Murder, Magic, and Mystery...Oh My!

While it could be argued by many that the writings of Stephen King do not make for "literature", much less "classic literature", I feel I must respectfully disagree. Perhaps it is because I grew up stealing King's novels from my father's bookshelf, but I've always found that he had the ability to tap into my darkest fears and lay them out for me to see.

Though he is best known as the "King of Horror", Stephen King took a detour in 1987 to write The Eyes of the Dragon, a tale for his 13-year-old daughter Naomi who was not particularly fond of horror stories. This novel contains all of the classic examples of fantasy writing and is told in a bedtime-story kind of way.

The plot centers around the kingdom of Delain, King Roland, his two princely sons Peter and Thomas, and the evil sorcerer Flagg. Flagg lusts for control of Delain and will stop at nothing to get it, but knows that he cannot ever rule directly. He poisons King Roland, killing him, and blames it on Roland's eldest son. Peter is what we would today call an all-American boy: he is handsome, charming, respectful, intelligent, athletic, and a wonderful hunter.

After Peter is imprisoned in the Needle (a Washington Monument-like tower), Flagg makes sure that Thomas, Peter's younger brother, succeeds his father's throne. Though Thomas is a good-hearted boy, he is also painfully gullible and slow. He appoints Flagg as his chief advisor and Flagg is finally able to rule Delain indirectly, because Thomas will listen to anything Flagg tells him.

While Flagg destroys Delain through Thomas, Peter spends years devising a way to escape the Needle, clear his name, avenge his father's murder, and save the kingdom once and for all.

For other reviews on this wonderful story, please visit the following:
Good Reads
Amazon Editorial Reviews
Amazon Customer Reviews

Feelin' Wicked

Nearly everyone has seen The Wizard of Oz (and those who haven't need to go watch it right this second!), but how many people can say that they know the full story behind the infamously Wicked Witch of the West? Fortunately for her, there are more and more people all the time who do, thanks to Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West.

In this novel, that awful green lady is given a name: Elphaba (a phonetic play on The Wizard of Oz's author's name: L. Frank Baum). Elphaba was born with green skin and very sharp teeth, while her younger sister Nessarose (later the Wicked Witch of the East) was born very pink and lacking arms.

It is explained in the novel that Elphaba and Galinda (later Glinda the Good Witch of the South) were unwillingly made roommates at school. They begin their relationship hating one another but eventually grow very close. Elphaba is very passionate about Animal rights ("Animals" in Wicked are talking animals who hold the same rights as humans) and Galinda changes her name to Glinda--their favorite professor's mispronunciation of her name--after the professor is murdered when on the verge of announcing an important discovery showing similarities between Animals and humans. Elphaba takes up his work in secret and falls in love with a young prince named Fiyero, whose body is covered in a pattern of blue diamonds.

Elphaba discovers who is responsible for the professor's murder and she and Glinda travel to Oz to seek the Wizard's help. When they are rebuffed, Elphaba sends Glinda back to school and remains behind, telling Glinda that she cannot see her again and that she shall be taking matters into her own hands.

The next five years are spent in vigilantism for Elphaba, trying to free the Animals and throw the Wizard out of power. Fiyero finds her and they begin an illicit affair, though Fiyero already has a wife and three children. The Gale Force, the Wizard's secret police squad, are looking for Elphaba but find Fiyero alone in her apartment. Fiyero is kidnapped and murdered, sending Elphaba spiraling into a grief so strong that she abandons her cause and spends the next six years as a mute nun.

Eventually, Elphaba returns home at the request of her father to help her sister Nessarose. While there, Nessarose promises Elphaba that she may have her ruby slippers--enchanted by Glinda so that Nessarose may walk without assistance--after her death. This is where our friend Dorothy comes in.

When Dorothy's house falls on Nessarose, killing her, Glinda gives Dorothy the ruby slippers and sends her to find the Wizard, in hopes that he can send her back to Kansas. Glinda fears for Dorothy's safety. Meanwhile, Elphaba is livid that Glinda gave Nessarose's shoes to Dorothy. After meeting with the Wizard, she finds out that Dorothy & Co. are on their way to her castle, possibly to kill her. Elphaba returns to her castle and Dorothy confirms that the Wizard sent them to kill her, but that she really just wants to apologize for killing her sister. Elphaba is doubtful and enraged and accidentally sets herself on fire. Dorothy, trying to help, throws a bucket of water on her to put her out, but melts her instead.

After reading this novel, I couldn't help but feel sorry for Elphaba. Though she has always been referred to as Wicked, she wasn't really. This poor, unfortunately green girl was simply misunderstood.

Grow up already, wouldja?

It is difficult to believe that there is anyone these days who is not at least mildly familiar with the famous tale of the boy who wouldn't grow up. However, it is sadly unsurprising that there are few who have actually read his classic story.

Peter Pan the novel is vastly different than Peter Pan the beloved Disney film. True, they both feature the mischievous Peter, the motherly Wendy Darling with her brothers John and Michael, as well as the Lost Boys, the swashbuckling pirates, that tart Tinker Bell, and the nefarious Captain Hook, all found in the mysterious island of Neverland. However, most of the similarities stop there.

While Disney's Peter is a fun-loving, good-humored young scamp who wants to stay a child forever, J.M. Barrie's Peter is a cruel, sardonic young boy who hates mothers and has no problem playing mean-spirited tricks. Perhaps Disney's most famous--and most highly marketable--character from that film, Tinker Bell, is also portrayed very differently than she is written to be in the novel. In the animated classic, the pixie spends much of her time pouting about Wendy and flitting about and, importantly, never speaks. However, this contrasts sharply with Barrie's Tinker Bell who swears like a sailor and talks the Lost Boys into trying to shoot Wendy down out of the sky.

Obviously, the original J.M. Barrie tale of the flying boy is much darker than the popular Disney portrayal makes it out to be. Some may think that it would ruin the story and the moral behind it, but it serves to make the story much more palatable and interesting to adult readers. The story itself and the language Barrie uses is often intriguing and very engaging. For example, the opening paragraph:

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs. Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, "Oh, why can't you remain like this for ever!" This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.

Barrie himself is an ever-present narrator, often stepping out of the story to remark on something and taking the reader off on a bit of a tangent, before remembering he has a story to tell and getting back down to business. These tangential digressions can be a bit confusing from time to time, but the author's peculiarities shine through them and can also be quite amusing.

Overall, Peter Pan is a novel that is vastly underappreciated because too many people assume it to be of the same caliber as the Disney film. It may be a story about a young boy who refuses to grow up, but it teaches every reader that it is far better to become an adult and deal with the responsibilities that come with it than to stay young forever alone and forgetful of anyone who ever loved you.

For more reviews on this underrated classic tale, please visit the following:
The James Logan Courier Weekly
Amazon Customer Reviews
Good Reads

If interested in reading Peter's story for yourself, you can do so in its entirety here:
Project Gutenberg

Long Semester's Journey Into Graduation

It's getting to be that time again, folks, and the combination of spring fever and senioritis is certainly working a number on me. So what does a giddy gal like me read to plunge back down into those undergraduate pits of despair? Eugene O'neill, of course! More specifically, his masterpiece play Long Day's Journey Into Night. (Sounds upbeat, doesn't it?)

Long Day's Journey tells only of one full day in the life of the Tyrone family in August of 1912. James Tyrone is a failed actor, his eldest son (Jamie) is a bit of a ne'er-do-well, his youngest son (Edmund) is dying of tuberculosis, and his wife Mary... *sigh* Well, there's something about Mary.

The Tyrone family's favorite way of communicating is by not communicating. In fact, the men of the family make every effort to hide family difficulties, troubles, or worries from flighty Mary Tyrone. Eventually, we learn that Mary has become addicted to morphine following Edmund's birth nearly twenty years earlier. She has been fighting the addiction, having returned from the 1912 version of rehab ("the sanatorium"), but is once more displaying signs of morphine use. The Tyrones know that worry only drives Mary to morphine even more. Meanwhile, Mary is paranoid of the men's paranoia and is convinced that they're watching and analyzing her every move (which she is right about).

When Mary is in her drug-induced state, she becomes very removed from the situation and goes on and on about all the things she could have been, if ony she hadn't married that damnable James Tyrone. As a coping mechanism, the Tyrone men drink...a lot. In fact, James Tyrone very well could be considered an alcoholic and both of his boys are headed that way.

This play is extremely autobiographical (O'neill's own mother was named Mary and was a morphine addict), so much so that O'neill forbade it from ever being publicly performed until there were no remaining O'neill family members still living. The tale is also very cyclical and lacks that satisfying finish because the Tyrone family still doesn't have closure for itself by the end of the play.

While it's probably not the best choice for entertainment purposes, Long Day's Journey is O'neill's masterpiece for good reason and is a great source of insight into the psyche of the writer, as well as into our own family relationships.

For other reviews on this classic drama, please visit the following:
Amazon Customer Reviews
Amazon Editorial Reviews
RTE Entertainment

Haunted by a Handmaid

Written in 1984, Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale is a literary gut punch. It has been saddled with nearly every literary label under the sun from science fiction or feminist to dystopian or speculative fiction. Truly, it is an amalgamation of all of these terms because it borrows a bit from each area. The horror of the novel, however, lies in its inherent possibility.

The story takes place in the not-too-distant future. The president has been assassinated and Congress "machine-gunned" by a group of Islamic fanatics...or so the citizens are told. The Constitution is suspended and a new law is in place: women are no longer allowed to hold property or jobs, own or acquire money, and are no longer allowed to read. The government has been overthrown by an extreme Christian-fundamentalist theocracy who turns the United States into the Republic of Gilead. Because of the high rate of birth defects and the plunging numbers of healthy Caucasian births, any woman of childbearing years with "viable ovaries" is taken from her family and forced to train as a Handmaid. Handmaids have but one responsibility: become pregnant and carry that child to term. These women are garbed in red with white "wings" around their face to act as blinders. Other women are chosen to serve as household servants or Marthas, and wear green. The highest rank of women is that of the Wives, who wear blue. Each household is run by a Commander, the husband of a Wife. If the Commander and his Wife are unable to conceive (which, in this government, is always the fault of the woman, never the man), they are assigned a Handmaid. The Handmaid lays with the Commander once a month in hopes to conceive. After three failed pregnancies, the Handmaid is declared an Unwoman and sent off to The Colonies to clean up toxic waste (with an expected lifespan of no more than three years).

Punishment in Gilead is taken very seriously. If a woman is caught reading (a sin for women in Gilead), the third offense is punishable by the removal of a hand. Attempts at escape are met with instant death and any kind of dissention from the government or their official brand of Christianity is rewarded with either a Salvaging (public hanging) or a Particicution (a ceremony in which you are beaten, then dragged in front of a mob who will rip you apart). There are very few friendships in Gilead, as the Eyes (government spies) are everywhere and executions are frequent. However, the novel's main character Offred ("Of-Fred", named for her Commander) retains hope that she will someday be reunited with her husband Luke and their daughter. Through the horrors that exist in Gilead and the novel, the reader is buoyed on by Offred's recollections of her former life and by the quiet hope to which she clings.

Often considered a sister novel to works such as George Orwell's 1984 or Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange, Atwood's story of a simple Handmaid is a tale that is sure to haunt any reader for years to come.

For other reviews of this novel, please see the following:
Powell's Books
Amazon Reviews
Good Reads

Bookmark in Lieu of a Breakdown

I have two 8-week online classes ending this week as well as some big projects due in my other classes, so I haven't had time to put together a literature review for this week's post. Don't despair, Constant Reader (to borrow a phrase from The King)! I still have something up my sleeve.

Since we won't be having a discussion on this post this week, I thought I could leave you with some recommendations on where to go here in Springfield for book discussions. The Springfield-Greene County Library system has a whole list of book clubs and book discussions throughout the spring. This list has discussions planned all the way through May 26th.

Need a way to keep the kids busy and get them more involved in reading? Try taking them to one of the Library's storytimes. For the tweens and older kids, there are the TeenNight events. All events at the Springfield-Greene County Library locations are free of charge and open to the public.

This is where I place the bookmark for this week, ladies and gents. We'll pick up where we left off next week, hopefully a bit saner and less maxed-out!

Love & Literature

I was a Jane Austen virgin until the fall of 2006 or so. I picked up a copy of Austen's second novel Pride & Prejudice and immediately fell in love. How could I have gone so long without reading this masterpiece?

Originally titled First Impressions, this brilliant piece of literature begins with the introduction of the Bennett family and the story centers around the Bennetts' daughter Elizabeth. Early on, Elizabeth Bennett makes the acquaintance of Mr. Darcy (the new renter at Netherfield in the Bennetts' neighborhood) and they strongly dislike one another. They each despise the others' pride, but it is their own pride which makes it difficult to overcome the prejudices they have against one another. As events unfold throughout the novel, Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy slowly come to learn more of one another and dislike turns to apathy, then to affection, then eventually to a great love.

Like all of her novels, this Austen work has a very narrow scope, encompassing merely a few families in a specific area of England, with very little mention of the surrounding country or the world at large. Any references to distant places are just that: distant and cursory. Jane Austen is renowned the world over for her razor-sharp satire of English society in the early nineteenth century, but is also lauded for showing such an unfettered view of a woman's experiences in that time.

As much as Austen mocks the rigidity of society and its norms in the Victorian era, she was also very dedicated to tradition. In this way, it comes as no surprise that Austen's writing style is very consistent with the way a woman was meant to behave in that era. One of the most common complaints about Austen novels is that there is a lack of overwhelming emotion, which is understandable because Austen tends to shy away from such effusions of feeling. However, the careful reader will not find it hard to sense Austen's--and her characters'--subtle passion throughout all of her novels. Women in Austen's time were meant to think sensibly and rationally which meant that outbursts of emotion and passion were discouraged. However, suppressing those feelings didn't mean that they weren't nearly bursting from the seams of their corsets, much like any Austen novel's binding is practically splitting from the passion held within its pages.

For other reviews of this wonderful classic story, please visit the following:
Amazon Customer Reviews
Good Reads
CHUD.com

Also, the entire novel can be read in linked-hypertext at Pemberly or in book form at Google Books.

Creating a Monster

With the reanimation of lifeless limbs into a coherent, eloquent being, Mary Shelley gave birth to a literary classic. Written based on a personal nightmare, a simple story of creator and creation has become much more than she may have dreamed.

Shelley's first and most famous novel, Frankenstein, is considered to be one of the very first science-fiction novels and centers on two strong main characters: Dr. Frankenstein and his unnamed monster. Gifted in many ways, young Dr. Frankenstein decides to combine stolen limbs from corpses to create a new, living body and soon becomes fanatical about the idea. Months upon months of his life are devoted solely to the success of his experimental creation, causing him to overlook his own declining health. At last, on a dreary November night (as all scary stories seem to begin), his creation begins to move. Frightened beyond words at the hideous face that searches his own, the doctor runs from that which he has created. Thus begins a tense and lengthy game of cat-and-mouse between the doctor and his experiment.

Shelley does an excellent job at illustrating the hardships that both Dr. Frankenstein and his monster endure on their search for one another. Dr. Frankenstein's misery is suffered primarily through a combination of grief, anger, and guilt. Frankenstein's monster, however, lives in misery because he cannot find the two things that he truly seeks: love and acceptance.

Abandoned by his creator in a world that he does not know, Frankenstein's monster searches vainly for friendship and acceptance by a society that sees him only as a hideous abomination. Granted, the monster knows that he is hideous and wretched, but he hopes to woo people to overlook his appearance with his charm, eloquence, and beautiful words. He nearly finds success with this approach in a blind man, but the man's son sees the monster and wrenches his father away. With the removal of such a receptive individual, all of his hopes for love and companionship evaporate. Frustrated with both his inability to be accepted and society's inability to accept him, Frankenstein's monster vows revenge for his birth and plans to wreak his revenge on the man who caused his misery and his very life: his creator, Dr. Frankenstein. The monster carries out his revenge on the doctor by killing all whom he loves, therefore causing the doctor as much grief and misery as he feels himself.

It is hard to determine which of the two main characters in the novel is the "bad guy" or villain. Some would say that the villain is Dr. Frankenstein for creating a living being and then turning his back on it. Others might say that the monster is the worse of the two evils for killing so many innocent people in order to put pain upon another. Both of these characters obviously have numerous vices and issues, but they each are good people at the core; one is essentially the other.

Since Dr. Frankenstein and his creation are, at the end of the day, one and the same, it is fitting that the title is simply Frankenstein. Anything other than this simple name may have put an entirely different spin on the story or may have put more emphasis on one character than on the other. This way, the reader is allowed to consider both characters as the primary focus of the novel.

This novel has several cliched themes that could be applied such as "accept the person, not the appearance", "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", or "do not judge a book by its cover". One of the most important ideas expressed in the story is that the most basic thing that any being on the planet needs to survive is simply love. If Frankenstien's monster had only been accepted and shown genuine love and caring, Dr. Frankenstien would not have lost his entire family to the beast and would most likely have lived and died a fairly happy man. The monster may have lived to become accepted by society as a whole, therefore changing society into an accepting and all-encompassing mass. Yet, such things are too good to be true, and much too pleasant to be the subject of a classic Gothic novel.

For other reviews of this classic, please visit the following:
Challenging Destiny
My Hideous Progeny
Amazon Editorial Reviews

Shedding Light on the "Heart of Darkness"

Anybody bring a flashlight? We're going to need one, because today we are plumbing the depths of Joseph Conrad's classic novella "Heart of Darkness". (Yes, it's just as upbeat as the title promises. Buckle up, kids!)

Loosely based on his own experience in Africa, Conrad's best-known story revolves around a seafaring man named Marlowe who is sent by an ivory company into the depths of the Congo to retrieve one of the company's top agents. The agent in question is a Mr. Kurtz and the company feels that he has gone mad in the jungle. Marlowe experiences numerous setbacks throughout his trip, and his anticipation of meeting the legendary Mr. Kurtz seems to be heightened with every delay. As evidenced by the human skull-topped fence posts surrounding Kurtz's property, Marlowe is not to be disappointed. Upon their meeting, we find that Kurtz is revered as a bit of a god among the native tribes and he reminded me very much of a sort of human Gollum. (Those of you who have read the book, imagine Kurtz looming over his hordes of ivory and hissing, "My precccciousssss..." Eerily fitting, I think.)

There are many themes to be explored, even in this short novella, but the largest of these are the contrast between light and dark (which is much more complex in this story than simply "good and evil"), the representation of women in the 1890s, the complexities of African colonization, and the inclination toward madness in each of us.

The story begins slowly but, before I knew it, I had been sucked into the jungle along with Marlowe and Kurtz, fighting for my own sanity in the wilderness. The language is, at times, admittedly dense, but the story itself and the introspection it provides are well worth the effort. Just don't forget your imaginary machete!

Welcome!

Well, hello there!

Most of you who will be reading this realize it is part of an assignment for ENGL 251: Editing & Publishing. Those of you who happen to stumble across this place through other means: pull up a chair!

I have been blogging for a little over 4 years now, but my previous blogging has never had much of a theme or an underlying purpose. So, when given this assignment, I had a hard time coming up with a topic. I turned to my boyfriend for help and he said, "Well, what are you interested in?"

After some reflection, I decided to write about my first true love: books! I have been a bookworm since I first learned to read (to the point that I was often grounded from my bookshelf and sent outside to play as a punishment during my childhood) and it is a passion that has never left me. In this blog, I hope to share my thoughts on some of the favorite books of my past and some of the books I am currently reading (both for school and for leisure).

If you have not read some of these works previously, I hope to provide enough information to inspire you to pick the book up for yourself and explore the world within. If you have read some of these already, feel free to leave a comment with your own thoughts and opinions on the work. I like to think that a story is best enjoyed when in discussion among friends. :o)