Too much and not in the mood
boygenius, Taylor Swift breakup and Gaylor Conspiracies, Micro-individuality, Writing letters you never send, Old academics ruining all the fun, New game: Dichotomies, And more!
Hello!
Welcome back! Sorry for the very long delay in writing this but I promise I’m back!
The title of this newsletter is a slight variation of a Virginia Woolf quote “too much and not the mood” from a 1931 diary entry about how tired she was of editing her work and pleasing her readers. Same girlie. (I’m sure she’s tossing in her grave from me saying that). Although I’m yet to tire of writing these, and as far as readers go, you’re all nothing but delightful. Recently everything has been a little too much and I have simply not been in the mood to write my newsletter. So big apologies that it has taken me so long!
In all honesty, I think I did myself a disservice by putting this edition on the back burner, god knows how many lists I’ve got lying around of content ideas. I’ve spoken to my editor (aka me) and to make up for it I’m going to make this a Part 1 of 2, (which I’ll release next week). The fact that I willingly write an essay each month is comical.
Before we get started I have a (well, really one of many) bone to pick with Elon Musk. I can no longer embed tweets directly into this newsletter! Grrr. Instead, they’ll all be normal links. Boring! Rude! Apologies in advance, take it up with Apartheid Clyde. But as per usual everything pink and underlined is a hyperlink.
In this newsletter:
boygenius
The breakup and the mass exodus from Joe Alwyn’s Instagram
The private lives of public figures
On the pleasures of hand-writing letters you’ll never send
Okay boomer: A Sociocultural Investigation into the Perceived Loss of Male Dominance in Academia
How you sell a rom-com
“I wish you well”
Any takers?
The Internet Princess
Are you thunder or lightning?
This is your man?
boygenius
The album (and fan edits…) I’ve had on repeat since we last spoke has been boygenius’s new album ‘the record’. What do you get when you combine 3 insanely talented, hot, queer, sad girls? boygenius! The face of sapphic sad girls everywhere, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Bakers, and Lucy Dacus. Great album. I’m in love with all of them. Can’t get enough of the live clips, for those equally inclined I’ll attach some hyperlinks lol. These 3 men most accurately capture the experience of listening to this record.
Huge day for oat milk drinkers. boygenius joined MUNA at Coachella to play Silk Chiffon!
See cute clips below:
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CrBzcjaJGbR/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link (the answer is yes)
https://twitter.com/xboygeniusxhq/status/1646367669690462210?s=20
Genius lyrics interview of them singing acapella is super cute as is this one Fangirling over.
The breakup and mass exodus from Joe Alwyn’s Instagram:
Okay. Due diligence. Taylor Swift’s Eras tour has begun (as has my ticket saving). An epic 3+ hour show. I’ve seen most angles of every song at this stage. Speak Now Taylor’s Version is also going to be released on July 7th.
Joe and Taylor reportedly broke up, I was strongly in the denial camp for the first 3 weeks but have been moved to acceptance when there was a mass exodus from Joe’s social media following. Taylor’s friends (inc. HAIM, Blake Lively, and Gigi Hadid) all unfollowed Joe on Instagram after having lunch with her.
My concern here though is, if you can write 5 albums about someone being the love of your life and then break up, where does that leave the rest of us? What hope do we have?
One thing we know is, she’ll never walk Cornelia Street again.
The private lives of public figures:
Running with the Taylor theme, she is someone who openly communicates to her fans through ‘Easter Eggs’, hiding secret messages in all her songs, videos, clothes, posts, etc. It’s a huge puzzle between her and her fans revealing messages about her music and life sometimes years in advance.
Gaylor’s are a subgroup of Taylor Swift fans who believe Taylor Swift is bi/gay, it’s a huge conspiracy that they’ve ‘backed up’ with ‘evidence’ of past relationships, lyric analysis, and ‘secret messages’ they’ve interpreted from these Easter Eggs. Tumblr pages are dedicated to it.
Fandoms are not new but there has recently been a lot of research into these parasocial relationships and social surrogacy in the age of social media where everyone is seemingly friends with their idols. This podcast episode on Rehash discusses the ethics and responsibilities in parasocial relationships, focusing on the Gaylor conspiracy, and other supposedly queer ‘ships’ in media (think Sherlock and Watson). It briefly talks about queer baiting, and queer coding and why some of these projections and theories arise. They also discuss how normal boundaries are blurred in the case of Taylor Swift who actively encourages fans to read into everything she does. Where do the ethics lie when talking about someone’s sexuality who interacts with her fans, often through messages about her exes? Are we owed anything concerning the private life of public figures?
Sidenote: Is there any way we can get the Qanoners/conspiracy theorists to redirect their passion to the Swiftieverse? I feel like it meets a lot of the same criteria; community, secret messages, conspiracies etc., just without the government takedown, violence, right-wing extremism, and overall dangerous white supremacist stuff.
On the pleasures of hand-writing letters you’ll never send:
As most of you know, I love a good letter, and I love reading other people's letters. I have frequently shared letters from the Letters of Note substack. Recently, I stumbled across this article which hit particularly close to home. As big of a letter sender as I am, I am as equally big of a letter keeper/destroyer.
Some things need to be written but never shared. This article wrote about the power and beauty of writing letters you’ll never send. She also discusses the letters that would have changed history or a fictional text had they been sent.
Last month I read the experimental, semi-autobiographical novel by Chris Kraus I Love Dick (I know, a fun one to read on the tram) a melange of diary entries, letters, and reflections that begin as a seductive, sociological experiment and then kinda become just plain stalking and harassment. A project of writing letters and imagining a fantasy with a crush (relatable) that turns into an obsession/borderline harassment (yeah you’ve lost me). The epitome of letters better left unsent.
The article also references a book by Darian Leader Why Do Women Write More Letters Than They Post? pondering “‘[I]f a letter is written but not posted, at whom or what is it really aimed?’” and what it says about us (the writers) and the gendered dimensions of this.
Speaking of writing things that no one ever sees, this article titled ‘To All the Novels I Never Published’ spoke about novels he’s written that have never gotten published and novels he has written that he’ll never show anyone, asking:
Is it a book that you need many people to read? Or is it something you can lock in a drawer and smile after fondly, knowing you have done what you’ve done, even if no one else sees it?
For the most part, my unsent letters have been destroyed, they had served their purpose the second they were finished. But I think I have a few written to past exes and crushes stashed away, in the hope that they one day they’ll make a very entertaining read. Stay tuned for the memoir ha!
Okay boomer: A Sociocultural Investigation into the Perceived Loss of Male Dominance in Academia:
A professor tweeted this last month and received some very entertaining comments.
The replies? Hilarious. A reminder of why I’m on this hell site.
Personally, I love nothing more than a pop culture reference in an academic journal. Highly entertaining, let the worlds of high and low literature collide! People replied to the professor with fake academic article titles with pop culture references about the tweet and potential journal articles they could write, here are some of my favs:
She's Everything. He's Just Ken: A sociolinguistic study on the perceived loss of masculine power in traditionally male-dominated texts.
I’m Never Gonna Give You Up: Reflections on my Career of Academic Articles with Engaging Pop Culture Titles
That’s Gonna Be A No From Me Dog: An Investigation into White Men Taking Away All the Fun Things in Life
Oops I Did It Again: The persistent appeal of pop culture references in journal article titles
I Chime In With A Haven't You People Ever Heard Of Closing The Goddamn Door: Observing The Outgroup White Male's Inexorable Urge To Gatekeep Fun
The Lion, The Witch, and The Audacity of This Bitch: An Analysis of the ever-changing relationships between Media and Education in the modern age
I also chuckled at these real journal papers people linked:
My Hips Don’t Lie: The Role of Hip Movement in Accurate Diagnosis of Lumbar Disc Herniation
Fantastic Yeasts and Where to Find Them: The hidden diversity of dimorphic fungal pathogens
Sex and the Colonial City: Mapping Masculinity, Whiteness, and Desire in French Occupied Hanoi
The Children Yearn for the Mines: How the United States is Normalising Child Labour in Mainstream Media
How you sell a rom com:
We are well and truly in the rom-com revival era. We are set to receive a whopping 36 new rom-coms this year! Insane. I have mixed feelings about this, on the one hand, I love a rom-com. On the other, I don’t believe we’ve had a good one since 2013 (and that’s pushing it).
It does seem as though we are possibly heading in a good direction with some good old co-star sexual tension and chemistry.
After a superbly terrible start with Reece and Ashton, have two people ever had less chemistry?
We now have Sydney Sweeny and Glen Powell. Chemistry so through the roof that cheating rumours are going around. It’s all about plausible deniability though when you’re promoting a movie, and this might be treading a fine line. Glen Powell’s girlfriend has recently unfollowed both Sydney Sweeny and Glen on Instagram and has posted the classic “know your worth” posts…
“I wish you well”:
A bit late but I figured I’d still include it. It seems “I wish you well” is the new “Fuck you”. Gwyneth Paltrow was involved in a court case about a ski crash that she reportedly “lost a day of skiing” from. Rich people and their problems. She was found Gwynnocent but the trial was not without its highlights.
The post below captured some of my favourites. The prosecutor was fangirling big time, asking “May I ask how tall you are?” and then replying “I am so jealous. I have to wear 4-inch heels just to make it to 5’5”.
https://twitter.com/mattxiv/status/1640073294584897536?s=46&t=DaFHU3KfnCDYwFxCpipUww
At the end of the trial, Gwyneth whispered to the prosecutor “I wish you well” in a way that can really only be interpreted as, in my opinion, fuck you.
Any takers?
Saw this headline. I’m all for it. Any takers?
Are you thunder or lightning?
I liked this piece in the Paris Review this week about the binary, ridiculous, but deeply appealing statements like “There are only two types of people in the world”. Written by Sophie Haigney, she talks about the game she has created with her friends called “Dichotomies” where they create two ambiguous categories like Thunder and Lightning and then try to classify people as one or the other. For the most part, it’s purely based on “the vibe” of someone but you’d be surprised how many you all agree on. Totally unfounded but very entertaining and there's always a surprising consensus.
My friend Molly and I thought we invented this theory years ago at a sleepover, although we opted for the less creative categories of “Ah” and ‘Eh”. To this day I still have a 16 min voice memo recording of us explaining the theory and its intricacies in relationships and friendships categorising all our friends and family.
From the piece:
“All summer long I thought of other ways to divide the world in half: New Hampshire/Vermont, Picasso/Matisse, punk/hippie, still/sparkling, IPA/lager, Beatles/Stones, France/Italy, Bob Weir/Jerry Garcia, glamour/charisma, hater/enthusiast, ellipsis/etc., elusive/available, green/blue, beer/shots, Yankees/Mets”
Would highly recommend playing, although a warning that “Sometimes the discussion can get quite heated, for obvious reasons. We are trading in stereotypes and lazy characterization here. You might put your foot in your mouth by labelling someone France who is proudly Italian, or telling someone they are lightning when they perceive themselves as thunder.” Proceed with caution.
The Internet Princess:
I love a newsletter. I’ve counted and I’m subscribed to 27. A slightly terrifying amount when you lump them together like that, but yes, basically I’m the Jane Nichols of newsletters. I’d like to think my newsletter has something of its own to give but also am not totally delusional in thinking I’m doing something totally unique, completely not ever been done before.
One of the newsletters I’m subscribed to who writes really cool stuff is Internet Princess by Rayne Fisher Quann, cultural critic, essayist, philosopher, writer, influencer etc. etc. She wrote a post about our obsession with micro-individuality and uniqueness. It reminds me of Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror and how social media has distorted our perception of the self and turned us into endless monetizable assets.
“it feels more and more like our online behaviour has arrived at a curious paradox: everyone seems to be more obsessed with individuality and differentiation than ever before, while simultaneously participating in one of the most intoxicating lifestyle reproduction mechanisms in human history.”
Here’s a clip of it:
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This is your man?
And finally, Lloyd and I went to Danny Bhoy (possibly my favourite comedian) at the comedy festival. I was thinking back to his older shows (my neighbour introduced me to his DVDs when I was 13) which are still just as hilarious and quotable.
Here’s his show at the Sydney Opera House in 2007. Enjoy! With all this grim weather we could use a chuckle.
Although these flared jeans certainly are a sign of the times, I can safely say he’d fit right in on Brunswick street 2023. If you keep clothes long enough they’ll come back around.
All I can say is I'm gonna stick beside him.
That’s all for this newsletter! Thank you for sticking with me, a bloody good effort.
Sidenote but the other day I bumped into a friend I hadn’t seen in at least three years and she told me how much she loved reading my newsletter! Made my day and made me want to get back writing. So thank you to again to everyone who reads this🥰🥰
Love,
Rimini
Another marvellous read, Rimini - definitely worth the wait.
I particularly loved the Danny Bhoy show at the Opera House - Scottish humour at its best. Scotland is one of my all time favourite parts of the world. I'm strongly Scottish, I guess - the Fergus is from clan Fergusson, my paternal great-grandmother (Papa's mother and your great great grandmother).
Big hugs and stay warm xox