“Aphrodite, The Goddess Of Breathless Romances, Of Honeyed Breaths, Of Feverishly Promised Forevers.”

my great uncle

some interesting facts about my great uncle who is a mysterious academic icon to me

- he went to Oxford AND Cambridge i don’t know why or how but he did he did history (1500-now) at oxford and social and economic history at cambridge.     - he went to oxford when J.R.R Tolkien was a fellow of the school (after teaching) and told me Tolkien would eat lunch then stand on the table and recite Nordic/Viking poetry and it always confused the new students.                              - he knows at least 3 language i think. - he worked for the British government but we don’t know what he did and he won’t tell us. - is banned from Russia, China and USA for unknown reasons                              - lost all of his luggage on a conference/diplomatic(?) trip to Malaysia and had to order a custom suit and shoes because he  was 6′4 and he has size 12 shoes. it was for the next day                                                                                  - the Bolivian (armed) police were sent to find him when he forgot to tell someone where he was going so they thought he had been kidnapped but instead he went to a museum that was put on lock down while people searched for him. he had no idea what was going on and when he got back to his hotel found dozens of notes under the door telling him to contact them when he got back and where he was.                                                               - lives most of the year opposite a castle then come up to visit my grand-dad and stays in his other house in a tiny *tiny* village which is not much more then a few houses on boggy marsh land/moors on the coast.                                           - both of his houses are cozy and old and filled to the brim with books. Literally. i think the second house was actually just so he had another place for his books.  - has met Prince Charles on multiple occasions and they always talk for hours and is on less formal (but still formal) terms with him.                -met an MI6 spy at a garden party and didn’t know till his boss told him a few weeks later and only then he realised that the mans face was in no pictures.        - is in his 60′s and only ever owned about 3-4 cars because he drives them till they fall apart. literally, only when the wheels and a door fell off did he get a new one. - is friends with a Lord who has a steam train on his estate that works, he goes around every now and then and goes on the train.                      - the name he goes by is actually his middle name because he doesn’t like his first name. -was a french teacher apparently

i’ll add more if i’m told more or remember more

(this was originally all nice and lined up but i used my phone so if it looks weird that’s why)

My dream home is either:

An ancient Greek temple where I may receive prophetic visions

A gothic cathedral with plenty of alluring vampires

An old library filled with first-edition books

A forest clearing with many friendly cicadas trying to eat me

A quiet manor in the English countryside with ivy creeping up the walls

Wherever the ghost of Shakespeare lives

@booksociety 's It Is A Mystery Event: The Secret History

One is quite capable, of course, of working out these destructive passions in more vulgar and less efficient ways. But how glorious to release them in a single burst! To sing, to scream, to dance barefoot in the woods in the dead of night, with no more awareness of mortality than an animal!

Wounds of the Earth

— by xis.lanyx

chaotic academia, a concept : scribbling lorde’s lyrics aggressively on a napkin, burning candles and touching the wax with your fingers, getting ink on your white shirt, choosing to stay up to read when you have to wake up four hours later, brewing tea while shivering in your cold kitchen, compiling your last minute notes in a small dark cafe, going out from your home in the rain to buy yourself an umbrella, feeling homesick at home

Oh I really do enjoy how the 2020s are shaping up to be a lot like the 1920s. You get a generation of lost kids that grew up during a war. They reject their parents conservative attitudes. The youth has created a resurgence of Dadaism and Nihilism that the older generations don’t understand. An artistic boom replacing the materialistic tendencies of our parents. The queer community is thriving in a way that it hasent been in years. Activism and socialist ideologies are on the rise again. How wonderful. It makes me want to go to Paris and be the next Gertrude Stein

spending my life studying for ancient greek class, teaching myself latin, reading and annotating books, listening to classical music, worshiping ancient deities, travelling, visiting museums and getting drunk with my best friends on summer afternoons, while constantly lingering on the verge of insanity.

how much more “the secret history” can my life get?

Vassar College girls practicing Greek dance c. 1923

Going through the pile of books to go to charity shops and there’s this amazing kids history one that’s literally like

Give your friend a neolithic burial

If anyone did this to me I would immediately fall in love you

how to love a dark academic:

• write them letters and seal the envelopes with fancy wax seals

• buy them books

• write them poetry

• quote shakespeare, or really any other author or playwright to them

• read and discuss books with them

• listen to their 3 am rants on how we could've heard oscar wilde's voice if he'd had lived just a tad longer

• help them study