damselling
n.— «In his essay on Robert Walser, Coetzee refers to the pleasure the writer got from “damselling,” which he defines as “experiencing a feminine life imaginatively from the inside.” We are probably safe in saying that Coetzee is not damselling, as Anya appears to have the soul of a performer in a burlesque show.» —“The Shadow Line” by Hilary Mantel New York Review of Books Jan. 17, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
In White Oleander (Bookshop|Amazon), novelist Janet Fitch touts the value of memorizing poetry with these memorable lines: Always learn poems by heart. They have to become the marrow in your bones. Like fluoride in the water, they’ll make your soul...
Several years ago, the National Endowment for the Arts devoted a whole issue of its magazine to the topic of “The Art of Failure: The Importance of Risk and Experimentation.” Writers, artists, and musicians all shared their insights...