May 2012
16 posts
Generous description of 'Kafka enthusiasts' herein
Do the good ones come in waves? When do they arrive? Before the flamboyant Francophiles? Following the trust-fund-tracking artists? Amidst the chatterbox loving, pro-fun proclaiming, Kafka enthusiasts? After what seemed like a string of entertaining females and males, along came two intriguing spiders; we’ll call them Lonesome Moviegoer, and Rexroth Whisperer. Let me know if my reference to...
This side of darkness
Wit is the only wall between us and the dark, said Mark Van Doren.
Vivacious, stylish agent de presse for art and design firm, brunette, in her late twenties, former photography gallery director. Various loves include summers in Maine, Nabokov, large slobbering dogs, espionage novels by Alan Furth, gin-based drinks, and studying Arabic. You’re a man, 35-50, who can keep up his wits about...
As we grow, we accumulate qualities!
Older guy with these qualities seeks smart, slim, verbal never boring woman for love, great fun, and literary adventures.
She seems delicate.
Slightly oxymoronic, although, only because I seek balanced asymmetry. I only like black because white is my favorite and therefore its diametric opposite highlights its beauty. Delicate spice. Musical silence. Intense comfort. Free time. Might I challenge you to a crossword sometime?
The Graduate
I am: A 22-year-old male. A soon-to-be graduate of a better-than-most liberal arts college, with an almost-regretful major (philosophy). An aspiring yet already self-loathing careerist (publishing). A Southerner by birth and rearing; a resident of the city by June. I only plan this far ahead when I know I’m not entirely serious.
You are: Reading n+personals instead of concluding your...
*Not* a manic pixie dream girl!
Me: Female, intermittently employed, incurably introverted, perpetually broke fiction writer. Living literary crush: Norman Rush. Dead literary crush: Roberto Bolaño. Looking for correspondence, late night drinks, or whatever else comes after. Not interested in being your MPDG, if you know what I mean. Brooklyn. You: Can expand my views on philosophy, film, and music.
Shy is just an adjective
Shy and willowy, thirty-something Chicago writer in loveless marriage seeks woman for summer fling. Overly educated, underpaid, you fill in the rest. Must be open-minded (obviously), non-judgmental, and like tall skinny guys. Age is just a number.
Take her to a bar with a celestial jukebox!
Fifty-year-old female trailing a BA in history (European intellectual history in the pre-WWI era) and a JD from the University of Chicago has somehow landed in the lush hills of East Tennessee where she reads her New York papers and magazines and growls at the news alone but wishes to find another who sits proudly on the agnostic fence, who eagerly acts on recommended reads listed in the finer...
the anti-bullshit, anti-cynic writer of love...
28-year-old female, petite and pretty with inviting lips. Has inexplicably poor French grammar. Detests bullshit, including but not limited to: n+1 personal ads; men with fixies; glib, guilt-driven pseudo-Leftism; foodie culture; moralism tout court; people who take themselves too seriously. Prefers the plastic arts to the literary but will eagerly indulge your love of the latter. Thinks John Cale...
Sister wifedom in England!
Do you like rainy days for sitting on the couch with your man in front of a hot fire and a couple of cats, kids across the hall in their own living room? Could you live on a hill and walk to town? I am almost 33, a fundraising management consultant starting my practice, and planning to start a junior college in the next two years. My girlfriend is more than a decade older than me and we are...
Tall striking Maui gentleman aged 60 seeking life’s wondrous romantic beauty with lovely woman.
(from the new york review of books)
'Cathedral'
Me: Writerly not yet a writer, Sunday painter, promiscuous reader, allergic to nothing, fan of contemporary fiction by hyphenated authors. I adore whiskey and scrabble. Vice: gratuitous hi-fives. Virtue: I can make kale chips. You: Partial to crosswords, participate in readings and boozings with equally measured brio, call your mom on her birthday. Brunch restaurants are the cathedrals you...
Calling philosopher king!
A hero to win my heart, nourish my mind and satisfy my other desires. Seeks gentlemen 48-70.
(from the the new york review of books)
The artist with an aversion to authority
Woman, 36. Small, yellow-eyed, quiet, complex aversion to authority, to inanity, to wastefulness.
Seek a man of simple tastes and easy happiness. Prefer whip-smart and big-hearted, but looks do matter. Prefer a non-artist: it does not help if two of us are complicated. Prefer someone who would want to try for the long haul. East European descent is not a requirement, but might help in...
So, not a clinger!
I am dreamy but motivated. Seeking a similarly conflicted man. Long-distance relationship ideal! I only like literature that doesn’t pretend to be easy. I love WG Sebald and Maggie Nelson, and I subscribe to Ugly Duckling although I didn’t read every title last year. I sort of blame my brain and sort of blame Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost for moving me out of...
Re: Letters!
This ad—In New Haven, geographically and otherwise, a 26-year-old male—inspired a rather spirited reply from a Yale undergrad. We gave ‘New Haven male’ the chance to respond:
Dear Outcrying Undergrad:
To set the record straight, I’m not a Yalie. I relocated from Mass. to CT for work, and I consider New Haven the best spot to live. It’s not ideal, and I don’t know how long...
April 2012
17 posts
Letters!
[Penned in response to: ‘In New Haven, geographically and otherwise, a 26-year-old male.’]
You’re in New Haven? And I assume at Yale. Doing graduate work. I think if maybe you weasel around the get-togethers of other graduate programs you’ll find your lover. Grad students here are always pairing off. It’s us undergrads who should be anonymously posting to find a...
Some like their porn discursive. If you happen to... →
'INFJs are among the rarest of the sixteen...
Proudly bespectacled, mildly bearded early-mid-20s INFJ guy seeks compatible fellow to spend time with. Enjoys late-80s house compilations, snapshots as high art, and every exclamation mark of Frank O’Hara’s poetry. Embraces dress aesthetic of a 1966 Harvard homophile. From the South (the better Carolina). Looking for someone who enjoys, say, early-90s Detroit techno. Or, perhaps,...
Would like to avoid worries about autism (Ha!)
Alternately world-weary and childishly-delighted 25 year old, drug-and-disease free, non-smoking, Asian, female. Living by Central Park with 781 Fico in search of a clean, cuddly sex god like you to live happily, if fretfully, ever after with.
You: A sincere, deeply loving, overeducated-but-down-to-earth single male 24-35 in search of someone like me (Highly committed to the two languages,...
Francophile, soon to self-actualize
22-year-old male soon to be expatriate: come September I depart for a year of self-imposed exile in Le Faubourg Saint-Germain, Montmartre, Le Marais &c. (I have yet to decide.) Between then and now I’m looking for someone to go museum, gallery, and reading hopping, and bed hopping, of course. I’m sure we’ll want to share some rabbit pâté and a glass of the finest twelve dollar red. You...
Online dating... →
“At the Philip Levine reading we chatted for all of a minute about Geoff Dyer...”
– MISSED CONNECTION from last night’s packed, amazing, hilarious, poetrytastic Knopf and Tumblr Celebrate Poetry party.
(via housingworksbookstore)
Uncalendared Love
The first name cut on a rock, a King’s, Marked the beginning of time’s annals And each new year would recapitulate The unkind sloughings and renewals Of the death-serpent’s checkered skin. But you with me together, together, together, Survive ordeals never before endured. We snatch the quill out of Enoch’s hand To obliterate our names from his black scroll— Twin...
gotta love mistress-potential
Impoverished but ambitious artsy graduate student type seeks London-based man of means for spoilâge, frolics. Me: female, neither short, fat, nor dull. You: old-fashioned, wicked, and/or multi-lingual frequent traveler, possibly married.
“I’ll never marry,” he came to say; “I’ve seen too much of it, and I know a happy marriage is a very rare thing. Besides, I’m too old.”
But he did believe in marriage. Like all men who spring from a happy and successful marriage, he believed in it passionately—nothing he had seen would change his belief, his cynicism dissolved upon it like air. But...
Young girl sees ghost cats, makes gesture towards...
Girl (neophyte, 21) seeks man (bright), girl (tall), or both (together), for spheres (public/private). Not as well-educated as you’d like, i.e., it’s funnier to tell, rather than show. Fixated on the pride of men, women, and children, but will settle for a late supper or dangerous winter sport. Concerned, sartorially, and so are you. Often mistakes slippers and chair legs for ghost...
When you are lucky enough to double-book your ad...
On Mon, Apr 16, 2012 at 3:12 PM, Kaitlin Phillips <kaitlinephillips@gmail.com> wrote: Your ad is “live” on the nyrb website: http://www.nybooks.com/classifieds.
On Apr 16, 2012, at 3:33 PM, [x] wrote:
I feel like the venue calls for some sort of addenda, like: “Mrs. Robinsons and Madeleine Forestiers welcome.” On Mon, Apr 16, 2012 at 3:35 PM, Kaitlin...
POST-POSTGENDER
If connecting with a somewhat quirky 29-year-old Columbia Ph.D. student who is at least reasonably attractive by most standards, and who has a sincere interest in much of the standard cultural fare of a reasonably well-educated urbanite (e.g., opera, theater, live (mostly classical) music, art museums) piques your interest, you might consider contacting me. By way of greater disclosure, I...
Is dating men and women different? →
Normally with women you have to play all kinds of little games. You have to make vegetarian sushi even if you’re not a vegetarian. And we all have to be sensitive. It’s a long project. Whereas with men, it’s much easier to seduce them. Just yesterday I wrote a really naughty email to a spiritual master. And I met him in a course, I was listening to his talk but I didn’t...
I feel like my mother would want some info on his...
East Coast Jew in Oklahoma. New Jersey raised, Iowa and Illinois adulthood, now live in a refurbished doctor’s office in Tulsa, being a grown up. Only person who fits this description so if you know me, hello. Too old and bookish to be a crust punk, too many Crass records (i.e. one) to hang out with the young professionals of Tulsa. Spend Sundays reading the NYRB and drinking coffee. Crappy...
slim sophisticated smart straight seeks same
I am 35, tall, slim, with long black hair. I want a man who is sophisticated and urbane, who knows what he wants, a bon vivant and lover of life. If you can charm me with your lyrics or your elegant prose pronounced trippingly on the tongue, so much the better.
I like being treated like a lady and yes, I do appreciate a man holding the door open for me. I love seeing you in black tie or a smart...
March 2012
19 posts
This is the 2nd Prufrock tattoo on n+personals.
I’m making a life with a B.A. in English. My birthday is coming up soon and I’m getting a line from Prufrock tattooed on my shoulder. Dallas can be a drag. I just bought a cheap European car and learned how to drive stick shift. I am often told that I “stand out” here in Texas. Fashion is nice but sometimes I lounge about in my t-shirt and jeans. Somethings I read in...
Walden->Woolf
Portrait of a lady, not in her first youth but not far past it, seeking companion for travel, conversation, gastronomic experimentation, and lazy mornings. An adherent of Waldenesque simplicity for some years, she now perceives the limits of self-reliance. Seeking a room of her own, with a view. That’ll be the day.
'Bushwick'
Me: Spoken—if “well-” or not still up to you. Expect exuberant textual outbursts followed by contemplative silences. At my best when gaping open-mouthed at the sky, or drinking a micro-brew at the back table of a bar in Bushwick. I can all but guarantee that everything that transpires between us will only later serve as the tiny hard vertebra to the backbone of a devastating short...
1 tag
The 23 year old "getting famous"
Young adult but old 23 year old female living in England writing and studying and trying to know everything there is to know about any poetry that has written between right now and the 1940s. Curvy and capricious. Maybe I am looking to spend spring mornings watching a strip of light bounce from your bedsheets, maybe I am looking to have someone to write poetry for. Getting famous. You will be...
1 tag
Perhaps you've read the core and wear solid colors...
Young, female, a little neurotic. The aspiring polyglot in me is devastated that I’ve chosen to waste my undergraduate degree on the BFA I am currently pursuing in screenwriting, but the writer in me is psyched that I stand a fighting chance of being able to make a living purely from telling stories. I appreciate that Los Angeles has the capacity to satisfy both sides of my psyche—as well as...
Testimonial #2: at least we have proof all your...
Well, I’ve now had five different people awkwardly email to say they figured out it was me.
You did this to me.
I hope you’re happy. (I kid.) (Mostly.) (Kind of.)
(But really though, seriously contemplating moving to Montana or someplace where it will never be spoken of again.)
Testimonial #1: "This is a love story."
This is a love story. It began on Twitter. The n+1 interns were avidly promoting their new personals site, and I, in a fit of optimism, submitted a post as honest as I could muster. The headline that my ad eventually received was, “The Terribly Compassionate Pie Lover,” which sounds about right. The same day, the n+1 Twitter account retweeted this: “I think I might fall for...
The writer with a high tolerance for gentle...
Me: 25, male. Writer, editor, working other odd jobs, teaching a class this semester. General interests: people, objects, feelings. Current interests: Raymond Scott; mulling spices; Richard Hofstadter; the Clement Greenberg/T.J. Clark/Michael Fried flame war.
You: Brainy and down to earth. Large appetite for stuff (art, books, conversation, food, making out). Know things I don’t know and want to...
1 tag
The man that refers to Fitzgerald as "F. Scott,"...
Why is pulchritude such an ugly word? Dapper 22-year-old writer with a penchant for aestheticism. As an American my taste in literature is decidedly continental: Du Côté de Chez Swann, Madame Bovary et al. If the writer is not French than he is an American living abroad: F. Scott, Hemingway. My favorite novel that actually takes place in the States was written by a Russian émigré whose...
Angela Chase reads sci-fi, ponders Duchamp
19-year-old bespectacled female with wanderlust. Scholar of 20th and 21st century rom-coms. Possesses an ardent hatred for Natalie Portman. Knows the difference between Berlin and Zurich Dada. Equates the process of finding a significant other to Douglas Adams’ method of flying.
You: Skinny, articulate, brunette, male. Preferably located somewhere in Florida.
Things I am trying to do:
1. Not judge you for having an account at yahoo, aol, or earthlink.
2. Not judge you for misspelling the author’s name you purport to like.
3. Not send back witty missives to your “I hate you and how young you are and how much money I think your father makes, you are worthless for giving my ad that title” emails.
4. Not call you old and gross when you latch weird superlatives...
She doesn't want to marry into a broken home.
Young 34 seeks man 28-60.
Me: A fleshy Joy Bryant-ish Oxbridge grad. Works in finance but dreams of poetry, likes screenplays & the exotic. I take my vodkas neat and my sox red.
You: kind but strong-minded, sweet but masculine. You know who you are and what you want. Your parents are (still) married but you are not.
Not looking for your average Dorothy.
Manhattan male on the wrong side of forty, learning to accept the fact the world is going to hell in a hand basket. You: Female who preferably has no truck with hand baskets. I have published and perished more than once; perhaps you have done the same or are currently in the process thereof… at least the published part. Will show you my JPG, if you will show me yours. (Oliver Peoples...
Because at this stage in our lives, we could all... →
Love the girl who thinks in terms of "parlors,"...
I recently signed an April lease on a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn.
Today I decided that I want to convert the den of my future home into a parlor with as many chairs as possible. Matched chairs, mismatched chairs, chairs in conversation. This got me thinking that I really don’t know very much about chairs and how cool would it be to take an entire class about them, like History of...
Ladies don't take drugs.
Mid-twenties lady with more ink and sea salt in her veins than blood seeks Stephen Maturin, or close enough as to make no matter. Opium addicts need not apply.