My friend, Shelly Bryant has graciously offered to host the next book club blog on her site. Some of you may have joined us for the book club discussion here on Patricia Wood’s Lottery in December. That was the kick off to, hopefully, starting up a regular book club on blogs around the internet. It’s open to anyone who likes to read and discuss literature with other readers and writers. You are more than welcome to jump into any discussion that interests you and host if you’d enjoy picking and discussing a book on your blog.
Shelly’s first post on the upcoming book club can be found here
She’s given four choices to her blog readers, and left the decision of what we will all be reading together up to a group consensus. The four choices are varied and look outstanding, so drop by her blog and put in your vote.
For those of you unfamiliar with Shelly’s discussions, I can say they are among the most intelligent and thought provoking literary discussions I have ever had the privilege to take part in, both online and in person. Shelly is a poet who is very well read and highly educated, and she teaches literature to third and fourth year university students in Singapore... as if all of that wasn’t enough, she’s also great fun and nice to boot.
I’ll be joining in and I hope to see all of you there!!!
Showing posts with label book discussion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book discussion. Show all posts
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Final Discussion on The Mists of Avalon - Fated Love
This will be the third, and final, discussion on The Mists of Avalon. If you missed the first two, go check them out:
Second Discussion
First Discussion
If anyone else is thinking of holding a book club blog – let me know in the comments so I can follow along.
There are certainly other things to analyze when talking about this novel, but the treatment of love and ‘fated’ love never fails to capture my attention. Why is it, I wonder, that stories are more poignant when we are assured of true love, but in the end it never works out. Maybe it adds to the drama. Maybe it keeps us turning pages because, really, what’s more boring than ‘happily ever after’? Well, it’s not so boring if you get to live it, but maybe it’s more fun to watch the chase... or maybe, being faulty humans, we always want what we can’t have – but then, that would make these cases less about true love and more about pride and vanity, wouldn’t it?
Well, then, I suppose I’m digressing. In The Mists of Avalon we see fated love in many different facets. Of course there is the love triangle between King Arthur, Gwenhwyfar, and Lancelot. In this telling, Arthur seems to love his wife but there is always the underlying duty of it – it is his wife, though not by choice. Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot share a deeper love, one that can’t be denied, even though duty commands it.
Then we have Ingraine and Uther... and in one passage we find that this, apparent fated love was connived... while we believed that Uther and Ingraine shared a life before as King and Queen of Atlantis, in fact it was Viviane’s past life, her soul mate, “...And in a searing moment, Viviane knew why no man had ever been more to her than duty, or a path to power, or a night’s pleasure...”(p.194)
Maybe you all have a different sensibility here than I do. Does duty bear a higher responsibility than love? If not, why do we find it so fascinating when characters choose to forego happiness to retain honor? Maybe women see this differently, too. My sensibility tells me that true love is not replaceable. That foregoing the chance to be with a fated love is throwing away the greatest gift and one that will not come again. It also tells me that if you can walk away from this type of love, for any reason, it wasn’t really all that you imagined in your mind. I think the real thing would be worth any consequence... but maybe that’s naive.
It seems to me that the male sensibility is that all loves are replaceable. Maybe I’m wrong here, but that’s how it seems... So how about you? What was your take on the depiction of love, fated or otherwise in this telling?
Second Discussion
First Discussion
If anyone else is thinking of holding a book club blog – let me know in the comments so I can follow along.
Treatment of Love
There are certainly other things to analyze when talking about this novel, but the treatment of love and ‘fated’ love never fails to capture my attention. Why is it, I wonder, that stories are more poignant when we are assured of true love, but in the end it never works out. Maybe it adds to the drama. Maybe it keeps us turning pages because, really, what’s more boring than ‘happily ever after’? Well, it’s not so boring if you get to live it, but maybe it’s more fun to watch the chase... or maybe, being faulty humans, we always want what we can’t have – but then, that would make these cases less about true love and more about pride and vanity, wouldn’t it?
Well, then, I suppose I’m digressing. In The Mists of Avalon we see fated love in many different facets. Of course there is the love triangle between King Arthur, Gwenhwyfar, and Lancelot. In this telling, Arthur seems to love his wife but there is always the underlying duty of it – it is his wife, though not by choice. Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot share a deeper love, one that can’t be denied, even though duty commands it.
Then we have Ingraine and Uther... and in one passage we find that this, apparent fated love was connived... while we believed that Uther and Ingraine shared a life before as King and Queen of Atlantis, in fact it was Viviane’s past life, her soul mate, “...And in a searing moment, Viviane knew why no man had ever been more to her than duty, or a path to power, or a night’s pleasure...”(p.194)
Maybe you all have a different sensibility here than I do. Does duty bear a higher responsibility than love? If not, why do we find it so fascinating when characters choose to forego happiness to retain honor? Maybe women see this differently, too. My sensibility tells me that true love is not replaceable. That foregoing the chance to be with a fated love is throwing away the greatest gift and one that will not come again. It also tells me that if you can walk away from this type of love, for any reason, it wasn’t really all that you imagined in your mind. I think the real thing would be worth any consequence... but maybe that’s naive.
It seems to me that the male sensibility is that all loves are replaceable. Maybe I’m wrong here, but that’s how it seems... So how about you? What was your take on the depiction of love, fated or otherwise in this telling?
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Second Discussion on Mists of Avalon - Religious Duality
This is the second post on the book club discussion of the Mists of Avalon.
You can find the first discussion on the Sacred Feminine, here
For today’s discussion I’d like to start with the religious connotations inherent in the text. Duality seems to permeate the story in many ways, and my reading of it almost seems to take the pagan ideal of both male and female, god and goddess, and transplant that into the dueling philosophies discussed in the text. While the Priestesses of Avalon centered solely on the goddess, only making passive mention of the horned god and almost relegating him to a position of doing their bidding and then going away... the Christians and their one God became the Patriarchal symbol.
I found it interesting that the women, though possibly on purpose as the main idea was to focus on the female perspective... but the women were painted in the more accepting, less judgmental light. The character of Viviane said repeatedly that the God of Christianity wouldn’t allow for any other gods, while their view was that there was room for all belief... The thing I found interesting here is that their obvious contempt for all things Christian, marked their words as hypocrisy... at least for me.
We talked at length about the bending over backwards for the feminine perspective in this rewrite of Arthurian Legend in my last post. I do love the writing and I think the story itself was ingenious in bringing a new light to an old tale... But because the focus on the feminine permeates all aspects, I think that topic will come up here, and in any discussion about the text. Here’s what I’m wondering. Do you think it was intentional, to show these female characters hypocritically in relation to their behavior toward the male dominated religion? And what do you make of the negative inferences that Christianity bound its women to a life of powerless servitude? Do you find that to be an honest rendition of the time period or as another means to draw negativity toward Christianity while highlighting pagan virtues?
You can find the first discussion on the Sacred Feminine, here
For today’s discussion I’d like to start with the religious connotations inherent in the text. Duality seems to permeate the story in many ways, and my reading of it almost seems to take the pagan ideal of both male and female, god and goddess, and transplant that into the dueling philosophies discussed in the text. While the Priestesses of Avalon centered solely on the goddess, only making passive mention of the horned god and almost relegating him to a position of doing their bidding and then going away... the Christians and their one God became the Patriarchal symbol.
I found it interesting that the women, though possibly on purpose as the main idea was to focus on the female perspective... but the women were painted in the more accepting, less judgmental light. The character of Viviane said repeatedly that the God of Christianity wouldn’t allow for any other gods, while their view was that there was room for all belief... The thing I found interesting here is that their obvious contempt for all things Christian, marked their words as hypocrisy... at least for me.
We talked at length about the bending over backwards for the feminine perspective in this rewrite of Arthurian Legend in my last post. I do love the writing and I think the story itself was ingenious in bringing a new light to an old tale... But because the focus on the feminine permeates all aspects, I think that topic will come up here, and in any discussion about the text. Here’s what I’m wondering. Do you think it was intentional, to show these female characters hypocritically in relation to their behavior toward the male dominated religion? And what do you make of the negative inferences that Christianity bound its women to a life of powerless servitude? Do you find that to be an honest rendition of the time period or as another means to draw negativity toward Christianity while highlighting pagan virtues?
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