(no subject)
Dec. 1st, 2013 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. Finished the romance novel by Megan McKinney entitled When Angels Fall - which reminded me a great deal of Wuthering Heights except not as well written (obviously), and with more likable characters and a happier ending (basically the Heathcliff and Cathy characters end up living happily ever after - come on it's a romance novel, that's a given.)
Have you ever considered it interesting how classic novels have create tropes which are endlessly copied by writers across decades? Or in some cases, modern writers will decide to take various characters from the classic novel and write a story about them and publish it (aka literary fanfic). Examples of literary fanfic include: Mr. March, Ahab's Wife, The Wide Sargasso Sea, and Austenland. Actually there's quite a bit of Jane Austen inspired literary fanfic, particularly in regards to Pride and Prejudice - to the extent that it could almost be its own literary sub-genre. I do not however know of any related to Wuthering Heights, although that does not mean it does not exist. With few exceptions - Mr. March, Ahab's Wife, and The Wide Sargasso Sea, most literary fanfic tends to be a tad forgettable.
Wuthering Heights does have quite a few copy-cats though - so many, it's created its own gothic sub-genre or trope. So too for that matter has Jane Eyre. I'm pretty sure the trope did not exist prior to these works of art - which makes them actually timely and extraordinary regardless of whether you liked them or not. (I personally find both to be a bit on the ponderous side, lacking wit, and overly tragic, but I guess if you are a satirical bent - you might find the humor buried in their somewhere. Of the two - I prefer Jane Eyre, mainly because Jane and Rochester were likable and seemed to rise above their problems. Heathcliff and Cathy's moping just got on my nerves after a while. At any rate, I'm clearly in the minority on this - because both are quite popular. It should be noted, I'm not fond of literature written during the Victorian Age - it was my least favorite literary period, well that and Colonial Times and the Middle Ages. I did however like the literature prior to the Victorian Age quite a bit, and what came after it. I think it was all those repressed sexuality and heaving bosoms, and oh, oh, I can't have sex with you because that would be improper - or for that matter expose the inside of my wrist - because clearly that's the same thing. The Puritans clearly had a lasting effect on the English.)
The book was okay, typical Kindle read with lots of typos, one gets used to it after a bit. But keeping in mind I'm not a fan of the trope, the characters got on my nerves after a while, I kept wanting to smack one or both of them upside the head.
2. Romance novels do an excellent job of exposing and exploring the rape trope in fiction - possibly better than any other novel out there. What they show is how sex is used as weapon between the genders. Men often used it as a way to suppress or oppress women. Because historically, not so much now - depending on where you live, a woman's sexual background defined her prospects, her career choices and well whether she survived. Virginity was a valuable commodity. The rational for this - appears to be procreation. Ie. - you can only tell if the kid is the guy's if you know for certain he was the only one having sex with her. (Remember they didn't always have paternity tests...or even blood tests. And blood type doesn't always work - if everyone has the same type. Sometimes they went by genetic traits, skin color, ears, eye color, hair color - which aren't that reliable either - considering it could be an inherited trait from a prior generation.) Now of course you know who the mother is, but it wasn't always that easy to figure out the father. Add to this - that birth control wasn't exactly always available, and a lot of women died in childbirth. Plus, there were women who got pregnant every time they had sex. (My grandmother had this problem - which resulted in 11 kids...the rhythm method doesn't always work and she was, ahem, old school Catholic.) So the whole virginity bit was important. It was also important to be married before you had sex - because if you got pregnant - you wanted to be certain the kid would be protected by the father's name and get provided for. If you weren't - the father could ignore the kid. Women and children were not always provided for and in certain periods of history had no rights. (Yes, the male gender has a lot to answer for historically speaking. To say they haven't handled the mantle of power well would be a gross understatement.) This stuff, believe it or not is still in the law books - women and children were considered back in the 1800s and early 1900s to be little more than property.
So women had no rights. And little to no power - their only power was to say no, to resist, and to fight as much as possible back. Romance novels are often about someone who has no rights fighting to resist the party who has them or at least finding a way to co-exist or compromise. And the ways women assert their power - is rather interesting.
Rape - is often done by a male hero and/or villain - intent on proving his power, prowess, or superiority to the woman in these novels. He fails by the way. All he accomplishes is a)losing her and having to work really hard to get her back again, b)losing his self-respect
or c)losing ground in their relationship. His exertion of power by penis doesn't appear to work as he expects it to - and often backfires. If she caves, she finds a way of manipulating him with sex or the withholding of it to get what she wants. Sex becomes a power-play. But in no way, in romance novels, does rape weaken the woman or irretrievably hurt her or turn her into a victim. If anything she rises above it and it weakens the man or rapist - which is how it should be. Also, in many cases he is not demonized as a rapist, but as being weak and unable to control his impulses, and she is the stronger party.
As an aside, regarding rape, which is an impossible topic to discuss online in any capacity because it upsets many people and quite righteously, I may add. It is possible to like a fictional character who commits the crime of rape without condoning or favoring the crime. You can actually like characters without condoning what they do - I know this can be difficult to understand, but there it is.
One of my issues with fandom is the inability a lot of fans have of understanding this concept. For some reason, they can't wrap their heads around the fact that you can find aspects of tv series, book, writer, etc extremely offensive, yet still love the writer, series, etc - without necessarily condoning any of those things.
For example? You may find Orson Scott Card's diatribes about homosexuality offensive (seriously, who doesn't? Don't tell me), but still enjoy and love Enders Game and that series, as well as the movie. Just as you may love Virginia Woolf or Flannery O'Connor's work, even though she was a blatant racist. Or you may love the characters of Spike and Angel, even though both were self-professed rapists, serial killers, and torturers at various periods in their character's histories. You can also, likewise, love the Buffy/Spike or Buffy/Angel relationships despite these items. Loving Spuffy and wanting them to end up together, happily ever after canonically or non-canonically after S6 - doesn't mean you condone rape, any more than loving Homeland means you condone racism or loving Breaking Bad means you condone violence and drug dealing. Just as loving boddice ripper romance novels, or erotica or 50 Shades of Gray doesn't mean you condone what occurs in those novels or want to be with a man or woman like that. You can love Twilight and hate or even be oblivious to its themes. It's possible. We can think and feel multiple things at once. Why don't people get that? I think the reason is - that people tend to react emotionally to what they see, and don't think it through. I know when I'm in a rage or rant over something or other, regardless of it is - it is impossible for me to think rationally about it. I'll often think - you have to be an insane nut job to love that! But I'm admittedly not rational as I'm thinking this.
3. Watched Reign - eh, not holding my interest. I keep getting distracted by the fact that Portugese Prince is permitted to speak Portugese and have an accent, and also look Portugese, while the French and Scottish basically sound and look like they all hailed from London, England by way of the Royal Shakespeare Academy. Oh well, it could be worse, they could all sound like Americans. I can't help but wonder what people in France must think of this series? Also, France looks quite a bit like Canada.
See, my suspension of disbelief is weird. I have no problems with the blatant historical inaccuracies, mainly because I didn't memorize that part of history - so can't remember. If it was the Revolutionary War or the Civil War or World War II - that would be another story (those I have memorized). But the fact that everyone acts and sounds like they are from England - to the point that I can't tell who the English bad-guys are supposed to be (apparently anyone with certain style of beard?) - except for the guy from Portugal, bugs me.
How hard would it be to find a few attractive French or French Canadian actors? There has to be a couple out there hunting a job?
I'm thinking of giving up on it. I don't care about anyone. And the politics is sort of silly. Game of Thrones this isn't.
Have you ever considered it interesting how classic novels have create tropes which are endlessly copied by writers across decades? Or in some cases, modern writers will decide to take various characters from the classic novel and write a story about them and publish it (aka literary fanfic). Examples of literary fanfic include: Mr. March, Ahab's Wife, The Wide Sargasso Sea, and Austenland. Actually there's quite a bit of Jane Austen inspired literary fanfic, particularly in regards to Pride and Prejudice - to the extent that it could almost be its own literary sub-genre. I do not however know of any related to Wuthering Heights, although that does not mean it does not exist. With few exceptions - Mr. March, Ahab's Wife, and The Wide Sargasso Sea, most literary fanfic tends to be a tad forgettable.
Wuthering Heights does have quite a few copy-cats though - so many, it's created its own gothic sub-genre or trope. So too for that matter has Jane Eyre. I'm pretty sure the trope did not exist prior to these works of art - which makes them actually timely and extraordinary regardless of whether you liked them or not. (I personally find both to be a bit on the ponderous side, lacking wit, and overly tragic, but I guess if you are a satirical bent - you might find the humor buried in their somewhere. Of the two - I prefer Jane Eyre, mainly because Jane and Rochester were likable and seemed to rise above their problems. Heathcliff and Cathy's moping just got on my nerves after a while. At any rate, I'm clearly in the minority on this - because both are quite popular. It should be noted, I'm not fond of literature written during the Victorian Age - it was my least favorite literary period, well that and Colonial Times and the Middle Ages. I did however like the literature prior to the Victorian Age quite a bit, and what came after it. I think it was all those repressed sexuality and heaving bosoms, and oh, oh, I can't have sex with you because that would be improper - or for that matter expose the inside of my wrist - because clearly that's the same thing. The Puritans clearly had a lasting effect on the English.)
The book was okay, typical Kindle read with lots of typos, one gets used to it after a bit. But keeping in mind I'm not a fan of the trope, the characters got on my nerves after a while, I kept wanting to smack one or both of them upside the head.
2. Romance novels do an excellent job of exposing and exploring the rape trope in fiction - possibly better than any other novel out there. What they show is how sex is used as weapon between the genders. Men often used it as a way to suppress or oppress women. Because historically, not so much now - depending on where you live, a woman's sexual background defined her prospects, her career choices and well whether she survived. Virginity was a valuable commodity. The rational for this - appears to be procreation. Ie. - you can only tell if the kid is the guy's if you know for certain he was the only one having sex with her. (Remember they didn't always have paternity tests...or even blood tests. And blood type doesn't always work - if everyone has the same type. Sometimes they went by genetic traits, skin color, ears, eye color, hair color - which aren't that reliable either - considering it could be an inherited trait from a prior generation.) Now of course you know who the mother is, but it wasn't always that easy to figure out the father. Add to this - that birth control wasn't exactly always available, and a lot of women died in childbirth. Plus, there were women who got pregnant every time they had sex. (My grandmother had this problem - which resulted in 11 kids...the rhythm method doesn't always work and she was, ahem, old school Catholic.) So the whole virginity bit was important. It was also important to be married before you had sex - because if you got pregnant - you wanted to be certain the kid would be protected by the father's name and get provided for. If you weren't - the father could ignore the kid. Women and children were not always provided for and in certain periods of history had no rights. (Yes, the male gender has a lot to answer for historically speaking. To say they haven't handled the mantle of power well would be a gross understatement.) This stuff, believe it or not is still in the law books - women and children were considered back in the 1800s and early 1900s to be little more than property.
So women had no rights. And little to no power - their only power was to say no, to resist, and to fight as much as possible back. Romance novels are often about someone who has no rights fighting to resist the party who has them or at least finding a way to co-exist or compromise. And the ways women assert their power - is rather interesting.
Rape - is often done by a male hero and/or villain - intent on proving his power, prowess, or superiority to the woman in these novels. He fails by the way. All he accomplishes is a)losing her and having to work really hard to get her back again, b)losing his self-respect
or c)losing ground in their relationship. His exertion of power by penis doesn't appear to work as he expects it to - and often backfires. If she caves, she finds a way of manipulating him with sex or the withholding of it to get what she wants. Sex becomes a power-play. But in no way, in romance novels, does rape weaken the woman or irretrievably hurt her or turn her into a victim. If anything she rises above it and it weakens the man or rapist - which is how it should be. Also, in many cases he is not demonized as a rapist, but as being weak and unable to control his impulses, and she is the stronger party.
As an aside, regarding rape, which is an impossible topic to discuss online in any capacity because it upsets many people and quite righteously, I may add. It is possible to like a fictional character who commits the crime of rape without condoning or favoring the crime. You can actually like characters without condoning what they do - I know this can be difficult to understand, but there it is.
One of my issues with fandom is the inability a lot of fans have of understanding this concept. For some reason, they can't wrap their heads around the fact that you can find aspects of tv series, book, writer, etc extremely offensive, yet still love the writer, series, etc - without necessarily condoning any of those things.
For example? You may find Orson Scott Card's diatribes about homosexuality offensive (seriously, who doesn't? Don't tell me), but still enjoy and love Enders Game and that series, as well as the movie. Just as you may love Virginia Woolf or Flannery O'Connor's work, even though she was a blatant racist. Or you may love the characters of Spike and Angel, even though both were self-professed rapists, serial killers, and torturers at various periods in their character's histories. You can also, likewise, love the Buffy/Spike or Buffy/Angel relationships despite these items. Loving Spuffy and wanting them to end up together, happily ever after canonically or non-canonically after S6 - doesn't mean you condone rape, any more than loving Homeland means you condone racism or loving Breaking Bad means you condone violence and drug dealing. Just as loving boddice ripper romance novels, or erotica or 50 Shades of Gray doesn't mean you condone what occurs in those novels or want to be with a man or woman like that. You can love Twilight and hate or even be oblivious to its themes. It's possible. We can think and feel multiple things at once. Why don't people get that? I think the reason is - that people tend to react emotionally to what they see, and don't think it through. I know when I'm in a rage or rant over something or other, regardless of it is - it is impossible for me to think rationally about it. I'll often think - you have to be an insane nut job to love that! But I'm admittedly not rational as I'm thinking this.
3. Watched Reign - eh, not holding my interest. I keep getting distracted by the fact that Portugese Prince is permitted to speak Portugese and have an accent, and also look Portugese, while the French and Scottish basically sound and look like they all hailed from London, England by way of the Royal Shakespeare Academy. Oh well, it could be worse, they could all sound like Americans. I can't help but wonder what people in France must think of this series? Also, France looks quite a bit like Canada.
See, my suspension of disbelief is weird. I have no problems with the blatant historical inaccuracies, mainly because I didn't memorize that part of history - so can't remember. If it was the Revolutionary War or the Civil War or World War II - that would be another story (those I have memorized). But the fact that everyone acts and sounds like they are from England - to the point that I can't tell who the English bad-guys are supposed to be (apparently anyone with certain style of beard?) - except for the guy from Portugal, bugs me.
How hard would it be to find a few attractive French or French Canadian actors? There has to be a couple out there hunting a job?
I'm thinking of giving up on it. I don't care about anyone. And the politics is sort of silly. Game of Thrones this isn't.