Hello,
thank you for taking time.
Being a mother is always-already near to the wild heart.
This newsletter—named after the Clarice Lispector novel, Near To the Wild Heart—began on tinyletter on a snowy day in Montreal in 2017 and moved here on a record-breaking hot day in November 2022.
In this iteration, I will continue to post biweekly-ish entries on ~things/affects/pleasures/language/philosophy/politics/art/books/stories/food/climate~ as they intersect with motherhood. I will also experiment with what writing about and alongside parenting (two young children in our world) can be, and share playful explorations of my works-in-progress.
Near To the Wild Heart started as a way to find ~things/affects/pleasures/language/you~ during the isolation after giving birth to my son almost six years ago. I wanted to be vulnerable and clumsy in the experiences I was having—being a mother, desiring in ways I didn’t fully understand, making do with philosophy, familial unrequitedness, and feeling out of control with post-partum depression but not in any legible way I saw around me. Now, I am no longer depressed, have another child, and welcome new ways of making do.
Subscribing
Because of the intimate content of the newsletter, not all my entries will be visible to the public. As a subscriber you will have access to all of them. Your payment will go a long way to support my dream to write and publish all the ideas that need to be out in the world. It will go to buying time.
While I have to provide a price for subscribers, please please email me at magdalenao@substack.com and I can add you to the comp list to get full access, no questions asked.
Praise from Readers
I feel so privileged to read this, to share the experience with you in relating some of your words to my own experience. —Emilie
I love the personal and poetic style of your writing. —Ash
what a beautiful and loving and intense (intensely packed, with layers of thinking) “letter.” com-plicated, comes to mind : folded together —John
Thank you for sharing and reminding of the beauty in the storm. —Evita
About
Magdalena Olszanowski is an award-winning writer, artist, and educator in Montreal. She received her PhD in Communication Studies from Concordia University where she is now part time faculty. She also teaches at Dawson College and John Abbott College. An exhibiting new media and video artist as well as a writer, she has written for, or been featured in, publications such as esse, Feminist Media Studies, Visual Communication Quarterly, n+1, nomorepotlucks, and SXSW, among others. The first phase of her documentary, microfemininewarfare, has been featured at international art festivals.
She was recently named CBC’s Featured Columnist for 2022. Currently, she is on maternity leave and working on a bildungsroman set in 1970/80s Poland. She was born in Warsaw, Poland and now lives in the Villeray neighbourhood in Montreal, Canada.
