Gay But Not Happy

Uncategorized, Winter 2016-17

By Diana Holiner

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Women Running on the Beach, Summer 1922./ De Agostini Picture Library / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Women Running on the Beach, Summer 1922./ De Agostini Picture Library / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

 

As a minority, you tend to look everywhere to see yourself represented. Whether it be in movies, books, TV shows, music, or life, there’s something comforting in knowing that you can see parts of yourself in others. It does get discouraging though, when all the people you look at are dying or unhappy. This is the struggle that queer girls and women face every time that we try to find a character that we can see ourselves in. Finding LGBTQ+ characters in today’s media is hard enough–in their most recent report on TV, GLAAD has reported that LGBTQ+ characters make up only 4.8% of the characters on broadcast TV–but finding ones that stay alive is becoming close to impossible.

 

Killing queer women has become so common that it has its own trope: Bury Your Gays. The trope Bury Your Gays goes back centuries, and is unfortunately still in full use today. TV Tropes (tvtropes.org) describes the trope as one where “gay characters just aren’t allowed happy endings.” While it makes sense that in older works this might have been more prevalent–especially with lesbian pulp fiction where one author was told that the gay characters were not allowed happy endings–it seems like there is no need for it in 2016. Yet, turn on a TV and you will see lesbians dying left and right. When we look at our favorite queer women characters, they’re either getting shot by a stray bullet (Lexa, The 100), getting killed by guards (Poussey Washington, Orange is the New Black) or dying in car explosions (Nora and Mary Louise, The Vampire Diaries). And these deaths are just within the last year. It’s obvious that some queer characters will die, but the rate at which writers have been killing them off compared to straight characters is appalling. From the 1970s until now, there have been 162 deaths of queer female characters on TV, out of around 380 queer female characters altogether. That’s approximately 42%.

 

Many say that these characters were killed off for so-calledshock value, but the thing is, it’s not so shocking anymore. It’s normal. It’s common practice. A shocking thing would be to have a queer female character be alive, happy, and in a healthy relationship, but that doesn’t seem to be happening in TV at all. According to an article in Autostraddle, which studied queer women in fiction, 35% of shows have dead lesbian/bi female characters, and 84% of shows don’t give lesbian/bi female characters happy endings. We constantly see ourselves dying, being written off, or being heartbroken. While TV networks might pat themselves on the back for being progressive enough to include queer characters, all that progressiveness goes out the window when the writers and showrunners decide that they’ve had enough. It’s not progressive to show a lesbian character, hype her, bring in a huge LGBTQ+ audience, and then simply kill her off. It’s not progressive when we are only included to be killed. Some might say that at least we’re getting representation, but this representation does not befit us. It is time wewere given hope.

 

When first accepting that they are queer, a lot of queer youth will look to anything to see themselves represented, and it’s disheartening to know that queer youth will see their representations die. We see too much of white, cisgender, and straight characters on TV, when what we need to see are characters of color, transgender and nonbinary characters, and queer characters. It just might help those struggling to come to terms with their sexuality. As Larry Wilmore said on the Nightly Show after the Orlando shooting, “unlike other minority groups in America, LGBT people aren’t born into a home or a family that shares their minority experience.” A majority of LGBTQ+ people can’t simply turn to their family for support, so they turn to fictional characters, but it’s a real kick in the face when we see all of these characters become neglected.

 

The message that TV show runners are giving queer women who are desperate to see themselves represented is that we can be gay in the sense of being queer but we cannot be gay in the sense of being happy.

 

Diana Holiner is 20 years old and is part of the Dynamy Internship Year program. She is originally from Dover, Massachusetts and is now living in Worcester. She interns at Worcester Magazine and the Worcester Journal. In her free time she enjoys reading, writing, singing, and eating ice cream.

PHOTO CREDIT: France, Paris, Women Running on the Beach. Photopgraphy. Britannica ImageQuest, Encyclopædia Britannica, 25 May 2016.
quest.eb.com/search/126_3742873/1/126_3742873/cite. Accessed 25 Jan 2017.

Grace and Frankie: Worth a Watch

Uncategorized, Winter 2016-17

Lillian Cohen

Via Facebook

Via Facebook

Much like the critically acclaimed Gilmore Girls, Grace and Frankie fits its prospective audience perfectly, keeping a slow but steady plot, filled with laughs and minor drama–perfect series to binge watch when you’re sick or just need a day to relax. Directed by Betty Thomas and created by Marta Kauffman and Howard J. Morris in 2015, Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin star as women who begin to live together and become unlikely friends after their husbands, played by Sam Waterston and Martin Sheen, come out as lovers. Lily Tomlin was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series in 2015 and 2016 for this role.

It all starts with a nice dinner together, in public, the perfect place to make a spectacle of yourselves while you wives throw food at you and yell after you tell them about your 20 year affair with each other. Obviously that wasn’t how Robert and Sol expected it to go, but Grace and Frankie have never been those to do the expected. That’s part of what makes their living arrangements, sharing their beach house, so odd. They’ve always been those ladies who gossip behind each other’s backs to their mutual friend Babe and smile to each other’s faces. But now, being put in the same position, they realize that no one else can truly understand the feeling that their entire marriage and life was a lie.

We also see the development of Robert and Sol’s relationship before and after their marriages, finding out the secrets that they hid while together in secret.

Not unexpectedly, the couples’ children also have a hard time adjusting, not knowing which side to stand on.

The overall cinematography is pretty good. It’s shown from far away, much like the cameras on a sitcom, so that one can almost observe what’s going on. There are no close ups really. This gives a stage-like effect that really adds to the overall show, not trying to draw viewers into the show but presenting  them with the story.

 The sets are present character and quirks of the characters. Frankie has her own meditation nook at the beach house, with a hanging woven chair and hippie-patterned pillows on the floor. Grace and Robert had a pristine house with nothing out of place, looking like r a picture from Good Housekeeping.

Throughout the series, the plot stands not only as a commentary on feminism and family values, but also on aging and how one’s life changes as we age. We experience what it’s like to be a female CEO of a cosmetics company, an elderly gay couple, a different race than your parents, and how the people in your life changes who you are. It’s definitely worth a watch.

Lillian Cohen currently attends Doherty Memorial High School in Worcester, Massachusetts and is an active member and Chapter Board member of the United Synagogue Youth organization. She enjoys writing and is an intern at both the Worcester Journal and Worcester Magazine.

Photo URL: https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-1/p200x200/12670715_543328459184932_7744120753528289365_n.png?oh=9dbfe2c167b45e2001fe0a40575f278d&oe=592456FD

 

4 Your Eyez Only

Uncategorized, Winter 2016-17

 

Tazwar Ferdous

Via Wikipedia

Via Wikipedia

 

After a two-year hiatus, platinum-award winning artist J. Cole’s 4 Your Eyez Only Only transitions from his predictable discussions of fame and fortune to bringing his listeners into the dark and moody realism of social problems, nuanced with a sense of hope and change. He describes his new role as a husband and father and contrasts that with the life of a fictional African American man who is forced to balance a life of crime and parenthood, ultimately forcing him to leave his family.

     Cole has eschewed the noise of mainstream hip hop, producing a melancholic sound with somber and organic instrumentation. The project begins with the song “For Whom the Bell Tolls”. A depressing trumpet is played in the background and bells are tenaciously shook as Cole sings  “I see the rain pourin’ down…”The sorrowful mood is further conveyed in songs such as “Ville Mentality” and “4 Your Eyez Only”.

    He introduces listeners to his wife and newborn daughter in the songs, “She’s Mine, Pt. 1,” “Foldin Clothes,” and “She’s Mine, Pt. 2.” After a long self-exile from social media and hip hop music, he sheds some insight on what kept him occupied. In “She’s Mine, Pt. 1”, Cole eulogizes his fiancee, and ultimately conveys what she means to him. The song is reminiscent of his much older love songs, such as “Dreams.” But orchestrally, it is very somber and deviates from the traditional hip hop sound, suggesting he has found new and authentic love. He further conveys his love for his  fiancée in the song “Foldin’ Clothes,” in which he raps about the smaller things in life, such as folding clothes.  In “She’s Mine, Pt. 2,” Cole sings of his new role as a father, and how precious his daughter is to him, questioning whether he is “worthy of this gift”.

    Cole also illustrates the perspective of, presumptively, his fictional African American friend struggling with poverty, creating a harsh and callous mentality. This serves the purpose for his song, “Immortal,” which reverts to Cole’s usage of aggressive flow and rhymes, this time over an eerie beat, creating vivid imagery of crime, death, and drugs. He then proceeds to illustrate the callous mentality that develops as a result of such social pressures by affirming that “real” men do not break down or die from them, hence the title “Immortal.” In the outro of the song, Cole makes an insightful point from his own perspective. He remarks how so many are influenced to think that the only way to be successful is to play in the NBA, become a rapper, or deal drugs, thus restricting them from reaching their full potential. However, in his song, “Changes”, Cole provides a sense of hope and maturation for these problems.

    The final song is “4 Your Eyez Only,” an emotional track with a duration of 8 minutes in which Cole reveals the purpose of the entire album. In the previous song, “Changes,” Cole reveals the name of his fictional African American friend, James Mcmillan Jr. In the majority of “4 Your Eyez Only”, Cole raps from the perspective of James, who is leaving an important message behind for his young daughter. In a pessimistic tone, he expresses how he “can’t visualize [himself] as nothing but a criminal,” and voices his premonition on how his harsh lifestyle with crime and drugs will result in his death. He also mentions how the cops have a presence in his neighborhood, which may be referencing police brutality in America. Through this verse, J. Cole reveals the true reality behind a life associated with crime, and how these lifestyles can emotionally affect men, regardless of how “real” or “immortal” they might seem.  The last verse is told from Cole’s perspective, and he concludes that the album is a message left behind from James to his daughter. He finishes 4 Your Eyez Only by remarking that his father was a “real” man, not because he was involved with drugs and crime, but because of his passionate love for his daughter.

There are a few problems. The vague transitions between his perspective and James’ perspective is confusing. Throughout the album, Cole raps from James’ perspective, only to rap from his own a few lines later. His transitions are often abrupt, and it’s also difficult to distinguish them, considering both of them often talk about their daughters. This obfuscates the overall purpose and message Cole is trying to convey. Also, explicitly revealing the entire purpose of the album in an eight-minute song prevents his listeners from recognizing for themselves the album’s subtleties. Lastly, 4 Your Eyez Only is comprised of only ten songs. This may leave some fans unsatisfied, considering Cole was inactive for 2 years.

    And yet, the album as a whole provides a comprehensible picture of social problems facing African Americans while revealing the positive changes in the singer’s life. Also, he finally deviates from the traditional hip-hop sound, which may please the fans who are eager for change. 4 Your Eyez Only proves itself to be a worthy album.

 

    

 

Crushed Stars and Losing Dogs: Review of Mitski’s Puberty 2

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

by Tricia Wise

Puberty 2 is the latest album from Mitski. Photo courtesy of the artist. 

Puberty 2 is the latest album from Mitski. Photo courtesy of the artist. 

Though just shy of 26 years old, Mitski is already an artist who effortlessly manages to blur the line between force and fragility. Here is an extensive release of existential and outsider themes that evoke both utter despair and raw power, along with inevitable feelings of growth, command, and maturity. Mitski already realizes and fluently expresses emotional knowledge through her lyrics, which varyingly speak directly to the girl on a drunk walk home alone, the girl listening to records on her bedroom floor after a bad breakup, and the girl who is just trying to be the best she can be and still feels inadequate. Speaking to the anxieties, both modern and timeless, of the teen and young-twenties girl, Mitski unwaveringly roots for the underdog; pretty much any situation you can imagine feeling like you are definitely gunna die, Mitski has probably already sung about it.

I pulled up her recent album Puberty 2 released June 17th) on Spotify as I rode home from a friend’s apartment around midnight. I was a couple of songs in when I reached my own dimly lit apartment, but decided to ride around a little more to complete the album (as if I hadn’t already heard it a million times). Puberty 2 is the type of album where you really just have to listen to it all the way through, maybe two—or three—or twelve times in one sitting.

The first song I heard that got me hooked on this wonderful Brooklyn-based artist wasFirst Love/Late Spring,” which I have tried and failed countless times to learn on guitar. This was from her previous album, Bury Me at Makeout Creek (2014). It was Tuesday afternoon in October of last year; I was lying on my bed after a long day of classes, procrastinating making my way up the hill to the library to write my capstone papers. The lyrics were so striking and hit me so hard, I had to immediately listen to it three more times.

In the words of Lester Bangs, “music—you know, true music, not just rock’ n’ roll—chooses you.” Mitski’s is the kind of music that makes these words ring true for me. I knew of a few friends who mentioned Bury Me at Makeout Creek in the past, but it wasn’t until that day when I stumbled upon this dark and emotional album that I finally got what they were all talking about. And I think there’s something to be said for Bangs’ statement—music is this all-encompassing powerful shit that can just encapsulate your entire soul whether you’re at an open mic night, a stadium concert, or alone, lying on your bed listening to your third generation green iPod Nano (do not judge me). No matter the setting, Mitski’s songs are just this kind of all-encompassing and captivating music—the kind that seems to choose you.

Mitski does not hold hesitate to immerse herself in her own emotions and sadness, which in itself is remarkable in a time when female artists are often expected to show indifference or relentless power towards relationships—and yet, Mitski still manages to make music that is undoubtedly empowering. Anyone (but actually probably just millennials) can relate to her honest and overtly relatable lyrics. (Check out  “Class of 2013”).

Although Bury Me at Makeout Creek has a far more dejected feel than her recent release, Puberty 2 surrenders to these dark themes, but challenges their melancholy through the strength of its own self-aware sadness. In this album, Mitski seems to “put on her white button-down” and face everything head-on.

The album opens with “Happy,” which articulates an accurate view of the “Netflix and chill” culture and those ramifications. Two other songs off the album, “A Loving Feeling” and “Once More to See You,” have a similar vibe—however, “A Loving Feeling” is a much more ironically upbeat number.

“I Bet on Losing Dogs” and “Thursday Girl” are two of my favorite songs on the album, despite being two of its slowest. Both definitely have a dark feel with nice, heavy melodies that are perfect for listening to at 3 a.m. or even while going for a jog.

“My Body’s Made of Crushed Little Stars” brings up a similar apprehension toward adulthood as in “Class of 2013,” but with more of a classic punk vibe (I am here for that distortion). In this song she talks about not being able to pay rent, yet “wanting to see the world” and trying to “ace an interview”—all things manypost-college graduates are currently experiencing.

“Your Best American Girl” was the first single from the album, and definitely one of the best. Watching the video makes it even more relatable and, like, ugh. It also seems like she’s making fun of (generally, white) music festival culture (so American) and makes out with her own hand—even though the video seems quirky and a bit tongue-in-cheek, there is still a lot of depth within the video itself. To be real, this song speaks to me on so many levels…the “I do, I finally do” in the last verse always gives me chills.

In “A Burning Hill,” the final song of the album, she describes herself as “a forest fire” (quite different from the Dead Kennedys song). With an atmospheric timbre appropriate for a finale, the most powerful lyric in the song may be: “I stand in a valley watching it and you are not there at all.” Honorable mentions go to “Fireworks” and “Dan the Dancer.”

She may not have “hit it big” just yet, but Mitski undoubtedly deserves to become (as I predict she will) one of the most influential musicians of our generation, and surely already is for countless budding musicians (myself inclu
ded)—which makes it kinda hard to write an unbiased review, and to stop to watch her live performances on
YouTube while writing this. Ultimately, Mitski’s music is the kind that is so powerfully personal and so emotionally raw that I cannot help but be reminded of that quote at the end of Almost Famous (Cameron Crowe, 2000), when William asks Russell what he loves about music, and he responds as Led Zeppelin’s “Tangerine” plays in the background:, “To begin with, everything.”

Mitski will be performing at the Paradise Rock Club in Boston on November 1st. Photo courtesy of the artist. 

Mitski will be performing at the Paradise Rock Club in Boston on November 1st. Photo courtesy of the artist. 

Tricia Wise is a recent graduate of Clark University and an aspiring writer (and possibly makeup artist). To read more of her work, visit her blog at www.beantownbroads.com.  

 

Pimping a Butterfly

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

Tazwar Ferdous

 

“Hip-hop has always been about bragging and boasting,” Eminem once told 60 Minutes and he was partly right. Mainstream hip-hop music has always had a reputation for the genre’s recurring themes of money, drugs, and women, evoking for those outside the community what may now be a stereotypical image of conceited rappers boasting about gold chains and the bevies of prostitutes in their narcotic-filled Ferraris. Many artists, however, employ hip-hop as a tool for protest and spreading awareness. Kendrick Lamar is one of them.

Born and raised in Compton, California, Lamar endured the struggles of living with gang tensions, poverty, drug dealings, poor education, and a bizarre environment throughout his adolescence. To Pimp a Butterfly, an album he released in 2015, compassionately addresses this amongst other issues. One song, “Alright,” revolves around the power of determination and optimism in the face of the much publicized police shootings of the past few years.

“Blacker the Berry” is a bitter reflection on self-hatred in the African American community. The album brings awareness to issues of racial discrimination, certainly, but also to the fact that, often, these communities are in their own conflict of hatred and violence in the form of gang tension and crime. Drawing on his own experiences of growing up in the midst of two infamous rival gangs, the Crips and Bloods, Lamar created more vivid imagery of this bellicose environment in his earlier song, “m.A.Ad city.” With lines like, “Pakistan on every porch, we adapt to crime. Pack a van with four guns at a time” and  “‘AK’s, AR’s ‘Ay y’all duck’. That’s what momma said when we was eating the free lunch.”

The most personal song in the album is undoubtedly “u,” in which Lamar scrutinizes his insecurities and the plagues of reaching fame, even calling himself a “failure.” He despises himself for abandoning his family in Compton after attaining fame and fortune, and regrets his decision to refrain from suicide. This song has a significant place in the album, exposing Kendrick Lamar as an icon and inspiration who is vulnerable enough to reveal his insecurities and personal problems.

As a meaningful contrast  to “u”, “i” is a jubilant song of contentment and self-love. With radiant instrumentation and the catchy “I love myself” hook, Lamar shelters his listeners from the negativity of his community, and instead emphasizes the importance of self-love and gratitude. Taking a welcome break from the self-loathing and social issues which pervade throughout the album, “i” is Lamar’s offer of optimism through hip-hop, as he uses the song to encourage a unified sense of strength, pride, and self-respect among the African American community.

“Mortal Man” is the final song on To Pimp a Butterfly, a lasting remark from Lamar where he questions the loyalty of his fans and affirms his responsibility in leading and influencing the youth. After exhorting his community to persevere in the midst of discrimination and self-hatred, Lamar feels that he is not only an artist, but an iconic leader. Throughout his hooks, he affirms his responsibility in prolonging the legacy of influential icons such as Nelson Mandela when he says, “The ghost of Mandela, hope my flows they propel it,” and later acknowledges himself as a flawed leader when he says, “As I lead this army, make room for mistakes and depression.”  Though Lamar seems to accept his role in the public eye and in  the African American community, he is still apprehensive about making mistakes, knowing  he is only a “mortal man,” showing us another angle of his insecurity when he asks his audience,  “When shit hit the fan, is you still a fan?”

To Pimp a Butterfly will continue to have  a lasting impact on hip-hop music and society as an example of how hip-hop as a platform can be utilized for far more than just entertainment. Its ripples are already being felt, and since its release we have seen more of the social action side of hip-hop . J. Cole, another very prominent and mainstream hip-hop artist, was recently featured in a song called “Jermaine’s Interlude,” where he refers to the issue of police brutality. In July, West Coast rap artists Snoop Dogg and The Game led a peaceful march protesting police brutality. Both artists were once member of rival gangs.

It’s too early to say whether Kendrick will become a figure comparable to Martin Luther King Jr., but there is no doubt that he is, like them, bringing attention social and motivating people to persevere–except Kendrick is doing it with some funky hip-hop beats. 

 

Tazwar Ferdous is a junior at Hopkinton (Massachsetts) High School and has been writing as a hobby for a few years. He is currently interning at The Worcester Journal.

 

   

Adaptations of Childhood: What We Can Learn from Harry Potter and The Little Prince

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

Sasha Kohan

Images created with prisma by Sasha Kohan. 

Images created with prisma by Sasha Kohan. 

In my home growing up, summer meant reading. More the indoor, imaginative types than rough-and-tumble summer camp kids, my siblings and I reveled in our library’s summer reading program, and savored those blissful months of seemingly infinite time to read.

Now, as a graduate perpetually attempting to stay caught up with the excess of pop culture news and trends that invade my social media, I find reading for reading’s sake is a slow-paced and almost impossible luxury. Now, however, as my first post-collegiate summer draws to an end and the years of True Adulthood loom ever more closely, I was recently brought back to those elementary and middle school summers, in ways both parallel and disparate, with two of the latest and most significant commodifications of literature of my childhood. First, there was Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a two-part (confusing way of saying ‘four act’) play written by Jack Thorne based on J.K. Rowling’s universe and story (supposedly), which came out in the tradition of those golden midnight release parties of yore on July 31 of this year, a holy day for any true Potter fan who knows it to be the birthday of both Ms. Rowling and Harry himself. Then Mark Osborne’s feature-length animated take on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s 1943 novella The Little Prince premiered on Netflix after being rejected by Paramount for unknown reasons just a week before its scheduled release in spring.

I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that both The Little Prince and the Harry Potter series are among the most significant and timeless works of children’s literature written thus far, along with others like Lewis Carroll’s Alice books and C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia—both of which, in case you haven’t seen, have already received (and, as has been recently announced, will continue to receive) their 21st century commercial cinema treatment—which is why I find the coincidental timing of these two releases almost as eerily enchanting as when Toy Story 3 came out dangerously close to my own high school graduation and hometown goodbye. I think it’s also safe to say that, although there are certainly merits and weaknesses to both Cursed Child and Little Prince, what their side-by-side premieres illustrate most glaringly is that there is a right way to handle such beloved material—with a true sense of the original’s spirit and values, a deep respect for the characters and their creator, and the creative sense and imagination to invent something wholly new while preserving the integrity of its source material—and there’s a wrong way.

Other Potterheads may disagree, but I have to say that Cursed Child does it wrong. I’m not even one of those anti-revisionist fans who spew bitter canon-only comments about Pottermore and the seemingly boundless lengths the film industry will go to ensure the immortality of the franchise (in fact, while I’m not convinced of the necessity of five of these prequel films, I’m quite looking forward to seeing Eddie Redmayne as Newt Scamander in the upcoming November release of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them)—no, I was fully prepared to give Cursed Child all the chances in the world. Having read positive reviews of the West End production in London and (internally) cheering when Noma Dumezweni was cast as Adult Hermione, I went to Nonesuch Books straight after work on August 1 and paid full price for my hardcover copy of the rehearsal script.

The summertime connection with the series was always especially felt, for although reading any Potter book by a fire in the middle of a snowstorm is sure to evoke the Hogwarts coziness from the first two films, one can never quite erase the seasonal association with the book release parties, Harry’s birthday, and the fact that summer was always the worst time for Harry. His isolation among the Dursleys paralleled our own as we immersed ourselves in his world and looked forward to getting to his school year, which was always rich enough to fill the empty space of summer vacation. Indeed, I recall one summer between fourth and fifth grade when I read almost nothing but Prisoner of Azkaban, starting and finishing and starting over until I’d read it cover to cover a total of—I believe—36 times. Cursed Child hardly ranks that high on any scale of engagement, but it was a sort of pleasant surprise when I actually lay in bed reading late into the night as I had not done in years, smiling at some of the surprises that came up. (Albus as Slytherin! Hermione as Minister of Magic! Scorpius as sweet and completely benign!) Those were the moments that almost made me feel like a fourth grader, eating up the magic universe for the first time again.

Unfortunately, those moments were few and far between. Before I even attempt to address the myriad plot failures and character mutilations, the physical act of reading the script is jarring in itself. Even for someone who’s read a fair share of scripts and screenplays in her life, the scene changes happen what feels like entirely too fast for the most part, with blackouts and elaborate set changes on nearly every other page. Though I tried to assure myself with each jolting transition that it’s probably better if you see it onstage, I have sincere doubts about the efficacy of whatever stage tricks and technical effects they’re using to create the magic described in the somewhat poorly-written stage directions. Has Jack Thorne ever read a play before? I was forced to ask myself at times. Has Jack Thorne ever read a Harry Potter book, even? Based on his characterization of Ron alone, I’m inclined to say no. I would hope that any Potter fan would be capable of portraying Ron as more than the flat caricature of comic relief he apparently grows up to be, and able to paint Harry’s feelings toward fatherhood with significantly more nuance. Cursed Child was obviously not written by Rowling’s pen and, providing almost nothing but dialogue, the play glaringly lacks the distinct narration of the novels. The lines in between conversations were full of descriptions and details in Rowling’s own voice which were just as much a part of the reading experience as the intricate plotlines and complex characters.

Speaking of plotlines…ah, where to begin? To be honest, I’m not even sure I should. I initially allowed myself to be entertained by the absolutely labyrinthine mess of the plot Thorne concocted (from what I now confidently assume were photocopied pages of the back cover summaries), but the more I read reviews comparing the whole script to bad fan fiction, the more I can’t help but surrender to the plain and simple truth that not every fan theory deserves to be brought to life. (Unsurprisingly, comparisons have already been drawn to the infamous “My Immortal” fanfiction from 2006-2007—if you haven’t heard of it, it is imperative that you read a few lines, any lines, or at least read the Wikipedia article about it.) Yes, sure, I appreciated the bones thrown to the Malfoy/Hermione shippers and the Bellatrix/Voldemort shippers, and yes, the idea of an alternate world where Hermione is a fugitive warrior queen and Cedric is a Death Eater is undeniably intriguing, but this sentence alone captures only what I estimate to be around 7% of the totally unnecessary and indiscriminate events that occur in the course of this four-act play.

The Little Prince, by comparison, is an enormous success. Running at 108 minutes with an all-star cast of voice actors, Osborne’s vision of the little boy who lived on a planet hardly bigger than himself uses the skeleton of Saint-Exupéry’s story and manages to build it into a completely new narrative. This is clearly what Cursed Child attempts or overconfidently thinks it is doing, but this new version of The Little Prince is remarkable for how harmoniously it seems to create a contemporary fable while also capturing the soul of the original book. Adaptation is a tricky thing, for both adaptors and observers; many film scholars don’t even really consider it worth studying, because how can you truly compare one medium to another? It’s apples and oranges, most of the time. In this case, though, the differences are not quite so vast; more like oranges and nectarines.

As with Cursed Child, or any adaptation, The Little Prince takes some liberties with its source material, adding the entirely new characters of The Little Girl (voiced by Mackenzie Foy) and The Mother (Rachel McAdams), who exist in a busy, modern world not unlike our own; obsessed with progress and productivity, training from an unreasonably young age to prepare for adulthood, studying all the answers test-makers want to hear, forsaking play for work, even on summer vacation. Just as in the book, there’s an emphasis on the “strangeness of adults” that feels more relevant and more heartbreaking than ever. The film swings heavily at helicopter parenting, standardized testing, and the educational application process that seems to be starting earlier and earlier, encouraging the pursuit of extremes to the disadvantage of anything in between.

Most of these details are not in Saint-Exupéry’s 1943 book, but it is exactly the kind of society for which the wisdom of his Little Prince was an antidote. “What is essential is invisible to the eye” remains one of the book’s most famous through lines and main themes, and comes up both directly in the film’s presentation of the aviator’s story and discreetly in the beginning, as we see a row of intimidating posters in the bleak hallway of an elite academy: “What will you be when you grow up? Essential.”

The movie is playful and clever in all the ways the Prince would want it to be—even Osborne’s decision to use both the Pixar-like computer animation for The Little Girl’s world and stop-motion animation for her vision of the Little Prince’s adventures demonstrates this—because why not? These are the kind of creative choices that make the movie feel so novel while carrying on what was at the heart of the classic little French tale, giving us all its sweeping philosophical suggestions and simplicity.

Striking, too, is how seamlessly Osborne fits his film into the theoretical canon of the original book. When The Little Girl befriends the aviator (Jeff Bridges) and begins saving the pages and illustrations he sends to tell the story of The Little Prince (which, in another wonderful detail, appear to be in their original French), we know that what she is collecting will become the book from which her own story originates, the one the world grew to know and love enough to want to see this very movie. Even with a few forgivable lines thrown in for pure comic effect and perhaps one too many extraneous endings, Osborne’s version of The Little Prince is undoubtedly one of the finer examples of an adaptation that lovingly respects its source and provides a modern retelling of the wisdom of children to enchant another generation.

Ultimately achieving what the Harry Potter books and others like them did and still do, the film creates a space of pure escapism that still, somehow, feels like it is about you and your world—because, really, this is what all great children’s literature does. As we transition through seasons and slowly grow into adults, these stories and these characters continue to remind us not to forget how it felt when everything around us seemed like magic and all the magic seemed to be real.

Sasha Kohan is a recent graduate of Clark University and hopes to pursue a career in pop culture writing. To read more of her work, visit her website at www.sashakohan.com.

A Romantic Reawakening

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Kelcy Williams

Reawakened, a great read for lovers of mythology, love triangles, Egyptian princes and adventure, is the first novel in the Reawakened series by Colleen Houck. The protagonist, Lily Young, is a seventeen-year-old living in New York City. During spring break she goes to her favorite museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and comes across the mummy exhibit. What she doesn’t expect is for the Egyptian prince Amon to awaken, handsome and shirtless, and inform her that he needs to borrow her life force until he can find his brothers. Lily, being raised in the present day, where shirtless men wearing skirts are not  the norm, thinks he is crazy and has a plan to feed him and then return him  to whatever mental institution she believes he has escaped from.  Through a magical twist, she finds herself in Egypt on a quest to find his brothers, the personification of the moon and the god of the stars, so that they can defeat the evil shape-shifting god Seth and save humankind before time runs out. Quite a yarn.

I’ve found Colleen Houck is a captivating writer whose books I cannot put the book down, and she does not disappoint with Reawakened. She starts the book wonderfully, describing the basic genealogy of ancient Egyptian mythology which, unbeknownst to the reader, is the foundation of the whole story. Indeed, the tale of Amon and Lily’s demonstrates the author’s extensive knowledge of Egypt and Egyptian mythology, and she weaves together these myths into a fascinating narrative.

Houck uses inner dialogue and diction to add depth to the protagonist Lily, and to bring out the personalities of other supporting characters in this novel. For example, she uses interesting dialogue in the line “I flashed my membership card,” as an exciting way to show the reader that Lily loves museums and visits this one often, instead of saying that Lily goes to the museum every Monday and Wednesday and stays until closing. Houck has also mastered the art of diction. This novel features a lot of adventure, and Houck captures it all with her colorful words. This book made me talk at the pages like I would a movie, pleading for Lily to not touch that rock, or to watch out for booby traps; for her to listen Amon, when he tells her to wait inside. She allows the reader to not just read words on a page but to live them out through the characters.

One of my favorite quotes from Lily is in the beginning of the novel when she says, “Though in my heart I longed for some chaos and adventure, the truth was that I very much depended on order to function.” This is a great quote, because it is ironic and foreshadows the impending chaos and journey she will soon partake on. If she thinks she needs order to function now, then she will so be proven wrong when she is thrown into a heart-stopping adventure. Lily  develops into a stronger character able to handle the new challenges that life throws at her.

If I have any criticism of the book, it is that the first part of the story escalates too quickly. Lily meets a strange man in the museum and thinks he is mentally ill, but then three chapters later she wants to kiss him. This introduction of romance into this novel seems rushed and awkward. From that point on, however, as the story begins to really unfold, both the romance and plot is set at the perfect pace. If you enjoyed the novels in her Tiger’s Curse series, then it may take a while to stop picturing her other heartthrobs, Ren and Kishan, in place of Amon and his brothers, but believe me, Amon’s features and mannerisms are definitely swoon-worthy. It’s a great read. Be careful when you read it, because the second book is not out yet and you may very well fall off of the cliff you’ll be hanging from.

Editor’s note: The second novel in this series, Recreated, will be published this summer.

Kelcy Williams of Maryland studies Mechanical Engineering and Professional Writing at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, Massachusetts,  to be a Mechanical Engineering major, soon to have a Journalism minor. She loves books and  Korean barbecue.

Telling Cancer Where to Go

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Sloane M. Perron

Linda Brossi Murphy of Boylston, Massachusetts, is a cancer survivor. Throughout her cheekily titled book, Fuck Off, Cancer, Murphy shares candid details about her diagnosis, her changing body, losing her hair, maintaining a healthy sex life during chemo, and the importance of an occasional glass of wine.

Murphy’s story begins four years ago during what she describes as a “mid-afternoon romp” with her husband, David, during which she discovered a lump in her breast. The lump was originally diagnosed as being hormonally induced, but when it persisted she was referred to to UMass Memorial Hospital in Worcester.

On Halloween, Murphy got the bad news that, yes, she had cancer.

The good news, however, was that her cancer was rated “ light to medium” by the doctor, and was  treatable. It was an aggressive form of breast cancer, however, and  Murphy wound up receiving five different forms of chemotherapy over a year and a half.

Despite her naturally positive outlook, the treatments took a heavy toll on her body. “Cancer does not make you sick,” Murphy said, “Cancer treatments make you sick.”

After a couple of weeks of chemotherapy, Murphy’s hair began falling  out in clumps, along with her eyelashes and eyebrows. She  texted pictures of the hairballs to family and friends and asked for help  naming the hairballs. They came up with Tom and Jerry, Rooster, Timmy and Tommy, and Cheech and Chong.

“I am against shaving your head,” she said. “Any hairs that want to stay, can.” Eventually, Murphy bought three wigs that allowed her to become a blonde, a redhead, or a brunette, according to her whim. Her husband never knew what his wife was going to look like, she chuckled. She began to see the importance of wigs to people going through chemotherapy, and some of the proceeds from sales of her book will be donated to wig salons to purchase wigs (and wine, of course–may as well make the most of the situation) for their clients.

Murphy was touched by the outpouring of support she received from loved ones, “My family was awesome,” she said. “I have a great group of family and friends.” She developed the idea of “chemo parties,” where different family members and friends would drive her to Mass General Hospital in Boston for her treatments, spend the day with her in the hospital, and then enjoy time in Boston together. Murphy always brought cookies for all of the nurses. The staff became a second family to her, she said.

Throughout the course of her recovery, Murphy documented and photographed almost every aspect of the experience, from initially discovering the lump to her last day of treatment and being able to ring the bell at the radiation department of Mass General, a tradition that signaled the end of one’s radiation treatment.

    Murphy’s goal in writing “F Off Cancer” was to remove the stigma and fear that commonly surrounds cancer. She’s grateful, she says, for good health insurance, a strong support system, and a reliable car to get her back and forth to Boston. If her diagnosis with cancer means that a poor, single mother waitressing tables with no insurance does not get it, then Murphy would not change anything about her ordeal with cancer. In her mind, the death of a child, chronic pain, and ALS are all much worse than the experience she had.

    Her family brought the same playful spirit to the experience. Murphy recalled waking up one night and saying to her husband, “We have the best life ever.” He responded, “You are aware that you are going through cancer, right?”

A lot of such humor, as well as introspection and raw emotion are all to be found in in Murphy’s book. And she hopes that telling cancer to “f*** off” she can inspire others to face the obstacles they must overcome in their own lives with humor–and perhaps a glass of wine.

Linda Brossie Mupry / photo by sloane perron

Linda Brossie Mupry / photo by sloane perron

 

Sloane M. Perron is agraduate of Anna Maria College in Paxton, Massachusetts She enjoys writing in all forms and has a passion for telling the stories of others.

 

   

Doing the Right Thing

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Warren Singh

Decision time, and the fate of the free world hangs in the balance: it’s 1939, and I’ve been put in charge of a new top-secret government project called The Manhattan Project, devoted to developing a game-changing weapon in competition with the Nazis. Given the circumstances, it’s a little nerve-wracking to consider the first thing that I have to do, which is choose a second-in-command to lead the team of physicists that will be the heart and soul of the endeavor.

 I’m on page 18 of The Right Decision, an immensely fun read, despite being written like a textbook (which, being published by McGraw Hill, is probably  intentional) regarding how to make decisions.

Written by a math professor named James Stein, the book draws from the fields of mathematics and economics (more specifically, decision and game theory) to address better ways of weighing and choosing options. Its chapters are divided into various broad topics: the first part of the book covers an idea central to decision theory, the ‘payoff factor’. Really, it’s a fancy way of saying, ‘what is it that you want out of this?’ Subsequent chapters deal with various ways of assessing the core idea, such as the inadmissibility option (if an option is inferior to other, similar ones, drop it like it’s on fire) or the Bayes criterion (which choice works out best on average?).

Midway, the book takes a pleasantly diverting turn, the reasons for which Stein explains at the beginning. He writes that one doesn’t learn to ride a bike solely by reading about it: you instead take a few core ideas, and then go and practice them until it clicks. Then you vary the situation and do it again. This is what he aims to do with the book, and this is where the fun is. Interspersed through the chapters are problems presented for the reader, in which Stein presents a real or hypothetical scenario and asks what you, the reader, would do. Spanning such diverse scenarios as “my best friend and his girl are having trouble and have broken up, when can I make a move for her” to “in what direction should you take your multinational corporation at this critical juncture,” these problems are immensely entertaining.

The author writes that he hopes that doing these puzzles will be just as entertaining as crosswords or Sudoku, but with the added benefit of helping us make decisions. Stein offers  28 scenarios, complete with solutions. He advises tackling one a day for a month, with the hope that at the end of it, the reader will have vastly improved decision-making skills.

Stein argues that we are the sum of our decisions, his point being that our decisions won’t always lead to good things, as the real world frequently has factors that we can’t influence, but over the long haul good decisions tend to add up better than bad ones.

It reminded me of a championship poker player, who wrote that poker is a discrete game: that is, all the odds are known. If all the odds are known by everyone at the table, then what separates champions from the merely adequate? Well, as he explains, even though the probabilities in poker are well defined, it is possible to make the correct play (there’s always a correct play, given that the probabilities are limited) and lose. A champion player is someone who can make the right play five times in a row, lose five times in a row, and the sixth time, still make the correct play.

The Right Decision doesn’t pretend to deal a winning hand, much less guarantee a good payoff. But it does teach one how to assess the odds, which is oddly liberating. In the end, there are no guarantees, and all we can do is play a beautiful game.

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Warren Singh is a bookworm and wiseacre who sometimes goes undercover as a writer. He also occasionally pretends to be studying chemical engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, Mass. Sinecures, paeans, and disproportionately massive bribes may be proffered at probablystillsomewhatincorrect.wordpress.com

Daughters of Punk

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

by Sasha Kohan

Punk was defined by an attitude rather than a musical style.
— David Byrne

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To be clear: I am not here to talk about what’s punk and what’s not. As much as I’d like to have the authority to do so, my knowledge of punk is scant compared to what I really love – pop. And while the two may seem to be diametrically opposed, it seems to me that pop is beginning to take a few small but visible notes from punk’s playbook.

Pop culture infiltrates our lives – in fashion, film, slang, TV – trickling through our minds, memories, and conversations in big and small ways, but perhaps most obviously in music. And right now – sorry guys – women own the playing field. The influence these women can have (and are already having) on thousands of girls today could be immense, but what are we actually learning from them? And is it really as bad as some people seem to think?

Exhibit A: Taylor Swift. Undeniably attractive as she may be, the seven-time Grammy winner is also undeniably more conservative than most of her other female pop peers, somehow remaining as innocent and adorable as when she released her debut album in 2006; for all we know, Ms. Swift has been completely sober and sexless for all her twenty five enchanting years on earth. Despite the self-professed confessional nature of her songwriting, criticism of what some may call an obsession with boys continues to crop up year after year. Referred to as “a feminist’s nightmare” by Jezebel, Swift has publicly admitted that her relationships are most often what inspires the strong feelings behind her songs, with countless defenders who thrive on the connection built between the artist and fans in hearing familiar stories and moments retold in such an articulate, relatable voice. What some interpret to be a “feminist’s nightmare” is Swift’s apparent inability to write about anything but these relationships, with haters arguing that the lyrical message of her music is little more than simply, BOYS; fans, however, see something very different.

Lana del rey performing  at the isle of wight festival in 2012 / amir Hussein / Getty Images Entertainment / Getty Images / Universal Images Group

Lana del rey performing  at the isle of wight festival in 2012 / amir Hussein / Getty Images Entertainment / Getty Images / Universal Images Group

NPR interestingly called Swift a “princess of punk” upon the release of her fourth album, Red, in 2012, commenting on the noticeably new attitude of the songs and noting that Swift’s growth is evident in the tones of both anger and acceptance (as opposed to what might have previously been called whining and obsession) felt throughout the album. Swift’s maturation is by far most visible in light of her newly-released fifth studio album, 1989, and is perhaps most palpable in the single “Blank Space” and its music video. In what the New York Times called a “metanarrative” about her reputation as a perpetually lovelorn, occasionally clingy ex-girlfriend, Swift seems to have directly dedicated “Blank Space” to her haters, shamelessly acknowledging her notoriety in lines like “You look like my next mistake” and the gleefully knowing chorus, “Got a long list of ex-lovers / They’ll tell you I’m insane / But you know I love the players / And you love the game.” The accompanying video brings Swift’s self-awareness to a new level, following a traditional fairy-tale love story and featuring caricatures of Swift’s alternately girl-next-door and crazy-ex personas, teaching us just as much about rolling with the punches and knowing yourself as her earlier songs did with issues of growing up and dealing with young love and heartbreak. Swift is in good company though: fellow pop princess Lana Del Rey also defied the mainstream culture by abandoning the reputation built by hip-hop inspired Born to Die (2012) when packing her second album Ultraviolence (2014) full of slow, psychedelic songs, none of which make the traditional three-minute radio cut. Del Rey took a bow to her skeptics as well, most notably in the Ultraviolence song “Brooklyn Baby,” which highlights haters’ perceptions of the artist whom Rolling Stone called “rock’s saddest, baddest diva” as an unapologetic hipster. Swift may have taken a note from Del Rey’s book as she gave her haters exactly what they were looking for in “Blank Space.” Though Swift’s sugar-sweet, pure-as-a-virgin image may have made (and continues to make) her music marketable to younger listeners and often causes older ones to undermine or disregard her music, Swift is undeniably succeeding in the powerful cultural position she holds – in fact, because her sound is so accessible to young girls, she is actually instilling her ideas of how to work through relationships and expressing strong feelings in girls at a younger age – kind of empowering, right? And isn’t that the kind of ability we’d like our daughters growing up with?                       

The one girl who probably has the most to say on growing up is actually the youngest of most pop stars on the radar right now. At 16, Lorde topped the U.S. Billboard Charts in 2013 with her hit “Royals,” from her debut album, Pure Heroine (the name itself basically says all you need to know). Now, at 18 years old, Lorde remains admirable in a traditional sense — incredibly talented, wildly successful — yet at the same time “punk” in the way she defies our expectations; a 16-year-old girl writes an album almost entirely absent of boys, romance, or sex? Her incredibly impressive debut instead focused mainly on the concept of youth and the strangeness of getting older, a theme as universal as Ms. Swift’s obsession with writing about boys. “Royals” even challenges the elements of songs on the radio as of late: “But every song’s like gold teeth, Grey Goose, trippin’ in the bathroom / blood stains, ball gowns, trashin’ the hotel room / we don’t care.” How punk is it to write a number one international hit song that rolls its eyes at every other number one hit?

And then there’s Miley. Once the woman of the hour, arguably old news, yet consistently relevant and discussed amongst fans and cynics alike.

Ridding herself of the long, luscious, Hannah Montana locks in favor of a Twiggy-inspired shaved head and bleach blonde bangs, and crowned as “Princess of Twerk” by tabloids everywhere.. Cyrus has gone through an incredible transformation.  Under intense public scrutiny for the majority of her life, the singer received shocking amounts of negative publicity in the aftermath of the controversial 2013 VMA performance. Her public sexuality and discussion of drug use has been criticized as an overly dramatic way of saying, “Y’all check me out, I’m not a kid anymore,” and her carefree attitude towards the situation has upset parents telling CNN they are now forced to think that Cyrus does not either a) care what her younger fans think of her or b) hasn’t even bothered to think of what her actions are doing to her image…but isn’t that what continues to make her so awesome?  

                                                                                                                                            miley cyrus performing in london

                                                                                                                                            miley cyrus performing in london

Despite the scandal created around her new look, Cyrus is flourishing more than ever because she simply does not care – which is why VICE magazine even went so far as to call her “the most punk rock musician around” at the height of her controversy. Subsequent appearances on Saturday Night Live and The Ellen Show proved her capacity for eloquence, honesty, and a good sense of humor (about herself) and what it’s like to suddenly be the most talked-about person in the world. She’s not perfect, but she’s rich, pretty, and testing her limits, paving the way for her own independent image, trying to figure out who she is.

That Cyrus can disguise her fourth album, Bangerz, (which is, in fact, a breakup album) as what most angelheaded hipsters would write off as another shitty pop record trying too hard to get in the Top 40 is actually an incredible feat. When some girls might be tempted to fill their album with acoustic emotion and bittersweet strings, Cyrus shook off her broken engagement with actor Liam Hemsworth by reestablishing her confidence in herself: “So don’t you worry ‘bout me, Imma be okay / Imma do my thang.” The lyrics of the album tell the story of real feelings, but the upbeat quality of most of the songs instills a sense of conviction and empowerment – occasionally admitting to unhappiness, but never giving in to it. “Wrecking Ball” is the obvious exception, but we can allow her a few minutes of sadness, right? And can we please allow her to wear what she wants? To dance how she wants? Though the initial hysteria surrounding the transformation of Ms. Cyrus has faded, I think it’s important to remember how harshly and cynically many of us reacted. Everyone has (had) at least a little bit of Miley in us, in our reckless, fun, experimental youth. We watched her evolve and now here she is, and some people still want to criticize her for not keeping things PG? All I can say is: grow up.

Rock critic Lester Bangs said that “punk represents a fundamental and age-old Utopian dream: that if you give people the license to be as outrageous as they want in absolutely any fashion they can dream up, they’ll be creative about it, and do something good besides.” Not to say that girls like Miley, Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, and Lorde are punk musicians — not at all — but they’re bringing an element of the tradition into mainstream popular music. The women of pop are stronger than ever as they continue to top the charts, make bank, and make the news every week, joining the ranks of Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, and other established queens of the radio. As they use their words, sounds, and images to express themselves with confidence and be who they choose to be, listeners of our generation should feel more and more comfortable following suit. Punk is, after all, “just another word for freedom.”

Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this article appeared in the magazine STIR in 2013.

 

Sasha Kohan is a student at Clark University, Worcester, Mass., studying English and Screen Studies.

Photo credits:

The Doctor Is In

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Alexandra D’Ordine

DOCTOR WHO (Peter Capaldi) and clara oswald (Jenna Coleman) in the tardis / BBC

DOCTOR WHO (Peter Capaldi) and clara oswald (Jenna Coleman) in the tardis / BBC

 

Walk into any sci-fi convention like Comic-Con and you’re bound to find a few people dressed as metal-encased Daleks and hear the buzzing of a sonic screwdriver. You may even run into attendees wearing bowties or curiously striped scarves and shouting “Allons-y!” If these elements don’t ring a bell, you’re most likely part of the ever-decreasing population of Americans who are unfamiliar with the British television show and cultural phenomenon, Doctor Who.

After celebrating its 51st anniversary last year, Doctor Who is as popular as ever. Throughout its long history, the premise has remained the same: an alien time-traveler, a Time Lord called the Doctor, scoops up various companions and shows them the universe via his living time machine, a blue police box called the T.A.R.D.I.S, which stands for Time and Relative Dimension in Space (a police box is an obsolete telephone callbox for use by the police). Every so often, the Doctor regenerates, meaning his body and personality changes in response to a deadly force. This plot line and the constant replacement of the Doctor’s companions have allowed the show to continue more than half a century.

The show has had its ups and downs in the U.K., including the series’ cancellation in 1989 and a 1996 film version that received a lukewarm response. However, the revived series that began in 2005 has returned the show to its former popularity and more.

Alan Kistler, author of Doctor Who: A History, is familiar with how the show has changed over the years.

“In the revival series, I think the first two years were a major high point, redefining the show and stripping the mythology of Doctor Who back to basics–a strange and mysterious alien on his own who wanted to explore the impossible,” said Kistler. “By 2005, you also had the BBC now adopting what had been successful in the U.S. in making science fiction shows more mainstream.”

The show was not completely new to the U.S. Some of the pre-2005 episodes were shown on PBS, but they didn’t catch on. SyFy offered the revived series but was unable to achieve the necessary audience. Then, in 2009, BBC America started airing current episodes at roughly the same time as they were broadcast in the U.K. It was a success. The premiere of the fifth series in 2010 had 1.2 million viewers, according to The Hollywood Reporter, which at the time was a record for any show on BBC America.

“BBC America started a stronger U.S. advertising campaign starting with season 6, so that’s definitely pushed its popularity further,” said Kistler.

Three years later, the 50th anniversary special was shown in 94 countries on six continents, achieving the Guinness World Record for the largest simulcast of a TV drama. Many of these viewers were in the U.S., one of the few countries in which the special was also shown in theaters. 

Since last year it has become even more popular, with the premiere of the eighth series on August 23, 2014 attracting 2.58 million viewers, making it the highest rated premiere ever on BBC America, according to TV By the Numbers.

Glenn Grothaus is a Doctor Who enthusiast from St. Louis, Missouri, who started watching the show in 2010 and has been a fan, or “Whovian,” ever since. Last summer he attended the St. Louis Comic-Con and was pleased to meet Matt Smith, the actor who played the Eleventh Doctor.

“I had heard about Doctor Who but was under the misperception that it was some weird British sci-fi show,” said Grothaus. “But I liked the idea of them [the Doctor and his assistants] wanting to do good.”

The show began to catch on here with people such as Grothaus for a multitude of additional reasons. For example, some recent episodes have been set in the U.S. and a native of Scotland with an American accent, John Barrowman, was cast as recurring supporting character, Jack Harkness. Several episodes were also filmed in the U.S., such as one that takes place in Manhattan.

“There’s no set genre or interpretation, so people can take what they wish from the show,” said Kistler.

Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman on the Empire State Building / BBC

Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman on the Empire State Building / BBC

 

Also, the Internet and social media have been instrumental in the show’s globalization.

“Streaming services have allowed Americans to catch up on the new show very easily,” said Kistler. “Before, fans might have been the only person in their class or workplace to like Doctor Who. Now, even if that’s the case, Twitter and Tumblr are full of online communities that encourage each other to watch and discuss more of the show.”

“I actually went to the St. Louis Science Center for a Doctor Who night,” Grothaus said. This included speakers, exhibits, and showings of several episodes. “They never would have had that 10 years ago. But it’s global now.”

At Comic-Con, Grothaus saw Matt Smith’s panel and the demand for Doctor Who right in the middle of the country.
“[Matt Smith] said he was amazed by how the popularity here has exploded in the past several years,” Grothaus said.

Grothaus said that the Comic-Con panel also included fans that had been unusually moved by the show, including a young girl struggling with mental illness who said that Doctor Who showed her the importance of hope and perseverance.

So there you have it—Doctor Who can even heal.

“It disguises it[self] as sci-fi,” Grothaus said, “but it’s so much more.”

Grothaus also observed that the show’s themes of equality and social justice seemed to appeal to many younger Americans.

However, this successful expansion of the franchise is not without dissent: some fans of the classic series do not approve of its globalization and feel that it has lost its characteristic British tone. Amanda Keats of Yahoo TV: U.K. & Ireland cites the Eleventh Doctor’s memorable wearing of a Stetson hat and the inclusion of characters that are CIA agents.

Some long-time fans that Grothaus saw at Comic-Con may have shared this view, but he noted that they were generally accepting of new fans.

“They were totally encouraging the younger fans to jump in,” he said.

Grothaus is an elementary school teacher and sees first-hand how Doctor Who appeals to children. “It speaks to all ages,” he said. “It’s universal in its themes of loyalty, adventure, bravery, and sacrifice. And when you have that, you can reach anyone, no matter what age, gender, or race.”

 

Alexandra D’Ordine is majoring in Biochemistry and Professional Writing at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, Mass. She enjoys writing about anything from popular culture to science, playing piano (particularly Chopin), and learning as much as possible.

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Bikers, Birds, and Blue Velvet: The American Bad Dream

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Sasha Kohan

Well, I did it: I finally forced myself to watch some of the “classics” I’ve somehow missed on my inadvertent journey to becoming a Screen Studies major. By compiling a list of every movie I am ashamed to have never seen and forcing my friends to initial the ones they wouldn’t mind watching twice, I figured I had set myself up for success, achievement, culture, education. I chose Easy Rider (1969, Dennis Hopper), The Birds (1963, Alfred Hitchcock), and Blue Velvet (1986, David Lynch).

 hitchcock with avian friend during the making of “The birds,” 1963

And now, here I am, trying to consider exactly what I’ve seen.

I’ve seen a lot of things.

I’ve seen a man with bloodstained holes where his eyes used to be, another gruesomely stabbed to death in a sleeping blanket, and a group of gangsters moved to tears by a lip-synched rendition of “In Dreams.” More unsettling, I’ve seen Dennis Hopper as both one half of a freedom-chasing, drug-using motorcycle duo and as a sadomasochistic sociopath who gets off wearing a gas mask. Perhaps even more unsettling still, I’ve seen a vulnerable Jack Nicholson (vulnerable? Jack Nicholson?) succumb to the peer pressure of two freewheeling hippies and anxiously take a hit of his first joint.

 

Needless to say, these movies have left me with a lot on my mind, while 20 years of life and education have left me with an infuriatingly insufficient ability to articulate it all. I’ve nearly finished the course requirements that fulfill my Screen Studies major thus far, and as a result I can critically examine the meaning of certain camera angles, costume decisions, light temperature, and transitions, among other details. I could point out the total absence of non-diegetic music in the soundtrack of The Birds, how horribly the silences enhance the anticipation of impending crowing sounds, how starkly it contrasts with the feel-good road trip playlist of Easy Rider and the recurring nominal theme of Blue Velvet. I could analyze Hopper’s jarring quick cuts back and forth from present to future, scene to scene, and explain how such an unconventional technique underlines how strange the easygoing motorcycle life seemed to the square society surrounding Billy and the aptly and unsubtly named Captain America. And I could talk about how Blue Velvet – well, I wouldn’t even know where to start.

But this is the trouble when movie lovers become film students. Once you are trained in the art of noticing technicalities, the ability to simply sit back and watch a movie slowly but surely evolves into a constant process of interpretation and evaluation, until you suddenly find yourself reading an impossible amount into every romantic comedy and action movie you see with your family, and they all get sick of you asking what they thought because “I liked it” is no longer good enough. Frankly, and from a film student’s unrelenting eye, the movies I watched are so rich with deliberate mysteries, I feel I could write a thesis for each one in an attempt to solve it all – but there is a thin thread tying together my discombobulated train of thoughts. Hanging over my mental rubble is a hazy but discernible smog, an overwhelming and conflicted sense of America.

 Dennis hopper charms kyle maclachlan 

 Dennis hopper charms kyle maclachlan 

But what else is new, really? On-screen, off-screen – the Americas are the same.

 

Though these films are aesthetically dated in ways that could never be recreated now without accusations of insincerity or that unconvincing, too-smooth Hollywood glow, I was surprised (I don’t know why) to realize that, in theory, America is just as terrifying as it always has been. Whether I imagined the past or the present as more of a golden age I couldn’t say; I have just always been under the impression that something fundamental had changed between “now” and “then,” but now, I’m not so sure. A while back, I recall posting a rare politically-charged status on Facebook regarding the Supreme Court decision which allows corporations to refuse contraception health coverage, openly wondering how we’ve allowed things to get so unreasonably out of control. (I try to keep these comments few and far between – sooner or later, everyone starts to hate that one person who posts too much of a too-strong opinion). Through my passionately confused, concerned fit of outrage, dulled only by the silent, padded walls of the Internet, I was suddenly reminded of Easy Rider’s tagline: “A man went looking for America. And couldn’t find it anywhere.” Then an image of Blue Velvet struck me, vaguely – white picket fence, green grass, red roses, and all the filth that lives beneath.

dennis hopper and peter fonda in “easy rider”

America. Looking. Can’t find. Anywhere.

 

It was all so big, I wasn’t sure if the links were truly there or if I had imagined them in a desperate attempt to create some meaning in my stupid life – and then – Godzilla! The Birds! Apocalypse! America! It was there, all there! It was all one horrible, beautiful web of fiction and lies, of myth and reality, of now and then, of me and of them.

What really unites The Birds, Blue Velvet, and Easy Rider, is the responsibility of the individual, and the deeply significant absence of love. Whether or not this is indicative of some universal lack of love for the American Dream is relevant in some ways, but irrelevant in others. Human relationships, whether between Tippi Hedren and her handsome pet store customer, Blue Velvet‘s young hero and his high school lover, or Billy and Captain America, are irrelevant to these stories. While flirtation, sex, and friendship do exist and move the plot, the utter emptiness of these relationships mainly highlight the utter emptiness of these characters and the world they live in – that is to say, America. Things have changed – the specifics, yes (the distinctly eighties hair, the sixties cinematography, the political context, the popular culture) – but what struck a nerve in me was realizing how true these movies still are, and how alone we and you and I often feel in the universal longing to do or make something worthwhile, in this world or in ourselves, asking, is this the way to live?

Perhaps, as it so often happens, I’m reading too much into things. Perhaps I’m a twenty-something cynic, doomed to a life of reading Dostoevsky with troubled, furrowed brows. Or perhaps I ought to buy a pack of cigarettes and Mrs. Wagner’s pies, walk off, and look for something better than the America found here.

 

Sasha  Kohan is a student at Clark University, Worcester, Mass., pursuing a degree in English and Screen Studies.

 

 

Photo Credits:

Alfred Hitchcock. [Photography]. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 14 Jan 2015, from 
http://quest.eb.com/#/search/158_2481394/1/158_2481394/cite

BLUE VELVET (1986) – HOPPER, DENNIS; MacLACHLAN, KYLE. [Photography]. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 14 Jan 2015, from 
http://quest.eb.com/#/search/144_1534583/1/144_1534583/cite

EASY RIDER (1969) – HOPPER, DENNIS; FONDA, PETER. [Photography]. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 14 Jan 2015, from 
http://quest.eb.com/#/search/144_1555235/1/144_1555235/cite

 

 

Full Steam Ahead to the Past

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Kieran Sheldon

 

Two years ago, yearning to relieve the monotony of a four-day family road trip, I happened upon a novel entitled The Strange Affair of Spring-Heeled Jack by Mark Hodder. According to the synopsis on the back, Sir Richard Burton, Victorian-era explorer and agent of the Queen, was heading into Victorian London’s slums in search of arch-criminal Jack. The synopsis seemed interesting enough, and the cover involved some sort of interesting stilt-walking figure wreathed in blue lightning, so I bought it.

I’d visited London before, and thoroughly enjoyed it. However, real-world London had nothing on Hodder’s version, which was populated not only by the expected lofty lords and cursing cabbies, but also by genetically engineered werewolves, clockwork automatons, and a man who had transplanted his brain into an orangutan. Colossal airships blotted out the sun. Historical figures had been somewhat modified. For instance, in Hodder’s London, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Victorian-era engineer, survived beyond his presumed death in an enormous steam-powered mech-suit. Somehow, I don’t suspect that the real Brunel accomplished such a feat.

            Oh, and as it turns out, Spring-Heeled Jack was a time-traveller.

            I had next to no idea what I was reading, but I loved it. Through blind luck, I had stumbled upon steampunk.

            Well, consider my monotony relieved.

            As a literary genre, steampunk involves the fantastical juxtaposition of the technology and beliefs of the Victorian era with those of today. This anachronism results in such contraptions as clockwork robots and galleons that hover on the aether. Mike Perschon, Professor of English at MacEwan University, proposes on his blog, The Steampunk Scholar that steampunk is characterized by three things: technology powered by dubious or unexplained science, a Victorian-era aesthetic, and an exploration of how the men and women of the past imagined their future. Thus the clockwork robots, and much else.

            Steampunk also influences fashion and art. Designers incorporate Victorian garments and airship goggles into their outfits, while artists build modern relics that echo the magnificence of the past. For instance, renowned steampunk craftsman Jake von Slatt modified the pictured guitar by electrolytically etching cogs onto its faceplate.

     jake von slatt and his steampunk guitar / jake von slatt

     jake von slatt and his steampunk guitar / jake von slatt

            However, when steampunk bleeds beyond the written word and into other cultural phenomena, such as fashion, music, or art, its definition quickly grows less distinct. Primarily, this stems from steampunk’s appeal to those countercultural souls who actively defy definition. Many who incorporate steampunk elements into their artwork do so as a rebellion against popular culture. Therefore, as soon as popular culture begins to understand the steampunk movement, its adherents change its definition.

            At first, I was a bit put off by steampunk’s emphasis on rebellion, which had always seemed destructive and ugly to me. However, I came to find steampunk’s take on rebellion fascinating, because it focuses not on destruction, but creation. Steampunk artists, designers, and musicians declare their disdain for some facet of modern culture not by tearing it down but by designing something new and beautiful to take its place. These artists are often referred to simply as “makers,” and for good reason, since they build fantastical devices the likes of which this world has never before seen.

            Perhaps most visibly, steampunk rebels against the impersonal nature of modern technology. Many steampunk artists find themselves dismayed by the mass-produced, homogenized gadgets that fill modern markets. Goggles firmly in place, these adventurous souls construct the personalized, artistic technology that they wish was more prevalent in the world. Thomas Willeford, a maker who works mostly in leather, and who built the marvelous ornithopter backpack pictured, points out that “something can be very functional and still have a sense of beauty about it. Where are the wood-grain laptops? Where are the beautifully picture-framed monitors that are commercially available? The monitor is made from induction-molded plastic. It wouldnt be that much harder to make it look better.”

                                                                         THOMAS WILLEFORD'S ORNITHOPTER BACKPACK / JESSE WALKER  

                                                                         THOMAS WILLEFORD’S ORNITHOPTER BACKPACK / JESSE WALKER  

 

            Steampunk also objects to modern technology’s mechanical incomprehensibility to the average man or woman. In the Victorian era, most technology, involving nothing more than pressurized air and cogs, was understandable without years of specialized study. Williford explained that, instead of presenting iDevices and laptops that seem almost magical in their cryptic operations, “steampunk likes to say, ‘Heres how our science works. See this steam engine here?'”

            The leatherworker bemoans our ages lack of practical know-how. “I find the inability of people to use tools to be rather abhorrent, he said. It is the opposite of being self-sufficient and self-powered. The ability to use tools makes one better prepared for adversity.”

            Steampunk suggests a single solution to these many issues: build the type of technology that you want to see in the world, and build it with your own hands. Through this experimentation with technology, often referred to as “tinkering,” steampunk devotees not only make themselves more mechanically knowledgable and capable, but simultaneously create art. Thus, again, the movement eschews the destruction of the unsatisfactory in favor of the creation of something better.

            Wearers of steampunk fashion act in a similar manner, casting aside modern dress in favor of top hats, vests, goggles, corsets, and all manner of brass bits and bobs. Styles range from simple hats and vests to such gloriously inconvenient contraptions as Willeford’s ornithopter backpack. Disappointed with the ripped jeans and brand-name sweatshirts of today? Why not wear the sophisticated suits and gowns of yesterday? Some steampunk devotees do just that, while others wear clothing inspired by the practical, utilitarian garb of the Victorian-era worker, the better to hold all of their tinkering tools. Once again, steampunk advocates the creation of a fantastical Victorian-inspired alternative to a less-than-fantastical aspect of modern life.

      Mark Eliot Schwabe, a “SteamSmith” / Mark Eliot Schwabe

            Mark Eliot Schwabe, a “SteamSmith” who designs intricate metal brooches and charms with airship motifs, contends that steampunk also encourages rebellion through sheer politeness, in an echo of the refined etiquette of the Victorian age. Schwabe notes that one of the reasons he was attracted to steampunk was that when he first encountered it was that, in those days, “our American society was not as well-mannered as it is, actually, now. People were all too frequently in your face. And Victorian manners were a refreshing alternative to that.”

 

            Willeford also objects to modern rudeness, which, he said, is too often passed off as harsh honesty. Bludgeoning people with ‘honesty’ is rude and, worse, its lazy, he said. “When you take the time to be polite to the people around you, you are telling them that they are worth that time. In this way, Steampunk combats modern rudeness through imitation of the manners of a more refined age, another of its anachronistic solutions to the less pleasant aspects of modern life.      

            Not everyone is persuaded of Steampunks cultural significance. English professor Mike Perschon, who teaches at MacEwan University in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, claims that the ethos of steampunk culture has strayed from that of steampunk literature, which does not often incorporate the same countercultural ideals. He also believes that other forms of steampunk do not have the significance that many devotees attribute to them. While studying the genre, he far more often encountered “steampunk that just wanted to tell a ripping good yarn” than steampunk advocating countercultural ideals. In addition, while some members of the steampunk community see steampunk as a statement that “we’re disillusioned with the iPod world we inhabit,” when he has visited steampunk conventions, he has noticed fans toting “a lot of iPods.”

            “Steampunk won’t change the world, he said. People will.” He alluded to a story Jake von Slatt had shared with him about some steampunk friends of his who volunteered repairing bicycles in Africa. That’s world-changing, Perschon said. But as I understand it, none of them were dressed in goggles or top hats when they did it. “

              airship brooch / MARK ELIOT SCHWABE

              airship brooch / MARK ELIOT SCHWABE

            Maybe steampunk won’t change the world on its own, but it might just point the world in the right direction. After all, making our society more individualized, polite, and self-sufficient certainly qualifies as a noble cause. Certainly, the modern world proves far superior to the Victorian era in many ways, but perhaps the turning of the years has taken something away from us, too. Perhaps too much of our technology and culture has become, in the words of Schwabe the SteamSmith, “same-same.”

            “I think many people worldwide have felt the need to individualize and personalize and customize objects and experiences,” Schwabe says, “and steampunk is an excellent vehicle for doing just that.”

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Kieran Sheldon admits that he is a bit odd. His myriad pastimes include playing nerdy board games, wearing top hats, and growing carnivorous plants. He also writes a good deal of fantasy and science fiction, but never without his trusty pirate squid, Cal, at his side. He is  a junior at Bancroft School in Worcester, Massachusetts.

 

A Bibliophile’s Odyssey

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Nick Porcella

 

Last summer I decided I would stay in my college town of Worcester, Mass, rather than return home. I picked up a job in Admissions and an internship at the Worcester Art Museum, and, for the first time in my life, I found myself on a nine-to-five, Monday-through-Friday schedule. The weekends were mine. Work ended at 5 p.m. on Friday and did not require my attention until 9 a.m. Monday. No homework. No appointments. I remember that first weekend kicking around my apartment, unsure of what to do with myself.

“Get used to it,” my Dad said, laughing. He’s been doing this for decades.

The profound realization that I was about to begin seeing a whole new kind of freedom was disconcerting. I felt like a domesticated eagle being pushed out of its cage and into the wild for the first time. What exactly was I supposed to do?

The next Saturday, I opted for change. I had a list of tucked-away used bookstores within one gas-tank’s driving distance. For the remainder of the summer, I decided, I would take one of my days off and just drive somewhere. Drive and find books, sit in coffee shops, see things.

My first trip was to Montague, Mass, which had a highly rated used bookstore called the Book Mill. Sixty miles away and on country roads—they seemed like country roads to me—I decided I would spend three hours of round trip travel to go to a bookstore.

                         nick porcella

                         nick porcella

Though their slogan read “Books you don’t need in a place you can’t find!” I found them. Challenge complete! The Book Mill was a complex of different shops. There was the main book shop, yes, but also two restaurants, a music store, and an art gallery. All of the buildings, which were a part of the 1834 Montague Mill, overlooked the waterfall that gave the Millers Falls segment of town its name.

 

The place was brilliant. I loved the cozy atmosphere and the well-organized, diverse assortment of books. I spent some time in the Classics section, followed by Art (I always save Fiction and Literature for last). There were seats that encouraged people to sit down and read, and I found the perfect spot overlooking the waterfall. I sat and read a long while. It was one of those rare days where I actually thought I had a better time wandering lonely as a cloud. I hadn’t told anyone about my journey.

My pleasurable loneliness didn’t last long. The pictures of Montague that I posted online were a hit, and pretty soon I had  friends wanting to tag along on a book adventure. A few weeks later I picked a random Sunday (it turned out to be Father’s Day—sorry, Dad) to visit the Book Barn in Niantic, Conn. My friends Margaret and Zena joined me for the car ride down I-395.

nick porcella

nick porcella

The Book Barn was broken up into four sections, each with a different flavor: Midtown, Downtown, Annex, and something called Store 4. We began at the Midtown store. Midtown alone impressed, almost to a scary degree when we realized that the Annex was even bigger. This Midtown section was a maze!(ing). Books in nooks in corners—everywhere! Midtown had tens of thousands of books, maybe even a six-figure book selection. And this was just one store of four? Score! More! Books galore!

 

We decided that any store with such obscure sections as Glass Collecting and Dinosaurs for Youth would contain many hidden gems. So, we paid for what we had accumulated from Midtown, dropped the first load at the car, and proceeded to the Downtown Book Barn. We bought more books there and then made a stop at Lollipops and Gumdrops, where we ordered old-fashioned milkshakes and ice cream, and, with a sugar-boost and rested legs, continued our book shopping adventures.

We ended the day at the Book Barn Annex, the largest of the four sections, where we found hundreds of thousands of books spread over several buildings in a complex. By the end of the day we were punch-drunk from staring at books for hours and none of us had the stomach for Store 4. We left with a trunk full of books.

Everything had worked out absolutely perfectly, we agreed. We had found the place and we had shopped for hours.

We ended our summer of book trips by heading out to Northampton. Zena joined me for this trip, as well.

                                              nick porccella

                                              nick porccella

The long day of book-looking began at Raven Book Store. By now, we felt like experts. We were no longer surprised to find tens of thousands of books lining miles of shelf space. We no longer were shocked to be in aisles wide enough for only one set of shoulders. We also became more selective, especially knowing that there were at least a half-dozen other stores to visit. So at Raven, as well as at the next stop, the Old Book Store, neither Zena nor I bought anything. Each store probably had 30,000 used books. Each was entered through lower level basement-type doors. But for me at least, I was like a spoiled child: I had seen this all before.

 

Then there was Gabriel Books; or, the place that spoiled me all over again. Walking down Main Street past myriad sculptures, farmers markets, coffee shops, and young couples—indeed, all some of the things that make Northampton so spectacularly rich a community—we found Market Street. A few hundred feet down Market was Gabriel Books. A small store absolutely packed with goodies, Gabriel’s boasts an excellent selection of literary fiction, history, and rare finds, all packed in. We could hardly turn  in the aisles.

Very close to Gabriel Books we found Metropolitan Used & Rare Books and Records, amusingly located at 9¾ Market Street.

After lunch, we took a short ride to Hadley, which borders Northampton. There was one book store in the area, Grey Matter Books. There was no website for the place, but we figured we would give it a try.

We headed down Main Street towards Hadley. About three miles or so later we saw two small blue signs, one reading “Grey Matter Books 2/10 Mile” and the other “Troubadour Books 2/10 Mile” as well as directional signs pointing us left at the next set of traffic lights. We turned left and held our breath.

We could not find the place.  East Street seemed nothing but farm land. After driving up and down several times, we saw a small red sign through the trees. This led us to a one-lane dirt road and then to a big red barn, and there it was, under a canopy of verdant trees. No wonder the guide book reads, “We apologize in advance for any difficulty in finding us.”

Inside we found the single greatest place in the history of humanity. The music in the background was hypnotic, a mixture of tingling indie music. There were sections like Books of the Weird and even Hypnosis. There were rare books, first editions, and signed books. And since Troubadour Books and Grey Matter Books had evidently merged, there were two sections of everything. 

The Melville selections were particularly impressive, and I bought almost everything they had, as well as a first edition printing of J.D. Salinger’s Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction. The guy at the register gave me a 10% discount. I could have spent much, much more.

At this point, Zena and I were beginning to droop, but we had had too much success to quit now. Driving back towards Northampton, we went the opposite direction on Main Street to get to our penultimate book stop. In Bookends Bookstore, I managed to find the exact edition of a book I needed for a class, brand new, yet cheaper than any used copies I had seen online.

And finally to our last stop, which was in Easthampton. Finding White Square Fine Books and Art, we parked on the narrow main street and headed inside. This bookstore was more upscale in décor than the other stores, but the prices were still reasonable. Paying for my 1892 copy of Melville’s Omoo, we left just before they closed around five o’clock.

We strolled down the street to check out the scenery and were rewarded with the sight of a beautiful mountainside overlooking a deeply green landscape that included a pond. This view was a cherry on top of the sweet, sweet day. We also found a quirky sculpture of a bear on which were painted dozens of fish. What an odd creation.  We called it a day and got on the road. And so ended our book odyssey.

nick porcella

nick porcella

 

 

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Nick Porcella studies English at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, and intends to teach high school. His interests include Herman Melville, rap music, photography, and writing. He is completing a memoir, Getting to Say Goodbye. See more of his work here.

Weatherbox Takes Flight

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Thomas Matthews

“You heard we were a good band; well, you didn’t hear it from us.”

So sings Brian Warren, front man of the San Diego band Weatherbox, on “Pagan Baby,” a track from the band’s 2014 release, Flies In All Directions.  

Triple crown records

Triple crown records

Cocky? Coy? Disingenuous? Who can say? But it’s true, and this latest album proves it.

Weatherbox is most often labeled a “punk rock” band, but the loosely used label doesn’t do the band justice. While Weatherbox most certainly has punk roots, they blend a wide variety of styles into their unique sound, which ranges from the mellowness of the acoustic to blistering, chaotic rock, and even some synth-rock (see ‘Bathin’ In the Fuss’). Over it all hover Warren’s introspective, sometimes brooding lyrics.

Weatherbox has never had a solid lineup. With constantly changing band members, Warren has done the grunt work of structuring and writing all the songs, and just filling in the gaps with people who can play his songs, which demand experienced, advanced musicians.

Flies In All Directions is a great display of the band’s versatility. The album opens with pop-punk anthem “Pagan Baby,” a jam-packed, two minutes and twenty-eight seconds of tight, relentlessly loud rock. After just one listen to this song you’ll be sure to conjure plenty of dirty, confused looks in response to your singing along to lyrics: “It’s such a nice day, let’s stay inside/ it’s such a nice day; we’ve got a lot of time/ nice day.” Warren sings seemingly senseless lyrics as catchy as anything by McCartney or Springsteen.

Warren uses his lyrics and music as a sort of therapy to flush out the demons of mental health that he has had to overcome.

                           brian warren / triple crown records

                           brian warren / triple crown records

He details this in an article in MTV’s Buzzworthy: “I was convinced of awful delusions,” he said, referring to the time their first album, American Art, was released. He hallucinated about “men in disturbing prosthetics, caricatures of my friends but with sharp teeth and arched eyebrows. At another point I thought I was a ghost a million years in the future, where a holographic overlay of 2006 obscured reality and a semi-hostile robotic intelligence had replaced all of humanity.” In an interview with Interview Magazine he described his delusions as part of a series of intense nervous breakdowns he began to have while making his second album, The Cosmic Drama.

As to Flies In All Directions: “This record is taking all of those delusions and making a storyline that’s positive.”The epiphany came after a nervous breakdown he suffered in 2009. “I was at this party standing there, it probably didn’t look like much, but in my head all the years of delusions sort of coalesced into this one story,” he said.

Warren tried to communicate the torment of psychosis in his interview with Interview Magazine: “it’s weird because I’d have to explain psychosis, which is a really hard thing to do. All these delusions are created and then the psychotic mind can easily shove them into this one category.” His lyrics seem better suited to express the feeling of being plagued by hallucinations and psychosis. In “The Fresh Prints of Bill Ayers” he sings, “And I received a deleted memory of you and me/ On the run from a team of sickening police forever/ We used to have such fun together/ Do you remember?”

But it’s not all about Warren and his struggles. On the album’s captivating closing song, “Love Me A Good Microcosm,” he sings: “Cause you can glorify the Old Pages and be responsible for the New Cages/ Or you can say ‘to hell with me’ and you can get creative,” detailing the damaging effects obeying dated religious texts have on society, including the loss of  critical thinking.

Weatherbox has made a triumphant step forward in the evolution of its sound with Flies In All Directions. We see the band tackle thirteen tracks and craft each with precise attention to detail. Warren told Interview Magazine he even took some classes on using audio software so he could communicate in the studio the exact sound he wanted. Did it pay off? I would say yes, definitely. While the metaphorical lyrics and abrasive, dark tones of songs like “The Drones” and “Ghost Malls” may be hard for the unfamiliar listener to get into, the album has plenty of welcoming songs as catchy as those of any indie/punk/pop/rock band.

You can buy the album from Triple Crown Records here  

Below, listen to “Bring Us The Head Of Weatherbox” and watch “Pagan Baby” performed live at  Audio Tree Studios, both from Flies In All Directions.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/138422754″ params=”visual=true&show_artwork=true&callback=YUI.Env.JSONP.yui_3_17_2_1_1420745416557_7697&wmode=opaque” width=”100%” height=”400″ iframe=”true” /]

[youtube=://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxVdKHvhAr0&w=854&h=480]

 

Contributing Editor Thomas Matthews studies English at Clark University.

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Abandon Ship by Knife Party

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Ajey Pandey

 

Knife Party, as far as side projects go, has gotten really big. The electronic music act features Rob Swire and Gareth McGrillen, two members of the Australian band Pendulum. They started Pendulum back in 2002 as rock and metal musicians dabbling in computer music, and have since achieved major success with their signature mix of rock and electronic music.

But in 2011 Swire posted a 20-second clip titled “Not Pendulum” featuring a glitchy, rumbling dance track that had more in common with the work of electronic dance music producer Skrillex than his old work. That clip became Knife Party. Since then, the duo has shifted attention from Pendulum to Knife Party, releasing three EPs (four-track mini-albums) that augment the violent, distorted synths of electro house and dubstep with a goofy sense of humor and a love for cheesy sci-fi/horror flicks. If you watched Breaking Bad, you’ve probably heard the Knife Party song “Bonfire,” that wall-shaking love child of reggae and dubstep that graced the fifth season.

You can hear the musicians’ bending and blending of genres in songs like “EDM Death Machine,” which kicks off with, “In the future, nobody will drop the bass / No one will do the Harlem Shake,” then continues by remixing “Sandstorm,” that trance song that has never stopped playing since 1999. And then there’s “Centipede,” which starts with a 40-second clip about giant killer centipedes hunting tarantulas. Yup.

Now the duo is back with a full album, Abandon Ship. And it’s amazing.

About half of the album is classic Knife Party fare, the sort of music that will either get you dancing or give you a headache. At the album’s loudest, heavily processed drums pound out steady, powerful rhythms, meaty synth chords flood your ears, and bass sounds, metal guitars, and robot speech shake down your house.  Goofy audio clips dispersed in the music make you laugh as hard as you dance. Imagine Transformers 8: MegaÜber Dance Fight taking place in a haunted house in space, add some lasers, and you’ll have idea of where this album can go.

But not even the most turned-up tracks here stay full throttle all the time. The duo doesn’t shy away from extended interludes where they replace heavy drums and violent bass with smooth, liquid-feeling chords and staccato melodies that bounce around your head like blinking lights on a computer. This occasional mellowness is a good thing, because a perpetual tsunami of sound would drive the heads of all but the most dedicated ravers into the nearest brick wall. That said, every track here is still an all-out dance number, so you may need to stop halfway through the hour of music to catch your breath.

Some of the tracks throw the raging-robot sound out the window, exploring vastly different styles. The first track, “Reconnect,” introduces the album with a cinematic flair somewhere between Star Trek and Pirates of the Caribbean. Then, in “Begin Again,” the musicians return to their roots in Pendulum, with light background synths, blaring trumpets, and Rob Swire belting out cliche yet catchy lyrics. But the most out-there song–by far–is “Superstar.” It’s disco. Sung by Bryn Christopher, the track has all the funky guitars and retro synths your heart desires, and I can’t stop dancing to it.

The album is dotted with little jokes to spice things up. In “EDM Trend Machine,” the duo plays brief pieces of stereotypical rave music, then, with a cartoonish vinyl scratch, cut to a completely different sound. The house track “404” features error-message sounds from decade-old computers. “Micropenis” features a 30-second interlude seemingly ripped out of an NES game and narrated by a text-to-speech generator. And, well, it’s called “Micropenis.”

As Abandon Ship released, Rob Swire tweeted that he was happy just to make it, even if it sold poorly and he and Gareth McGrillen would “have to sell organs for food.” And that shows in the album itself (well, maybe not the organ-selling bit). It’s lovingly crafted, but it’s never too serious not to have fun with.

You can download this album via iTunes, Google Play, or Beatport, buy a CD via the musicians’ site, or stream the entire album for free on their SoundCloud page (https://soundcloud.com/knifepartyinc).

 

Ajey Pandey is a 12th grade student at Mass Academy of Math and Science, Worcester, Mass. He enjoys writing, making music, and especially writing about music.

 

Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns: The Poetry of Andrea Gibson

Fall 2014, Uncategorized

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by Sarah Leidhold

 I heard the poetry of Andrea Gibson before I read it; and I’m not sure if that is considered cheating, like giving one’s eyes the pleasure of watching the movie before the more satisfying labor of earning the narrative through the exploration of reading. A crony of mine posted a link of her spoken word session on Facebook, making a bold statement about her brilliance. Because I respect the opinion of this friend, my fingertips instructed the mouse to click, and, as requested, I turned up the volume.

What I heard then was something I never forgot. It was Gibson’s piece, “Maybe I Need You,” about the prickling nostalgia of having your hands ache to hold someone who is entirely too gone to fathom. I myself wasn’t hurting at the time, but when heartbreak did befall my soul, I craved the sound of her rhythmic vocalizations and the piece’s exactly on point descriptions of the rollercoaster of human emotion.

I sought out her writing more and more, finding my own writing muse gaping at her creative insightfulness and begging that my words would try to mimic it. As cliché as it may sound, Gibson was my compass through a summer tangled with the dark disillusionment of love lost. And since then, I have made her my poetical goddess, referring to her when I need a wisp of inspiration or when my heart is feeling hollowed out or much too full. Last year I witnessed her reading live and I completely saturated the basins of my cheekbones with saline–crying for the incomprehensible beauty that I was witnessing.

Gibson’s book of poetry, Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns, was published in 2008 by Write Bloody Publishing. with  a new edition coming out in 2010. Featuring illustrations by Anis Mojgani, the book was awarded the DIY Book of the Year and was nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns contains 26 poems, most written in free verse, with some sporadic rhyming.

Within these texts, Gibson stares into the face of the forces of evil that are cloaked in propriety or tradition in our world and gives us the gory details: patriarchy, warfare that slaughters children on US dollars (“El Mozote”), the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder that soldiers bring home from war, mental health issues, the horror of rape, the injustice of laws that do not allow gays to marry, the wrongful assumptions of sexism, the avarice inherently interlaced with our consumer culture, and more. She dexterously contrasts the stark blackness of these horrible truths with the saving grace of much more gentler forces like forgiveness, love that spans across boundaries of gender or race, the innocence of children, the unrelenting promise of pacifism, and, above all, the power of altruism as the guiding force for human harmony.

Gibson juxtaposes two opposing images of mankind: one as a monstrosity that employs indiscriminate violence to satisfy its bottomless greed under the guise of religious convictions, and the other a creature capable of breathtakingly profound descriptions of the specificity of things, both internal and external, that make the human race such a beautiful species, one that harbors more potential for compassion than it is capable of realizing.

Gibson fleshes out images/instances of both love and hate: personifying both empty clichés about romantic relations and stark facts about the horror of war. Her poems speak with the breath of human life by painting portraits of people, things, and emotions with a crafted realism. But Gibson also whispers into the reader’s ear idealistic ideas that fill one with hope that the world can be improved, as in “See Through”:

“And Jesse this

is not just a picture [of] our history,

not just a picture of our past.

We’ve been hundreds of years

Measuring the size of their hearts

By the size of our fists,

Erecting our bliss on the broken backs of dark skin.

The present is far from gift-wrapped”

Besides being a poet, Andrea is an activist who urges us not only to be aware but also to work for change. Again, from “See Through”:

“I don’t believe we’re hateful.

I think we’re just asleep.

But when we wake we can’t call up the dead and say,

‘Sorry, we were looking the other way.’

There are names and faces behind our apathy,

eulogies beneath our choices.

There are voices deep as roots

thundering unquestionable truth

through the white noise that pacifies our ears.

Don’t tell me we can’t hear.

Don’t tell me we don’t hear.

When the moon is slain,

when the constellations disperse like shrapnel,

don’t you think it’s time

something changed?”

The title of Gibson’s collection, Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns, suggests a rebellion against traditional principles and authorities, but not all of Gibson’s work focuses on extremes of human pain and injustice. She also has pieces that completely focus on the bliss of finding harmony in relationships, especially romantic ones, as in “Love Poem.” She also discusses the heartache of relinquished connection with another in writing that moves one’s heart.

Gibson’s writing often makes allusions to history, current events, and other literature, as well as employing metaphors and extended metaphors.

 Anyone who picks up this book should prepare to be moved, to heave open one’s heart. This writer’s words have become for me the poetic equivalent of Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense”—it’s a call to arms, a pamphlet that reminds me of the necessity to rebel against the thoughtlessness that keeps the veil over our eyes in this culture. 


Sarah Leidhold, an overzealous student at Worcester State University, harbors a pervasive addiction to both producing and absorbing poetry. She especially enjoys the uninhibited spilling out of inspired sentiments in the all-accepting form of free verse. More of her work can be found here.