Shame

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

  But Albrecht’s confirmation as archbishop was not secured without the payment of a high price. The price,10,000 ducats, was set by the authorities in Rome and did not originate with the German embassy, which had gone to prosecute the case. The proposition came from the Vatican itself and at the very moment the Lateran council was voting measures for the reform of the Church. It carried with it the promise of a papal indulgence for the archbishop’s territories. The elector Joachim expressed some scruples of conscience over the purchase, but it went through. Schulte exclaims that, if ever a benefice was sold for gold, this was true in the case of Albrecht.1332 The bull of indulgences was issued March 31,1516, and granted the young German prelate the right to dispose of pardons throughout the half part of Germany, the period being fixed at 8 years. The bull offered, "complete absolution—plenissimam indulgentiam — and remission of all sins," sins both of the living and the dead. A private paper, emanating from Leo and dated two weeks later, April 15, mentions the 10,000 ducats proposed by the Vatican as the price of Albrecht’s confirmation as having been already placed in Leo’s hands.1333 To enable him to pay the full amount of 30,000 ducats his ecclesiastical dignities had cost, Albrecht borrowed from the Fuggers and, to secure funds, he resorted to a two-years’ tax of two-fifths which he levied on the priests, the convents and other religious institutions of his dioceses. In 1517, "out of regard for his Holiness, the pope, and the salvation and comfort of his people," Joachim opened his domains to the indulgence-hawkers. It was his preaching in connection with this bull that won for Tetzel an undying notoriety. Oldecop, writing in 1516, of what he saw, said that people, in their eagerness to secure deliverance from the guilt and penalty of sin and to get their parents and friends out of purgatory, were putting money into the chest all day long.

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

  They showed me that people want to be fooled, and that it was easy to fool them. All I’d done was imagine myself as Anaïs, and people, needing her to be there, believed in the lie. It left me feeling inflated, pumped with helium, but also cynical. I’d satisfied the dream I’d held for so long of becoming Anaïs, if only for one night, but when it happened, it felt creepy—like being a body snatcher. [image file=image_rsrc3R3.jpg] Only three days later Anaïs, back from the hospital, phoned to find out how the event had gone. I still felt drained, as if my trick of becoming her in the auditorium and the rush of her fans had been a seizure that had left me limp, hollow, my ears ringing. “How did it go?” “Alright. They didn’t boo.” “What else? “I have a bunch of gifts to bring you. How did you get out of the hospital so soon?” “What do you mean?” She sounded affronted. “I mean all the other times you had to stay longer.” “Oh, they just had to fatten me up this time.” “Couldn’t they have waited until after your appearance?” “No, they thought I was that weak.” “Oh. I’m sorry. People really missed seeing you.” She said the purpose of her call was to invite me and Jamie to come tell her about the event, and she wanted both of us to stay after to meditate for her cure with the “white light people.” “What do they charge for that?” I asked skeptically. “Nothing. They want to help. It’s just white light, Tristine.” [image file=image_rsrc3R3.jpg] There was total gridlock on the freeway and I arrived almost two hours late. The house was dark except for lit tea candles everywhere, and the white light people, teenagers in diaphanous robes, were ready to begin. Anaïs’s eyes were shut so I put down the gifts and tried to creep unnoticed to an empty chair next to Jamie. The young men with scraggly beards and girls with long braids made a semi-circle around Anaïs, who sat up straight in a kitchen chair. The meditation, which one of the young men guided us through, was to feel the white light penetrating Anaïs’s body, healing all her cells from the top of her head to her toes. I threw myself into it. With the effort of moving boulders, I concentrated on that white light dissolving her cancer cells. My eyes were closed, but when I heard weeping, I opened them. Anaïs was coiled into herself. “I turned against God.” She struggled to speak between sobs. “Because of my father.” She looked like a trembling, terrified child instead of the woman I knew. The white light kids huddled together in consternation while Rupert rushed to her side and held her as she continued to sob uncontrollably. Jamie and I exchanged an alarmed look.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  later, whether she liked it or not, she would be compelled to let him have his way with her, but meanwhile she was proudly resolved to turn a blind eye to her sorrowful predicament. To the three surviving members of her female retinue, she gave instructions that they should never disclose their identity to anyone until such time as they were in a position that offered them a clear prospect of freedom. Furthermore, she implored them to preserve their chastity, declaring her own determination to submit to no man’s pleasure except her husband’s – a sentiment that was greeted with approval by the three women, who said they would do their utmost to follow her instructions. As the days passed, and Pericone came into closer proximity with the object of his desires, his advances were more firmly rejected, and the flames of his passion raged correspondingly fiercer. Realizing that his flattery was getting him nowhere, he decided to fall back on ingenuity and subterfuge, holding brute strength in reserve as a last resort. He had noticed more than once that the lady liked the taste of wine, which, since it is prohibited by her religion, she was unaccustomed to drinking, and by using this in the service of Venus, he thought it possible that she would yield to him. And so one evening, having feigned indifference concerning the matter for which she had paraded so much distaste, he held a splendid banquet with all the trappings of a great festive occasion, at which the lady was present. The meal was notable for its abundance of good food, and Pericone arranged with the steward who was serving the lady to keep her well supplied with a succession of different wines. The steward carried out his instructions to the letter, and the lady, being caught off her guard and carried away by the agreeable taste of the wines, drank more than was consistent with her decorum. Forgetting all the misfortunes she had experienced, she became positively merry, and when she saw some women dancing in the Majorcan manner, she herself danced Alexandrian fashion. 5 On seeing this, Pericone felt that he would soon obtain what he wanted, and calling for further large quantities of food and drink, he caused the banquet to continue until the small hours of the morning. Finally, when the guests had departed, he accompanied the lady, alone, into her room. Without the least show of embarrassment, being rather more flushed with wine than tempered by virtue, she then undressed in Pericone’s presence as though he were one of her maidservants, and got into bed. Pericone lost no time in following her example. Having snuffed out all the lights, he quickly scrambled in from the other side and lay down beside her, and taking her into his arms without meeting any resistance on her part, he began making amorous sport with her.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  On hearing the King’s inquiry, she turned boldly towards him and replied: ‘No, my lord, but our women, whilst they may differ slightly from each other in their rank and the style of their dress, are made no differently here than they are elsewhere.’ On hearing this, the King saw clearly the reason for the banquet of chickens, and the virtue that lay concealed beneath her little homily. He realized that honeyed words would be wasted on a lady of this sort, and that force was out of the question. And thus, in the same way that he had foolishly become inflamed, so now he wisely decided that he was honour-bound to extinguish the ill-conceived fires of his passion. Fearing her replies, he teased her no further, but applied himself to his meal, by now convinced that all hope was lost. And as soon as he had finished eating, in order to compensate for his dishonourable coming by his swift departure, he thanked her for her generous hospitality and departed for Genoa, with the lady wishing him God-speed.

• From Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997)

  e [8] , makes this eloquent statement: …“the attempt to achieve and maintain justice, or to undo or prevent injustice, is the one and only universal cause of violence.” (italics his) On an emotional and intellectual level, Dr. Gilligan’s insight is profound and accurate, but how does it translate into the biological level of instinctive functioning? To the non-thinking world of the felt sense, I believe that justice is experienced as completion. Without discharge and completion, we are doomed to repeat the tragic cycle of violent re-enactment, whether it be through “acting out” or “acting in.” It is humbling to own up to the fact that a significant portion of human behavior is performed from hyper-aroused states due to incomplete responses to threat. Most of humanity appears to be fascinated, perhaps even mesmerized by those of us who “act out” our search for justice. There are countless books detailing the lives of “serial-killers,” many of them best-sellers. The theme of justice and revenge is probably the subject of more movies than any other single topic. Underlying our powerful attraction to those who “act out” is the urge for completion and resolutio n- or, what I call “renegotiation” of trauma. In a renegotiation, the repetitive cycle of violent re-enactment is transformed into a healing event. A transformed person feels no need for revenge or violenc e- shame and blame dissolve in the powerful wake of renewal and self-acceptance (see Chapter Fourtee n– Transformation ). Unfortunately, there are very few examples of this phenomenon in literature and films. The movie Sling Blade has many of the transformative qualities inherent in a traumatic renegotiation. Our mundane “collision scenario” is much more a part of everyday life than the stuff movies are made of, and therefore, more telling. On page 133 of Violence, Gilligan writes: “If we want to understand the nature of the incident that typically provokes the most intense shame, and hence the most extreme violence, we need to recognize that it is precisely the triviality of the incident that makes the incident so shameful. And it is the intensity of the shame, as I said, that makes the incident so powerfully productive of violence.” When people are overwhelmed and cannot successfully defend themselves, they often feel ashamed. When they act violently, they are seeking justice and vengeance for having been shamed.

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

  What I’d resented moments before now swayed me. If Anaïs could revert to her Catholicism, why couldn’t I do likewise? I prayed: Holy Mary, Mother of God, please let Anaïs still be alive and let me be the one to receive her last words. I heard slidings and brushings from behind the hospital screen set up in front of the bedroom area and the faint sound of whimpering. She was still alive! As a uniformed nurse retracted the screen, Rupert led me to a narrow hospital bed that had been set up next to the queen bed with its soiled lavender backrests. Rupert and the nurse disappeared into the kitchen, leaving me alone with Anaïs. I thought it was incredibly generous of him to give me these last precious moments with her. Her lids were half open, her face colorless, her skin stuck like damp silk to her skull. But she was breathing. I leaned down to kiss her and was taken aback by the stench around her. I avoided inhaling as I whispered, “I saw a priest leaving.” “I agreed to let a priest come,” she said in a hoarse, barely audible voice. I said, “I always thought the Catholic Church had an advantage in having the sacraments, especially the last one.” She didn’t say anything. She looked in pain. She tried to shift her body and the stench became worse. Rattled, I carried on, “I always thought Extreme Unction was the best sacrament. You get to have oil rubbed on your face, and, without having to do anything, all your sins are removed.” I looked for oil on her forehead, but not seeing any, assumed the nurse had wiped it off. Suddenly agitated, Anaïs tried to raise herself. In a voice surprisingly strong, she cried, “Extreme Unction? That’s for when one is dying!” She glared at me. “You think I’m dying?” Oh my God! How could I have been such an idiot? She wasn’t dying yet at all. I had imagined she was dying, which made it look as if I couldn’t wait for her to go! Now she knew what I’d tried so hard to hide: that I was eager for her to be gone so I could find out who I was—without her. I wanted to disappear through the floor. I stammered, “I just saw that priest, and—” “I gave him my confession! Usually Father Lucas comes but he couldn’t today so they sent a substitute.” I tried to backtrack. “No, I know you aren’t dying. I was just saying how Extreme Unction is my favorite sacrament. Confession is good, too. What did he give you for a penance?” “Nothing.”

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Some half a mile from where we stand, you can see a copse where practically every morning Nathan goes for a long walk, entirely alone; it will be a simple matter for you to find him there and deal with him as you please. But if you kill him, and wish to make good your escape, you must leave the copse, not by the way you entered, but along the path you see over there to the left, for although it is a little more difficult, it will lead you home by a shorter and safer route.’ Having imparted this information to Mithridanes, Nathan took his leave, and Mithridanes secretly sent word to his companions, who had likewise found lodging in the palace, about where they were to wait for him on the following day. Meanwhile Nathan had no misgivings about the advice he had offered, and when the next day came, not having changed his mind in the slightest, he set off alone for the copse to meet his doom. Mithridanes had no other weapons but a sword and a bow, and as soon as he had risen he girded them on, mounted his horse, and rode over to the copse, where from some distance away he espied the solitary figure of Nathan sauntering among the trees. He galloped towards him, but being resolved to see his face and hear him speak before attacking him, he seized him by the turban he was wearing and exclaimed: ‘Greybeard, your hour has come!’ By way of answer, all that Nathan said was: ‘In that case I have only myself to blame.’ On hearing his voice and observing his features, Mithridanes recognized him at once as the man who had been so hospitable and sociable towards him, and had given him such faithful advice; hence his fury immediately subsided and his anger gave way to a feeling of shame. And having thrown away his sword, which he had already drawn in readiness to strike, he dismounted from his horse and flung himself in tears at Nathan’s feet, saying: ‘How clearly, dearest father, do I perceive your liberality, seeing the ingenious way in which you have come to offer me the life which without any reason I was eager to take, as you discovered for yourself from my own lips. But God was more heedful than I of my obligations, and in this moment of supreme need He has opened my eyes, which vile envy had kept so tightly sealed. And because you have been so compliant towards my evil design, I am all the more conscious of the debt of penitence that I owe you.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Angela let her cry on for a while, then she lifted the tear-stained face and kissed it: ‘Oh, Stephen, Stephen, get used to the world—it’s a horrible place full of horrible people, but it’s all there is, and we live in it, don’t we? So we’ve just got to do as the world does, my Stephen.’ And because it seemed strange and rather pathetic that this creature should weep, Angela was stirred to something very like love for a moment: ‘Don’t cry any more—don’t cry, honey,’ she whispered, ‘we’re together; nothing else really matters.’ And so it began all over again. 5Stephen stayed on to lunch, for Ralph was in Worcester. He came home a good two hours before teatime to find them together among his roses; they had followed the shade when it left the herb-garden. ‘Oh, it’s you!’ he exclaimed as his eye lit on Stephen; and his voice was so naïvely disappointed, so full of dismay at her reappearance, that just for a second she felt sorry for him. ‘Yes, it’s me—’ she replied, not quite knowing what to say. He grunted, and went off for his pruning knife, with which he was soon amputating roses. But in spite of his mood he remained a good surgeon, cutting dexterously, always above the leaf-bud, for the man was fond of his roses. And knowing this Stephen must play on that fondness, since now it was her business to cajole him into friendship. A degrading business, but it had to be done for Angela’s sake, lest she suffer through loving. Unthinkable that—‘Could you marry me, Stephen?’ ‘Ralph, look here;’ she called, ‘Mrs. John Laing’s got broken! We may be in time if we bind her with bass.’ ‘Oh, dear, has she?’ He came hurrying up as he spoke, ‘Do go down to the shed and get me some, will you?’ She got him the bass and together they bound her, the pink-cheeked, full-bosomed Mrs. John Laing. ‘There,’ he said, as he snipped off the ends of her bandage, ‘that ought to set your leg for you, madam!’ Near by grew a handsome Frau Karl Druschki, and Stephen praised her luminous whiteness, remarking his obvious pleasure at the praise. He was like a father of beautiful children, always eager to hear them admired by a stranger, and she made a note of this in her mind: ‘He likes one to praise his roses.’ He wanted to talk about Frau Karl Druschki: ‘She’s a beauty! There’s something so wonderfully cool—as you say, it’s the whiteness—’ Then before he could stop himself: ‘She reminds me of Angela, somehow.’ The moment the words were out he was frowning, and Stephen stared hard at Frau Karl Druschki.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Oh, but she knew, and only too well, what it would mean should they be there together; the lies, the despicable subterfuges, as though they were little less than criminals. It would be: ‘Mary, don’t hang about my bedroom—be careful . . . of course while we’re here at Morton . . . it’s my mother, she can’t understand these things; to her they would seem an outrage, an insult. . . .’ And then the guard set upon eyes and lips; the feeling of guilt at so much as a hand-touch; the pretence of a careless, quite usual friendship—‘Mary, don’t look at me as though you cared! you did this evening—remember my mother.’ Intolerable quagmire of lies and deceit! The degrading of all that to them was sacred—a very gross degrading of love, and through love a gross degrading of Mary. Mary . . . so loyal and as yet so gallant, but so pitifully untried in the war of existence. Warned only by words, the words of a lover, and what were mere words when it came to actions? And the ageing woman with the far-away eyes, eyes that could yet be so cruel, so accusing—they might turn and rest with repugnance on Mary, even as once they had rested on Stephen: ‘I would rather see you dead at my feet. . . .’ A fearful saying, and yet she had meant it, that ageing woman with the far-away eyes—she had uttered it knowing herself to be a mother. But that at least should be hidden from Mary. She began to consider the ageing woman who had scourged her but whom she had so deeply wounded, and as she did so the depth of that wound made her shrink in spite of her bitter anger, so that gradually the anger gave way to a slow and almost reluctant pity. Poor, ignorant, blind, unreasoning woman; herself a victim, having given her body for Nature’s most inexplicable whim. Yes, there had been two victims already—must there now be a third—and that one Mary? She trembled. At that moment she could not face it, she was weak, she was utterly undone by loving. Greedy she had grown for happiness, for the joys and the peace that their union had brought her. She would try to minimize the whole thing; she would say: ‘It will only be for ten days; I must just run over about this business,’ then Mary would probably think it quite natural that she had not been invited to Morton and would ask no questions—she never asked questions. But would Mary think such a slight was quite natural? Fear possessed her; she sat there terribly afraid of this cloud that had suddenly risen to menace—afraid yet determined not to submit, not to let it gain power through her own acquiescence. There was only one weapon to keep it at bay. Getting up she opened the window: ‘Mary!’ All unconscious the girl hurried in with David: ‘Did you call?’

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

  Our differences went back to how we’d responded to our fathers’ abandonment at eleven. She’d expressed her grief directly, passionately, begging her father to stay, crying inconsolably for years. I had responded to my father’s abandonment, as to the news of her death, with alarm and anger but no tears. Anaïs lied to others, especially men, but her acceptance of her feelings made her truthful with herself. I had lied to myself in denying my feelings, hollering, “Good riddance!” when my father absconded. My smartass personality protected me then, but left me blindsided when Philip deserted me. The timber that still rammed my gut whenever I thought of Philip abruptly made me aware of my body, fatigued from treading water. I turned on my back and squeezed my eyelids to shut out the sun. Its light blazed brightly against my lids, like fire burning through film, like awareness burning through the dark. Anaïs had felt her feelings directly when she was eleven, but when I’d reread her accounts of her reunion with her father when she was twenty-nine, there was something off-key, an indirectness, a distance, the hypnotic poetry of trauma. In her published writings, Anaïs had presented herself as in control of her adult reunion with her father, but when I read more closely I saw that it was her father who had seduced her. He invited her to spend a week with him at a Mediterranean hotel and the first evening engaged her in seductive conversations about their twinship, the same eyes, hands, feet, the same Don Juanism. He pulled her into his mad Nietzschean fantasy that as artists they were above the rules that govern other people. It was he, the parent, who refused his role as protector; it was he who was the perpetrator. Yet it was she who took on responsibility, telling Renate that she had seduced him. Why? Because, as I now recognized in myself, bravado was more tolerable than the helplessness of grief. It had to have been especially so for an adult, married woman, whose need for her father’s love was so great that she’d been unable to deny him anything. She’d covered her shame with Sabina’s audacious cape—the persona of seductress far preferable to the role of devastated victim.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  On hearing this, Messer Torello was delighted and ashamed at one and the same time, for on the one hand he was delighted to have had so eminent a guest beneath his roof, whilst on the other he was ashamed at the thought of having entertained him so frugally. But Saladin continued: ‘Messer Torello, now that God has sent you here to me, you must no longer think of me as your master, but rather as your servant.’ After much rejoicing in each other’s company, Saladin caused him to be dressed in regal robes, and having presented him to a gathering of the leading peers of his realm, and spoken at length of Messer Torello’s excellence, he commanded that those of them who set any store by his favour should honour the person of Messer Torello as they would his own. And this was precisely what each of them did from that day forth, especially the two gentlemen who had stayed with Saladin in Messer Torello’s house. Messer Torello’s sudden elevation to the pinnacle of renown took his mind away for a while from his affairs in Lombardy, the more so because he had every reason to believe that his letter had been safely delivered into the hands of his uncle. But on the very day that the Christian host fell into Saladin’s hands, a Provençal knight of no great repute, whose name was Messer Torello of Digne,7 had died and was buried in the Christian camp; and since Messer Torello of Strà was famed for his nobility throughout the whole of the army, whenever anyone heard that Messer Torello was dead they at once assumed it was the latter of the two, and not the former, who was meant. Before they had a chance to perceive their mistake Messer Torello was taken prisoner, so that many Italians returned with tidings of his death, and there were those who had the audacity to assert that they had seen his corpse and attended his burial. And when this came to the knowledge of his wife and family, it brought enormous and incalculable sorrow, not only to them but to all who had known him. We should be hard put to describe in few words the nature and extent of the grief, the sadness, and the heartache experienced by his lady. Suffice it to say that when, after mourning continuously for several months on end, the pangs of her sorrow began to abate, and her hand was being sought by the most powerful men in Lombardy, she was urged by her brothers and the rest of her kinsfolk to remarry. Time after time she refused, bursting into floods of tears whenever the subject was mentioned. Eventually however she was forced to accede to the wishes of her kinsfolk, but only on condition that she should remain unmarried till the period prescribed in her promise to Messer Torello had expired.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  As soon as his mask was removed, Friar Alberto was immediately recognized by all the onlookers, who jeered at him in unison, calling him by the foulest names and shouting the filthiest abuse ever to have been hurled at any scoundrel in history, at the same time pelting his face with all the nastiest things they could lay their hands upon. They kept this up without stopping, and would have gone on all night but for the fact that half-a-dozen or so of his fellow friars, having heard what was going on, made their way to the scene. The first thing they did on arriving was to throw a cape over his shoulders, after which they set him free and escorted him back, leaving a tremendous commotion in their wake, to their own quarters, where they placed him under lock and key. And there he is believed to have eked out the rest of his days in wretchedness and misery. Thus it was that this arch-villain, whose wicked deeds went unnoticed because he was held to be good, had the audacity to transform himself into the Angel Gabriel. In the end, however, having been turned from an angel into a savage, he got the punishment he deserved, and repented in vain for the crimes he had committed. May it please God that a similar fate should befall each and every one of his fellows. THIRD STORYThree young men fall in love with three sisters and elope with them to Crete. The eldest sister kills her lover in a fit of jealousy; the second, by giving herself to the Duke of Crete, saves her sister’s life but is in turn killed by her own lover, who flees with the eldest sister. The murder is imputed to the third lover and the third sister, who are arrested and forced to make a confession. Fearing execution, they bribe their gaolers and flee, impoverished, to Rhodes, where they die in penury. On finding that Pampinea had reached the end of her story, Filostrato brooded for a while, then turned to her and said: ‘The ending of your story was not without a modicum of merit, from which I drew a certain satisfaction. But there was far too much matter of a humorous kind in the part that preceded it, and this I would have preferred to do without.’ He then turned to Lauretta, and said: ‘Madam, pray proceed with a better tale if possible.’ ‘You are being much too unkind toward lovers,’ she replied, laughing, ‘if all you demand is an unhappy ending to their adventures. However, for the sake of obedience I shall tell you a story about three lovers, all of whom met an unpleasant fate before they were able to enjoy their separate loves to the full.’ Then she began:

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  Who was after whom? I wondered. “Lupita, can you move your admiration society outside?” It was Mrs. Wilhelm. I had briefly forgotten about her. She motioned me into her office with her determined German chin and sharp gray eyes. Suddenly I was afraid again. The door shut with a precise click. She motioned me to sit at the table I had shined with lemon wax just that morning. My work detail was to clean her office after breakfast before I went to class. I did so diligently, with respect and fear. “I have something I want to show you,” Mrs. Wilhelm said. Here it is , I thought. I expected her to pull out the weekend’s report on the ditch episode, or at least to point out an uneven wax job. Instead she put a letter in front of me. It was addressed to her, and it was from my stepfather. I had no idea why my stepfather would write to Mrs. Wilhelm or any administrator at the school. I had never seen him write a letter to anyone. His routine was to come in from work at four, find a reason to hit my brothers or me, then open and read the evening paper. My mother would hide in the kitchen cooking dinner, though she was tired after waitressing all day at the diner for the old lady from back East who ran the place. One time I lost it. My mother was exhausted from working a double shift. My stepfather sat in his huge chair barking out orders. He yelled at my mother to cut his meat, to bring him another glass of iced tea. Then he snapped at her because she wasn’t moving fast enough. “Hurry up, bring me some more ice! What’s taking you so long?” He had just asked her for something at the other end of the house a few minutes before. I had to say something. “Why don’t you buy her a pair of roller skates so she can get around faster?” I was belted. I was grounded forever. But it was worth it. The envelope had been opened neatly by Mrs. Wilhelm with the electric letter opener I dusted every morning. I took out the letter. He had used my mother’s drugstore stationery and had written with blue ink. Dear Mrs. Wilhelm, I am writing to you because I think there are some things you need to know about our daughter who is now a student at your school. We had quite a problem with her when she was in our home and could not control her. Watch out for her. She will steal. She is not to be trusted. I was not his daughter—I had never heard him call me that—nor had I stolen anything. Tears threatened, but I refused to give him that satisfaction, even if he was six hundred miles away. My face blushed; I was stung by his betrayal.

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  I was attractive: I watched a boy wreck his car because he was staring at me. I was ugly: I had had a front tooth missing from the time I was seven. I cracked it while leaping on furniture to catch my brother while we were in the care of a babysitter. It was too expensive to replace the tooth properly. Without a front tooth, I learned to keep my mouth shut and my head down. My head was often in my sketchbook. I sketched fashions. I made my own clothes. My designs and ideas would show up months later on the pages of fashion magazines, said my mother. I made good grades. School was a refuge from home. I found friends who did not know my house or my family because they did not live nearby. I made friends across the various islands of school cultures, from the elite socs, who had everything from looks to money, to the renegade greasers, who could usually be found slinking up against the back fence, smoking. My friends were other Indian students as well as non-Indian students. I defied categories. I was considered “the brain” and “the artist” all at once. My stepfather watched me closely. I felt like prey. I had to be stealthy. I was careful not to be anywhere near him alone. I didn’t want to be anywhere that he might be tempted to touch me in any manner. I slipped up, because he found my hidden diary, broke the lock, and read aloud from it in front of the family. He read my day-to-day musings. They were small things, but they were mine and they were meant to be private. I walked home with my friends and saved my bus money. Bought gloss. Pepsi and a peanut butter cup for lunch. Saturday at the library. I imagined a kiss. Forever. DK and Me. 2 Young 2 Be Together. Bee To Gather. “I shall love thee better after death.” Elizabeth Barrett Browning so cool. He read those words with great delight. I was humiliated. Violated. I swore to myself I would never write anything again. I had no thoughts of becoming a writer, though I checked out my quota of books every week from the local branch of the library, located in the strip mall down the road. I checked out books on physics, fat novels I could loll around in—from Louisa May Alcott, Dickens to cheap popular stuff—paranormal and ghost reportage, and human anatomy books. I was the library reference person for my friends. They asked questions about sex, unicorns, and religion, and I would look them up. I belonged to the Columbia House Record Club. I bought recordings with money I made from my jobs. I baby-sat, I took in ironing, and one summer I took a job busing and washing dishes at the restaurant where my mother cooked. In those junior high years I went for bands like the Yardbirds and the Byrds.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  And now he turned round and deliberately faced her; smiling right into her eyes he lied glibly: ‘My dear, don’t be foolish, there’s nothing strange about you, some day you may meet a man you can love. And supposing you don’t, well, what of it, Stephen? Marriage isn’t the only career for a woman. I’ve been thinking about your writing just lately, and I’m going to let you go up to Oxford; but meanwhile you mustn’t get foolish fancies, that won’t do at all—it’s not like you, Stephen.’ She was gazing at him and he turned away quickly: ‘Darling, I’m busy, you must leave me,’ he faltered. ‘Thank you,’ she said very quietly and simply, ‘I felt that I had to ask you about Martin—’ 3After she had gone he sat on alone, and the lie was still bitter to his spirit as he sat there, and he covered his face for the shame that was in him—but because of the love that was in him he wept. CHAPTER 131T here was gossip in plenty over Martin’s disappearance, and to this Mrs. Antrim contributed her share, even more than her share, looking wise and mysterious whenever Stephen’s name was mentioned. Every one felt very deeply aggrieved. They had been so eager to welcome the girl as one of themselves, and now this strange happening—it made them feel foolish which in turn made them angry. The spring meets were heavy with tacit disapproval—nice men like young Hallam did not run away for nothing; and then what a scandal if those two were not engaged; they had wandered all over the country together. This tacit disapproval was extended to Sir Philip, and via him to Anna for allowing too much freedom; a mother ought to look after her daughter, but then Stephen had always been allowed too much freedom. This, no doubt, was what came of her riding astride and fencing and all the rest of the nonsense; when she did meet a man she took the bit between her teeth and behaved in a most amazing manner. Of course, had there been a proper engagement—but obviously that had never existed. They marvelled, remembering their own toleration, they had really been extremely broad-minded. An extraordinary girl, she had always been odd, and now for some reason she seemed odder than ever. Not so much as a word was said in her hearing that could possibly offend, and yet Stephen well knew that her neighbors’ good-will had been only fleeting, a thing entirely dependent upon Martin. He it was who had raised her status among them—he, the stranger, not even connected with their county. They had all decided that she meant to marry Martin, and that fact had at once made them welcoming and friendly; and suddenly Stephen longed intensely to be welcomed, and she wished from her heart that she could have married Martin.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  On the wedding day not a few eyes would be wet at the sight of so youthful a man and maiden ‘joined together in an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man’s innocency.’ For such ancient traditions—in spite of the fact that man’s innocency could not even survive one bite of an apple shared with a woman—are none the less apt to be deeply moving. There they would kneel, the young newly wed, ardent yet sanctified by a blessing, so that all, or at least nearly all, they would do, must be considered both natural and pleasing to a God in the image of man created. And the fact that this God, in a thoughtless moment, had created in His turn those pitiful thousands who must stand for ever outside His blessing, would in no way disturb the large congregation or their white surpliced pastor, or the couple who knelt on the gold-braided, red velvet cushions. And afterwards there would be plentiful champagne to warm the cooling blood of the elders, and much shaking of hands and congratulating, and many kind smiles for the bride and her bridegroom. Some might even murmur a fleeting prayer in their hearts, as the two departed: ‘God bless them!’ So now Stephen must actually learn at first hand how straight can run the path of true love, in direct contradiction to the time-honoured proverb. Must realize more clearly than ever, that love is only permissible to those who are cut in every respect to life’s pattern; must feel like some ill-conditioned pariah, hiding her sores under lies and pretences. And after those visits of Violet Antrim’s, her spirits would be at a very low ebb, for she had not yet gained that steel-bright courage which can only be forged in the furnace of affliction, and which takes many weary years in the forging. 2The splendid new motor arrived from London, to the great delight and excitement of Burton. The new suits were completed and worn by their owner, and Angela’s costly gold bag was received with apparent delight, which seemed rather surprising considering her erstwhile ban upon presents. Yet could Stephen have known it, this was not so surprising after all, for the bag infuriated Ralph, thereby distracting his facile attention for the moment, from something that was far more dangerous. Filled with an ever-increasing need to believe, Stephen listened to Angela Crossby: ‘You know there’s nothing between me and Roger—if you don’t, then you above all people ought to,’ and her blue, child-like eyes would look up at Stephen, who could never resist the appeal of their blueness.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  But her eyes would look cold, though her voice might be gentle, and her hand when it fondled would be tentative, unwilling. The hand would be making an effort to fondle, and Stephen would be conscious of that effort. Then looking up at the calm, lovely face, Stephen would be filled with a sudden contrition, with a sudden deep sense of her own shortcomings; she would long to blurt all this out to her mother, yet would stand there tongue-tied, saying nothing at all. For these two were strangely shy with each other—it was almost grotesque, this shyness of theirs, as existing between mother and child. Anna would feel it, and through her Stephen, young as she was, would become conscious of it; so that they held a little aloof when they should have been drawing together. Stephen, acutely responsive to beauty, would be dimly longing to find expression for a feeling almost amounting to worship, that her mother’s face had awakened. But Anna, looking gravely at her daughter, noting the plentiful auburn hair, the brave hazel eyes that were so like her father’s, as indeed were the child’s whole expression and bearing, would be filled with a sudden antagonism that came very near to anger. She would awake at night and ponder this thing, scourging herself in an access of contrition; accusing herself of hardness of spirit, of being an unnatural mother. Sometimes she would shed slow, miserable tears, remembering the inarticulate Stephen. She would think: ‘I ought to be proud of the likeness, proud and happy and glad when I see it!’ Then back would come flooding that queer antagonism that amounted almost to anger. It would seem to Anna that she must be going mad, for this likeness to her husband would strike her as an outrage—as though the poor, innocent seven-year-old Stephen were in some way a caricature of Sir Philip; a blemished, unworthy, maimed reproduction—yet she knew that the child was handsome. But now there were times when the child’s soft flesh would be almost distasteful to her; when she hated the way Stephen moved or stood still, hated a certain largeness about her, a certain crude lack of grace in her movements, a certain unconscious defiance. Then the mother’s mind would slip back to the days when this creature had clung to her breast, forcing her to love it by its own utter weakness; and at this thought her eyes must fill again, for she came of a race of devoted mothers. The thing had crept on her like a foe in the dark—it had been slow, insidious, deadly; it had waxed strong as Stephen herself had waxed strong, being part, in some way, of Stephen.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  ‘If I hadn’t grown so fond of you both,’ wrote Lady Massey, ‘this would be much less painful—as it is the whole thing has made me quite ill, but I must consider my position in the county. You see, the county looks to me for a lead—above all I must consider my daughter. The rumours that have reached me about you and Mary—certain things that I don’t want to enter into—have simply forced me to break off our friendship and to say that I must ask you not to come here for Christmas. Of course a woman of my position with all eyes upon her has to be extra careful. It’s too terribly upsetting and sad for me; if I hadn’t been so fond of you both—but you know how attached I had grown to Mary . . .’ and so it went on; a kind of wail full of self-importance combined with self-pity. As Stephen read she went white to the lips, and Mary sprang up. ‘What’s that letter you’re reading?’ ‘It’s from Lady Massey. It’s about . . . it’s about . . .’ Her voice failed. ‘Show it to me,’ persisted Mary. Stephen shook her head: ‘No—I’d rather not.’ Then Mary asked: ‘Is it about our visit?’ Stephen nodded: ‘We’re not going to spend Christmas at Branscombe. Darling, it’s all right—don’t look like that . . .’ ‘But I want to know why we’re not going to Branscombe.’ And Mary reached out and snatched the letter. She read it through to the very last word, then she sat down abruptly and burst out crying. She cried with the long, doleful sobs of a child whom some one has struck without rhyme or reason: ‘Oh . . . and I thought they were fond of us . . .’ she sobbed, ‘I thought that perhaps . . . they understood, Stephen.’ Then it seemed to Stephen that all the pain that had so far been thrust upon her by existence, was as nothing to the unendurable pain which she must now bear to hear that sobbing, to see Mary thus wounded and utterly crushed, thus shamed and humbled for the sake of her love, thus bereft of all dignity and protection. She felt strangely helpless: ‘Don’t—don’t,’ she implored; while tears of pity blurred her own eyes and went trickling slowly down her scarred face. She had lost for the moment all sense of proportion, of perspective, seeing in a vain, tactless woman a kind of gigantic destroying angel; a kind of scourge laid upon her and Mary. Surely never before had Lady Massey loomed so large as she did in that hour to Stephen. Mary’s sobs gradually died away. She lay back in her chair, a small, desolate figure, catching her breath from time to time, until Stephen went to her and found her hand which she stroked with cold and trembling fingers—but she could not find words of consolation.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Henry Jones lost his head and pinched Pat’s bony shoulder, then he rolled his eyes: ‘Oh, boy! What a gang! Say, folks, aren’t we having the hell of an evening? When any of you folk decide to come over to my little old New York, why, I’ll show you around. Some burg!’ and he gulped a large mouthful of whisky. After supper Jamie played the overture to her opera, and they loudly applauded the rather dull music—so scholarly, so dry, so painfully stiff, so utterly inexpressive of Jamie. Then Wanda produced her mandolin and insisted upon singing them Polish love songs; this she did in a heavy contralto voice which was rendered distinctly unstable by brandy. She handled the tinkling instrument with skill, evolving some quite respectable chords, but her eyes were fierce as was also her touch, so that presently a wire snapped with a ping, which appeared completely to upset her balance. She fell back and lay sprawled out upon the floor to be hauled up again by Dupont and Brockett. Barbara had one of her bad fits of coughing: ‘It’s nothing . . .’ she gasped, ‘I swallowed the wrong way; don’t fuss, Jamie . . . darling . . . I tell you it’s . . . nothing.’ Jamie, flushed already, drank more crème-de-menthe. This time she poured it into a tumbler, tossing it off with a dash of soda. But Adolphe Blanc looked at Barbara gravely. The party did not disperse until morning; not until four o’clock could they decide to go home. Everybody had stayed to the very last moment, everybody, that is, except Valérie Seymour—she had left immediately after supper. Brockett, as usual, was cynically sober, but Jamie was blinking her eyes like an owl, while Pat stumbled over her own goloshes. As for Henry Jones, he started to sing at the top of his lungs in a high falsetto: ‘Oh, my, help, help, ain’t I nobody’s baby? Oh, my, what a shame, I ain’t nobody’s baby.’ ‘Shut your noise, you poor mutt!’ commanded his brother, but Henry still continued to bawl: ‘Oh, my, what a shame, I ain’t nobody’s baby.’ They left Wanda asleep on a heap of cushions—she would probably not wake up before mid-day. CHAPTER 461S tephen’s book, which made its appearance that May, met with a very sensational success in England and in the United States, an even more marked success than The Furrow. Its sales were unexpectedly large considering its outstanding literary merit; the critics of two countries were loud in their praises, and old photographs of Stephen could be seen in the papers, together with very flattering captions. In a word, she woke up in Paris one morning to find herself, for the moment, quite famous.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Moreover, both the suitor and the husband love and respect her so deeply that they are able to spend a long time in her company without even recognizing her. But in order that you shall be left in no possible doubt concerning the merits of these two gentlemen, I am ready, provided that you will grant me the special favour of pardoning the dupe and punishing the deceiver, to make the lady appear, here and now, before your very eyes.’ The Sultan, who was prepared to allow Sicurano a completely free hand in this affair, gave his consent and told him to produce the lady. Bernabò, being firmly convinced that she was dead, was unable to believe his ears, whilst Ambrogiuolo, for whom things were beginning to look desperate, was afraid in any case that he was going to have more than a sum of money to pay, and could not see that it would affect him either one way or the other if the lady really were to turn up. But if anything he was even more astonished than Bernabò. No sooner had the Sultan agreed to Sicurano’s request than Sicurano burst into tears and threw himself on his knees at the Sultan’s feet, at the same time losing his manly voice and the desire to persist in his masculine role. ‘My lord,’ he said, ‘I myself am the poor unfortunate Zinevra, who for six long years has toiled her way through the world disguised as a man, a victim of the false and wicked calumnies of this traitor Ambrogiuolo and of the iniquitous cruelty of this man who handed her over to be killed by one of his servants and eaten by wolves.’ Tearing open the front of her dress and displaying her bosom, she made it clear to the Sultan and to everyone else that she was indeed a woman. Then she rounded on Ambrogiuolo, haughtily demanding to know when he had ever slept with her, as he had claimed. But Ambrogiuolo, seeing who it was, simply stood there and said nothing, as though he were too ashamed to open his mouth. The Sultan, who had always believed her to be a man, was so astonished on seeing and hearing all this, that he kept thinking that he must be dreaming and that his eyes and ears were deceiving him. But once he had recovered from his astonishment and realized that it was true, he lauded Zinevra to the skies for her virtuous way of life, her constancy, and her strength of character. And having ordered women’s clothes of the finest quality to be brought, and provided her with a retinue of ladies, he complied with her earlier request and spared Bernabò from the death he assuredly deserved. On recognizing his wife, Bernabò threw himself in tears at her feet asking her forgiveness, and although he merited no such favour, she graciously conceded it and helped him up again, clasping him in a fond and wifely embrace.