So, Armand falls in love with Louis because he represents a new age. He is a tie to that century...
Armand claims that Louis represents his century in his desire to find evil in the world, and in himself. So long as there is evil to hate, he is satisfied. Or, perhaps, he longs to find evil in the world because he does not want to admit that he still loathes himself and his life.
And then you have the contrast between Louis's desire to be deemed evil, for that's the real reason he tells his story, and the reporter's quick love for the life Louis has lead. The reporter hears the horrors of Louis's life and wants it for himself! Anything, anything to avoid the simple life. He wants /some/ sort of passion, romance and drama in his life.
But really, aren't both of those ideals so very present in our society? Have we inherrited the obsessions and disorders of our past, or is Armand just dumb?
And if there is some twisted ideal like that for every century, what is ours?
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Love and Lust
I'm not going to get through with this post before the bell, I bet you.
Anyway, I just wanted to get this topic out in the open. I know we've mentioned some of this in our more verbal discussions, but... love and lust for Vampires.
I know that at some point, in our first day of reading, Louis compared drinking Lestat's blood to sex. I also know that later on, Louis was--
Oh, lord, I'll do this at home.
Anyway, I just wanted to get this topic out in the open. I know we've mentioned some of this in our more verbal discussions, but... love and lust for Vampires.
I know that at some point, in our first day of reading, Louis compared drinking Lestat's blood to sex. I also know that later on, Louis was--
Oh, lord, I'll do this at home.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Lestat
Lestat's character is an interesting one, isn't it? Especially when compared to Louis's. Louis almost instantly dislikes him as soon as he has a feeling for what it is to be a vampire... he despises the way Lestat goes about things, simply because it seems disrespectful to the experience of being an undead.
Now, Louis did not seem to be particularly high-strung before his transformation. He was well-off, I suppose, and uses the term "vicious egotism" in reference to himself... and he mentions that he had looked down on his black workers before the transformation. Still, he didn't seem to think of himself as a higher, special class. Perhaps he wanted to, perhaps he longed to be... but he was grounded on some level. As a vampire, though, he automatically sees it as a sort of beautiful thing... and he automatically feels as if he is a special, privileged being and that Lestat disrespects that.
Lestat, meanwhile, seems so far to be very engaged with human matters. His father. The plantation. He doesn't care to highlight the transformation in Louis, and probably not simply because he doesn't care for Louis, but that he doesn't care for being a vampire.
Are they foils of each other?
Interview with the Vampire was written in 1976, but in 1985 Anne Rice published a second novel in a "series"... the Vampire Lestat. I haven't done much research on it, but when I saw this, I looked briefly at what Wikipedia had to say. Evidently, the events of the two books contradict each other... ... so that it is clear that the narrators are unreliable.
Perhaps this is why the story is told the way it is?
And perhaps we should note the interplay between Louis and Lestat when reading, so we can try to decide what's really going on... and whether Lestat is really as bad as he's made out to be so far.
Now, Louis did not seem to be particularly high-strung before his transformation. He was well-off, I suppose, and uses the term "vicious egotism" in reference to himself... and he mentions that he had looked down on his black workers before the transformation. Still, he didn't seem to think of himself as a higher, special class. Perhaps he wanted to, perhaps he longed to be... but he was grounded on some level. As a vampire, though, he automatically sees it as a sort of beautiful thing... and he automatically feels as if he is a special, privileged being and that Lestat disrespects that.
Lestat, meanwhile, seems so far to be very engaged with human matters. His father. The plantation. He doesn't care to highlight the transformation in Louis, and probably not simply because he doesn't care for Louis, but that he doesn't care for being a vampire.
Are they foils of each other?
Interview with the Vampire was written in 1976, but in 1985 Anne Rice published a second novel in a "series"... the Vampire Lestat. I haven't done much research on it, but when I saw this, I looked briefly at what Wikipedia had to say. Evidently, the events of the two books contradict each other... ... so that it is clear that the narrators are unreliable.
Perhaps this is why the story is told the way it is?
And perhaps we should note the interplay between Louis and Lestat when reading, so we can try to decide what's really going on... and whether Lestat is really as bad as he's made out to be so far.
More comparisons...
What really catches my attention with this novel is the style in which it was written. Its much more modern text. The descriptions of Louis's first kill truly sent a shiver down my spine and made my stomach queasy. I think it is because it is written in the way that my mind thinks, therefore, I am able to feel the descriptions in a much stronger sense than I am when reading something written in classic text. Perhaps its because when reading classic literature, I am always going to be detatched, ever so slightly...
Which brings me to my next point: Rice's vampire story is much more graphic than Dracula. In Dracula, I was caught up in the delicate way it was written-craving to find out the mystery it presented. Will Dracula kill Jonathan? Is Lucy going to die or be saved in time? The entire book was blanketed in a suspense that Stoker so intricatedly wove. This complicated and romatic plot fascinated me. In Interview with the Vampire, I feel more raw fear. Whenever I came across any description of Louis sucking blood, I was disgusted... and yet, I enjoyed this feeling because rarely do I get that strong of an emotion from a book. Does this have to do with our soceity today? Am I just so desensitized that I need vivid descriptions of murder and deception to feel anything? This notion makes me sad...
Which brings me to my next point: Rice's vampire story is much more graphic than Dracula. In Dracula, I was caught up in the delicate way it was written-craving to find out the mystery it presented. Will Dracula kill Jonathan? Is Lucy going to die or be saved in time? The entire book was blanketed in a suspense that Stoker so intricatedly wove. This complicated and romatic plot fascinated me. In Interview with the Vampire, I feel more raw fear. Whenever I came across any description of Louis sucking blood, I was disgusted... and yet, I enjoyed this feeling because rarely do I get that strong of an emotion from a book. Does this have to do with our soceity today? Am I just so desensitized that I need vivid descriptions of murder and deception to feel anything? This notion makes me sad...
The Process
Are the early losses of blood that Louis suffers before going through the more officially mentioned steps that Lestat puts him through important? If not, we start with:
Step One: Death of the overseer. It is sort of ironic, actually... Louis watches as Lestat kills the overseer... he "oversees" that death, and is made to approve of it. Hahaha, fun.
+ Remove the body. Probably not for the purpose of the change, but for the purpose of concealing what happened. Eh.
+ Beating the body. Same. They made it look like robbers had done the deed...
Step Two: Somewhat necessary for the whole mentality... the discovery that Louis secretly does desire life.
Step Three: Exchange of blood. We all know what this is about...
+ The world, for Louis, is changed.
Step Four and Five: The slow removal of "living" fluids from the body/the death of the body and the first kill...
How much of that is really, truthfully the process and how much of it is just what Louis encountered? How is this the same, or different, from other processes we encounter in other novels?
Step One: Death of the overseer. It is sort of ironic, actually... Louis watches as Lestat kills the overseer... he "oversees" that death, and is made to approve of it. Hahaha, fun.
+ Remove the body. Probably not for the purpose of the change, but for the purpose of concealing what happened. Eh.
+ Beating the body. Same. They made it look like robbers had done the deed...
Step Two: Somewhat necessary for the whole mentality... the discovery that Louis secretly does desire life.
Step Three: Exchange of blood. We all know what this is about...
+ The world, for Louis, is changed.
Step Four and Five: The slow removal of "living" fluids from the body/the death of the body and the first kill...
How much of that is really, truthfully the process and how much of it is just what Louis encountered? How is this the same, or different, from other processes we encounter in other novels?
I really have no idea what to talk about.
Although, I do really like the way that the book is set up. Like, I wasn't imagining a literal interview with a vampire. But that's what it is. And it looks like it keeps that up the whole book though, since the majority of the book is marked as dialogue. It's sort of an interesting set-up. Third-person, but also a first-person narrative in most ways.
So, uh, a discussion question, though, so you all have something to respond to: Why do you think Anne Rice set the book up that way? I mean, obvious this is supposed to be the story that a particular vampire wanted to get out to the world, but the vampire also could have just "told" the story himself. Are the boy's reactions important? So far they keep things moving, but eventually I think they'll become less frequent as Louis becomes more involved in his memories...
Although, I do really like the way that the book is set up. Like, I wasn't imagining a literal interview with a vampire. But that's what it is. And it looks like it keeps that up the whole book though, since the majority of the book is marked as dialogue. It's sort of an interesting set-up. Third-person, but also a first-person narrative in most ways.
So, uh, a discussion question, though, so you all have something to respond to: Why do you think Anne Rice set the book up that way? I mean, obvious this is supposed to be the story that a particular vampire wanted to get out to the world, but the vampire also could have just "told" the story himself. Are the boy's reactions important? So far they keep things moving, but eventually I think they'll become less frequent as Louis becomes more involved in his memories...
Inspired or just plain old copy cat?
Alright, I have to. I have to mention it. I'm apologizing for it right now...Twilight. Thats right. I'm going there. The vampires in Interview with the Vampire and Twilight are way too similar. It bugs the hell out of me. I'm fine with taking ideas of what a vampire is from other notable novels...like Dracula maybe, but its like Stephanie Meyer just took Rice's novel and wrote a sequel. The marble skin...uncanny senses....feeding off of animals...argh! Maybe its the fact that this book was only written 30 years ago. Modern classic? Sure, but that is not enough time for that specifc description of a vampire to really be instilled as what we view to be the prototype for a vampire. Its just still too unique an idea. How did Meyer not get in trouble for this? Does anyone know how Rice feels about Twilight? I'll just have to ask Shelby...
Monday, February 16, 2009
Movie vrs. Book...
So, for the first half of the movie, it followed the book surprisingly well. They kept all the names (though they did give the narrator a new one, that's understandable.) They even used some direct quoting...
On the other hand, the end was certainly different. Unfortunately, KC won't know what I'm talking about because she was a JERK and went to go look at COLLEGES. But, at any rate, the movie seems to support the idea that the narrator is not insane. They did have to take a stance, I suppose, because it's much harder to portray that sort of muddled situation when the audience is made into witnesses...
Still, she wasn't even holding Miles when he died! There's no possible way that she could have been smothering him. Thus, the children must have been possessed--how else did Miles just fall over and die?
The other difference was that there was a different emphasis when it came to the "disturbing" relationships. That is, there was less focus on possible homosexuality--important because of the author's own situation--and more focus on what happened between Mrs Jessel and Quint. ... and stuff between the governess and Miles.
Why choose to so outright hint at dirty things between Jessel and Quint but ignore poor Miles's situation? I suppose it was the time... but they didn't shy away from heterosexual badness...
On the other hand, the end was certainly different. Unfortunately, KC won't know what I'm talking about because she was a JERK and went to go look at COLLEGES. But, at any rate, the movie seems to support the idea that the narrator is not insane. They did have to take a stance, I suppose, because it's much harder to portray that sort of muddled situation when the audience is made into witnesses...
Still, she wasn't even holding Miles when he died! There's no possible way that she could have been smothering him. Thus, the children must have been possessed--how else did Miles just fall over and die?
The other difference was that there was a different emphasis when it came to the "disturbing" relationships. That is, there was less focus on possible homosexuality--important because of the author's own situation--and more focus on what happened between Mrs Jessel and Quint. ... and stuff between the governess and Miles.
Why choose to so outright hint at dirty things between Jessel and Quint but ignore poor Miles's situation? I suppose it was the time... but they didn't shy away from heterosexual badness...
Monday, February 9, 2009
MInd Wanderings (no, I didn't mean wonderings)
Random thoughts about my reading in regards to the narrator:
Chapter 16--first few lines--she is disillusioned about her importance to the children! I think she is jealous of their Perfectness!
But chapter 17...Miles lies awake and thinks...of who else but our dear narrator? I think he may be playing into her fantasy. He is a bright little boy!
And she is beginning to sound desperate! "I just want you to help me to save you!" Sounds like an obsessive love affair.
Chapter 18--does she fall under Miles's spell when he plays the piano? She just "forgets"?
Chapter 16--first few lines--she is disillusioned about her importance to the children! I think she is jealous of their Perfectness!
But chapter 17...Miles lies awake and thinks...of who else but our dear narrator? I think he may be playing into her fantasy. He is a bright little boy!
And she is beginning to sound desperate! "I just want you to help me to save you!" Sounds like an obsessive love affair.
Chapter 18--does she fall under Miles's spell when he plays the piano? She just "forgets"?
Oh! Poor Ms. Grose!!! The narrator is confounding the woman! How in the h$%* does the narrator know at the end of chapter 18 that the children are with the ghosts? What is she up to?
End of chapter 19--the narrator refers to Flora as an "it." "I'll be hanged," it said, "if I'll speak!"
Funny, often characterization happens in the simplest ways--in Lord of the Flies the boys become savages, in Frankenstein the creature becomes the daemon. Here Flora has become an it!
What happened to the girl?!
So the children aren't aliens...sadly. But they are beautiful, right? I don't know what to believe anymore! Were they just like that because that is how the narrator percieved them to be? She saw them as something to be claimed? When Flora no longer loved her, she turned ugly and common. Miles remained beautiful. What troubles did she have that she needed this possession over them? Was it a lost love? Lost family? Some people are just mad yes, but it seemed that in gothic literature, it is always something that drives them over the edge. What happend? Was she Miss Jessel? Not literally...but figuratively.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Poison Puree
"I wished to mix a witch's broth and proposed it with assurance, she would have held out a large clean saucepan."--chapter 11
Just an interesting line that might be a metaphor for the narrator's less than kosher purpose, and how she sucks Mrs. Grose into her intrigue with the children.
Just an interesting line that might be a metaphor for the narrator's less than kosher purpose, and how she sucks Mrs. Grose into her intrigue with the children.
The Open Window as Motif...just a thought
As I was reading tonight and finishing up chapter 10, I kept recalling Lucy Westerna at the window, allowing Dracula to enter. In chapter 10 the narrator finds Flora in the window, face to face with Ms Jessup and then from Miles's window she spies him outdoors at the tower. The window just seems significant! There is a short story called the Open Window that is also gothic in nature. I guess that this is just an observation that I wanted you to follow to see if it might play a greater role in gothic literature.
Confusion!!
Miles mentioned that he wishes that he could go to school with others like him. The nanny jokes that Flora is the only one she has ever met that is anything like Miles. But I don't think she caught on to what he was saying. I think that it has been obvious to us (or so we think) that these children are not human. So it makes me wonder, what exactly are they? Is it like Escape to Witch Mountain? Are they really aliens? Probably not...but could they be demons...or ghosts themselves? I'm not sure yet...four chapters to go, but its driving me crazy. What do you guys think they are?
And also, Quint and Jessel....good or evil? I still can't decide who is the protagonist in this plot. The ghosts? The children? The narrator? It's so cryptic. I have to say, its a little annoying because I have no clue who to root for...Maybe it will be the uncle.
And also, Quint and Jessel....good or evil? I still can't decide who is the protagonist in this plot. The ghosts? The children? The narrator? It's so cryptic. I have to say, its a little annoying because I have no clue who to root for...Maybe it will be the uncle.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Unreliable Narrator... (SPOILERS)
So, I've been thinking about this a lot ever since you mentioned it, "Mina," but in chapter 20 it really hit me hard how very possible it is that our narrator is not really as trustworthy as we think...
There Flora and the narrator stand, along with Mrs. Grose, when Mrs. Jessel appears on the other side of the lake! At first the narrator is very happy to finally have proof--that Mrs. Grose has finally encountered the ghost, too... "Mrs. Grose's dazed blink across to where I pointed struck me as showing that she too at last saw..." (Chapter 20, p 197)
But then later: "My elder companion, the next moment, at any rate, blotted out everything but her own flushed face and her loud shocked protest, a burst of high disapproval. 'What dreadful turn, to be sure, Miss! Where on earth do you see anything?'
"I could only grasp her more quickly yet, for even while she spoke the hideous plain presence stood undimmed and undaunted. It had already lasted a minute, and it lasted while I continued, seizing my colleague, quite thrusting her at it and presenting her to it, to insist with my pointing hand. 'You don't see her exactly as we see?--you mean to say you don't now--now? She's as big as a blazing fire! Only look, dearest woman, look!" (Chapter 20, p 198)
And then Mrs. Grose abandons her, and I'm assuming that the narrator, in her mind, must be mad! And perhaps she is...
Are, even in this fiction story by Henry James, ghost stories the product of an overactive imagination, the mind of a madwoman, the flutter of white draperies? I don't know yet, I haven't finished the story, but now I think that this might all be some trick in the narrator's mind...
There Flora and the narrator stand, along with Mrs. Grose, when Mrs. Jessel appears on the other side of the lake! At first the narrator is very happy to finally have proof--that Mrs. Grose has finally encountered the ghost, too... "Mrs. Grose's dazed blink across to where I pointed struck me as showing that she too at last saw..." (Chapter 20, p 197)
But then later: "My elder companion, the next moment, at any rate, blotted out everything but her own flushed face and her loud shocked protest, a burst of high disapproval. 'What dreadful turn, to be sure, Miss! Where on earth do you see anything?'
"I could only grasp her more quickly yet, for even while she spoke the hideous plain presence stood undimmed and undaunted. It had already lasted a minute, and it lasted while I continued, seizing my colleague, quite thrusting her at it and presenting her to it, to insist with my pointing hand. 'You don't see her exactly as we see?--you mean to say you don't now--now? She's as big as a blazing fire! Only look, dearest woman, look!" (Chapter 20, p 198)
And then Mrs. Grose abandons her, and I'm assuming that the narrator, in her mind, must be mad! And perhaps she is...
Are, even in this fiction story by Henry James, ghost stories the product of an overactive imagination, the mind of a madwoman, the flutter of white draperies? I don't know yet, I haven't finished the story, but now I think that this might all be some trick in the narrator's mind...
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