Tag-Archive for » neil gaiman «
A big thanks to Sarah for this wonderful Neil Gaiman article with him expertly talking about vampires. That man is so smart. And so right. When did becoming the undead become to desirable?
Gaiman made a good point – that writing a story about vampires was the perfect way to talk about sex in the Victorian era without actually having to talk about sex. Vampires were evil creatures that seduced helpless young women. They weren’t something to lust after. They were something to be feared. They could steal your innocence *shock*
Prior to Dracula, forget the fangirls after Edward. Those blood-sucking things were demonic and the pure essence of evil. You knew what you were getting into with those guys. All you had to do was look at them and you’d run away screaming. Bram Stoker made the vampire more appealing, and all that more dangerous. Dracula wasn’t supposed to be the undead James Bond that all the ladies wanted. He really was the wolf in sheep’s clothing, making him all the more evil. Now you’re not able to tell the difference between the bad and the good. The evil blends in and you’re far too late when you realize you’ve made a grave mistake.
Alas, Gaiman used my beloved Lost Boys as the sort of catalyst that turned vampires from demons into poster boys you pinned up on your wall and sighed over. Ok, so maybe that’s a little true. The Lost Boys sexed up vampires even more. They made them desirable. You wanted to be one of them. And what did you have to lose? Just sunlight? Sure, I can give that up! I get to be immortally pretty! Yay! Who needs a soul?
And then they kept morphing into these brooding emo boys that wear guyliner and are forever tortured. They turned into shelter dogs.
You know, maybe Gaiman’s right. Maybe this is the end of the cycle and vampires will go back underground where they belong to fester and mutate back into their former selves. Maybe they’re sick of being emasculated and want nothing more to do with the fangirls and moping.
We can only hope. You know, I love my Lost Boys. I love my Near Dark. I even like my Interview with the Vampire. But you can have your emo boys with snap-on fangs. Louis was as far as I wanted to take it, and that’s saying something. They’re morphed too far and it’s time for vampires to go back into their cocoons for a little while. They need their beauty sleep.
The Washington Post released an article about the Newbery Awards and how, just maybe, the seemingly high brow award may be more detrimental to a child’s reading than beneficial.
Honestly, I’m more inclined to agree with this rebuttal article and add a few more points but first, the argument against the Newbery. Essentially, critics of the Newbery feel that the books that are chosen as award winners aren’t those that kids would necessarily want to read or could really understand. It’s an award that’s out of touch with the youth of America and thus forcing children to read books that don’t stimulate them could turn them off to reading even more.
I don’t know about you, but even with all of the information in that first article, I still think it’s a pretty weak argument, not to mention slightly underestimating younger readers. That’s why I like the second article better. Personally, I find nothing wrong with the Newbery, no more so than the Pulitzer or the National Book Award. Remember when Stephen King won the NBA? And all those masters of lit-ra-ture scoffed at a genre writer winning an award that was supposedly so far out of his reach? That’s kind of why I don’t read a lot of those books. Many of them are filled with pretentious naval-gazing and I do see the Newbery as being, relatively speaking, the children’s equivalent. At least the Newbery winners can’t stop open doors.
This was definitely an interesting read and I’m glad I listened to those that recommended this book. While I may not have seen it in Stardust, I can see why people consider Gaiman a fantasy god. His writing, when he’s not trying to write in a specific style (I was told Stardust read like it did because Gaiman was trying to write like the more classic fairy tales), just takes you fluidly from one end of the story to the other. It’s not high brow literary nor is it a fantasy that takes itself way too seriously. It’s just good writing telling a story that I’ve never heard before.
I’m sure, if the story of Anansi was broken down into it’s more baser parts, there’d be your standard fantasy fare in there somewhere (know-nothing guy saves of the day of the other guy that everyone thought could do it all) but the story of Anansi, of all the animals and the transcendence from their world into ours is nothing like I’ve ever read. I have no idea if Gaiman took liberties with actual folk stories and myths but does it really matter? They were told so well and in such an authentic voice that they could have been. And that’s all that matters, right?
I just finished reading Stardust by Neil Gaiman the other night and, according to myself, it was the first fantasy book I’ve ever read (outside of Harry Potter which, really, isn’t this type of fantasy). I’m still blissfully ignorant of the categories of fantasy and when someone asks me what kind of fantasy I write, I say, ‘uh . . . fantasy?’ There are subgenres to the Momma genre, many of which I have no idea what they are so if anyone were to ask me what kind of fantasy this was, ‘uh . . . fantasy?’
Before I go any further, I have to say I saw the movie before I read the book (actually the movie was what put me on the fantasy path). A faux pas to many, I know but, to be honest, I didn’t know the book even existed before the movie came out. Remember, I’m a fantasy newbie and know next to nothing about any of it. From what I understand, Neil Gaiman is a pretty big name in fantasy land. Before this you could have said his name to me and I would have had no idea who you were talking about. So, right now, I ask that you forgive the comparisons. I can’t help it. The movie is burned much more strongly in head than the book is.
