Sunday, May 3, 2020

I Think We're All Bozos on This Bus


I really don’t know what to say. I was confused the entire time what was happening, but when I closed my eyes I could finally sort of picture what was happening in the ‘plot’. A hacker and Clown go to a theme park and the hacker tries to hack into the rides? I don’t even know, haha. I think this was just so the creators could include references to pop culture while mentioning the future and predicting how silly the idea of the future has become. I mean they are traveling through a theme park, so that shows what they think the future will be like (and I agree with them, I feel like I’m in a theme park even decades later). I like the fact that the president was apparently an animatronic. I feel like that is also an accurate representation considering all of the stuff he says. I believe the title is incredibly fitting not just for the adventure itself, but for describing the world during this insane period of time. It could also be argued that the creators thought the ideas people at the time had for the future were ludicrous, and thus used those ideas to create a silly, satire including Holograms, clowns, hackers, and animatronics. Maybe the humor is lost on me, but I didn’t think it was my cup of tea. Although I respect and can realize that for it’s time, it would have been hilarious to experience.

Sunday, April 26, 2020

The Distance Of The Moon


I had to do a semester long project based off one of Italo Calvino’s works, Invisible Cities, so I was excited to read another one of his pieces. He did not let me down at all. I love how he describes his worlds. They are incredibly rich with content but at the same time, they are so whimsical and obscure that it’s almost hard to picture them. In this story, we have our protagonist who is also our narrator describing his adventures when the moon used to be close enough to Earth that humans were able to climb onto it and collect it’s ‘milk’. The imagery is fantastic, Calvino describes how the moon still has its own gravitational pull that will pull in the ocean and it’s creatures and suspend them in the air. I cannot even imagine going on a boat to see the moon and also experiencing floating octopuses and fish being pulled toward it. Our narrator also includes his tragic endeavor in love, when a married woman who’s attracted his eye eventually realizes her own love for the narrator’s deaf cousin will never be returned because he is truly in love with the moon. This causes her to ‘become’ the moon when she finds herself stuck on its surface and as the satellite eventually drifts away from our planet, she does nothing to pull herself back to her home planet. It’s a very beautiful story (although tragic for our protagonist). I definitely think that this story was written with the intention of creating literature. I wouldn’t think of this so much as a genre piece, but it could be put into some category if you looked at it hard enough. I think Sci-Fi is appropriate, but I one hundred percent do not think Italo Calvino wrote this while thinking “I’m going to write a sci-fi, romance piece. Yes. That is specifically what I am going to write.” I don’t think it’s a necessary distinction, but I do think it’s something to keep in mind when reading any piece of literature. It’s kind of like when people don’t understand a movie; if they would’ve known the director’s intentions behind creating it, maybe the movie would’ve made a little more sense. I’ll be honest, I did not understand what writing literature for the sake of creating literature meant when I initially read it. But then when I rad this story, I understood it. I change my mind, I do think it’s an important distinction. Especially if you’re an artist (that includes writing) you should be able to create just for the sake of it without having to worry about what you’ll make or what category it will fit under, just get in there and get your hands dirty. Isn’t that what the spirit of creativity is all about? I loved this short story, just for that. I wasn’t thinking about genre at all while reading it, I was just engaged and having a good time being immersed into the work.

Saturday, April 25, 2020

Blood Child


1. What is your reaction to the text you just read?
It was a lot to take in. I did not expect for there to be so much description of how they impregnate people? When we were talking in groups I found out that it’s implied by the cover art that our main character is a child, which is pretty disturbing, but honestly I’m desensitized to a lot of things.

2. What connections did you make with the story? Discuss what elements of the story with which you were able to connect?
I mean there was not a lot to make connections with, besides maybe how the aliens are parasites but it’s an agreement between them and the Terrans, so.


3. What changes would you make to adapt this story into another medium? What medium would you choose; what changes would you make?
I think this would be an awesome story as a comic! I think it’s descriptions are worth having illustrations, maybe it’s because I own comics that are similarly sci-fi horror that are beautifully rendered. I think I would stay to the text as much as I could just because I think it’s worth living the gross scenes in all their glory.


4. Are there elements of this work that you would consider afro-futurist?
Not really since they really don’t mention anything about race as far as I’m concerned. I guess it’s implied, but I didn’t really understand that without it being explained to me.

Saturday, April 18, 2020

I Live with You


I enjoyed this story quite a lot! I kept thinking about Jordan Peele’s Us while reading it. I really love how the author breaks up her sentences (maybe because I write similarly) it definitely made the story seem a lot more dramatic when it’s written that way. I also enjoyed how she wrote it like we were reading a log of the narrator’s internal dialogue, it’s unique and really hooked me in. The entire time I was trying to figure out what exactly the narrator was, was she a doppelganger? Or maybe she was just some girl who looked like the protagonist and made a little life out of stalking and living off Nora. I was also trying to find the connection that maybe this was all a metaphor for self-doubt and how people tend to self-destruct until they are truly alone. I do not really understand which one it is supposed to be, but I assume that is the point- so that readers can get whatever they want from it. I was imagining there to be a woman living with Nora that looked just like her, but Nora and others genuinely did not notice she was there. I was left with a lot of questions- Why did she try to seduce an older man? Just to fill the void of loneliness because Nora didn’t think she could even try for anyone remotely out of her league? Why didn’t Nora take care of the doppelganger a long time ago? Did she even really exist outside of Nora’s mind or did Nora do all the sneaky things the narrator talked about? I think this story reflected more of the majoritarian culture more than anything. Our protagonist is a loner who does not live outside her means in the least bit. Willard is an older man who has a physical disability and tries his best to live his life humble. Or maybe that is the minority? I guess it can be seen from both perspectives that their lives are either sad or the same as everyone else’s, but I really hope the rest of society is doing a little better than Nora is. I think, in a way, we are all striving to reach an unachievable goal that’s set for us. It may not be the ‘American Dream’, but it sure is a lot of pressure considering more than half the population is ‘just getting by’ on the wages they are given. So, I do think it could be perceived both ways. With the rise of social media culture and influences, it is almost like we are expected to just work hard and earn a million dollars, when in reality, we are all kind of like Nora. Just living humbly but buying into trends to keep some semblance of being progressive with the times.

Sunday, April 12, 2020

Fragments of a Hologram Rose



I thought other sci-fi was hard to read and understand, but this has to take the cake for me. In this story, we are looking through the lens of a man who has just gotten through a breakup with his girlfriend. His name is Parker. We’re obviously farther into the future due to the describing of electronics around him. This lonely soul is trying his best to cope with the trauma by using these tape recordings that captured his ex-girlfriend’s sensations during certain periods of her life. Sounds like a very unhealthy way to cope to me. Of course, our protagonist has given up the chance for stability working at a Japanese company in order to relive his life through these tapes instead. The future of the US seemingly is filled with war and has become a depressing wasteland of a reality, which gives Parker more of a reason to want to succumb to escapism. I think this is a very interesting way of addressing escapism and reality in the future. The thought of having tapes to record how you feel during certain situations of your life is enticing, but just like some episodes of Black Mirror, I feel like they could end up doing more harm than good. Since Parker has given up all of the aspirations he’s been working towards to help him cope with this breakup, I don’t think this would become a fairly positive thing. Rekindling memories of an old relationship is one thing, but continuously living through it like it’s a drug is a completely different. I don’t think this idea in itself is made to be abused like that, but the fact that the first time we’re introduced to this kind of reimagining of the sense is us seeing it through a poor man who’s just gotten dumped kind of says something about how it will be used. At least in my opinion. I think recordings like this could be dangerous to the mental health of those using them especially if it’s used in succession like how Parker was using it. It could, on the other hand help those who need have conditions that mess with memories, like Alzheimer’s patients or those with amnesia or dementia. This story was also very hard to read (at least to me), since there were so many descriptions of electronics that I could not even fathom what they looked like or were used for. I do know that that is the territory that comes with the Cyber Punk genre. Despite it being mildly difficult to navigate what was happening in the story, there was enough scene exposition that I could at least picture what was happening, which I think was the point. If that’s true, the author succeeded brilliantly. Overall, an interesting take on a melancholy story of a man longing for the times of the past where he had the girl. The technologic touch was pretty compelling to read.

Saturday, April 4, 2020

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream


I have heard about this story a while back, not for the short piece of literature but for the point and click adventure game that was based on it. I remember the bare bones of the game, but upon reading the piece it was based on, I remembered more about the characters that the story left out although I read that the game is like another universe version of the characters). I remember it being about the torment of a small group of individuals and how they torment became too much for them to handle. In I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, we are taken through just a handful of things these 5 people have to endure for the rest of eternity because during WWIII, a super computer that gained sentience was built to torture humans and eventually wiped the human race. We do not know why the 5 people were specifically chosen to be the ones the machine AM chose to make “immortal”, but we do know it wants revenge similarly to how Frankenstein’s monster did. The machine has become sentient, but it is not able to do anything other than exist. Which isn’t much of an existence at all, and thusly wants its revenge on the human race. This story brings up how each character perceives and interacts with AM’s torture methods differently, but all of them lose their humanity from it in some way. Each characters morals have been altered by AM to support the opposite of what they originally stood for, Benny being altered the most physically; once a handsome gay scientist and is now a simian-looking heterosexual animal who’s only redeeming (?) quality is the fact that he was given a large penis. Other characters have been altered in similarly mental ways: Ellen who was once “pure” although not a virgin, has become a slave to her lust, Nimdok being mysteriously but visibly traumatized, Gorrister once a pacifist and idealist is now apathetic and nihilistic, and Ted our main character who believes he has not gone through any trauma from AM but is obviously paranoid the others despise him. It’s interesting how each character has had something destroyed within them, due to a machine that was created by the species it’s now keeping captive. As soon as Ted narrates Gorrister’s story of how AM came to be, they bring up how we needed bigger weapons to fight WWIII, and the Allied Master computer is what they created. There was one created by each major power, and they all became sentient and melded into AM. I think this is an interesting take on political commentary. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a WWIII and it was about the cyber race instead of nuclear weapons. I think war is a byproduct of greed and that nothing good comes from it. I think that people are capable of horrors we are not even aware of yet, but I do think that there will always be some kind of empathy. Ted especially feels this when he decides to sacrifice himself for everyone else to get a way out. I think there will always be two ends of the spectrum within humanity.


Saturday, March 28, 2020

The Martian

I am not the biggest sci-fi person. Although I do like it a bit more than fantasy. But the difference.... is science. Which I'm not the best at understanding. With fantasy, there are not as many mathematical/chemistry elements that I will look at and read 4 times over and blink with my empty eyes at. So reading some of this book was a little hard for me. Especially since I have the attention span of a puppy. My mom adores Star Trek and even has the emblem tattooed on her ankle, so it's not a completely foreign subject (and with the campy-ness of the original series my brain doesn't process much of the science aspect at all).

The Martian is about a team from NASA traveling to mars and encounter a a strong sandstorm that knocks unconscious one of their members that they assume is now dead and try to leave the planet as fast as they can, while they leave the body of their friend behind. The man wakes up alone on Mars and then has to cultivate potatoes using his own poop to survive until NASA comes to rescue him.

The suspense in this book is palpable. It has a way of keeping me on my toes that I've never experienced from the genre since Close Encounters. I really felt bad for Watney, although he seemed to figure out everything pretty naturally. I reckon that's probably what their training (aka gibberish to me) is for. He's relatively calm to the situations happening, which if he were otherwise he probably wouldn't have ended up back on Earth. I also have a lot of respect for this character due to the way he quickly reacted to everything that was thrown at him. The story is pretty dramatic, though, which is most likely why it is considered an Opera. If only he broke out into song regularly, it would've nailed the genre on the head. All jokes asides, this was a very compelling read. I couldn't imagine having to go through the betrayal of your own crew, saving your own poop for growing potatoes, repairing lost rovers, losing all your air, and still somehow ending up home could do to your brain. That's a ton of stress. The poor lady who felt guilty for leaving him behind has to deal with that too, now. I think she did what she had to do in order to save the rest of her crew, I don't think she's fully to blame. Overall, the Martian was very interesting. I will probably go watch the movie now, I heard it was really good.

Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Anansi Boys



This book is not what I was expecting it to be at all. What exactly was I expecting it to be? I have no idea. But I will say I didn’t think Neil Gaiman would capture me like he did. In this book, Fat Charlie is overcome with a million different unlucky instances, even though in the beginning he seemed to have a pretty good life. The myths in this selection were of a greater power- the creators of the universe. HOw did they create the universe? Through stories and songs created by gods of animals. The dedication to the West Indian culture in this book is very interesting, especially since I have no previous knowledge of anything remotely close to the myths Gaiman alludes to. Charlie’s father was the spider god Anansi, who is the ruler of mischief. This explains how sad Charlie’s life has become due to his father playing jokes on him all the time, but Anansi has passed away. Little does Charlie know that he has a brother named Spider (who is actually his other half) that has been given their father’s gift of mischief. It is up to Charlie to stop Spider’s devilish actions against him that spirals his life into chaos. Fate is a joke in this story, seeing as no one seems to be taking it seriously since everyone kind of does what they want (except Fat Charlie who is just trying to live his life). Like I had previously mentioned, a lot of characters break out into song about their lives and how their aspirations came to be. I have never read anything that portrayed gods with song, although I don’t read a ton of fantasy novels in general. It was fun to get to understand the characters but trying not to think of it being played out like a Disney movie was a little hard. Although the theme of fate was prevalent, like we talked about in the lecture, I believe in “Everything happens for a reason”. I feel like that applies whole heartedly to this novel due to the fact that Charlie does seem to find out his true purpose in the end. He was destined to be a singer and to marry the cop Daisy instead of his ex-fiancee Rosie. Which I have just realized as I was writing this that they both had flower names…. Which brings me to the point: women are used as a driving force in this novel. Without Spider coming in and snatching up Rosie, Charlie could’ve been met with the same fate later on after their marriage to some other guy. Similarly, if it weren’t for Daisy, Charlie may not have ever realized his talent for singing and preserving the stories from the “Beginning Of the World”. I appreciate Charlie’s respect for women, I think there are a lot of Spiders running around our society today still thinking women are prizes to be won. I appreciate that Gaiman made sure the protagonist outgrew Spider and learned how to become a nice young man.

Friday, March 20, 2020

Harry Potter

Complex Moral issues are practically the foundation built upon the groundwork for The Sorcerer’s Stone. Harry has been raised for all of his life as a lower status family nuisance to his aunt, uncle, and his cousin. After a series of rapidly insane events unfold on his 11th birthday, a whole entire world of magic is revealed to him. On top of that, he is thrusted into a huge responsibility of being titled “The Boy Who Lived”, practically a deity in the eyes of many in this world. With this comes friends who automatically respect him, enemies who envy him, and a need to uphold this new family legacy of his magician parents who were both popular, smart (well at the very least his mother), and in the most esteemed house anyone can be a part of. Harry has so much thrust upon him and must navigate it while also keeping up with classes and assignments, an obvious parallel that most students would immediately be sympathetic towards. Harry’s new way of life also comes with challenges in the form of rivalries, such as with Draco Malfoy. He’s given multiple chances to inflict as much pain and suffering to Harry and his friends without much as a second glance from professors, and most of the time leaving the scene of the crime Scott free. Meanwhile, any event that Harry would become a part of, he would seem to always get the short end of the stick, such as being caught for being out of their dormitories. Though sometimes things work out for the better, like when he took a chance and helped Hermione escape the Troll, using teamwork together rather than letting past resentments get the better of them. It seems that Rowling had a knack for keeping things tense with new challenges that can intermingle with a character’s moral code, and nothing else shows it clearer than the final few chapters set in the various rooms that were made to keep The Sorcerer’s Stone locked up. Hermione’s ingeniousness assists with any task at hand and helps them decode clues and riddles that would elude any normal person who hadn’t indulged themselves in countless literature. She not only has book smarts but can also think on her feet, with quick decision making as with The Devil’s Snare and the Flying Keys, which would have stumped both Harry and Ron the moment they were thrusted into it.Ron, though not really seen as the brains of the group, can really be seen as the epitome of “best friend” material. His loyalty and faithfulness in his friend’s ability to power through the final challenges gives him the fortitude to sacrifice himself for his friends, the type of moral attitude seen in very few people and the very definition of a spiritual challenge that would show anyone’s true colors. Harry is a very “trust your gut” individual. From the get-go, his life has forced him to only trust in himself for his own decision he’d enact upon, and in turn has a very keen and justly guided moral compass. Naturally a personality like that molds a very honorable and just young kid who has no sinister intentions and has a heart of gold, which unlocks the Sorcerer’s Stone for him. It’s fair enough to say that Harry has many laborious tasks that he has to uphold throughout the book. He was thrust into a world with notoriety he didn’t even know existed, and still somehow managed to make do with it all without becoming a perfect character.

Sunday, March 1, 2020

The Hobbit


The Hobbit is a great example of the Hero’s Journey. Bilbo Baggins one hundred percent does not want to be a thief in this war that has nothing to do with him. He is a normal hobbit who does nothing but normal hobbit things and that is all that he wants to do. That is until he experiences the dwarves’ perseverance to save what they can of their kingdom. He sees them willing to give up their lives even though they don’t have that great of a chance of succeeding. That’s his pivoting moment that propels his Hero’s Journey. During his trip through the Lonely Mountain, he learns how to be the thief they originally wanted him to be. He helps the dwarves’ army fight against trolls, and a congregate of Orcs, and outsmarting Gollum for the ring. He learns that you can do anything if you put your mind to it, and despite losing friends along the way, he is the one who is responsible for their victory in the end. He even ‘came back from the dead’ in the eyes of the dwarves. At the beginning, Bilbo was content with that he had. He wanted a quiet life to himself, but seeing other be so selfless, he decided he wanted to be a part of their adventure.

Akata Witch


The characters in Akata Witch are definitely archetypes, but not in a bad way at all. They are very interesting and deeply written characters. Sunny, is the New Girl or Hero in this situation, and she a disability that may seem very superficial, but affects how she can go about her life. She is albino which means she is very sensitive to sunlight and feels out of place compared to the others around her who have a lot more melanin. She’s great at sports, but she can’t be in the sun because it burns her skin. Her magic is being able to teleport to the spirit world and be invisible, and both of those are directly tied into her albinism. So while she may be an archetype, she still is original and uniquely herself. Orlu could be seen as the Everyman archetype, and while he is very bright, he is dyslexic which proves to be a great disadvantage to his progression in learning about his Leopard Powers. His powers also stem directly from his disability and he is able to undo Juju spells. Though, he is taken advantage of by ChiChi for this powerful ability. ChiChi could be seen as the Joker, but she is very hotheaded when it’s her that’s being made fun of. She is quick to stand up for what she wants, but she’s not afraid of bending the rules to get there. She picks on Orlu by using him to undo the spells of her bad ideas. But she is able to remember everything that reads. Sasha is the Rebel of the group, he was kicked out of America for getting revenge on some bullies and sending a monster to haunt them. He is extremely quick to anger and has an authority problem, but he eventually learns how to use his powers for good instead. He seems to come off as unscholarly due to his authority problem, but he actually has the same power ChiChi does, which is to remember everything he reads. These characters are also interesting because they represent the opposite of how most people write literature. It’s usually the male characters that are the heroes and the smartest, while the girls are the more emotional ones. In this case, the girls are the ones who are firm and stand for what they believe in, while the males are the ones who are either neutral or too emotional. I appreciate this, being a woman. I think woman are a lot more than archetypes on a paper. I think every character should at least be more than that, and these characters are all deeply written, and do a great job at telling a story about finding yourself.

The Condition Of New Death

Okay, this will not be written like the other blogposts because these stories are right up my alley and I’m really jazzed about it. Three Moments of an Explosion: The Condition of New Death is not the weird people these days are used to. In my humble opinion, I think this is the new horror. I think the upcoming generation will create even more things in this category until it is the new horror. Things that don’t describe the unfathomable creatures that make up our universe, but cater to the everyday person who are subjected to the uncanny valley. In most contexts, I think the uncanny valley usually applies when we’re talking about horror and how you can barely make out the face of the shadow in the corner of the screen, but China Mieville is blunt about it in this story. Corpses whose feet orient toward you no matter where you’re standing in comparison to them? And on top of that no one questions anything about this new evolution of ‘death’ either. That’s genuinely disturbing. Things like skeletons and ghosts have outgrown their welcome in the new generations, I think. We’re craving something more, and I think this is just that. One of my favorite horror movies, Cabin In The Woods, is also a part of this category, which is probably why I’m so excited about it. Both are good examples of taking a normal sounding scenario and adding a pinch of something being off, and then voila, you have the New Weird. In Mieville’s story it starts with an older man who comes home one day to find his wife dead on the floor. Seems normal, right? But then she reorients herself so that her feet are always rotating to her shocked husband no matter where he moves. Okay, now it’s no longer the thing we’re used to seeing. It has a new twist. Same thing with Cabin In The Woods, the movie starts with a normal plot of silly and horny college students who want to go stay in, you guessed it, a cabin in the woods. But, the entire time we have shots of these other people working in some sort of lab talking about sacrifices and then all of a sudden it’s more interesting. These are some of the best scenarios I can think of that are using the uncanny valley as a plot point rather than honing a focus on visuals.

I have absorbed a lot of media like this, actually. There’s a short film that’s eerily similar to it, I wonder if it was inspired by The Condition of New Death? It’s called This House Has People In It and it can be found on YouTube. Additionally, there’s a sequel to that video called Unedited Footage of A Bear that also falls under the category of the New Weird, and even my favorite horror artist Junji Ito would be considered the New Weird. I’m actually really glad that I have a title for what this genre is so I can keep looking into it.

Of A Mirror and A Bell


There’s a different kind of evil vs good when it comes to differences between Eastern and Western Fiction. In Of A Mirror and A Bell a prime example of some of those differences are shown. Eastern ‘evil’ usually is dependent (but not always) on themes of revenge. The farmer’s wife in this story gives away a prized possession because she wanted to do something to benefit everyone, but her heart was not fully in it. She gives up a hand mirror that was passed down in her family and ultimately regrets it because of all the great memories she has of the mirror. When the people of Totomi start to melt down all of the items the inhabitants donated for their new public works project (the bell) they come to realize that the farmer’s wife was not honestly giving up her hand mirror with all of her heart because the mirror did not melt. When the woman commits suicide due to the public shame she is receiving, she has given herself to the afterlife as a vengeful spirit. Then the story starts to go into details about the phenomenon nazoraeru. To me nazoraeru is a kind of karma, and whatever energy you give into the world will be given back to you, depending on whether the intentions were positive or not. In this case, the woman died in anger, maybe because she didn’t honestly put her heart into giving up the mirror. In our western culture, we can view this as potentially and ‘evil’ act because the task of breaking the bell was almost impossible and made people go mad with greed. Although in Eastern stories, at least to me, I think that there is always a balance between the good and evil, it having a lot to do with intention and how that energy is put back into the world. If the woman intentionally killed herself with the thought of driving people mad with greed who once called her selfish, then she could be considered ‘evil’. Although, I think she knew that someone who was pure of heart would be able to find a loophole in her rule. Which is why to me, I think that is the true balance between good and evil. It was more of a karma thing. The people who actually needed money in order to live are the ones who were able to “break the bell”. Although we do not know if the man who made the bell out of clay technically earned his riches, but it is implied that he does. Meanwhile in American fiction, I think good vs evil is more black and white. If you kill someone, you are evil; If you save someone, you are good. I think the Eastern style is much more realistic, karma aside. Don’t put out bad energy into the world and you will not receive bad energy back.

Saturday, February 29, 2020

Interview With The Vampire


Interview With The Vampire is a novel I greatly enjoyed. While the characters all have their flaws, there’s still so much this book has done to rationalize the emotions that people feel while in a toxic relationship. Lestat is a character who is very (in my opinion) sociopathic. He will do anything in order to get the outcome he desires. Louis is new to being a vampire, and he is portrayed as being completely unsure of is it’s even something he wants to commit to. He would rather die than live a life of immortality, but Lestat being his ‘lover’ manipulates him into staying immortal so that he isn’t lonely. This is one of the big red flags that Lestat waves in the reader’s face that he is in fact a toxic person. The entire novel goes into detail about Louis’ internal struggle with becoming an immortal creature. Is he a demon like Babette said he was? He didn’t want to take people’s lives so that he could live, but when Lestat made him a full-fledged creature of the night, he didn’t seem to have a choice. Lestat even goes to the lengths of making Louis feel guilty by turning Claudia into a vampire, thus determining the same fate as Louis to a young 5-year-old girl. So now on top of all of the internal dialogue Louis has going on, he has to now care for a girl who will be forever stuck in a five year old’s body. That is so much for someone to have to deal with mentally, it’s no wonder why Louis explains to the interviewer that it is not a romanticized life. It is not all the glory immortality seems to have a reputation to be. Despite all of the psychological torment, there is a great benefit to the way these characters are portrayed. Anne Rice did a fantastic job of not fetishizing gay romance and toxic relationships. A lot of novels have a history of making either queer relationships that are objectively bad in some kind of retrospect, or making the romance very shallow. In this novel, it is portrayed as a real relationship that has a lot more down than ups; it’s important to realize that queer people also have real relationships that can be abusive. They are people with real feelings and should not be romanticized. Louis’ personal growth is slow, and at first glance can seem like it doesn’t progress all that much, but he learns to be a brotherly figure to Claudia who is still slowly growing mentally, though her body is the same. He has to acclimate to the immortal lifestyle, find someone to care for Claudia so he can move on, and then try to kill his abuser multiple times (each time ultimately failing, but succeeding in making Lestat miserable) before having every vampire he knows be killed by his love interest. What a life to live. It’s no wonder that he reacts the way he does at the end when the interviewer asks to be turned. Louis by the end is completely bare of emotion and passion. There’s only so much someone can take emotionally, and I think there’s no better way he could’ve ended his interview.

Sunday, January 19, 2020

Frankenstein



       I was surprised to learn that this story was not so much about an evil monster, but more about a glorified child who was left to fend for himself. Victor can be dumbed down to being a bad parent who refuses to find responsibility in his child. I genuinely feel bad for Frankenstein’s monster, all he wanted was to be loved and accepted by normal people, but was never given the chance due to his appearance. Knowing some backstory on Mary Shelly also helps decode the themes of parenthood and grief. Mary Shelly was in her teens when she had the dream that inspired Frankenstein, she was pregnant, and had previously had a miscarriage. I can completely understand her concerns as a mother to not be able to properly parent her child. Guilt is a heavy burden to bare. Victor’s response to not being able to handle his creation felt incredibly relevant to real life. I know there’s so many parents that unknowingly put their children through so much stuff they’re not equipped to handle yet. There’s such a strong family theme behind this story. Whether it’s loss, the connection between parent and child, or finding the good in people and wanting to be a part of something, it’s there. When the monster describes how he watched people through a hole in a wall and envied their connection with each other, it really helped to unfold the true meaning behind the story. Why are we here? What is the meaning of life if you are unable to find happiness? Alienation is not something any living being can handle easily.
There’s some big differences across media for this piece, too. In the original film adaptation of Frankenstein, the monster is shown more in the light of actually being a mistake to humanity instead of a creature that was given an obsolete life out of its control. The monster is shown throwing a girl named Mary into a lake after throwing daisies into the water and watching them float. There seems to be a disconnect in the movie overall, seemingly being more inspired by the book than being a movie version of the book.
Overall, I enjoyed the read far more than I would’ve originally thought. It was engaging, relevant, and full of deeply packed emotion that you would have passed on surface level. The themes of family and isolation were strong, and were what really drew me into thinking about the deeper meaning.