Welcome to the third installment of Intersections! With midterms just around the corner, fall is in full swing. On Nassau Street, small businesses have embraced an autumnal spirit by incorporating seasonal ingredients into their offerings, from pumpkin cream cold brew at Small World Coffee to baked-apple-with-gingersnap ice cream at The Bent Spoon. 

Additionally, many students have been finding joy as both audience members and performers with the return of in-person concerts. This past Sunday, Oct. 2, undergraduates enjoyed performances by A$AP Ferg, Naaji Hylton ’22 (J. Paris), and THE WLDLFE (among others) at Lawnparties — Princeton’s student-organized biannual “music festival.” The previous weekend, many students attended Governors Ball in New York City to see popular artists such as Megan Thee Stallion and Phoebe Bridgers. And on Friday and Saturday this weekend, the Princeton University Orchestra presents their season opener, featuring soloist and Princeton alumna Hana Mundiya ’20.

For the first time since the beginning of the semester, students will have ample time to themselves during fall break. Some students will return home to be with family, others may plan to take a city sojourn to someplace nearby, while others still may simply decide to stay rooted in place. Yet regardless of where students choose to go, the break from schoolwork will undoubtedly provide an opportunity to reflect on how the return to campus has impacted all our lives. If you wish to share your thoughts with the ‘Prince’ community, please write to us at prospect@dailyprincetonian.com. We’d love to hear from you.

Cameron (Cammie) Lee
Co-Head Editor of The Prospect
cameronl@princeton.edu

What’s the Conversation

• Contributing Writer Clara McWeeny reflects on how the burdensome reading load of the Humanities sequence has destroyed “the pleasure read,” keeping her from returning to the books and worlds she’s grown accustomed to calling her own.
• Assistant Editor Molly Cutler examines the value of revisiting old favorites, the risk of nostalgia, and the transactional nature of media consumption today after her own experience rereading “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings.”
• Contributing Writer Mary Ma visits three Chinese restaurants in Princeton — SC House, Lan Ramen, and Tiger Noodles — and reflects on her experiences at each as a Chinese American.

• Senior Writer Gabriel Robare speaks with Naaji Hylton ’22 (J. Paris) about his musical influences, sources of inspiration, and expectations for his performance as the student opener at Fall Lawnparties 2021.
• Contributing writer Lauren Fromkin argues that “star-crossed” by Kacey Musgraves represents a meaningful shift for the better in the artist's creative and romantic life.
• Contributing writers Claire Shin and Davina Thompson walk readers through two days of the Governors Ball Music Festival 2021, describing notable performances from Megan Thee Stallion and Post Malone.

What to Do This Weekend

• The Princeton University Orchestra opens its 2021–22 season with Rimsky Korsakov’s “Scheherazade,” Aaron Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” conducted by Mariana Corichi Gomez ’21, and Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3 in G Major, performed by Hana Mundiya ’20. Performances are this Friday and Saturday, Oct. 8 and 9, at 7:30 p.m. in Richardson auditorium.
• “300 Years in a Convent, 50 in Hollywood” celebrates Filipino American History month with artwork by the burgeoning art collective NExSE (Northeast by Southeast) and is on view right now in the CoLab, located in the Lewis Center for the Arts Forum. The exhibition is open to those with University prox access from 10 a.m. to 8:30 p.m.
• The much-anticipated Jasper Johns retrospective, “Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror,” is now on view at the Whitney and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The collaborative show divides 500 works by Johns — one of America’s most influential living artists — between the two museums. As noted on the Whitney site, “This unique dual structure draws on the artist’s lifelong fascination with mirroring and doubles, so that each half of the exhibition echoes and reflects the other.” Read more about the exhibition here.
• On Oct. 13 from 4–6 p.m., Professor Anne Cheng of Princeton’s English department will present a talk (based on a forthcoming paper) titled “Exceptional States: Racial Melancholia, Revisited” with The Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis. Professor Cheng’s paper emphasizes the importance of psychoanalysis in how we think about contemporary anti-AAPI hate and violence, particularly when situated in a longer history of discrimination against Asians in America. Find more information and RSVP for the talk here.

The Prospect Curio Cabinet

• Ever since they performed at Princeton Tower Club for Lawnparties, THE WLDLFE has been a frequent play. Some of their biggest hits include “You Don’t Love Me (Like You Used to)” and “Waterfalls” that perfectly balance a sense of growing excitement in their sound with somewhat melancholic lyricism. If you’re looking for some chill vibes or to wallow in your feelings (but haven’t yet reached Adele-worthy levels of sorrow), make sure to queue up THE WLDLFE.
• “Taste Makers: Seven Immigrant Women Who Revolutionized Food in America” (WW Norton) by Mayukh Sen — “a queer, brown child of immigrants” — will be available for purchase in bookstores everywhere on Nov. 2, 2021. “Taste Makers” explores America’s modern culinary history through the lives of seven “pathbreaking” chefs and food writers whose narratives have been largely ignored. Join an upcoming public conversation between Mayukh Sen and novelist Monique Truong, sponsored by the Asian American Writers Workshop, on Nov. 11 at 7 p.m. Find more information and RSVP for the talk here.
• Harvard Professor Arthur C. Brooks presents a new podcast titled “How to Build a Happy Life,” which is a spinoff of his column for The Atlantic of the same name. In his first episode, Brooks sits down with Dan Harris of Ten Percent Happier to discuss the long-term merits of meditation in emotion management, life satisfaction, and overall happiness.
• From the first beat, “Meet Me At Our Spot” by THE ANXIETY, WILLOW, and Tyler Cole seems to capture both the sense of possibility that makes high school coming-of-age movies so compelling and also the excitement of a burgeoning relationship. If you want to feel the excitement and possibility of having a special spot to share with a special someone, add this song to your listening rotation.