“The biggest Marxists cheerfully explained that this or that had happened to them because of somebody they had known at Harvard. You would think Harvard was where they had a spiritual awakening they were so proud of it. It was how they respected each other. It made them plausible. So who was I? How could I turn into something vaguely familiar, though hopefully not useful. Luckily there was television. It showed me that I could be a character. Television contained vaudeville. Which means ‘voice of the city.’ A working class person might do this or that. I drank a lot in those early years so of course she got drunk. The picture got more and more complicated as the activities increased and the totem of self expanded, was amended, and new notions were continually introduced. It worked out.”


— Eileen Myles, “Iceland,” from The Importance of Being Iceland (2009)

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