And here’s a new setting for you, my dears. Bit different from the library, eh?
Also of note: you can now buy a giclee print of any Bite Me! page. Perhaps obvious considering that I already do this for Family Man, but it honestly didn’t occur to me to offer this until now. Enjoy the possibilities of displaying a beautiful print of Claire’s thigh above your desk at work.
Lord: it is time. The huge summer has gone by.
Now overlap the sundials with your shadows,
and on the meadows let the wind go free.
Command the fruits to swell on tree and vine;
grant them a few more warm transparent days,
urge them on to fulfillment then, and press
the final sweetness into the heavy wine.
Whoever has no house now, will never have one.
Whoever is alone will stay alone,
Will sit, read, write long letters through the evening,
and wander on the boulevards, up and down,
restlessly, while the dry leaves are blowing.
Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. Stephen Mitchell.
Illustration by 3amfromkyoto
Posting this poem whenever I first start to feel the onset of autumn has become a sort of tradition for me. The leaves here are turning; the light has changed. Pumpkins are shedding their umbilical vines. School has started again.
I’m not looking forward to the greyness and the dark of the Pacific winter; but autumn offers some fine consolations. It’s a magnificent last meal. I always thought that Rilke (and Mitchell) did a fine job a catching that thin, golden membrane between their fingers.
Hi all! As I mentioned last week, I’m taking this week off of updating the comic to celebrate my birthday on the 9th, and to spend this past Labor Day weekend visiting my family. And also to catch up on store orders, and all that paying work that I had to postpone due to an exciting bout of Mystery Food Poisoning-esque Illness. (good news, though: ginger beer and saltines are just as delicious as I remember them being.)
But, as promised, I’ve uploaded a new batch of notes for page 14o-150! What do microbats, Immanuel Kant, and Catherine the Great’s choice of saddles all have in common? They are totally tangentially related to Family Man! As is everything I potentially find interesting.
In other things that you should be reading, I recently received a copy of Volume One of Skin Horse, the wonderful comic by Shaenon Garrity and Jeffrey Wells. It is beautifully produced and just as delightful as everything I have come to expect from Ms. Garrity and her collaborators.
I mean, god, the storyline with the silverfish alone is worth its weight in gold. I mean, where else will you find a single panel like this, in which a silverfish explains their finest silverfish opera:
The entire damn storyline maintains this grade of lunacy, and I don’t think I have ever seen ten more expressive lines than what Shaenon does with those freaking silverfish.
So, seriously, shoo. Go buy.
Back to the lady and into the woods, to points unknown and previously unseen. The end of the chapter’s coming up…think I’ll answer any questions? Either way I’m looking forward to the next few weeks. This is the last page I’ll draw as a 25 year-old; starting with the next update I’ll be the same age as Luther. God help me.
I’m taking next week off to celebrate Labor Day weekend and my birthday (09/09/09 tell me that isn’t rad) with family and friends. But I will be uploading a brand spanking new batch of notes, so check in next week!
And now, bed.
(In Memoriam Marina Tsvetayeva, Anna Wickham, Sylvia Plath, Shakespeare’s sister, etc., etc.)
The best slave
does not need to be beaten.
She beats herself.
Not with a leather whip,
or with stick or twigs,
not with a blackjack
or a billyclub,
but with the fine whip
of her own tongue
& the subtle beating
of her mind
against her mind.
For who can hate her half so well
as she hates herself?
& who can match the finesse
of her self-abuse?
Years of training
are required for this.
Twenty years
of subtle self-indulgence,
self-denial;
until the subject
thinks herself a queen
& yet a beggar —
both at the same time.
She must doubt herself
in everything but love.
She must choose passionately
& badly.
She must feel lost as a dog
without her master.
She must refer all moral questions
to her mirror.
She must fall in love with a cossack
or a poet.
She must never go out of the house
unless veiled in paint.
She must wear tight shoes
so she always remembers her bondage.
She must never forget
she is rooted in the ground.
Though she is quick to learn
& admittedly clever,
her natural doubt of herself
should make her so weak
that she dabbles brilliantly
in half a dozen talents
& thus embellishes
but does not change
our life.
If she‘s an artist
& comes close to genius,
the very fact of her gift
should cause her such pain
that she will take her own life
rather than best us.
& after she dies, we will cry
& make her a saint.
Erica Jong
Photo