NORTH
2019-2020
2019-2020
Cover Art by Erin Wai
Both ironically and sincerely, we hope this letter finds you well and safe…
We are so proud of the success of North this year. From poetry nights, to soup days, to Humsoween, we have loved the energy everyone has brought to supporting North and the true spirit of the Humanities...until everything came to a standstill with COVID-19.
In light of the halt to the school year and to the production of a physical North journal, we have decided to put it online so everyone can have access to the amazing artwork, photography, and writing that has come out of the last year.
Together, we had the opportunity to share a truly incredible year as North Editors. Teaming up as both third and fourth year students is representative of the strong community we students of the Humanities have built. Through our classics soup days, newfound love of toga parties, and even over the course of COVID, we have had the pleasure of creating North for you this past year.
This (online) journal represents all of the art we have created before we were submerged in a global pandemic. We hope that you look at this art as a reminder of who you were and what you were creating before this great time of stress and uncertainty, as well as a reminder of what you can create coming out of this.
We hope that in viewing this journal, you can look back on the past year with nostalgia for easier times, but also towards the future with hope and a desire to grow and create. Most importantly we hope that it will remind you to focus on all the beauty and fascination that the world sets out for us.
We are so proud of all of you for the incredible art that you have created and shared with us here at North, and we hope that even as we all sit at home and adjust to zoom university, the muses continue to inspire you.
All of the funds raised to fuel the North journal’s publication this past year will be sure to be carried forward into the next, in the hopes that we will be able to publish an incredible physical journal in 2021.
With hopeful sincerity,
Your Co-Editors in Chief
Clare Duncan & Maeve McMahon
First Year
Sadie BadourCurrently Listening to: Ain't Together, King PrincessCurrently Reading: Selected Poems, Margaret AtwoodFavourite North Memory: Valentine's Day Poetry NightSecond Year
Erin WaiCurrently Listening to: Switzerland, The Last BisonCurrently Reading: Percy Jackson, Rick RiordanFavourite North Memory: Scary Story NightThird Year
Maeve McMahonCurrently Listening to: Pretty Girl, ClairoCurrently Reading: On Photography, Susan SontagFavourite North Memory: Scary Story NightFourth Year
Clare DuncanCurrently Listening to: Phoebe Bridgers <3Currently Reading: The Faraway Nearby, Rebecca SolnitFavourite North Memory: Humsoween
SADIE BADOUR: Sadie Badour is a Humanities student in her first year. When she's not commuting back to the suburbs or doing her readings way too late at night, Sadie enjoys drawing and watercolour painting here and there.
RHEA CHOPRA: Rhea Chopra is a third year Humanities & Philosophy student whose poetry is inspired by the unknowable parts of our world.
CLAIRE FRENCH: Claire French is an amateur photographer who aims to capture images that evoke the sublime. And also images of more mundane things like cats and rail yards.
KATHLEEN GANT: I’m Kathleen Gant. My work is largely inspired by things I’ve seen and works I’ve read, and I like to experiment with different styles and techniques. I’m mainly a digital artist but I was trained with oils and am most comfortable with them. In my digital paintings I like playing with colour and texture to achieve different feelings and looks.
RODAINA IBRAHIM: Hello! My name is Rodaina and I am a first year Journalism and Humanities student. This is the first time I’ve published anything and I occasionally write poems and stories.
TYCHE MCPHEE LETTS: Yep, Tyche McPhee Letts writes silly genre fiction as a hobby. She’s ended up in a few actual books which people actually pay money for, which seems like something a person’s supposed to mention in an author bio.
RHEA LISONDRA: Rhea Lisondra is a fourth year Journalism and Humanities who can art sometimes.
SAM POMERANT: When he’s not tweeting about how much he hates writing, Sam Pomerant can be found writing things that he loves. He is a first-year Humanities student who is very appreciative of the fact that the program has opportunities such as North where students can flex their creative writing skills. In the past Pomerant has done some work as an independent producer of a one-man show at the Ottawa Fringe Festival. He would like to thank Gabby Calugay-Casuga, Brandon Fairbairn, and Hayley Forbes for reading his story before submitting it to North.
KATHERINE SURKAN: Katherine Surkan is a six foot tall houseplant vaguely shaped like a woman. She is in third year Humanities with a minor in Political Science, making her an absolute riot at parties. She hopes one day to publish a novel and tour in her two-member folk-punk band. She fully understands the dwindling popularity and reputation of folk-punk as a genre.
AUSTINA YU: Austina Yu is a first year Journalism and Humanities student who is enthusiastic about crafts, musical instruments, and cute things. You can most often find her at the art gallery, in a museum, or agonizing over an insignificant decision.
TAYLOR SIMARD: Taylor is in second year BioHums and plays for the Carleton Frisbee team, she clearly likes architecture lots but her friend Nandini hates it and so they’re at war.
ERIN WAI: Erin is a second year Journalism and Humanities student who sometimes paints when she is procrastinating assignments.
CLARE DUNCAN: Clare is a fourth year Journalism and Humanities student whose writing aspirations are vague and unclear, but she would like to thank the College of the Humanities for wherever she ends up...
Most likely to befriend Confucius if he were in Hums: Brandon
Biggest Achilles-Patrocles energy: Alex and Craig
Most likely to try saving the Ark of the Covenant and get zapped in the process: Gabby
Most likely to flirt using Song of Soloman’s dove and goat metaphors: Gabby
Most likely to quit HUMS to be an Ascetic : Jeremy / Amelia
Most likely to start their own NRM (New Religious Movement): Brandon
Tiamat (most chaotic): Tor
Dionysus (most dramatic): Sam
Favourite Text: Confucius / Gilgamesh
Favourite Prof: Dolansky
Most likely to start a bang frenzy/most likely to cut their own bangs in the hums lounge: Alex
Most likely to use qua casually in a conversation: Andrew
Most likely to view themselves as the One. (Plotinus): Ben Skene
Most likely to commission a sculpture of themselves: Maddy
Most likely to write the two extra 2000 essays for fun: Andrew
Most likely to write an entire book to dispute someone else's ideas (Aristotle): Aerock
Most breakdowns (Lady Philosophy): Nandini
Most like meno in an argument: Alice
Most likely to speak in class and not get any heresy points: Erin
Favourite Text: Boethius
Favourite Prof: Stephenson
Petrarch (most likely to fall in love with love): Dani
Luther (most likely to accidentally start a war): Claire
Shakespeare (most dramatic): Tijana
Cereta (most likely to roast an entire lineage of men): Zoe / Maeve / Belle
Sidney (most passionate about the Classics): Maeve
Milton (unironically into astrology): Mirianna
Burke (most celebrity-obsessed): Emilie
Wollstonecraft (most wild): Genevieve
Shelley (most likely to have an adult emo phase): Taylor / Zoe / Katherine
Byron (most iconic): Carmen / Mirianna
Blake (most #deep): Nick
Rabelais (class clown): Mirianna
Mozart (actual child prodigy): Jessica
Favourite Text: Frankenstein
Favourite Prof: White
Hegel (most likely to talk forever, but still make no sense): Newell
Rousseau (most likely to escape society to return to nature): Bryce
Einstein (most likely to understand/enjoy most of HUMS Science): Abby
Arendt (most likely to get into politics or academia): Owen
Taylor (biggest social butterfly): Julia
Gandhi (most likely to start a fight but not finish it): Rhea
Rushdie/Said (most likely to travel the world): Kendall
Foucault (most likely to go to prison and escape): Jake
Favourite Text: The Communist Manifesto / Taylor’s Modern Social Imaginaries, honourable mention: texts that weren't on the 4000 syllabus
Favourite Prof: Farhang Rajaee
(Anonymous)
“I am not a merciful god”
“Your degree is useless”
"Many Great Books are boring"
“If you haven't noticed, Augustine is a little wordy and even the best of us find ourselves nodding off”
“Ah! Blessed, blessed chloroform!”
“This is a chug-a-lug choo choo pace”
“So this shit about the world soul... ?!”
On Rousseau: "He was famously paranoid but he was probably right"
On Nietzsche: "He had a varied menu of personal involvements with people"
"This world is a garbage heap"
“With anal play, the child is already becoming a philosopher of the human condition”
“The RCMP found me”
“In 25 minutes I will explain the structure of the soul and from that we can understand material reality”
“How fish sex could be sensual I don’t know, but watching this certainly was”
“There's no philosophy without tears”
“It is a cycle of imbibing the gay truth and excreting the gay matter (the fart)”
“For those of you who don't know fanfic, basically you take the bible....”
“There is a gremlin inside every cat that hits the meow button”
“I found prostitutes in England really quite dreadful. France is a different kind of place!”