Haunted by the Devil Inside--Embrace It.

Well, here we are. What you see here before you is the final post to this blog. Tragic, I know. Just like how it’s tragic that I tweaked the opening lines of the modern version of Antigone to fit this blog post because I couldn’t think of another beginning and still remember my lines. Why yes, I am coming out thespian. Anyway, let’s dive right into this…shall we? No more need of fluffy pleasantries, it’s time to blog.

            Time really has flown, hasn’t it? It seems like yesterday the first post to this blog was being born from the taps of my fingers on a keyboard…and now…wow. Now is the end of the line, the end of the road for this blog and class. In a way I’m glad and in a way, I am also sad.  I’m sad because now there will be no more amazing conversations organically taking form in the classroom that literally thrum with life and pulsate with insight. I’m sad that I won’t have class with most of these people ever again, and probably will never really speak to them again either. However, amidst all of this sadness comes a feeling of happiness for the end of the class. Before you jump me in a dark alley, reader, please hear me out.

            You see, Suzanne is the kind of professor one really only comes across once in a lifetime, if even that. First you must find the end of the rainbow, the second star to the right, Atlantis…Anyway my point is that it is sheer, unadulterated fortune when one gets to take a class with her. She chooses texts that are brilliant with depth and knowledge, texts that really challenge readers and texts that really motivate readers. She chooses books almost as if she were playing chess. For you see, everything in her courses is always laid out very strategically. It was the same in GLBT Lit last spring—which I took—with how the texts take one on a journey of self-discovery. This class was no different.

            First we began with Mather and dug into the heart of early America’s darkness right away. We talked about the Salem Witch Trials and how so many innocents were killed all because of a group of girls wanting attention and being overly frightened of ghost stories and tales of magic. We talked about a woman being othered and branded by society as an Adulterer for having an affair while her husband was gone (a child was the result of this union). She was forced to wear her “sin” upon her body for all the world to see, judge, and condemn her by; using her as a living example of the Devil’s presence on earth. We talked about a woman who yearned for affliction for attention from God for her being tested and tried by her capture by Native Americans; we talked about the Spaniard’s unapologetic conquest and  rape of America and the Aztec culture; we talked about a soldier refusing to allow a woman to find love outside of himself; we talked about a man who damns his crew to their death by strangling them with his monomania and hubris over his obsession… we talked about how through the humanization of doom and a whale, the steps of the sailors of the Essex were haunted for they succumbed to their hunger for survival. We also talked about perversion, addiction, and obsession blurring the line between free will and the lack thereof; about reclusiveness caging a part of the heart to always want what’s beyond its grasp; about the painful past’s presence in poetry and all self-expression for it never releases its host; and finally…we talked about coming into and celebrating one’s selfhood.

            It’s not easy to see how these texts related to one another at first…but through each revelation of self that came with each text, the answer was revealed: all of these texts contain people who were haunted by their inner monsters and othered by them. Their inner monsters of obsession, perversion, desire for domination, knowledge of what one is capable of…the inner monsters of greed, lust, pain, and suffering; the inner monster of differing from the norm. No matter the text, there was always at least one person who played host to a monster within, one person who was haunted by one, one person who suffered for being expected to be able to tame it.

Devil Inside- Utada Hikaru

Everybody wants me to be their angel
Everybody wants something they can cradle
They don't know I burn
They don't know I burn
They don't know I burn

[Chorus:]
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside of me
Devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil somewhere really deep inside me
Devil inside of me
Jealous angel deep inside me

You don't know cuz you're too busy reading labels
You're missing all the action underneath my table
I'm waiting for my turn
Waiting for my turn
Just waiting for my turn
Just waiting for my turn

[Chorus:]
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside of me
Devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil somewhere really deep inside me
Devil inside of me
Jealous angel deep inside me

Time to make it burn
This is how I burn

[Chorus:]
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil (or something like it) inside of me
Devil (or something like it) inside
Maybe there's a devil somewhere really deep inside me
Devil inside of me
Jealous angel deep inside me

             People can’t handle those different from them, those that differ from society’s norm in anyway. Society just simply wants to cradle everyone like babies, perfect, moldable little angels, and make sure that they grow up “right.” AKA In order for society to accept you as part of it, one must conform to society’s demands. This includes the demands of purity, heteronormativity, morality… Society wants no one to cross the line and stray from the herd of normality. Not even when conforming sometimes means painful self-alteration. Those that are different and othered grow to hate this “monster,” this “devil” growing inside them that makes them different. They grow to be painfully aware of this monster’s urges, its feelings, its wants, its desires. They both fear their monster, and love their monster. They fear being othered yet they love being different.

Long lost words whisper slowly to me
Still can't find what keeps me here
When all this time I've been so hollow...inside


(I know your still there)


Watching me, wanting me
I can feel you pull me down
Fearing you, loving you
I know ill find you somehow


Hunting you, I can smell you
Alive
Your heart pounding in my head


Calling me, Hearing me
I wont let you pull me down
Saving me, Raping me
Wont you leave....


Watching me, wanting me
I can feel you pull me down
Fearing you, Loving you
I won't let you pull me down


Watching me, wanting me
I can feel you pull me down
Fearing you, Loving you
I won't let you pull me down 

Those accused of being witches were othered  for having something different about them. Hester Pryne was othered for knowing and acting on the desire inside of her. Rowlandson was othered for her faith amongst the Indians, and othered by the rest of society when she was free. The Aztecs were othered because they were different and because the Spaniards gave into their inner monsters of greed and lust for power. Eliza was othered for her different view point on life. Ahab was othered for he gave into his monomaniacal nature and released his obsession. The crew of the Essex was othered for what they had to do to survive and because of the tragedy’s haunting shadow surrounding them. Poe and his narrators were othered for they gave in and explored the darker parts of themselves, they knew their monsters well. Dickinson was othered for her reclusiveness, othered by her feelings, and othered by herself. Sexton was othered for her progressive personality, her past, and her illness; and Whitman was othered because of how well he knew his inner monsters and expressed them , he was othered for being different from the norm of society. Like I said, every text contained someone being othered by their monsters and being haunted by them. Some people in our class even revealed to the rest of us that they also have been othered; I have been othered. Perhaps this is why our class connected so much to each and every one of the texts we read throughout the quarter…because we all found a bit of ourselves in every piece.

This is why I am glad in a way that this class is done. I was able to learn so much more about myself through this course and through these texts; I was able to self-reflect on my own relationship to my inner monsters and why I am still haunted by them today. And now that the class is over, I will be able to continue down this path of self-reflection and actualization embracing my “monsters” within; I will be able to help others do the same.

This class was absolutely amazing. Not only for the teacher and the students in it, but for what it taught me. This class taught me that it is ok to be different, that it is ok to embrace the darker parts of yourself, and that it is ok to be who you really are. Forever will I be grateful for this class and for this blogging assignment. For now, the blog will be a testament to the journey I have gone through and a place where I can take sanctuary when I need to remind myself to “sound my barbaric YAWP” to “announce my place in the family of things.”

Auf wiedersehen, readers, and make it work.

Soon, un jour...

 If it seems to you there must needs be something unreal, illusive, in a love that has grown

up entirely without the basis of personal intercourse, dear Friend, then you do not yourself

realize your own power nor understand the full meaning of your own words, ‘whoso

touches this, touches a man.’… Real effects imply real causes. (qtd. in Harned 77)

Anne Gilchrist to Walt Whitman, April 12, 1872

Juliette: 
Qu'est c'qu'on sait de l'amour quand on a que 16 ans
Bien sûr on sait qu'un jour mais, un jour ça sera quand
Qu'est c'qu'on sait de la vie, quand la vôtre commence
Et qu'on meurt d'impatience en attendant celui
Qui vous aimera, celui, qui vous dira
Les mots, ces mots qu'on attend
L'amour, je le veux maintenant
(What can I know of love when I am only 16 years old?
Of course I know that someday but, that someday will be when?
What can one know of life, when yours hasn't begun?
And one dies of impatience waiting for him
Who you will love, him, who will always say to you
The words, these words that one waits for
Love, I want it no) 

"Un Jour" from Romeo et Juliette de la haine et l'amour

 

I know there's someone somewhere

Someone who's sure to find me soon

After the rain goes there are rainbows

I'll find my rainbow soon

Soon it won't be just pretend

Soon a happy ending

Love, can you hear me

If you're near me

Sing your song

Sure and strong

And soon 

"Soon" from Thumbelina 

 What do Anne Gilchrist, Juliet, and Thumbelina have in common?

Anne longs for the love of Whitman and Juliet and Thumbelina long for the love of simply someone. They yearn, they pray, they plead, and they beg for love to come to them someday soon. They want to experience that moment when everything clicks together, where everything all of a sudden falls into place, where new light shines on the world and everything becomes a precious thing. They want to fill that empty cavern of their chests which the lack of love carved out with jagged claws. Like them, I too long for love. I long for it with every fiber of my being, with my whole self. Sometimes, I find myself feeling that empty feeling and that lack of completeness. Yes, some may argue that this is simply patriarchy's influence creating my need to be chosen...but I don't think that's all there is too it. In fact, I know that it is not that simple. Let me tell you a story.

Once there was a little girl who had a father. This father would come in and out of her life for many years; his apologies for his absence came in the form of gifts. Yet when he abused her, there were never any apologies given. She kept this hidden from her family for a long time. One day when she was on her way out of his house, he blocked the hallway. "I won't let you leave until you give me a kiss," he said. Terrified, the little girl screamed for her mother...and her mother came and rescued her. The little girl never saw her father again and now, she is beginning to realize that even though she was free from her father's abuse, she would never be free from his scars. She grew up with them after all. Grew up with intense feelings of inadequacy and she grew up blaming herself for her father's lack of love for her. "What did I do wrong?" "What did I do to make him not love me?" "Is there something wrong with me?" "Why can't I be better?" she would ask herself over and over again. These questions would become a convoluted mantra of self-imprisonment; these questions would become a paradox which she would have to cage in her mind, mentally seeing it pace back and forth like a caged lion, occasionally escaping its prison to wreak havoc. This paradox is yearning for love, yet feeling undeserving. No whips, no cages, no anything incapacitates this paradox within her, so she goes through life a ghost of herself, a shade, a slave to the animal caged within, and witness to the imagined monster in the mirror.

This little girl was and still is me. 

I am the servant vessel of my scars and I am a host to intense yearning. Consistently I empathize with those who yearn to fill their emptiness with love, to fill their life with love. I know that feeling like I know my name and there are times when I entangle myself with words of doubt and self-deprecation. This is why I connected so strongly to the story Suzanne told our class about Anne Gilchrist and Walt Whitman. The only differences are that she has a face to the longing in her heart and I do not; she has someone to write her feelings to which I lack.

Like Anne, I express myself far better in writing than in person. Perhaps it is like John Bennett says in Suzanne's article on Gilchrist and Whitman that "a woman gives us the effusions of her soul" through writing (Ashworth 175). Like I do in my poetry, Anne writes her soul in her letters; she bares it for Whitman to see. She writes it for him, a special, specific person and is "haunted by the fear of 'dead' letter--letters that do not reach their destination or that fail to produce the 'right' affect" (176). The worst feeling in the world is knowing or feeling that your words are lost to the wind, thinking that no one will ever answer you. I have not yet received my answer. But Anne did.

Whitman wrote back to Anne in a manner that was quite unusual, for he never wrote back to a reader in such a deep capacity before, such a personal capacity. I imagine this delighted Anne to a degree that is probably unfathomable, for she truly loved Whitman with every cell in her body. She also was delighted by his responses most likely because "every little [epistolary] detail" transcended the "great vast space" between them (178).She felt closer to him than she ever felt through simply reading his poetry: she felt chosen. Her soul was being answered and the emptiness being filled by his words of (platonic) love. I hope that through their correspondence, knowing that Anne's soul answered the words he wrote made Whitman feel as complete as she. I hope that one day my words will also be answered like hers were for no one wants their words to go unanswered; I don't want my life to simply be a string of dead letters for "I lie abstracted and hear beautiful tales if things and the reasons of things,/ They are so beautiful I nudge myself to listen" and I long to tell someone of these beautiful things I hear (Whitman 133). Such as the beautiful things I hear in Whitman's words. During the facilitation by Julie, Vianca, and Sean, they asked us to write and draw out favorite Whitman quote. I struggled to just pick one...so I hodge podged four of my favorites into one and now I consider this string of words some of the most beautiful I have ever read: 

I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and fathomless/ as myself;/ They do not know how immortal, but I know/...I am the poet of the body,/ And I am the poet of the soul./...My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,/ With the swirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds./...I lie abstracted and hear beautiful tales if things and the reasons of things,/ They are so beautiful I nudge myself to listen./ I cannot say to any person what I hear.... I cannot say it to myself..../ it is very wonderful (Whitman 29, 42, 48, and133).

Perhaps one day I'll feel that completeness and have someone to write my words to, but til that day, I'll simply just have to "make it work" with the hand of life cards that I have been dealt.

Ashworth, Suzanne. "Lover, Mother, Reader: The Epistolary Courtship of Walt Whitman." Nineteenth-Century Contexts 26.2 (2004): 173-197. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 13 Mar. 2011.

And now a Dickinson Rembrance is all I own

This week myself, Deidre, and Via led the facilitation for Emily Dickinson. It turned out to be much better than I anticipated as many of our classmates shared very personal things and we created many wonderful poetic couplets through our exercise. I won't rehash everything we asked the class or everything that we explained, that would be a pain for both myself and you, dear reader. Simply, I will just delve right into discussing my own personal reactions and connections to Dickinson.

Before I make my first connection, I want to preface it with the knowledge that I have been highly interested in the Tudor family and time period since around the fifth grade. Ask me anything about other British monarchs and I couldn’t tell you squat. Ask me anything about the Tudors though, and I could bore you for hours haha. Anyway, now that that is out of the way, here comes the first connection: Henry VIII’s love letters to Anne Boleyn. This connection struck me like a bolt of lightning when we were reading Dickinson’s Master Letters aloud in class. Like the Master Letters, his letters to her are meant to be a seduction of sorts, an expression of his love, lust, and longing. What are the Master Letters you ask? They are letters written by Emily Dickinson to someone only known as “Master.”

Letter One

Dear Master

            I am ill—

but grieving more

that you are ill, I

make my stronger hand

work long eno’ to tell

you – I thought perhaps

you were in Heaven,

and when you spoke

again, it seemed

quite sweet, and

wonderful, and surprised

me so – I wish that

you were well.

I would that all I

love, should be weak no

more.

            This letter sounds remarkably like the twelfth letter which Henry VIII wrote to Anne Boleyn when the sweating sickness broke out across England.

There came to me suddenly in the night the most grievous news that could arrive and I must needs lament it for three reasons:  the first being to hear of the sickness of my mistress, whom I esteem more that all the world, and whose health I desire as my own, and would willing bear the half of your illness to have you cured;  the second because of my fear of being again endlessly tortured by my enemy absence, who until now has caused me every possibly annoyance, and so far as I can judge is like to do worse, I pray God to rid me of so importunate a rebel; the third, because the physician in whom I most trust is absent at a time when he could do me the greatest pleasure;  for I hoped through him, and his skills, to obtain one of my chief joys in this world, that is to say, that my mistress should be cured.

However, for lack of him I send you the second, and the only one left, praying God that soon he can make you well again, when I shall love him more than ever; praying you to be governed by his advice regarding your illness, by doing which I hope soon to see you again, which will be better medicine for me than all the precious stones in the world.

Written by your secretary, who is, and ever will be

 Your loyal and most assures servant,

H. (A.B) R (Tudor 38-39)

There is more than the illness connection between these letters though. There is also a language connection. The language used in both letters is one of dominance and submission. “Master” and “Mistress” imply the submission of Dickinson and Henry to the dominance of the object of their affections. They put themselves in subservient roles in their relationships “grieving more that you are ill,” and “whose health I desire as my own, and would willing bear the half of your illness to have you cured,” which begs the question of what love would be like if love was solely expressed through the language submission and subjugation. Would our relationships be more trusting like, as Beth said in class, puppies constantly exposing their bellies? Would it be a relationship if indecision for each partner wants to submit to the others will? Would vulnerability become strength? I’m not sure. It is very hard to imagine a world like this due to patriarchy and its clearly defined dominant and submissive roles and relationships. Alison said in class that “you can’t submit to nothing” and I am inclined to agree with her. In order for there to be submission, there must be domination of some kind. This further complicates love being based solely on submission.

            Dickinson further explores this concept under the veil of the somebody v. nobody theme in some of her poems. “I’m nobody! Who are you?/…How dreary to be somebody” (Dickinson 18)! Clearly Dickinson is continuing her subservient role but here, she is expressing it through self-defacement. She views herself as sub par, as nobody and actually seems to celebrate her lack of selfhood for she proclaims that she is nobody rather than simply stating it. While I do share Dickinson’s lack of self-confidence and view that she is of lesser value than others, I do not share her celebratory nature dealing with this. In fact, it’s rather painful to view oneself this way constantly and oftentimes causes quite a few snags in friendships and relationships in general. It certainly does nothing to help depression. She also suffered from loving people who were beyond her grasp (Sue) which I also sympathize with. I’ve liked the same guy for over five years now and continuously he is beyond my grasp for he is always in a relationship. I recognize that this is an unhealthy fixation, it is unhealthy to hold on, but I can’t help myself. More and more I am realizing that emotional connections are important to me and this is a very strong one that simply refuses to die. Just like how Dickinson’s love for Sue never died even when Sue married Dickinson’s brother. Such is the dilemma of life and love, which is something Dickinson knew extremely well for she is considered the first poet of pain for her complex understanding of it. Her pain from suffering from unfulfilled love really comes out in her poem that I like to call “Amethyst Remembrance.” I call it this not only because that is within the poem, but because I’ve known the poem for years only in song form.  “the gem was gone/And now an amethyst remembrance/Is all I own” (Dickinson 184). There exist Gregorian Birthstone poems which dictate all the meanings of the various birthstones according to the month that people were born in. Amethyst is the birthstone of February:

"The February born shall find
Sincerity and peace of mind,
Freedom from passion and from care,
If they, the amethyst will wear."

            According to the poem, an amethyst means sincerity, peace of mind, freedom from passion and from care. This is another reason why I feel that this poem is about the pain of unrequited love for if one plugs in the meaning of the stone, it fits. “And now [freedom from passion and from care]/ is all I own.” She is trying to separate herself from her pain of her love being gone. Perhaps this poem is about losing Sue to her brother in marriage. Or perhaps it is simply about unrequited love or lost love in general. Either way this poem continues to tug on my heartstrings today.

Tudor, Henry. Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn: The Love Letters. Mount Vernon, NY: Peter Pauper Press, 1900. 38-39. eBook.

What is love? Baby don't hurt me...no more.

What is love?

No really. What is love?

Is it the one power that rules us all like the one ring? (I need to get off this facetious kick).

Is it blind? Is it rational?

Do we choose it?

Like Kylie, I too believe that we choose to accept love rather than choose to be in love. I don't  think that we all have this switch inside of us that we turn off and on depending on if we want to love someone or not. It takes time to grow and takes more than just willpower to manifest. We choose to allow ourselves to love another just as we choose to accept love from another person. It is all about choice even though sometimes, one cannot help but have feelings for another person. I've been there. I liked the same guy for more than five years even though I didn't want to like him for I knew the relationship would never happen. However, deep down inside, I know I chose to continue to like him and go along with my friends' encouragements. Just as now, I am choosing to let go of the feelings I had for him; the why part of that is a long story.

I also believe that there are different kinds of love like romantic love, platonic love, familial love...destructive love, enriching love. I also believe that there is a huge difference between lust and love which is why I have such a hard time with Romeo and Juliette because I cannot for the life of me decide whether or not I think they are in love or in lust with each other. But that is beside the point. The point is that there are many different kinds of love which makes it a complicated thing indeed. When one adds soulmates into the mix, that just makes it even more complicated because that adds an entirely new set of beliefs and opinions. Alison believes that everyone has more than one soulmate and that there are different kinds such as intellectual soulmates v. romantic ones. I'm inclined to believe that as well. Though a part of me also believes in the soulmate mythology of the Japanese and Chinese. An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstances. The thread may stretch or tangle but will never break. The Chinese believe that around the ankles of men and women are tied red strings of fate that attach to their soulmates; the Japanese believe it attaches to the pinky. According to Laurie Sue Brockway in Your Interfaith Wedding, "The red string of fate celebrates the legend that soulmates are tied together at the ankle at birth to ensure they will find each other someday, " (75). Don't ask me why I am so fond of this concept, I think it's the romantic in me. However, like I said, I do also believe that there is more than one soulmate out there for us, just different kinds and in different forms.

This makes me wonder about both the relationships of the main couples in the books/stories we read in class this past week, Ligeia and The Shining, for they are truly puzzling ones.

In Ligeia, Poe's narrator practically festishizes Ligeia to the point where he can't escape either her eyes or her intelligence. “Those eyes! those large, those shining, those divine orbs! they became to me twin stars of Leda, and I to them devoutest of astrologers.” On page twenty-nine, all he does is describe her eyes; why is he so obsessed with them? By describing her eyes are the twin stars of Leda, he is also telling us that she and her eyes became his moon and his sun, his night and day. How and why? Because the twins Leda bore from Zeus are Artemis and Apollo: the moon goddess and the sun god. His whole being revolves around his obsession with her eyes to the point where he forgets her last name and how they met and all he remembers is her strange beauty. Who do her eyes really belong to in this case? Was he really in love with her? I am puzzled about the latter especially. Regardless of whether or not their love was real though, I believe that their relationship was highly unhealthy. It was parasitic. He kept feeding off of her identity, off her appearance, and off her soul until she slowly wasted away to nothing from her lack of selfhood and died.

Even when Ligeia is gone, she is still all he can see, all he can compare life to. Just as he took over her in life, she takes over him in death.

Another interesting relationship that we talked about this week was the relationship between Jack and Wendy Torrrance in The Shining. Unlike Poe’s narrator and Ligeia, there is no obsession between these two characters. They are simply…Jack and Wendy. Their marriage is going to pot; Danny even knows this due to his shine. On pages forty and forty-one, we see how haunted by his parents wanting a divorce. It’s his living nightmare that sparks his shinings to get worse and his reality will twist into hell when they get to The Overlook. His parents never touch affectionately and grow ever more distant from each other. Jack is unstable and standing on the precipice of insanity even before they arrive at The Overlook from the isolation he feels from his family and from his past relationship with his father. You see, Jack was abused by his father when he was young and Jack is trying to fight becoming that. However, he does injure Danny a few times…though those few times are severe. He breaks Danny’s arm and he slaps him. The breaking of the arm sparked Wendy to go into protective mode…but she still is hesitant to leave Jack because she doesn’t want to go back to her mother’s house where Wendy is not living up to her mother’s expectations. She doesn’t want to leave the man she loves even though he is verbally abusive to her—he threatens to break her ankle and even has malicious thoughts when they are having sex—and physically so with her son.

As said, Jack is also considering divorce and as evidenced on page forty, thinks that he’d be better off that way. However, there is still something there connecting him to Wendy just as there is still something connecting her to him. She knows it’s wrong, she knows he’s rough, she doesn’t know what to do but they’ve been through enough. She is caught in an endless, spiraling cycle of abuse until she finally breaks free with Danny at the end after suffering tremendous injuries from the battle with Jack (who dies at the end of the novel). This is like Poe's narrator's relationship with Ligeia: it is unhealthy for both of them and the only way to escape is through death. "Til death do us part," indeed.

(First Video is for Wendy about Jack. The second is for Jack about Wendy. Ignore the part where he talks about another man)

Brockway, Laurie Sue. Your Interfaith Wedding: A Guide to Blending Faiths, Cultures, and Personal Values into One Beautiful Wedding Ceremony. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2010. 75. eBook.

Steppin' to the Bad Side: The Tell-Tale Heart of the Black Cat

Steppin' to the bad side, ooh, ooh, ooh
Gonna take a mean ride, ooh, ooh, ooh
The smile I had has gone away
Those that steal are gonna pay
Steppin' to the bad side today
I tell ya now, its got to end
No more trustin' them, my friends
We're gonna change our style, change our tone


Steppin' to the bad side, surrendering to the darkness...is every mind truly prone to madness?

This is the question pondered throughout the class session this week.

As we know, every mind is prone to addiction of some kind. Oftentimes this addiction overcomes our free will and we can no longer be accountable for our own actions; we'd do anything for a fix, to silence our all consuming monomania. With addiction we are controlled by our bad choices. Again, our free will is overcome. I think the nature of addiction varies from person to person…but regardless, their free will is always in contention and their choices are always at least partly from the addiction source. Like how one of my grandmother’s relatives recently stole her jewelry while she was sleeping in order to go buy drugs. This raises a new question. Is free will outside the realm of reason?

In The Black Cat by Edgar Allen Poe, the narrator makes us question the relationship between addiction and freewill. For not only does the narrator take the eye of his "beloved" cat, Pluto, but he later goes on to hang Pluto, kill his wife, and wall her corpse up in the wall. What drove this sociopath to kill? Was it addiction such as his alcoholism? Or was it some more sinister, deeper issue? Stephen Asma, the visiting author to our school, once said that "we always look for the catalyst behind every wrong-doing." He's right. We truly cannot begin to fathom why someone would do such horrible things for no reason, we don't want to. Why? Because we don't want to start to see that everyone could potentially commit these acts, that we all could have this potential within ourselves. No one wants to admit that they sometimes have bad thoughts, perverse thoughts. This is what makes humans so complex for they have depth of personality. Everyone just simply chooses to see and accept only the personality traits that are lit up with white light; and they choose to shun and condemn those traits that are enshrouded in the depths of the shadows. Poe is a mastermind with how he shows the depth and complexity of human nature. Why? Because he is not afraid to explore what truly lies in the deep waters of our minds. In The Black Cat, Poe explores the nature of perversity and madness within his narrator. The depth of the narrator's perversity is most clearly illustrated on page 232, but also is where the narrator himself ponders this same issue of everyone having perversity within them.

And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart--one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which give direction to the character of Man. Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself--to offer violence to its own nature--to do wrong for the wrong's sake only---that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute, (Poe 232). 

 The narrator then goes on to kill his wife and wall up her corpse, as I previously stated. Although, the narrator is caught by the police and will pay the consequences of this murder because of "Pluto" for
"[he] had walled the monster up within the tomb," (238). I'm inclined to think that the monster he walled up within the tomb was actually his sanity, his guilt, his remorse, his conscious. This was the same thing that happened in The Tell Tale Heart. The narrator swears that he could hear the beating of the old man's heart beneath the floorboards, when in actuality it was his own imagination, it was his conscious; in The Black Cat it was "Pluto's" cry that gave the murder away, which I interpret as it being his guilt etc that called out to him and overtook him, not the real "Pluto."

Bonus: A visual of a one-eyed cat. AKA my cat: Calcifer Winks.

"Never get out of the boat"

Ok so these guys, Tyler and Jack, walk into a bar and shout to the barman "Hey, Dick! Give us two Essex' and a side of whale, sperm whale."

The bars packed, so the barman is a little slow in getting them their order. They get a little impatient and start making a fuss. Dick, the barman, shouts back at them due to their continued ruckus making, "Jesus, calm it down, Chase and Pollard! You'd think you were about to end up eating each other!"

The bar goes silent. Tyler vanishes all of a sudden and Jack gets up in Dick's face, "Listen here, Moby Dick. First rule about Cannibal Club is 'Never talk about Cannibal Club.'"

Dick goes pale in the face for a moment before grinning and pushing Jack and Tyler's order onto the floor, "Well that ship has already sailed. Guess I just sunk it."

Don't get the joke? Well, I didn't understand how Fight Club and In the Heart of the Sea went together either at first (I just threw in Moby Dick for shiggles so disregard that). As it’s sometimes easier to think of something in terms of something else, let us look at their connection as the “Lost Boy” connection. While this is one of many, it is one that brings about very interesting concepts and metaphors in both the book and the movie. First, let’s analyze Fight Club.

Everyone knows that Peter Pan lives in Neverland, the second star to the right and straight on til morning, and that no one ever grows up there. Fairies and mermaids are real, Indians celebrate their culture with pride and no fear of persecution…every fantasy comes to fruition. It’s a real utopia for all children and for anyone who refuses to grow older. What does Peter Pan have to do with Fight Club you ask? I shall tell you! In Fight Club, Jack ends up living with a man named Tyler. Now see, Tyler has this old, rundown house that he lives in. Everything leaks, the water is disgusting, the floors are treacherous, no one is around for miles…and it holds a power over both Tyler and Jack. It becomes their sanctuary. Here, they have no cares and don’t have to think about the outside world. Their house is their Neverland, and they are the lost boys who inhabit it. They are the boys who have never grown up and who constantly and subconsciously search for their place in the world around them. Tyler releases his hold on adulthood by renouncing thinghood: “The things you own end up owning you,” (Fight Club). This obsession with the material takes Jack a while to let go of, it was an obsession for the longest time while he went about his day simply because he had to and not because he wanted to. He was essentially a thing himself and thusly, was practicing what Sartre calls “bad faith.” It took discovering his own Neverland and discovering his need for emotional release for him to let go and embrace life the way that the lost boys in Peter Pan do. “Let’s stop being perfect and evolve,” Tyler says (Fight Club). He wants to evolve into his true self, to stop trying to be perfect all the time and just live. Which is what Jack both wants and needs (evidenced by the fact that Tyler IS Jack).

I don’t know if I’ve ever had a Neverland. I mean, sure. I know what it’s like to live life as a thing, an automaton, never doing things for yourself but always because you either have to or other people expect it of you. Unfortunately, I’m still there. However, it is through quotes like Tyler’s about the need to evolve instead of being perfect, like Emerson’s about life not being an apology, like Rilke’s “Hiersein ist herrlich” that my want to cease thinghood emerges. I know I’ll never be like Tyler or Jack and completely let go of the need for perfection and the subconscious pull to do things for others instead of yourself, I don’t think myself or my chronic depression would allow that. However, I’m keeping my eye on the horizon and hoping that someday, I can let go and find a Neverland that enables me to let go of this depression.

Which, in a way, is what Pollard does In the Heart of the Sea; he overcomes his forced “survival mode” and forgives both himself and the crew. He finds strength and integrity but most of all, he integrates his experience into who and what he is by even forgiving the whale. He transcends thinghood by getting on a boat again, by living out his life by his own means. He lets the incident go as much as he can, though he does fast on the anniversary of the sinking. Chase on the other hand, does not let it go. In fact, he profits from the tragedy and sensationalizes it (Phillbrick 205). He lets the tragedy rule him and never gets on a boat again. He never escapes his survivor mode and remains a lost boy for the rest of his days. Unlike Pollard who left behind his days as a lost boy yet still found his Neverland status by accepting what happened as a tragic accident and moving on with life. Whereas Chase, along with never letting it go, does not accept what happened as an accident and tries to place the blame on someone or something to excuse it and to escape his role in the tragedy. "Chase began to wonder what "unaccountable destiny or design" had been at work. It almost seemed as if something--could it have been God?--had possessed the beast for its own strange, unfathomable purpose. Whatever or whoever might be behind it, Chase was convinced that "anything but chance" had sunk the Esssex," (89).

In the story of In the Heart of the Sea, Pollard and Chase’s status as lost boys parallels their feelings to the aftermath of the sinking and their troubling memories. Letting go of something is perhaps one of the hardest things to do, especially a memory, which is how Pollard is able to escape being a lost boy and become found. I don’t think I could ever let go of my troubling memories, especially the ones concerning my father. I don’t think I could ever let go of the fear, the hurt, the hatred, and the dejection; I don’t think I could ever let go of my feelings of inadequacy from his leaving. However, unlike Chase, I’m not going to let my troubling memories rule me and I’m going to continue to believe in “hiersein ist herrlich” if it’s the last thing I do.

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate...

...Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine as children do. It's not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own lights shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." (quote as taken from Coach Carter but it is originally said by Maryanne Williamson with some word changes.)

Suzanne brought up this quote in class when we were discussing Ahab and how he is not afraid of his power. But let us put Moby Dick aside for a moment and focus on this quote and Self-Reliance by Emerson. "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure." But what is our power and why are we trained to see our greatest fears as fears of inadequacy instead of supremacy? I think I know why. I think that in this world of oppression and privilege, the privileged cannot afford for those who are oppressed to see their own power for then there would be equality. Now you may be thinking that equality is what everyone truly wants. I'm going to burst your bubble and tell you that is not the case. The white man doesn't want equality for that means he no longer benefits because of his gender and his race. The heterosexual woman doesn't want equality because then she would no longer reap the benefits of being heterosexual in a world where heterosexuality is the norm. Deep down inside us all, it is this way. But systems of oppression and privilege are not simply black and white, there is grey area as well. This is what we call intersectionality. All these areas of oppression work together in the world of systems. The world of systems training people to see themselves as inadequate and to lose sight of their own power and to recognize it only in those "chosen" ones. But there is a secret...the oppressed are aware of their power as well. But they are afraid of upsetting the social norm by exerting this power. But who says that only the privileged get to exercise the right of setting what we call the social norm? That's bullshit. "We are all meant to shine." "Your playing small does not serve the world." Movements for empowerment are their own worst enemies for they acknowledge the inadequacy of having something called "the social norm," they acknowledge that people are seen as inadequate, yet they only think that they are aware of their power. I say they in terms of the small groups of people who do rise up to try and take back the power that was stripped away from them. Because in the grand scheme of things, the majority of those who are oppressed either just don't acknowledge it, or they accept it. People need to learn that this acceptance is wrong.

People must understand that "[their] life is not an apology, but a life" (Emerson 1163). They must understand that in order to take power back as a whole, they must first take back the power of their own selves and their own identity. We can even scale this down onto a more personal battlefield and look at this in terms of personal identity and personal expression. Day by day we are surrounded by advertisements, media, etc that tell us what we should look like, what we should act like... There is largely nothing out there saying that those who aren't beautiful are just as important as those that are. There is largely nothing out there saying that to be overweight is ok. "Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water of which it is composed, does not" (1176). Society continues to live on, but the damage that it does lives on, its ideals live on. This is "the other terror that scares us from self-trust" it "is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them" (1164).  This causes people to live inside self-created masks and to learn to hate themselves, rather than to love themselves. Emerson disagrees with this practice whole-heartedly. For he believes that "If we live truly, we shall see truly" (1168). He also believes that "Nothing can bring you peace but yourself" (1176).

I know, I know. Easier said than done right? I'm right there with you, readers. For the longest time I have thought myself inadequate, have hated my looks because I'm not like everyone else, hated my weight because its not what society wants it to be...I've been there. I've been there all my life because of my subconscious daddy issues. Hell, I'm still there. But believe me, the best thing you could ever do is to listen to Emerson and live your own life. Don't get wrapped up in what society wants you to be and what they want you to look like and act like...Just don't. It leads you down a road that no one should ever go down and trust me, no one wants to have to take medication for the rest of their life or find themselves in heaven in a white robe, attempting to play the harp, and trying to see if your halo can act as an antenna so that you can hear who got kicked off The Bachelor. No. I have not died before. I'm just trying to lighten the mood in order to drive my point home. We all have to learn, as Emerson says, that "to be great is to be misunderstood" (1165). "[Our] life should be unique; it should be an alms, a battle, a conquest, a medicine" (1163). Our life should be OUR life. Not anyone else's. ESPECIALLY not anyone else's for copying someone or trying to be someone you are not is still hiding yourself away. "...imitation is suicide" (1160). This is what Emerson has taught me both through reading and discussing Self-Reliance. This is the way I am going to try and live from now on. Through his words and through Rilke's "Hiersein ist herrlich." For to be here now is glorious.

Now. Repeat after me, reader.

"I must be myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love me for what I am, we shall be the happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I must be myself. I will not hide my tastes or aversions...I do this not selfishly, but humbly and truly" (1170).

For "love takes off masks that we cannot live without and know we cannot live within" (Baldwin). So love yourself.

But don't become so obsessed with it that it takes over your entire world. Don't pull an Ahab. Think, what would Yojo do? (Yojo is the idol that Queequeg worships). No seriously, I mean it. Don't let loving yourself become your white whale. Just let your intuition guide you, let those epiphanies of emotion that come when your are unsure, push you up to the surface of the water you've felt you were drowning under all along. For if you love yourself too much, you will lose sight of teaching others to do the same. Like how Ahab lost sight of his crew due to his obsession with Moby, how he lost sight of life in general due to his hubris.  Like how in that one magician movie...Either The Illusionist or The Prestige (I get them mixed up all the time) The Great Danton becomes obsessed in finding out another magician's secrets to the point where it costs him everything. Just as Ahab lost everything to Moby, his leg, his ship, his crew...his life. Don't lose your life to obsession. Lose your life to love.

Anyway. That's all for now. Make it work and auf wiedersehen.