Research is very near to my favorite thing to do. The best thing about it is how one thing leads you to another, then another, then suddenly you're five miles away, looking with a shaded hand at your starting point and going "Huh. That's neat."
And then there are links! Blessed, blessed links throughout life that lead back to something from ten years before and give you a new perspective on it.
When I was 14, I interviewed Rupert Holmes, writer of The Piña Colada Song and creator of the '90s AMC series Remember WENN, the latter of which is my favorite show of all time. He also, it turns out, wrote and composed the musical version of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, which I have of course gotten a bit into 13 years after that interview. Basically, Rupert Holmes is the greatest, and links over time are awesome.
Researching The Mystery of Edwin Drood and the possibly queer subtext contained therein (of which scholars have MUCH TO SAY, I do assure you) has led me down some delightful paths and into areas about which I knew almost nothing prior to a couple weeks ago.
I've emailed and gotten replies from two of the leading academics in their fields; I've started a biography of Nell Ternan, which has in turn acquainted me with the story of the mistress of William IV (Dora Jordan); I'm reading a series of essays about Edwin Drood from 1951 which has the BEST theory for Dick Datchery and which I got very skippy about yesterday; I read an article on Dickens and Wilkie, which gave a rather concise summing up of their friendship and its essential dissolution as well as the probable cause; Dr. Furneaux, author of Queer Dickens, referred me to Lillian Faderman, who in turn referred me to her anthology Chloe Plus Olivia, which I happened to already own (but had not read): this anthology I've only just begun, but already it's been extremely informative regarding early female authors/poets such as Katherine Philips and Geraldine Jewsbury.
Basically EVERYTHING IS EXCITING. And Lillian Faderman is brilliant and I'm pretty determined to read everything she's written. Obsessions are the best because they give you the energy to go off in all these directions, as anything related to the object of obsession now becomes interesting. Meanwhile, I've started reading W.M. Thackeray's Pendennis as a result of all this, which might be the weirdest of the offshoots, but it is already hilarious, so good job, Thackeray.
So DO NOT DESPAIR, OBSESSIVES. Sometimes our tendencies make us productive.
And then there are links! Blessed, blessed links throughout life that lead back to something from ten years before and give you a new perspective on it.
When I was 14, I interviewed Rupert Holmes, writer of The Piña Colada Song and creator of the '90s AMC series Remember WENN, the latter of which is my favorite show of all time. He also, it turns out, wrote and composed the musical version of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, which I have of course gotten a bit into 13 years after that interview. Basically, Rupert Holmes is the greatest, and links over time are awesome.
Researching The Mystery of Edwin Drood and the possibly queer subtext contained therein (of which scholars have MUCH TO SAY, I do assure you) has led me down some delightful paths and into areas about which I knew almost nothing prior to a couple weeks ago.
I've emailed and gotten replies from two of the leading academics in their fields; I've started a biography of Nell Ternan, which has in turn acquainted me with the story of the mistress of William IV (Dora Jordan); I'm reading a series of essays about Edwin Drood from 1951 which has the BEST theory for Dick Datchery and which I got very skippy about yesterday; I read an article on Dickens and Wilkie, which gave a rather concise summing up of their friendship and its essential dissolution as well as the probable cause; Dr. Furneaux, author of Queer Dickens, referred me to Lillian Faderman, who in turn referred me to her anthology Chloe Plus Olivia, which I happened to already own (but had not read): this anthology I've only just begun, but already it's been extremely informative regarding early female authors/poets such as Katherine Philips and Geraldine Jewsbury.
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| me and anything related to my subject |
Basically EVERYTHING IS EXCITING. And Lillian Faderman is brilliant and I'm pretty determined to read everything she's written. Obsessions are the best because they give you the energy to go off in all these directions, as anything related to the object of obsession now becomes interesting. Meanwhile, I've started reading W.M. Thackeray's Pendennis as a result of all this, which might be the weirdest of the offshoots, but it is already hilarious, so good job, Thackeray.
So DO NOT DESPAIR, OBSESSIVES. Sometimes our tendencies make us productive.
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