hysterical and useless

The Punishment of the Hypocrites in Dante’s Inferno.

"It's easy to say "violence is never the answer" if you've never had to fight for your life"

I recently wrote about building my own personal curriculum to better understand 1) the ideas and concepts around the term “hauntology,” and 2) wrap my head around Julia Kristeva’s writings. But it occurred to me that I’d be terribly remiss if I didn’t mention my own books in terms of creating some courses for self-learning!

I put together a (hopefully very shareable) slideshow of graphics about how each book might assist in studies of the arcane & esoteric, the darker side of life, and the fantastical, and how you shouldn’t skip the visual component when you’re deepening your understanding of this, that, or the other thing. (Coming from a rather lazy student, I mean obviously more pictures and less words is the way to go hehehe.)

If you’ve been online lately, you’ve probably seen people talking about “personal curriculums,” essentially, self-directed courses of study built around whatever you’re genuinely curious about. Instead of following someone else’s syllabus, you’re creating your own path through a subject, pulling together books, films, essays, art, music, whatever feeds your particular obsession.

It’s a beautiful way to learn, and it’s having a moment because people are hungry for depth, for expertise that comes from genuine interest rather than algorithmic recommendation. You get to be both student and curator of your own education.

I love this concept because it’s exactly how I’ve always learned: following threads of interest across mediums and disciplines, building connections between visual art and literature and history and folklore. It’s also, not coincidentally, how I approach curating my books. (It’s also a good reason to buy new notebooks!)

Which brings me to this: if you’re building a personal curriculum, here’s where my Art in the Margins series fits.

Studying the occult, symbolism, or esoteric art history?

The Art of the Occult belongs in your visual studies. From theosophy and kabbalah to the zodiac and alchemy, from spiritualism and ceremonial magic to the elements and sacred geometry—this book brings together artists who have been drawn to these unknown spheres and created curious artworks that transcend time and place. Whether you’re learning tarot, diving into the history of magical practice, or exploring Hermetic traditions, you need the visual language that goes with it. These works stem from a soul-deep desire for truth and awareness, revealing the hidden rules of nature and our world through imagery that has haunted and inspired across centuries.

Exploring Gothic aesthetics, melancholy, or the beauty of darkness?

The Art of Darkness is your visual companion. This book celebrates artists who have been obsessed with darkness throughout history—creating works that haunt and horrify, mesmerize and delight, and play on our innermost fears. From dreams and nightmares to matters of mortality, from depravity and destruction to gods and monsters, these artworks indulge our greatest fears while asking: what comfort can be found in facing our demons? Why are we tempted by fear and the grotesque? If you’re studying Victorian mourning culture, exploring Gothic traditions, or simply trying to understand why certain aesthetics speak to something deep within you, this is your sourcebook. Denial of our darkness leads us to fear it….better to create a connection with our shadows and revel in all the inspiration and wonder we may find there!

Deep-diving into fantasy worldbuilding, mythology, or the fantastic?

The Art of Fantasy gives you the visual language. Artists have explored imaginary worlds and fantastical creatures for centuries, expressing the unreal and impossible, the mystical and mythical through paint and illustration. This book presents a compendium of artworks inspired by myth, fantasy, and the unreal—from beasts and beings to forgotten realms and wonderlands, from dreams and magic to faith and philosophy. If you’re studying folklore, reading epic fantasy, learning about mythological traditions across cultures, or working on your own creative worldbuilding, these visual flights of fancy and imagination show you how artists have conveyed the vast swathe of hopes and dreams in our collected hearts. Fantasy is not simply an escape from reality…it is the irresistible impulse that reveals hope and wonder in us all.

Whatever you’re studying, visual art deepens your understanding in ways that text alone cannot. It shows you how ideas manifest aesthetically, how concepts become tangible, how symbolism operates visually. The artists in these books are thinking deeply about their subjects, creating work that’s in conversation with history, mythology, spirituality, and culture across centuries.

If you’re building your own curriculum for any of these subjects, please don’t skip the visual component! These books are resources, and they’re meant to be referenced, returned to, absorbed alongside whatever else you’re studying.

And who helped me with that? Not people calling for some nebulous revolution. Not people telling me that the system was useless. Not people preaching at me to grow my own food. It was a church food bank partially funded by the state of Texas that some southern hippies donated a bunch of Whole Foods nonsense to.

And you know what? I’m sick and tired of defeatism. What can we get done right now, huh? Are you gonna accept something a bit better to help people right now or are you waiting for your perfect utopia to come to you?

It’s histamine, not histamines.

I know it might be confusing because there are different types of antihistamines, but that plural refers to how the drugs interact with the receptors in the body, not the chemical itself.

Different antihistamines target different receptors in the body to address specific issues. So, for example, Zyrtec targets h1 receptors which primarily mediate allergic reactions related to the respiratory system, while h2 blockers, like Pepcid, target the receptors in the GI tract. When combined, people are finding they can help alleviate PMDD which is great.

There is not, however a different histamine that affects your sinuses and another that affects your gut. It’s all just one chemical, but it can be picked up by different pathways in the body, hence why we have h1 and h2 blockers. (We also have h3 and h4 receptors and probably more I’m forgetting about right now that can be targeted by different medications. Neat!)

Similar to how the body has different histamine receptors, MCAS is not exclusively a histamine issue. It can be the main issue for many people, but it is rarely the sole issue.

There are hundreds of chemical compounds contained in a single mast cell and when those cells degranulate, it’s the equivalent of taking a Molotov cocktail to the immune system. Histamine is merely one of them.

Telling someone with MCAS they must have something else because eating low histamine isn’t helping them, is not only arrogant, it is shockingly ignorant and frankly fucking insulting.

People with this disorder know more than you.

Michelle Malley