A Little Life - Tumblr Posts
jude after sickness //
"things get broken and sometimes they get repaired, and in most cases, you realise that no matter what gets damaged, life rearranges itself to compensate for your loss, sometimes wonderfully"
very overdue reading update
okay so
last i said i finished the winners which closed out the beartown series and i adored them so much. i love benji and i have done a heavy amount of reading since then.
i ended up dabbling in a genre i'm not entirely familiar with, that being romance. i read and finished the chestnut springs series by elsie silver in the span of 12 days and i really enjoyed them believe it or not. though i hated the last one and i will personally fist fight beau eaton myself.
now to shift from all of that sappy lovey dovey stuff i am reading
drum roll
a little life by hanya yanagihara
yes i know how sad the story is and no i do not think i am prepared for it but i feel like this is the time in my life i just need to bite the bullet and finish it.
that being said, since starting streaming i have been really good with my reading goals and i've been flying through books. this has been really good for me and i'm so happy that i have reached affiliate on twitch so i can start earning money on doing something i love.
i think i might wrap this post up soon but if you are interested in watching me on twitch and would like to join reading sprints you can check out my link in my pinned post, i stream every tuesday, thursday through sunday at 10pm est.
i've been feeling really good. reading slumps do pass
my current read! what are you reading today? Let me know 🌷💌 happy weekend🌻 just relax and get ready to start Monday with a bang!
a little life đź’Ś by hanya yanagihara
been feeling a little numb and bored time to re-read a little life
lispenard street
moments from a little life
wtf has to say the author of a little life that is 1000 pages long (no spoiler pls i just started reading)
Jude St Francis...deserves the world.
Imagine, if you will:
Jude is sleeping, curled on his side as usual and Willem holding him from behind. So, so close and so tight- wide awake and just filled with love and fear and sadness but love. Then he whispers, into Jude's hair:
Now, cry with me.
( just finished the book and i haven't been this distraught since 'wHaT hAs hEcToR eVeR dOnE tO mE?')
me 🤝 those few books that make me sob my soul out until i cant breathe
a hill i will die on is that a little life by hanya yanagihara is not meaningless and is not torture porn and is in fact a very stark and realistic exploration of unprocessed trauma and the inability to talk and how trauma shapes the way you view those who love you and the fact that tiktok has turned it into the "you will cry at the end!!!!" book honestly breaks my heart
my night is ruined
suddenly remembered how jude was harsh and cruel around Harold and julia after willem was gone so that they would leave him alone but broke down when despite everything Harold just let out a soft "my poor jude. My poor sweetheart" and hugged him.
The reason why I enjoy hearing or reading about queer characters is that, it truly fascinates me. Not the whole 'how can they be gay thing' but the whole 'they are gay and they have a significant other.' Like these people didn't care. They loved another person truly and wholly without giving a single fuck. And despite the rules and norms of the society, they choose to love. I can never do that. I can never be that brave to risk everything else I have for just one person. They wrote letters, they allowed the world to know. And they didn't care.
Like the sonnets Shakespeare wrote for a mysterious young man. Like Oscar Wilde and Alfred Douglas. The letters between Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West. The letters between John Laurens and Alexander Hamilton. The letters between Emily Dickinson and Susan Gilbert.
I love the fictional characters as well. Who literally risk everything and overcome fears of their own to love. Alec was a shadow hunter and he fell in love with Magnus WHO WAS A WARLOCK and married him. Nico di Angelo who was born in the 1940s where being gay meant living on the streets fell in love with Will Solace. Henry was a freaking Prince, yet he wrote such pure, raw, unadulterated words for Alex. Jude went through so much in his life and yet he allowed Willem to love him. Ari and Dante lived during a time where being gay was fatal; Dante was attacked in the book and Ari's brother killed a prostitute after finding out that they were trans. Oliver came from a conservative family and still loved Elio. These couples would have had doubts and apprehensions but they still loved each other and didn't care.
Here are some iconic quotes;
"I must see you soon — you are the divine thing I want." And. "...it is a marvel that those red rose-leaf lips of yours should be made no less for the madness of music and song than for the madness of kissing. Your slim gilt soul walks between passion and poetry. I know Hyacinthus, whom Apollo loved so madly, was you in Greek days." Oscar Wilde to Alfred Douglas.
"You should not have taken advantage of my sensibility to steal into my affections without my consent." Alexander Hamilton to John Laurens.
"I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia...you have broken down my defences. And I don’t really resent it." Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf.
"Do I repine, is it all murmuring, or am I sad and lone, and cannot, cannot help it? Sometimes when I do feel so, I think it may be wrong, and that God will punish me by taking you away; for he is very kind to let me write to you, and to give me your sweet letters, but my heart wants more." Emily Dickinson to Susan Gilbert.
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" Shakespeare.
"You could give me the past," he said a little sadly. "But Alec is my future." Magnus Bane, City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare.
"Nico, I've seen a lot of brave things. But what you just did? That was maybe the bravest." Jason Grace to Nico di Angelo, House of Hades by Rick Riordan.
"Should I tell you that when we're apart, your body comes back to me in dreams? That when I sleep, I see you, the dip of your waist, the freckle above your hip, and when I wake up in the morning, it feels like I've just been with you, the phantom touch of your hand on the back of my neck fresh and not imagined? That I can feel your skin against mine, and it makes every bone in my body ache? That, for a few moments, I can hold my breath and be back there with you, in a dream, in a thousand rooms, nowhere at all?" Prince Henry of Wales to Alex Claremont-Diaz the First son, Red White & Royal Blue by Casey Mcquiston.
"You were treated horribly. You came out on the other end. You were always you.”
"And who are you?"
"I'm Willem Ragnarsson. And I will never let you go." Willem Ragnarsson to Jude St. Francis, A Little Life by Hanya Yanahigara.
"How could I have ever been ashamed of loving Dante Quintana?" Aristotle Mendoza in Aristotle and Dante discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire SĂ enz.
"I could spend the rest of my life like this: with him, at night, in Rome, my eyes totally shut, one leg coiled around his. I thought of coming back here in the weeks or months to come—for this was our spot." Elio from Call me by your name by Andrè Aciman.
Of course there are many more real and fictional couples, feel free to comment some.
As I said, I know not whether it is the place that I live or my own upbringing. But I will maybe allow myself to silently feel but I would never have the courage to love like these people. Those who receive love are both weak and strong but those who love are stronger than anyone else.
- midnight rants.
This is a collection of books my sister and I own regarding queer characters. Every book on the screen is a good read and we really recommend you guys read it.
This pride month you don't have to wear a rainbow flag and go around the street. Instead remember everyone;
Every boy who thought he was unnatural and kept his feelings to himself.
Every girl who didn't understand why she was attracted to other girls instead of boys.
Every man who had to marry a girl because of society.
Every woman whose opinions about herself were disregarded.
Every teenager who was kicked out of the house because they realized that they wanted to be a different gender.
Every fucking person who were killed, slaughtered and raped in the name of religion, morals and what's natural.
(You are a human person made out of flesh and bones, nature runs within you, that is more natural than murder.)
Remember these people, remember that when you pass comments against a queer celebrity or a book; it will not affect the book or that person, instead it will terrorize your brother, sister, niece or nephew who might not be straight. Look around the place you live: your love, respect and recognition might be the only freedom they receive. Try to understand everything and everyone, even if you cannot, that still doesn't excuse you being disgusted by something that's different. Do not disregard them by saying that they are confused, they have thought about this more than you ever will.
Love is love.
After all, there are worse problems in this world than boys kissing boys.
so. i just read a little life. i will never be happy or smile again (not a joke)
i was thinking about making a new list about my favorite books of all time™️ but i’d start with A Little Life and would ramble about it non-stop. also — i would be so lost into it that A Little Life would be the ONLY book in my list. at this point of my life, that might be right.
(it is not! my 17 year old version still have A LOT to say about some books; my boring 20 yrs old version, however, got lost in track of time and — guess what! — barely reads anything but academic texts. what a shitty end)
literally my mom and grandma...
"stop crying it's just a book" i'm gonna fucking kill you
my life was never the same after reading “the only trick of friendship, i think, is to find people who are better than you are. not smarter, not cooler, but kinder and more generous, and more forgiving and then appreciate them for what they can teach you and try to listen to them when they tell you something about yourself no matter how bad or good it might be, and to trust them, which is the hardest thing of all. but the best, as well”
i need a spotify wrapped but it’s just how many times i cried over gay fictional characters this year
