In Defense of Being Boring at Parties - by Shannan Mann

Most of the writers I love lived alone in some way. Rilke in castles, Baldwin in borrowed rooms, Carson in her margins. García-Márquez’s whole life thesis was solitude. Even when surrounded by people, they wrote like they were speaking across a distance only they could cross. The music I return to…Cohen, Bach, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s qawwalis and ghazals…often sounds like it first began in a room with the lights off. I’ve known this solitude since before I had words for it, a kind of tuning fork inside me that goes quiet in company. Particularly in the buzzy, beer-washed, flickering lights, marijuana-soaked company that naturally becomes louder as the night grows deeper. I don’t go to (m)any MFA gatherings anymore. I used to, at first, (once or twice times once or twice let’s be honest). I’d stand in the kitchen with a drink in my hand and try to say one thing worth remembering…something that might land in someone’s notebook later. There’s a compulsion under the surface, quiet but cons

Most of the writers I love lived alone in some way. Rilke in castles, Baldwin in borrowed rooms, Carson in her margins. García-Márquez’s whole life thesis was solitude. Even when surrounded by people, they wrote like they were speaking across a distance only they could cross. The music I return to…Cohen, Bach, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s qawwalis and ghazals…often sounds like it first began in a room with the lights off. I’ve known this solitude since before I had words for it, a kind of tuning fork inside me that goes quiet in company. Particularly in the buzzy, beer-washed, flickering lights, ma