A long-expected journey.

My introduction to the Hobbit was not that auspicious. When I was 3, I came into possession of a Fisher Price Record Player and a few records to go with it, including this one::

"Hobbit Book & Record: Rankin/Bass (1977)"

I set up the record player in my multicolored, foldable indoor playhouse (if I recall correctly, it came from Little Golden Books or Random House - something like that) and spent days listening to records. Mostly, to be honest, I was listening to other records: I forget which they were, but I had two that were identical with different B sides, and at first I thought the song changed by magic.  I solved this great mystery by teaching myself to read, which led to my real introduction to Tolkien four years later. As for the Rankin Bass record, the only impression it really made on me was "Goblins are scary and will eat your head!"

Yesterday I reread the Hobbit (for maybe the 7th time). Even after this many readings, I noticed new things, for instance this parallel between the Hobbit and LoTR, which made me smile:

"You asked me to find the fourteenth man for your expedition, and I chose Mr. Baggins. Just let any one say I chose the wrong man or the wrong house, and you can stop at thirteen and have all the bad luck you like, or go back to digging coal."

"Together we score one hundred and forty-four. Your numbers were chosen to fit this remarkable total: One Gross, if I may use the expression. No cheers. This was ridiculous. Many of his guests, and especially the Sackville-Bagginses, were insulted, feeling sure they had only been asked to fill up the required number, like goods in a package. ‘One Gross, indeed! Vulgar expression."

It seems being asked to fill up a required number is not such an insult!

I read it this time because I wanted to reinforce my own original impressions before seeing Peter Jackson's interpretation later this week. Though I think I read LoTR a total of nine times, I didn't reread it before seeing the movie, and this is something I regret. My Frodo and my Aragorn (among others), ones I liked far better than the movie versions, are now difficult to recall. Reading the books first meant my Middle-Earth was really my own, and though the longing to see those images realized is what brought me to the movie, what made them powerful was the degree to which they "matched" a world that had already existed for years in my mind's eye. The Shire, Gandalf, Gollum were much as I pictured them and this delighted me; hearing the songs set to music thrilled me, but it occurred to me just yesterday that if I hadn't read the book before seeing the movie I might not have read it it all..

The richness that sets Tolkien apart from the genre largely inspired by him, something I've spent a lifetime trying to put my finger on, does not really make it to the screen. The movie was mostly enjoyable because I had read the books. The world called to me, in part, because I'd found it the way Tolkien himself found it, starting with that intriguing sentence "In a hole in the ground there lived a Hobbit". It began as a world where the narrator joked with me and an ordinary person (who seemed, in size and experience, more like my 7-year-old self than like a middle-aged man) revealed himself to be a fellow "fan" of stories of dragons and elves, and this world evolved into a gradually darker, more epic, seemingly older one; a path taken in both the Hobbit and LoTR, but also spanning both. For me, Tolkien's anachronisms and changes in style are not a blemish (as some seem to think) but a key to what sets him apart. Most writers of fantasy take an ordinary character and thrust him or her over some threshold into another world - a classic part of the hero's journey - but Tolkien handled this in a more artful way, starting from an "ordinary" world that is itself fanciful and symbolic, a dream version of reality, and progressing from there into a deeper dream. I wouldn't call it escapist any more than I would say that of the dreams that keep us sane.

The movie on the other hand, taken by itself, is barely distinguishable from ordinary escapist mental junk-food; it would have entertained me but had no lasting impact. I would probably have scoffed and said something clever about male power fantasies, then promptly forget the whole thing. The striking contrast between the various parts of Middle-Earth, which even creeps into the voice of the narrator, would be gone. Tom Bombadil, who breaks the rules of the story (and the rules of storytelling!) so near the beginning would be gone, along with the philosophical weight he brings. The Scouring of the Shire, also "breaking the rules", would be gone, breaking the relationship between the Shire and the heroic world, and thus the implied relationship between reader and book. The movies followed the "rules", and in doing so take life out of the story. I still enjoyed them because I watched them with an overlay of meaning remembered from the books. 

I don't doubt the Hobbit movie will similarly smooth over the quirks and bumps, though in this case the story will be padded rather than condensed. Minimizing the differences in style between the Hobbit and LoTR (an understandable attempt to repeat a successful formula) will certainly have this effect. Following Gandalf might be interesting, but it violates the veil that is drawn around the story in the Hobbit and thus flattens the world, bringing the background into the foreground. I sometimes enjoy fanfiction, and I suppose that's what this amounts to, but fanfiction is not the best introduction to a work! I'll certainly enjoy seeing the characters, places and music "brought to life", but this phrase is misleading: they are already very much alive for me, which is why I want to see them.

Word association: guilty pleasures

I just read Margaret Atwood's "Oryx and Crake" in one sitting, something I find rather embarrassing. I'm usually embarrassed when I get hooked by a story, because, as a master of literature, I know very well that gripping stories rarely coincide with the type of writing that an educated individual ought to enjoy. But what the hell, I'm anonymous here, and I feel like talking about "Oryx and Crake", whether my undergrad advisor would have found it "intellectually stimulating" or not.
You see, it had several things going for it from the outset. Number one, it was post-apocalyptic, and I'm a sucker for that sort of thing. The old, tired last-human-on-earth-struggling-to-survive image gets me every time, ever since I stole my dad's copy of "Earth Abides" as a kid. It always seems to promise to get to the heart of the matter, to reveal something essential about what it is to be human, which is odd for a creature we hear over and over is a "social animal". Maybe it's because I'm an autistic introverted misanthrope with social anxiety? I don't know, but I know I love a good dystopia, where all the nastiness of humanity can burn itself out and maybe, if we're lucky, leave a gem among the ashes. Or something like that. I'm a reader, not a writer, ok?
So anyway, that brings me to the other thing that grabbed me: there are people with Asperger's in the book (among whom is title character Crake). Apparently Atwood did a bit of research, because they use the term "neurotypical" or "NT". Still, these aspies are very nearly your basic evil geniuses, devoid of empathy, viewing humans as cattle and blah, blah, blah, except that (and again, this may be an autistic reading) they are actually somewhat sympathetic. The world they live in is degenerate, violent, tawdry and soulless. Crake's desire to put an end to this world and replace it with a better is understandable. Even his friend Snowman, neurotypical that he is, seems to understand and, perhaps, work to realize Crake's vision in the end. I'll avoid a spoiler here, but he is left in position to pass judgment on humanity, and, as the curtain falls, that judgment passes to the reader. Very nice, actually. I enjoyed some of the symbolism: the "whuff" of air, the rakunk, the parrot, and the snowman (which, unfortunately, was spoiled when Atwood felt the need to explain it). Sometimes the writing seemed too self-conscious, but at best it was vivid and intense. I enjoyed it. But I'm embarrassed by this, because if I learned one thing in school, it's that books that keep you turning pages are never good.

Oh well.

On an unrelated note, you can participate in an interesting-looking study on word association through a link found here:

"On average, an adult knows about 40,000 words. Researchers in psychology and linguistics are interested in how these words are represented mentally. In this large-scale study we aim to build a network that captures this knowledge by playing the game of word associations. "

Neuroskeptic associated several words with "pain". Me? I repeatedly associated words with "sex".
Word association is fun!
I'm reminded of a website I found years ago (and referred to in a bullshit essay about Borges):
Now there is a database of word associations, and a degenerate and tawdry one at that. But what are words without their associations? They are like naked, lonely NTs wandering a post-apocalyptic beach, slowly dying of infected wounds. Or maybe like references with no point. Or blogs without readers.

Well, 'til next time. I'm probably going to talk about the Hobbit movie (before I see it). I may imitate the bigwigs at The Tolkienist & try to convince the masses to read the book before seeing the film. A futile task, most likely. I'm told Tolkien is too slow-paced and dry for today's young'uns (which brings to mind another fun dystopia).

Eowyn, Mulan, and that dude who doesn't talk in vent

You know that feel when you're the only female in some tech course & get the best grade on a test the dudes failed? Or when you're top dps in a pug raid and speak in vent for the first time? It's kind of like this:

 or maybe this:

 and it's awesome, right? In both cases one could say you're incognito: in the class your achievement is hidden, in the game your gender is, but the moment you get to reveal that you are both the girl and the winner is sweet indeed.
I've been thinking about this trope lately and how it relates to the issue of girls/women in geek culture. I'm sure I'm not the only female who often participates in this culture either without revealing her gender (that "dude" who doesn't talk in vent) or, when her gender is known, feels the urge to keep quiet about her accomplishments. Another example I came across recently was in "She - Understanding Feminine Psychology" by Robert A. Johnson, which is based on the tale of Psyche and Eros. An interesting read, but the essentialism is irritating (that's how it goes with Jungian stuff). At one point in the myth Psyche is given the quest of retrieving fleece from the (violent and dangerous) golden rams, she sneaks in under cover of darkness and gathers the fleece left on the trees. If we are to take Johnson's word for it, this illustrates how a woman should take just enough "logos, the masculine rational scientific energy... for her purposes without a power play" because apparently to do so openly would be to "leave much destruction in her wake".
Ugh. Not even gonna touch that one.
I relate to Psyche, though, in my way. I relate when the blueprints I drew up are approved only when presented by a male friend; when I find remaining androgynous online is the best way to have my ideas heard and evaluated on their own merits, when I see female public figures judged on aspects of their appearance and personal lives that would never matter if they were male. I want to sneak in at night, dress in drag, pretend my microphone is broken, simply pursue my goals without the burden of sexism. So, when possible, I do.
But I can't help but wonder why this story has such mainstream acceptability. I love Tolkien, but I'm not about to call him a feminist, nor do I find Disney movies (or Greek mythology, or Jungian psychology) to be the ultimate in enlightenment. These stories are inspiring, but if you're the dude who never talks in vent - when do start talking? Only the greatest heroine, after all, can be openly female without setting feminism back! Once you're known, your accomplishments become suspect. You risk having them attributed to someone else. If you're only second best, better to stay hidden. If you're still learning, do it quietly (if my examples seem unrelated, think "women participating in male-dominated activities" - either in work or play. Work and play seem to have a lot of overlap in the geek world, anyway).
You also can expect to have your motives questioned. Coming back to Eowyn, I have to think of how her "crush" on Aragorn is seen as a flaw, how some critics seem to feel the need to explain it away in order to redeem her. The thing I don't get about this is Aragorn himself is (in part) trying to impress a woman. In fact, impressing a love interest seems to be a perfectly respectable motive for a man (not to mention I like to read this as a projection of Eowyn's shadowed "masculine side", and her stint as Dernhelm as a way of integrating this - but that's another matter). The point is, the understandable desire to impress someone you share interests with and find attractive is suspect in a female. The problem with the "fake geek girl" is not that she is nothing like the real geek girl, but that the distinction is too blurry. It comes too close to saying that an attraction to geeks makes one a fake geek (apply that to guys and see how silly it sounds!) I would argue that a girl who wants to attract geeky guys probably is a geek, but that would go against the great and eternal law that the highest ambition of every female is to get as much attention from as many males as possible, whoever those males may be and whatever her own sexual orientation, relationship status, age, interests, etc.. You know what I mean.

So yeah: we can't always feel comfortable pursuing our interests openly, and the compromises we make by pursuing them in a subtle way, though they might help us as individuals, work to maintain the "boys only" image these activities have. I'm not judging: I like to learn, work and play without dealing with sexism the whole time - but perhaps some of that burden is self-imposed. Perhaps it's better to be an openly female n00b than to pretend your mic is broken until you top the charts. I don't know. Do weigh in. There is a small chance I will buy you one of these

if you do!