If you visit my house, you will see what my husband and I have spent all our money on over the past twenty-odd years: books, and music. I listen to music as both a passive consumer — aware something is playing in the background — and as a greedy supplicant: eyes wide, forehead sweaty, mouth slack. I can play nothing. I can sing a little, now that I’ve figured out I’m an alto and not a soprano. Because I lack the training and the language, I can’t tell you how or why a piece of music or a song works.

All I can do is respond.

I create playlists to go with various projects. In the old days, I burned CDs, and in the ancient times before that, I made cassette mixtapes. When I come back to revisions, I can get myself into the emotional places I need to be by spinning an earlier draft’s playlist.

I had many mixes for what became This Marlowe. Here’s one.

The Lizard — Pipher

Scarborough Fair/Canticle — Simon and Garfunkel

Loser — Beck

Maps and Legends — REM

Para mihi domine — Christobal de Morales, arranged by the Hilliard Ensemble and Jan Gabarek

Locomotive Breath/Bond Theme — Scheppel with Feed the Wolf

Fuckin Up — Junkhouse

99.9F — Suzanne Vega

Morning — Beck

The Drunken Whaler — Copilot

Everybody Wants to Rule the World — Lorde

The Heart’s Filthy Lesson — David Bowie

Heart is a Drum — Beck

Scared — The Tragically Hip

Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap — AC/DC

King of Birds — REM

Losing My Religion — REM

Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) — Kate Bush

Faster — Within Temptation

Under Pressure — Queen with David Bowie

Breaking — Suzanne Vega

Uniko Iv: Emo — Kimmo Pohjonen and Kronos Quartet

Dear God — XTC

Pilgrimage — Suzanne Vega

Grace, too — The Tragically Hip

I’m So Sorry — Imagine Dragons

Dirty Knife — Neko Case

Say Goodbye — Beck

Demons — Imagine Dragons

This is Gospel — Panic! At the Disco

Heretic Pride — The Mountain Goats

Don’t Come Around Here No More — Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers