Rambles, Rants, and Randomness.

This is it. 

 

This is my final blog as a Dystopian Lit student. Nay, I think it's my final blog as a high school student. We need to take a moment of silence.

I'm going to say honestly, I never thought I'd be at this point. I feel like at the beginning of things, we think we have all the time in the world, and then all of a sudden, it's like BAM- it's done. It's not a part of my life anymore and I need to move on. But I can't. I'm like that creepy obsessive ex-girlfriend who won't leave you all alone. Yes, I said it. I'm obsessed with all of Dystopian lit. What am I going to do when I don't have to write blogs? I may go insane. Either way, I hope I do justice in what is presumably my last post EVER.

So this blog is my choice of topics. What does that even mean, my choice of topics? You're giving me a decision? Everyone very well knows that I am one of the most indecisive people on this planet and you have the gall to give me a decision? This just won't do.

I guess I'm going to ramble a bit more then I'm going to answer the questions in the last prompt since you gave us 2 options there too (are you trying to kill me?) and then I'm probably going to ramble some more.

Sometimes I have this image of me sitting in World Lit next semester in room 226 and suddenly an alpaca bursts in and then Dex eats a cat and I'll be laughing uncontrollably to myself but no one else will get it because it's an inside joke. And that makes me sad.

Anyway, let me tell you what I thought was the best dystopian book. Is this supposed to be one that we all read in class or one that I read on my own as a result of this class? I just do both to be safe. The best one I've personally read is When She Woke. If you want to know why, read my previos posts.

As a class, I think I liked The Handmaid's Tale the best out of all of them. And not just for the ceremony. I liked it because there was action and "romance" of a bizarre sort and the musings of Offred really entertained me. I thought it was interesting to ponder this society and why it got that way- the whole discussion that it was the fault of the feminists was fascinating. This definitely exposed me to ideas and consequences that I'd never thought about at all before. Does that suffice? I thought it was overall a pretty solid book.

Now the SCARIEST dystopian book. Blindess- obvi. If you want to know why I said that, read my last post- you won't be disappointed. But I think they're all pretty tied up for me. I'm scared of a government that forbids free speech and I'm disgusted/terrified of an overly unintelligent society and the thought of the moon crashing out of orbit gives me nightmares. So I can't give you a definite answer about which is the scariest.

Do you ever think of how definitions of things vary from person to person? Like my version of scary means basically everything because I'm a hypochondriac, but for other people, scary is a limited number of things like extreme heights or death by camel. I don't know your fears.

And something I think about frequently, on a similar note, is pain tolerance. Because I think I have  relatively low tolerance for physical pain, but what if my pain is just less painful? Or on the flip side, what if my pain, if we were able to transfer it to another person, was excrutiating? What I guess I'm saying is that I am and forever will be dumbfounded by relativity. <--- this was one of those rants I was talking about.

Sorry this is a terribly long, terribly random post, but I'm almost done. I've decided I can't answer the last question.

How am I supposed to know the most likely dystopian scenario when I have such a small sample to draw from? We've purposely read different classes of dystopian books to be well-rounded in the genre. To answer this question truly and scientifically, I would need to know the premise of every single dystopian book that's ever been written and then break the scenarios into categories and figure out which one is the most prevalent. So what you're asking me to do is basically impossible.

But to answer a question of my own invention: What would be your favorite dystopian scenario?
Ah, well now I've stumped myself. I'm torn between a version of Man vs. Wild where Bear Grylls has to survive with a baby as a sidekick or a world in which artichokes are illegal.


Just kidding, I've never actually thought about it, but if you feel inclined to comment, I would love to hear your crazy ideas of dystopian scenarios.

So this is it. Again. The last sentence of my last blog. I thought about making it really dramatic or witty or deep, but moreover it has to be concise and from the heart, so I'll end with this:

Thanks, it's been real.

Blindness? Erm.. more like Blandness

Side note: I'd like to say sorry upfront, because it's going to get a bit ugly in the following paragraphs.

So first let's talk about Blindness. In case you didn't catch my outrage during the dicussion, I didn't like it. Not one bit. First of all, it's a stupid premise. My apologies to Mr. Saramago, but that is not even a realistic possibility the way he sets it up. People don't just go blind. I don't care that it's a fictional book, the fact that he disregards all scientific and medical knowledge irks me.

Secondly, I got tired of the sentences that would go, "The blind man said..." Oh wait, that was basically every single sentence. Don't tell me the man is blind because I already. freaking. know.
Because everyone is blind. You know, besides the doctor's wife.

I was also terribly aggravated by the characters. They should shut up, stop fooling around with each other and actually organize themselves! They are so selfish, stupid, one-dimensional and annoying I just couldn't handle it.

You know, now that I think about it, the title should've been something like "Asylum of the blind," or "Prepare for the most painful reading experience ever." I guess those aren't as catchy or brief. Those really aren't that witty either.

As for the impact on me, I did freak out a little bit whilst reading it. It was probably the scariest book we read all semester, in my opinion. But that's less so based on the events of the book, but blindness in itself, which is naturally frightening to me. So in a weird sense, I could kind of relate to their panic when they all first went blind- even though I've never gone blind. Does that make any sense?

And don't even get me started on the ending. That is by far the worst possible way to end the book. They're all sitting around thinking, hey maybe we can figure out a way to survive in a world that's totally fallen apart, when suddenly it's they're all saying, "Hey I can see again!"
At this point, I'm just like: NOOOOOOOOOOO, why didn't you die in the asylum fire because I just can't take you anymore!
Sorry- that was mean, but it's the truth. Dystopian books shouldn't have hopeful endings. I thought it was an implied rule.

But anyway, I don't mean this to sound like this was the worst book I ever read- though it's up there- it just didn't strike me as a brilliant novel. I guess if you analyze is really closely there's the whole idea that this blindness is of the moral sense and society should become more collectivistic and work towards a common goal or we'll be destroyed by self-interest, but I wasn't really feeling that.Rather I think the larger message I got was to watch for excrement and always have a source of food and water.

Maybe I'm just blind to what others consider good writing. But then again, aren't we all blind to something?

Soy Speechless

So as (one of) my final projects, I read When She Woke by Hillary Jordan.

CAUTION: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS, HINTS, SOY or TRACES OF PINE NUTS.

 

It. Was. AWESOME. I can’t even believe how fantastic it was. I stayed up way past my bedtime two nights in a row reading it. Which is a big thing for me. I voted for this one when we were deciding on a book to read as a whole class even though I didn’t know anything about it, but golly, I must have some great instinct because it absolutely rocked my fuzzy socks off.

The premise is that in our not so distant future society, we’ve given the criminal justice system a makeover. Think about what a good TV show that would make. Extreme Makeover: Prison Edition. I’d watch it. Anyway, Hannah (the main character) tells us that “prisons were disintegrating and filled to bursting… living in conditions so horrific as to be unconstitutional. Rape, murder, disease and abuse of prisoners by guards were endemic” (209). That pretty much paints the gruesome picture of it. I mean, in some places that’s not too far from the truth.

As a result of all of these things, the government decided to switch to a practice called melachroming instead. When someone commits a crime (with the exception of some terribly violent crimes and extremely dangerous criminals) they are melachromed. What this means is they are implanted with this virus that changes the color of their skin according to the crime they’ve committed. Hannah is colored red for abortion, which is considered second degree murder. But there’s a whole rainbow to choose from- yellow for minor misdemeanors, blue for child molesters, and the list goes on.

You have to renew this virus every four months or the virus will start to fragment and you spiral into insanity and you must retain your color for however long your prison term would have been had you been in a society like ours. The thing about Chromes (what they call these colorful criminals) is that they are treated very poorly. I mean obviously, they’re criminals, but it was rather heartbreaking to read all of the disadvantages and horrible things that happen to them.

Let’s get to Hannah. She is a regular girl, presumably in her mid 20s, belongs to a very Christian family in Texas, real family girl. Then she has this affair with a married man (GASP) who also happens to be her reverend (DOUBLE GASP). She gets pregnant (DUH) and decides to have an abortion. She gets sentenced 10 years for this and due to the fact she would not name the father or the abortionist, 6 years are added. 16 years as a Red? I can’t even imagine.

The book goes onto to chronicle the time ( maybe a year-ish) following her release from the initial detainment and turning Red. Her struggles with family and faith and the sketchy organization known as the Fist. I don’t want to give anything too big away, so I’ll leave the storyline rather vague because you should read it for yourself.

Whilst reading, I was struck by how it incorporated ideas from some of the books and movies we’ve looked at. There was a Great Scourge, an epidemic in which women couldn’t give birth and wasn’t remedied until seven years later, leaving many women sterile. Doesn’t that sound a bit like The Handmaid’s Tale and Children of Men? That would explain why abortion is illegal. There’s talk of these new technologies and a hint to the power of corporations, as in Feed. Lucky for us, we don’t all talk like idiots. And wouldn’t you know, they even make a reference to a cat. I’m not sure in what context because it was so brief, but I do know that nobody ate it. Thank goodness for that.

I guess this book freaked me out a little, because it’s not too exaggerated and some of the events could be probable. For instance, she discusses the nuclear attack on Los Angeles “as she pictures a carefree twelve-year-old girl much like herself, coasting down a hill on her bike in Los Angeles on a day much like this, her face lifted to the wind, to the sudden searing blast of air from the bomb that would incinerate her and her family and seven thousand others” (163). Terrifying, right? And we very well know that some nations have the power to do this at the push of a button.

She alludes to the revolt of Middle Eastern countries and the prevalence of anti-Islamic bias, to the cutting of ties between Canada and the United States, to the Sanctity of Life laws, to the intermingling once again of church and state.  To environmental changes like extreme flooding, to a 1984-like “Freedom from Information Act,” to the fall of the last democratic government in South America.  It’s all a bit alarming when you think about it. It seems that we’re always on the brink of a world-changing crisis. Fiscal cliff, anyone?

But even with the shocking and the saddening, the book kind of uplifted me. Even after Hannah’s been through so much, she develops a new sense of self, so transformed from the old her, and in a good way. She finally stands up for herself and gets out of all of the boxes she’s put herself in, both metaphorically and physically. It definitely demonstrates the flexible nature of personality, even when we think who we are is set in stone.

And of course a good book isn’t complete without a bit of romance. It gets a bit awkward in parts, but the fact that she can still love after all that’s happened to her and that someone may even be able to love her, gosh, I was nearly in tears. It was just so beautiful, but not too worry, it wasn’t as mushy as a Nicholas Sparks book or as… indescribable as I imagine 50 Shades to be.

And I have this thing about quotes. I like to write down quotes from books that I find particularly striking or touching or wise or otherwise memorable. Quotes are just to fascinating not to. So I will provide you with some of my favorites:

“There are infinite kinds of love, but charity is the purest of them all, because it’s the only one that doesn’t ask, What’s in it for me?”  (54)

“How could anything be grateful for such an existence? And yet, this creature was, and when it saw itself and knew that it wanted to live in spite of everything, it wept even harder” (280)

“God is He and She, straight and gay, black and white and red and green and blue and all the rest. And so, to despise me or you would be to despise not only His own creations but also to hate Himself. My God is not so stupid as that.” (303)

“Maybe beauty just is, Maybe it’s inexplicable, or beyond explanation.” (320)

I’m not sure how to conclude really, besides the advice that a) you should read this book, b) we should probably try our best to prevent our society from evolving into this, though I don’t know how, so you’re on your own there, and c) we should be grateful and happy and accepting and open to change and whimsy and life as a whole. Fantastic. I end on a rather cliché note, but alas, embracing letter c), I shan’t be troubled by it, but rather embrace it.