The second published volume of Susan Sontag’s diaries, As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh: Journals and Notebooks, 1964-1980, gave us the celebrated author and thinker’s insights on love (now available as a limited-edition print!), writing, censorship, and aphorisms. But the first installment, Reborn: Journals and Notebooks, 1947-1963 (public library), is in many ways even more fascinating, as we see a young Sontag begin to take shape as a private person and a public intellectual.

Immediately before turning 24 on January 16, 1957, Sontag produces the following list, a blend of the pragmatic and the aspirational:

Rules + duties for being 24

1. Have better posture.
2. Write Mother 3 times a week.
3. Eat less.
4. Write two hours a day minimally
5. Never complain publicly about Brandeis [University] or money.
6. Teach [SS’s toddler son] David to read.

Then, several weeks later, Sontag resolves:

DON’T

1. Criticize publicly anyone at Harvard —
2. Allude to your age (boastfully, mock-respectfully, or otherwise)
3. Talk about money
4. Talk about Brandeis

DO

1. Shower every other night
2. Write Mother every other day