Gratitude

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 Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood (2016)

  It fired, and then it didn’t fire, and then it fired again for the final shot. Anyone who knows anything about firearms will tell you that a 9mm handgun cannot misfire in the way that gun did. But at the crime scene the police had drawn little chalk circles all over the driveway, all with spent shell casings from the shots Abel fired, and then these four bullets, intact, from when he was standing over my mom—nobody knows why. My mom’s total hospital bill came to 50,000 rand. I paid it the day we left. For four days we’d been in the hospital, family members visiting, talking and hanging out, laughing and crying. As we packed up her things to leave, I was going on about how insane the whole week had been. “You’re lucky to be alive,” I told her. “I still can’t believe you didn’t have any health insurance.” “Oh but I do have insurance,” she said. “You do?” “Yes. Jesus.” “Jesus?” “Jesus.” “Jesus is your health insurance?” “If God is with me, who can be against me?” “Okay, Mom.” “Trevor, I prayed. I told you I prayed. I don’t pray for nothing.” “You know,” I said, “for once I cannot argue with you. The gun, the bullets—I can’t explain any of it. So I’ll give you that much.” Then I couldn’t resist teasing her with one last little jab. “But where was your Jesus to pay your hospital bill, hmm? I know for a fact that He didn’t pay that.” She smiled and said, “You’re right. He didn’t. But He blessed me with the son who did.” For my mother. My first fan. Thank you for making me a man. For nurturing my career these past years and steering me down the road that led to this book, I owe many thanks to Norm Aladjem, Derek Van Pelt, Sanaz Yamin, Rachel Rusch, Matt Blake, Jeff Endlich, and Jill Fritzo. For making this book deal happen and keeping it on track during a very tight and hectic time, I would like to thank Peter McGuigan and his team at Foundry Literary + Media, including Kirsten Neuhaus, Sara DeNobrega, and Claire Harris. Also, many thanks to Tanner Colby for helping me put my story on the page. For seeing the potential in this book and making it a reality, I would like to thank everyone at Random House and Spiegel & Grau, including my editor Chris Jackson, publishers Julie Grau and Cindy Spiegel, Tom Perry, Greg Mollica, Susan Turner, Andrea DeWerd, Leigh Marchant, Barbara Fillon, Dhara Parikh, Rebecca Berlant, Kelly Chian, Nicole Counts, and Gina Centrello.

• From Stone Butch Blues (1993)

  I remembered something my English teacher told me about not looking for approval for doing what you think is right. But I needed Jan’s approval so much at the moment that my eyes welled up with tears of gratitude. From that day forward, Jim Boney began to bait me mercilessly. “Hey, suck this,” he’d shout at me across the shop floor. Nobody wanted to take him on, partly because he held sway as a bully and partly because he was so tight with the foreman. “What am I gonna do, Jan?” I moaned over a beer. “You've gotta fight him,” Jan told me. I didn’t want to fight Jim Boney. I was afraid of him. “‘There’s no other way to stop him,” Jan said. I knew she was right. Two weeks later, Jim Boney pushed me too far. I was bending over to grab some sheets off the skid and I felt something on the back of my thigh. I swatted behind me and touched flesh. Jim Boney had pulled his cock out of his pants and rubbed it up against my jeans. I felt dizzy with fear and nausea. The worst part was that Jim Boney saw the look and recognized it. He and Jack laughed at me. All the women were watching, instead of working, so the booklets spilled off the end of the line and scattered on the floor. Jack shut the machine down. It got real quiet. Leroy called Jim Boney an asshole and told him to put his little dick back in his pants. Boney pushed Stone Butch Blues 89 Leroy, and they squared off to fight. “Your fight’s with me, Jim Boney,” I shouted. The burst of bravado startled me as much as it did everyone else. They were brave words, born of fear. “C’mon, you want a fight? Let’s go.” Everybody looked at Boney. He smirked at me in such a smarmy way that I knew he wanted to reduce me to the same helplessness I’d felt minutes before, but I refused. “C’mon,” I told him. “What are you afraid of, huh? Getting your ass whipped by a bulldagger?”’ Duffy came running up and then stopped in his tracks. He watched the standoff. Jim Boney lunged forward, and Jack and Kevin held him back. But I could tell Boney wasn’t struggling too hard to get to me. I didn’t know why Boney wasn’t eager to fight me, but it emboldened me. “T’ve had it up to here with your shit, Boney. We all have. Do your fucking job and leave me alone or else ?m gonna pound the shit out of you.” Jack and Kevin looked at Boney to see what he’d do. They let go of his arms. Boney waved his arm at me as though he were disgusted and turned away. “She ain’t worth it,’ he told them. “She ain’t worth shit.” As Boney walked away, Duffy shouted at him, “She’s a better union man than you are, Boney!”

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  AUGUSTINE. (De Cons. Ev. ii. 32.) Luke also gives this as spoken in continuation of some other of the Lord’s discourses; from which it appears that he has rather followed the actual order of events; Matthew to have followed his recollection. Or the words of Matthew, Then began he to upbraid the towns, must be taken, as some think, as expressing some particular time by the word then, but not referring generally to that time in which the many other things here told were done and said. Whoever, therefore, thinks thus must suppose that this was spoken twice. And when we find in the same Evangelist some things spoken by the Lord at two different times—like that in Luke concerning the not taking a scrip for their journey,—what wonder is it if any thing else, which was twice spoken, is found once severally in two several Gospels in the actual connexion in which it was spoken, which connexion is different, because they are two different occasions on which it is related to have been spoken? 11:25–2625. At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. 26. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight. GLOSS. (non occ.) Because the Lord knew that many would doubt respecting the foregoing matter, namely, that the Jews would not receive Christ whom the Gentile world has so willingly received, He here makes answer to their thoughts; And Jesus answered and said, I confess unto thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth. GLOSS. (ord.) That is, Who makest of heaven, or leavest in earthliness, whom Thou wilt. Or literally, AUGUSTINE. (Serm. 67. 1.) If Christ, from whom all sin is far, said, I confess, confession is not proper for the sinner only, but sometimes also for him that gives thanks. We may confess either by praising God, or by accusing ourselves. When He said, I confess unto thee, it is, I praise Thee, not I accuse Myself. JEROME. Let those hear who falsely argue, that the Saviour was not born but created, how He calls His Father Lord of heaven and earth. For if He be a creature, and the creature can call its Maker Father, it was surely foolish here to address Him as Lord of heaven and earth, and not of Him (Christ) likewise. He gives thanks that His coming has opened to the Apostles sacraments, which the Scribes and Pharisees knew not, who seemed to themselves wise, and understanding in their own eyes; That thou hast hid these things from the wise and understanding, and hast revealed them unto babes. AUGUSTINE. (Serm. 67. 5.) That the wise and understanding are to be taken as the proud, Himself opens to us when He says, and hast revealed them unto babes; for who are babes but the humble?

• From On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (2019)

  Thanks to my superb and fearless agent, Frances Coady (Captain Coady!), for your keen eyes, tireless faith, and patience, for respecting me as an artist first and foremost. For finding and believing in me before it all began. Deep gratitude to my editor, Ann Godoff, for your pristine enthusiasm for this little book, for understanding it so thoroughly, so totally, and with bone-deep care. For standing behind its author’s vision in every way. And to the superb team at Penguin Press: Matt Boyd, Casey Denis, Brian Etling, Juliana Kiyan, Shina Patel, and Sona Vogel. I’m indebted to Dana Prescott and Diego Mencaroni of the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, where, during a power outage in an Umbrian thunderstorm, this book was started, by hand. And to Leslie Williamson and the Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts, where this book was finished. Generous support was also provided by the Lannan Foundation, the Whiting Foundation, and the University of Massachusetts–Amherst. Thank you, Peter, always, for Peter. Ma, cảm ơn. About the Author Ocean Vuong is the author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds, winner of the Whiting Award and the T.S. Eliot Prize. His writings have also been featured in The Atlantic, Harper's, The Nation, New Republic, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Born in Saigon, Vietnam, he currently lives in Northampton, Massachusetts. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is his first novel. What’s next on your reading list? Discover your next great read! Get personalized book picks and up-to-date news about this author. Sign up now.

• From Stone Butch Blues (1993)

  For a moment I felt uneasy. If she relied on me, she had no idea what a thin reed she leaned on. Then I flushed with gratitude as I realized how she was holding me up, even at this moment. “You pulled it off, kid,” she punched my shoulder lightly. “Jesus,” she added, as a look of fear crossed her face. “Did you see the ears on those guys?” We finished our cigarettes in silence, lost in similar thoughts. | It was always hard the first day I started working at a new factory; it wasn’t easy for anyone. It took a while 80 = Leslie Feinberg for a new person to be accepted into the community of a plant. Before co-workers invested their caring in you they wanted to know if you were staying. Many workers never came back after the first day, or couldn’t make quota. Others made it almost to the eve of the ninety days required to join the union, only to be laid off. I planned to stay at this bindery, if I could. I easily made quota the first day, feeding machines and packing skids. By day two I slowed down. If quota was made too effortlessly, the foreman would raise it. I was being watched and I knew it. The first day I wore sunglasses, defensively, all day long, I didn’t take off my denim jacket and kept it buttoned up over my black T-shirt. This was a small sweatshop with a company union and I was the only he-she in the plant. If this were a big plant, I would be one of the many he- shes, so many we would have our own baseball or bowling teams within the factory complex. There I would probably have bound my breasts at work, worn a white T-shirt with no jacket, and found my place among out own smaller societal structure within the life of the plant. But despite the fact that I hadn’t yet been initiated into this society, kindnesses were not withheld. At lunch I bought a bottle of pop from the machine near the time clock and sat down on a skid to eat my baloney sandwich. Muriel, one of the older Native women who worked near me on the line, offered me half her apple. I stood and thanked her. I ate it appreciatively. Each morning for the next week Muriel offered me coffee from her thermos. Everyone watched us, weighing everything they could obsetve. Those moments before the whistle blew in the morning were precious because they were ours. Only the kerchunk of the time clock stole the last one from us. We all dragged ourselves out of bed a little earlier in the mornings to be at the plant a quarter hour before we had to punch in. We drank coffee and ate rolls, talked and laughed.

• From Speak, Memory (1966)

  Only recently have I read for the first time his important Sbornik statey po ugolovnomu pravu (a collection of articles on criminal law), published in 1904 in St. Petersburg, of which a very rare, possibly unique copy (formerly the property of a “Mihail Evgrafovich Hodunov,” as stamped in violet ink on the flyleaf) was given me by a kind traveler, Andrew Field, who bought it in a secondhand bookshop, on his visit to Russia in 1961. It is a volume of 316 pages containing nineteen papers. In one of these (“Carnal Crimes,” written in 1902), my father discusses, rather prophetically in a certain odd sense, cases (in London) “of little girls à l’âge le plus tendre (v nezhneyshem vozraste), i.e. from eight to twelve years, being sacrificed to lechers (slastolyubtsam).” In the same essay he reveals a very liberal and “modern” approach to various abnormal practices, incidentally coining a convenient Russian word for “homosexual”: ravnopolïy. It would be impossible to list the literally thousands of his articles in various periodicals, such as Rech or Pravo. In a later chapter I speak of his historically interesting book about a wartime semiofficial visit to England. Some of his memoirs pertaining to the years 1917–1919 have appeared in the Arhiv russkoy revolyutsii, published by Hessen in Berlin. On January 16, 1920, he delivered a lecture at King’s College, London, on “Soviet Rule and Russia’s Future,” which was published a week later in the Supplement to The New Commonwealth, No. 15 (neatly pasted in my mother’s album). In the spring of the same year I learned by heart most of it when preparing to speak against Bolshevism at a Union debate in Cambridge; the (victorious) apologist was a man from The Manchester Guardian; I forget his name, but recall drying up utterly after reciting what I had memorized, and that was my first and last political speech. A couple of months before my father’s death, the émigré review Teatr i zhizn’ (“Theater and Life”) started to serialize his boyhood recollections (he and I are overlapping now—too briefly). I find therein excellently described the terrible tantrums of his pedantic master of Latin at the Third Gymnasium, as well as my father’s very early, and lifelong, passion for the opera: he must have heard practically every first-rate European singer between 1880 and 1922, and although unable to play anything (except very majestically the first chords of the “Ruslan” overture) remembered every note of his favorite operas. Along this vibrant string a melodious gene that missed me glides through my father from the sixteenth-century organist Wolfgang Graun to my son.

• From Blue Like Jazz (2003)

  THANK YOU, KATHY HELMERS, FOR YOUR ENCOURAGEMENT and help in getting this book to a publisher, and to Lee and Alice and the rest of the crew at Alive for their generous hearts and diligent work. Much gratitude to the people at Thomas Nelson for rolling the dice; those people are Brian, Jonathan, Kyle, Ashley, Pamela, Laurie, Belinda, Blythe, Amy, Danielle, Kathleen, Carol, Andrea, Paula, Tina, Louetta, Kristen, Jenny, Deonne, and interns Stacey and Sarah. And thanks to the rest of that great crew at Thomas Nelson including the huge sales staff on the road who don’t get thanked enough. Also thanks to media trainer Joel Roberts. My friends gave their lives to me and then kindly let me write about our relationships, which was something vulnerable and giving, so thanks to Tony, Penny, Laura, Andrew the Protester, Rick, Mark the Cussing Pastor, Les, the Tunnell family, Wes and Maja Bjur, Paul and Danielle, Mike, Josh, Jeremy, Heather, Kurt, Curtis, Mitch, Simon, Trevor, Michael, Stacy, Diane, Wes, Grant, Julie the Canadian, Matt and Julie Canlis, Rachel Clifton for being the second mom to so many of us, the guys at Graceland, and the guys at Testosterhome too. Also, the people I love at Imago-Dei Community and my family. Thanks Josh, Gregg, and Sono for giving me a start. And to John and Terri MacMurray, who were like family away from family. Thanks Wes and Maja for letting me live in your attic for so long and as always for your love and kindness. Thanks, Peter Jenkins, for your drawings, and Steve Harmon, for author shots, video stuff, and encouragement. Thanks, David Allen, for your work on cover comps. I owe you one. Thanks to Tony’s grad class at Multnomah for reading the manuscript and giving encouragement; those folks are Shemaiah, Lindsey, Toby, Steve, and Nicole. Thanks to James Prior for bringing me so often to San Fran and for your friendship. This book was written at Common Ground, Palio, Horse Brass Pub, the downtown coffee shops including Seattle’s Best, Vista Springs, and a few others I can’t remember, but thanks to these fine establishments for their good coffee and beer. Thanks to trimet for getting me around. “How we get there matters!” While I wrote I listened to Patty Griffin, the Pogues, Bruce Springsteen, Eliot Smith, Lyle, Whiskeytown, Phil Roy, Big Head Todd and the Monsters, the Jayhawks, P.O.D., Tori Amos, Steve Earle, Bob Schneider, Moby, the Beatles, and my current favorite, Wilco (Yankee Hotel Foxtrot had just come out when I started the project, and we were all amazed and happy), so strange thanks to the makers of the sound track. Thank you for reading this book. It means a great deal to me that you would take the time. I hope we get to meet some day soon. Donald Miller has written for Believe Magazine, HM Magazine, Killing the Buddha, and many other publications. He is a frequent speaker on issues relating to Christian spirituality,

• From Heptaméron (1559)

  It was not long before the husband went to see the metayere as usual ; and great was his surprise to find the sorry room become so neat, but still greater was it when she gave him a silver cup to drink out of. He asked her where it came from, and the poor woman told him with tears that it was his wife, who, pitying his poor entertainment, had thus furnished the house, enjoining her to be careful of his health. Struck by the great goodness of his wife, who thus returned so much good for so much evil, the gentleman reproached himself for ingratitude as great as his wife's generosity. He gave his metayere money, begged her thenceforth to live like an honest woman, and went back to his wife. He con- fessed the whole truth to her, and told her that her gen- tleness and goodness had withdrawn him from a bad * Woman of Touraine. 22 338 THE HEPTAMERON OF THE \Nin<el 3«. course, from which it was impossible he should ever have escaped by any other means ; and forgetting the past, they lived thenceforth together in great peace and concord.* There are very few husbands, ladies, whom the wife does not win in the long run by patience and love, unless they are harder than the rocks which yet the weak and soft water pierces in time. " Why, this woman had neither heart, nor gall, nor liver ! " exclaimed Parlamente. " What would you have ? " said Longarine ; " she did as God commands, rendering good for evil." " I fancy,'' said Hircan, " that she was in love with some Cordelier, who ordered her as a penance to have her husband so well treated in the country, in order that while he was there she might have leisure to treat him- self well in town." " In this you plainly show the wickedness of your own heart," said Oisille, "judging so ill of a good deed. I believe, on the contrary, that she was so penetrated by the love of God that she cared for nothing but her hus- band's welfare." " It strikes me," said Simontault, " that he had more

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  3. The valiant woman rose in the night, as the Scriptures tell us, and gave a prey to her servants and food to her maidens. That signifies the work of the Church of the Gentiles. She rose in the night, because by the hearing of the word she turns herself from the darkness of sins to Jesus. When the Jews refused the Sacraments that were offered to them, she took them away with all desire, and with them she feeds the faithful. By this food she strengthens them in three things: a, in works of mercy; b, in gain to the soul; c, in buying heavenly riches. Hence it is said that this woman considered a field and bought it, and that she planted a vineyard with the fruit of her hands. Now works of mercy are signified by the fruit of her hands; the gain to the soul is signified by the planting of the vineyard; and the buying riches of God is signified by the field that she bought. a. We are strengthened for good works by the food of our Lord. As fodder strengthens an ass to carry burdens, so Heavenly Bread strengthens the servant of God for good works. When you think rightly of God’s measureless bounty to you in this Holy Sacrament your hearts are greatly strengthened in the love of your neighbour. b. We are strengthened in gain to the soul. For from the full Heart of Jesus the oil of grace is ever flowing for the salvation of souls. c. We are strengthened for the buying of heavenly riches. The heritage of heavenly fields is bought with the money of virtue and good works; and these fields, as well as the names of the buyers, are written in the book of life. On the heart of the buyer are stamped as a sure pledge the sign of the Cross of Christ and the light of the image of God. There is a faithful witness, for in the day of judgment God will be witness before all, that truly by the price of good works you bought that kingdom of life. N. You may, as was said, take the third chief effect to be the giving of everlasting life. This is seen in three things: 1, in the making ready of all delights; 2, in the fulfilling of all desires; 3, in the sureness of the everlasting enjoyment of all good. (See page 68.) The Voice of the Holy Ghost (1) About the destruction of sins; Thou sawest till a stone was cut out of a mountain without hands; and it struck the statue upon the feet thereof, that were of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. Dan. 2:34. For this end the Son of God appeared, that He might destroy the works of the devil. 1 John 3:8. 1. Washing the stain from the heart; They shall be whited with snow in Selmon. Ps. 67:15.

• From The Laws of Human Nature (2018)

  I cannot forget to thank my cat, Brutus, who has now overseen the production of my last five books and who has helped me understand the human animal from a very different perspective. I would like to thank my dear sister, Leslie, for all her love, support, and many ideas she has inspired over the years. And of course I must thank my very patient mother, Laurette, for everything she has done for me, not least of all instilling in me a love of books and history. And finally, I would like to thank all those innumerable people throughout my life who’ve shown me the worst and the best in human nature, and who’ve supplied me endless material for this book. Selected Bibliography Adler, Alfred. Understanding Human Nature: The Psychology of Personality. Translated by Colin Brett. Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2011. Allport, Gordon W. The Nature of Prejudice . Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979. Ammaniti, Massimo, and Vittorio Gallese. The Birth of Intersubjectivity: Psychodynamics, Neurobiology, and the Self. New York: W.W. Norton, 2014. Arendt, Hannah. Between Past and Future . New York: Penguin Books, 1993. Argyle, Michael. Bodily Communication . New York: Routledge, 2001. Balen, Malcolm. A Very English Deceit: The South Sea Bubble and the World’s First Great Financial Scandal. London: Fourth Estate, 2003. Barlett, Donald L., and James B. Steele. Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness. New York: W.W. Norton, 2004. Baron-Cohen, Simon. Mindblindness: An Essay on Autism and Theory of Mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999. Bion, W. R. Experiences in Groups: And Other Papers. New York: Routledge, 1989. Bly, Robert. A Little Book on the Human Shadow. New York: HarperOne, 1988. Bradford, Sarah. America’s Queen: The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. New York: Penguin Books, 2001. Caro, Robert A. Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson. New York: Vintage Books, 2003. Chancellor, Edward. Devil Take the Hindmost: A History of Financial Speculation. New York: Plume, 2000. Chernow, Ron. Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. New York: Vintage Books, 1998. Cozolino, Louis. The Neuroscience of Human Relationships: Attachment and the Developing Social Brain. New York: W.W. Norton, 2006. Crawshay-Williams, Rupert. The Comforts of Unreason: A Study of the Motives Behind Irrational Thought. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1970. Damasio, Antonio. The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness. Orlando, FL: Harcourt, 1999. de Waal, Frans. Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex Among Apes. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007. Diamond, Jared. The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal. New York: Harper Perennial, 2006. Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Idiot . Translated by Constance Garnett. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2004. Douglas, Claire. The Woman in the Mirror: Analytical Psychology and the Feminine. Lincoln, NE: Backinprint.com, 2000. Durkheim, Émile. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. Translated by Karen E. Fields. New York: The Free Press, 1995. Ekman, Paul. Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication and Emotional Life. New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2007. Eliot, George.

• From Stone Butch Blues (1993)

  When Szone Butch Blues was published, I thought I would keep cartons of copies in my closet to give out to people who were ready to read it. But this book, like the movements for social change it was inextricably connected with, exploded the closet door off its hinges. Since then I’ve received the gift of hundreds of thousands of letters, emails, and phone calls; heartfelt emotions shared by individuals Pve met at rallies, universities, colleges. I’ve been stopped by strangers—in places from a gas station in rural lowa to a shopping mall in Jersey City. These people, many of whose life battles do not seem to be related in any way, shape or form to oppression based on sexuality, gender or sex, took time and care to explain to me the impact the book made on their thinking, their decisions, their actions. People who have lived very different lives have generously related to me the similarities they recognized in these pages with their own struggles— the taste of bile; the inferno of rage—transsexual men and women, heterosexual crossdressers and bearded females, intersexual and androgynous people, bi-gender and tri-gender individuals, and many other exquisitely defined and expressed identities. Perhaps what resonates most for me are reports that copies of Stone Butch Blues are passed around in prison cell blocks until they are worn and tattered. This book has journeyed to lands that I have not yet seen. Letters and emails have traveled to me from the tip of South America to the far reaches of the North, from Africa to Asia. The novel is translated into German and Dutch. The Chinese-language edition, with a preface I wrote for readers there, has been serialized in Tatwan’s leading daily newspaper, recommended as reading for teenagers and adults alike. And mote translations are in the works. Has publishing this novel changed my life? Yes. And no. It hasn’t altered the trajectory of my life. As I finished writing Stone Butch Blues I had already lived in the vortex of the left-wing LGBT liberation current for 30 years. I’'d been a revolutionary activist for more than 20 years; a weekly journalist and editor for Workers World newspaper. I had fought against Pentagon wars of aggression. Supported Palestinian self-determination. Worked to defend political prisoners like Mumia Abu-Jamal and Leonard Peltier. Been a leading organizer of the 1974 March Stone Butch Blues 3317 Against Racism in Boston. Toured the country in 1984 speaking about the AIDS crisis. I’d mobilized to stop the Nazis and Klan, helped protect women’s reproductive rights, and made national rallies and demonstrations more accessible to Deaf and disabled activists. ... I leave it to historians, herstorians and hirstorians to analyze the changes in the decade since this novel was written, and to place the publication of Stone Butch Blues within broad and persistent social and political efforts to right societal wrongs.

• From Paul and Matthew Among Jews and Gentiles: Essays in Honor of Terence L. Donaldson (2021)

  3 Introduction Donaldson presents a research trajectory that is both solid and informative. 3 At the writing of this edited volume he also has a forthcoming monograph on Gentile Christian Identity from Cornelius to Constantine. 4 This edited volume is important for the development of scholarship in the ways in which some prominent NT scholars engage Donaldson’s contributions to sharpen some of his conclusions and to honor him for his work and friendship. These essays are located at the intersections of three bodies of literature— Paul, Matthew, and Second Temple Jewish Literature—as well as with themes and questions that have been central to Donaldson’s work: Christian Judaism and the parting of the ways, Gentiles in Judaism and early Christianity, and anti-Judaism in early Christianity. Donaldson’s scholarly achievement, as well as his dedication to his students and commitment to scholarly pursuits across the academic divide, has made it a pleasure for me to be in conversation with a variety of scholars. The essays included in this Festschrift testify to the wide array of colleagues eager to engage with Donaldson’s work and to push the scholarly conversations in further and fruitful directions. Overview of the Volume Chapter 1 is from Steve Mason. Mason is very interested in probing historical questions. He challenges some of the categories now taken for granted, such as Judaism, to study Paul. The question that guides his analysis is a simple, yet profound one: “How did Paul present himself to the groups of Christ-followers he established, in relation to Judean law, custom, and culture?” To Mason, there was not a lexical category of “Judaism” known to Paul and his contemporaries. His important contribution pushes us to be more attentive to history and to historical figures like Paul in their particular historical and linguistic milieu. Chapter 2 is by Leif Vaage. His style of writing and of thinking is provocative and inimitable. He moves from modern anthropology, to ancient history, and to biblical studies to push the reader to reassess his/her understanding of Paul’s earthly identity. What comes to us from Vaage’s analysis is the presentation of an ancient figure who appears stranger and, perhaps, much more interesting than simply understanding Paul as being “this” (by nature a Jewish self ) or “that” (an identity framed by Christ and understanding himself as a citizen of heaven). My contribution in Chapter 3 explores the theme of the new creation in Jubilees and Romans. I have shown some similarities between human sin and the decay of creation in Jubilees and Romans, but the two texts could hardly be more dissimilar in some respects, for example, in the place the two accord to Israel and the law, although in this area there are important agreements. I also maintain, alongside Donaldson and 3 Jesus on the Mountain: A Study in Matthean Theology (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1985); Paul and the Gentiles; Judaism and the Gentiles(Jews and Anti-Judaism in the New Testament; Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2010).

• From In the Dream House (2019)

  To all of these writers, academics, archives, publications, and presses: thank you for your activism, your scholarship, and your wisdom. AcknowledgmentsThis book would have been impossible without the resources and support of the University of Pennsylvania, the Lesbian Herstory Archives, the Special Collections and University Archives at the University of Oregon, Yaddo, Playa, the Wurlitzer Foundation, and Bard College. Many thanks to Tracy Fontil, for her impeccable and thorough research, and the Bassini Foundation for sponsoring her apprenticeship. Thank you to Dorothy Allison for her wisdom; Elliott Battzekek and Sawyer Lovett at Big Blue Marble Bookstore for their insight; Jane Marie at the Hairpin for publishing my first writing on this subject; Jen Wang and Jess Row for their musical expertise; Kendra Albert for leading me to resources on archival silence; Kevin Brockmeier for reading and being encouraging about an early draft of this memoir; David Korzenik for his legal advice; Mark Mayer for his sharp line edits and tender encouragement; Michelle Huneven for her thoughtful edits on “A Girl’s Guide to Sexual Purity” when it was published in the Los Angeles Review of Books; Nikki Gloudeman for editing “Gaslight” for Medium and Matt Higginson for commissioning it; Sam Chang for her all-around excellence and also for directing me to Terry Castle’s The Professor; Sofia Samatar for our many conversations about the radical possibilities of nonfiction; Ted Chiang for teaching me about time travel; Yuka Igarashi at Catapult for editing and publishing “The Moon Over the River Lethe”; and the vultures who sat in a tree over my head as I finished this book, for clearing away the rot. I am, as always, in debt to my editors Ethan Nosowsky and Yana Makuwa (this book is infinitely better for their insight); my brilliant and scarily capable agent, Kent Wolf; and the entire team at Graywolf, for their tireless efforts, boundless faith, and endless good cheer. I am deeply grateful to Amy, Ben, Bennett, Carleen, E.J., Evan, John, Laura, Rebecca, Rebekah, and Tony for their love, friendship, and stabilizing presence during those days; Chris, Emma, Julia, Karen, Lara, and Sam for listening when my pain was fresh and inarticulate; Audrey, R.K., and all the other members of the weirdest, gayest First Wives’ Club ever, for trusting me with their stories; and Margaret, for putting the pieces together. And of course, the biggest thanks go to my wife, Val—my plot twist, my fate, my fairy-tale ending—who challenges me and comforts me and allows me to splash details of our lives all over the place. I’d do it all again, baby. It brought me you.

• From On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (2019)

  The egg is warm as my insides, he thinks. It’s an old remedy. “The egg, it heals even the worst bruises,” says his grandma. She works on the violet lump shining, like a plum, on the boy’s face. As the egg circled, its smooth pressure on the bruise, the boy watched, under a puffed lid, his grandma’s lips crease with focus as she worked. Years later, as a young man, when all that remains of the grandma is a face etched in his mind, the boy will remember that crease between her lips while breaking open a hard-boiled egg on his desk on a winter night in New York. Short on rent, it would be eggs for dinner for the rest of the week. They would not be warm, but cold in his palm, having been boiled by the dozen earlier that morning. At his desk, drifting, he’ll roll the moist egg across his cheek. Without speaking, he will say Thank you. He’ll keep saying it until the egg grows warm with himself. “Thank you, Grandma,” says the boy, squinting. “You fine now, Little Dog.” She lifts the pearly orb, and places it gently to his lips. “Eat,” she says. “Swallow. Your bruises are inside it now. Swallow and it won’t hurt anymore.” And so he eats. He is eating still. — There were colors, Ma. Yes, there were colors I felt when I was with him. Not words—but shades, penumbras. We stopped the truck one time on the side of a dirt road and sat against the driver door, facing a meadow. Soon our shadows on the red exterior shifted and bloomed, like purple graffiti. Two double-cheese Whoppers were warming on the hood, their parchment wrappers crackling. Did you ever feel colored-in when a boy found you with his mouth? What if the body, at its best, is only a longing for body? The blood racing to the heart only to be sent back out, filling the routes, the once empty channels, the miles it takes to take us toward each other. Why did I feel more myself while reaching for him, my hand midair, than I did having touched him? His tongue tracing my ear: the green pulled through a blade of grass. The burgers started to smoke. We let them. — I would work for the farm for two more summers after that first one—but my time with Trevor would stretch through all the seasons in between. And that day, it was October 16—a Thursday. Partly cloudy, the leaves crisp but still on their branches.

• From Paul and Matthew Among Jews and Gentiles: Essays in Honor of Terence L. Donaldson (2021)

  3 I am always very impressed by Terry’s careful scholarship, especially in how he probes difficult questions. On the Sonderweg (two-covenant) question, see his “Jewish Christianity, Israel’s Stumbling and the Sonderweg Reading of Paul,” JSNT 29 (2006): 27–54. I am eternally grateful to have studied with him, both at the Masters and Ph.D. level in Toronto. I could not have asked for a better, and very patient, scholar-mentor. The present chapter is a revised version of a seminar paper for a class I took with him as a graduate student.

• From The Laws of Human Nature (2018)

  There are always plenty of people to use for such a comparison. They live in harsher environments, deal with more threats to their lives, and have deeper levels of insecurity about the future. You can even look at friends who have it much worse than you. This should stimulate not only empathy for the many who have less but also greater gratitude for what you actually possess. Such gratitude is the best antidote to envy. As a related exercise, you can write up all the positive things in your life that you tend to take for granted—the people who have been kind and helpful to you, the health that you presently enjoy. Gratitude is a muscle that requires exercise or it will atrophy. Practice Mitfreude . Schadenfreude, the experience of pleasure in the pain of other people, is distinctly related to envy, as several studies have demonstrated. When we envy someone, we are prone to feel excitement, even joy, if they experience a setback or suffer in some way. But it would be wise to practice instead the opposite, what the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche called Mitfreude— “joying with.” As he wrote, “The serpent that stings us means to hurt us and rejoices as it does so; the lowest animal can imagine the pain of others. But to imagine the joy of others and to rejoice at it is the highest privilege of the highest animals.” This means that instead of merely congratulating people on their good fortune, something easy to do and easily forgotten, you must instead actively try to feel their joy, as a form of empathy. This can be somewhat unnatural, as our first tendency is to feel a pang of envy, but we can train ourselves to imagine how it must feel to others to experience their happiness or satisfaction. This not only cleans our brain of ugly envy but also creates an unusual form of rapport. If we are the targets of Mitfreude , we feel the other person’s genuine excitement at our good fortune, instead of just hearing words, and it induces us to feel the same for them. Because it is such a rare occurrence, it contains great power to bond people. And in internalizing other people’s joy, we increase our own capacity to feel this emotion in relation to our own experiences. Transmute envy into emulation. We cannot stop the comparing mechanism in our brains, so it is best to redirect it into something productive and creative. Instead of wanting to hurt or steal from the person who has achieved more, we should desire to raise ourselves up to his or her level. In this way, envy becomes a spur to excellence. We may even try to be around people who will stimulate such competitive desires, people who are slightly above us in skill level.

• From Paul and Matthew Among Jews and Gentiles: Essays in Honor of Terence L. Donaldson (2021)

  Returning to Tomoko Masuzawa’s work on nineteenth-century European discourses on religion, I wonder how much progress biblical scholarship has made as a subdiscipline of religious studies. How much of this talk of exclusivity and inclusivity, particularism and universalism, is real y just coded theological apologetics? F. C. Baur valued inclusivity and universalism in a Germany that was moving away from provincialism and a fragmented German state, to a unified Germany. Wright and Dunn valued inclusivity and universalism in the United Kingdom at a time when the evils of colonialism were becoming apparent to the Western conscience. Today, we too are influenced by discourses of inclusion and universalism. To my mind, there is 34 On this issue, see Douglas A. Campbel , “Galatians 5.11: Evidence of an Early Law-observant Mission by Paul?” NTS 57 (2011): 325–47; Justin K. Hardin, “‘If I Still Proclaim Circumcision’ (Galatians 5:11a): Paul, the Law, and Gentile Circumcision,” JSPL 3 (2013): 145–64; and Joshua Garroway, The Beginning of the Gospel: Paul, Philippi, and the Origins of Christianity (New York, NY: Palgrave MacMil an, 2018). 35 As Jonathan Z. Smith puts it, “ ‘Unique’ becomes an ontological rather than a taxonomic category; an assertion of a radical difference so absolute that it becomes ‘Whol y Other,’ and the act of comparison is perceived as both an impossibility and an impiety”: Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity (CSHJ; Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1990), 38. 96 96 Paul and Matthew among Jews and Gentiles much that is praiseworthy in these modern discourses. But to allow them to influence our historical work on ancient Judaism is to give theology, apologetics, or modern ideologies the driver’s seat where it is unlicensed to drive. More than that, it is to bear false witness against others who cannot defend themselves. Such discourses of exclusivity and inclusivity are barely masked apologetics for Christianity over Judaism that claim inclusivity for Christianity at the very moment that they are guilty of, in the name of Christianity and via poor historical work, excluding, judging, and condemning the other. When such ideologies masquerade as history, it is our job to unmask them as such. Throughout his scholarship, Terry Donaldson has done just this, and I, for one, am both deeply indebted and grateful to him. 97 Part Two Matthew 98 98 99 6 Beyond Universalism and Particularism: Rethinking Paul and Matthew on Gentile Inclusion Anders Runesson Introduction

• From Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away (2022)

  One aspect of the generosity of my friends and colleagues (and those who became my friends during the course of writing this book) has been their willingness to connect me to others they thought would be helpful in this journey. Thank you to Josh Kopelman for introducing me to Stewart Butterfield, Ron Conway, and Andrew Wilkinson; Michael Mauboussin for introducing me to Sasha Cohen and Laurence Gonzales; Richard Thaler for introducing me to Shane Frederick and Maya Shankar; David Epstein for introducing me to Riley Post; Max Bazerman for introducing me to Stuart Baserman; Maya Shankar for introducing me to Jennifer Kurkoski, who in turn introduced me to Barry Staw and Astro Teller; Ted Seides for introducing me to Michael Mervosh; and Mark Moffett for reintroducing me to Ken Kamler. This is my third book with the same pillars of professional support: Jim Levine, Niki Papadopoulos, and Michael Craig. Like the previous two efforts, this book wouldn’t have been possible without these dear friends. Jim Levine has nurtured this project from the very beginning. Apart from his obvious acumen in protecting and advancing my interests as my agent, he has somehow managed to be constantly encouraging and optimistic, while maintaining a hawk’s eye for challenging anything he thought would make the book better as it evolved. Niki Papadopoulos has shaped this book as editor every step of the way. Her attention to detail is amazing, and she has an incredible capacity for understanding and directing a book’s flow and organization. I trust her instincts and judgments completely. Simply put, Niki gets me. I can’t overstate how important that is for getting me through the wrenching process of writing a book, nor can I express how much better this book is because of her. I am grateful to Adrian Zackheim for his enthusiastic cheerleading of this project, as well as everyone in the Portfolio and entire Penguin Random House family, including Kimberly Meilun and Amanda Lang. I am deeply indebted to Michael Craig, who has been essential to producing this book. In addition to being a great friend, he has been incredibly generous with his talents as editor, researcher, test-audience member, contributor of ideas and examples, compiler, and organizer of this material. I am confident that this book would not exist without him. I’m also grateful to my research assistant, Antonio Grumser, as well as for the work of Meghna Sreenivas at the start of this project. This book benefited tremendously from the input and feedback I received from all the companies, conferences, professional groups, and executives who have hired me, giving me an opportunity to workshop my ideas through consulting, coaching, keynotes, and retreats over the years. A special thank-you to the people at mParticle, who made possible a great illustration of kill criteria in action and gave their permission to mention the company by name.

• From In the Dream House (2019)

  You get so high, by accident. So high that when you take the subway to Little Russia, to the beach there, you remember almost none of the trip aside from a few bright, distant fragments. Being in a drugstore and feeling like you were a sacrifice to the Minotaur. Hot sand. Her touching your back with cool lotion. (There are photos of the three of you, evidence of your presence there. You’re smiling, and you look unbearably soft.) Then, it is your birthday. There is a party. You’re too high to stand up so you sit, legs splayed and head heavy, with your back against the stove. People keep coming and sitting next to you and talking, and you keep realizing, in this drifting, belated way, that they’re concerned for you. You try to explain that you’re fine, you’re fine, you’re just high, but whatever you’re actually saying, people do not seem convinced. Val visits you on the floor, brings you pieces of cheese. You stick one in your mouth, meditate on its smooth mouthfeel and nutty sweetness. You like her so much. She is so kind and open, and you respect her fortitude. Another piece, this one salty and crumbly, so pleasant in the way it comes apart. How did you get so lucky, to have all of these new people in your life? The next piece is fresh mozzarella, and as Val helps you stand you think to yourself mozzarella is basically water cheese and then you go to another room and fall asleep. Dream House as Meet the ParentsIn the car from New York, your girlfriend is high and quiet. She reeks of weed, and is about to meet your parents for the first time. You are angrier than you’ve ever been with her. “We’re gonna meet my parents in, like, an hour. I don’t understand why you would do this.” “You’ve never had to meet someone’s parents when you’re the first girlfriend,” she snaps. “They look at you in this way and it’s unbearable.” You are silent. “They won’t be able to tell,” she says. “Now you can’t even help me drive,” you say. “I have to do this all on my own.” You inch through New York this way, the car filled with the silent, wavy heat of your respective angers. In Allentown, your parents are very nice to her. Dream House as Here Comes the BrideIn DC, she meets your college friends, whose reactions to her range from sweet and excited to reserved. (Sam has gotten to them, you realize with a panic. You haven’t successfully contained the situation.)

• From The Laws of Human Nature (2018)

  and assistance on the project. Also at Inkwell, my thanks go to Michael Mungiello, and to Alexis Hurley, for bringing the book to a global audience. I have many people to thank at Penguin, most important of all my editor, Andrea Schulz, for all her much appreciated work on the text, and our numerous conversations in which she helped sharpen the concept and share with me her own insights on human nature. I must also thank the original editor on the project, Carolyn Carlson, as well as Melanie Tortoroli for her editorial contributions. I would also like to thank Andrea’s assistant, Emily Neuberger; the designer of the cover Colin Webber; in the marketing department, Kate Stark and Mary Stone; and Carolyn Coleburn and Shannon Twomey for their work on the publicity front. I must also thank Andrew Franklin, publisher of Profile Books in England, who has been there for all six of my books, and whose literary and publishing acumen I can always count on. As always, I must thank my former apprentice and now bestselling author and master strategist Ryan Holiday for all of his research suggestions, marketing help, and overall wisdom. I cannot forget to thank my cat, Brutus, who has now overseen the production of my last five books and who has helped me understand the human animal from a very different perspective. I would like to thank my dear sister, Leslie, for all her love, support, and many ideas she has inspired over the years. And of course I must thank my very patient mother, Laurette, for everything she has done for me, not least of all instilling in me a love of books and history. And finally, I would like to thank all those innumerable people throughout my life who’ve shown me the worst and the best in human nature, and who’ve supplied me endless material for this book. Selected Bibliography Adler, Alfred. Understanding Human Nature: The Psychology of Personality. Translated by Colin Brett. Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2011. Al port, Gordon W. The Nature of Prejudice . Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979. Ammaniti, Massimo, and Vittorio Gal ese. The Birth of Intersubjectivity: Psychodynamics, Neurobiology, and the Self. New York: W.W. Norton, 2014. Arendt, Hannah. Between Past and Future . New York: Penguin Books, 1993. Argyle, Michael. Bodily Communication . New York: Routledge, 2001. Balen, Malcolm. A Very English Deceit: The South Sea Bubble and the World’s First Great Financial Scandal. London: Fourth Estate, 2003. Barlett, Donald L., and James B. Steele. Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness. New York: W.W. Norton, 2004. Baron-Cohen, Simon. Mindblindness: An Essay on Autism and Theory of Mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999. Bion, W. R. Experiences in Groups: And Other Papers. New York: Routledge, 1989. Bly, Robert. A Little Book on the Human Shadow. New York: HarperOne, 1988. Bradford, Sarah. America’s Queen: The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. New York: Penguin Books, 2001. Caro, Robert A. Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson. New York: Vintage Books, 2003.