Time to look back on all the books we've read this semester. I'll rank them in a Top 10 list sort of way, except that there are only 5.
5. Libra
DeLillo's novel comes in last in the rankings largely due to two things: first, his writing style really threw me off, and second, I am bored out of my skull by conspiracy theories, largely because I am satisfied with the explanation that Oswald did it alone. My inability to separate the fictional Oswald from what I know of the historical Oswald probably also kept me from fully enjoying the book. It got much better towards the end, with the various threads of the plot coming together in a grand mess of an assassination, but I feel that Libra would have been better if it had more in common with Mumbo Jumbo and presented its conspiracy in terms of absolute ridiculousness. DeLillo seems to be taking his own writing a bit too seriously.
My favorite part was probably Weird Beard. Or the Jack Ruby chapters, since he had the weirdness to fit into Ishmael Reed's world.
4. Kindred
Knowing ahead of time that Butler did not intend this to be a science fiction novel saved this book from suffering the fate of Never Let Me Go*. Even so, this book gets #4 on the list because I felt the story was stretched out too much and I never felt invested in the characters. Mostly the characters.
I'm not entirely sure how to explain why, so I'll just give some examples: I felt no pity whatsoever for Rufus. Dana had some nice cynical moments, but just as many where she seemed incredibly naive. Kevin seemed like an add-on. The character I could empathize the most with was Tom Weylin, who at least had a twisted moral code.
Maybe this all boils down to my general dissatisfaction with emotional characters. I like self-repression in fiction. I like it when characters throw away emotion because something needs to get done. Give me Mrs. Dalloway and Bruce Wayne, but keep your Romeos and Juliets at home.
The main problem I faced with this book in class discussion was that I took this book fairly literally; I felt that with the heavily plot-based narrative, a lot of things didn't have to have any hidden meaning. Time travel? Well of course it's time travel and not Dana imagining the past while studying genealogy! She LOSES HER ARM.
My final criticism is that for such a horrific subject matter, Kindred just doesn't have the bleak tone required to pull it off. There's too much of a sense of finality (due to the reliance on plot) in the semi-hopeful epilogue.
3. Slaughterhouse-Five
Third, second, and first place in this ranking are all very close, so their placements are somewhat arbitrary.
Slaughterhouse-Five was the funniest of the novels we read; after all, it's about a massacre! Reed and Doctorow have more subtle humor with a few laugh-out-loud moments, but Vonnegut goes all-out with writing that veers towards Douglas Adams.
Billy Pilgrim seemed like a much more varied character than any of the other protagonists we encountered, shifting from super chill (everything was pretty much all right with Billy Pilgrim) to silently weeping to just plain bewildered.
And who doesn't love telepathic toilet plungers?
As with Kindred, I took this novel literally, and got really defensive when an article for a panel presentation suggested that Billy Pilgrim wasn't really unstuck in time.
2. Mumbo Jumbo
Reed's style and formatting choices threw me off initially, but I came to enjoy the weirdness and lack of standardization. I didn't find the overall story all that exciting, but each scene was fun to read on its own. Mumbo Jumbo packs a lot into a small space and doesn't take itself too seriously, so it doesn't feel drawn-out like some of the other novels.
I'm having a hard time pinning down exact reasons for liking this novel, so I'll just say that it was fun to read and felt more substantial than Libra or Kindred.
1. Ragtime
I love cynical narrators. I love stuff that's too weird to be made up. I like Doctorow's writing style. What more is there to say?
For one thing, characters. Even though we're not always inside their heads, I was more invested in the characters in Ragtime than in anyone in the other books. Goldman is rational. Houdini is repressed. MYB knows exactly what he wants to do, but doesn't know why. Coalhouse is self-destructively emotional, but finishes up nicely. It just boils down to Doctorow and his characters having brains that function similarly to mine, though with different starting values.
Another thing I like about Ragtime: it's so bleak! Everyone dies or gets deported or vanishes except for the abusive, patriotic psychopath, while history just keeps rolling on. Great ending.
I thought Doctorow's story was strange before I read any of the other novels for this class. Now it seems pretty tame. This is good because it kept the story easy to follow while still allowing for entertaining craziness and hidden references (like "Warn the Duke").
------------------------------------------------------
* I went into Never Let Me Go expecting it to go really deep into discussing the ethics of cloning and societal reactions to clones. Instead, it was basically a story about people with terminal illness having relationship problems. The cool premise about citizens whose only purpose in life is to replace other peoples' organs was just an excuse to have the main characters die young.
I will not go so far as to say that the film The Island did a better job at this, though.
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Arch is part of a conspiracy!
This is inspired by one of Izzy's blog posts, the link to which is below:
http://parchedforprose.blogspot.com/2014/05/pieces-of-puzzle.html
Anyway, let's go about analyzing the mysterious person known as "Arch Stuart Robison" in a conspiracy light...
---------------------------------
Item 1: Fake names
Just what is he hiding? This blog is written by "ArchR," but the corresponding Google+ account is "CUBirding." There certainly seems to be an implication of stalking. He will C U when you are birding. Potential connection to NSA surveillance. Login names for Scratch and NaNoWriMo accounts point to association with David Zindell novels and the United Sates Navy.
Item 2: He regularly walks around with binoculars and a camera.
Seems suspicious to me.
Item 2.5: He walks around with binoculars and a camera near areas with signs that say "Keep Out: Disease Control Area."
Suspected connection to biological warfare research.
Item 3: Frequently visited websites
He follows several suspicious blogs, including "Goodbye Twentieth Century." Possible connection to Y2K virus. He is also active on a set of internet forums that include posts about the procedure of killing hospital visitors and installing car bombs. If discussing these things with half a million other psychos isn't a sign of conspiracy involvement, I don't know what is.
Item 4: Acquaintances and connections
Met with the mayors of multiple German towns while traveling abroad; additionally, was allowed access to city archives in one of these towns. Has family members who worked for corporations that did contract work for the military, including radar and missile design. Is friends with someone who has a special access permit to the grounds of the Clinton nuclear power station. Worked for a summer with a group of scientists planting tracking devices in the bed of a river.
Item 5: Lack of a driver's license
Eighteen years old and still not allowed to drive? How un-american. In lieu of a driver's license, he has identification documents that allow him to cross national borders and electronically unlock doors.
Item 6: Entertainment choices
Plays Spore and Civ V video games, indicating a possible god complex. Has spent hours playing flight simulation games, pointing to secret pilot training. His main character in Super Smash Bros Melee was previously Zelda, which can only be interpreted as a sign of mental instability.
Disturbing themes appear in his list of favorite works: his favorite movie features a protagonist who commits war crimes; one of his favorite stage productions involves an attempt to violently overthrow the government; he has recently read books featuring early 1900s anarchists, the JFK assassination, and portrayals of Western civilization as the embodiment of evil.
Item 7: Past encounters with authority
Stopped by a US Border Patrol agent in southern Texas; no arrest. Accosted by a member of the Los Angeles Police Department for loitering near airport property; no arrest. Confronted by a US National Guard member for stepping into a restricted area near US military facilities; no arrest.
Item 8: Publication subscriptions
Subscribes to Audubon magazine, which may have connections to clandestine ecoterrorism. Also receives EAA SportAviation (more evidence for Aerospace involvement). Is a member of the "Lego Club," and thus may be receiving bribes from or doing corporate espionage for a Danish toy company.
Item 9: College choice
Is planning on attending a college he had never heard of until the year he applied. Seems rather abrupt. What sort of special offer was involved? Investigate CIA campus recruiting programs.
Item 10: Coincidental similarities to Oswald
Has bad handwriting. Has an older sibling. Wears T-shirts. Does not show his teeth when he smiles. High hairline. Knows specifics of 1950s military aircraft. Reads encyclopedias like they're Tom Clancy thrillers. Knows that a killdeer is a bird. Likes to make puns. Might get a job in Aerospace.
While no conclusion can be drawn at this point, it is very clear that the subject is involved in shady conspiratorial activities.
-----------------------------------------------
...and just for fun, we have a little game: one of the pieces of evidence I mentioned (one of the sentences, not one of the topics) is completely made up. The rest (though perhaps not the interpretations of them) are factual. Try to guess which one is an attempt to mislead obsessive investigators.
Have fun!
http://parchedforprose.blogspot.com/2014/05/pieces-of-puzzle.html
Anyway, let's go about analyzing the mysterious person known as "Arch Stuart Robison" in a conspiracy light...
---------------------------------
Item 1: Fake names
Just what is he hiding? This blog is written by "ArchR," but the corresponding Google+ account is "CUBirding." There certainly seems to be an implication of stalking. He will C U when you are birding. Potential connection to NSA surveillance. Login names for Scratch and NaNoWriMo accounts point to association with David Zindell novels and the United Sates Navy.
Item 2: He regularly walks around with binoculars and a camera.
Seems suspicious to me.
Item 2.5: He walks around with binoculars and a camera near areas with signs that say "Keep Out: Disease Control Area."
Suspected connection to biological warfare research.
Item 3: Frequently visited websites
He follows several suspicious blogs, including "Goodbye Twentieth Century." Possible connection to Y2K virus. He is also active on a set of internet forums that include posts about the procedure of killing hospital visitors and installing car bombs. If discussing these things with half a million other psychos isn't a sign of conspiracy involvement, I don't know what is.
Item 4: Acquaintances and connections
Met with the mayors of multiple German towns while traveling abroad; additionally, was allowed access to city archives in one of these towns. Has family members who worked for corporations that did contract work for the military, including radar and missile design. Is friends with someone who has a special access permit to the grounds of the Clinton nuclear power station. Worked for a summer with a group of scientists planting tracking devices in the bed of a river.
Item 5: Lack of a driver's license
Eighteen years old and still not allowed to drive? How un-american. In lieu of a driver's license, he has identification documents that allow him to cross national borders and electronically unlock doors.
Item 6: Entertainment choices
Plays Spore and Civ V video games, indicating a possible god complex. Has spent hours playing flight simulation games, pointing to secret pilot training. His main character in Super Smash Bros Melee was previously Zelda, which can only be interpreted as a sign of mental instability.
Disturbing themes appear in his list of favorite works: his favorite movie features a protagonist who commits war crimes; one of his favorite stage productions involves an attempt to violently overthrow the government; he has recently read books featuring early 1900s anarchists, the JFK assassination, and portrayals of Western civilization as the embodiment of evil.
Item 7: Past encounters with authority
Stopped by a US Border Patrol agent in southern Texas; no arrest. Accosted by a member of the Los Angeles Police Department for loitering near airport property; no arrest. Confronted by a US National Guard member for stepping into a restricted area near US military facilities; no arrest.
Item 8: Publication subscriptions
Subscribes to Audubon magazine, which may have connections to clandestine ecoterrorism. Also receives EAA SportAviation (more evidence for Aerospace involvement). Is a member of the "Lego Club," and thus may be receiving bribes from or doing corporate espionage for a Danish toy company.
Item 9: College choice
Is planning on attending a college he had never heard of until the year he applied. Seems rather abrupt. What sort of special offer was involved? Investigate CIA campus recruiting programs.
Item 10: Coincidental similarities to Oswald
Has bad handwriting. Has an older sibling. Wears T-shirts. Does not show his teeth when he smiles. High hairline. Knows specifics of 1950s military aircraft. Reads encyclopedias like they're Tom Clancy thrillers. Knows that a killdeer is a bird. Likes to make puns. Might get a job in Aerospace.
While no conclusion can be drawn at this point, it is very clear that the subject is involved in shady conspiratorial activities.
-----------------------------------------------
...and just for fun, we have a little game: one of the pieces of evidence I mentioned (one of the sentences, not one of the topics) is completely made up. The rest (though perhaps not the interpretations of them) are factual. Try to guess which one is an attempt to mislead obsessive investigators.
Have fun!
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
On snipers...
The topic of snipers feeling sympathy for their victims came up in class today. Oswald certainly seems like he doesn't want to take the shot--he likes Kennedy, is glad that Jackie looks good for the immortalizing photos, and feels sorry for hitting Connally. Is this strange for a sniper? Isn't the long range shot a way of distancing yourself from your victim, unlike Ruby's incredibly personal killing of Oswald? You're just supposed to pull the trigger and hit someone really far away.
When this topic came up in class, my mind jumped to some other source I had read/seen/heard that argued the opposite: due to the highly accurate nature of sniping (aiming at specific body parts) and the close-up view offered by a scope, snipers are by necessity emotionally invested in their target--and thus the really good snipers are the ones who can push aside their feelings and pull the trigger knowing exactly what they are doing: taking a life.
Trouble was, I couldn't remember what work of fiction this was from. Was it Enemy at the Gates? I've only actually seen a clip of that movie in Mr. Butler's class. What else do I watch that would go in-depth about sniper psychology? The episode of Quantum Leap in which the protagonist inhabits the body of Lee Harvey Oswald?
Eventually I remembered that it came from the anime series Area 88. I'm not a big consumer of anime, but I watched this series in its entirety while I was sick one time after stumbling across numerous references to it on the Wikipedia page for "aircraft in fiction." I mean, who doesn't love a TV show that consists mostly of what-if battles between Cold War-era fighter planes?
While perhaps not as deep or literary as other sources (and not terribly realistic in its depiction of the nameless sniper, who has the timing and precision to pull off a serial assassination you'd expect from a murderous Rube Goldberg, plus a gun with high-explosive bullets), the eighth episode of Area 88 has a few things to say about snipers and war photographers.
If you don't care to watch 23 minutes of airplanes, explosions, and odd choices of background music, the discussion of sniper psychology starts around 6:56. The audio is Japanese, but there are English subtitles.
If we were to put these fictional long-range shooters on a spectrum, Oswald would seem to be at the "ineffective softie" end and Area 88's sniper at the other, with Raymo in between. Raymo has the precision and focus during the shooting, but as soon as he gets the shot off and sees Kennedy's head explodes he goes into a sort of out-of-body adrenaline mode. The anime villain is little more than a self-aiming gun.
Even with his pseudo-remorse, Oswald pulls the trigger, satisfying Shinjou's assertion that a sniper "does what he does fully understanding that his action leads to the enemy's death." It's just that his actions don't lead to his target's death, since he's inconsistent and isn't using the best rifle.
When this topic came up in class, my mind jumped to some other source I had read/seen/heard that argued the opposite: due to the highly accurate nature of sniping (aiming at specific body parts) and the close-up view offered by a scope, snipers are by necessity emotionally invested in their target--and thus the really good snipers are the ones who can push aside their feelings and pull the trigger knowing exactly what they are doing: taking a life.
Trouble was, I couldn't remember what work of fiction this was from. Was it Enemy at the Gates? I've only actually seen a clip of that movie in Mr. Butler's class. What else do I watch that would go in-depth about sniper psychology? The episode of Quantum Leap in which the protagonist inhabits the body of Lee Harvey Oswald?
Eventually I remembered that it came from the anime series Area 88. I'm not a big consumer of anime, but I watched this series in its entirety while I was sick one time after stumbling across numerous references to it on the Wikipedia page for "aircraft in fiction." I mean, who doesn't love a TV show that consists mostly of what-if battles between Cold War-era fighter planes?
While perhaps not as deep or literary as other sources (and not terribly realistic in its depiction of the nameless sniper, who has the timing and precision to pull off a serial assassination you'd expect from a murderous Rube Goldberg, plus a gun with high-explosive bullets), the eighth episode of Area 88 has a few things to say about snipers and war photographers.
If you don't care to watch 23 minutes of airplanes, explosions, and odd choices of background music, the discussion of sniper psychology starts around 6:56. The audio is Japanese, but there are English subtitles.
If we were to put these fictional long-range shooters on a spectrum, Oswald would seem to be at the "ineffective softie" end and Area 88's sniper at the other, with Raymo in between. Raymo has the precision and focus during the shooting, but as soon as he gets the shot off and sees Kennedy's head explodes he goes into a sort of out-of-body adrenaline mode. The anime villain is little more than a self-aiming gun.
Even with his pseudo-remorse, Oswald pulls the trigger, satisfying Shinjou's assertion that a sniper "does what he does fully understanding that his action leads to the enemy's death." It's just that his actions don't lead to his target's death, since he's inconsistent and isn't using the best rifle.
Monday, May 12, 2014
Weird Beard is real.
He tells us he's not making it up, kids. And he's telling the truth.
"Weird Beard" was a real person, really was a DJ for KLIF Dallas, and testified before the Warren Commission because of his correspondence with Jack Ruby.
Eat your cereal with a fork.
http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/moore_r.htm
http://knightslanding.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/russ-the-weird-beard-knight/
...I just felt like pointing out that little tidbit. When I first read the section where Jack Ruby listens to Weird Beard, it felt clearly metafictional; after all, one of DeLillo's characters was saying "We are for real." As it turns out, many of the characters are for real... including the ones that fall into the category of too strange to be made up.
"Weird Beard" was a real person, really was a DJ for KLIF Dallas, and testified before the Warren Commission because of his correspondence with Jack Ruby.
Eat your cereal with a fork.
http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/moore_r.htm
http://knightslanding.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/russ-the-weird-beard-knight/
...I just felt like pointing out that little tidbit. When I first read the section where Jack Ruby listens to Weird Beard, it felt clearly metafictional; after all, one of DeLillo's characters was saying "We are for real." As it turns out, many of the characters are for real... including the ones that fall into the category of too strange to be made up.
Saturday, April 19, 2014
Librargh
<rant>
In Yellowstone
Once upon a time there were three bears. Baby Bear came back home before breakfast with a smirk on his face. It was like him to do that, smirk before breakfast. Mommy Bear made porridge.
"Where you been all morning?"
"Getting beat up. They said I talk like a polar bear."
They sat watching the TV because the porridge was too hot. A steaming bowl of mushy grain product. China dishes. The red tablecloth on top of the cheap wooden table bought for twenty-five dollars at a garage sale held by Mommy Bear's sister. There was no Daddy Bear anymore. His philandering with many mistresses had been sneaky at first, and once found out he had arranged a messy divorce. They only had two chairs.
"We should go for a walk."
A walk. They will pass the time it takes for the porridge to cool down by taking an ordinary walk. While they are out a girl named Goldilocks comes along and enters their house.
My daughter Goldilocks, she loves to read.
Her mother always.
Goldilocks tried both bowls of porridge, the second one being just right. How fun it will be to narrate the eating of the porridge to Robert Sproul, who had turned and gone home too early. Goldilocks tested the house's furniture. One excessively large chair. One just right. One bed with too much give in the mattress. One perfect. Stucco walls glistening like... uh... stucco doesn't glisten. Ceilings like parchment. Dirt floor littered with Baby Bear's toys. Sentence fragments.
The bears return in the present tense.
We found Goldilocks in my bed and ate her.
The bears were upset that their house had been invaded. Mommy Bear decided it would be best to move out. A boy in a non-human-infested part of the world isn't chased down by truancy officers. I am a god-fearing American Grizzly Bear just as patriotic as any other, so why must my boy be taken away from me just because he likes to go to the zoo?
It was the CIA. The CIA is responsible for Goldilocks.
The bears defected to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union wants maps, contents of garbage cans, locations of campsites. It was a worker's paradise, better in every way than America but not perfect.
The bears return in the present tense.
Mommy Bear made porridge.
They sat watching the TV because the porridge was too hot. A steaming bowl of mushy grain product. China dishes. The red tablecloth on top of the cheap wooden table bought for twenty-five dollars at a garage sale held by Mommy Bear's sister. There was no Daddy Bear anymore. His philandering with many mistresses had been sneaky at first, and once found out he had arranged a messy divorce. They only had two chairs.
</rant>
...if you haven't figured it out yet, I'm not the biggest fan of DeLillo's writing style.
In Yellowstone
Once upon a time there were three bears. Baby Bear came back home before breakfast with a smirk on his face. It was like him to do that, smirk before breakfast. Mommy Bear made porridge.
"Where you been all morning?"
"Getting beat up. They said I talk like a polar bear."
They sat watching the TV because the porridge was too hot. A steaming bowl of mushy grain product. China dishes. The red tablecloth on top of the cheap wooden table bought for twenty-five dollars at a garage sale held by Mommy Bear's sister. There was no Daddy Bear anymore. His philandering with many mistresses had been sneaky at first, and once found out he had arranged a messy divorce. They only had two chairs.
"We should go for a walk."
A walk. They will pass the time it takes for the porridge to cool down by taking an ordinary walk. While they are out a girl named Goldilocks comes along and enters their house.
My daughter Goldilocks, she loves to read.
Her mother always.
Goldilocks tried both bowls of porridge, the second one being just right. How fun it will be to narrate the eating of the porridge to Robert Sproul, who had turned and gone home too early. Goldilocks tested the house's furniture. One excessively large chair. One just right. One bed with too much give in the mattress. One perfect. Stucco walls glistening like... uh... stucco doesn't glisten. Ceilings like parchment. Dirt floor littered with Baby Bear's toys. Sentence fragments.
The bears return in the present tense.
We found Goldilocks in my bed and ate her.
The bears were upset that their house had been invaded. Mommy Bear decided it would be best to move out. A boy in a non-human-infested part of the world isn't chased down by truancy officers. I am a god-fearing American Grizzly Bear just as patriotic as any other, so why must my boy be taken away from me just because he likes to go to the zoo?
It was the CIA. The CIA is responsible for Goldilocks.
The bears defected to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union wants maps, contents of garbage cans, locations of campsites. It was a worker's paradise, better in every way than America but not perfect.
The bears return in the present tense.
Mommy Bear made porridge.
They sat watching the TV because the porridge was too hot. A steaming bowl of mushy grain product. China dishes. The red tablecloth on top of the cheap wooden table bought for twenty-five dollars at a garage sale held by Mommy Bear's sister. There was no Daddy Bear anymore. His philandering with many mistresses had been sneaky at first, and once found out he had arranged a messy divorce. They only had two chairs.
</rant>
...if you haven't figured it out yet, I'm not the biggest fan of DeLillo's writing style.
Thursday, April 17, 2014
The obligatory bird referene post for Libra
Lee Harvey Oswald asks how many people know a killdeer is a bird.
Now you do.
I apparently take killdeer for granted, and thus this is the best photo I have of any. The bird on the far left and the bird on the far right are both killdeer. In the middle are one spotted sandpiper and one solitary sandpiper.
If you want to see some live killdeer, head down to the Fourth Street extension just north of Windsor Rd (or anywhere else south of St. Mary's Rd). There was a nest last week near Atkins Tennis Center, though last I checked I couldn't find any evidence of it having been there. Considering the pestering and distraction displays I got from the adult killdeer in the area, though, there are probably chicks hiding somewhere.
ANYWAY,
This is the part where I get all conspiracy theory-y and say that DeLilo purposely picked the killdeer as his random bird encyclopedia reference.
To start off with, it has the word "kill" in it, so we wonder about what other alphabetically adjacent encyclopedia entries Oswald was interested in.
Secondly, killdeer fit in very well as imagery for Win Everett's failed assassination plot (note that this might be an example of me reading waaaaaaaay too much specific biological importance into a nature reference, similar to my reaction every time I see mention of orchids). The killdeer's most notable behavior is that they will lead predators away from their nests and young by pretending to have a broken wing. It's actually a really fun display to watch, and pretty convincing. One of the parent birds will make a lot of noise and partially extend one wing while sitting on the ground, occasionally twitching it to make a point of its fictional injury. Movement of the wing and the bird's bright reddish-brown tail also help divert attention. When approached, the displaying bird will run along the ground, keeping just enough distance between itself and the predator to be safe but still a potential food item. This continues until the predator is deemed to be far enough away from the nest, at which point the bird ends the charade, spreads both wings, and flies away, eventually looping back around to its nest.
Specifics aside, killdeer are the classic example of diversion tactics in nature; there are other organisms that do this, but kildeer are the ones that end up in textbooks.
Everett's plot, then is like a killdeer's display: he is going to enact a life-threatening situation (broken wing/assassination attempt) that is ultimately fake, but convincing enough to lead nosy people to where Everett wants them (away from the nest/in support of an invasion of Cuba) while leaving the important target (mommy bird/JFK) unscathed.
After all, there are plenty of other weirdly-named birds that could have been used, one of which would be an even more blatant symbol:
(unfortunately, I have no photos of this bird)
Snipe.
 |
| Photo by me. |
I apparently take killdeer for granted, and thus this is the best photo I have of any. The bird on the far left and the bird on the far right are both killdeer. In the middle are one spotted sandpiper and one solitary sandpiper.
If you want to see some live killdeer, head down to the Fourth Street extension just north of Windsor Rd (or anywhere else south of St. Mary's Rd). There was a nest last week near Atkins Tennis Center, though last I checked I couldn't find any evidence of it having been there. Considering the pestering and distraction displays I got from the adult killdeer in the area, though, there are probably chicks hiding somewhere.
ANYWAY,
This is the part where I get all conspiracy theory-y and say that DeLilo purposely picked the killdeer as his random bird encyclopedia reference.
To start off with, it has the word "kill" in it, so we wonder about what other alphabetically adjacent encyclopedia entries Oswald was interested in.
Secondly, killdeer fit in very well as imagery for Win Everett's failed assassination plot (note that this might be an example of me reading waaaaaaaay too much specific biological importance into a nature reference, similar to my reaction every time I see mention of orchids). The killdeer's most notable behavior is that they will lead predators away from their nests and young by pretending to have a broken wing. It's actually a really fun display to watch, and pretty convincing. One of the parent birds will make a lot of noise and partially extend one wing while sitting on the ground, occasionally twitching it to make a point of its fictional injury. Movement of the wing and the bird's bright reddish-brown tail also help divert attention. When approached, the displaying bird will run along the ground, keeping just enough distance between itself and the predator to be safe but still a potential food item. This continues until the predator is deemed to be far enough away from the nest, at which point the bird ends the charade, spreads both wings, and flies away, eventually looping back around to its nest.
Specifics aside, killdeer are the classic example of diversion tactics in nature; there are other organisms that do this, but kildeer are the ones that end up in textbooks.
Everett's plot, then is like a killdeer's display: he is going to enact a life-threatening situation (broken wing/assassination attempt) that is ultimately fake, but convincing enough to lead nosy people to where Everett wants them (away from the nest/in support of an invasion of Cuba) while leaving the important target (mommy bird/JFK) unscathed.
After all, there are plenty of other weirdly-named birds that could have been used, one of which would be an even more blatant symbol:
(unfortunately, I have no photos of this bird)
Snipe.
The half-baked mechanics of time travel
As a science-fiction author, Butler isn’t content to simply say “it just is that way”, even in a novel she describes as fantasy. Though at first she seems to disregard the more nitpicky aspects of time travel, there are some instances in the novel where the
We can add plenty of more metaphorical interpretations to Dana losing her arm in the wall, but the way I interpreted it at first was a simple answer to an obvious question: it's established fairly early on that Dana moves slightly in space between the time she leaves and returns to the present, so what happens if she happens to move into an area where there's an obstacle?
The original Star Trek series had to answer the question of "why do Kirk and Spock never beam into a wall when using the transporter?" This was explained by the one-way accuracy of transporter pads. It was safe to beam crewmembers into a large open area on a planet's surface, but in order to move them from ship to ship there had to be a corresponding receiving apparatus on the other end to make sure they didn't end up like Dana. Transporter technology presumably got better as time went on, since this rule was disregarded in later Star Trek series.
Anyway, Butler gives a pretty clear answer to the question: yes, Dana's movements in space are random, and thus it is possible for her to wind up halfway inside of a wall. Certain versions of the X-Men storyline (superhero comic writers like to create alternate realities and retcon things out the wazoo) involve Nightcrawler dying from this sort of accident.
Butler does a fairly good job of sweeping other potential time-travel issues under the rug. Dana makes a point of not testing the paradox. However, there's one instance that I'm really kind of annoyed by.
Why is Rufus still in the past?
When Dana timeported while Kevin was holding on to her, Kevin got dragged into the past. Similarly, Kevin gets pulled back to the present when he tackles Dana during the confrontation with Rufus. So if a person in direct contact with Dana undergoes the same temporal displacement, why does the dead body of Rufus, which is clinging tightly to her arm, turn into a wall instead of following her to the present?
Does it not work on dead people?
Even so, is Rufus entirely dead at that point?
The NaNoWriMo forums, which are a great place to look for answers to the weirdest questions you've ever wondered about, suggest that people are still alive for a while after losing consciousness from stab wounds.
The problem isn't so much that there's a loophole in the time travel--if I wanted to be really picky, I'd go after stuff like "why isn't the dirt under her feet timeported as well?" The problem is that this is a pretty blatant inconsistency, to the point of being distracting and causing tangents that lead to discussion of the finer details.
Oh, well. I guess I'll use a catch-all explanation:
Metaphorical license.
We can add plenty of more metaphorical interpretations to Dana losing her arm in the wall, but the way I interpreted it at first was a simple answer to an obvious question: it's established fairly early on that Dana moves slightly in space between the time she leaves and returns to the present, so what happens if she happens to move into an area where there's an obstacle?
The original Star Trek series had to answer the question of "why do Kirk and Spock never beam into a wall when using the transporter?" This was explained by the one-way accuracy of transporter pads. It was safe to beam crewmembers into a large open area on a planet's surface, but in order to move them from ship to ship there had to be a corresponding receiving apparatus on the other end to make sure they didn't end up like Dana. Transporter technology presumably got better as time went on, since this rule was disregarded in later Star Trek series.
Anyway, Butler gives a pretty clear answer to the question: yes, Dana's movements in space are random, and thus it is possible for her to wind up halfway inside of a wall. Certain versions of the X-Men storyline (superhero comic writers like to create alternate realities and retcon things out the wazoo) involve Nightcrawler dying from this sort of accident.
Butler does a fairly good job of sweeping other potential time-travel issues under the rug. Dana makes a point of not testing the paradox. However, there's one instance that I'm really kind of annoyed by.
Why is Rufus still in the past?
When Dana timeported while Kevin was holding on to her, Kevin got dragged into the past. Similarly, Kevin gets pulled back to the present when he tackles Dana during the confrontation with Rufus. So if a person in direct contact with Dana undergoes the same temporal displacement, why does the dead body of Rufus, which is clinging tightly to her arm, turn into a wall instead of following her to the present?
Does it not work on dead people?
Even so, is Rufus entirely dead at that point?
The NaNoWriMo forums, which are a great place to look for answers to the weirdest questions you've ever wondered about, suggest that people are still alive for a while after losing consciousness from stab wounds.
The problem isn't so much that there's a loophole in the time travel--if I wanted to be really picky, I'd go after stuff like "why isn't the dirt under her feet timeported as well?" The problem is that this is a pretty blatant inconsistency, to the point of being distracting and causing tangents that lead to discussion of the finer details.
Oh, well. I guess I'll use a catch-all explanation:
Metaphorical license.
Thursday, March 13, 2014
What? There's no Santa Claus?
...or rather, no Howard W. Campbell?
Coming off of Ragtime and Mumbo Jumbo, I'd gotten into the habit of assuming that characters who are fleetingly referred to are either entirely real (you just can't make this stuff up!) or based on someone real. So imagine my disappointment when I discover that there was not a prominent American expatriate from Schenectady working in the Nazi propaganda department.
Oh, well. I guess the important thing is that Howard W. Campbell was entirely believable in the sense that I was not shocked by his existence. After all, there were (and still are) plenty of Nazi sympathizers and Nazi party members in the United States, so the concept of one working for Goebbels is not out of the question.
Campbell was originally created for one of Vonnegut's earlier works, Mother Night (1961, eight years before SH5), but he fits in well with one of the messages of the later work: anybody can do terrible things.
...okay, that sounded a bit like a motivational poster.
In order to shy away from a traditional view of the war, Vonnegut muddles the lines of who exactly is fighting whom and avoids identifying one particular side as "Committer of Atrocities". The American soliders are miserable; the Germans are equally miserable, and save Billy from his own squad. The bombing of Dresden is senseless and horrible, but those candles are always burning in the background. Billy is an American taking shelter with Germans from an American and British bombing raid; Campbell is an American working for the Germans, just another part of the blurred boundaries.
But still, it's a bit of a letdown that Vonnegut had to invent the character instead of ripping him straight from history.
Coming off of Ragtime and Mumbo Jumbo, I'd gotten into the habit of assuming that characters who are fleetingly referred to are either entirely real (you just can't make this stuff up!) or based on someone real. So imagine my disappointment when I discover that there was not a prominent American expatriate from Schenectady working in the Nazi propaganda department.
Oh, well. I guess the important thing is that Howard W. Campbell was entirely believable in the sense that I was not shocked by his existence. After all, there were (and still are) plenty of Nazi sympathizers and Nazi party members in the United States, so the concept of one working for Goebbels is not out of the question.
Campbell was originally created for one of Vonnegut's earlier works, Mother Night (1961, eight years before SH5), but he fits in well with one of the messages of the later work: anybody can do terrible things.
...okay, that sounded a bit like a motivational poster.
In order to shy away from a traditional view of the war, Vonnegut muddles the lines of who exactly is fighting whom and avoids identifying one particular side as "Committer of Atrocities". The American soliders are miserable; the Germans are equally miserable, and save Billy from his own squad. The bombing of Dresden is senseless and horrible, but those candles are always burning in the background. Billy is an American taking shelter with Germans from an American and British bombing raid; Campbell is an American working for the Germans, just another part of the blurred boundaries.
But still, it's a bit of a letdown that Vonnegut had to invent the character instead of ripping him straight from history.
The Tralfamadorians' MG/YA cousins?
(MG = Middle Grade, YA = Young Adult. I wasn't quite sure what to qualify the book in question as; I read it during elementary school, but they probably wouldn't let public-schoolers anywhere near it until eighth grade. I'm just bad at gauging reading level. I will henceforth refer to it as a kids' book, since any audience younger than me is clearly composed of kids.)
As I read through Slaughterhouse-Five, I couldn't help but notice that the Tralfamadorians have some stylistic similarities to an alien species I had encountered before: the Boov from Adam Rex's middle-grade/young-adult novel The True Meaning of Smekday, which to this day remains one of the few books I have read more than once. That's how good it is. Adam Rex writes some weeeeeiiiiiird kids' books. But they're really good. He also illustrates them.
Smekday involves a girl named Gratuity, a cat named pig, and a (male) alien named J.Lo traveling in a (hovering) car called Slushious. Needless to say, it's not all that serious of a book.
The Boov (pronounced Bo-o-ov, according to the alien character who is rather rude in his ignorance of the International Phonetic Alphabet) don't have much of a direct relationship to the Tralfamadorians except for glovelike body parts and a general theme of lavatory about their appearance. They don't live in the fourth dimension; they don't see everything all at once; they don't say "So it goes". The Boov are presented flat-out comically, with malapropisms in their speech (the bomb is going to explore!), condescending treatment of humans (sending them to human preserves and feeding them milkshakes), general ineptitude (a second alien race is on its way to destroy Earth because a Boov technician accidentally sent them a recording of an offensive children's song), and odd affinities (they like to wear oranges on their feet). They don't have much to offer in the way of deep philosophical insights about the meaning of time, and they actually don't have such a hard time understanding things the way humans do. Instead, the similarities I see between the Boov and the Tralfamadorians are more tangential, including passing references and stylistic features.
The main passage of SH5 that made me become literarily unstuck and jump to Rex's book was where the Tralfamadorians react to Billy's inspiring speech about everyone living in harmony. The adorable little gloved plungers close their hands over their eyes because Billy has just said something very stupid; they then explain that they themselves are actually more dangerous to the galaxy than humans are, since they destroy the universe while testing new fuels for their flying saucers. Specifically, a Tralfamadorian test pilot presses a starter button and the whole universe disappears.
This passage reminded me of the Boov's own mishaps in space exploration, featuring a Koobish (a type of alien livestock used as a test animal) named Peeches who leans on the Big Red Button Labeled NO, leading to the complete loss of the mission... sort of. I can't tell you what happens to it without spoiling things.
Okay, okay, so maybe not a big connection; just pressing buttons and making bad things happen. But this at least got me thinking about some other connections. Both species view humans as animals, placing them in zoos or herding them off to preserves in Arizona. Both try to focus on the happy parts of life and block out sadness, failure, and mistakes, and yet both are also somewhat defeatist and realize when they can't change something; the Tralfamadorians' destruction of the universe and the Boov losing control of Earth against the invading Gorog. Throw in some weird technology and an astounding number of sexes, and you can see where I might be getting ideas about these two being related somehow.
Since Adam Rex wrote Smekday much later than Kurt Vonnegut wrote SH5, I'll assume a non-Tralfamadorian concept of time and conclude that Adam Rex hid some Vonnegut references throughout his book, and if I go back and read it again, I'll probably find more than just the ones I immediately remembered while going through SH5.
Of course, I could email Adam Rex and ask him about this. He seems like the kind of guy who would answer email from fans.
As one last interesting note, The True Meaning of Smekday is being made into a Dreamworks animated movie. I'm sure they'll ruin it. For one thing, they've retitled it Home (can people really not handle "smek"?) and J.Lo has been possibly been renamed "Oh", perhaps because the female human known as "J. Lo" has been cast as Gratuity's mother, and it would be confusing (BUT OH SO HILARIOUSLY METAFICTIONAL!!!) to have Jim Parson's character share a name with his costar--especially since in the book there is a brief exchange where Gratuity points out that J.Lo is the name of a human actress.
I wonder what they'll do with the parts where J.Lo (the alien) directly adresses the reader to explain certain aspects of Boov history and culture through comic strips?
Basically, if they stay true to the book, it will probably not be popular with a general audience (due to sheer weirdness) but will become a cult classic kids' film. If they try to tone it down a bit, it will be the usual bland silliness you expect from an animated movie that tries to be new and different.
Anyway... I'm judgmental about movies. And Smekday is great. Go read it.
As I read through Slaughterhouse-Five, I couldn't help but notice that the Tralfamadorians have some stylistic similarities to an alien species I had encountered before: the Boov from Adam Rex's middle-grade/young-adult novel The True Meaning of Smekday, which to this day remains one of the few books I have read more than once. That's how good it is. Adam Rex writes some weeeeeiiiiiird kids' books. But they're really good. He also illustrates them.
Smekday involves a girl named Gratuity, a cat named pig, and a (male) alien named J.Lo traveling in a (hovering) car called Slushious. Needless to say, it's not all that serious of a book.
The Boov (pronounced Bo-o-ov, according to the alien character who is rather rude in his ignorance of the International Phonetic Alphabet) don't have much of a direct relationship to the Tralfamadorians except for glovelike body parts and a general theme of lavatory about their appearance. They don't live in the fourth dimension; they don't see everything all at once; they don't say "So it goes". The Boov are presented flat-out comically, with malapropisms in their speech (the bomb is going to explore!), condescending treatment of humans (sending them to human preserves and feeding them milkshakes), general ineptitude (a second alien race is on its way to destroy Earth because a Boov technician accidentally sent them a recording of an offensive children's song), and odd affinities (they like to wear oranges on their feet). They don't have much to offer in the way of deep philosophical insights about the meaning of time, and they actually don't have such a hard time understanding things the way humans do. Instead, the similarities I see between the Boov and the Tralfamadorians are more tangential, including passing references and stylistic features.
The main passage of SH5 that made me become literarily unstuck and jump to Rex's book was where the Tralfamadorians react to Billy's inspiring speech about everyone living in harmony. The adorable little gloved plungers close their hands over their eyes because Billy has just said something very stupid; they then explain that they themselves are actually more dangerous to the galaxy than humans are, since they destroy the universe while testing new fuels for their flying saucers. Specifically, a Tralfamadorian test pilot presses a starter button and the whole universe disappears.
This passage reminded me of the Boov's own mishaps in space exploration, featuring a Koobish (a type of alien livestock used as a test animal) named Peeches who leans on the Big Red Button Labeled NO, leading to the complete loss of the mission... sort of. I can't tell you what happens to it without spoiling things.
Okay, okay, so maybe not a big connection; just pressing buttons and making bad things happen. But this at least got me thinking about some other connections. Both species view humans as animals, placing them in zoos or herding them off to preserves in Arizona. Both try to focus on the happy parts of life and block out sadness, failure, and mistakes, and yet both are also somewhat defeatist and realize when they can't change something; the Tralfamadorians' destruction of the universe and the Boov losing control of Earth against the invading Gorog. Throw in some weird technology and an astounding number of sexes, and you can see where I might be getting ideas about these two being related somehow.
Since Adam Rex wrote Smekday much later than Kurt Vonnegut wrote SH5, I'll assume a non-Tralfamadorian concept of time and conclude that Adam Rex hid some Vonnegut references throughout his book, and if I go back and read it again, I'll probably find more than just the ones I immediately remembered while going through SH5.
Of course, I could email Adam Rex and ask him about this. He seems like the kind of guy who would answer email from fans.
As one last interesting note, The True Meaning of Smekday is being made into a Dreamworks animated movie. I'm sure they'll ruin it. For one thing, they've retitled it Home (can people really not handle "smek"?) and J.Lo has been possibly been renamed "Oh", perhaps because the female human known as "J. Lo" has been cast as Gratuity's mother, and it would be confusing (BUT OH SO HILARIOUSLY METAFICTIONAL!!!) to have Jim Parson's character share a name with his costar--especially since in the book there is a brief exchange where Gratuity points out that J.Lo is the name of a human actress.
I wonder what they'll do with the parts where J.Lo (the alien) directly adresses the reader to explain certain aspects of Boov history and culture through comic strips?
Basically, if they stay true to the book, it will probably not be popular with a general audience (due to sheer weirdness) but will become a cult classic kids' film. If they try to tone it down a bit, it will be the usual bland silliness you expect from an animated movie that tries to be new and different.
Anyway... I'm judgmental about movies. And Smekday is great. Go read it.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Silliness and Science Fiction...
...do they weaken a message?
This blog post mostly consists of me musing and asking you all for answers. Just warning you.
Today in class we questioned whether Vonnegut can tackle issues like war and and the meaning of life while including flying saucers, toilet plungers, and two-bit sci-fi writers. Does the silliness detract from the seriousness?
Just to get that out of the way, I'll just say that I am of the belief that if you can't take a joke about something, you can't take it seriously, either. Vonnegut's writing style panders perfectly to me. This blog post will not focus on the use of humor to discuss serious topics.
Instead, I'm musing about the inclusion of science fiction, or rather why that might set off some peoples' alarm bells for anti-seriousness.
Maybe it's just because I've been raised in a pro-sci-fi household, but I've never really understood why it's sometimes not considered a "serious" genre (example: while researching education issues and methods for a paper sophomore year, I found out that many educators discourage children from reading adventure, fantasy, and sci-fi). I've often found science fiction to be a much more approachable way to tackle tough philosophical issues than through "literary fiction" (poorly defined term... refers to fiction which has nothing outstanding to identify it by except the fact that it is written?) Vonnegut's characters' use of science fiction for reinventing themselves and their world is something I see as entirely valid: science fiction can look at a potential future to try to make sense of the present.
Most of the time, I'm not complaining about sci-fi not being serious--instead, I'm complaining about certain incredibly-non-serious-and-non-sci-fi things being labeled as sci-fi and thus giving it a bad image (John Carter of Mars, James Cameron's Avatar, The Fifth Wave by Rick Yancey, The Host by Stephanie Meyer... the list goes on and on). Are these kinds of works the reason for people disregarding the genre? Too much sex, explosions, Pocahontas, and White Man's Burden in Space obscuring the public's view? I suppose the definition of sci-fi is up for grabs. Here's the one I'll provide: works of fiction that focus on the impact of scientific discoveries and technological developments on society and the human condition. This can be anything from the invention of time travel to newfound political relations with aliens.
Is "real" sci-fi just too weird to appeal to a broader audience? Do the more extrapolated or fantastical elements distance the story too much from the real world? Is it a matter of, "Well, that's someone's imagined future, and they're probably wrong about a bunch of stuff"?
If anyone would like to comment with some reasons why sci-fi is unrelatable or lessens the seriousness of a work's central message, I'd love to hear them. And I promise that I won't give you terrifyingly rabid backlash. I'll give you mild-mannered, constructive backlash.
This blog post mostly consists of me musing and asking you all for answers. Just warning you.
Today in class we questioned whether Vonnegut can tackle issues like war and and the meaning of life while including flying saucers, toilet plungers, and two-bit sci-fi writers. Does the silliness detract from the seriousness?
Just to get that out of the way, I'll just say that I am of the belief that if you can't take a joke about something, you can't take it seriously, either. Vonnegut's writing style panders perfectly to me. This blog post will not focus on the use of humor to discuss serious topics.
Instead, I'm musing about the inclusion of science fiction, or rather why that might set off some peoples' alarm bells for anti-seriousness.
Maybe it's just because I've been raised in a pro-sci-fi household, but I've never really understood why it's sometimes not considered a "serious" genre (example: while researching education issues and methods for a paper sophomore year, I found out that many educators discourage children from reading adventure, fantasy, and sci-fi). I've often found science fiction to be a much more approachable way to tackle tough philosophical issues than through "literary fiction" (poorly defined term... refers to fiction which has nothing outstanding to identify it by except the fact that it is written?) Vonnegut's characters' use of science fiction for reinventing themselves and their world is something I see as entirely valid: science fiction can look at a potential future to try to make sense of the present.
Most of the time, I'm not complaining about sci-fi not being serious--instead, I'm complaining about certain incredibly-non-serious-and-non-sci-fi things being labeled as sci-fi and thus giving it a bad image (John Carter of Mars, James Cameron's Avatar, The Fifth Wave by Rick Yancey, The Host by Stephanie Meyer... the list goes on and on). Are these kinds of works the reason for people disregarding the genre? Too much sex, explosions, Pocahontas, and White Man's Burden in Space obscuring the public's view? I suppose the definition of sci-fi is up for grabs. Here's the one I'll provide: works of fiction that focus on the impact of scientific discoveries and technological developments on society and the human condition. This can be anything from the invention of time travel to newfound political relations with aliens.
Is "real" sci-fi just too weird to appeal to a broader audience? Do the more extrapolated or fantastical elements distance the story too much from the real world? Is it a matter of, "Well, that's someone's imagined future, and they're probably wrong about a bunch of stuff"?
If anyone would like to comment with some reasons why sci-fi is unrelatable or lessens the seriousness of a work's central message, I'd love to hear them. And I promise that I won't give you terrifyingly rabid backlash. I'll give you mild-mannered, constructive backlash.
Thursday, February 6, 2014
The Novel as a Museum Exhibit
Ishmael Reed's Ragtime has an unusual variety of footnotes, images, definitions, citations, newspaper clippings, and other such non-narrative bits thrown in with the somewhat jumbled story. This certainly throws some readers off, and some may find this format to be objectionable, but I actually like the way Reed tells the story. It seems almost like an exhibit at a history museum, where artifacts are displayed next to descriptions of the world they were part of and there is an occasional helpful little placard explaining what the heck some of these things are.
I can think of a few other novels that could be construed as having this layout. One is 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson, which takes advantage of its miscellaneous extra documents to explain some of the technologies and cultural norms present in its science-fiction setting (such as a section from a do-it-yourself book on how to colonize an asteroid).
The other novel, which many more of you have likely heard of, is The Hithchiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. This one is somewhat more structured in its use of extra documentation than 2312, but still: every once in awhile, we get a break from the usual adventures so we can read a section of the eponymous encyclopedia that tells us the wonders of towels, dolphins, mice, the Infinite Improbability Drive, species that are mostly harmless, and Pan-Galactic Gargleblasters.
I happen to like the story + supporting documents approach enough that I've considered using it for one of my own long-term writing projects.
And when I say long-term, I mean long-term.
In sixth grade or so I created a set of characters who I just kept on thinking up stories for (Note "thinking up," not "writing." There are very few finished stories). Thing is, as I got older, my writing style and writing tastes changed, and I kept reimagining not only plotlines but also the themes and setting these characters existed in. If you placed the original characters in a room with their more recent incarnations, they wouldn't recognize each other. Or be able to breathe the same atmosphere, for that matter.
Here's the short explanation of the premise: The current rendition (unfinished, as always) features two sentient alien species living in a major political mess on a large moon orbiting a gas giant in a distant solar system. Then one day, a human spaceship discovers their civilization, and the political mess just gets worse. Some characters are trying to use humanity's new diplomatic influence to bring peace to the moon. Others are trying to use humanity's superior technology to bring peace in an entirely different way. And of course, humanity is busy with its own war against a fourth sentient species, and would greatly appreciate any help from its new acquaintances.
Anyway, since I prefer to write in the first person, the problem is: who do I use as a narrator?
The original alien character who's stuck with the story for six years?
The human journalist?
Or one of the other characters involved?
The answer is Yes.
It's potentially confusing (Mumbo Jumbo certainly is), but ideally I'd throw in a couple of historical documents and narrator's notes into the story. The original alien character would be primary narrator; after all, he's sort of the center of attention. The journalist can be passed off as the document's translator, adding her own notes to explain certain aspects of alien society and even filling in accounts of events she was present at but the alien character wasn't. And to give human readers the full story, she'll include a number of historical documents from the time.
Gimmicky? Sort of. But does it accomplish what I'm looking for? Yes.
That's probably similar to what went through Ishmael Reed's head when he was deciding what "extras" to add into Mumbo Jumbo.*
*which, I must point out, I have found to be far less confusing than Mr. Mitchell's warnings suggested it would be.
I can think of a few other novels that could be construed as having this layout. One is 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson, which takes advantage of its miscellaneous extra documents to explain some of the technologies and cultural norms present in its science-fiction setting (such as a section from a do-it-yourself book on how to colonize an asteroid).
The other novel, which many more of you have likely heard of, is The Hithchiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. This one is somewhat more structured in its use of extra documentation than 2312, but still: every once in awhile, we get a break from the usual adventures so we can read a section of the eponymous encyclopedia that tells us the wonders of towels, dolphins, mice, the Infinite Improbability Drive, species that are mostly harmless, and Pan-Galactic Gargleblasters.
I happen to like the story + supporting documents approach enough that I've considered using it for one of my own long-term writing projects.
And when I say long-term, I mean long-term.
In sixth grade or so I created a set of characters who I just kept on thinking up stories for (Note "thinking up," not "writing." There are very few finished stories). Thing is, as I got older, my writing style and writing tastes changed, and I kept reimagining not only plotlines but also the themes and setting these characters existed in. If you placed the original characters in a room with their more recent incarnations, they wouldn't recognize each other. Or be able to breathe the same atmosphere, for that matter.
Here's the short explanation of the premise: The current rendition (unfinished, as always) features two sentient alien species living in a major political mess on a large moon orbiting a gas giant in a distant solar system. Then one day, a human spaceship discovers their civilization, and the political mess just gets worse. Some characters are trying to use humanity's new diplomatic influence to bring peace to the moon. Others are trying to use humanity's superior technology to bring peace in an entirely different way. And of course, humanity is busy with its own war against a fourth sentient species, and would greatly appreciate any help from its new acquaintances.
Anyway, since I prefer to write in the first person, the problem is: who do I use as a narrator?
The original alien character who's stuck with the story for six years?
The human journalist?
Or one of the other characters involved?
The answer is Yes.
It's potentially confusing (Mumbo Jumbo certainly is), but ideally I'd throw in a couple of historical documents and narrator's notes into the story. The original alien character would be primary narrator; after all, he's sort of the center of attention. The journalist can be passed off as the document's translator, adding her own notes to explain certain aspects of alien society and even filling in accounts of events she was present at but the alien character wasn't. And to give human readers the full story, she'll include a number of historical documents from the time.
Gimmicky? Sort of. But does it accomplish what I'm looking for? Yes.
That's probably similar to what went through Ishmael Reed's head when he was deciding what "extras" to add into Mumbo Jumbo.*
*which, I must point out, I have found to be far less confusing than Mr. Mitchell's warnings suggested it would be.
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Doctorow, Mieville, Oblivion, and the art of Homagiarism
Homagiarism (ɒmɨdʒərɪzɨm) - n. The act of ripping off someone else for your own creative purposes.
In Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow took the name and basic story arc for Coalhouse Walker, Jr. from a novel written a century and a half earlier by German author Heinrich von Kleist. Is that even legal?
Well, yes.
But is it okay? Is there something wrong with Ragtime because it uses someone else's plot? I understand that there are those of you who say that there are no original ideas in fiction, and postmodernists can probably barf up some stuff along the lines of "does it really matter that someone else wrote it first?", but still: Doctorow used someone else's material. This is something that can be great in some circumstances, and terrible in others. Let's view this dichotomy through two examples.
Some people evidently like to reread the same plot over and over again. Some people evidently think that transpositions are the best way to get kids to read/watch fuddy-duddy old works of fiction like Shakespeare. I am not one of those people.
However, CM gets away with his use of HM's premise because 1) he throws in plenty of his own stuff on top of it, and 2) he puts a clever twist on the end of the Ahab vs Moby plotline (I can't explain it without spoiling a great part of the book... but it's clever). In fact, with pirates, monsters, weird technology, and a search for the edge of the earth, good old Moby-Dick gets so deeply buried that you don't notice it's there.
CM homagiarized correctly by taking a premise and plot as things to modify and build off of. Now we look at an example of how homagiarism can go very, very badly.
The Phantom Menace, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Dune, Planet of the Apes, Tron, 2012, Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Portal, Gattaca, Independence Day, Wall-E, Top Gun, The Matrix, Logan's Run.
I HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN ALL OF THOSE FILMS (or played that video game), AND I STILL CAUGHT THE REFERENCES! Oblivion takes the most iconic scenes/ideas/props/sets/voices from these works and jams them together into one big, sad excuse for science fiction. The problem is that there is very little (if any) original content to pad the references, and all of the homagarized bits are taken almost exactly in their original forms--no clever twists here.
Granted, there was one reference that I actually thought was clever: the slanted Statue of Liberty from Planet of the Apes. This was okay for two reasons: 1) it is probably the most recognizable post-apocalyptic image of all, and 2) it shows up for just a moment--they fly past it during a chase scene.
Didn't his highschool librarian tell him to always cite his sources?
PS: Interestingly enough, both Railsea and Oblivion are metafiction! The narrator of Railsea occasionally interjects to comment on the progress of the story, and Oblivion's innumerous references ensure that the viewer is constantly reminded: "Hey, I saw that in a sci-fi film once--OH WAIT: THIS IS A SCI-FI* FILM! OMG LOL." (or something like that). Additionally, the inclusion of Tom Cruise's sunglasses from Top Gun remind the viewer that the character onscreen is really just Tom Cruise putting on a persona.
*I do not endorse the labeling of Oblivion as science fiction.
In Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow took the name and basic story arc for Coalhouse Walker, Jr. from a novel written a century and a half earlier by German author Heinrich von Kleist. Is that even legal?
Well, yes.
But is it okay? Is there something wrong with Ragtime because it uses someone else's plot? I understand that there are those of you who say that there are no original ideas in fiction, and postmodernists can probably barf up some stuff along the lines of "does it really matter that someone else wrote it first?", but still: Doctorow used someone else's material. This is something that can be great in some circumstances, and terrible in others. Let's view this dichotomy through two examples.
RAILSEA
This young-adult novel by China Mieville takes cues from a very recognizable source: Moby-Dick. The most obvious reference is that there's a captain who lost an appendage and gained a vendetta in a harpoon battle with a large white animal. At first, the book seems to be a rewrite of Herman Melville's (note Melville, not Mieville; I'll call them CM and HM so you don't get confused) novel set in a thoroughly weird universe of endless expanses of railroads and overgrown subterranean mammals. This is not exactly a striking new concept in the world of fiction; anything that was ever famous spawned remakes (or at least sales pitches) as "xyz IN SPACE!" or "xyz AT A MODERN HIGH SCHOOL!" or "xyz UNDER THE SEA!" or "xyz ON AN AIRPLANE!" (or in the case of Airport '77, on an airplane under the sea).Some people evidently like to reread the same plot over and over again. Some people evidently think that transpositions are the best way to get kids to read/watch fuddy-duddy old works of fiction like Shakespeare. I am not one of those people.
However, CM gets away with his use of HM's premise because 1) he throws in plenty of his own stuff on top of it, and 2) he puts a clever twist on the end of the Ahab vs Moby plotline (I can't explain it without spoiling a great part of the book... but it's clever). In fact, with pirates, monsters, weird technology, and a search for the edge of the earth, good old Moby-Dick gets so deeply buried that you don't notice it's there.
CM homagiarized correctly by taking a premise and plot as things to modify and build off of. Now we look at an example of how homagiarism can go very, very badly.
OBLIVION
I watched this movie without knowing that it was meant to homage just about everything, so my initial reaction was that it had no original content whatsoever. Even now that I know that all of the ripped-off scenes were entirely intentional, it seems like a dumb idea. Here's a list of all the works I noticed were referenced (all were caught on my first time viewing the film; they aren't buried too deeply.)The Phantom Menace, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Dune, Planet of the Apes, Tron, 2012, Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Portal, Gattaca, Independence Day, Wall-E, Top Gun, The Matrix, Logan's Run.
I HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN ALL OF THOSE FILMS (or played that video game), AND I STILL CAUGHT THE REFERENCES! Oblivion takes the most iconic scenes/ideas/props/sets/voices from these works and jams them together into one big, sad excuse for science fiction. The problem is that there is very little (if any) original content to pad the references, and all of the homagarized bits are taken almost exactly in their original forms--no clever twists here.
Granted, there was one reference that I actually thought was clever: the slanted Statue of Liberty from Planet of the Apes. This was okay for two reasons: 1) it is probably the most recognizable post-apocalyptic image of all, and 2) it shows up for just a moment--they fly past it during a chase scene.
RAGTIME
So does Doctorow get away with it? Does he have a good example of homagiarism? His transposition of von Kleists' story is pretty straightforward, but it's intertwined with other stories in the novel. In the end, the thing that makes Doctorow's homagiarism acceptable is that the source he takes "influence" from is not widely known. For one thing, it doesn't automatically trigger something in our brain that says, "Hey, wait a minute! They already did that in (insert fiction here)!". But it also makes it clear that Doctorow is not just using the homagiarized story to try and jump on a bandwagon; it's not, "This was popular, so let's remake it" (ahem*Michael Bay*ahem), it's "Hm. This is an interesting story. I bet I could use it somehow...". It seems like a more genuine form of reuse... though maybe Doctorow could have at least mentioned in a preface or end note that he used von Kleist's story?Didn't his highschool librarian tell him to always cite his sources?
PS: Interestingly enough, both Railsea and Oblivion are metafiction! The narrator of Railsea occasionally interjects to comment on the progress of the story, and Oblivion's innumerous references ensure that the viewer is constantly reminded: "Hey, I saw that in a sci-fi film once--OH WAIT: THIS IS A SCI-FI* FILM! OMG LOL." (or something like that). Additionally, the inclusion of Tom Cruise's sunglasses from Top Gun remind the viewer that the character onscreen is really just Tom Cruise putting on a persona.
*I do not endorse the labeling of Oblivion as science fiction.
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
The Wrong Bird, and What is Allowed to be Fictional
So there I am, reading chapter 10, when all of a sudden Doctorow starts talking about the Eskimos eating auks and fulmars. Then he mentions auklets. My bird brain immediately starts nitpicking.
There are no, and never have been, auklets on the East Coast.
In fact, there are only two birds that could be called "auks" in the Atlantic Ocean, and one of them (the razorbill) can't really be described as "small and inoffensive", leaving us with only one possibility for what Doctorow is referring to: the dovekie (Alle alle), which is technically neither an auk nor an auklet. Sure enough, there is an Inuit dish that involves packing hundreds of dovekies into sealskins and letting them ferment, as mentioned in Ragtime.
But who calls the dovekie an auklet?
Near as I can tell, one source. From 1919, which based on ngrams is about the time that the word "auklet" really caught on in literature. This particular source only uses the word "auklet" once, while the rest of the time it uses the term dovekie. The autobiography of Peary's assistant, Donald Baxter MacMillan, uses the terms little auk, dovekie, ice bird, rotch, and bullbird, but not auklet.
So take that, E.L. Doctorow! You used the wrong name for the bird!
...but why the heck am I more hung up about the word auklet (putting my obvious ornithological obsessions aside), than, say, the fact that Freud and Jung take a boat together through the Tunnel of Love? What if E.L. Doctorow actually had his taxonomy straight and meant to have west coast seabirds getting eaten by Eskimos in Greenland? Is that more implausible than anything else in the book?
Well, not really. But it would definitely seem to be more fictional, since it doesn't appear intentional.
If Doctorow has a historical figure do something we have no proof they ever did, it's part of the story. He's in full control of the characters' actions. The places they go actually exist. The cars the ride in are the kind of cars people would have ridden in (fun fact: electric cars were actually pretty common before gasoline engines got quiet and efficient enough to be practical). There's plenty of real history (Stanford White's murder, Evelyn Nesbit having a connection to anarchists, views on unions, etc) thrown in to fit the story we know--Ragtime could have happened, it's just in between the parts of history that got written down.
Auklets (real auklets, not dovekies) on the east coast would be perfectly fine if this were surrealist or alternate history. But since everything else is (reasonably) tightly conforming to the real world, it would just seem out of place. With historical figures, Doctorow can say "Yeah, I'm making this stuff up, but it could have happened," but auklets on the east coast would be "Oh, and by the way--I'm disregarding some aspects of nature, just 'cause."
This might just be my science fiction brain talking, but it seems that the author can make up anything that truly matters to the story, while passing details have to stick closer to fact. The line between fiction and BS lies in whether or not the made-up stuff is gratuitous.
I apologize to anyone who is a fan of surrealism.
-----------------
Miscellany:
There are no, and never have been, auklets on the East Coast.
In fact, there are only two birds that could be called "auks" in the Atlantic Ocean, and one of them (the razorbill) can't really be described as "small and inoffensive", leaving us with only one possibility for what Doctorow is referring to: the dovekie (Alle alle), which is technically neither an auk nor an auklet. Sure enough, there is an Inuit dish that involves packing hundreds of dovekies into sealskins and letting them ferment, as mentioned in Ragtime.
But who calls the dovekie an auklet?
Near as I can tell, one source. From 1919, which based on ngrams is about the time that the word "auklet" really caught on in literature. This particular source only uses the word "auklet" once, while the rest of the time it uses the term dovekie. The autobiography of Peary's assistant, Donald Baxter MacMillan, uses the terms little auk, dovekie, ice bird, rotch, and bullbird, but not auklet.
So take that, E.L. Doctorow! You used the wrong name for the bird!
...but why the heck am I more hung up about the word auklet (putting my obvious ornithological obsessions aside), than, say, the fact that Freud and Jung take a boat together through the Tunnel of Love? What if E.L. Doctorow actually had his taxonomy straight and meant to have west coast seabirds getting eaten by Eskimos in Greenland? Is that more implausible than anything else in the book?
Well, not really. But it would definitely seem to be more fictional, since it doesn't appear intentional.
If Doctorow has a historical figure do something we have no proof they ever did, it's part of the story. He's in full control of the characters' actions. The places they go actually exist. The cars the ride in are the kind of cars people would have ridden in (fun fact: electric cars were actually pretty common before gasoline engines got quiet and efficient enough to be practical). There's plenty of real history (Stanford White's murder, Evelyn Nesbit having a connection to anarchists, views on unions, etc) thrown in to fit the story we know--Ragtime could have happened, it's just in between the parts of history that got written down.
Auklets (real auklets, not dovekies) on the east coast would be perfectly fine if this were surrealist or alternate history. But since everything else is (reasonably) tightly conforming to the real world, it would just seem out of place. With historical figures, Doctorow can say "Yeah, I'm making this stuff up, but it could have happened," but auklets on the east coast would be "Oh, and by the way--I'm disregarding some aspects of nature, just 'cause."
This might just be my science fiction brain talking, but it seems that the author can make up anything that truly matters to the story, while passing details have to stick closer to fact. The line between fiction and BS lies in whether or not the made-up stuff is gratuitous.
I apologize to anyone who is a fan of surrealism.
-----------------
Miscellany:
- Taxonomy tip: Fulmars look like gulls, but aren't actually related to them. Alcids (auks, auklets, murres, guillemots, puffins, etc) look nothing like gulls, but are pretty closely related to them.
- Don't look up pictures of dovekies. If you do, you will never be able to forgive Peary, Father, and the Eskimos for being heartless killers.
- The described way of killing "auks" is probably accurate. I mean, you'd die too if a giant hand wrapped around you and stopped your heart from beating. It's like the five point palm exploding heart technique for birds.
- The Eskimo dish involving pickled "auk" is called kiviaq.
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
The Split
Posts older than this one pertain to the 20th Century Novel. Posts more recent than this one pertain to History as Fiction. Just so you know.
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