"Failing Better: A Conversation with Ocean Vuong" interviewed by Viet Thanh Nguyen for LA Review of Books (2019) [ID'd]

“So, there’s two songs I’m working on. One is with the Norwegian singer Aurora, who’s one of the most extraordinary people I’ve ever met. Absolutely original human being. You just think: Who designed her? She’s such a one-off. Wonderful person. So, we took one of her songs. I think … yes, I’m remembering the title, because it had another title which I’m getting mixed up with. But it’s called now ‘A Soul with No King’. It’s a beautiful song. And so what we’ve done with that song is we’ve made a sort of … it’s as though she’s walking through a forest, and then we’ve made a clearing, a kind of sonic clearing in the forest, and we’ve inhabited that with Norwegian birds and her voice. I think it’s a really lovely result.”

Brian Eno talking about remixing AURORA's "A Soul With No King" for the Earth Percent's Sounds Right in a recent podcast for Midnight Chats, found by Leaves in the Warriors & Weirdos forum and Amrothian

photo by Wanda Martin

Best comeback line ever.

When I first asked my grandma if I could write and publish about her, she gave me an instruction that has stuck with me over the years and I try to always keep it in mind when I write about family. She said, roughly translated from Korean: “you can write what you want, but let us live a little more beautifully the second time.” I took this as permission with a condition that I would fictionalize where necessary, to protect them and myself. The women I write about are both us and not us. Maintaining that fictionalized barrier is important to me.

Jihyun Yun, from “you can write what you want, but let us live a little more beautifully the second time": Jihyun Yun in conversation with Nicole Lachat, published Prairie Schooner, March 9, 2023

If you were to go to the movies alone, what would be the perfect movie to see?

Andrew Garfield, in an interview with GQ

It's never-ending. The grief is never-ending. The love is never-ending. Like, Oh. That's the nature of love.

Audre Lorde to her students during a poetry workshop, as shown in A Litany for Survival: The Life and Work of Audre Lorde (1996) dir. by Ada Gay Griffin and Michelle Parkerson

SEBASTIAN STAN Variety Studio presented by Audible at Sundance, 2024

"Failing Better: A Conversation with Ocean Vuong" interviewed by Viet Thanh Nguyen for LA Review of Books (2019) [ID'd]

Tom Hiddleston on Jimmy Kimmel Live!

➥ PSA: KÄÄRIJÄ IS A GROWER, NOT A SHOWER.

PEDRO PASCAL on Hot Ones.