaining furniture, napped for an hour on the cold waterbed, and showed up at UCLA in time to register for a full load of film production classes. Now I had to keep running hard and fast enough to keep the wolf of depression from catching my heels. My mother could not have been pleased with my surprise visit after I told her that being an English prof hadn’t worked out and I’d enrolled in film school. But she allowed herself no sign of disappointment, sautéed me a plate of mushrooms—my favorite dish—and offered me furniture from her endless stash to replace what Philip had taken from the beach house.

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  13 o Why did a military defeat and a national displacement serve as a catalyst for the collection and editing of a nation’s history? Periods of national crisis are often followed by a reshaping of a nation’s story, as we see in our own history with such events as the Vietnam War or 9/11. • Although the Bible does not give us a great deal of detail concerning the individual experiences of deported Judeans, we can make some generalizations based on what we know to be the military practices of Babylonia in this period. Judeans at all levels of society may well have been forced to watch as their family members were killed, as was the case with King Zedekiah. They would have seen their homes burned and their sacred sites looted. • Tens of thousands of Judeans were probably taken into exile. They would have traveled from Jerusalem north into Syria, east across southern Turkey, and finally, south along the Euphrates River into what was then Babylonia (modern Iraq), a distance of 800 to 900 miles. Because the group included women, children, and the elderly, the journey would have been long and slow, and it’s likely that many people died along the way. • Once the Judean exiles arrived in Babylonia, a new stage of transition would begin. They would find themselves in a land very different from their own, surrounded by a people who spoke a foreign language and worshipped foreign gods. • Much of what was ultimately preserved in the Bible speaks in some way to the horrific loss and displacement the Judeans experienced during the period of exile. Psalm 137 • Psalm 137 was probably written during the Babylonian Exile and offers one of the few descriptions we have of exilic life. • In the psalm, the captives ask, “How can we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?” They have a sense that singing praises to their

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  18 Lecture 2: By the Rivers of Babylon—Exile Judeans are the covenantal partners of the Israelite god; if they keep his laws, he will be their god and protect them. • The historical books of the Bible, together with the writings of the prophets, seem designed in part to answer the question: Why were the Judeans conquered? The most popular answer provided is that the Judeans were conquered not because the Israelite god was not strong enough to protect them, but because they had not fulfilled their side of the covenant. • The book of Proverbs, structured as the advice of a father to a son, lists the values the Judeans should pass on to their children, including fear of, or reverence for, the Israelite god as the beginning of knowledge. • In such books as Ezekiel, Isaiah, Ecclesiastes, and Job, we find the Judeans struggling with questions that could not be answered with existing histories and writings: Why are we being punished for the sins of our parents and grandparents against the covenant? What if our god is not just, not accessible, or not knowable? Has our god forgotten us? • The story in the Bible is not written as objective history. Rather, it is the recorded memory of a conquered and exiled people determined to remember their past and pass that memory down from generation to generation. Carr, An Introduction to the Old Testament, pp. 1–52. Fleming, The Legacy of Israel in Judah’ s Bible, pp. xi–xv, 3–35. Suggested Reading 19 1. Can you think of additional stories in the Bible that would speak to the crisis of exile? 2. How have national crises in the history of America reshaped our national narrative? 3. How does the role of memory or remembering help us to understand the kind of history that is preserved in the Bible? Questions to Consider

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  I managed to wrap the children in blankets and carry them through the dark to the neighbors’. I remember blood dripping in the white falling snow. When I began dreaming of killing him with a broken vodka bottle, I knew I had to call an end to it. [image "6706.jpg" file=Image00008.jpg] [image "6709.jpg" file=Image00009.jpg] [image "6711.jpg" file=Image00010.jpg] One night after I had forced him to move out, he came looking for me. He’d been drinking for weeks. I asked my friend and her husband from Acomita to stay with the children and me that night for protection. We locked the doors and windows, visited around the kitchen table while we waited. He showed up a few hours after the bars closed. We heard his footsteps kick gravel in the yard. He tried the front door handle, then attempted to force it open. He knocked, calling my name softly, familiarly, asking me to let him in. Then he kicked the door, yelling, “I’m going to kill you!” He walked around to the back. He called out that he was pulling down the telephone wires so we couldn’t call the police. The house went dark. We lost electricity. He kicked in the back window. The glass shattered and he began attempting to crawl in. He was drunk and awkward. My friend’s husband entreated him in their tribal language to stop. The police came just as he got into the house. I watched, pained and relieved, as they shackled him. The electric cables crackled with power on the dirt lawn. The police had never seen anything like it. Anyone else would have been killed with all those volts of electricity. He appeared unhurt by the voltage and called out drunkenly to me from the back seat of the police car, “I love you, Joy. I love you.” I did not get him out of jail that time. I did not take him back. My dreams had warned me. I had taken him back many times, when he showed up freshly showered, smelling sweet, with sorry, charm, and flowers. I understood why women went back to their abusers. The monster wasn’t your real husband. He was a bad dream, an alien of sorts who took over the spirit of your beloved one. He entered and left your husband. It was your real love you welcomed back in. During that period my house became the safe house for many of my Indian women friends whose husbands and boyfriends were beating them. One night there were three or four of us camped out together. We listened to music, laughed, and cooked dinner. Our children ran around in the yard and played. After the children were put down to sleep, we sat in a circle and told our stories. One friend’s husband had broken her ribs. The last time he had beat her she was in the hospital with her jaw wired together. Because she was hospitalized for so long she lost a semester of credits.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  She dragged the coat more closely around her, and stared at the house which was reddening with sunrise. Her heart beat anxiously, fearfully even, as though in some painful anticipation of she knew not what—every window was dark except one or two that were fired by the sunrise. How long she stood there she never knew, it might have been moments, it might have been a lifetime; and then suddenly there was something that moved—the little oak door that led into that garden. It moved cautiously, opening inch by inch, until at last it was standing wide open, and Stephen saw a man and a woman who turned to clasp as though neither of them could endure to be parted from the arms of the other; and as they clung there together and kissed, they swayed unsteadily—drunk with loving. Then, as sometimes happens in moments of great anguish, Stephen could only remember the grotesque. She could only remember a plump-bosomed housemaid in the arms of a coarsely amorous footman, and she laughed and she laughed like a creature demented—laughed and laughed until she must gasp for breath and spit blood from her tongue, which had somehow got bitten in her efforts to stop her hysterical laughing; and some of the blood remained on her chin, jerked there by that agonized laughter. Pale as death, Roger Antrim stared out into the garden, and his tiny moustache looked quite black—like an ink stain smeared above his tremulous mouth by some careless, schoolboy finger. And now Angela’s voice came to Stephen, but faintly. She was saying something—what was she saying? It sounded absurdly as though it were a prayer—‘Christ!’ Then sharply—razor-sharp it sounded as it cut through the air: ‘You, Stephen!’ The laughter died abruptly away, as Stephen turned and walked out of the garden and down the short drive that led to the gates of The Grange, where the motor was waiting. Her face was a mask, quite without expression. She moved stiffly, yet with a curious precision; and she swung up the handle and started the powerful engine without any apparent effort. She drove at great speed but with accurate judgment, for now her mind felt as clear as spring water, and yet there were strange little gaps in her mind—she had not the least idea where she was going. Every road for miles around Upton was familiar, yet she had not the least idea where she was going. Nor did she know how long she drove, nor when she stopped to procure fresh petrol. The sun rose high and hot in the heavens; it beat down on her without warming her coldness, for always she had the sense of a dead thing that lay close against her heart and oppressed it. A corpse—she was carrying a corpse about with her. Was it the corpse of her love for Angela? If so that love was more terrible dead—oh, far more terrible dead than living.

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  121 Life in Exile, Life in Judah Lecture 17 I n our last lecture, Ezekiel was our informant on the experience of conquest, deportation, and exile. We saw that his experience served as a catalyst for reformulating Judean theology, as the prophet imagined the Israelite god mounting a chariot and joining the exiles in Babylonia. In this lecture and the next two, we will continue to look at specific aspects of the exilic experience. In this lecture, we’ll consider those Israelites who ended up in Egypt instead of Babylonia and those who remained in Judah. In the following lecture, we’ll look at the issue of literacy and education in ancient Israel and Judah and the gradual development of monotheism as a religious belief system. Multiple Experiences of Exile • The biblical account of the Babylonian conquest of Judah would lead us to believe that nearly all the Judeans were either killed or carried into exile in Babylonia, leaving Judah a desolate and empty wasteland for three generations (e.g., 2 Kings 25:10–12). o In all reality, the total number of exiles taken to Babylonia was somewhere between one-fourth and one-third of the population. o The remaining three-fourths or two-thirds were killed in battle, fled to Egypt of their own accord, or stayed in the land of Judah. • The segments of the Judean population were different from one another in several respects. o The Judean exiles who ended up in Babylonia were compelled militarily to leave their land. They arrived in Babylonia in three successive deportations, in 597, 586, and 582 B.C.E. These exiles were almost exclusively members of the upper class: royalty, priests, landowning nobles, and artisan craftsman.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  the Vergellesi family of Pistoia A leading family of Pistoia, north of Florence, the Vergellesi were politically active in the early part of the fourteenth century on behalf first of the White Guelphs then of the Ghibellines. Francesco de’ Vergellesi is recorded as having undertaken a political mission to the French court in 1313, and around 1326 he was indeed appointed podestà (governor) in the province of Lombardy. Sixth Story 1 . one of those prudes Nothing in what we are told about Catella merits such a description, with the possible exception of her jealous love for her husband, which is exploited by her admirer in a fashion that can only be thought of as callous and despicable. Possibly the most unpleasant story in the whole collection, this account of the cruel rape of a virtuous wife gives the lie to the claim that the Decameron is a feminist work ante litteram . Although the story is being narrated by one of the young ladies, Fiammetta, the viewpoint is decidedly masculine and anti-feminist. It is fair to add that the specious arguments presented in B.’s tale by the rapist to his victim are based upon passages from Livy and Valerius Maximus describing Tarquin’s rape of Lucretia. 2 . Ricciardo Minutolo The surname is also that of the dead archbishop in II, 5. Minutolo was the name of a leading Neapolitan patrician family, as also was Sighinolfo, the married name of the lady, Catella, who is the object of Ricciardo’s obsessive affection. Both Ricciardo Minutolo and Filippo Sighinolfi were known to B. during his fourteen-year sojourn in Naples, although Sighinolfi’s wife was not called Catella, but Mattea. It is unlikely that either family would have approved of B.’s fictive account of their marital arrangements. 3 . to meet in secret at a bagnio The bagnio (in Italian, bagno ), or Turkish bath-house, was a favourite meeting-place for adulterous lovers. Seventh Story 1 . Tedaldo degli Elisei… Aldobrandino Palermini As in the previous tale, the two families involved were among the oldest-established in the city where the novella is set, but the historical records reveal no trace of either a Tedaldo degli Elisei or an Aldobrandino Palermini. 2 . the devil’s mouth at the bottom of the abyss It was common for artists to depict the souls of the damned being devoured by demons. In his Inferno , Dante reserves this punishment for the three worst sinners of all, Judas Iscariot, Brutus and Cassius. As traitors to the founders of Church and Empire, each is being gnawed by one of the three slavering mouths of the giant Lucifer at the very centre of Hell. 3 . There was once a time … The lengthy tirade that follows, against the depravity of the religious, was to become a model for later writers engaging in anti-clerical invective. The Decameron contains numerous examples of a mocking attitude towards the religious, who along with women were the most popular target for medieval satirists.

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  Georgette listened quietly as she polished Lupita’s nails. I told Lupita I wanted to paint, to be an artist. She told me that what she wanted was someone to love her. And then she said to me nonchalantly, as she looked sideways at Georgette, “What do you know about that Navajo boy, the cowboy with the eyelashes—Clarence?” She had perfect timing, the mark of a good hunter or singer. Then she said directly to Georgette, “He’s a good kisser.” I hated confrontation and kept quiet. “He’s spoken for,” spit Georgette, who stood up quickly to face Lupita, spilling acetone all over her and my prized suede pants. The whole room stank of rotten apples. Lupita knew exactly what Georgette had been up to all along when she invited her to our room. I wondered if she knew anything about Clarence’s bet and whether I should tell her, and if so, when. Lupita picked up Georgette’s sharp nail file and began to file her nails. Georgette wasn’t through, though. “You Mexican bitch!” she snapped. “Get out of here.” “This is my room too,” I said. “She can stay. And by the way, please take off my pants.” Georgette glared at me as she quickly replaced my pants with her skirt. She kicked the ruined pants aside. “You’re both sick,” she spit out. “Nobody can be from Venus or anyplace else but here.” She marched out of the room carrying her case of nail polish and a story she would vent to her friends in the next room. Later I set out for the painting studio to get myself back together. When I painted, everything went away: the seductions, the sad need for attention, the missing fathers, fearful mothers, and evil stepfathers. I could fly to the moon, and to Venus too, if I wanted. I understood Lupita when she said she was from Venus. I was also from somewhere far away, the other side of the Milky Way, and would return there someday. I knew it, as I knew I could count on cerulean blue to be absolutely cerulean blue when I spread it on a canvas. An approaching cold front froze the stars to the dark sky. The Powwow Club was practicing in the gym, and a song flew out the tall narrow windows toward the white shell of the moon. The moon leaned delicately toward the bright point of Venus, framed by the graceful cottonwoods lining the sidewalk. I felt flawed, imperfect, but what haunted me was not flamboyant like Georgette’s ghost. It was a subtle thing, a delicate force, like the field of stars under the sky when we danced in the summer. I was haunted by a paradox: if there is such beauty, then why are we suffering? As I opened the door to the studio, Herbie jumped me. I screamed. I chased him, then held him down, made him promise never to frighten me again. Then I told him everything: about Lupita, about Georgette, about Mrs.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Came the day when Mary refused to see Martin, when she turned upon Stephen, pale and accusing: ‘Can’t you understand? Are you utterly blind—have you only got eyes now for Valérie Seymour?’ And as though she were suddenly smitten dumb, Stephen’s lips remained closed and she answered nothing. Then Mary wept and cried out against her: ‘I won’t let you go—I won’t let you, I tell you! It’s your fault if I love you the way I do. I can’t do without you, you’ve taught me to need you, and now . . .’ In half-shamed, half-defiant words she must stand there and plead for what Stephen withheld, and Stephen must listen to such pleading from Mary. Then before the girl realized it she had said: ‘But for you, I could have loved Martin Hallam!’ Stephen heard her own voice a long way away: ‘But for me, you could have loved Martin Hallam.’ Mary flung despairing arms round her neck: ‘No, no! Not that, I don’t know what I’m saying.’ 3The first faint breath of spring was in the air, bringing daffodils to the flower-stalls of Paris. Once again Mary’s young cherry tree in the garden was pushing out leaves and tiny pink buds along the whole length of its childish branches. Then Martin wrote: ‘Stephen, where can I see you? It must be alone. Better not at your house, I think, if you don’t mind, because of Mary.’ She appointed the place. They would meet at the Auberge du Vieux Logis in the Rue Lepic. They two would meet there on the following evening. When she left the house without saying a word, Mary thought she was going to Valérie Seymour. Stephen sat down at a table in the corner to await Martin’s coming—she herself was early. The table was gay with a new check cloth—red and white, white and red, she counted the squares, tracing them carefully out with her finger. The woman behind the bar nudged her companion: ‘En voilà une originale—et quelle cicatrice, bon Dieu!’ The scar across Stephen’s pale face stood out livid. Martin came and sat quietly down at her side, ordering some coffee for appearances’ sake. For appearances’ sake, until it was brought, they smiled at each other and made conversation. But when the waiter had turned away, Martin said: ‘It’s all over—you’ve beaten me, Stephen . . . The bond was too strong.’ Their unhappy eyes met as she answered: ‘I tried to strengthen that bond.’ He nodded: ‘I know . . . Well, my dear, you succeeded.’ Then he said: ‘I’m leaving Paris next week;’ and in spite of his effort to be calm his voice broke, ‘Stephen . . . do what you can to take care of Mary . . .’ She found that she was holding his hand. Or was it some one else who sat there beside him, who looked into his sensitive, troubled face, who spoke such queer words? ‘No, don’t go—not yet.’

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  6That night she stared at herself in the glass; and even as she did so she hated her body with its muscular shoulders, its small compact breasts, and its slender flanks of an athlete. All her life she must drag this body of hers like a monstrous fetter imposed on her spirit. This strangely ardent yet sterile body that must worship yet never be worshipped in return by the creature of its adoration. She longed to maim it, for it made her feel cruel; it was so white, so strong and so self-sufficient; yet withal so poor and unhappy a thing that her eyes filled with tears and her hate turned to pity. She began to grieve over it, touching her breasts with pitiful fingers, stroking her shoulders, letting her hands slip along her straight thighs—Oh, poor and most desolate body! Then she, for whom Puddle was actually praying at that moment, must now pray also, but blindly; finding few words that seemed worthy of prayer, few words that seemed to encompass her meaning—for she did not know the meaning of herself. But she loved, and loving groped for the God who had fashioned her, even unto this bitter loving. CHAPTER 251S tephen’s troubles had begun to be aggravated by Violet, who was always driving over to Morton, ostensibly to talk about Alec, in reality to collect information as to what might be happening at The Grange. She would stay for hours, very skilfully pumping while she dropped unwelcome hints anent Roger. ‘Father’s going to cut down his allowance,’ she declared, ‘if he doesn’t stop hanging about that woman. Oh, I’m sorry! I always forget she’s your friend—’ Then looking at Stephen with inquisitive eyes: ‘But I can’t understand that friendship of yours; for one thing, how can you put up with Crossby?’ And Stephen knew that yet once again, county gossip was rife about her. Violet was going to be married in September, they would then live in London, for Alec was a barrister. Their house, it seemed, was already bespoken: ‘A perfect duck of a house in Belgravia,’ where Violet intended to entertain largely on the strength of a bountiful parent Peacock. She was in the highest possible fettle these days, invested with an enormous importance in her own eyes, as also in those of her neighbours. Oh, yes, the whole world smiled broadly on Violet and her Alec: ‘Such a charming young couple,’ said the world, and at once proceeded to shower them with presents. Apostle teaspoons arrived in their dozens, so did coffee-pots, cream-jugs and large fish slices; to say nothing of a heavy silver bowl from the Hunt, and a massive salver from the grateful Scottish tenants.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  But, after all, the Devil has no real power over believers. He hates prayer, and flees from the cross and from the Word of God as from a flaming fire. If you cannot expel him by texts of Holy Scripture, the best way is to jeer and flout him. A pious nun once scared him away by simply saying: "Christiana sum." Christ has slain him, and will cast him out at last into the fire of hell. Hence Luther sings in his battle hymn, — "And let the Prince of ill Look grim as e’er he will, He harms us not a whit: For why? His doom is writ, One little word shall slay him." Luther was at times deeply dejected in spirit. He wrote to Melanchthon, July 13, under the influence of dyspepsia which paints every thing in the darkest colors: "You elevate me too high, and fall into the serious error of giving me too much credit, as if I were absorbed in God’s cause. This high opinion of yours confounds and racks me, when I see myself insensible, hardened, sunk in idleness, alas! seldom in prayer, and not venting one groan over God’s Church. My unsubdued flesh burns me with devouring fire. In short, I who ought to be eaten up with the spirit, am devoured by the flesh, by luxury, indolence, idleness, somnolence. Is it that God has turned away from me, because you no longer pray for me? You must take my place; you, richer in God’s gifts, and more acceptable in his sight. Here, a week has passed away since I put pen to paper, since I have prayed or studied, either vexed by fleshly cares, or by other temptations. If things do not improve, I will go to Erfurt without concealment; there you will see me, or I you, for I must consult physicians or surgeons. Perhaps the Lord troubles me so much in order to draw me from this wilderness before the public."422 Notwithstanding his complaints of illness and depression, and assaults from the evil spirit, he took the liveliest interest in the events of the day, and was anxious to descend to the arena of conflict. He kept writing letters, books, and pamphlets, and sent them into the world. His literary activity during those few months is truly astounding, and contrasts strangely with his repeated lament that he had to sit idle at Patmos, and would rather be burned in the service of God than stagnate there. He had few books in the Wartburg. He studied the Greek and Hebrew Scriptures very diligently;423 he depended for news on the letters of his friends at Wittenberg; and for his writings, on the resources of his genius.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Came the thought of that unforgettable scene with her mother. ‘I would rather see you dead at my feet.’ Oh, yes—very easy to talk about death, but not so easy to manage the dying. ‘We two cannot live together at Morton. . . . One of us must go, which of us shall it be?’ The subtlety, the craftiness of that question which in common decency could have but one answer! Oh, well, she had gone and would go even farther. Raftery was dead, there was nothing to hold her, she was free—what a terrible thing could be freedom. Trees were free when they were uprooted by the wind; ships were free when they were torn from their moorings; men were free when they were cast out of their homes—free to starve, free to perish of cold and hunger. At Morton there lived an ageing woman with sorrowful eyes now a little dim from gazing for so long into the distance. Only once, since her gaze had been fixed on the dead, had this woman turned it full on her daughter; and then her eyes had been changed into something accusing, ruthless, abominably cruel. Through looking upon what had seemed abominable to them, they themselves had become an abomination. Horrible! And yet how dared they accuse? What right had a mother to abominate the child that had sprung from her own secret moments of passion? She the honoured, the fulfilled, the fruitful, the loving and loved, had despised the fruit of her love. Its fruit? No, rather its victim. She thought of her mother’s protected life that had never had to face this terrible freedom. Like a vine that clings to a warm southern wall it had clung to her father—it still clung to Morton. In the spring had come gentle and nurturing rains, in the summer the strong and health-giving sunshine, in the winter a deep, soft covering of snow—cold yet protecting the delicate tendrils. All, all she had had. She had never gone empty of love in the days of her youthful ardour; had never known longing, shame, degradation, but rather great joy and great pride in her loving. Her love had been pure in the eyes of the world, for she had been able to indulge it with honour. Still with honour, she had borne a child to her mate—but a child who, unlike her, must go unfulfilled all her days, or else live in abject dishonour. Oh, but a hard and pitiless woman this mother must be for all her soft beauty; shamelessly finding shame in her offspring. ‘I would rather see you dead at my feet. . . .’ ‘Too late, too late, your love gave me life. Here am I the creature you made through your loving; by your passion you created the thing that I am. Who are you to deny me the right to love? But for you I need never have known existence.’

• From Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997)

  There are feelings of hopelessness, futility, and despair that accompany being incorrectly advised that the only way your symptoms can be alleviated is through a lifelong regime of medication or therapy. Estrangement and fear can arise from the thought of talking to anyone about your symptoms, because your symptoms are so bizarre you are certain that no one else could be experiencing the same thing. You also suspect that no one will believe you if you do tell them, and that you are probably going crazy. There is the added stress associated with mounting medical bills as you go in for a third or fourth round of tests, procedures, referrals, and finally, exploratory surgery to ascertain the cause of your mysterious pain. You live with the knowledge that the doctors believe you are a hypochondriac because no cause for your condition can be found. When interpreting trauma symptoms, jumping to the wrong conclusions can also be devastating. Harmful consequences can ensue when inaccurate readings of symptoms lead people to believe they were sexually, physically, or even ritually abused as children, when they were not. I am in no way suggesting that childhood abuse does not occur. Large numbers of children in every segment of society suffer unconscionable abuses every day. Many of them do not remember the abuses until they become adults. However, as I will explain in later chapters, the dynamics of trauma are such that they can produce frightening and bizarre “memories” of past events that seem extremely real, but never happened. The body of misinformation about trauma, its treatment, and a traumatized person’s prospects for recovery is astounding. Even many professionals who specialize in trauma don’t understand it. Inevitably, misinformation leads to anxiety and more suffering. A Traumatized Person's Reality All of us have had experiences that lose something in the telling. Shrugging it off, we say, “You had to be there.” Trauma is such an experience. Words can’t accurately convey the anguish that a traumatized person experiences. It has an intensity that defies description. Many traumatized people feel that they live in a personal hell in which no other human could possibly share. While this is not entirely true, elements of this perception are accurate. Here is a condensation of what severely traumatized individuals struggle with: I don’t know of one thing I don’t fear. I fear getting out of bed in the morning. I fear walking out of my house. I have great fears of deat h... not that I will die someday, but that I am going to die within the next few minutes. I fear ange r... my own and everyone else’s, even when anger is not present. I fear rejection and/or abandonment. I fear success and failure. I get pain in my chest, and tingling and numbness in my arms and legs every day. I almost daily experience cramps ranging from menstrual-type cramps to intense pain. I just really hurt most of the time. I feel that I can’t go on.

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  The story of my grandfather Monahwee and the people at the Battle of Horseshoe Band was horrific and it made a deep groove in the family and tribal memory. A story matrix connects all of us. There are rules, processes, and circles of responsibility in this world. And the story begins exactly where it is supposed to begin. We cannot skip any part. In some story realms the baby is born and the next day he or she is a giant who kills monsters. Mine was not that kind of story. I am born of brave people and we were in need of warriors. My father and I had lost the way. I was born puny and female and Indian in lands that were stolen. Many of the people were forgetting the songs and stories. Yet others hid out and carried the fire of the songs and stories so we could continue the culture. In a world long before this one, there was enough for everyone until somebody got out of line. We heard it was Rabbit, fooling around with clay and the wind. Everybody was tired of his tricks and no one would play with him; he was lonely in this world. So Rabbit thought to make a person. And when he blew into the mouth of that crude figure to see what would happen, the clay man stood up. Rabbit showed the clay man how to steal a chicken. The clay man obeyed. Then Rabbit showed him how to steal corn. The clay man obeyed. Then he showed him how to steal someone else’s wife. The clay man obeyed. Rabbit felt important and powerful. The clay man felt important and powerful. And once that clay man started, he could not stop. Once he took that chicken, he wanted all the chickens. And once he took that corn, he wanted all the corn. And once he took that wife, he wanted all the wives. He was insatiable. Then he had a taste of gold and he wanted all the gold. Then it was land and anything else he saw. His wanting only made him want more. Soon it was countries, and then it was trade. The wanting infected the earth. We lost track of the purpose and reason for life. We began to forget our songs. We forgot our stories. We could no longer see or hear our ancestors, or talk with each other across the kitchen table. Now Rabbit couldn’t find a drink of fresh water. The forests were being mowed down all over the world. The earth was being destroyed to make more, and Rabbit had no place to play. Rabbit’s trick had backfired. Rabbit tried to call the clay man back, but when the clay man wouldn’t listen, Rabbit realized he’d made a clay man with no ears. I was not brave. I was pulled from my mother, whom I almost killed with the struggle. I was hooked up to a ventilator.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  But her plans misfired, for the ship was driven by strong winds to the island of Ponza, 3 where they put in to a little bay and began to await more favourable weather for their voyage. Like the others, Madonna Beritola went ashore there, and she sought out a deserted and remote spot on the island where, in complete solitude, she could give vent to her sorrow for the loss of her husband. This became a daily ritual of hers, until one day, as she was busy sorrowing, it happened that a pirate- galley arrived, taking the crew and everyone else unawares, and departed again after capturing the ship and all hands. Having completed her daily lament, Madonna Beritola, following her usual practice, returned to the shore to look for her children. On finding nobody in sight she was at first perplexed, and then, suddenly suspecting what had happened, she cast her eyes seaward and saw the galley, not yet very far distant, with the little ship in tow. Realizing all too clearly that she had now lost her children as well as her husband, and finding herself abandoned there, alone and destitute, without the slightest notion of how she was going to find them again, she fell in a dead faint on to the sand with the names of her husband and children on her lips. There was nobody at hand to revive her with cold water or other remedies, and hence it was some time before she came to her senses. When, eventually, the strength returned to her poor exhausted body, bringing with it further tears and lamentations, she called out over and over again to her children and searched high and low for them in every cavern she could find. But when she saw that her efforts were useless and that the night was approaching, she began, prompted by an instinctive feeling that all was not entirely lost, to devote some attention to her own predicament. And, leaving the shore, she returned to the cave where she was in the habit of giving vent to her tears and sorrow. She had had nothing to eat since midday, and a little after tierce on the following morning, having spent the night in great fear and incredible anguish, she was compelled to start eating grass in order to appease her hunger. Having fed herself to the best of her ability, she then started brooding, tearfully, about what was to become of her. And whilst in the midst of these various reflections, she caught sight of a doe, which came towards her and disappeared into a nearby cave, emerging shortly afterwards and then running away into the woods. Getting up from where she was sitting, she entered the cave from which the doe had emerged, and inside she saw two newly born roebucks, no more than a few hours old, which seemed to her the sweetest and most charming sight it was possible to imagine.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  The sun was positively blazing, and having reached its zenith, was beating freely down, with all its power, straight on to her soft and tender body and on to her unprotected head, so that not only did it scorch every part of her flesh that was exposed to its rays, but it caused her skin to split into countless tiny cracks and fissures. And so intense was the roasting she received that although she was soundly asleep, it forced her to wake up. On finding she was being burnt, she attempted to move, whereupon she felt as if the whole of her scorched skin was being rent asunder like a piece of flaming parchment being stretched from both ends. Moreover (and this was not in the least surprising), she had such an excruciating pain in her head that she thought it would burst. The floor of the tower-roof was so hot that she could find nowhere to stand or sit down, and so she kept shifting her position the whole time, weeping incessantly. But apart from all this, there being not a breath of wind, the air was literally teeming with flies and gadflies, which, settling in the fissures of her flesh, stung her so ferociously that every sting was like a spear being thrust into her body. And hence she flailed her arms in all directions, heaping a constant stream of curses upon herself, her life, her lover, and the scholar. Being thus goaded, tormented, and pierced to the very quick by the incalculable heat, the rays of the sun, the flies and gadflies, her hunger and above all her thirst, as well as by a thousand agonizing thoughts, she stood up straight and looked about her in the hope of seeing or hearing someone who could be summoned to her assistance, being by now prepared to do anything, come what may, to effect her release. But here too she was dogged by ill luck. The peasants had all deserted the fields on account of the heat, and in any case nobody had been working near the tower that morning because they were staying at home to thresh the corn. So all she heard was the sound of cicadas, and the only moving thing in sight was the Arno, whose inviting waters did nothing to lessen her thirst, but only made it worse. And scattered about the countryside she could see houses and woods and shaded places, all of which played no less cruelly upon her desires. What more are we to say of this hapless widow?

• From The Decameron (1353)

  The girl’s mother was extremely upset, and regarded no punishment as too severe for her daughter’s lapse. But she could not stand passively aside and allow them to suffer the kind of fate which, on piecing together certain of Currado’s remarks, she realized he was intending to inflict on the culprits. So she hurried to catch up with her irate husband, and began pleading with him not to ruin his old age by killing his own daughter in a sudden fit of frenzy and soiling his hands with the blood of one of his servants. He could, she insisted, find some other way of placating his anger, such as having them incarcerated, so that, as they languished in prison, they would have a chance of repenting in full for their sinful behaviour. The saintly woman pressed these views and many others upon him with so much urgency, that she dissuaded him from killing them. And he ordered each of them to be imprisoned in different places, where they were to be closely guarded, receive a minimum of food, and suffer the maximum of discomfort, until such time as he decided otherwise. These instructions were promptly carried out, and I leave you to imagine the sort of life they led in their captivity, weeping incessantly and almost starving to death. Now, when Giannotto and Spina had been languishing in these wretched conditions for more than twelve months, and Currado had dismissed them from his thoughts, it came about that King Peter of Aragon, with the aid of a subversive movement led by Messer Gian di Procida, stirred up a rebellion in Sicily8 and wrested the island from King Charles. Currado, being a Ghibelline, was overjoyed at the news, and when Giannotto heard about it from one of his gaolers, he heaved a deep sigh, and said: ‘Oh, alas! for fourteen long years I have travelled the world in continual hardship, waiting only for this to happen! And now that it has come about, just to prove the vanity of all my hopes, I find myself here in this prison-cell, without the slightest prospect of being released until the day I die.’ ‘What are you talking about?’ said the gaoler. ‘Surely the affairs of mighty monarchs are no concern of yours? What was your business in Sicily?’ ‘It almost breaks my heart,’ replied Giannotto, ‘when I recall the business of my father. For although I was still a small boy when I fled from the island, yet I remember seeing him as its governor, when King Manfred was alive.’ ‘And who was this father of yours?’ asked the gaoler.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Then one afternoon Roger came with his car to take Angela for a drive through the hills. The New Year was slipping into the spring, and the air smelt of sap and much diligent growing. A warm February had succeeded the winter. Many birds would be astir on those hills where lovers might sit unashamed—where Stephen had sat holding Angela clasped in her arms, while she eagerly took and gave kisses. And remembering these things Stephen turned and left them; unable just then to endure any longer. Going home, she made her way to the lakes, and there she quite suddenly started weeping. Her whole body seemed to dissolve itself in weeping; and she flung herself down on the kind earth of Morton, shedding tears as of blood. There was no one to witness those tears except the white swan called Peter. 5Terrible, heart-breaking months. She grew gaunt with her unappeased love for Angela Crossby. And now she would sometimes turn in despair to the thought of her useless and unspent money. Thoughts would come that were altogether unworthy, but nevertheless those thoughts would persist. Roger was not rich; she was rich already and some day she would be even richer. She went up to London and chose new clothes at a West End tailor’s; the man in Malvern who had made for her father was getting old, she would have her suits made in London in future. She ordered herself a rakish red car; a long-bodied, sixty horse power Métallurgique. It was one of the fastest cars of its year, and it certainly cost her a great deal of money. She bought twelve pairs of gloves, some heavy silk stockings, a square sapphire scarf pin and a new umbrella. Nor could she resist the lure of pyjamas made of white crêpe de Chine which she spotted in Bond Street. The pyjamas led to a man’s dressing-gown of brocade—an amazingly ornate garment. Then she had her nails manicured but not polished, and from that shop she carried away toilet water and a box of soap that smelt of carnations and some cuticle cream for the care of her nails. And last but not least, she bought a gold bag with a clasp set in diamonds for Angela. All told she had spent a considerable sum, and this gave her a fleeting satisfaction. But on her way back in the train to Malvern, she gazed out of the window with renewed desolation. Money could not buy the one thing that she needed in life; it could not buy Angela’s love.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  Thee will I honor, Thou, my soul’s glory, joy, and crown." The numbers had been reduced by hardship, death, and moral shipwreck from twenty to seven thousand. At Genoa the waters were as pitiless as they were at Marseilles. Some of the children remained in the city and became, it is said, the ancestors of distinguished families.430 The rest marched on through Italy to Brindisi, where the bishop of Brindisi refused to let them proceed farther. An uncertain report declares Innocent III. declined to grant their appeal to be released from their vow. The fate of the French children was, if possible, still more pitiable. At Marseilles they fell a prey to two slave dealers, who for "the sake of God and without price" offered to convey them across the Mediterranean. Their names are preserved,—Hugo Ferreus and William Porcus. Seven vessels set sail. Two were shipwrecked on the little island of San Pietro off the northwestern coast of Sardinia. The rest reached the African shore, where the children were sold into slavery. The shipwreck of the little Crusaders was commemorated by Gregory IX., in the chapel of the New Innocents, ecclesia novorum innocentium, which he built on San Pietro. Innocent III. in summoning Europe to a new crusade included in his appeal the spectacle of their sacrifice. "They put us to shame. While they rush to the recovery of the Holy Land, we sleep."431 Impossible as such a movement might seem in our calculating age, it is attested by too many good witnesses to permit its being relegated to the realm of legend,432 and the trials and death of the children of the thirteenth century will continue to be associated with the slaughter of the children of Bethlehem at the hand of Herod. § 55. The Fourth Crusade and the Capture of Constantinople. 1200–1204. Literature.—Nicetas Acominatus, Byzantine patrician and grand logothete. During the Crusaders’ investment of Constantinople his palace was burnt, and with his wife and daughter he fled to Nicaea: Byzantina Historia, 1118–1206, in Recueil des historiens des Croisades, histor. Grecs, vol. I., and in Migne, Patr. Gr., vols. 139, 140.—Geoffroi de Villehardouin, a prominent participant in the Crusade, d. 1213?: Hist. de la Conquête de Constantinople avec la continuation de Henri de Valenciennes, earliest ed., Paris, 1585, ed. by Du Cange, Paris, 1857, and N. de Wailly, Paris, 1871, 3d ed. 1882, and E. Bouchet, with new trans., Paris, 1891. For other editions, See Potthast, II. 1094. Engl. trans. by T. Smith, London, 1829.—Robert de Clary, d. after 1216, a participant in the Crusade: La Prise de Constant., 1st ed. by P. Riant, Paris, 1868.—Guntherus Alemannus, a Cistercian, d. 1220?: Historia Constantinopolitana, in Migne, Patr. Lat., vol. 212, 221–265, and ed. by Riant, Geneva, 1875, and repeated in his Exuviae Sacrae, a valuable description, based upon the relation of his abbot, Martin, a participant in the Crusade.—Innocent III. Letters, in Migne, vols. 214–217.—Charles Hopf: Chroniques Graeco-Romanes inédites ou peu connues, Berlin, 1873.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Having thus been prevented from attaining his desire by the only means he could think of, Pietro all but died of grief. If he could only have secured Gigliuozzo’s consent, he would have defied every one of his relatives and married the girl whether they liked it or not. But in any case he was determined, provided he had her support, to see this affair through to the end; and having learned through the medium of a third party that her approval was forthcoming, he arranged with her that they should elope from Rome together. So one morning, having made all necessary preparations, Pietro got up very early, saddled a pair of horses, and rode away with her in the direction of Anagni,2 where there were certain friends of his whom he trusted implicitly. Since they were afraid that they might be pursued, they had no time to stop and celebrate their nuptials, so they simply murmured sweet nothings to one another as they rode along, and exchanged an occasional kiss. Now, the route they were taking was not very familiar to Pietro, and when they were about eight miles away from Rome, instead of turning right, they turned off along a road to the left. Scarcely had they ridden for two miles along this road when they found themselves close to a castle, from which, as soon as they were sighted, a dozen soldiers emerged. Just as they were about to be intercepted by the soldiers, the girl saw them coming and let out a shriek, saying: ‘Quickly, Pietro, let’s fly; they are coming for us.’ Employing all her strength, she pulled her nag’s head sharply round in the direction of a huge forest; and clinging to the saddle for dear life, she dug her spurs into the animal’s sides, whereupon the nag, being thus goaded, carried her off into the forest at a brisk gallop. Pietro, who had been busy gazing into the girl’s eyes instead of watching where he was going, was slower than she to catch sight of the soldiers, and he was still looking about him to discover from which direction they were coming when he was fallen upon, caught, and forced to dismount. They asked him who he was, and when he told them, they began to confer among themselves, saying: ‘This fellow’s a friend of the Orsini,3 our enemies. What better way to show them our contempt than to take away his clothes and his nag, and string him up from one of these oak trees.’ This idea commanded their unanimous approval, and they ordered Pietro to strip.