For posterity:
I’m putting up the curtains I had as a small child.
They are made entirely of layers of pink lace.
I want him to feel like a pedophile while I am on
top of him. Those curtains looming above him
like some pale distant first grade crush. My figure
clinging to his body like a child to its mother in
a room full of strangers.
For posterity:
I’m putting up the curtains I had as a small child.
They are made entirely of layers of pink lace.
I want him to feel like a pedophile while I am on
top of him. Those curtains looming above him
like some pale distant first grade crush. My figure
clinging to his body like a child to its mother in
a room full of strangers.
Tonight is a night I sit up all night, writing an essay and avoiding the heat.
It was hot out today. California knows what I mean. I was going to spend the day in the library to work on said essay but then went balls to that when I started sweating on the way there. Instead I went home, put on a movie to fall asleep to—There Will Be Blood. I can only fall asleep to movies I like, you see. TWBB happens to also have a great soundtrack and music does indeed soothe the savage beast.
The ceiling fan was whirring away, doing what it does (so simple a purpose, so necessary a tool.) As I laid on the couched-up futon trying to fall asleep, emptying my mind like I sometimes imagine a Zen master does, I thought, there will be sweat. Fuck me, there will be sweat.
I recently spoke with someone about heat after she remarked on me ordering iced coffee or iced tea every time. We were in line and the cafeteria tables were sparsely populated with college students, most of them younger than me, still in the phase when life is college. The lights were also sparse, and a slight breeze from the foggy exterior slipped in through a crack between the entrance doors.
“I can’t stand the heat,” I told her. “It’s one of the reasons I left Los Angeles. The fuckin’ heat. I’m going north forever.”
“What? Oh, I love the heat,” with emphasis on love. One of those long, drawn out loves when you wish the woman saying it was saying it about you, those kinds of loves. She’s moving to Los Angeles. Teaches ballet to the kids, which is a cute thought, then I thought about the slightness of her frame, the intelligence of her voice. The tiny dancer wants to go to UCLA, become a lawyer. A lawyer living and loving in the heat.
She’s a writer, too, and this just makes it difficult to process everything. If only it wasn’t now. If only it was three years ago, or perhaps a year from today. A time before or after the sweat.
I woke up from the nap just as There Will Be Blood was coming to its climactic finale between fraud and evil. Daniel Day-Lewis’s Plainview was beating Paul Danno’s Eli in the head with a bowling pin. The look in his eyes was concentrated. You could see the intent, the need to finally do what he’s wanted to do. It’s satisfaction. I’ve always believed that that was the whole point of TWBB. I mean this man, he’s not right. He holds onto his hatreds like a miser holds onto his money, but he thrives on them. If Plainview didn’t have the hatreds in his life he wouldn’t be the man he is, successful and cutthroat, able to get the best of his adversaries be they the big oil companies or greedy preachers. Plainview is a model of getting what one wants and, eventually, what one needs, even at the cost of family and life.
I drove to work and realized I’d forgotten to bring along my laptop’s power supply, which meant I’d be making a return trip through the evening warmth. My back was sticky, my temples coated and forehead smooth from my constant squeegeeing. What would have been a simple trip to the office to work on an essay (they have air conditioning and space to think) turned into an ordeal.
I don’t like ordeals. They complicate what could be otherwise simple plans. But they are natural, and faced with the possibility of more sweaty driving I turned toward the gym. If I was going to be sweaty I decided I’d sweat for good reason.
The exercise was bland. Some quick weights and then a mix of walking with short bursts of jogging, leaving my heart dry as jerky and pounding to get the fuck out. I half-heartedly read the Closed Captions on one of the televisions and listened to one of the many fiction podcasts on my old iPod. It was Julian Barnes reading Frank O’Connor’s “The Man of the World” for The New Yorker’s fiction podcast. I’d never heard of either writer, as it often the case with these podcasts, but O’Connor’s story and Barnes’s discussion of it left me with some choice quotes and thoughts on the subject of the “world of appearances.” A quote remained in the air as I walked along in place. It won out over the phat beats of the gym’s speakers and drone of the late night sports chatter on the televisions, and that’s when I knew it was a keeper.
From Frank O’Connor’s autobiography:
“I was always very fond of heights and afterwards it struck me that reading was only another form of height, and a more perilous one. It was a way of looking beyond your own backyard into your neighbors’. Our backyard had a high wall and by early afternoon it made the whole kitchen dark and when the evening was fine I climbed the door of the outhouse and up to the roof to the top of the wall.”
“I felt like some sort of wild bird, secure from everything and observing everything. The horse cart coming up the road, the little girl skipping rope on the pavement, or the old man staggering by on his stick, all of them unconscious of the eagle eye that watched them.”
I couldn’t help but notice several short, tightly curled hairs on the tiled floor of the shower after I finished the workout. They slowly migrated as the water ran down my legs and they were pushed toward the drain. Many people might find such a sight deplorable, the way a dirty bathroom that is just a bit grimy will send people running, but they were just hairs. I stood and watched them swim away. When I got out of the shower I looked at myself in one of the many large mirrors placed in a locker room and it seemed interesting that one man could have short, curly hair and then another man could have coarse, wavy hair. I never would’ve thought of that. Body hair’s just not something most folks think on.
After the gym I walked back to my car with my head down, avoiding the snails that were so desperately crawling to the sprinklers in the shrubs. Some were barely moving and others were so far from the water that I doubted if they’d make it. I was already sweating again and my hopes that the mist from the sprinklers would provide some relief were dashed. Sweating is sometimes a subconscious effort so I focused my thoughts on the last time I felt sweat that wasn’t my own. That night it was warm, slightly denser than water. It tasted of ink, smelled faintly of cauliflower and smoke. The sounds were breathing and short little female gasps. The sight was faint outlines of her contours in the darkness, loose hairs catching light from the window off to the side. I looked up to her face every minute or two to catch anything I could, because it was a rare sight, one to be remembered, and a woman’s eyes remain with you long after the rest may fade. There was sweat and that night it felt good. I invited the heat with open arms.
I wonder if she could see me remembering her.
Tonight is a night I sit up all night, writing an essay and avoiding the heat.
It was hot out today. California knows what I mean. I was going to spend the day in the library to work on said essay but then went balls to that when I started sweating on the way there. Instead I went home, put on a movie to fall asleep to—There Will Be Blood. I can only fall asleep to movies I like, you see. TWBB happens to also have a great soundtrack and music does indeed soothe the savage beast.
The ceiling fan was whirring away, doing what it does (so simple a purpose, so necessary a tool.) As I laid on the couched-up futon trying to fall asleep, emptying my mind like I sometimes imagine a Zen master does, I thought, there will be sweat. Fuck me, there will be sweat.
I recently spoke with someone about heat after she remarked on me ordering iced coffee or iced tea every time. We were in line and the cafeteria tables were sparsely populated with college students, most of them younger than me, still in the phase when life is college. The lights were also sparse, and a slight breeze from the foggy exterior slipped in through a crack between the entrance doors.
“I can’t stand the heat,” I told her. “It’s one of the reasons I left Los Angeles. The fuckin’ heat. I’m going north forever.”
“What? Oh, I love the heat,” with emphasis on love. One of those long, drawn out loves when you wish the woman saying it was saying it about you, those kinds of loves. She’s moving to Los Angeles. Teaches ballet to the kids, which is a cute thought, then I thought about the slightness of her frame, the intelligence of her voice. The tiny dancer wants to go to UCLA, become a lawyer. A lawyer living and loving in the heat.
She’s a writer, too, and this just makes it difficult to process everything. If only it wasn’t now. If only it was three years ago, or perhaps a year from today. A time before or after the sweat.
I woke up from the nap just as There Will Be Blood was coming to its climactic finale between fraud and evil. Daniel Day-Lewis’s Plainview was beating Paul Danno’s Eli in the head with a bowling pin. The look in his eyes was concentrated. You could see the intent, the need to finally do what he’s wanted to do. It’s satisfaction. I’ve always believed that that was the whole point of TWBB. I mean this man, he’s not right. He holds onto his hatreds like a miser holds onto his money, but he thrives on them. If Plainview didn’t have the hatreds in his life he wouldn’t be the man he is, successful and cutthroat, able to get the best of his adversaries be they the big oil companies or greedy preachers. Plainview is a model of getting what one wants and, eventually, what one needs, even at the cost of family and life.
I drove to work and realized I’d forgotten to bring along my laptop’s power supply, which meant I’d be making a return trip through the evening warmth. My back was sticky, my temples coated and forehead smooth from my constant squeegeeing. What would have been a simple trip to the office to work on an essay (they have air conditioning and space to think) turned into an ordeal.
I don’t like ordeals. They complicate what could be otherwise simple plans. But they are natural, and faced with the possibility of more sweaty driving I turned toward the gym. If I was going to be sweaty I decided I’d sweat for good reason.
The exercise was bland. Some quick weights and then a mix of walking with short bursts of jogging, leaving my heart dry as jerky and pounding to get the fuck out. I half-heartedly read the Closed Captions on one of the televisions and listened to one of the many fiction podcasts on my old iPod. It was Julian Barnes reading Frank O’Connor’s “The Man of the World” for The New Yorker’s fiction podcast. I’d never heard of either writer, as it often the case with these podcasts, but O’Connor’s story and Barnes’s discussion of it left me with some choice quotes and thoughts on the subject of the “world of appearances.” A quote remained in the air as I walked along in place. It won out over the phat beats of the gym’s speakers and drone of the late night sports chatter on the televisions, and that’s when I knew it was a keeper.
From Frank O’Connor’s autobiography:
“I was always very fond of heights and afterwards it struck me that reading was only another form of height, and a more perilous one. It was a way of looking beyond your own backyard into your neighbors’. Our backyard had a high wall and by early afternoon it made the whole kitchen dark and when the evening was fine I climbed the door of the outhouse and up to the roof to the top of the wall.”
“I felt like some sort of wild bird, secure from everything and observing everything. The horse cart coming up the road, the little girl skipping rope on the pavement, or the old man staggering by on his stick, all of them unconscious of the eagle eye that watched them.”
I couldn’t help but notice several short, tightly curled hairs on the tiled floor of the shower after I finished the workout. They slowly migrated as the water ran down my legs and they were pushed toward the drain. Many people might find such a sight deplorable, the way a dirty bathroom that is just a bit grimy will send people running, but they were just hairs. I stood and watched them swim away. When I got out of the shower I looked at myself in one of the many large mirrors placed in a locker room and it seemed interesting that one man could have short, curly hair and then another man could have coarse, wavy hair. I never would’ve thought of that. Body hair’s just not something most folks think on.
After the gym I walked back to my car with my head down, avoiding the snails that were so desperately crawling to the sprinklers in the shrubs. Some were barely moving and others were so far from the water that I doubted if they’d make it. I was already sweating again and my hopes that the mist from the sprinklers would provide some relief were dashed. Sweating is sometimes a subconscious effort so I focused my thoughts on the last time I felt sweat that wasn’t my own. That night it was warm, slightly denser than water. It tasted of ink, smelled faintly of cauliflower and smoke. The sounds were breathing and short little female gasps. The sight was faint outlines of her contours in the darkness, loose hairs catching light from the window off to the side. I looked up to her face every minute or two to catch anything I could, because it was a rare sight, one to be remembered, and a woman’s eyes remain with you long after the rest may fade. There was sweat and that night it felt good. I invited the heat with open arms.
I wonder if she could see me remembering her.
The Russian girls and their haven in Alaska. Heaven or S&G? Either way firmly embedded. The single highway and five hours later there’s a canyon town. Locals friendly, tourists shiny, and backcountrymen smiling with grit. A place like no other, best of the bunch. The search isn’t over but paradise while there’s a paradise to be had.
The Russian girls and their haven in Alaska. Heaven or S&G? Either way firmly embedded. The single highway and five hours later there’s a canyon town. Locals friendly, tourists shiny, and backcountrymen smiling with grit. A place like no other, best of the bunch. The search isn’t over but paradise while there’s a paradise to be had.
Historically,
women were oppressed as the “lesser sex” (depending on the
culture) and as such many were forced into positions of subservience
where they could not express themselves as independent individuals.
Whether it be a need to express love, biographical experience, a
fictional tale, or even something as simple (or complicated) as love,
it was difficult to do so without the aid of a family or rank that
allowed women to become educated enough to learn to read and write.
For many of these women authors it then became a need to not only
express themselves through writing but to also express the need to be
fully realized individuals.
One
common argument regarding the “weak” nature of women’s wills
and the reason they are dependent on men is the creation story and
Eve’s acceptance of the forbidden fruit. Many people refute that
it was not just Eve who fell from grace but Adam as well, for as
Aemilia Lanyer wrote in her volume of poetry, Salve
Deus Rex Judaeorum (published 1611):
Your
fault being greater, why should you disdainOur
being your equals, free from tyranny?If
one weak woman simply did offend,This
sin of yours hath no excuse nor end. (85 – 89)
Lanyer
used biblical reference (a common theme of Western literature during
that time) to make her point because religion played a vital role in
Western literature of the period, and it is possible Lanyer used such
language to gain respect, as it was important to recognize that which
is important to society in general. Anne Bradstreet, another
outspoken author of the period, wrote “Men can do best, and women
know it well; / Preeminence in each, and all is yours, / Yet grant
some small acknowledgement of ours” (40 – 43), in which she
proposes that while men clearly are the superiors in society it is
only fair to acknowledge that women are at the very least capable of
the same literary accomplishments. Other women authors of the period
include Dorothy Leigh and Elizabeth Brooke Jocelin who, although not
as quick to put down men, were also proponents of an education and
equality for their children regardless of sex.
As
time passed and more women were granted access to an education and a
means to express their ideas the writings became more diverse and
expressive of the desire to become independent individuals. Mary
Leapor, a middle-class working woman who wrote from the point of view
of a common worker in at least one of her works, wrote that “…
men are vexed to find a Nymph so Wise” (30). Indeed, for men to
accept a woman as an independent and equally intelligent person was a
bold proposal, especially for men of middle- or lower-class who were
less educated and worldly and clung to the old ways more than
educated men did.
Of
course the cause for individualism was not advocated just for women,
but for all people. Hannah More’s “The Black Slave Trade”, an
anti-slavery piece, uses the “cause” she pleads to “sanctify”
her work, which advocates “And Liberty, in you a hallow’d flame,
/ Burns, unextinguish’d, in his breast the same” (133 – 134).
Once again equality comes to the forefront. For all people, even
slaves, to be considered equal is to recognize them as individuals.
More later wrote a satirical piece called “The White Slave Trade”
in which she claims that English women are held prisoner by the
fashions that they are forced to bear, using terms such as
“inhumanity” and “impolicy” to describe the practice of
raising daughters to be eventual good wives and mothers, and nothing
more. When some women other than educated white women began to write
they, too, expressed their disdain for the practices that kept people
in a subservient level. Mary Prince described such practices,
although they were dictated and not told, when describing her life as
a former slave. Towards the end of her memoir she states: “I am
often vexed, and I feel great sorrow when I hear some people in this
country say, that the slaves do not need better usage, and do not
want to be free. They believe the foreign people, who deceive them,
and say slaves are happy. I say, Not so” (437). That such a
statement was allowed to be published, by a woman of African descent
no less, shows women and all people began to gain more individual
recognition towards the end of the eighteenth century.
Women
writers began to get published more frequently in the nineteenth
century, and with the influx of new literature came cultural and
philosophical change. One notable yet sometimes overlooked
philosophical work is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.
In the novel the monster struggles to understand itself as an
individual being, at first tied to its creator but learning to be
independent through experience and its own observations of the world
around it. After observing a family of cottagers reading out loud
near a place it was living, the creature comments “The words
induced me to turn towards myself.” (589). The creature began to
attain independent thought by becoming in a sense more educated.
Later, the creature tells of the Arab mother of one of the cottagers,
Safie, who instructed the daughter to “aspire to higher powers of
intellect and an independence of spirit forbidden to the female
followers of Muhammad.” Shelley’s commentary on a woman’s
subservient status in Muslim society certainly stands out in a
narrative where a monster tells of the process through which it
attained self awareness and intelligence.
It
was arguably in the twentieth century that women writers came out in
full force to deal with individualism as ideas of feminism, sexual
and racial equality, and civil rights began to play a prominent role
in society and world politics. Joyce Carol Oates’ “Nairobi”
demonstrates the loss of individualism in modern society. In the
story Ginny, a middle class shop girl, is taken out to purchase new
clothes so that she can attend a social gathering with the man buying
her the new clothes. At one point the man, Oliver, asks her if she
wants to keep her old shoes, and after quickly stating “Of course”
she changes her mind and says “No, the hell with them” (1681).
During the course of the evening Ginny is instructed not to speak too
much (or rather exactly how to behave), and is then sent home at the
end of the evening with only her new clothes and a bland cordial
sentiment. Reflecting on the evening, the narrator states that “All
she had really lost, in a sense, was her own pair of shoes” (1684).
Ginny’s loss of her shoes, which she intended to keep before
quickly changing her mind, represent Ginny’s loss of individuality
after allowing Oliver to control her as he did, if only for a few
hours. Oates’ portrayal of such a loss through a seemingly
inconsequential object serves to highlight just how important one’s
individuality truly is.
While
many authors since the advent of the written word have tackled the
subject of individuality (attainment, preservation, or loss of),
women authors have the unique perspective of being in positions of
subservience until recently in recorded history. The points of view
they bring to the collective table help not only to broaden the
understanding of individuality but the importance of it.
Works Cited
Bradstreet, Anne. “The Tenth Muse Lately
Sprung Up in America.” Women’s
Worlds: The McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008. 90-91.
Lanyer, Aemilia. “Eve’s Apology in Defence
of Women.” Women’s Worlds: The
McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008. 58-60.
Leapor, Mary. “An Essay on Woman.”
Women’s Worlds: The McGraw Hill
Anthology of Women’s Writing. Ed.
Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa Schnell,
Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill,
2008. 255-257
More, Hannah. “The Black Slave Trade.”
Women’s Worlds: The McGraw Hill
Anthology of Women’s Writing. Ed.
Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa Schnell,
Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill,
2008. 288-296.
Oates, Joyce Carol. “Nairobi.” Women’s
Worlds: The McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008.
1678-1684.
Prince, Mary. “The History of Mary Prince, a
West Indian Slave.” Women’s
Worlds: The McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008. 419-438.
Shelley, Mary. “The Monster’s Narrative”
from Frankenstein.
Women’s Worlds: The McGraw Hill
Anthology of Women’s Writing. Ed.
Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa Schnell,
Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill,
2008. 579-606.
Historically,
women were oppressed as the “lesser sex” (depending on the
culture) and as such many were forced into positions of subservience
where they could not express themselves as independent individuals.
Whether it be a need to express love, biographical experience, a
fictional tale, or even something as simple (or complicated) as love,
it was difficult to do so without the aid of a family or rank that
allowed women to become educated enough to learn to read and write.
For many of these women authors it then became a need to not only
express themselves through writing but to also express the need to be
fully realized individuals.
One
common argument regarding the “weak” nature of women’s wills
and the reason they are dependent on men is the creation story and
Eve’s acceptance of the forbidden fruit. Many people refute that
it was not just Eve who fell from grace but Adam as well, for as
Aemilia Lanyer wrote in her volume of poetry, Salve
Deus Rex Judaeorum (published 1611):
Your
fault being greater, why should you disdainOur
being your equals, free from tyranny?If
one weak woman simply did offend,This
sin of yours hath no excuse nor end. (85 – 89)
Lanyer
used biblical reference (a common theme of Western literature during
that time) to make her point because religion played a vital role in
Western literature of the period, and it is possible Lanyer used such
language to gain respect, as it was important to recognize that which
is important to society in general. Anne Bradstreet, another
outspoken author of the period, wrote “Men can do best, and women
know it well; / Preeminence in each, and all is yours, / Yet grant
some small acknowledgement of ours” (40 – 43), in which she
proposes that while men clearly are the superiors in society it is
only fair to acknowledge that women are at the very least capable of
the same literary accomplishments. Other women authors of the period
include Dorothy Leigh and Elizabeth Brooke Jocelin who, although not
as quick to put down men, were also proponents of an education and
equality for their children regardless of sex.
As
time passed and more women were granted access to an education and a
means to express their ideas the writings became more diverse and
expressive of the desire to become independent individuals. Mary
Leapor, a middle-class working woman who wrote from the point of view
of a common worker in at least one of her works, wrote that “…
men are vexed to find a Nymph so Wise” (30). Indeed, for men to
accept a woman as an independent and equally intelligent person was a
bold proposal, especially for men of middle- or lower-class who were
less educated and worldly and clung to the old ways more than
educated men did.
Of
course the cause for individualism was not advocated just for women,
but for all people. Hannah More’s “The Black Slave Trade”, an
anti-slavery piece, uses the “cause” she pleads to “sanctify”
her work, which advocates “And Liberty, in you a hallow’d flame,
/ Burns, unextinguish’d, in his breast the same” (133 – 134).
Once again equality comes to the forefront. For all people, even
slaves, to be considered equal is to recognize them as individuals.
More later wrote a satirical piece called “The White Slave Trade”
in which she claims that English women are held prisoner by the
fashions that they are forced to bear, using terms such as
“inhumanity” and “impolicy” to describe the practice of
raising daughters to be eventual good wives and mothers, and nothing
more. When some women other than educated white women began to write
they, too, expressed their disdain for the practices that kept people
in a subservient level. Mary Prince described such practices,
although they were dictated and not told, when describing her life as
a former slave. Towards the end of her memoir she states: “I am
often vexed, and I feel great sorrow when I hear some people in this
country say, that the slaves do not need better usage, and do not
want to be free. They believe the foreign people, who deceive them,
and say slaves are happy. I say, Not so” (437). That such a
statement was allowed to be published, by a woman of African descent
no less, shows women and all people began to gain more individual
recognition towards the end of the eighteenth century.
Women
writers began to get published more frequently in the nineteenth
century, and with the influx of new literature came cultural and
philosophical change. One notable yet sometimes overlooked
philosophical work is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.
In the novel the monster struggles to understand itself as an
individual being, at first tied to its creator but learning to be
independent through experience and its own observations of the world
around it. After observing a family of cottagers reading out loud
near a place it was living, the creature comments “The words
induced me to turn towards myself.” (589). The creature began to
attain independent thought by becoming in a sense more educated.
Later, the creature tells of the Arab mother of one of the cottagers,
Safie, who instructed the daughter to “aspire to higher powers of
intellect and an independence of spirit forbidden to the female
followers of Muhammad.” Shelley’s commentary on a woman’s
subservient status in Muslim society certainly stands out in a
narrative where a monster tells of the process through which it
attained self awareness and intelligence.
It
was arguably in the twentieth century that women writers came out in
full force to deal with individualism as ideas of feminism, sexual
and racial equality, and civil rights began to play a prominent role
in society and world politics. Joyce Carol Oates’ “Nairobi”
demonstrates the loss of individualism in modern society. In the
story Ginny, a middle class shop girl, is taken out to purchase new
clothes so that she can attend a social gathering with the man buying
her the new clothes. At one point the man, Oliver, asks her if she
wants to keep her old shoes, and after quickly stating “Of course”
she changes her mind and says “No, the hell with them” (1681).
During the course of the evening Ginny is instructed not to speak too
much (or rather exactly how to behave), and is then sent home at the
end of the evening with only her new clothes and a bland cordial
sentiment. Reflecting on the evening, the narrator states that “All
she had really lost, in a sense, was her own pair of shoes” (1684).
Ginny’s loss of her shoes, which she intended to keep before
quickly changing her mind, represent Ginny’s loss of individuality
after allowing Oliver to control her as he did, if only for a few
hours. Oates’ portrayal of such a loss through a seemingly
inconsequential object serves to highlight just how important one’s
individuality truly is.
While
many authors since the advent of the written word have tackled the
subject of individuality (attainment, preservation, or loss of),
women authors have the unique perspective of being in positions of
subservience until recently in recorded history. The points of view
they bring to the collective table help not only to broaden the
understanding of individuality but the importance of it.
Works Cited
Bradstreet, Anne. “The Tenth Muse Lately
Sprung Up in America.” Women’s
Worlds: The McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008. 90-91.
Lanyer, Aemilia. “Eve’s Apology in Defence
of Women.” Women’s Worlds: The
McGraw Hill Anthology of Women’s Writing.
Ed. Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa
Schnell, Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill, 2008. 58-60.
Leapor, Mary. “An Essay on Woman.”
Women’s Worlds: The McGraw Hill
Anthology of Women’s Writing. Ed.
Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa Schnell,
Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill,
2008. 255-257
More, Hannah. “The Black Slave Trade.”
Women’s Worlds: The McGraw Hill
Anthology of Women’s Writing. Ed.
Robyn Warhol-Down, Diane Price Herndl, Mary Lou Kete, Lisa Schnell,
Rashmi Varma, Beth Kowaleski Wallace. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill,
2008. 288-296.
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The faces reside in the corners where I put away things that I’ve long since left behind. Like ghosts, or wilted flowers, or some other whimsical cliché. I put them there and there they remain, because I don’t have the guts to open the window and let them out. They can’t leave those corners, because I like to remember they’re there, but they also can’t fly away and for that I am truly sorry. It’s just the hand dealt to me by the universe and there are much worse deals to be had so I always take what I can get. What I get just happens to be quite beautiful and thus quite cruel when it goes away, so I hold on, if only in the hollows of the attic.
They are a varied bunch, my corner girls; exuberant, caramel-coated sweetcheeks; thin eyebrows penciled in for extra expressive oomph; narrow nose accentuating the kind of striking profile that makes a girl look nosy but exotic; wide, hollow eyes that melt a man’s will like so much salt over a fresh snowfall. They are the features of many lost loves. I think they still look out from the corners, but while I keep them there I can’t allow myself to glance in their direction. Too risky, you understand. My corner girls would tear me to shreds.
Foresight I lack, but forethought is plentiful, and I’ve had much time to contemplate matters. I know how it ends. I’m going to die in the corner grasping a wall or a lamp or anything within reach, and my corner girls will leap out of their corners and break all the windows as they feel the rush of the wind for the first time. The ones I acted cruelly towards will scratch at my face and stomp on my skull, and I can’t fault them for seeking revenge before they flee for freedom.
God, I hope they make it.
The faces reside in the corners where I put away things that I’ve long since left behind. Like ghosts, or wilted flowers, or some other whimsical cliché. I put them there and there they remain, because I don’t have the guts to open the window and let them out. They can’t leave those corners, because I like to remember they’re there, but they also can’t fly away and for that I am truly sorry. It’s just the hand dealt to me by the universe and there are much worse deals to be had so I always take what I can get. What I get just happens to be quite beautiful and thus quite cruel when it goes away, so I hold on, if only in the hollows of the attic.
They are a varied bunch, my corner girls; exuberant, caramel-coated sweetcheeks; thin eyebrows penciled in for extra expressive oomph; narrow nose accentuating the kind of striking profile that makes a girl look nosy but exotic; wide, hollow eyes that melt a man’s will like so much salt over a fresh snowfall. They are the features of many lost loves. I think they still look out from the corners, but while I keep them there I can’t allow myself to glance in their direction. Too risky, you understand. My corner girls would tear me to shreds.
Foresight I lack, but forethought is plentiful, and I’ve had much time to contemplate matters. I know how it ends. I’m going to die in the corner grasping a wall or a lamp or anything within reach, and my corner girls will leap out of their corners and break all the windows as they feel the rush of the wind for the first time. The ones I acted cruelly towards will scratch at my face and stomp on my skull, and I can’t fault them for seeking revenge before they flee for freedom.
God, I hope they make it.