I don't recognize those old buildings that used to mean so much to me

[sovay]

Bertie Owen's keyboard is really breaking and I didn't fall asleep until well after eight this morning. I did not get much done today that was not work, but I did have post-holiday corned beef and soda bread with my parents in the evening. I did not have cabbage. I like cabbage in coleslaw and several other dishes—and I will eat it by itself if it's stir-fried—but when it's steamed or boiled I feel there is no safe ground between the raw food movement and sublimated into a fart.

1. In context of discussing the longstanding (and totally deserved) community argument with Michael Weingrad's "Why There Is No Jewish Narnia," my mother remarked that of course portal fantasy has Christian origins; Christianity has its other world into which you can be assumed or translated at any second right there in its conception of Heaven. On the one hand, C.S. Lewis himself presumed this link in his wraparound of Narnia into Aslan's Country. (Elizabeth Goudge made a similar connection in The Valley of Song (1951), though hers works much better for me on account of avoiding allegory and including Fairy.) On the other, I can't remember seeing anyone really write about it. Please point me toward articles to the contrary, if they exist? Otherwise I can tell my mother she just said something tremendously useful about twentieth-century fantasy.

2. Please enjoy a non-binary penned punk song about Claude Cahun: Worriers, "The Only Claude That Matters." rydra_wong, I thought you should know.

3. Everyone in general, I'm just really charmed by Madeline McGrane's "Vampire Horse."

4. Courtesy of moon_custafer: Brad Dourif in Fatal Beauty (1987). I will resist all efforts to explain to me that he is not playing the title role.

5. And then I made the mistake of clicking on an article about millennial millionnaire-billionaires:

I steer the conversation to the subject of how utterly detached from the real world elites seem to have become. "Elitism, the way I would define it, is obtainable," he replies. "All that stands between you and being elite is your own investment in yourself."

I tell Rosenthal that I've met many people in America who work as hard as him and his friends—harder, in fact—but struggle to make ends meet. He acknowledges that he's benefited from considerable advantage, but insists we now live in an era in which "the internet is the great equaliser".

"What are you doing to create the utility for yourself? Are you introducing people so they can collaborate?" he says. Struggling Americans, he adds, might want to "host a dinner. Invite 10 strangers. See what happens."

Rosenthal presses on with his thesis, telling me there are just not enough people in the world who will "excessively commit their lives to something. Journalism, cheese, automobiles, whatever. Rocket ships—perfect example. Everyone wants to work at SpaceX, no one wants to go to engineering school."

I believe the emotion I experienced at that moment is technically known as "eat the rich."

I am trying to convince myself to go to bed early; I have two doctor's appointments tomorrow and one of them is at eyebleed o'clock. This would be a more compelling argument if I didn't also want to read things.

Comments

[asakiyume]

I loved Vampire Horse!

"host a dinner. Invite 10 strangers. See what happens." Yup yup yup. Getting that Rich-o-phagic desire pretty strongly myself.

[sovay]

I loved Vampire Horse!

"Other horse! No!"

Yup yup yup. Getting that Rich-o-phagic desire pretty strongly myself.

They must be well-nourished, with all those catered retreats!

[selkie]

Do you want to come to the dinner I'm hosting, Mr. Millennial Billionaire
It has cutlery
Also an assortment of mustards
If you could just bring some cornichons and when you shower don't use the Bronner's peppermint

[sovay]

If you could just bring some cornichons and when you shower don't use the Bronner's peppermint

Lavender is okay. Lavender is savory.

[muccamukk]

Dunno. I like mint sauce.

[rydra_wong]

Do you want to come to the dinner I'm hosting, Mr. Millennial Billionaire

Are you perchance inviting 10 strangers?

[gwynnega]

"Vampire Horse" is delightful.

I have never seen Fatal Beauty, but now I am disappointed that Brad Dourif is not playing the title role.

[moon_custafer]

There was a period in the ‘eighties when Dourif not only played a lot of villains, he played a lot of villains in oversized charcoal-grey tweed coats. I’ve never bothered to compare screen caps to see if it’s the same coat in each role, but I occasionally imagine someone putting together a fan vid in which his character is possessed by an evil overcoat that compels him to wander the world.

[ethelmay]

Farah Mendlesohn discusses The Pilgrim's Progress as an influence on quest and portal fantasies in Rhetorics of Fantasy. (I found this through Googling -- I've read the book but don't know it well.)

Bunyan's landscape is presented as a dream, though, and I think portal fantasies are kind of a reification of dreams. (The movie version of The Wizard of Oz went backward on this.)

[sovay]

Farah Mendlesohn discusses The Pilgrim's Progress as an influence on quest and portal fantasies in Rhetorics of Fantasy.

Thank you! I know of the book, but have not read it; Bunyan sounds like a variant of what my mother was describing, but worth checking out.

and I think portal fantasies are kind of a reification of dreams. (The movie version of The Wizard of Oz went backward on this.)

Agreed.

[rosefox]

I cannot think of a single major fantasy writer who is Jewish, and there are only a handful of minor ones of any note. To no other field of modern literature have Jews contributed so little.

I had not previously known my eyes could just burst into flames like that.

[sovay]

I had not previously known my eyes could just burst into flames like that.

I believe your icon perfectly crystallizes the argument.

[conuly]

Burning question: Exactly whose stylistic decision was it, in the "Jewish Narnia" article, to italicize tsunami as a non-nativized foreign word?

I believe the emotion I experienced at that moment is technically known as "eat the rich."

Too rich for my blood. Why don't we just compost the rich instead? Better for the arteries.

[sovay]

Burning question: Exactly whose stylistic decision was it, in the "Jewish Narnia" article, to italicize tsunami as a non-nativized foreign word?

That might be on the magazine, but man, this article.

Why don't we just compost the rich instead? Better for the arteries.

I'm carnivorous?

[justice_turtle]

*head-tilty* Your mom’s observation may possibly explain a hell of a lot about my relationship to both portal fantasies and Christianity. (I did not read the article, as I have jury duty tomorrow and would prefer not to set myself on fire with my mind when I’m trying to sleep. ;P) If I remember, I will probably have a post or at least a ramble about that at some point,

The icon is for the billenniaire. :P

[sovay]

Your mom’s observation may possibly explain a hell of a lot about my relationship to both portal fantasies and Christianity.

I'm glad I posted it, then! If you get a chance to ramble, I would be interested to read it, and if not, so it goes.

I did not read the article, as I have jury duty tomorrow and would prefer not to set myself on fire with my mind when I’m trying to sleep.

Good call. It's been eight years and that article is still wrong.

The icon is for the billenniaire.

It is an excellently applicable icon.

I hope the jury duty went as well as it could possibly go.

[tree_and_leaf]

I believe the emotion I experienced at that moment is technically known as "eat the rich."

Well, it would cut the cost of the entree....

[poliphilo]

Weingrad seems to miss the obvious fact that the fantasy tradition is not simply Christian but also specifically British/Irish- and by extension Anglo-American. There may be not be a Jewish fantasy tradition but I'm not aware of there being a French or a Russian or a Chinese or a Nigerian tradition either. Modern fantasy comes out of a very specific cultural moment- the revolt against modernity in 19th century Britain that drew on British/Irish traditions and found expression in Tennyson's Idylls of the King, in pre-Raphaelitism, in fairy-painting, in Gothic revival architecture, in the folk song revival and the fantasy novels of Morris and MacDonald.

[moon_custafer]

I'm not aware of there being a French or a Russian or a Chinese or a Nigerian tradition

I’d argue that there are fantasy traditions in numerous cultures – but I think what gets translated into English, depending on who decides to translate and publish it, often gets categorized as “magical realism” (Okri’s The Famished Road, frex).

[coraline]

Stolen from Tumblr: the name for that emotion is vorgeoisie :)

[sovay]

Stolen from Tumblr: the name for that emotion is vorgeoisie

That's beautiful.

[isis]

Vampire Horse makes me think of the problem raised in one of my vampire canons (Underwood and Flinch) - immortal vampires need to be cautious about who they turn into vampires, as eventually you reach the point where everyone's hungry and nobody's food!

The millenionaires article really brings home how maybe it is better to make one's money the old-fashioned (and slow) way, as by the time you have wealth you have the wisdom to know how to handle it. I admit that I live in my own bubble and yeah, I'd rather eat grass-fed beef with braised local greens and a craft beer than wash down a Big Mac and fries with Budweiser, but this kind of vapid conspicuous non-consumption is just as bad to me as the 9000-sf mansion with the helipad on top.

And of course their insistence that anyone can become fabulously wealthy if they just devote every waking hour to their dream is bogus. https://www.inc.com/chris-matyszczyk/so-youre-smart-but-youre-not-rich-this-eye-opening-new-scientific-study-tells-you-why.html is pretty interesting. The actual study (https://arxiv.org/pdf/1802.07068.pdf) is somewhat depressing: "[T]he model shows, in quantitative terms...that a great talent is not sufficient to guarantee a successful career and that, instead, less talented people are very often able to reach the top of success..."

[sovay]

Vampire Horse makes me think of the problem raised in one of my vampire canons (Underwood and Flinch) - immortal vampires need to be cautious about who they turn into vampires, as eventually you reach the point where everyone's hungry and nobody's food!

It's a legitimate point! Also, what is this series? It sounds good.

I admit that I live in my own bubble and yeah, I'd rather eat grass-fed beef with braised local greens and a craft beer than wash down a Big Mac and fries with Budweiser, but this kind of vapid conspicuous non-consumption is just as bad to me as the 9000-sf mansion with the helipad on top.

It's the way it uses all the language of mindfulness and world-healing while merely serving as a combination of pacifier and humblebrag. I have no idea what I would do if I had an actual million dollars, but I like to think better than that.

The actual study is somewhat depressing: "[T]he model shows, in quantitative terms...that a great talent is not sufficient to guarantee a successful career and that, instead, less talented people are very often able to reach the top of success..."

That is an amazing combination of glumly unsurprising and demoralizing all the same.

[kore]

//starts reading

Some readers may have already expressed surprise at my assertion that Jews do not write fantasy literature. Haven’t modern Jewish writers, from Kafka and Bruno Schulz to Isaac Bashevis Singer and Cynthia Ozick, written about ghosts, demons, magic, and metamorphoses? But the supernatural does not itself define fantasy literature, which is a more specific genre. It emerged in Victorian England, and its origins are best understood as one of a number of cultural salvage projects that occurred in an era when modern materialism and Darwinism seemed to drive religious faith from the field. Religion’s capacity for wonder found a haven in fantasy literature.

//stops reading

//tosses article out window


(EMERGED IN VICTORIAN ENGLAND, wtffffffffff)

[moon_custafer]

OK, so they're talking about Fantasy, not fantasy, and furthermore the capital-F version is defined as "just whatever I think counts as Fantasy."

[cmcmck]

Even though I would now count as 'comfortably off' if not rich, my origins in a working class mining family would still tell me that eating the rich is a darn good idea!

Shame I'm vegetarian! :o)

[ashlyme]

Same here - I might break that vow for this idiot. Capitalist longpig, enybody?

[negothick]

I remember being on a Readercon panel specifically organized to rebut that "Why is There No Jewish Narnia" article--can't remember if it was the same year or the year after. Of course, if Weingrad had confined himself to "Why is there no English-language wildly-successful mass-market kid's fantasy series, also readable by adults, that explains Judaism to non-Jews using the mode of allegory?", then I might have agreed with him. As far as I know, there is no such book. Judaism isn't a proselytizing religion, with the exception of urging those already Jewish to be more observant. But then, modern Lubavitcher Chasidism--unlike its founders--are uneasy with the fantastic, and their kids' books are stupefyingly mimetic. And published in Yiddish. They don't want their kids to read the classics of Yiddish literature, which are considered too secular.

[kore]

Of course, if Weingrad had confined himself to "Why is there no English-language wildly-successful mass-market kid's fantasy series, also readable by adults, that explains Judaism to non-Jews using the mode of allegory?", then I might have agreed with him. As far as I know, there is no such book. Judaism isn't a proselytizing religion, with the exception of urging those already Jewish to be more observant.

Nicely put.

[thisbluespirit]

host a dinner. Invite 10 strangers. See what happens."

Rosenthal presses on with his thesis, telling me there are just not enough people in the world who will "excessively commit their lives to something. Journalism, cheese, automobiles, whatever. Rocket ships—perfect example. Everyone wants to work at SpaceX, no one wants to go to engineering school."

Ha. Ha. I'm a bit squicked by cannibalism generally, but frankly in this case, I'll hand you the knife and fork. Or possibly just getting said person to host anything on a tight budget.

0_o


The fantasy thing is v interesting! I don't really know, but I think it probably also does need to be taken into account that there is a long British tradition that goes back to Celtic times of people disappearing to fairy/otherlands where time runs differently as well. Not that the two things are necessarily entirely separate in any direction.

[sovay]

I'm a bit squicked by cannibalism generally, but frankly in this case, I'll hand you the knife and fork. Or possibly just getting said person to host anything on a tight budget.

I appreciate your support all the more!

I don't really know, but I think it probably also does need to be taken into account that there is a long British tradition that goes back to Celtic times of people disappearing to fairy/otherlands where time runs differently as well. Not that the two things are necessarily entirely separate in any direction.

Agreed! I have no problem acknowledging the importance of otherworlds and underworlds (and the places where they cross) in various folk traditions and I certainly like the idea of applying that to the differing rates of time in Earth and Narnia.

[ashlyme]

Weingrad has a very narrow definition of fantasy, alas.

I enjoyed the Cahun song - I read a little more about them and respects to the way they defied the Nazis on Jersey. They deserve a good biography if there isn't one already.

Vampire Horse is the best Western ever.

Passing the condiments if you want to start snacking on that there Rosenthal. I'll leave it up to you if you serve him with cabbage or without.

[sovay]

Weingrad has a very narrow definition of fantasy, alas.

I genuinely think that article becomes more of a trash fire every time I look at it, which is one of the reasons it keeps coming around: someone else on the internet finds it and combusts.

I enjoyed the Cahun song - I read a little more about them and respects to the way they defied the Nazis on Jersey. They deserve a good biography if there isn't one already.

I don't know if there's any biography of Claude Cahun, good or otherwise! Mostly I see articles on the internet. I want to say they left at least one memoir, but I have no idea of the translation status if so.

I would enjoy a movie, especially now that we have the openly queer non-binary actors to play them.

Vampire Horse is the best Western ever.

It just makes me happy.

Passing the condiments if you want to start snacking on that there Rosenthal. I'll leave it up to you if you serve him with cabbage or without.

I had some rather nice cabbage this afternoon that had been fried with garlic and chili, so tonight I'm thinking with! Thank you.

[rydra_wong]

Please enjoy a non-binary penned punk song about Claude Cahun: Worriers, "The Only Claude That Matters." rydra_wong, I thought you should know.

Much appreciated!

[sovay]

Much appreciated!

Yay!

Nice icon.