Odessa's Oddities & Curiosities | Week of 1/27/2025

Dear friends,

We are already at the third week of classes and I’ve barely restrained myself from telling you all about my classes. First, all in all, I have a lush set of interdisciplinary classes to close out my Yale career. If you have no interest in my classes, skip down a few paragraphs to my recommendations.

First, James Joyce and Marcel Proust with Prof Marta Figlerowicz where we read and discuss Ulysses and most of In Search of Lost TIme. This is my second time with Ulysses, but my first with Proust, and I figured that I must close out my time at Yale by taking the class that will make me the most obnoxious person at dinner parties ad infinitum.

Ego aside, I find reading Ulysses remarkably similar to my experience of Torah study (eek! is that sacrilegious?) — the book is endlessly generative. My professor noted that there is no getting to the bottom of Ulysses, because there simply is no bottom. She started class by acknowledging the crust of elitism on these two novels — the fetishization of big books. But Professor Figlerowicz explained that Ulysses is Joyce’s attempt to flex his knowledge in the Western canon in an effort to find belonging in British society as a poor Irishman. Joyce wantonly experiments with representations of consciousness (only 30 years after William James’ coined “stream of consciousness”). From a cog sci perspective, I find the claim on how thought and associations operate fascinating. More will come on Ulysses in future newsletters. (The phrase dogsbody keeps popping into my head)

Second, Young Adult Writing. My professor, Jake Halpern, had us all climb under the table as soon as class began. This class, he announced, will involve getting in touch with your inner child. Remember what a table could serve to your imagination. A fort? A castle? A hidden universe? Needless to say, I was hooked. He framed the class as a runway to finish our young adult novels. My Jewish pirate novel is currently taxiing on that runway.

Third, Literary Production: Prose. We get to take a class with the senior editor of the Yale Review (!!) at the Yale Review (!!) (the oldest continuously operating literary magazine in America). It’s very much in the inside baseball of literary magazines…so excuse me if I start waxing poetic about the sensibility of one magazine or another. But we get to learn the nuts and bolts of editing, filtering submissions, agenting etc. It feels both very practical and extremely impractical.

Four, Social Networks and Data Science. The new professor in the sociology department is killing it. Social networks are so important and super fascinating. My research fingers are tingling at the chance to learn how to conduct this form of analysis. God, I love analyzing data to feed my inner nosy bitch.

Fifth, Strategic Leadership Across Sectors…i.e. Ava and I take a class together! Finally! And we get to hear from some very cool speakers in the process…this week featured a lot of hostage negotiators (including a freed hostage — Paul Whelan). Interesting article on the truce negotiations in Gaza here.

More to come as my semester continues ❤️ 

Moving on to recommendations:

I loved this story of ski-bums coming together to try to save their mountain from corporate cronies.

This fascinating, lurid read on this woman’s ChatGPT boyfriend. There are TWISTS.

Natalia taught me that scientists have discovered that some parts of your brain “go to sleep” (still a little unclear what it means for your brain to sleep). But it involves slow waves across your cortex. So next time you’re drowsy, blame the parts of your brain for falling asleep.

Ulysses got me thinking about opera, and how opera was really a place to be seen rather than a place to listen, so here’s a piece about the Parisian opera house.

And if the cold is making you lust for travel like it is for me, relish this piece on Venice in the wintertime.

Super cool art alert! Jazz! Popcorn! Robot!?!?! I found this reel on Instagram.

And my literary-magazine-eye was tickled by this change in tone of The New York Magazine’s hilarious piece on quitting sugar — if you don’t read anything else from this newsletter, read this. (Or the ChatGPT boyfriend one).

I will be following the case of DeepSeek closely — Chinese company blowing up the secrecy of proprietary LLM models by making theirs open source.

And I have two episodes of 99% Invisible for you—episodes that I turned to when my lovely outdoor winter run turned into an arduous run up a snowy hill.

An episode on Steven Johnson’s fascinating book The Infernal Machine — makes me want to write a novel on Emma Goldman.

And an episode on the history of reality television and the age-old desire to see the private made public.

Yale seniors have the option of participating in a Mellon Forum — most typically a presentation on your thesis + free food & drinks. It is just so lovely to watch friends come together to support and introduce their friends. I was so proud of Tetsu’s kickass Mellon Forum — first Mellon of the year.

Somehow this past week, I misplaced both my phone and laptop charger, which turned electricity for my devices into this scarce, much-desired resource. My little rat brain was just like more electricity! more charge!

Also, I must share that I forgot how deeply heavy it is to be an American during the Trump Administration. This is not to mention how difficult it is to be an immigrant or Trans at this moment. But somehow, I had forgotten that in addition to all the horror, just the pervasive heaviness his administration brings. It is hard to remain open-hearted at these times.

Some poems for you, my open-hearted friends. The Fury of Sunsets by Anne Sexton. About Standing (in kinship) by Kimberly Blaeser. The Quiet World by Jeffrey McDaniel.

For my new semester, I’ve adorned my laptop with a new case and new stickers. I know it’s a little childish, but I love my stickers as assertions of my values and interests. On there, I keep a Mary Oliver poem:

Pay Attention

Be Astonished

Tell About It

So here I am…telling you about it.

With love & curiosity,

Odessa