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Marina Benjamin

Senior Editor, Aeon+Psyche

Marina is a former arts editor of the New Statesman and deputy arts editor of the Evening Standard newspaper in London. Her books include, Living at the End of the World which looked at end-time cults, Rocket Dreams, an off-beat elegy to the Space Age, and Last Days in Babylon, the story of the Jews of Iraq. Marina specialises in the culture of science, developmental psychology and strong personal narratives. Her acclaimed memoirs The Middlepause and Insomnia have been translated into 9 languages. Her latest memoir A Little Give will be published in 2023. She can be found on Twitter @marinab52.

See Marina Benjamin’s profile on Aeon

Edited by Marina Benjamin

Black and white drawing of swirling smoke and flames rising from the ground, bordered by a rough square outline.

The self

idea

Why bad doodles can reveal more about you than good drawings

For Marion Milner, ‘not being able’ is a valuable state – one that allows for new and unexpected forms of learning

by David Russell

A young woman in a contemporary apartment is reflected but partially obscured in the plate glass windows

Place

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The divided self: does where I live make me who I am?

At home in Delhi, I am a more social, interactive person. A quiet balcony in Frankfurt gave me space to be by myself

by Anandi Mishra

A woman sitting inside a red double-decker bus at night, with a busy street and shops in the background.

Freedom and choice

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Why not driving is my own form of resistance

As romantic petrochemical-fuelled narratives slip into the past, I’ve found my own kind of freedom in a life without a car

by Vicky Grut

Painting of a man and a woman in period clothing pose inside a room with a chandelier, a convex mirror, and an inscription on the wall behind.

Philosophy of art

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To master the art of close looking, learn to hold time still

Visual literacy is a skillset that’s rarely taught, but it begins with learning how to look – and how to hold time still

by Grace Linden

Mountain landscape with a winding dirt path, large rocks, green hills and a cloudy sky.

Sacred places

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Nan Shepherd delved into a queer erotic kinship with nature

In the Highlands, Nan Shepherd found an erotic kinship with nature: ‘The Living Mountain’ a core text for queer ecology

by Melissa Matthewson

A couple embraces outdoors at night, seated at a café table. Nearby, a waiter sweeps the ground while chairs are stacked up.

Values and beliefs

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What if my lessons in existentialism were in bad faith?

When I’m teaching existentialism in the classroom, how can I tell where bad faith ends and enlightenment begins?

by Robert D Zaretsky

A woman with blonde hair in a bun is reading a book, wearing a dark blue dress and sitting on a chair against a plain white background.

Stories and literature

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Forget ‘Little Women’. How did girls learn to be grown women?

How might 19th-century novels for adolescent girls help us find healthier models of what it means to grow up female today?

by Julie Pfeiffer

Two people on a train reading Metro newspapers, one headline reads “Real claim: We’ve got £85m Bale”, the other “Royalty: A new wave”.

Love

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What I’ve learned about relationships as an agony uncle

I am an agony uncle. This is what I’ve learned about men, women and how relationships work in my 10 years of giving advice

by James McConnachie

Illustration of a blond man in medieval attire watching a blonde woman in a pink dress reclining on a bed, surrounded by flowers.

Stories and literature

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Young women were the true originators of the Grimms’ Tales

Snow White, Rapunzel, Cinderella – the old fairy tales are full of female lust and hope, and most were told by women

by Christine Lehnen

A painting of a woman floating on her back in a stream, surrounded by flowers and greenery, wearing a dress.

Memoir

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If madness is like drowning, then writing is my raft ashore

I imagine madness as a kind of watery death, like Ophelia’s. The only way I can get to safety is by writing myself ashore

by Azania Imtiaz Khatri-Patel

A sepia-toned photograph of a man with a moustache, overlaid with handwritten text in cursive script.

Stories and literature

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Remembrance of telephony past: what Proust made of the phone

For Marcel Proust, the telephone gave distance a sensory form and allowed new ways to experience absence more profoundly

by John Attridge

Two women with braided hair sitting on a park bench, smiling and engaging in conversation. One faces the camera, while the other is seen from behind.

Friendship

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For Beauvoir, it’s friendship that lets us become truly ourselves

For Simone de Beauvoir, friendship, even more than love, was the means to overcome the tragedy of our radical separation

by Skye C Cleary