The Night Before the Semester After

February 14, 2021

The Night Before the Semester After – Full Design

This week, the Nass previews the new art museum, visits nearby nature, and ruminates on the mysteries of love.

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Letter from the Editor

The Editor-in-Chief ushers in the Nass’s forty-third volume.

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Envisioning a New Museum for Princeton

Where a Nass writer considers how a new art museum might reconsider values of equity and inclusion.

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Nass Recommends Local Nature Preserves

Where a Nass writer urges us to explore the nearby natural world.

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The Story about a War and Some Other Things

“Anyway, I’ve heard stories are supposed to have morals. I don’t know if this is much of a story, really, but I’ll give it a moral anyhow.”

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Oeuvre Reviews: Joshua Malina in Sports Night

“It was a chilling fragment of the 20th century hiding under the innocent guise of a sitcom, leaving me shaking in my little Gen-Z boots.”

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“That Tender Infinity” : Or, Fifteen Vignettes on Love

“When I saw him again for the first time in nearly thirteen months, we chatted as though no time at all had passed, as though we were still standing there, waiting for the train to arrive.”

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Nasstrology: Valentine’s Day Edition

The Nass gives its lovelorn readers guidance for the greeting card industry’s favorite holiday.

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Fragments

“sharpened pencils, winning teams / in the same elusive dream”

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Verbatim

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Overheard during Lecture

HUM Professor: It's up to your generation to solve these problems. I'm ready to retire and die.

Overheard in Creative Writing Workshop

Poetry Professor: You can’t hurt my feelings. Only fascists can hurt my feelings.

Overheard on Twitch Stream

Confused Gamer: What's a bugle?

Designated Music Expert: It's a dog!

Overheard in the Car

Annoyed Bridge Year Kid: St. A's people love nothing more than to tell you how they aren't supposed to talk about St. A's.

Overheard in Theater Seminar

71-year-old professor: And the entire cast from Friends was in my dream. Joey and I went back to the hotel and… well I'll stop there.

Overheard on Zoom

Theater Prof: My friend used to translate Aeschylus–you know the scholar Robert Fagles?

Overheard in Class

Theater Professor: If you see a small bear, that's my dog Arlo. He once scared Joyce Carol Oates to death.

Overheard in Poetry Seminar

Comp Lit Professor: What is happening while I'm making love?

Overheard in Forbes

Swiftie 1: I think Taylor Swift is for everyone.

Swiftie 2: Bootlicker.

Overhead in a dining hall

One student: Can you overdose on Gummy Vites?

Overheard in Zoom DMs

Nass figurehead: My roommate really wants to flash his butt on this call

Senior roommates driving to a grocery store during the snowstorm

Driver: No lanes, just vibes.

Overheard while trying to avoid a sociopolitical debate

Comp lit major, hot chocolate in hand: The Princeton pandemic response has been the clearest case for anarchism that I've ever seen.

Overheard at piercing parlor

Man, to me: You can put your boobie away.

Overheard in a childhood bedroom

Girl, scrolling through boy's spotify: God, he's [ex-boyfriend] but self-aware, and spiritual. I hate it here.

 

Overheard in the Car

Dad: Driving is as American as apple pie.

License-less daughter: I HATE APPLE PIE.

Overheard on iMessage

Prince Writer: He's writing a novel? What's it about?

Nass Writer: I didn't care enough to ask.

Overheard in Final Project

Exhausted sophomore trying to make a point: Yes, Professor, I realize that murder is sort of a character flaw.

Overheard in the Kitchen

Bro: She's got the look of one of like six white girls in one of those flocks–you know, the scary flocks.

Overheard in Creative Writing Class

First Year Writer: Writing Fiction is kind of traumatizing.