Right, well, better get this week off on a head start!
As was previously stated, my task for the week involves wrangling M. Rickert's "Journey into the Kingdom." According to Rickert's Wikipedia article, "Journey into the Kingdom" won the 2007 World Fantasy Award for Best Short Fiction. This came as no surprise to me, really, as I thoroughly enjoyed it! The characters were quirky and entertaining, and the story itself contained at least three stories within a story. A lovely interwoven plot, and a great read.
If you haven't finished, read no further--spoilers abound.
I love that the story starts off with coffee shop art. So often one walks into a local coffee shop and finds him/herself face to face with a truly dreadful canvas with an even more abhorrent title on sale for some ridiculous amount of money. The slack jawed expression Agatha throws Alex when she explains that someone actually wanted to buy her painting was priceless ("Doesn't he know it sucks?"). However, I feel that the way the paintings are first described must mean that they *don't* suck. Alex describes the careful strokes and the combination of hues. And while the title doesn't really fit with the paintings, it describes the three stories as a whole quite well.
I really want to read an artist's statement like that one day.
Anyway, some recurring themes in the class that cropped up in the story include: live people dating dead people (and the troubles involved), the power of an artist's word (i.e. the "artist's statement"), death by ocean/water, and slightly creepy guys tying up young girls and tossing them into watery places.
As always, I like to compare this to things I've read that aren't on the syllabus... Again, this story reminds me of Karen Russell's alligator wrestling story in St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves. In the story the reader encounters two young Floridian girls, one of which selfishly wanders into the swamp at night to meet with her dead boyfriends (i.e. let them possess her). Worth a read, definitely, and could make an interesting comparison.
Question: What did everyone think of the bizarre, half-drowned, one-night stand (really one-night stand) at the end?
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6 comments:
I totally laughed at the part where they discussed her painting.
And I agree on the creepyness factor of the guy in this story. Talk about stalker tendencies! But I did like the spin the author used in this story where she could appear perfectly normal except that she needed breath to sustain her form.
Wasn't it Epicurus who that that with your last breath your soul was released from your body to be no more? And also isn't a lot of meditation focused on controlling the breath to harmonize the soul? I thought that I'd heard that somewhere before.
Yeah, the part with the painting was amusing and I definitely laughed when she said that her painting sucked. Also, Alex definitely weirded me out. I mean, stalker much? I thought the fact that Agatha had to use cups to get a little bit of people's essence was really interesting. I wouldn't have thought that a cup could contain a person's breath but perhaps so. It makes sense that Agatha would work in a coffee shop. Yeah, the weird one night stand...um...definitely weird. But it seemed to me as if Alex really just wanted to leave his life but do it the way he wanted. Which was apparently having the breath sucked out of him by a ghost.
This story was completely rockin. I was, like Alex, totally absorbed by Agatha's autobiography. When the narrative switched back to the coffee shop, my mind still lingered on her unique ghost story. The ending was no doubt shocking and mysterious, but Agatha's tale is what won my affections.
Haha I must not have had much of an imagination when I read this, because I totally just thought he killed an innocent girl because he was so absorbed in his fragile mental state, and then dreamed that she returned to him. And I left it there. I thought this because of the superb writing, I promise. Alex's story about what happened to him right after his wife died was so powerful, so real. Part of me still truly thinks he just went a little crazy with grief. It's not unheard of. And crazy people *do* always believe they are getting saner....
I really want to read an artist's statement like that one day.
I hope you don't plan on inviting him over to watch I Love Lucy before throwing him off a dock?
I'm so glad everyone liked this! I thought the breath thing was awesome as well! Oh, and yeah, Renee, I think it was Epicurus with the last breath thing... I think I recall that anyway (my knowledge of Greek philosophers tends to dwindle past Plato). However, the breath-soul thing is all kinds of all over the place (from the Christian God breathing the breath of life into Adam all the way down to the Dementors' Kiss in Harry Potter!)
And Susan, Jessie and I were also discussing the possibility of Alex's mental hallucinations and the killing of an innocent girl. It's totally plausible that the one night stand happened in his imagination (which is why I asked the question... gotta stir up debate, you know?). Personally, I like to believe that Agatha was already dead... because... well, in all honesty, it's just a lot less creepy that way. However, if I were Agatha, I don't think someone as freaky as Alex is someone I would want to spend the rest of eternity with (which could happen if Alex also becomes a "breath stealer").
No, Kalen, I would not throw him off a dock... boys are heavy.
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