Melissa says [Leland] is in love with me. “Watch him,” she said. “He can’t take his eyes off you. He watches you constantly. He talked about it for days when you turned down his marriage proposal. He hates it when you talk to other guys.” “Hogwash,” I said, and I don’t say that often. Then I realized she had a point. Whether it’s love, blamm-o, the real thing, or not – well, he’s feeling something. And me? I feel married. He blew it! He had his chance! I was mad about him when we were sleeping together. That S.O.B. is now paying for his mistake. But I wish sometimes that he and I could get together and be with each other. It has nothing to do with [Sebastian], it’s just nice to have someone in love with me, someone who is fascinated by my stupid stories and someone who doesn’t notice my flab, someone who would not criticize or embarrass me in public. Oh how nice it would be, but it is not in the cards. I could...

Had a fight with [Leland]. He suggested we sleep together in a crude and obnoxious manner and I was offended that he held me in such low regard, that he viewed me as a sexual object rather than as a friend. He claims I imply to him that I want to have an affair with him. Actually nothing could be further from the truth. Though his body is beautiful, sex would complicate things between me and the Fellas as well. “What,” he said wetly in my ear. “You don’t love me anymore?”

Alice’s kitchen, summer 1987 “It was like a second honeymoon.”

  In 1995, when I was 25, I read The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, and began the practice of “morning pages,” i.e., writing stream-of-consciousness style for 20 minutes per day. This habit continued for the next three decades.     In 2020, in an effort to cut down on the hundreds of pounds of old notebooks I’d been storing, I began to transcribe them using voice-to-text. Once I had all the early journals transcribed, I took pictures of various pages, ripped out a few other pages to keep, and tossed the rest. (Please note that the word “tossed” here means “ripped up, then went around to at least 15 different garbage cans in various neighborhoods in Manhattan to dispose of the torn scraps, so that nobody would be able to find a whole trove and piece them together somehow.”) Now I’ve started posting excerpts from the transcripts of my old diaries. But WHY. WHY AM I DOING THIS. These diary entries are not flattering to me....

Summer, 1988 So then we stopped by Roger’s to get some herb, and Roger was really weird to me. I guess they all know now what a horrible witch I am. [Sebastian] and I came back here and I was in a terrible, awful mood. We fought and gave each other our keys back. Then we decided to be friends, and then we cried. This journal is just the most depressing thing; reliving all of this is the hardest past. But I’m determined to keep up in it faithfully, because one day I’ll be writing happy things in it and I won’t appreciate the good times without recording the bad. “…we’d talk, cry, fight, make love, and cry some more–this went on for weeks.”

Summer 1988 well here i am, alone, naturally, writing from my bed, my one piece of furniture so far. this place is so weird and white and empty. i feel so isolated out here. i wish i had a phone to ring, not that it would. So fine they’re all gone, and i’m still me, whatever that is. too much space to think here. i guess i fucked things up pretty badly to wind up like this, or maybe it’s better this way. no [Sebastian], no [Leland], no more phone booths and stupid scenes. still, I thought things would be different. i mean i moved out and left somebody i loved, somebody who loved me, the only person who ever loved me, granted an insane person , as you would have to be to love me. i guess two insane people in a relationship is too many. [Sebastian’s] a child, he can’t take care of himself, how can he take care of me? but at least he tried! i’m so fucked up. i can’t believe i treated him this way, and for what? [Leland] never loved me so fuck him....

Both a literary magazine and a chronicle of girl culture, Bust was born in 1993. With contributors who are funny, fierce, and too smart to be anything but feminist, Bust is the original grrrl zine, with a base of loyal female fans–all those women who know that Glamour is garbage, Vogue is vapid, and Cosmo is clueless.The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order contains brand new, funny, sharp, trenchant essays along with some of the best writings from the magazine: Courtney Love‘s (unsolicited) piece on Bad Girls; the already immortal “Dont’s For Boys”; an interview with girl-hero Judy Blume; and lots of other shocking, titillating, truthful articles. A kind of Our Bodies, Ourselves for Generation XX, The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order is destined to become required reading for today’s hip urban girl and her admirers.

Compiled by poets who have been at the center of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe in New York City, Aloud! showcases the work of the most innovative and accomplished word artists from around America.

What are are holding right now in your hands is a book. Not a telephone reciever, which is how most of the poems in this collection were first transmitted…There are plenty of examples of this spreading of one art form or another through popular mediums. There are all those wonderful Russian Constructivist posters, Dr. Alphabet’s public poetry gatherings on football fields, Dada caberet antics, and various forms of street theatr…Essentially what all of these movements were trying to do was expand the playing field called “art”. By making the field bigger they gave us all more room to frolic. They pushed art right out of the dusty museums and smack dab into your lives… Poetry should be everywhere, and slowly but surely it’s infiltrating our lives. We are gla dto be the instruments of this infiltration.” –from the Introduction Featuring Penny Arcade, Tish Benson, Nicole Blackman, David Cameron, Xavier Cavazos, Todd Colby, Matthew Courtney,...

Practical insights from modern masters of memoir—A.J. Jacobs, Sarah Vowell, Tobias Wolff, Elizabeth Gilbert, Frank McCourt, and many more. In The Autobiographer’s Handbook, you’re invited to a roundtable discussion with today’s most successful memoirists. Let Nick Hornby show you how the banal can be brilliant. Elizabeth Gilbert will teach you to turn pain into prose. Want to beat procrastination? Steve Almond has the answer. Learn about memory triggers (Ishmael Beah: music) and warm-up exercises (Jonathan Ames: internet backgammon). These writers may not always agree (on research: Tobias Wolff, yes, Frank McCourt, no) but whether you’re a blossoming writer or a veteran wordsmith, this unprecedennted wealth of knowledge will help anyone who’s ever dreamed of putting their story on paper, on writing themselves into existence. Featuring: Steve Almond • Jonathan Ames • Ishmael Beah • Janice Erlbaum • Elizabeth Gilbert • Nick Hornby • A. J. Jacobs • Maxine Hong...