i-kweem asked: Favorite books?

Limiting the list to prose, here are (some of) my favorites:

The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone, Blindness by José Saramago, The World of Silence by Max Picard, Surfacing by Margaret Atwood, The Beach by Alex Garland, After Dark by Haruki Murakami, Empire of Signs by Roland Barthes, The Accidental Woman by Jonathan Coe, Everyman by Philip Roth, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, Ignorance by Milan Kundera, Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout.

I’ll take advantage of this question to throw my Goodreads profile out there. In the last months I’ve started updating it regularly and I’d like to add some friends and find new books to read. Feel free to add me :)

Anonymous asked: If you could offer a newborn child only one piece of advice, what would it be?

Don’t ever lose your ability to wonder.

Anonymous asked: Simone, you're lovely. You always have been. You always will be. You'll never fade.

Delightful and unexpected, just like a flower finding its way out of a crack in the sidewalk.

Thank you, whoever you are :)

Anonymous asked: Look, I really love all the stuff that you post and I always want to reblog, but I really can't stand the way it makes me do that! Is there any way you could just post normal quotes instead of a click through?

If the problem is that Tumblr cuts in half the text posts, then you don’t reblog my poetry posts because you get this, right?

If that’s the case, you just need to click the [as…] at the top and choose [as text]. This way, you’ll post the whole poem without those obnoxious links.

As for not posting poetry as quotes, I think that the way a poem is written is as important as its meaning, and trapping it inside quotation marks doesn’t really give it justice.

Hope this helps :)

Anonymous asked: What's your IQ?

I don’t know, I’ve never felt the need to take IQ tests. I have a lovely relationship with my ego and I wouldn’t want to ruin everything by soothing or upsetting it too much.

crookedfingertips-deactivated20 asked: what do you think when you hear the word 'Deaf'?

As Mumon Ekai wrote,

Words cannot express things;
Speech does not convey the spirit.
Swayed by words, one is lost;
Blocked by phrases, one is bewildered

So I think of possibilities. Of new ways of exploring, learning and understanding. Of a new discovery of body language: the hands, the eyes, the skin. Of a new kind of imagination and awareness. And mostly, I think of silence.

And of course I think of not having the faculty of hearing, but that’s just the linguistic convention talking.

sunset32 asked: Simone, are you making this blog with a specific reader in mind?

All the best, M

This blog is essentially a collection of things I like, of what makes my mind wander and my brain tingle. I guess the ideal reader would be someone who shares my tastes and my outlook on life, or at least finds them interesting enough to follow and join me in my journey.

Anonymous asked: Are you familiar with much else of Milan Kundera's work?

I can say I am. I read four books of his, which is almost half of his bibliography, counting only the novels. Here are some quotes I collected, if you want to take a look.

Anonymous asked: Your blog is legit! except, personally, your poetry is not the best no matter how abstract or concrete, etc; you do not deserve "top editor" solely because I'm following folks who are much more experienced and poetically gifted. Don't get me wrong, the photos and drawings (reblogs) are awesome but when it comes down to writing there are 10x better underrated writers than you.

I agree, there are thousands of better writers than me on Tumblr. I think it’s something that has to do with the fact that I’m not a writer. You could even go as far as actually visiting my blog and see for yourself.

But thanks! I’m pretty sure there was a compliment in there somewhere.

Anonymous asked: You have such a great combination on your blog, and the songs - love every one of them.

Thank you, anon :)

Anonymous asked: You are VERY cute :D Your tumblr is pretty frickin sweet.

Well, thank you anon :)

Anonymous asked: What are your favourite tumblrs?

Dear anon, I could give you a long, boring list of links OR you can go to this page and see what I “like” daily, so you can have an idea of my faves AND please your eyes, ears and mind at once.

Enjoy :-)

Anonymous asked: emollient |iˈmälyənt|
adjective
having the quality of softening or soothing the skin : an emollient cream.
• attempting to avoid confrontation or anger; soothing or calming : the president's emollient approach to differences.
noun
a preparation that softens the skin : formulated with rich emollients.
DERIVATIVES
emollience |əˈmɑljəns| |iˈmɑljəns| noun
ORIGIN mid 17th cent.: from Latin emollient- ‘making soft,’ from the verb emollire, from e- (variant of ex-) ‘out’ + mollis ‘soft.’

Anonymous people looking out for each other! How sweet is this? How emollient?

Also, I think I’m starting to lose control over this whole ask thing.

Anonymous asked: What's the meaning of emollient? :)

I can answer this because of my extraordinary English skills the fact that we have the equivalent term, “emolliente”, in Italian.

Dear anonymous, I’ll keep it simple: if you’re not a baby and your skin is very soft, chances are you’re using some kind of emollient to smooth it.

Oh, and hi there.

justpackupandmove asked: omg i didn't know u were a guy either! LOL. But I enjoy reading u nevertheless.

Okay, one more hint of a doubt and I’ll seriously start questioning my sexuality.

:-)

Thank you, nevertheless!