stat addicts and niche communities

Today I’m marking four thousand page views on my post Nosferatu. I considered just quietly letting it go by, then I decided I’d rather celebrate. Stuff being understated and humble. It’s exciting. When I first started this blog I really would have been happy with a few views each week. Then, of course, WordPress gradually turns us all into obsessive stats checkers – pressing a little metaphorical bar over and over again for that tiny little fix, like rats in some experiment, dashing our hopes when one day seems to be on a downward trend. It’s Facebook all over again (secretly downcast when there’s no little red number hovering over our notification icon). Reminds me of the closing sequence of the Social Network. Refresh, refresh, refresh (ad infinitum). Anyway, I’m not that bad, and generally only check on stats once a day (honest) but I sometimes find myself checking Facebook waaay too often and think – isn’t there something better to do with my day? Like read War and Peace or something?

Hang on, this was meant to be a celebration, not a rant…

What I really intended to do was write a nice little reflective piece on how far vampires have come since their first shadowy film forays. It would honour the theme of the original Nosferatu post. Perhaps that’s for next week? The good thing about the popularity of this post is that what I thought was a niche interest turns out to be … well, a niche interest. But a niche interest online is a very powerful thing. It’s a little like the feeling of going to New York. You realise that no matter how different you feel you are, there’s bound to be a little community where you fit perfectly. As bloggers it’s these little communities, or tribes, where the real power lies. If we try to pander to the masses we will probably find ourselves lost in the sludge. In Seth Godin’s words, ‘there’s no tribe of normal.’

the only problem is my baby's going to look freaked out in all my iphone photos - carefully-placed happy face sticker?

Blog stats addicted? There’s help:

http://www.blogussion.com/favorites/blogger-not-a-crackhead/

‘If you’re trying to build a tribe, a community or a movement, and you want it to be safe and beyond reproach at the same time, you will fail.’ Seth Godin’s post on ‘normal’:

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/04/there-is-no-tribe-of-normal.html

My serial fiction ‘Indigo’ is now available at Smashwords

Dear readers and random Searchers,
Indigo is now available (still free) on Smashwords for reading in all sorts of devices. You can still get it as a pretty PDF by going to the Indigo page at this blog. So if you feel like a paranormal fiction novella for your e-reading device, you know just where to go:

http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/opheliasfiction

If you go straight to my page you can avoid all the erotica and self-help rants … my story is entirely free from both. There might be some kissing though. Just giving you fair warning. Oh, I know, there’s lots of good stuff on Smashwords. It’s just a matter of finding it.

As you’re all my close personal friends I’d love to hear if you have any feedback on the readability on your particular device. I’ve tried to stick very closely to the Smashwords style guide. Also, any reviews will be very favourably looked upon, even if they’re lukewarm. It’s easy to sink voicelessly into the mysterious depths on a site like Smashwords.

Sharing my writing with an audience has always been one of my goals, so a big thanks to those who have taken the time to read my work! A story isn’t complete until a reader brings it to life.

 

new year’s resolutions

How are those New Year’s Resolutions going?

I put ‘resolutions’ in caps because that’s how they feel. Like big Pronouncements from on High. This year I Shall … Or, I’m Giving Up [insert substance]. Okay, that’s enough of the caps. How many resolutions do we keep? Make them specific and set goals. That’s what the experts say. Perhaps if you’re a writer you could commit to doing 250 words a day? (said in tones of innocent encouragement). That’s not much. Just write any old thing, it’s easy. NO, IT’S NOT EASY. It’s not how my brain works. The whole idea is just bleh. If you’re a writer who can do that, well good on you. I suspect more time writing would just translate to a big nothing much – much like these amusing treadmill cats. Only less amusing.

In fact specific resolutions strike me as a big bag of no fun. This year, instead of a particular resolution, my husband and I came up with a theme for the year. Perseverance. Brick by brick. (By the way, I got that quote from Seabiscuit. An emperor said it apparently, but I have no idea what the original source is – would love to.) So I guess whenever one of us is complaining (no one’s accepting this article, I can’t write good anymore, I’m too busy to blog/write a novel/contribute to the world) the other can just nod sagely and say, ‘brick by brick, brick by brick’.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

On learning Latin

It is a truth universally acknowledged that those with a very young baby are highly unlikely to blog. And yet, in that magical space between the baby falling asleep at nine and me falling asleep at 10.30ish, here I am. For some reason tonight I am thinking (with a fond head-shake) about Latin.

When I got to uni I was dazzled by all the subjects there. It was like a big box of chocolates. Victorian Science and the Supernatural, Great Civilisations, Arthurian Legends. They all beckoned to me alluringly – those lovely crisps readers, just waiting to by filled with yellow highlightings. Am I coming across as a nerd? And, at last, I could learn Latin. Yep. Nerd.

Of course, the reality was not quite what the romance suggested. Many of those learning Latin had the benefit of having it beaten into their heads at school, if benefit is the word. I found it pretty overwhelming. First year Latin required you to cram all the basic grammar and vocab into your head. It was not fun, much as our tutors endeavoured to make it so (by making us sing Carmina Burana to a bellowing tape deck). Maybe Einstein said it best:

“One had to cram all this stuff into one’s mind for the examinations, whether one liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year.”

At the end of the exam period I was feverishly dreaming conjugations and declensions (amo, amas, amat …). I still retained enough enthusiasm to sit through Intermediate Latin and to attend all the tutorials, even though I wasn’t technically enrolled or receiving credit (and no exams, thank god). But I was pig-headedly doing classics as my MA and determined to plod through Livy’s history with my dictionary and grammar book.

I’d realised by that time that the classicists who’d translated the Latin texts had done a much better job than I ever could. Often I would stumble through a translation, creating a halting English version only to read a decent translated version and think Oh! Of course, how elegant! If only I’d thought of putting it like that!

How do I use it now? Well, sometimes I can make out the incantations in Supernatural or Angel. And … Um … yep, that’s it. I should say though that the (somewhat) mad experience of doing a thesis in classics was irreplaceable. I had the joy of teaching. I met wonderful people that I deeply admire. I found a way to instantly winnow out the people I wanted to keep as close friends (when asked what I was studying at BBQs potential friends would say – oh how interesting! Non-potential friends would look blank, if not dismayed, and say – but how do you make a living out of that?). You could even say that the love of classics led to the birth of my beautiful son, thanks to being crammed into a tiny office with my future husband. Oh, and to those nay-sayers at BBQs, I still don’t know how you make a living out of it, but I’m going to bloody enjoy finding out.

Marcus done it.

Children and those sad, sad horse stories…

The upcoming release of War Horse is making me wonder – why are horse movies such tearjerkers? I cried just about all the way through the Horse Whisperer, and I didn’t actually like any of the characters in it, or the way the training was depicted. And then there’s the triumphant, overcoming the odds horse film – Seabiscuit, The Black Stallion, National Velvet – where the horse helps the little man (or girl) make it big.

I’ve loved horses since I was little. Many children seem to love horses. Is there something about horses and their magnificent vulnerability? Their ability to gallop us to glory or reveal our cruel side? Who could forget the moment in Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty (1877) when the equine narrator, now fallen a little lower in life and pulling a cab for hire, meets his old friend Ginger (‘It was Ginger, but how changed!’)?

I said, “You used to stand up for yourself if you were ill-used.” “Ah!” she said, “I did once, but it’s no use; men are strongest, and if they are cruel and have no feeling, there is nothing that we can do, but just bear it — bear it on and on to the end. I wish the end was come, I wish I was dead. I have seen dead horses, and I am sure they do not suffer pain; I wish I may drop down dead at my work, and not be sent off to the knackers.” I was very much troubled, and I put my nose up to hers, but I could say nothing to comfort her. I think she was pleased to see me, for she said, “You are the only friend I ever had.” Just then her driver came up, and with a tug at her mouth backed her out of the line and drove off, leaving me very sad indeed. A short time after this a cart with a dead horse in it passed our cab-stand. The head hung out of the cart-tail, the lifeless tongue was slowly dropping with blood; and the sunken eyes! but I can’t speak of them, the sight was too dreadful. It was a chestnut horse with a long, thin neck. I saw a white streak down the forehead. I believe it was Ginger; I hoped it was, for then her troubles would be over. Oh! if men were more merciful they would shoot us before we came to such misery.

Pretty devastating for what’s generally sold as a children’s book. The novel charted the fall from grace of a beautiful black horse, passed from owner to owner, gradually becoming more physically damaged and going to worse and worse homes, who eventually ends up broken down, starved and scarred. At last he’s taken to a kind home and recognised by his old stable boy. It’s those recognition scenes that really get you. They’re a staple of the tear-jerking horse book. The pathos is almost unbearable.

Painful separation, triumphant reunion, abuse and solace. Children understand – at least in their imagination. They are also often powerless in a world of adults – unable to choose where they go, who looks after them, or what their immediate future will be. They dream of rescuing the horse and the horse rescuing them. Galloping them away, newly powerful and free to make their own way in the world. So that’s what it is with children and those sad, sad horse stories.

Ten lovely minutes from the lovely film, The Black Stallion. The cinematography is truly breathtaking:

http://youtu.be/f1ihzkEFwqE

angels among us …

Can angels fall and become human? It’s a question often asked, at least on answers.yahoo.

Answers.yahoo gives a mixed response, but according to pop culture: yes, totally.

I can’t claim to know much about angels, though I once had a dream that Azrael had opened a doorway to hell on the second floor of my house. The less said about that, the better. My understanding is that, in terms of Christian lore, when angels fall they tend to fall the whole way. Milton’s Paradise Lost is one of the most influential sources for fallen angels (even if you haven’t read it, it’s probably filtered through somehow). His depiction of Satan addressing Beelzebub immediately after the fall is strangely poignant:

‘If thou beest he – but o how fall’n! How changed / From him, who in the happy realms of light / Clothed with transcendent brightness didst outshine / Myriads though bright…’

Angels don’t fall by halves. Another incidental point is that (in traditional thought) humans do not become angels, no matter how good they are. Angels are celestial beings. They are messengers and smiters. They announce God’s will, they slaughter a hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians in a night, they are really pretty terrifying and completely different from humans.

But let’s not let any of that get in the way of a good story.

Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire is one of those good stories. You might be familiar with Wim through the Buena Vista Social Club or Paris, Texas. Wings of Desire follows an angel who falls in love with a woman and wishes to give up his immortality. It was followed by Far Away, So Close the story of Cassiel, another angel who becomes human and has a pretty rough time of it (he’s oddly naïve for a being who’s been watching humans for thousands of years).

Gorbachev has an angel on his shoulder (Cassiel, to be specific)

I often wondered if the character of Castiel on Supernatural was a homage to Wim Wender’s Cassiel, or did one of the writers just happen to see Far Away, So Close on late night TV, forget about it, and think they were creating Castiel in a stroke of genius? I prefer to think the former is true. That a beautiful German film might be filtering through to us in weekly television.

Castiel (note the 't')

Wings of Desire certainly inspired the Nicholas Cage vehicle City of Angels, for better or for worse. A film I never plan to see, I’m afraid. One thing all sources agree on – angels like to wear voluminous overcoats and will very probably take to the bottle when things don’t go their way. Don’t blame me, blame popular culture.

Perhaps these stories are about our desire to be protected from above and also to have angels understand our struggles from the ground. In a way these angels are repeating the tradition of the story of Christ – the divine experiencing the human. The apostasy comes when the angel chooses to remain human – to forever give up the divine in order to ‘attain’ mortal love and experience the slings and arrows of human life with no return to grace promised. You might call it a humanist reworking of Christian beliefs. Or you might just enjoy the story.

Motorcycle accident victim comforted by an angel from Wings of Desire: http://youtu.be/3bZXO_xmnJc

 

 

 

Love and disorder

I really believe that love is unchanging and those who try to set an era for the birth of the modern emotional experience of love are perhaps over simplifying (yes, people write articles about this). The ways of expressing love certainly change with fashion. But how deep is this change? My mother went on an Austen stint during her pregnancies, but I’m afraid I watched the entire series of Supernatural instead. Gen X, hey? However, after a series of late nights up with my baby I’ve finally turned to Austen and the Brontes. Starting to read Pride and Prejudice again put me in mind of the changing views of love and made me wonder – are these changes just veils on the surface?

To modern tastes, Austen can be quite the tease. She spends the entire novel following the trials of Darcy and Elizabeth’s courtship, yet when it comes to the final expression of that love she swiftly and demurely pulls back:

‘[Darcy] expressed himself on the occasion as sensibly and as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to do.’

‘Nuff said, apparently. Fill in the gaps, people. Bronte’s ‘And so, dear reader, I married him’ is another famous moment of literature where we either come over a bit teary or (most likely) wish that we’d been privy to a little more between the lines. Because it’s not likely we’ll take a moment to sit back and fill in those gaps then and there – Austen’s story moves on, no time for romantically dawdling in undisclosed scenes. It’s all back to business.

filling in the gaps BBC-style

I’m pretty sure these characters would have felt the same as us anyway. After all, we all release the same hormones when we’re in love (and many that we share with mammals in general). We haven’t materially evolved since those days of yore. It’s really just the cultural context that’s changed. The trappings, if you like.

The Romans pretty much had love perfectly described. Omnia vincit amor, said Vergil. Love conquers all. Not just all obstacles in its way. That would be pretty romantic. No, omnia here means everything – sanity, good judgment, moral order and even self-respect. The Romans knew love was scary. We know that too.

Love - armed and dangerous

I squished a little spider that had fallen into my baby’s crib the other day. ‘My first murder for Will’, I joked to my husband. Yes, it was a joke, but anyone who’s had a child suddenly senses how vast and dangerous love can be. Maybe that’s why Austen and company so quickly turn away from it – because what does passionate love do to an otherwise orderly society? Causes trouble, that’s what.

supernatural and the dangers of picket fencing

I’m currently in the last few days of my pregnancy and I’m requiring lots of walking, oranges and Supernatural-watching. My mum re-read Jane Austen novels when she was pregnant, so I’m feeling a little low brow. But, if it’s any consolation, I’m bringing a thoughtful approach to my watching …

check the decor!

The thing about viewing back-to-back Supernaturals is that you really notice the set design. Those cheesy motel rooms are fantastic and they tell an architectural story that runs parallel to the main narrative. You start to notice that the boys live in a transient world of kitsch and dated rooms while the people they rescue are generally upper middle American families hemmed in by white picket fences and perfect lawns.

Awesome wallpaper. Dean is clearly stoked.

If you were writing a paper on the topic, you might begin by noting that the Winchesters are defending against the constant threatened destruction of the idealised family unit, driven by the disintegration of their own family. But who’s writing a paper? Not me. I’m much too lazy right now. Occasionally the brothers get drawn in to the dream of the white picket fence (Dean gets a lot of love from those upwardly mobile single mums) but for the most part they are homeless, drifting through a weird world of past decors suggesting more carefree times that have fallen off the tracks (optimistic 50s and 60s wall papers, disco themed rooms with mirrored ceilings, hunting lodge hokiness – more innocent times of yore. Yes, even the mirrored ceiling carries a sense of nostalgia).

Hunting lodge chic

American Gothic considers what happens behind the white picket fences. The settings of traditional gothic fiction often reflect the emotional states that occur within them – cemeteries, dungeons, labyrinths, but the gothic genre (old and new) also situates the danger in a seemingly safe setting (traditionally the bedrooms of young women, the bridal suite or the convent). Supernatural continues this theme, with the family unit being in constant danger of destruction or infiltration and the illusion of safety in material comfort constantly undermined.

Knowingly or unknowingly – these themes permeate many TV series, often answering the question – small towns – what’s going on there? Jam-making and embroidering – I think not! (At least, that’s the position of the gothic). You only need to think of Twin Peaks, American Gothic and True Blood.

The king of ominous interior decorating is probably David Lynch.

Apparently, the prettier things look, the more suspicious we get. Although the interiors Sam and Dean frequent are pretty crumby, there’s a kind of authenticity to their crumbiness. It’s when you see that creamy picket fence that you’d better start running.

PHOTO LINKS:

http://caffienekitty.livejournal.com/208699.html

http://damselundistressed.wordpress.com/2011/02/21/supernatural-like-a-virgin/

Hey There Li’l Red Riding Hood …

I saw Red Riding Hood today. It was a bit disappointing. That red cloak against the white snow looked so pretty in the trailer. I judged a dvd by its cover and paid the penalty. I suppose I was expecting something more gothic, after all, the Grimm’s version is pretty, well, grim:

‘[The huntsman] took a pair of scissors, and began to cut open the stomach of the sleeping wolf. When he had made two snips, he saw the little red riding hood shining, and then he made two snips more, and the little girl sprang out, crying: ‘Ah, how frightened I have been! How dark it was inside the wolf.’ After that the aged grandmother came out alive also, but scarcely able to breathe. Red Riding Hood, however, quickly fetched great stones with which they filled the wolf’s belly, and when he awoke, he wanted to run away, but the stones were so heavy that he collapsed at once, and fell dead. Then all three were delighted.’

Earlier versions can be even grislier. In some, the wolf tricks the girl into eating her own grandmother and makes her undress and throw her clothes into the fire.

Recent readings see the red cloak as a symbol of the girl’s sexual maturity – the wolf as a predatory suitor. But I suspect this understanding was there from the beginning. Perrault (who wrote a 17^th century version) was pretty clear on the message to be taken from the tale: ‘From this story one learns that children, especially young lasses, pretty, courteous and well-bred, do very wrong to listen to strangers.’ Modern interpretations seem to be in agreement.

Despite the theme of a predatory male stalking a girl in a dark forest, one of the prevailing themes of the story remains the cunning of Red Riding Hood:

‘What big teeth you have! She saw how his jaw began to slaver and the room was full of the clamour of the forest’s Liebestod but the wise child never flinched, even when he answered: All the better to eat you with. The girl burst out laughing; she knew she was nobody’s meat.’ [Angela Carter’s ‘The Company of Wolves’]

Because sometimes little girls are scarier than the big, bad wolf …

LINKS:

Betty Boop meets ‘Li’l Red Riding Hood’. It’s a creepy song. It’s a creepy fairy tale:

http://youtu.be/1JOwxnVoG6Q

‘TV Tropes’ warns about dressing girls in red:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LittleDeadRidingHood

A modern Red Riding Hood from Pewdie at Deviant Art. She looks like she could take care of herself:

http://pewdie.deviantart.com/art/Little-Red-Riding-Hood-121623216

 

 

 

Varney the Vampire: could it be longer, or crappier?

I am half-way through reading Varney the Vampire by James Malcolm Rymer. This may seem insignificant until you realise that this is probably amongst the longest and worst novels ever written. Perhaps I’m exaggerating just a bit. A tiny bit.

Varney didn’t start as a novel, to be fair. It appeared as a serialised fiction in 1845. Which might explain its rambling and contradictory quality. I’m pretty sure James didn’t have a master plan or an editor. Although Dickens wrote serialised novels that are really quite amazing, so we can’t blame the genre.

It’s worth noting that Varney appeared well before Stoker’s Dracula (1897) and contained many of the vampire tropes we think of as originating in Stoker’s text. It also contains a sympathetic vampire – which was pretty forward thinking really. Although I still found the male protaganists’ ability to forgive Varney after his (luridly-described) attack on the heroine to be a bit surprising, to say the least. Although this scene provided the highlight, let’s be honest:

‘With a sudden rush that could not be foreseen — with a strange howling cry that was enough to awaken terror in every breast, the figure seized the long tresses of her hair, and twining them round his bony hands he held her to the bed. Then she screamed — Heaven granted her then power to scream. Shriek followed shriek in rapid succession. The bed-clothes fell in a heap by the side of the bed — she was dragged by her long silken hair completely on to it again. Her beautifully rounded limbs quivered with the agony of her soul. The glassy, horrible eyes of the figure ran over that angelic form with a hideous satisfaction — horrible profanation.’

Crapilicious. Is that a new word? If I’m going to read 1,000 or so pages of crap, they’d better be pretty lurid. I’m just saying. The Monk is a classic example. Unfortunately, most of Varney reads a little more like this:

“Did you hear a scream, Harry?” asked a young man, half-dressed, as he walked into the chamber of another about his own age. / ”I did — where was it?” /  ”God knows. I dressed myself directly.” /  “All is still now.” / ”Yes; but unless I was dreaming there was a scream.” /  “We could not both dream there was. Where do you think it came from?” /  ”It burst so suddenly upon my ears that I cannot say.” /  There was a tap now at the door of the room where these young men were, and a female voice said, – ”For God’s sake, get up!” /  ”We are up,” said both the young men, appearing. / ”Did you hear anything?” / “Yes, a scream.”

By this time, we are all screaming … And they still haven’t finished. It’s made even more frustrating by the fact that there are only two women in the main house. One of them is in the room with them.

Why am I reading it? I was feeling a little giddy after finishing my teaching for the year, and there it was at the bookstore for $4.50, with a really quite nice cover on it. I’d always meant to read it, having done every subject I could on Victorian Gothic Fiction at uni. It seemed like a big (brick-sized) gap in my reading. Of course, I knew it was a ‘penny dreadful’, which did not bode well in terms of quality. These serials involved titillating stories that sold for a penny per instalment. They are not known for their high level of literary accomplishment. Having said that, I have found myself getting hooked on Varney in places – though it generally ends in disappointment or confusion (for me).

The final reason was that I’ve finished my own serialised gothic fiction, Indigo, and I was interested to see what illustrious company I was joining. I’m feeling pretty good about my novel at this point. Until I read some Dickens …

SURPRISE!!!!

An introduction to Penny Dreadfuls: http://www.collectingbooksandmagazines.com/penny.html

An admirable blog – the blogger is not only reading Varney, but also giving brief summaries so we don’t have to: http://varneythevampire.blogspot.com/