Page 39. Paulo Bacigalupi sets a stage for Emiko, one of the four main characters in The Windup Girl that we read about this week. I don’t mean to suggest that we haven’t encountered problematic writing, character, character development, or plot conflict yet. I also don’t mean to suggest that there are not other interesting passages to […]
A common theme in these books we have been reading has been free love or societies where sex isn’t a big deal. I think Sierra in class today talked about how when people aren’t worried about who other people are sleeping with there is a lot more time and space in brains for information that […]
In class we were talking about the possibility of other universes and how each one would change based on each decision one makes. That being said, you and I are very different people and so each of my decisions create a new universe for each decision I make and each decision you make creates a […]
After finishing LeCarre’s novel The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, I was quite…angry, to subsitute for a better word. The book held no appeal to me until the homestretch was clear, until Alec was taken under arrest and Liz received the mysterious request to go to the Party’s meeting in the East. But […]
It is not an understatement to say that Hitler was a monster, but what helped to influence his ideals of Aryans being the superior race, and on the other end of the spectrum Jews as the most inferior of peoples? I think that there is no way to try and understand someone so deeply disturbed […]
Many of the major powers of World War I were monarchies. Whereas the royal families of Great Britain and Italy emerged victorious at the end of 1918 (and the kingdoms of Spain, The Netherlands, and Denmark, among others, remained neutral) the monarchies of the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Russian Empire collapsed due […]
I want to preface this by saying that I really, really enjoyed most of It, even with all of its issues. That being said, I think it’s important to look at one aspect of the novel we didn’t really discuss in class: what the hell was the point of the Turtle? It’s pretty clear […]
I’ve been thinking a lot about the words we’ve been using throughout the course of the semester to discuss monsters. Looking back through my notes, there are a few words that repeatedly pop up on every page I’ve written: monster, monstrous, and monstrosity. Now, our course is called Literary Themes: Monsters/Protean Figures, and, as was […]
As the Stephen King’s novel It unfolds, more and more is revealed about the monster that terrorizes Derry. We’re given a general idea of Its abilities and origins but, beyond Its own survival, we’re not really given any insight into the monster’s motivations. Why does It kill people? What does It do with them once […]
I hate how the ones that are still alive at the end of It forget each other. It’s been driving me insane wondering why they all had to forget each other all over again. I really wanted them to at least all stay in touch but that’s because I like happy endings. This for me wasn’t […]
There’s a reason Sinister is the only movie that gives me nightmares. Not only does it corrupt beautiful little children and turn them into brainwashed-family-killing-baby-psychos, it also basically has the monster trifecta: corrupting what’s considered “safe” by our culture, haunted places, and the cyclic quality of monstrosity. Bagul targets the children he wants based on […]
Isolation. This word, this idea…it’s my worst fear. It may sound silly, being alone being “my monster” for this blog post, but this idea is very real to me and is something that has affected me my whole life. Now I’m not talking about Cast Away stuff where I’m stuck on an island with only […]
Language is used by society to communicate with people. Words are used creatively, figuratively, openly, and privately. They’re also subject to change and variation. Stephen King does not miss a beat in It. In one scenario, he describes the “barrens” on page 531. Bill was walking in the small woods and wondered why “forest” or […]
Stephen King makes a set of victims. King reminds his readers of a real problem with bullying through characters such as Henry Bowers, who’s ready to kill Mike for the color of his skin. But then characters such as Al Marsh and Tom pose similar threats against Beverly for simply being another sex. King did […]
One theme that hasn’t really been touched on in IT so far is the dangers of bullying. From school ground to cyber life bullying has remained a hot button issue in society. Henry Bowers is one of the scariest monsters in the book for me because he tortures the main characters just because he can. […]
I’m a hypochondriac. There I said it. I haven’t always been this way, and I guess I have knowledge to thank for that. So many times throughout the semester we have talked about how there is this “fear of the unknown” and while I have to agree, I also think that knowing isn’t really all […]
I have been wracking my brain trying to think of a monster archetype that frightens me, a physical or visual representation of fear that I was particularly scared of when I was younger, or even just one specific object that still inspires terror in me. And I just can’t do it. Which is not to […]
After discussing the archetypes of monsters from class, I want to expand on my idea that monsters are a symbol of our fear of death. For example, in my last post, I discussed how I was seriously afraid of a fictional character as a child. This is obviously a very irrational fear since I […]
Did you ever hear the phrase, “I wish I were a kid again” and actually considered it? I admit I have because being an adult can really be a bitch sometimes. While we were discussing about kids and adults in class today, I believe when it comes to fear, adults tend to have anxieties more […]
While reading It there was one question I was constantly struggling with: why was Bill Denbrough the leader of the Losers Club? There really was never a concrete explanation given and none of the other members of the Losers could quite put their finger on it. It was just something they all felt: “Bill was […]
I’ve loved scary movies since I was a child, but they never seem to have that lifelong bone-chilling effect on me that everyone goes on about. It wasn’t until about a year ago that I finally met my match. My most memorable example of monstrosity, and the only figure that has succeeded in consistently giving […]
Photo Credit: http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Gollum OK, I’ll admit it, I’m afraid of Gollum. Why? I honestly don’t have a rational reason. Maybe because the fantastic creatures of Middle Earth are really a threat to humanity. Alright, that’s not likely. Nevertheless, I found him frightening on screen, and when my father did an impersonation of the sickly creature one night […]
One of the big themes rampant in IT so far is spousal and parental violence. This is not a new subject to be writing or reading about seeing as there have been about 5,000 lifetime movies about the subject. So why is it such an important theme in the novel? My only answer is that Stephen […]
I cannot remember a time when I did not find clowns frightening. For me, they have always been figments of nightmares and horror movies. The idea that clowns could not be monstrous even seems more absurd than them being monsters. But why is this so? What happened to the happy, party-goers that would tell jokes […]
Throughout Stephen King’s novel, IT, we are introduced to a gang of kids who grew up in a crummy neighborhood in Maine and are faced with the ultimate quest of getting rid of the monster who is known as Pennywise. Due to Pennywise dressing up as a clown, it is his way of manipulating kids into […]
On occasion, I’ve thought about why I’m friends with the people I am friends with. How did we become friends? Why am I friends with this person and not that person? Why do I have a couple groups of friends? Why don’t some people fit into that specific group? Here is one article about friendships […]
Growing up in a religious home and attending Catholic schooling from elementary through high school, the ideas of the devil and the spirit world have never been completely foreign. While I have always believed (and was taught) the devil was an existent entity, the idea of the spirit world has been more of a touchy subject. […]
It’s easy to see in modern horror and slasher flicks how monster identity tends to operate as a cultural warning. It’s slyly insinuated that if you don’t follow a certain moral conduct that a certain vigilante justice will be waiting to punish you. The current archetypes are so overtly called upon and overplayed in cinema […]
As a kid I could be convinced of pretty much anything. I loved to read (#englishmajorprobs) and anything that happened in the stories I read I imagined being real and happening to me. I think this just helped aid people in convincing me that the unreal was in fact real. My neighborhood was chocked full […]
The fact that Chris is an actress in The Exorcist is particularly interesting to me, as William Peter Blatty could have chosen any old profession for the mother of Regan to have. Imagine if Chris had been a stay-at-home mom (which would have warranted the inclusion of a father figure), or a lawyer, or a […]
“And yet I think the demon’s target is not the possessed; it is us . . . the observers . . . every person in this house. And I think—I think the point is to make us despair; to reject our own humanity, Damien: to see ourselves as ultimately bestial, vile, and putrescent; without dignity; […]
In our discussions in class, we all seemed to come to the obvious conclusion that monsters are evil. However, there was some disagreement as to what evil actually is. Specifically, whether or not an action was extreme enough to be considered evil. I found it interesting that there seems to be a distinction […]
When I started reading ‘The Exorcist’ I was in the middle of watching an episode of the hit Showtime television show ‘Homeland’. In that show the main character, played by the incredible Claire Danes, suffers from Bipolar disorder. My understanding of the disease is that it causes severe mood swings in the people who have […]
“The Black Hole” is a science fiction Disney movie from 1979. My parents rented the VHS for us to watch when I was little because it’s Disney sci-fi, so it can’t be scary, am I right? Having re-watched it recently, I now realize that, while you can clearly tell that it was made […]
In The Exorcist, I found that pinning down Reagan’s age to be very difficult. I know that her age is mentioned as being twelve, but she does not seem to act to like it. She seems to be very anti-social, preferring to play alone, by herself, in the basement. She does not seem to have […]
Halloween has come and gone, so there’s no better time to discuss monsters. Hopefully we have all recovered from our candy-induced stomach aches, and from the little frights caused by decorations and costumes. How many watched a horror film that night or weekend? I had the pleasure of viewing the 1986 remake of “The Fly” […]
Random fact: as a child I absolutely loved The Wizard of Oz movie. And by “as a child” I mean I still do. When they walk through the forest, scared over “lions, tigers and bears,” this seems like a legitimate fear. We see monsters described in terms of animals quite often. The likelihood of actually […]
While reading The Exorcist, I could not help but feel that William Peter Blatty was trying his best to not only make a haunting tale, but also showing that even with the times changing, that women still needed to be saved by a man. The demon within Rags is like the dragon, and Reagan herself, […]
I noticed that my interpretation of The Exorcist as having some misogynistic connotations ruffled a few feathers so I figured I would dedicate my second blog post to delving further into these issues. Literature would be boring if feathers weren’t ruffled! Now that we’ve read the conclusion of the novel; it is easier to examine […]
I’m a worrier. It’s just in my nature to think of the worst possible case scenario and to say, “with my luck it will happen”. This is to be said for my health as well. It all stems to one particular instance, or at least I think it does. I was younger, maybe six or […]
Symbolism runs rampant in the everyday world, permeating every inch of our lives. The hidden arrow in the FedEx logo, the signs that tell us how the road ahead of us is positioned, even the color of clothing made for infants (try buying baby girl clothes in a shade other than Pepto Bismal pink). Symbols […]
The Exorcist is a novel filled with many different reactions to our society that in the 1970’s was changing rapidly with the presence of the evolving feminist movement. I found a wonderful article that easily sums up the second wave feminist movement here. It is helpful to know the issues women were advocating for at […]
I’m sure just about every kid, at some point, saw a movie they were maybe not quite old enough to see when their parents weren’t looking. For me, that movie was The Thing, which has to be pretty close to the all-time worst possible choice in that scenario. Besides continuing the 80’s trend of […]
When I was young, going swimming was my monster. Not specifically water because I was fine on a boat or when I was near water. I did okay putting my feet into water but once it came to actually venturing into the water, I was terrified. Even thinking back to being in the water then […]
In class I brought up how science is in the novel can be used for good or evil. Professor Rybak stated that my reasoning was based on a “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” argument. I decided I had to look into this claim further. Jake repeatedly references war, violence, religion and […]
Darkness is a great shade. It’s a wonderful contrast for lighting a stage or low-lighting skin for a photo. It leaves mystery as a background for a ballerina. Or it defines the skull of the performer. Black is a dramatic color. We are easily intimidated by people who wear too much. In essence, darkness drastically […]
Cannibalism in The Last Werewolf is a topic we discussed a bit in class, and it’s a topic that comes up quite often throughout the book. Jake Marlowe eats human flesh at every full moon throughout the course of the book. He discusses that he has tried to abstain and only feed every other full […]
When I think of monsters I think of childhood. As I’ve grown up I’ve come to believe that a lot of creativity is lost in adulthood. We are told to be thinkers and that means to be more analytical than imaginative. We toss away our coloring books, are told that “doodling” is wrong because it […]
· If society can choose what is evil then evil is a human created concept. Hmm… not just a human made concept, which is to broad, but a socially made construct. Evil is something that social institutions tell us is wrong. Institutions like religion. This, of course is what the book is getting at, […]
Before Jake’s transformation into a werewolf he had class. No really, he was of the upper (echelon). Even at this point Jake had money, which as we’ve come to find out is very helpful to have when you live for centuries. Even after he becomes a werewolf, Marlowe manages to keep his class status […]
Gender, intercourse, religion, morality, individuality, society, and family all have definitions of sex. Countless times in this course, sex has been a topic, especially in our last two novels: Dracula and The Last Werewolf. The act itself is discussed openly. Years ago, one would be slapped for mentioning it. Today, these things can still happen. […]
In my last post I discussed some of the classic “monstrous” traits of witches. So now I’d like to offer a different perspective: a defense of witches. Perhaps they’re not so wicked after all. The first point I’d like to bring up is something I touched on in my last post: The Salem Witch Trials. […]
Since we have discussed so much about vampires and werewolves, I thought I switch gears for a bit and focus on cars. Anyone who has a car will say that they either love their car, or call it a piece of crap. However, what would happen if the car was represented from a different universe […]
When we were reading Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, I was constantly reminded of the story of Jack the Ripper. I thought it was probably just because of the similar settings and the image on the cover, but the Afterword included in the version of the book we read in class also mentions the […]
A simple answer to the title’s question is this: not the readers. The Last Werewolf is written in such a manner that readers can’t help but sympathize with the main character, the monster in question, the werewolf. From the first person narrative writing style to the logic and rationalization of Jake Marlowe’s actions to the […]
I’ve been racking my brain trying to find a monster that’s really stuck out to me in life but I wasn’t able to think of a specific monster I wished to write about. I finally realized there is something that I do think is a monster, but the thing is, I don’t think it’s always […]
This past summer, I’ve read Anne Rice’s The Queen of the Damned. Before, I have read Interview with the Vampire and thought the novel was entertaining. Now, after having read The Queen of the Damned, I was astonished with the type of villain Rice created in this novel. The Queen of the Damned is […]
With Halloween approaching, I can’t help but think back to Trick or Treating as a kid. With the hundreds of different Halloween costume possibilities, year after year I always wanted to dress up as a witch. What can I say? I loved the black pointy hat and pretending to have magical powers. Not to mention, […]
“But ought and I parted company when I murdered my with-child wife and ate her and carried on living. “ (Duncan, 121) Jacob Marlowe is a Monster. In The Last Werewolf Glen Duncan uses a very scientific measure of thinking for the main character. It is best to deal with my feelings for the text […]
Glen Duncan uses plenty of colorful and often dark language throughout the novel. But perhaps readers of The Last Werewolf are most disturbed by the outlandish claims towards The Beatles. Forget all that sex and violence, why so hard on the Fab Four? Okay maybe not everyone feels this way, but as a Beatles fan, […]
While watching an episode of The X-Files late one night, I noticed Agent Fox Mulder used the term “bloofer” when interpreting a case. While the case was eventually solved on the show, a general consensus about what “bloofer” might mean hasn’t been met. Lucy becomes this mysterious “bloofer lady” to the children she attacks but […]
I sort of began to explore the concept of death in my last blog post, where I briefly touched on the idea of survival being the key to our deepest fears. Evolution has hardwired survival into our heads, and most of our fears stem from the fear of death. As such, humans have developed a […]
I love dogs, although I wouldn’t exactly say I’m a “dog person.” For instance, Riley – the Australian shepherd that ate both my prized, hand-made, parchment-threaded journal from high school and my hard-cover edition of Dracula – is not making my top ten list. Regardless, I do love most dogs, and I don’t think I’m alone […]
“Old”, “dusty”, “abandoned”, and “creepy” are often characteristics attributed to contemporary horror settings; each characteristic can be traced back through visual and linguistic examples to the beginning of culture. Dracula provides a template for every house and every monster inhabiting those houses in many forms of culture since the time it was published. Each place Dracula comes […]
Vlad Dracula III, or Vlad the Impaler, was born a prince in Wallachia (modern day Romania) during the 15th century. His father, Vlad II, named his son “Dracul” in honor of his secret society, the Order of the Dragon. In total, he reigned over parts of Transylvania for only 7 years but managed to change […]
Women are usually thought to be the secondary character in novels that have a large number of male characters. This is especially true in Dracula by Bram Stoker. The men are the main players in the story, but the women that do present themselves hold great weight in the stories true meaning, the biggest players […]
Blood, it’s transferred, drunk, and spilled in Dracula. It’s a pivotal part of the story, but why is that so? What makes blood special other than the fact that it runs through our veins? To answer these questions, it’s important to look at the basics of what blood is now and what it used to […]
Throughout the majority of Bran Stoker’s novel there seems to be coursing theme of selective blindness or closed mindedness. The majority of the characters are unable to understand and accept the increasingly obvious supernatural situations they are put into. Through their selective blindness, they are opened up to many unfortunate situations, including the demise of […]
As we find ourselves finished with Bram Stoker’s Dracula I find that the ambiguity (as described in pt. 1) surrounding the motif of mental illness in the novel has dissolved like Dracula in his coffin. In my view of the text it is clear that the characters of Renfield and Seward are vehicles by which Stoker explores the […]
In my first post I went over my personal history of fear with Freddy Krueger, a brief recap of what his actions were in the movies and the deep rooted questions the monster archetype provokes. For this post I want to focus on several things. First, I want to explore Freddy Krueger’s personal history and […]
Let me tell you how I first got started on this. In the reading assigned for today, when Dracula visits Renfield at the lunatic asylum in Chapter Twenty-One, Renfield explains how Dracula “began promising [him] things – not in words but by doing them” (Stoker, 239). Renfield then goes on to explain how Dracula did so just “by […]
Dracula has many abilities. He can turn into a bat, control wolves, rats and people, and even control fog. These abilities themselves may be part of what makes him a monster, but I believe that the shapes of the things he controls and turns into help to add to that statement. If Dracula turned into a butterfly rather than a […]
There has been one monster that has plagued my nightmares since I was a small child. The king of nightmares himself: Freddy Krueger. My fear of this popular movie icon began when I was seven years old at a neighborhood sleepover. My parents always limited the types of movies and television shows I watched so […]
In the Harry Potter universe, there is a particular creature called a “boggart“, which upon confrontation, turns into the thing that most scares its adversary. For Ron Weasley, it was a spider, for Hermione Granger, it was failure of all her exams, and for Harry Potter it was dementors (or fear itself). The truly unfortunate […]
Is there ever an inappropriate time to shout out Spider-Man? I hold several things to be true in this world. Spiders are cooler when they come in man form, men are cooler when they come in spider form, snakes are creepy no matter what, and Michael Myers is a terrifying mother f***er. I’m not scared […]
When I was a kid, there was this really (probably) awesome show on Cartoon Network—that I was forbidden to watch. It’s a strange story because although I grew up in a staunchly Lutheran home, we were by no means zealots. However, my father had put his foot down regarding The Smurfs, and […]
I’m sure that you could guess that yes, my monster comes from the mind of J.R.R. Tolkien but it not the one you may think. I find that the ring itself is a monster I think of. Many times in the books (and movies) the ring seems to have a mind of its own and […]
Dracula is capable of some pretty terrifying things. He is able to climb around on the outside of his castle like a lizard, turn into a bat, control fog and wolves, all while maintaining a balanced diet of blood. While all of these are terrifying aspects, one of his most terrifying attributes that is often […]
A theme or commentary of mental illness is threaded through Bram Stoker’s Dracula in the character of Renfield, but it would seem that what this commentary conveys is some what ambiguous. At times Stoker presents the character to the reader in scenes where we can not help but feel sympathetic, and yet at others Renfield acts in […]
Could Renfield be considered a monster? Before answering that question I think it pays to take a look at who he is. It is obvious from the beginning that Renfield suffers from some mental illness, which Dr. Seward is at turns fascinated, horrified and perplexed with: “the case of Renfield grows more interesting the more I…understand the man. […]
As far back as I can remember I’ve never had a specific “monster” character that consistently scared me. When I was younger, the scariest character lived in a reoccurring dream that I often had. In this dream, all of my loved ones were dead, and my sister, my cousin, and I were the only ones […]
I have spent the past three summers as a camp counselor, and I’ve heard my share of ghost stories and other bizarre anecdotes (it’s natural campfire conversation, after all). I’ve even told a few of my own: I used to perpetuate the rumor that there were giant, hungry, freshwater sharks on the other side of […]
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has really set the scene for this class, as we try to define what qualities monsters possess. This is not the first time I was exposed to the Jekyll and Hyde concept. My first interpretation of the story was from the children’s movie, The Pagemaster. During my first exposure, […]
Prior to having read the novel itself (which I did for the first time last week), I had had one previous experience with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. This occurred when I was seven years old and PBS aired the Wishbone (who was a Jack Russell Terrier with an impressive repertoire of doggy tricks and […]
While reading this book, it really baffled me as to how many times it used the word ‘afraid’ or ‘fear’. Whether it was people being afraid of Mr. Hyde or Mr. Utterson fearing for the life of Dr. Jekyll, the word had many different emotions from different scenarios stamped to it. Even the first […]
As Jekyll describes his struggle to cut Hyde out of his life after the violence and chaos this alter-ego puts into motion, he speaks like an addict trying to abstain from his next fix. Jekyll attempts to go cold turkey, but after two months on the wagon he describes […]
Earlier this year I read Carrie by Stephen King. This was my first King novel, and I was not disappointed. Carrie was dark, blunt, and one of the more thought provoking novels that I have read in a while. The main character, Carrie, fits into the archetype that we are developing about monsters in literature. […]
To me, spiders are monsters. They crawl around dark corners where they make their homes. They are stealthy, horrific, living organisms that will crawl on you when you least expect it. Do not ever try to perform any form of communication with me when I see a spider crawl across the floor, as I will […]
At an early age many of us identify the things that scare us and become the proverbial monsters under our beds.Whether they be something like spiders, heights, something we’ve seen on t.v. or been read to by our parents(the real Grimm’s Fairy Tales was not meant for young children). Although I developed a fear of […]