‘Even a young girl’s shame can be beautiful.’

Veronica

My experience of life as essentially unhappy and uncontrollable,’ American novelist and short story writer Mary Gaitskill once remarked, ‘taught me to examine the way people, including myself, create survival systems and psychologically “safe” places for themselves in unorthodox and sometimes apparently self-defeating ways. These inner worlds, although often unworkable and unattractive in social terms, can have a unique beauty and courage.’