Letter from the Editor Dear reader, This zine is birthed by the painful realization that we get lots of societal brownie points for fitting a narrow ideal and lots of shade when we try to break out. We are inspired by Patricia Hill Collins, who writes, “Reinterpreting existing works through new theoretical frameworks is another dimension of developing Black feminist thought.” Here our writers, poets and artists explore what it means to rewrite the social scripts and existing works that surround us using a different frame of mind. We reflect on visible and invisible constraints and challenge that which seems most natural. It’s liberatory, cathartic, and loads of fun! Much love, Isadora Zine Editor
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Table of Contents I like Opera by Layla Treuhaft-Ali...4 Real Literature by Hannah Schmitt...6 Third World by Ashia Ajani...8 Photograph by Sarah Rose...9 Laura after Petrarch by Anna Sudderth...10 Illustration by Bix Archer...11 What the AP Euro Textbook Didn’t Tell You by Julia Salseda...12 10/19 Revisited by Margaret Lee ... 14
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I like opera, and it’s totally inexcusable.
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Opera is one of the most elite art forms out there. Four hundred years ago, it was literally designed for aristocratic audiences. The genre is also intentionally expensive, requiring enormous casts, ornate costumes, and spectacular scenic design. The tiny Marxist in my heart naggingly reminds me that the $91 million that the Metropolitan Opera spent to produce Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle definitely should have been spent building affordable housing, or investing in schools, or doing literally anything other than put on a sixteen-hour-long opera. And it’s an explicitly raced genre. Representations of Arab (Aida), Roma (Carmen), and Chinese (Turandot) culture are entirely meant to play to the Western imagination, exoticizing and otherizing their subjects (not to mention that these characters are always played by white singers). And then there’s gender. There’s no doubt that opera takes a cavalier attitude toward rape and violence against women; it’s one of the most common plot devices around (Mozart’s Don Giovanni, one of the genre’s foundational texts, centers rape as a source of comedy, tragedy, and melodrama). Operas also make sweeping moral claims about women who step outside the accepted bounds of sexual normality. Take La Traviata, where a baron’s mistress tries to escape sexual dependency and royal corruption only to be forced back into her position by her lover’s father, who is concerned about his son’s social position. She contracts tuberculosis (which was then considered an STI) and dies. In Turandot, the title character seeks to abstain from sex to honor an ancestor who was raped; the audience is supposed to cheer the male protagonist on as he conquers her -- I mean, wins her love. He calls her what I’m pretty sure is Italian for “frigid bitch” too many times to count. The devastating consequences for both women point to the futility and immorality of women’s attempts to determine their own sexual paths in opera. And yet, I hope these operas continue to be performed, reimagined in a way that unsettles their foundations. The operatic stage was actually one of the first professional arenas where women could make their own living, and many of the female roles of opera are fascinating, musically and psychologically complex, undeniably
A piece by Layla Treuhaft-Ali powerful. Consider Carmen. When I was small, my dad recorded a PBS performance of Carmen, and I used to beg to watch and rewatch it. He only showed me the first act, where Carmen seduces Don Jose. When I asked him what happened next and he told me that Don Jose stabbed Carmen, I remember feeling intensely revolted for days. Carmen still holds that mixture of appeal and horror for me: I think there’s something pathetic and pitiful about Don Jose’s weakness and vulnerability juxtaposed with Carmen’s dazzling strength and vibrancy. I both love the opera and find it sickening to watch. I’m sure Bizet did not think he was writing a scorching critique of toxic masculinity, but the modern viewer feels almost viscerally that the tragedy lies in Don Jose’s obsession with masculinity. One of my favorite arias in all of opera is Zerlina’s “Batti, batti, o bel Masetto” (Beat me, beat me, beautiful Masetto) from Don Giovanni. Zerlina urges her fiance, Masetto, to punish her for her sexual promiscuity. At first, the aria seems pretty horrifying. But in the last few moments, Zerlina gleefully exclaims, “Ah, I see, you don’t have the heart!” In other words, she’s known the whole time that Masetto will not beat her, and she has been feigning weakness in order to manipulate him. She even co-opts the rhythmic pattern of “Lascia darem la mano,” the song that Don Giovanni used to attempt to seduce her. To me, this suggests that Zerlina -- a peasant woman -- sees herself as powerful enough to mimic the aristocratic Don Giovanni. What would it look like to queer opera? What would it look like to decolonize opera? Is opera something that anyone who’s not rich and white can relate to or find meaning in? I think I like the genre because, somewhere in my heart, I believe the answer is yes.
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Real Literature by Hannah Schmitt
Above: Volume of Sherlock Holmes stories. Below: A printed copy of Performance in a Leading Role, by Mad_Lori. This is a fanfiction based on BBC’s Sherlock, in which John and Sherlock are in a romantic relationship.
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When I was twelve, someone told me that there was one way to write Literature, and if I wanted to be a writer --- a real writer, really --- that was how I had to write. And I believed it, and when I was fifteen I wrote fanfiction about Sherlock Holmes and John Watson tenderly banging the shit out of each other, and I loved it, but I wrote in secret, because fanfiction was not Literature, and I didn’t want anyone to know that I wasn’t a real writer, really, that I didn’t really know how or even fucking want to write like I was supposed to. And now I think of all the years I spent not telling the stories I wanted to tell, snatching at the crumbs that fell off things like Sherlock because I was scared to admit that I wanted happy love stories, I wanted queer characters, I didn’t want to sound like anyone else but me. But writing back is not the last thing to do. We write back because it is a way to tear things up; we write back to get the chance to start over; we write back so that we can write at all. It is not the last thing to do. We tell our stories too.
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Third World by Ashia Ajani I taste of swollen fruit and regret Frozen tundra breaking out over my flesh Out of a hundred lives, I’ve used up twenty I like my women With pretty, glistening brown skin And palms that reek of nostalgia I can only offer you A bitter history and this chilly heart I am a poet And yes, I get sad sometimes Lonely too My railroad spine Has more gap than track Some white lady Put my knuckle bones and teeth In a leather pouch & wears it round her neck Like a charm
sarah
I want my body back, now! Third World bruises fading If there is heaven, I’m big enough to touch it
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Laura after Petrarch by Anna Sudderth He spoke her and she lost the power of speech. Beside him in his car, she listened while he called her pretty (only when she smiles.) His hands kept twitching towards her. Out of reach but only just, she shrank, and tried to fill herself with silence. Not like other girls, he called her. Hard to get. He grabbed a curl of hair, and pulled. She swallowed, keeping still. That night, at home, she scrubbed her face so long it stung. She tried to hum her body warm with sound, but couldn’t quite, could not quite form the room inside her mouth. So stripped of song, she found her name instead, a whispered chant of Laura, Laura, Laura, like a trance.
illustration by Bix Archer 10
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What the AP Euro Textbook Didn’t Tell You By Julia Salseda
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In the year 1672 the Benedictine nuns of Mont SainteAgape decided it was time for a change. It began with Sister Adeline and her long, languorous looks at Sister Marieanne over morning porridge. Sisters Marguerite and Louise were next affected, and by the time Sister Jean and Sister Cecile were found in flagrante delicto in the bell-tower (still wearing their habits, of course), the Reverend Mother knew that the great sodomite awakening, prophesized in one of the lesserknown chapters of Revelations, had begun. In some ways, abbey life continued as usual. The nuns rose early, and spent mornings in prayer. But when Sister Marieanne had a vision of the Holy Ghost while in confinement with Sister Adeline, joint prayer became general practice. The village men, who’d previously sold their wares in the abbey on Tuesdays, were now politely asked to send their wives. Unfortunately, when three wives decided to renounce the sacrament of marriage for life at the abbey, the Reverend Mother had to urge Sister Marguerite into a closer reading of the seventh commandment. Certain aesthetic revisions were deemed necessary. The great centerpiece of the chapel, a gold-leaf fresco of the Virgin Mary, remained perfectly intact, but images of the male saints which had lined the Great Hallway were steadily replaced by paintings of St. Teresa in ecstasy. While Jesus Christ never fell out of favor, crosses were discarded for their distastefully phallic symbolism. Naturally, as tales about the unnatural behavior of the nuns spread, the ecclesiastical hierarchy felt compelled to intervene. They sent a trio of local vicars to investigate the strange rumors. As it happened, the nuns, through their communal labor, had been producing cheese of such a high quality that it had become renowned throughout the region. The new revenue had lined the abbey’s coffers quite generously, and when the wily Reverend Mother offered a bribe of cheese and monies, the priests agreed to turn a blind eye.
The nuns became increasingly secluded as time went on. Visitors could only marvel from the outside at the sweeping archways of the abbey and the special slant of sunlight which seemed to grace it. If they were lucky, they caught a far-off glimpse of women, hand in hand, herding sheep through bright green pastures. And if they were especially blessed, and listening closely, they could hear the nuns of Mont Saint-Agape singing benedictions to their holy hallowed love.
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On October 19th, 2015, I tried to commit suicide.
On October 19th, 2016, I wake up to my alarm.
My initial reaction when I woke up in the hospital during the early hours of October 20th was anger.
I’m tired, I press snooze four times, but slowly make it out of bed and into the shower.
I was angry that my plan was thwarted, but I was also angry that I had done that to myself.
I look at my body underneath me in the shower and I notice its curves and crevices. I think about people who look at me from perspectives I will never experience.
I fell victim to my own violent wrath. I wanted to ask for help but I didnt want anyone to think I was weak. I probably could have prevented it had I taken better care of myself before this happened. I took advantage of my weak body and vulnerable mind. They kept bitching and I shut them up the only way I knew how. I panicked. Suicidality is a chemical imbalance. I consider that a shitty excuse. They knew what they were doing. The precense of an illness doesnt undo my trauma. People need to take responsibility when they hurt others. I am relieved. Maybe it wasnt actually my fault. It won’t happen again, that’s for sure. I just lost sight of what was important. Everyone fucks up.
I punished myself for being weak. I resent myself for lashing out like that. As both victim and assailant, I experience shame. shame that I couldn’t save myself shame that I inflicted such deep pain onto someone I love
I lather soap on my body and through my hair, and I thank myself. It has taken me twenty years be able to appreciate all that I do for myself. As I leave the shower, I see myself in the mirror. I pause. I smile at myself and I smile back at myself.
Hello, me. Hello.
I take my pills and think chemical imbalance. The memory of October 19th, 2015 comes back for a short moment as it does every morning, but this time it lingers for longer than it usually does. I used to punish myself for being weak. I used to resent myself for being so cruel to myself. I survived and I forgave. And I have learned a new emotion since then: empathy.
I’m dressed and ready to leave for the day. I check the time on my phone and I see that it’s October, 19th, 2016. I see myself in my mirror by my door. I pause. I smile at myself, and I smile back at myself. Hello, me.
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