The Dutch poet was born on 25 October 1859.

Hélène Swarth. Engraving by E.A. Tilly, 1889.
The Dutch poet was born on 25 October 1859.

Hélène Swarth. Engraving by E.A. Tilly, 1889.
“I am governed by the pull of the sentence as the pull of fabric is governed by gravity.”-Marianne Moore

Gertrude Stein at 3

Gertrude Stein by Alvin Langdon Coburn, 1913

Gertrude Stein on the cover of the 11 September 1933 issue of TIME Magazine
Gertrude Stein: 3 February 1874-27 July 1946

George Gissing Writing
“The misery of having no time to read a thousand glorious books.”-George Gissing
P. G. Wodehouse was born on 15 October 1881:

P.G. Wodehouse, circa 1904.
I love this sheet music from The Riviera Girl, a play written by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton:

The Riviera Girl, 1917.
“Odd how the creative power at once brings the whole universe to order.”-Virginia Woolf, A Writer’s Diary

Portrait of Virginia Woolf by Roger Fry. Circa 1917.
There isn’t a better book to read in October than Virginia Woolf’s A Writer’s Diary. Oh, it is extraordinary (in the full pulse of the word)!
“There’s no doubt in my mind that I have found out how to begin (at 40) to say something in my own voice; and that interests me so that I feel I can go ahead without praise.”-Virginia Woolf, A Writer’s Diary
The struggle to harness one’s creativity is universal and timeless. It’s a constant fight. Battle on, friends!
Plath. Ibsen. Woolf.
Dickinson.
Bloomsbury. Chekhov.
Millay.
Modernism. Tolstoy.
And Charles Chaplin.
Etc.
What are you reading this month?
“If a poet has a dream, it is not of becoming famous, but of being believed.”-Jean Cocteau

Jean Cocteau, 1923. (Died 11 October 1963).