BDM
LightNews LightNews
banner
bdmcclay.bsky.social
BDM
@bdmcclay.bsky.social
1.5K followers 230 following 620 posts
critic & essayist / my dog's name is Boswell

i have a newsletter: https://notebook.substack.com/

header image: https://collections.mfa.org/objects/237761
Posts Replies Media Videos
bdmcclay.bsky.social
from the archives:
July 20, 2025 at 5:48 AM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
submitting a "chaos" ballot to the nyt thing bc i don't watch enough movies to do an informed one
June 24, 2025 at 7:51 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
there are many places i don't expect to encounter kristin lavransdatter but the letters page in a 1939 issue of astounding science fiction is surely chief among them. and yet.
There are so many new magazines to compete with you in your own field now that one must forever resign himself to pulp paper. These new magazines split up the field so. Quality of stories must also suffer, but as yet your magazine shows no such decline. Probably because of the better rates you offer. Mr. Asimov thinks women of no account in history. Points out that men are the famed leaders. But history is a record of wars and sad oppression. Women are not famous for such things as this. Let men have all credit as rulers in history. But wait-wasn't there a certain maid of Orleans? Women are great in other things, too. I am reading what I believe to be the best novel in my experience: "Kristin Lavransdatter," by Sigrid Undset. Don't give man too much credit for the better things of our world. There are women Dostoievskys and Einsteins, but I hope never a woman Napoleon or Hitler！ I failed to understand why Kummer's world of women should not have scientifie progress! Always understood that repression of sex led to a distortion. They should have been fanatical scientists and workers—James Michael Rogers II, 2006 Court Street, Muskogee. Okla.
April 16, 2025 at 8:54 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
tariffs kinda the opposite of this
May 2014 tweet from Tom Morello (@tmorello): When I was a kid I thought quicksand was going to be a much bigger problem on a daily basis than it really is.
April 3, 2025 at 2:18 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
a reading list for people who don't want to wait for the book :) (the absolute must read is julie phillips's tiptree bio) www.notebook.bdmcclay.com/p/some-profe...
I’m interested in this subject but I don’t really want to wait around for your book. Feed me. Some non-fiction books you might like (Bookshop links are affiliate links). I have read some of most of these but have only read all of a couple: Octavia Butler (Gerry Canavan) Joanna Russ (Gwyneth Jones) The Battle of the Sexes in Science Fiction (Justine Larbalestier) In the Chinks of the World Machine: Feminism and Science Fiction (Sarah LeFanu) The Secret Feminist Cabal (Helen Merrick) James Tiptree, Jr: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon (Julie Phillips) Letters to Tiptree (ed. Alexandra Pierce) Galactic Suburbia (Lisa Yaszek) Julie Phillips is also working on a Le Guin biography that I’m quite excited for. There are a lot of women writer–centric SFF anthologies to get a sense of the spread of stories out there and I’m not sure if there is any particular one I’d recommend. The Library of America had a two volume set but it seems to be out of print. Maybe this three-volume Rediscovery set is the best buy. Alternately, if you’re more interested in this period in SFF writing, the Damon Knight Orbit anthologies might be worth a look. And I will again recommend Bobby Derie’s website for C. L. Moore stuff—I wrote to him asking for help tracking something down and he mentioned he’s thinking about writing some more about her this summer. So keep an eye out! :)
April 1, 2025 at 2:35 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
some professional news
Critic and essayist B.D. McClay's WEIRD SISTERS, a group biography of Joanna Russ, James Tiptree, Jr., and Ursula K. Le Guin-the star-crossed women who defined and defied the science fiction genre-exploring the art the women pursued, the limits they reached, and their very human entanglements, to Sally Howe at Scribner, by William Callahan at Inkwell Management (world).
April 1, 2025 at 2:17 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
i hope it involves "silently pocketing $49,000"
personal finance 8:00 A.M. What It’s Like to Plan a $50,000 Party for a 5-Year-Old Portrait of Charlotte Cowles By Charlotte Cowles, the Cut’s financial-advice columnist.
March 14, 2025 at 4:10 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
just call me
manga named "otherworld barbara" by moto hagio
November 26, 2024 at 1:37 AM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
GIFT GUIDE

are you the parent of a small child who hates life itself? well…
Uzumaki Coloring Book SPIRALS… THIS TOWN IS CONTAMINATED WITH SPIRALS… Kurouzu-cho, a small fogbound town on the coast of Japan, is haunted not by a person or being but a pattern: Uzumaki, the spiral—the hypnotic secret shape of the world. The bizarre masterpiece of horror manga, Uzumaki by Junji Ito, has been transformed into coloring book format. Color in each detail of the spirals and you may fall into a whirlpool of terror, never to escape!
November 25, 2024 at 6:52 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
mad scientist dog
November 18, 2024 at 2:25 AM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
i keep laughing at this but it has to be said there's no "but" here… patrick bateman is a swiftie… it gives me no pleasure to report this but you know it's true www.reddit.com/r/swiftiecir...
American psycho but Patrick Bateman is a swiftie: You like Taylor Swift? Her early work was a little too country for my taste. But when 1989 came out in 2014, I think she really came into her own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. She's been compared to Selena Gomez, but I think Taylor has a far more sarcastic, self-deprecating sense of humor. In 2017, Taylor released this; Reputation, her most accomplished album. I think her undisputed masterpiece is "Delicate". A song so catchy, most people probably don't listen to the lyrics. But they should, because it's not just about the insecurities and uncertainty of starting a new love. It's also a personal statement about the singer herself.
April 17, 2024 at 1:11 AM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
me spreading out the heating pad for boswell
Sir Walter Raleigh spreading his cloak before Queen Elizabeth
April 15, 2024 at 8:58 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
March 23, 2024 at 5:56 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
March 21, 2024 at 10:19 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
he's got that james dean daydream look in his eye
March 17, 2024 at 1:12 AM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
when you start connections with the purple row >>>>
March 11, 2024 at 3:52 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
got a tofu press
i'm a girl who is going to be okay
March 8, 2024 at 8:57 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
clare may be banned from twitter but she's still a poster
Clare Coffey: why do the people of melancholia not simply attack the rogue planet with hammers Barbara McClay: i think this is the plot of armageddon Clare Coffey: that's why you want to be in america not france when things get real
March 2, 2024 at 8:15 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
happy leap day to meeeeeeeeee
Tweet from Faber Books: "The opening lines from Intermezzo, the new novel from Sally Rooney. Coming September 2024." Quotation: "Didn't seem fair on the young lad. That suit at the funeral. With the braces on his teeth, the supreme discomfort of the adolescent."
February 29, 2024 at 7:24 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
my spotify on repeat is like hey girl hey… just checkin in… u ok
February 23, 2024 at 9:31 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
83.5/8.36= Taylor outstreaming Gaga at a 9.988038:1 ratio yesterday
February 20, 2024 at 3:11 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
deadline time…
February 19, 2024 at 11:10 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
persuasion (1817)
tweet from @aquariusdays: i bet your ex is waiting to hear from you:) you should message them!
February 18, 2024 at 8:52 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
that's it… i'm calling it… she reads the substack…
taylor swift at a piano that says the tortured poets department, file name: the bolter file name: the bolter
February 16, 2024 at 6:21 PM
bdmcclay.bsky.social
kinda want this dress
karen carpenter in a white floral print dress
February 9, 2024 at 11:30 PM