num_pages: 221
description: An entirely original portrait of a young writer shutting out the din in order to find her own voiceOn April 11 1931 Virginia Woolf ended her entry in A Writers Diary with the words too much and not the mood. She was describing how tired she was of correcting her own writing of the cramming in and the cutting out to please other readers wondering if she had anything at all that was truly worth saying.The character of that sentiment the attitude of it inspired Durga Chew-Bose to write and collect her own work. The result is a lyrical and piercingly insightful collection of essays letters (to her grandmother to the basketball star Michael Jordan to Death) and her own brand of essay-meets-prose poetry about identity and culture. Inspired by Maggie Nelsons Bluets Lydia Daviss short prose and Vivian Gornicks exploration of interior life Chew-Bose captures the inner restlessness that keeps her always on the brink of creative expression.Too Much and Not the Mood is a beautiful and surprising exploration of what it means to be a first-generation creative young woman working today.
language: English
title: Too Much and Not the Mood: Essays
publisher: FSG Originals