Excitement

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.

Page 130 of 182 · 20 per page

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  Father came back to the Parlour full-time, and I spent the day in the kitchen, gutting and filleting. We worked till almost seven: I had just enough time between the closing of the shop and the leaving of the Canterbury train to change my dress, to pull on a pair of elastic-sided boots and to sit down with Father and Mother, Alice, Davy and Rhoda for a hasty supper. They thought it more than strange, I knew, that I should be returning to the Palace yet again; Rhoda, in particular, seemed greatly tickled by the story of my ‘mash’. ‘Don’t you mind her going, Mrs Astley?’ she asked. ‘My mother would never let me go so far alone; and I am two years older. But then, Nancy is such a steady sort of girl, I suppose.’ I had been a steady girl; it was over Alice - saucy Alice - that my parents usually worried. But at Rhoda’s words I saw Mother look me over and grow thoughtful. I had on my Sunday dress, and my new hat trimmed with lavender; and I had a lavender bow at the end of my plait of hair, and a bow of the same ribbon sewn on each of my white linen gloves. My boots were black with a wonderful shine. I had put a spot of Alice’s perfume - eau de rose - behind each ear; and I had darkened my lashes with castor oil from the kitchen. Mother said, ‘Nancy, do you really think -?’ But as she spoke the clock on the mantel gave a ting! It was a quarter-past seven, I should miss my train. I said, ‘Good-bye! Good-bye!’ - and fled, before she could delay me. I missed my train anyway, and had to wait at the station till the later one came. When I reached the Palace the show had begun: I took my seat to find the acrobats already on the stage forming their loop, their spangles gleaming, their white suits dusty at the knees.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  Now I felt more awkward than ever. I looked at Kitty and she gave a nervous kind of laugh. Walter, however, had lost his frown, and his eyes looked blue and wide as a child’s. ‘Damn it, Ma,’ he said, ‘but you’re right!’ He put his hand to his brow, then stepped to the door: we heard his heavy, rapid tread upon the stairs, heard footsteps in the room above our heads - Sims’s and Percy’s room - and then the slam of a door, higher up. When he returned he held a strange assortment of objects: a pair of gentleman’s shoes, a sewing-basket, a couple of ribbons, and Kitty’s make-up box. These he dumped about me on the carpet. Then, with a hasty ‘Pardon me, Nancy’, he pulled the jacket from me, and the boots. The jacket he handed to Kitty, along with the sewing-basket: ‘Put a few tucks down the inside of that waist,’ he said, pointing to the seam. The boots he cast aside, and replaced with the pair of shoes - Sims’s shoes they were, and small, low-heeled and rather dainty; and Walter made them daintier still by tying ribbons in a bow at the laces. To advertise the bows a bit - and because, without my boots, I was now a little shorter - he caught hold of the bottom of my trouser-legs, and gave them cuffs. Next he seized my head and tilted it back, and worked upon my lips and lashes with carmine and spit-black from Kitty’s box: he did this gently as a girl. Then he plucked the cigarette from behind my ear and cast it on to the mantel. Finally he turned to Kitty and snapped his fingers. She, infected by his air of haste and purpose, had begun to sew as he had shown her. Now she raised the jacket to her cheek to bite the final length of cotton from it, and when that was done he took it from her and shrugged me into it and buttoned it over my breast. Then he stood back, and cocked his head. I gazed down at myself once again. My new shoes looked quaint and girlish, like a principal boy’s in a pantomime. The trousers were shorter, their line rather spoiled. The jacket flared a little, above and below the waist, quite as if I had hips and a bosom - but it felt tighter than before, and not a half as comfortable. My face, of course, I could not see: I had to turn and squint into a picture over the hearth, and saw it reflected there - all eyes and lips - over the red nose and whiskers of ‘Rackity Jack’. I looked at the others. Mrs Dendy and the Professor smiled, Kitty did not look at all nervous, now. Walter was flushed, and seemed awed by his own handiwork.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  Linda was pursued by two men. The first of them did all he could to arouse her by kissing her mouth and breasts, while the other, with more success, caressed her legs under her long dress, until she revealed by a shudder that she was aroused. Then he wanted to carry her off into the darkness. The first man protested but was too drunk to compete. She was carried away from the group to where the trees made dark shadows and lowered onto the moss. From nearby there were cries of resistance, there were grunts, there was a woman shrieking, “Do it, do it, I can’t wait anymore, do it, do it to me!” The orgy was in full bloom. Women caressed one another. Two men would set about teasing a woman into a frenzy and then stop merely to enjoy the sight of her, with her dress half-undone, a shoulder strap fallen, a breast uncovered, while she tried to satisfy herself by pressing obscenely against the men, rubbing against them, begging, lifting her dress. Linda was astonished by the bestiality of her aggressor. She, who had known only the voluptuous caresses of her husband, found herself now in the grip of something infinitely more powerful, a desire so violent it seemed devouring. His hands gripped her like claws, he lifted her sex to meet his penis as if he did not care if he broke her bones in doing so. He used coups de belier, truly like a horn entering her, a goring that did not hurt but which made her want to retaliate with the same fury. After he had satisfied himself once with a wildness and violence that stunned her, he whispered, “Now I want you to satisfy yourself, fully, do you hear me? As you never did before.” He held his erect penis like a primitive wooden symbol, held it out for her to use as she wished. He incited her to unleash her most violent appetite on him. She was hardly aware of biting into his flesh. He panted in her ears, “Go on, go on, I know you women, you never really let yourself take a man as you want to.” From some depths of her body that she had never known, there came a savage fever that would not spend itself, that could not have enough of his mouth, his tongue, his penis inside of her, a fever that was not content with an orgasm. She felt his teeth buried in her shoulder, as her teeth bit into his neck, and then she fell backwards and lost consciousness.

• From City of Night (1963)

  Right after that, Buddy came in with a score. Miss Destiny says shes sorry but theyll have to use the head. The score is obviously disappointed. A few minutes later and we hear the score coughing spitting. Lola says acidly she despises amateurs and queers. Now they come out, and the score is not only disappointed but nervous, afraid of the scene. As he started toward the door, Trudi calls out, “Dont be nervous, dear—blame the beads!”—and Skipper is going to Talk to him—but Buddy said no he got all the bread himself—and: “Did you hear the square spitting, man? did you?—” indignantly “—Christ, and I only pretended to shoot!” Darling Dolly is doing an imitation strip, proud of her smooth girlskin and figure, and everytime she bumps (like the queen at the 1-2-3 earlier), she says, “Sssssssssssufferrrrrrrrr....” Trudi’s daddy is giggling almost hysterically now, opening drinks, passing pills, joints. Suddenly theres a racket outside the window, like someone throwing a bottle, and Miss Destiny says, “It’s that psycho bitch!” and pulls the shades from the nails and theres the sex-hungry nympho in the next building hanging out the window in her half slip and brassiere (and she isnt badlooking) saying whats going on we’re disturbing the peace. Her piece, giggles Trudi, smothering herself cozily in her stole. And Miss Destiny coos, “Come on over, dear, come on over,” to placate her, and the sexhungry woman almost jumps through the window—“I’ll be right over, hear?” “Hoddawg!” said Chuck, and this puts Miss Destiny on. In just a few minutes heres the nympho and says it’s so warm she’ll take off her blouse if you dont mind, and I mean she wasted no time. Appalled at such uncouth effrontery, Darling Dolly Dane, smoking elegantly, inhaled accidentally and almost choked. To top it all off for Miss Destiny, who was becoming Most Depressed, heres another queen at the door: Miss Bobbi, with a drunk who tries to sober up immediately, rejects the scene, turns to leave—but Skipper gets a chance to Talk to him. “Cool it, cholly,” is all Skipper said, and the man reached for his wallet nervously, hands the money to Skipper, and stumbles out hurriedly. Miss Bobbi says icily hand over the bread which rightly belongs to her. Skipper gave her a nofooling? look. Miss Bobbi says she brought the score here, after all! Skipper says who got it? Miss Bobbi says she was going to until Skipper came on so bigassedly. Skipper says the score would have clipped her , and you saw it, jack, the score gave the bread to him. Miss Bobbie swished out in a huff.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  —No puedo creer que nunca hayas hecho esto —dice, mirándome como si necesitara redimir mi carnet de chica de pueblo pequeño—. En mis días, este era el lugar al que llevabas a una chica para mostrarle qué tan rudo eras en tu camioneta. Me tambaleo hacia la izquierda y luego hacia la derecha mientras la camioneta pasa por todas las pendientes enlodadas y los charcos. Me deja tener completo control del equipo de sonido y Glory Days de Bruce Springsteen suena en el casete que puse. Subo el volumen y me agarro al tablero. —Todavía lo es —le informo—. Aunque en mis días se está volviendo cada vez más difícil que los chicos con los que sales mantengan válidas sus licencias para conducir. Sonríe. —Te creo. Llueve y el lodo se levanta a nuestro alrededor y puedo ver manchas de ambas cosas golpeando las mangas de mi impermeable más cerca a la puerta y mi muslo desnudo. Pike insistió en que bajáramos las ventanas, sin importarle en absoluto que el interior pudiera ensuciarse. Dijo que eso mejoraría la experiencia. —¿Has traído a tus citas aquí? —pregunto. —De vez en cuando. Frunzo la esquina de mi boca en una sonrisa conocedora. —¿Y después las llevabas a Hammond Lock para luego besuquearse? Mueve su mirada rápidamente hacia mí, luciendo sorprendido. —¿Qué sabes tú sobre Hammond Lock? Me encojo de hombros. —Oh, escuché que es donde los viejos llevaban a sus citas hace algún tiempo, eso es todo. Simula un ceño fruncido y revoluciona el motor, bajándonos a toda velocidad por otra zanja. Mi estómago cae a mis pies y grito de nuevo, riéndome. —¡Detente! —suplico—. ¡Vas a hacernos volcar! El frente del guardafangos choca contra el fondo, lanzando una ola de barro y agua frente a nosotros. Mi cuerpo se lanza con violencia contra el cinturón de seguridad y grito emocionada, entrecerrando mis ojos. ¡Mierda! Pero no puedo dejar de reírme. Tiene razón. ¿Cómo es que nunca he hecho esto? Me lo he estado perdiendo. La fría lluvia cae suavemente a través de la ventana, rociando mi pierna y abro mis ojos de nuevo y limpio mi mejilla, viendo manchas de barro en mi mano. Girándome hacia él, veo sus ojos encontrándose con los míos, los cuerpos de ambos se sacuden con carcajadas silenciosas. —¡Está bien, es mi turno! —suelto emocionadamente. Desabrochando mi cinturón de seguridad, jalo la manija de la puerta, moviéndome para salir. —No, solo deslízate —me dice—. Saldré y daré la vuelta. Me detengo y giro, viéndolo abrir su puerta y en vez de bajarse, se levanta y da la vuelta por la caja de la camioneta detrás de nosotros. Me deslizo rápidamente hacia el otro lado del asiento y frente al volante. La ventaja de que su camioneta sea tan vieja es que tiene un solo asiento completo al frente. Y no necesito pasar por encima de una consola.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  The Basque suddenly opened the door. He bowed and said, “You wanted a man and here I am.” He threw off his clothes. Viviane looked at him gratefully. The Basque realized she was in heat. Two virilities would satisfy her more than that teasing, elusive one. He threw himself between the women. Everywhere the man and woman looked something was happening that enthralled them. A hand was opening someone’s buttocks and slipping in an inquisitive finger. A mouth was closing upon a leaping, charging penis. Another mouth was enclosing a nipple. Faces were covered by breasts or buried in pubic hair. Legs were closing over a burrowing hand. A glistening wet penis would appear and plunge again into flesh. The ivory skin and the gypsy skin were tangled with the man’s muscular body. Then a strange thing happened. Bijou lay full length under the Basque. Viviane was abandoned for a moment. The Basque was crouching over this woman who bloomed under him like some hothouse flower, odorous, moist, with erotic eyes and wet lips, a full-blown woman, ripe and voluptuous; yet her rubber penis stood erect between them, and the Basque was overtaken with an odd feeling. The penis touched his own and defended the opening of the woman like a lance. He commanded almost angrily: “Take it off.” She slid her hands under her back, unfastened the belt and pulled the rubber penis off. Then he threw himself on her, and she, still holding the penis, held it over the buttocks of the man who was now buried inside of her. When he raised himself to thump into her again, she pushed the rubber penis inside of his buttocks. He leaped like a wild animal and attacked her only more furiously. Each time he raised himself, he found himself attacked from behind. He felt the breasts of the woman crushed beneath him, rolling under his chest, her ivory-skinned belly heaving under his, her hips against his, her moist vagina engulfing him; and each time she plunged the penis into him, he felt not only his turmoil but hers as well. He thought the doubled sensation would drive him mad. Viviane lay there watching them, panting. The foreign man and woman, still clothed, had fallen over her and were rubbing against her frantically, too confused in wild sensations to seek an opening.

• From City of Night (1963)

  He interprets my silence as acquiescence. With sureness, he removes clothes from the closet, becoming progressively more excited as he touches them adoringly, worshipingly, reverently. His trembling hands reject an elaborately studded jacket, which he held treasuringly for a long moment—choosing more “conventional” clothes; admonishing himself: “Not the first time, not the first time”—but vaunting each idolized piece of clothes he nevertheless rejects. He has forgotten the restrained movements that the clothes hes wearing demand. His shirt is bulging out over his stomach. He has loosened the belt, the vest. Straps dangle. The shirt protrudes in a satanic tail behind him. Hes becoming sadly disheveled. The whole costume sags. Prespiration runs down his flushed face. Hes huffing. Ritualistically, like a servant who adores his job, whose purpose in life is subservience, he begins to remove my clothes (not as another person might, for the sake of the nakedness emphasizing the sexuality of the act: no, not at all like that: with him, it seems to be the actual act of obeisance that is exciting him). He had led me carefully away from the mirrors. When Im stripped, he doesnt touch my body, hardly even glances at me. First a pair of skintight black denim pants; a tapered shirt, russet-colored, which he leaves open halfway down my stomach. I wonder what this costume will ultimately be. It seems he is improvising for over-all effect: to create a fantasy which, like the furniture, will merely suggest something rather than be anything specific.... A pair of black boots which come to the knees; when he slips the boots onto my feet, his head bends brushing the slick leather with his cheek.... Black leather gloves. A hat which arches slightly on the sides. He added a thick large-buckled belt about my waist. Rushing to the leather box in the closet, he removed a long coiled whip, which he planted firmly in my hand. And he announced apocalyptically: “A plantation overseer!” Automatically I turn to face the panel of mirrors; but Neil blocks my view quickly. “Not yet!” After a few moments, he steps aside dramatically. “I present you to you—to You as You have always wanted to be,” he said solemnly. Clearly, this is me as he wants to see me. But I feel excited by the reflection of myself. Possibly noticing this, Neil stands before me again, once more blacking my reflection, as though my own fascination threatens to shut him out of the fantasy. “It’s just a hint,” he said in that awed tone. “Nothing extraordinary. Another time, I’ll Really Show You!” I notice his voice is changing strangely. What is he trying to convey by those vaguely recognizable accents? With a jolt of awareness which almost took my breath I realize that he is now speaking in the slightly slurred Southern sounds of a field hand! My first impulse was to laugh; my next, to remove the clothes and leave this fantastic man.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Quiero que se corra dentro de mí. Quiero que se derrame y quiero sentirlo. Estoy tomando la píldora, y soy saludable. Una vez que sepa que él también está saludable, le diré que las malditas gomas pueden irse a la jodida basura. Podría volver a provocarlo por video si su frustración acumulada me excita así. Unos momentos más tarde, mi respiración ha vuelto a la normalidad, y estoy agotada. —Sabes que estoy bromeando, ¿verdad? —le digo—. Solo lo haré para ti. Su mano se desliza por mi espalda húmeda, y lo escucho inhalar como si fuera a hablar, pero entonces algo golpea la puerta. —¡Jordan! —grita una voz—. Jordan, ¿estás aquí o no? Ambos saltamos, mi corazón se salta un latido. Cam. Pike se aparta de mí y me pongo las bragas, apresurándome a buscar mi sujetador y mi camisa. Escucho que la tapa del bote de la basura se cierra de golpe, y luego Pike está a mi lado mientras se apresura a meterse en su camiseta y yo en mi ropa. Pero justo en ese momento la puerta cruje y escucho la voz de Cam. —¡Jordan! —llama desde el interior de la casa. —¿Qué diablos? —gruñe Pike en voz baja, lanzándome una mirada asustada justo cuando Cam entra a la cocina. Pike se aleja un par de pasos de mí y se pasa la mano por el cabello mientras me abrocho los pantalones cortos. Cam nos mira, sus ojos se mueven velozmente entre Pike y yo, claramente asimilando nuestro desorden. —Hola —dice, con un tono sospechoso en su voz. Me lamo los labios secos, tratando de recuperar el aliento. —Hola —le digo—. Así que, ¿ahora solo entras en las casas de las personas? —Estaba golpeando la puerta y tocando el timbre —señala, su sorpresa se ha ido y ahora ha sido reemplazada con diversión—. Vi los dos autos afuera, así que sabía que estabas en casa. Un silencio incómodo sigue mientras mira a Pike con una sonrisa en los ojos y a mí con las cejas levantadas. Pike parece que quiere escapar. Se endereza, señalando con el pulgar hacia el patio trasero.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  He fell empty-handed to the platform floor, and as the train pulled out, I looked through the window and gave him a big sarcastic wave. • • • That fall, Lori helped me find a public school where, instead of going to classes, the students signed up for internships all over the city. One of my internships was at The Phoenix, a weekly newspaper run out of a dingy storefront on Atlantic Avenue in downtown Brooklyn, near the old Ex-Lax factory. The owner, publisher, and editor in chief was Mike Armstrong. He saw himself as a muckraking gadfly and had mortgaged his brownstone five times to keep The Phoenix going. The staff all used Underwood manual typewriters with threadbare ribbons and yellowed keys. The E on mine was broken, so I used the @ in its place. We never had copy paper and instead wrote on discarded press releases we dug out of the trash. At least once a month, someone’s paycheck bounced. Reporters were always quitting in disgust. In the spring, when Mr. Armstrong was interviewing a journalism school graduate for a job opening, a mouse ran over her foot, and she screamed. After she’d left, Mr. Armstrong looked at me. The Brooklyn zoning board was meeting that afternoon and he had no one to cover it. “If you start calling me Mike instead of Mr. Armstrong,” he said, “you can have the job.” I had just turned eighteen. I quit my job at the hamburger joint the next day and became a full-time reporter for The Phoenix . I’d never been happier in my life. I worked ninety-hour weeks, my telephone rang constantly, I was always hurrying off to interviews and checking the ten-dollar Rolex I’d bought on the street to make sure I wasn’t running late, rushing back to file my copy, and staying up until four a.m. to set type when the typesetter quit. And I was bringing home $125 a week. If the check cleared. • • • I wrote Brian long letters describing the sweet life in New York City. He wrote back saying things in Welch were still going downhill. Dad was drunk all the time except when he was in jail; Mom had completely withdrawn into her own world; and Maureen was more or less living with neighbors. The ceiling in the bedroom had collapsed, and Brian had moved his bed onto the porch. He made walls by nailing boards along the railings, but it leaked pretty badly out there, too, so he still slept under the inflatable raft. I told Lori that Brian should come live with us in New York, and she agreed. But I was afraid Brian would want to stay in Welch. He seemed more of a country boy than a city kid. He was always wandering through the woods, tinkering with a discarded two-stroke engine, chopping wood, or carving a block of wood into an animal head.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  known in the neighborhood as an easy target, so I always fought back. Sometimes I won, sometimes I lost. What worked best was to keep my wits about me. Once, as I was getting on the train, some guy tried to grab my purse, but I jerked it back and the strap broke. He fell empty-handed to the platform floor, and as the train pulled out, I looked through the window and gave him a big sarcastic wave. • • • That fall, Lori helped me find a public school where, instead of going to classes, the students signed up for internships all over the city. One of my internships was at The Phoenix, a weekly newspaper run out of a dingy storefront on Atlantic Avenue in downtown Brooklyn, near the old Ex-Lax factory. The owner, publisher, and editor in chief was Mike Armstrong. He saw himself as a muckraking gadfly and had mortgaged his brownstone five times to keep The Phoenix going. The staff all used Underwood manual typewriters with threadbare ribbons and yellowed keys. The E on mine was broken, so I used the @ in its place. We never had copy paper and instead wrote on discarded press releases we dug out of the trash. At least once a month, someone’s paycheck bounced. Reporters were always quitting in disgust. In the spring, when Mr. Armstrong was interviewing a journalism school graduate for a job opening, a mouse ran over her foot, and she screamed. After she’d left, Mr. Armstrong looked at me. The Brooklyn zoning board was meeting that afternoon and he had no one to cover it. “If you start calling me Mike instead of Mr. Armstrong,” he said, “you can have the job.” I had just turned eighteen. I quit my job at the hamburger joint the next day and became a full-time reporter for The Phoenix. I’d never been happier in my life. I worked ninety-hour weeks, my telephone rang constantly, I was always hurrying off to interviews and checking the ten-dollar Rolex I’d bought on the street to make sure I wasn’t running late, rushing back to file my copy, and staying up until four a.m. to set type when the typesetter quit. And I was bringing home $125 a week. If the check cleared. • • • I wrote Brian long letters describing the sweet life in New York City. He wrote back saying things in Welch were still going downhill. Dad was drunk all the time except

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  “A drop of Cherokee blood means the tribe can claim you forever, but not before I claim you for the night.” He extended his hand. “C. Willard Trenholm. But my friends call me Will.” “Victoria Leonard.” “Glad to meet you, Victoria.” He guided her down the stairs and out onto the dance floor. He was tall, maybe six five, and even in heels she came up only to his chest. He knew how to fox-trot, waltz, and lindy hop, all to music played by Peter Duchin himself. If her family could see her now! She heard Bru’s voice chiding her but she pushed it away and concentrated on her feet, trying to avoid being trampled or, worse yet, stepping on Will, since she had no idea how to dance that way. Later Paisley approached to say she’d met someone and was leaving with him. “Take a cab home, Victoria … okay? I mean it, no subways tonight.” Vix nodded, then returned to the dance floor with Will. She didn’t have to worry about getting home. He took her to the Rainbow Room for a nightcap and to admire the view. In the cab on the way back to her place, they made out like teenagers. When the taxi pulled up in front of her building, Will leaned forward and told the driver to go around the block again. She saw him three times that week. And the weekend after that. He sent flowers to her at home and Godiva chocolates to her office. “A person could get used to this,” Maia sang. Vix began to flirt with the idea of being a rich girl, of never having to worry about money again. You were wrong when you told me I wouldn’t fit in … she’d say to Tawny. Money was Will’s favorite subject, sex his second. He chased her around his family’s Park Avenue duplex, playing hide-and-seek in the gallery, which was lined with suits of armor, like a museum. In the forest green library he unbuttoned her shirt and admired her breasts. “Beautiful,” he said. “Are they implants?” She assured him they were the real thing. “I thought so,” he said, “but you hardly ever get the real thing these days.” He invited her to the ballet. She’d never been and borrowed a crushed velvet suit from Paisley. The following week it was Shakespeare at the Public, followed by dinner at Chanterelle. Maia began to call her The Heiress. “She wouldn’t be inheriting,” Paisley said, setting the record straight. “She’d be acquiring.” “Either way …” Maia said. That night the three of them sat around the coffee table, eating Chinese food from the cartons, while they watched Don’t Look Now on the VCR. As Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland chased one another around Venice, Maia said, “I hope Vix will invite us to Venice … to her palazzo on the Grand Canal.” “Mmm …” Paisley shoveled in chicken with cashews.

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  two guys in the car, both wearing baseball caps and wraparound glasses. And the driver was him, the National Treasure. “Heading up island?” Von asked. Caitlin turned to Vix. “You can walk if you want but I’m riding.” The other one, Bru, let his seat fall forward so Caitlin could squeeze into the back of the car. “You getting in or not?” Bru asked Vix. “Because we’re holding up traffic as you can see.” She followed Caitlin into the car, thinking there had to be exceptions to every promise. Besides, if they were going to be killed it would be better to be killed together, otherwise she’d have to explain to Lamb why Caitlin was murdered and she wasn’t. Caitlin yanked Von’s ponytail. He lowered his shades and looked at them through his rearview mirror. “I knew this was my lucky day,” he said, turning on the charm. “Hey, Bru ... get a look at what we caught.” “Uh-huh,” Bru answered, about as excited as if they’d reeled in two sardines. They were heading out of town, past the Italian Scallion vegetable stand, past mini golf, past the Tashmoo Overlook, to Lambert’s Cove Road where Caitlin told Von to take a right. “How far up?” he asked. “I’ll let you know.” When she did, Von slammed on the brakes making them fall forward against the front seats, which he found funny. “Thanks for the ride,” Caitlin said. “See you at the Flying Horses.” “Not this year,” Von told her. “I’m working at the fish market this year.” “Which one?” Caitlin asked. “That’s for me to know and you to find out,” Von said. “Yeah ... well, save me a fish head,” Caitlin said. “I’ll save you something better than that,” Von told her. “See me in about three years to collect.” “Don’t hold your breath,” Caitlin sang, slamming the car door. They could hear the boys laughing as they pulled back onto the road and floored it. Caitlin took this as a sign that all was not lost. She threw an arm over Vix’s shoulder as they walked the mile down the dirt road leading to their house. “Aren’t you glad we hitched?”

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  Title : Gender Trouble (Routledge Classics) Author: Butler, Judith Description: One of the most talked-about scholarly works of the past fifty years, Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble is as celebrated as it is controversial. Arguing that traditional feminism is wrong to look to a natural, 'essential' notion of the female, or indeed of sex or gender, Butler starts by questioning the category 'woman' and continues in this vein with examinations of 'the masculine' and 'the feminine'. Best known however, but also most often misinterpreted, is Butler's concept of gender as a reiterated social performance rather than the expression of a prior reality. Thrilling and provocative, few other academic works have roused passions to the same extent. Gender Trouble‘Gender Trouble is a classic in the best sense: rereading this book, as well as reading it for the first time, reshapes the categories through which we experience and perform our lives and bodies. To be troubled in this way is an intellectual pleasure and a political necessity. Butler’s lucid, witty and very smart classic is more than critique of gender-making apparatuses; it is generative of possibilities for promising monsters who may yet reconfigure what can count as natural.’ Donna Haraway ‘The most authoritative attack to date on the “naturalness” of gender. This is a brilliant and innovative book.’ Sandra Lee Bartky ‘Indispensable for feminist theory.’ Hypatia ‘At times brilliant, always groundbreaking, Gender Trouble is bound to make some trouble of its own.’ Outweek ‘A tremendously sophisticated and well-argued book, a very exciting read.’ Women and Politics [image file=image_rsrc22N.jpg] Routledge Classics contains the very best of Routledge publishing over the past century or so, books that have, by popular consent, become established as classics in their field. Drawing on a fantastic heritage of innovative writing published by Routledge and its associated imprints, this series makes available in attractive, affordable form some of the most important works of modern times. For a complete list of titles visit www.routledge.com/classics Judith Butler Gender TroubleFeminism and the Subversion of Identity With an introduction by the author [image "Logo: Published by Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, London and New York. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business." file=image_rsrc22P.jpg] First published 1990 by Routledge Second edition published 1990 by Routledge First published in Routledge Classics 2006 by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Reprinted 2007, 2008 (twice), 2010 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 1990, 1999, 2006 Routledge, 2007 Gender Trouble was originally published in the Routledge book series Thinking Gender, edited by Lind J. Nicholson. Typeset in Joanna by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk Printed and bound in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  A van had broken down, spilling clothes and furniture all over the road and creating a big backup. The police were trying to clear the highway, but a dog had jumped out of the van and was running up and down the turnpike as a couple of officers chased after him. The announcer got a lot of mileage out of the story, going on about the rubes with their clunker of a vehicle and yapping dog who were making thousands of New York commuters late for work. That night the psychologist told me I had a phone call. “Jeannettie-kins!” It was Mom. “Guess what?” she asked in a voice brimming with excitement. “Your daddy and I have moved to New York!” The first thing I thought about was the van that had broken down on the turnpike that morning. When I asked Mom about it, she admitted that yes, she and Dad had a teensy bit of technical difficulty with the van. It had popped a belt on some big, crowded highway, and Tinkle, who was sick and tired of being cooped up, you know how that goes, had gotten loose. The police had shown up, and Dad got into an argument with them, and they threatened to arrest him, and gosh it was quite the drama. “How did you know?” she asked. “It was on the radio.” “On the radio?” Mom asked. She couldn’t believe it. “With everything going on in the world these days, an old van popping a belt is news?” But there was genuine glee in her voice. “We only just got here, and we’re already famous!” After talking to Mom, I looked around my room. It was the maid’s room off the kitchen, and it was tiny, with one narrow window and a bathroom that doubled as a closet. But it was mine. I had a room now, and I had a life, too, and there was no place in either one for Mom and Dad. Still, the next day I went up to Lori’s apartment to see them. Everyone was there. Mom and Dad hugged me. Dad pulled a pint of whiskey out of a paper bag while Mom described their various adventures on the trip. They had gone sightseeing earlier that day, and taken their first ride on the subway, which Dad called a goddamn hole in the ground. Mom said the art deco murals at Rockefeller Center were disappointing, not nearly as good as some of her own paintings. None of us kids was doing much to help carry the conversation. “So, what’s the plan?” Brian finally asked. “You’re moving here?” “We have moved,” Mom said. “For good?” I asked. “That’s right,” Dad said. “Why?” I asked. The question came out sharply. Dad looked puzzled, as if the answer should have been obvious. “So we could be a family again.” He raised his pint. “To the family,” he said.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  We had a lot of arguments over what the name should be. I wanted to call her Rosita, after the prettiest girl in my class, but Mom said that name was too Mexican. “I thought we weren’t supposed to be prejudiced,” I said. “It’s not being prejudiced,” Mom said. “It’s a matter of accuracy in labeling.” She told us that both our grandmothers were angry because neither Lori nor I had been named after them, so she decided to call the baby Lilly Ruth Maureen. Lilly was Mom’s mother’s name, and Erma Ruth was Dad’s mother’s name. But we’d call the baby Maureen, a name Mom liked because it was a diminutive of Mary, so she’d also be naming the baby after herself but pretty much no one would know it. That, Dad told us, would make everyone happy except his mom, who hated the name Ruth and wanted the baby called Erma, and Mom’s mom, who would hate sharing her namesake with Dad’s mom. A FEW MONTHS AFTER Maureen was born, a squad car tried to pull us over because the brake lights on the Green Caboose weren’t working. Dad took off. He said that if the cops stopped us, they’d find out that we had no registration or insurance and that the license plate had been taken off another car, and they’d arrest us all. After barreling down the highway, he made a screeching U-turn, with us kids feeling like the car was going to tumble over on its side, but the squad car made one, too. Dad peeled through Blythe at a hundred miles an hour, ran a red light, cut the wrong way up a one-way street, the other cars honking and pulling over. He made a few more turns, then headed down an alley and found an empty garage to hide in. We heard the sound of the siren a couple of blocks away and then it faded. Dad said that since the gestapo would have their eyes out for the Green Caboose, we’d have to leave it in the garage and walk home. The next day he announced that Blythe had become a little too hot and we were hitting the road again. This time he knew where we were going. Dad had been doing some research and settled on a town in northern Nevada called Battle Mountain. There was gold in Battle Mountain, Dad said, and he intended to go after it with the Prospector. Finally, we were going to strike it rich. Mom and Dad rented a great big U-Haul truck. Mom explained that since only she and Dad could fit in the front of the U-Haul, Lori, Brian, Maureen, and I were in for a treat: We got to ride in the back. It would be fun, she said, a real adventure, but there wouldn’t be any light, so we would have to use all our resources to entertain one another. Plus we were not allowed to talk.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  We’d live in the forest in the mountains with the squirrels and the chipmunks. We could meet our grandma and grandpa Walls, who were genuine hillbillies. Mom made living in West Virginia sound like another great adventure, and pretty soon all us kids had signed on for the trip. Dad hated the idea, however, and refused to help Mom, so she plotted on her own. Since we had never retrieved the car—or any of our stuff—from the failed Grand Canyon expedition, the first thing Mom needed was a set of wheels. She said that God works in mysterious ways, and it just so happened that she had inherited some land in Texas when Grandma died. She waited until she received a check for several hundred dollars from the company that was leasing the drilling rights. Then she went to buy a used car. A local radio station had a promotional broadcast once a week from a car lot that we passed on our way to school. Every Wednesday the DJs and used-car salesmen would rave on-air about the incredible deals and the lowest prices around; to prove their point, they’d announce the Piggy Bank Special: some car priced under a thousand dollars that they’d sell to the first lucky caller. Mom set her sights on a Piggy Bank Special. She wasn’t taking any chances on being the first caller; she went down with her cash and sat in the dealership office while we kids waited on a park bench across the street, listening to the broadcast on a transistor radio. The Piggy Bank Special that Wednesday was a 1956 Oldsmobile, which Mom bought for two hundred dollars. We listened as she took to the airwaves to tell the radio audience she knew a heck of a bargain when she saw one. Mom was not allowed to test-drive the Piggy Bank Special before buying it. The car lurched and stalled several times on the way home. It was impossible to tell whether it was Mom’s driving or whether we had bought a lemon. We kids were not all that thrilled about the idea of Mom driving us cross-country. She didn’t have a valid driver’s license, for one thing, and she’d always been a terrible driver. If Dad got too drunk, she ended up behind the wheel, but cars never seemed to run right for Mom. Once we were driving through downtown Phoenix and she couldn’t get the brakes to work and she had Brian and me stick our heads out the windows and scream, “No brakes! No brakes!” as we rolled through intersections and she looked for something relatively soft to crash into. We ended up plowing into a Dumpster behind a supermarket and walking home. Mom said that anyone critical of her driving could help with the task. Now that we had a car, she continued, we could leave the next morning.

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  “She’s probably got a hot date lined up and doesn’t want us to know,” Maia joked. “Something like that,” she told them. For added luck, she wrapped her piano shawl over her raincoat. She felt exotic when she wore it, like a flamenco dancer. And if she didn’t exactly find luck in Atlantic City, she found Luke. She wouldn’t tell Maia and Paisley they met at the craps table. No one ever had to know the truth unless she and Luke wound up together. Then Maia would say, Can you believe Vix met Luke at a casino in Atlantic City? At the craps table? No, they wouldn’t believe it. She kept her impulsive side to herself. She’d once overheard Maia telling a friend at school, Victoria is the least spontaneous person in our entire class, but I’d trust her with my life. Actually, she didn’t really meet Luke at the craps table. She watched him. He was hot, on a roll, with a stack of chips in front of him that doubled and tripled every time he threw the dice. He was boyish, flush with excitement. She didn’t know it was a twenty-dollar table until she tried to place a bet. Embarrassed, she quickly retrieved her dollar chips. She hung around to watch anyway, as the crowd cheered Luke on, betting with him. He looked up once, caught her eye, and smiled. At the end of the day, as she was playing a slot machine, he came up behind her, dropped a quarter into the slot, covered her hand with his, and pulled the handle. Three cherries, clanging bells, and twenty ... thirty ... fifty dollars’ worth of quarters came spilling out. He caught them in a cup as she stood with her hands over her mouth, fighting the urge to jump up and down and shriek. “Some days you just can’t lose,” he said. He was slight, just her height, charming, with bedroom eyes. “Have dinner with me,” he said. When she didn’t answer right away he pulled out his wallet, fished out his driver’s license with its photo ID, held it up for her to see. “Luke Garden,” he told her. “New York City. Thirty-one, single, respectable, straight, Cornell ’80, sports management. I just won big!” So she had dinner. She told him her name was D’Nisha Cross. She told him she worked at ABC, in development. Two things borrowed, nothing blue. “Stay,” he said after dinner. “I’ve got a suite. Two bedrooms, two bathrooms. You get to sleep wherever you want. Really. Here ...” He

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Para cuando tenía catorce años, dejó de querer visitarme cada dos fines de semana, y ahora, apenas nos conocemos. Ni siquiera llamaba a menos que necesitara dinero. Sacudo la cabeza, despejándola. —¿Quieres poner una cinta? —sugiero a Jordan. No la miro a los ojos, pero puedo ver su cabeza moverse en mi dirección. —¿Una cinta? ¿Como una cinta de casete? De repente, su mirada se dirige al estéreo de mi auto y sus ojos se abren, la sorpresa ilumina su rostro. Casi me río. ¿No lo notó de camino hacia aquí? —¿Eso es una casetera de verdad? —dice. Alarga la mano y toca la radio del auto viejo como si fuera un jarrón precioso y presiona Abrir. Aparece una cinta de casete transparente con letras blancas que nunca escuché. La quita, la ahueca en su mano y lee el título. —Guns N 'Roses. —Se lleva la mano a la boca, como si estuviera a punto de llorar—. Oh, Dios mío. Lanzándose hacia la guantera, la abre y mira fijamente la fila de cintas ordenadamente dispuestas. —Deep Purple —lee—, Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp, ZZ Top... Luego, parece detectar algo que realmente la emociona, porque se acerca y saca el estuche negro de Def Leppard. —¿Hysteria? —exclama, leyendo el título del álbum—. Ya no hacen ese álbum. ¡Todo lo que puedes conseguir es la versión en vivo! Alzo las cejas, no estoy seguro de por qué todo esto es tan emocionante. —Te tomaré la palabra —digo, un poco divertido por su emoción—. Esta camioneta era de mi padre. Esas son sus cintas. Simplemente nunca llegué a sacarlas después que... falleció hace unos años. Se me ocurre que es la primera en tocar la cinta de Guns N'Roses desde que él la puso en el reproductor. Mira de nuevo a la colección.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  There was no reason for me to be automatically in awe of the wit and intellect of these New Yorkers. I picked up the suitcase. Evan did not insist I give it back to him. In fact, he seemed sort of relieved that I was carrying it. We continued on down the block, and he kept glancing at me sideways. “You West Virginia girls are one tough breed,” he said. “You got that right,” I told him. • • • Evan dropped me off at a German restaurant called Zum Zum. Lori was behind the counter, carrying four beer steins in each hand, her hair in twin buns and speaking in a thick German accent because, she explained later, it increased tips. “Dees ees mein seester!” she called out to the men at one of her tables. They raised their beer steins and shouted, “Velkomen to New Yorken!” I didn’t know any German, so I said, “Grazi!” They all got a chuckle out of that. Lori was in the middle of her shift, so I went out to wander the streets. I got lost a couple of times and had to ask directions. People had been warning me for months about how rude New Yorkers were. It was true, I learned that night, that if you tried to stop them on the street, a lot of them kept on walking, shaking their heads; those who did stop didn’t look at you at first. They gazed off down the block, their faces closed. But as soon as they realized you weren’t trying to hustle them or panhandle money, they warmed right up. They looked you in the eye and gave you detailed instructions about how, to get to the Empire State Building, you went up nine blocks and made a right and cut across two blocks and so on. They even drew you maps. New Yorkers, I figured, just pretended to be unfriendly. • • • Later, Lori and I took a subway down to Greenwich Village and walked over to the Evangeline, a women’s hostel where she had been living. That first night I woke up at three a.m. and saw the sky all lit up a bright orange. I wondered if there was a big fire somewhere, but in the morning Lori told me that the orange glow came from the air pollution refracting the light off the streets and buildings. The night sky here, she said, always had that color. What it meant was that in New York, you could never see the stars. But Venus wasn’t a star. I wondered if I’d be able to see it. The very next day, I landed a job at a hamburger joint on Fourteenth Street. After taxes and social security, I’d be taking home over eighty dollars a week.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  There was no reason for me to be automatically in awe of the wit and intellect of these New Yorkers. I picked up the suitcase. Evan did not insist I give it back to him. In fact, he seemed sort of relieved that I was carrying it. We continued on down the block, and he kept glancing at me sideways. “You West Virginia girls are one tough breed,” he said. “You got that right,” I told him. • • • Evan dropped me off at a German restaurant called Zum Zum. Lori was behind the counter, carrying four beer steins in each hand, her hair in twin buns and speaking in a thick German accent because, she explained later, it increased tips. “Dees ees mein seester!” she called out to the men at one of her tables. They raised their beer steins and shouted, “Velkomen to New Yorken!” I didn’t know any German, so I said, “Grazi!” They all got a chuckle out of that. Lori was in the middle of her shift, so I went out to wander the streets. I got lost a couple of times and had to ask directions. People had been warning me for months about how rude New Yorkers were. It was true, I learned that night, that if you tried to stop them on the street, a lot of them kept on walking, shaking their heads; those who did stop didn’t look at you at first. They gazed off down the block, their faces closed. But as soon as they realized you weren’t trying to hustle them or panhandle money, they warmed right up. They looked you in the eye and gave you detailed instructions about how, to get to the Empire State Building, you went up nine blocks and made a right and cut across two blocks and so on. They even drew you maps. New Yorkers, I figured, just pretended to be unfriendly. • • • Later, Lori and I took a subway down to Greenwich Village and walked over to the Evangeline, a women’s hostel where she had been living. That first night I woke up at three a.m. and saw the sky all lit up a bright orange. I wondered if there was a big fire somewhere, but in the morning Lori told me that the orange glow came from the air pollution refracting the light off the streets and buildings. The night sky here, she said, always had that color. What it meant was that in New York, you could never see the stars. But Venus wasn’t a star. I wondered if I’d be able to see it. The very next day, I landed a job at a hamburger joint on Fourteenth Street. After taxes and social security, I’d be taking home over eighty dollars a week.