Master List // My Promise // Captain Goat
- May 26
- 4 min read
A much needed update and moment of reflection
Master List of Prose and Context Articles
Click here to view my archive of posts on Substack. You can search it for keywords to find posts on ADHD, queerness, book titles, authors, reviews, specific themes and more. You can also sort by those with the most views and those with comments.
Last time I tried to make and maintain a list, but assigning each article exactly one category quickly became patently ridiculous: just take my review of The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, which should absolutely be listed under both my Vampires series and my book reviews, plus ideally under a topic related to colonialism. I looked into creating a spreadsheet with appropriate tags... but in the end I think the Substack archive is going to be just as effective 99% of the time. If you prefer, you can try the same on Medium or my website, though I think Substack's search function is currently the most useful.
Reflecting on Last Time
It's been a little over fourteen months – roughly half the life of Prose and Context – since the previous iteration of this post, which you can find here. I won't reiterate everything I said therein, but I hope it's a useful comparison and marker for how far we've come in the past year.
I'll be the first one to say that Prose and Context looks very different today than it did in March 2025 and before. I barely understood formatting, never mind managing consistency in it. I'm sad to remember that for a few months in 2024 I was using AI art, before more firmly realizing that sharing properly attributed human art is just better for everyone.
For whatever reason, I was also dead-set on my little series and categories: "Swift Riffle" and "Lyrical" and "Starting Points" and the like, which were probably helpful in getting me writing but became constraining over time and were certainly an absolute bane to SEO.
As I said at the time, I'm incredibly proud of the seven or so months I was writing two articles here per week. The structure and productivity of those days was eye-opening, as was the ever-creeping danger of creative burnout. Since then I've found a healthy social life and new hobby, and have fallen back in love with stories and storytelling – be it in books, music, film or elsewhere.
My Promise (May 2026)
My promise to my readers is to weekly share my researched perspective on a piece of media or a trend in media. With rare exceptions, my intent is for each article: to be relevant to navigating and understanding the world around us, to share a piece of media that is meaningful to me, and to reflect on my personal journey and growth.
You may have noticed that while my previous categories of posts have faded away, my Book Reviews & Analyses have become more and more frequent recently. It turns out people are far more likely to read them, and it's also been far more comfortable for me to simply lay out all my thoughts on a book at once, rather than trying to keep many books' details in my head for when I happen to find overlaps.
Not every post will be a book review, but I think going forward it will be a fairly even ratio of reviews and other posts – perhaps even alternating. My reviews will always open with a spoiler free section, including either a recommendation of the book or of stronger alternatives. Beyond that, I promise to live up to the title and offer world-relevant analysis rather than simple regurgitation of the plot.
Oar Up, Head Down
Another thing you may have noticed is my recent fascination with the music of Avatar, and today's article got me properly thinking about their song 'Captain Goat' (video above and off the same recent album as 'Death and Glitz') for the first time.
The dark metal sea shanty is sung from the perspective of a ship's crew facing storm and rocks, putting all their faith and hope in Captain Goat to row them home. The repeated "oar up, head down" reflects that they must obey and work, and never think for themselves.
It's literally the stuff of cults and fascism and late stage capitalism. And yet when I made the connection earlier today, it was a positive association with consistently putting the work into this blog, somewhat blindly trusting in another creative and hopeful side of myself.
Of course, the video ends with the crew unceremoniously falling overboard and drowning, while their fearless guide and leader continues on. If only there was a lesson there...
Perhaps the song and music video deserve a more thorough look at some point! But at least for today, they've been a powerful reminder to be mindful and thoughtful, and to enjoy the strange ironies when and where they arise.
And what's this post about if not mindfulness; reassessing rather than continuing unthinkingly in the direction I was previously going?
Thanks for reading and until next time <3
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