✨ Virgo SZN ✨

Virgo season kicked off on August 23rd this year and as I am a Virgo sun, we are honoring the season by shouting out some Virgoan authors. I’ve also shared a bit of a delusional wishlist.

THE BEST IN THE BIZ: VIRGO AUTHORS*

As Virgo is ruled by Mercury, any Virgo placements in an author’s chart is a good sign as far as I’m concerned. When it comes to Virgo authors, there’s many well known names: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Sherwood Anderson, Jorge Luis Borges, Agatha Christie, Roald Dahl, Goethe, Stephen King, George R. R. Martin, Mary Shelley, Leo Tolstoy, and Richard Wright...

Rather than talk about the authors I just mentioned, I thought I’d take advantage of the Excel I have been laboring over. This Excel (ok, it’s actually a Google sheet) keeps track of all of the authors I encounter while researching books and spending lots of time on the Internet. I organize the list by everyone’s Zodiac sign (lol). Below, are a few of the Virgo authors who are on my list:

Jean Rhys - August 24, 1890:

Best known for novel Wide Sargasso Sea (I hope to read it either this year or next), Rhys was born in the Caribbeans and lived a life of a baddie.** You can learn more about her life in her unfinished memoir, Smile Please. She is what I would call a bit of a stylist. Her writing is crisp and clear and also, a little mean. Her character descriptions are equal parts cutting and cruel.

Her writing career only began when she came under the influence of the editor and writer Ford Madox Ford. The duo would have an affair which would provide the material for Rhys’ debut, Quartet. Many of the experiences from Rhys’ life would find their way into her fiction.

During the 40s, Rhys withdrew from public life and would have faded from the world if it were not for the actress Selma Vaz Dias who put out a newspaper advert asking for the author’s whereabouts. Vaz Dias encouraged Rhys to write and this led to the publication of Wide Sargasso Sea which was a bit of a hit and finally resulted in the acclaim that had been missing from Rhys’ life.

Rhys believed success came too late in her life and believed happiness was preferable to writing but something not possible for novelist: “If I could choose I would rather be happy than write... if I could live my life all over again, and choose…”

I kind of want to pick up this biography on her: I Used to Live Here Once: The Haunted Life of Jean Rhys.

Rajinder Singh Bedi - September 1, 1915:

To be honest with you, I stumbled onto this author because I wanted to know what Saadat Hasan Manto’s sign was. I discovered Manto was a Taurus; one thing lead to another and I found his friend: Bedi.

Both Manto and Bedi were some of the subcontinent’s leading 20th century progressive writers. In pre-partition British India, the Progressive Writers' Movement was leftist with socialist leanings. They depicted the darkness hiding within the human psyche. In the case of Bedi, he was well known for his disturbing tales of Partition.

Khuswant Singh, an Aquarius and author of Train to Pakistan, translated Bedi’s Urdu novel Ek Chadar Maili Si into I Take This Woman. After Partition, Bedi would move to Bombay where he would have a career as a director and a screen writer. I think that’s really cool.

Stevie Smith - September 20, 1902:

Born Florence Margaret, Smith received the nickname Stevie while riding horses with a friend who thought she reminded him of Steve Donoghue, the jockey. Not to be confused with Booktube’s reigning king, Steve Donoghue.

After her father abandoned her family for a life at sea, and a three-year-long bout of tuberculosis, Smith’s life was to be plagued with depression and fears of death.

For most of her life, she lived in Palmers Green with her aunt who was to be a major influence in her life, especially once her mother died when Smith was 16. Smith was a feminist, a lapsed atheist, and incredibly independent. Smith worked in publishing for 33 years, but was given her full pension after she attempted suicide at the office.

She wrote over 15 volumes of poetry and three novels: Novel on Yellow Paper, Over the Frontier, and Holiday. All of her novels featured the same heroine: Pompey, a bored secretary whose life changes and evolves through the dynamics of war and love.

Her writing and poems, uncanny and wicked; infused with a deep sense of irony, were concerned with themes of loneliness and death. Both Seamus Heaney and Sylvia Plath were fans of her writing. A year before Plath’s death, she wrote the poet a letter declaring herself “a desperate Smith-addict.” With over eight hundred poems, this poetry collection is the one to read if you are intrigued by her work.

THE ULTIMATE VIRGO WISHLIST

I tend to not like most Virgo wishlists because they are so fudging reductive and bland with their emphasis on cleanliness and austerity. The below is a wishlist of things primarily for me, but maybe a Virgo in your life might appreciate the following items.

• A wonderful gift for the Virgo in your life (i.e. me) is a house! Or, a condo! I’m currently partial to this $5.9 mil (why not just call it 6 at this point!) 2 bed, 2.5 bath condo on Elizabeth Street. It’s right across the street from my beloved Eggshop and walking distance to all of my favorite downtown spots.

  • To be fair, it’s not even that great, there are def better options in NYC for the price but it’s the thought that counts when it comes to a gift lol

• Of course, this swanky new condo will need some furniture. And, what about a lovely orange Maurice Calka desk for me to write all my big and important and life changing thoughts on? Will def need this Bon Bon Cocktail glass to sit on my desk.

• My apartment wouldn’t be complete without a lush leather chair in a bubble-gum pink hue by Vittorio Introini. This chair is imperative for me so I can sit and read and continue to have even bigger and more important life changing thoughts.

• After working with many beauty brands, I am a very suspicious consumer. That does not mean I am entirely immune to the siren-like calls of a new beauty device. In this instance, I really want these two devices by the Korean skincare brand, Medicube.

  • The first is the Age-R Booster H, this device works by pulsating across your face. This creates electro-passageways which allows your beauty products to penetrate deeper into your skin. The second device, the Age-R ATS Air Shot, does the same pulsating thing and promises to deliver at home microneedling, sans the needles.

  • Though Hailey Bieber*** is a big fan of thes devices, I first discovered them on this TikTok video which I admit is giving big QVC-for-the-youth energy. (In a later video, the creator says she doesn’t work with the brand though she wished she did.)

  • If you want more info, check out this Vogue article.

• For many years, I have wanted to indulge in a buccal facial. Celebrities have been swearing by them and as someone who carries a lot of tension in their jaw, I just know this will feel divine. Top of mind, these are the facial spots I would accept gift certificates to: Katya Young Studios, NOY Skincare (tbh, my friend and I did try to book a facial here but we never heard back from the studio), and then in London, I want to check out Guendalina The Skin Sculpter.

• I absolutely love basketball shorts. In the most recent years, I have favored the Eric Emanuel shorts for their colors and interesting prints. Right now, I’m coveting these Relax Lacrosse Brand x Michelle Li shorts. I am partial to the red shorts over the blue.

• If I was going to the club to celebrate my birthday, I would wear a top like this Ludovic de Saint Sernin semi-sheer number or this Vaillant sequined top.

• When Look 39 came down the runway at A.W.A.K.E. Mode on October 4, 2022, I was in love. I’m not kidding. I’ve had the video of this look saved in my favorites on my phone since the day of the show. The whole look is a vision but the top is sleek and cool and I’m sure I’d wear it all the time. Moda had it on their site, but it has now sold out as of yesterday!

• A subscription for infinites amount of Mountain Valley Sparkling Water would be the best. I don’t even think they do that though. I just made it up. But, you could buy me a lot of fancy sparkling water and I’d be pretty happy.

• I really like these glass straws and it’s been on my mind for ages to buy them but it takes me many years before making a purchase so I hope you buy them and enjoy.

• Byredo has some of the BEST packaging in the whole, gosh darn world and these lip balms are just further proving that case.

• A beautiful floral arrangement featuring the stunning anthurium like this, or this, or also this is a great and wonderful gift for anyone regardless of their astro sign. ❤️ 

And, with that, I’m concluding this wishlist. I hope all of the Virgos in your life (myself included lol) have a glorious and wonderful year. As always, god willing, more life.

*This newsletter was a little longer than expected. I would have also liked to have written about Guillaume Apollinaire, Sarah Orne Jewett (a fellow New Englander), Mary Renault, Penelope Mortimer, and Han Suyin. Maybe next year. Should I do this for all of the Astro signs?
**Monetization has not occurred yet! But soon… maybe.
***I admit Hailey Bieber is not a big influence on my purchases… However, I did buy her Erewhon Strawberry Glaze smoothie 5x last summer when I was in LA and I loved it every time. No regrets. And, I also have purchased the Rhode lip balm. So, maybe I am a little influenced by her. Something for me to reflect on…