Editor's Note
Artwork by Leigh Ferrier
Dear Readers,
Being a part of Quiddity for the past two semesters has been such an amazing privilege. Getting to read everyone’s submissions and deliberate behind the scenes with Quiddity’s staff has made a rather dull and dreary year one in which I can look back and be grateful for the friends I’ve made and the connections we’ve established as a community in the work that we share.
After reading all the submissions, it seems like this Spring 2021 semester has been one of heartbreak for a lot of people. From breakups to breakdowns to breakthroughs, Issue #11 covers a wide range of emotions and topics that define a season of turmoil for many. We hope this new issue allows you all to feel those emotions, to feel like you are seen and heard, and to free yourself. We know this past year has been difficult for everyone, which is putting what this past year has been lightly. In the face of adversity, hope and optimism remain my dearest friends.
With better days looking ahead and summer quickly approaching, I’ll leave you with a quote from the great Samwise Gamgee:
It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going, because they were holding on to something. That there is some good in this world, and it's worth fighting for. — J. R. R. Tolkien, The Two Towers
- Michaela Coll, Fiction Editor