{"id":119703,"date":"2017-12-27T10:00:49","date_gmt":"2017-12-27T15:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=119703"},"modified":"2026-03-16T11:53:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T15:53:07","slug":"dark-feels-different-november-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Dark Feels Different in November"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>We\u2019re away until January 3, but we\u2019re reposting some of our favorite pieces from 2017. Enjoy your holiday!<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_117888\" style=\"width: 1010px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-117888\" class=\"wp-image-117888\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg\" width=\"1000\" height=\"671\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can-300x201.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can-768x516.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-117888\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Godfried Schalcken,\u00a0<em>Young Girl with a Candle<\/em>\u00a0(detail)<em>, <\/em> 1670\u20131675.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m in the November of my life,\u201d said Francesca, a fifty-eight-year-old curator with good shoulders and dark lively eyes and dark wavy hair and a laugh that came from deep in her gut. Two years ago, she was told she had two-and-a-half years to live. \u201cThis was my relationship with death before,\u201d she said, holding her arms apart at full wingspan. \u201cKnew it would happen. Never thought about it.\u201d Then she brought her index fingers together so they touched in front of her chest. \u201cThis was the diagnosis.\u201d Death was on top of her. The stamp of an expiration date on her forehead annihilated all other thought. In time, and with titanic mental effort, the initial all-consuming horror gave way. \u201cIn November, you\u2019re winding down,\u201d she said. \u201cIt means incorporating less sharp edges, more smoke.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Which is maybe to say more mystery, more potential. The sharp edges of fact give way to the blur of the question mark, the uncertainty, the quiet. \u201cThe space of nothingness is where one finds his or her own self and life\u2019s richness,\u201d writes the Japanese architect Tadao Ando. \u201cThis is a wonderful time of my life,\u201d Francesca said.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/11\/08\/dark-feels-different-november\/\">Read More &gt;&gt;<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We\u2019re away until January 3, but we\u2019re reposting some of our favorite pieces from 2017. Enjoy your holiday! \u201cI\u2019m in the November of my life,\u201d said Francesca, a fifty-eight-year-old curator with good shoulders and dark lively eyes and dark wavy hair and a laugh that came from deep in her gut. Two years ago, she [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2669,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32152],"tags":[31600,31599,27789,2186,31601,9414,1709,31596,9075,31597,31598],"class_list":["post-119703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-of-2017","tag-analytic-dictionary-of-chinese-and-sino-japanese","tag-bernhard-kalgren","tag-daylight-saving-time","tag-death","tag-in-praise-of-shadows","tag-jeannette-winterson","tag-junichiro-tanizaki","tag-ma","tag-november","tag-novemberance","tag-tadao-ando"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Dark Feels Different in November<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It\u2019s the presence of absence, the gap where the moonlight sifts through. It\u2019s the hollow where ghosts gather, the pause in conversation.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Dark Feels Different in November by Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"December 27, 2017 \u2013 We\u2019re away until January 3, but we\u2019re reposting some of our favorite pieces from 2017. Enjoy your holiday! \u201cI\u2019m in the November of my life,\u201d said\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-12-27T15:00:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-03-16T15:53:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"537\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nina MacLaughlin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1aa79ce6b1ed14531f6ba13b37ff8838\"},\"headline\":\"The Dark Feels Different in November\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-12-27T15:00:49+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-16T15:53:07+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\"},\"wordCount\":241,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Analytic Dictionary of Chinese and Sino-Japanese\",\"Bernhard Kalgren\",\"Daylight Saving Time\",\"death\",\"In Praise of Shadows\",\"Jeannette Winterson\",\"Junichiro Tanizaki\",\"ma\",\"November\",\"Novemberance\",\"Tadao Ando\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Best of 2017\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/\",\"name\":\"The Dark Feels Different in November\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/27\/dark-feels-different-november-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/girl_can.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-12-27T15:00:49+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-16T15:53:07+00:00\",\"description\":\"It\u2019s the presence of absence, the gap where the moonlight sifts through. 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