Having recently published a fantasy novel, I scroll through the covers of the titles that amazon groups with mine. Some sell well, some not so much, but they all have covers whose sense of style is a bit 1970s. Their covers also tell a lot of story. Mine is reserved. I realize it probably won't grab the fantasy nerds who might browse here for titles. As I look at the many genres and sub genres of fantasy, I have to use wikipedia to figure out what mine is- you've got urban fantasy, high fantasy, paranormal, epic fantasy, young adult, and sword and sorcery. Turns out my lil' opus is young adult high fantasy with a dash of urban.
These readers are voracious (since I graduated college I have not read so much). They are willing, to satisfy their appetite, to risk buying, and reading, what could by nothing but the blather of some egotist. I do not read this way. I wait on recommendations from friends, or, the NY Times Book Section. I figure a book is an investment of three to ten hours, and I'm not wasting time on risk. What it all comes down to is that I've just written a novel in a genre that I don't know the ins and outs of, like I know literary fiction.
Why write fantasy and science-fiction, mystery, and paranormal when plain old literary fiction is the genre of masters? James Joyce and Virginnia Woolf stayed away from dragons and spaceships. My favorite living authors are Marilynne Robinson, who may not know of the existence of genre fiction, Cormac McCarthy, who writes only literary fiction.
One thing that has always made novels worthwhile to me is the story-telling. Story telling, going back to Homer, has two prized social purposes. One, after a long day, it gives you something to enjoy while drinking your evening beverage of choice. Story-telling doesn't lie, it reduces life to the essential moments, the moments out of which defeat and triumph grow- and this magical reduction makes it better than life, while still being life.
Secondly, story telling instructs. It gives meaning to life. Now, story-telling is a popularly beloved art. Shakespeare and Homer shared this appeal with J. K. Rowling. Some authors that I love and admire now write for a small portion of our population. Marilynne Robinson is not read by anyone not an intellectual. I always believed that great books could be for everybody. That's not completely true, but it is something authors can work toward. Genre writing does tell stories. It doesn't let art overrun the entertainment value of the work.
That's why I'm writing genre stuff.
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Friday, August 24, 2012
I interview me
I was filling out an author interview at a website, the Mad Ones,, and figured I'd post my thoughts here. It's sort of amazing when you talk about where a book came from, how much there is to say.
I'm a teacher in Philly's public schools. You can see that in the "Illumen's Children" and how it focuses on young people and the challenges that they face. I've always loved books, especially those with strong story, good characters, and truth. Beyond that, I love my wife and the game of soccer.
TMO: What genera do you write and why?
That's a hard one. I love reading literary fiction, but it bothers me that it reaches such a small audience. I've written a literary thriller, a hard boiled mystery, a sci-fi novel, and now this is a fantasy novel. I love fantasy's exuberant world building. I admire Ursula Le Guin's ability to create cultures. I admire Tolkien's vast world and his characters. He mixes humor, human weakness, and honor into almost every character.
TMO: Tell us about your book….
In the fantastical kingdom of Regna, a pickpocket learns of a plot to kill his king. He lives in an outer ring, Subagora District, of the city, separated from Citans like the king by two walls and class laws, so how will he warn his leader? In his efforts he enlists the help of two Citans, one of whom is actually the princess, daughter to the king. The Citans demand the respect that is their due, but the orphan pickpocket respects no-one. An antagonist relationship develops, and the princess is intrigued by the street-wise, fight-ready attitude of the Subagoran.
Meanwhile, a cleric acquaintance of the pickpocket comes to wield Illumen’s fire for the forest people he once hated. Will he be the next manusignis, prophet of legend whose blue fire protects the weak and mistreated? Another friend from Subagora District learns the ways of the wendigo, the forest people. He runs with the forest creatures, and wields a bow that was wrestled from the grove of the fearsome forest spirit.
Diverging roads lead each one to confront the evil of the world, and their own weakness, but will they be able to fight against the armies of the Citans?
TMO: What was your inspiration for this book?
I taught in North Philly, a really tough neighborhood, for four years. I was amazed at the kids there, how much they wanted attention, how angry they were, how hard they found it to trust anyone. All of that goes into the character of Hands, an orphan pickpocket in this fantasy world.
Another inspiration is growing up from someone who was self-righteously religious and prudish, into being challenged by faith to be more compassionate. That is evident in the Shyheem subplot. A young cleric thinks he's better than everyone, until a heretic kidnaps him, and treats him to endless harangues and takes him among the people whom Shyheem judged.
The last inspiration is the American wilderness, its greenness, its life. I also love Hiyao Miyazaki's portrayal of the forest spirit, and I think any reader familiar with that will see parts of it in Mishipeshu, the terrifying and beautiful forest creature that runs the woods.
TMO: Do you have a favorite character and why that one?
I'd say it's Hands. I want him to succeed so much, but he makes everyone so angry with his attitude; he keeps pushing away people when they try to help him.
TMO: What project(s) are you currently working on?
The sequel, tenatively entitled, "Subagoran Rising", and a book called "Super Hero Laundry List, in which a nerd uses newly acquired super powers to gain popularity and the attention of girls. It's whimsical and fun.
TMO: Do you have any advice for writers out there?
The obvious stuff. Work hard, finish what you start- even when you fear it's worthless, make it the best you can, before moving on. The discipline will make the next project successful. Less obvious, but still important is pursue truth, wrestle for it. We all now when we're reading something that a writer's soul worked for, and we appreciate that.
TMO: Where can we find you? (facebook, twitter, blog, website, etc)
Well, I water-color and used it to represent some of my ideas. I used those skills to make a book trailer. I know people say these are a dumb idea, and I don't think I'm reading any books based on them, but it was fun to make and you'll enjoy it.
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Make Obsession Fruitful-
My last blog I talked about releasing my e-book and how awesome I felt. I've gotten some small reward now, hearing from one reader how much he enjoyed certain parts, and he was kind enough to also give me a few to-be-incorporated tips on zipline mechanics. We also discussed the carrying capacity of the Golden Eagle (it was carrying rope, not coconuts).
But mostly it involves me checking how it's selling (slowly, and to folks I know mostly) once a day. I could check more often, but that's sort of like watching the water not boil. I've also spent a little time googling the book, and this is clearly a waste of time- so I've been searching for ways to make all the time I spend obsessing about how many folks are getting a look at the adventure actually work.
Along the way, I've discovered some things. First, there are these amazing and voracious readers who read self-published ebooks and review them all over this vast internets of ours. Many of them have received complimentary copies of "Illumen's Children". Lucky folks, I know. Second, people make little teaser/preview videos for their books. This is crazy. I mean, I read reviews, and mostly listen to friends to find out what I should read. By the way, friends, have I got a recommendation for you!
Anyway, I'm going to continue trolling these interwebs for reviewers, but I'm going to make a preview video. Or try. I'll post it here at some point. Yoda said do or do not, there is no try.
A picture from the novel (not actually in it- that's for later)
But mostly it involves me checking how it's selling (slowly, and to folks I know mostly) once a day. I could check more often, but that's sort of like watching the water not boil. I've also spent a little time googling the book, and this is clearly a waste of time- so I've been searching for ways to make all the time I spend obsessing about how many folks are getting a look at the adventure actually work.
Along the way, I've discovered some things. First, there are these amazing and voracious readers who read self-published ebooks and review them all over this vast internets of ours. Many of them have received complimentary copies of "Illumen's Children". Lucky folks, I know. Second, people make little teaser/preview videos for their books. This is crazy. I mean, I read reviews, and mostly listen to friends to find out what I should read. By the way, friends, have I got a recommendation for you!
Anyway, I'm going to continue trolling these interwebs for reviewers, but I'm going to make a preview video. Or try. I'll post it here at some point. Yoda said do or do not, there is no try.
A picture from the novel (not actually in it- that's for later)
Saturday, July 28, 2012
NEW BOOK!
I've just published a fantasy novel, Illumen's Children, for Kindle. It's pretty exciting be able to do this in such a democratic way- the readers decide! If you have a Kindle, check it out. It will be available for other platforms soon.
The book is cool in that in doesn't use sentient species as an unconscious metaphor for race. While at times this has been an apt way to explain how different culture can make us, it has also been a vehicle for racist stereotypes.
In my book the main characters are dark skinned, and live on the outskirts of their city. They are generally poor. They interact with fantastical sentient species but also humans who look different and have more money. In some ways, the world in the book mirrors ours, and in others, it is a new place to discover. Above I've posted a water color map that appears in the Kindle version. The city is stratified by class- other species and foreigners may not enter past the first ring, Agora, while the dark skinned may not enter beyond Subagora (low market) District, the second outermost ring. Alturba (derived from latin- alta urbis, high city) is for the largely wealthy and light skinned, and the innermost ring, Citadel, is where the eight noble families live. The main characters, Subagorans, face the problem of alerting the king of an assassination plot, and they're not allowed anywhere near him.
It also has a range of characters, from a heretic who speaks the truth, to a half man, half monster, who passes for human among those who once ostracized him, and a hero of the wendigo people, who makes an improbable alliance with our protagonists.
The book is cool in that in doesn't use sentient species as an unconscious metaphor for race. While at times this has been an apt way to explain how different culture can make us, it has also been a vehicle for racist stereotypes.
In my book the main characters are dark skinned, and live on the outskirts of their city. They are generally poor. They interact with fantastical sentient species but also humans who look different and have more money. In some ways, the world in the book mirrors ours, and in others, it is a new place to discover. Above I've posted a water color map that appears in the Kindle version. The city is stratified by class- other species and foreigners may not enter past the first ring, Agora, while the dark skinned may not enter beyond Subagora (low market) District, the second outermost ring. Alturba (derived from latin- alta urbis, high city) is for the largely wealthy and light skinned, and the innermost ring, Citadel, is where the eight noble families live. The main characters, Subagorans, face the problem of alerting the king of an assassination plot, and they're not allowed anywhere near him.
It also has a range of characters, from a heretic who speaks the truth, to a half man, half monster, who passes for human among those who once ostracized him, and a hero of the wendigo people, who makes an improbable alliance with our protagonists.
Friday, November 6, 2009
I'm in my third year, and I feel like I'm teaching. That makes me happier than I've ever been. My teaching is punctuated by phrases that seem obvious, "So we see that Hamlet is finally ready to, Kahlil, sit down, do something. His uncle's reaction, KAHLIL, SIT DOWN, AND KEEP YOUR HANDS TO YOURSELF, shows his guilt." But most of the kids hear the part about Hamlet, and do their work.
Our building on the other hand, is a little out of hand. Teachers record a record number of assaults on their persons, mostly delivered via projectiles thrown either boldy or discreetly. Our hallways are characterized by the speed and roughness of a rugby game, and often at the end of day I pick my way through sheefs of paper through into the stairwells, and occasionally mustard smeers are placed at strategic points, like the newels of the banisters.
I am going to talk to admin shortly along with some colleagues about the situation. I know we have about ten new teachers this year, we've got the flu, and our children are difficult to deal with, but my personal number one pick for the insane atmosphere in our building is the disciplinary team. I have delivered three pink slips to this team. In the first case, two seniors got out of their seats and pushed one another. I told them to sit down. Intstead they grabbed one another and began to wrestle. They banged in the back wall. The taller senior used his bear hug to lift the shorter from the ground, from which point he slammed him down into a desk. At this point I told the taller senior to leave my room. Later I wrote the pink slips.
The response that I got from the team was that these two gentlemen's punishment was to serve two detentions with the instructor. I wrote them back. "Hey," said I. "I'm willing to give them a detention, but surely you know that this doesn't work as a practice for your team. It's against our contract. Secondly, are you going to tell them to serve these detentions?" Implicitly, I was asking, does writing a pink slip mean they will talk to a disciplinarian.
The response was this. "You didn't document any prior interventions." What this means is that I had no record of other disciplinary measures that I had taken with these students. I hadn't disciplined them for anything because they had been well behaved up to that point. "It is the instructor's responsibility to maintain the power of discipline in the classroom." I was not told who would tell them about the detentions, and I assumed this would be me. Since they wouldn't come if I told them they had a detention, I let it go.
But back to the bit about discipline in the classroom. This is the unkindest cut of all, not to mention its ironic reverberation. I had, until that day, felt exceptional about my classroom's discipline. Because my word and good sense had been violated so extremely, in an otherwise calm environment in which expectations and jobs were clear, I felt the disciplinary team should deal with it. Hey, they didn't listen to me. I told them to sit down.
Nope. Nothing from the team except for to tell me I couldn't control my classroom. Ironically, this kind of disciplinary help only adds to the anarchic situation. If you are powerless, and noone has your back, you're powerless.
Anyway, I'm philosophical. My newer colleagues are at their wits' end.
Our building on the other hand, is a little out of hand. Teachers record a record number of assaults on their persons, mostly delivered via projectiles thrown either boldy or discreetly. Our hallways are characterized by the speed and roughness of a rugby game, and often at the end of day I pick my way through sheefs of paper through into the stairwells, and occasionally mustard smeers are placed at strategic points, like the newels of the banisters.
I am going to talk to admin shortly along with some colleagues about the situation. I know we have about ten new teachers this year, we've got the flu, and our children are difficult to deal with, but my personal number one pick for the insane atmosphere in our building is the disciplinary team. I have delivered three pink slips to this team. In the first case, two seniors got out of their seats and pushed one another. I told them to sit down. Intstead they grabbed one another and began to wrestle. They banged in the back wall. The taller senior used his bear hug to lift the shorter from the ground, from which point he slammed him down into a desk. At this point I told the taller senior to leave my room. Later I wrote the pink slips.
The response that I got from the team was that these two gentlemen's punishment was to serve two detentions with the instructor. I wrote them back. "Hey," said I. "I'm willing to give them a detention, but surely you know that this doesn't work as a practice for your team. It's against our contract. Secondly, are you going to tell them to serve these detentions?" Implicitly, I was asking, does writing a pink slip mean they will talk to a disciplinarian.
The response was this. "You didn't document any prior interventions." What this means is that I had no record of other disciplinary measures that I had taken with these students. I hadn't disciplined them for anything because they had been well behaved up to that point. "It is the instructor's responsibility to maintain the power of discipline in the classroom." I was not told who would tell them about the detentions, and I assumed this would be me. Since they wouldn't come if I told them they had a detention, I let it go.
But back to the bit about discipline in the classroom. This is the unkindest cut of all, not to mention its ironic reverberation. I had, until that day, felt exceptional about my classroom's discipline. Because my word and good sense had been violated so extremely, in an otherwise calm environment in which expectations and jobs were clear, I felt the disciplinary team should deal with it. Hey, they didn't listen to me. I told them to sit down.
Nope. Nothing from the team except for to tell me I couldn't control my classroom. Ironically, this kind of disciplinary help only adds to the anarchic situation. If you are powerless, and noone has your back, you're powerless.
Anyway, I'm philosophical. My newer colleagues are at their wits' end.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Goodbye, Macbook
It was the last day of the school year, and I came back to my room after chatting about ways to read signals from the opposite sex with a group of colleagues. I grabbed a platter my dad made, a crate filled with chess boards and a lamp which had had the shade ripped off it sometime during my first year. I get half way down the hall before I realize that my bookbag is light. I don't have my laptop. I unlock the door and look around. It's nowhere. Stolen.
I don't feel like a success when I think back on this year. My classroom was a cold mess, with kids hitting one another, cursing at me, and talking while I talked. It's easy to make excuses for this, but I think they are all self fraughting. I've been thinking for the last couple of weeks about my plans for next year. I figure I need a schedule I keep to, a way that I guarantee certain things get done in the classroom every week, and that might make it better. I need to work more. I need to be less personal and accessible. Blah.
The laptop was missing, and I let the only admn I could find around, the Turn Around AP, that it was stolen. She tells me to leave. I call our tech guy and leave a message, asking if maybe he picked it up, but I know he didn't. It was stolen. Last day of school, and this is what I get to chew on for the summer. There was Kwane, a kid I love, a drug dealer, with a wifey and a conscience about his side jawns, who drops by my room on Thursday, the day after graduation. He sticks out his hand and we shake. "Trott, bye. I'm a miss the shit out of you, dog."
There are my perennials, the small pack of alternately exhuberant and dweeby chess players and soccer players who sign up for soccer pre-season, asking eagerly about upcoming tournaments. I lead them to successes this year.
The laptop is not the only thing that has been stolen this year. I've had markers taken out of my desk, sheets of my classroom money taken out of my desk, once a student pulled a paycheck out of my coat pocket. But that's my fault right? One shouldn't have a paycheck out where it can be taken, right? It should be locked up. I had a conversation with a colleague, after I was missign something.
"I hate feeling like I need to batten all the hatches against the strorm of humanity that comes through my room."
"But that's the reality of where we work," she said.
She was right. I lacked the mental discipline though, to implement all this. The laoptop, I locked the room, but I know some kids have keys to the rooms. I should have carried it with me. I was relazed, it was the last day of school, but at the same time, the students figured it was their moment to live free, and act with out consequences.
Another colleague tells me its not my fault, my room was locked.
We have our end of the year party that night. I dont' tell anyone abut the laptop, I don't want them to have their flow interrupted. I whisper an expletive to myself every few minutes. I manage to still wrest some enjoyment from the night, and drive home. I type an email giving admin the times bewteen which the laptop was taken. I also feel bad because I'm taking personal days the last two days of the year, staff only days, because I've had a vacation planned since March, and the snow day switch isn't going to take my vacation. On the ride out to the woods and the river, I talk to my friend Liz about it. I wish I was more careful. I wish people didn't steal.
The first two days of vacation, I keep feeling like I left things undone, and I'm unsure about what my administration will do about it. Will they write me up? Do I maybe deserve to be written up?
Monday, finally back from vacation, I know I have to get myself to school and try and talk to somepeople about what happened, but I check facebook and email twice. I request two friends. I make coffee, and turn on the television before I tell myself that I need to to this.
When I get to school I qwk the guy at the security station, a metal detector and an xray machine, if any admin are in. Nobody is except the AP I've already talked to, she's running an assembly for our summer program. I call the tech guy. He says they looked and couldn't find the laptop, and that they might garnish my wages. It was a Macbook, so that works out to about a thirtieth of my salary. A paycheck.
I go down to the auditorium and listen as they explain the summer program. It's going to be pretty good. They've got about three different outside groups in here, and ten juniors as mentors. I'm hopeful. I thought about helping but realized I needed to do nothing all summer if I was gonig to come back with renewed energy in the Fall. Mr. C sees me and sits down. I tell him about the laptop. He lets me know that another teacher had her laptop stolen that day, and when I mention the garnishing bit, he laughs and says how can they garnish wages when we only make three bucks an hour. I laugh.
He says I should go see Ms. Andrews. She is the sweet lady who is our school's financial officer. When I go tell her, she asks me if my computer is a CFF computer. I tell her it is. She says that means they can garnish my wages. To give me the serial number she gives me a copy of the signout sheet for the laptop. I read it, and I signed, say I understood I was responsible to replace it if necessary. I type up an incident report and leave.
Next year will be better than this year. This is what I keep telling myself.
I don't feel like a success when I think back on this year. My classroom was a cold mess, with kids hitting one another, cursing at me, and talking while I talked. It's easy to make excuses for this, but I think they are all self fraughting. I've been thinking for the last couple of weeks about my plans for next year. I figure I need a schedule I keep to, a way that I guarantee certain things get done in the classroom every week, and that might make it better. I need to work more. I need to be less personal and accessible. Blah.
The laptop was missing, and I let the only admn I could find around, the Turn Around AP, that it was stolen. She tells me to leave. I call our tech guy and leave a message, asking if maybe he picked it up, but I know he didn't. It was stolen. Last day of school, and this is what I get to chew on for the summer. There was Kwane, a kid I love, a drug dealer, with a wifey and a conscience about his side jawns, who drops by my room on Thursday, the day after graduation. He sticks out his hand and we shake. "Trott, bye. I'm a miss the shit out of you, dog."
There are my perennials, the small pack of alternately exhuberant and dweeby chess players and soccer players who sign up for soccer pre-season, asking eagerly about upcoming tournaments. I lead them to successes this year.
The laptop is not the only thing that has been stolen this year. I've had markers taken out of my desk, sheets of my classroom money taken out of my desk, once a student pulled a paycheck out of my coat pocket. But that's my fault right? One shouldn't have a paycheck out where it can be taken, right? It should be locked up. I had a conversation with a colleague, after I was missign something.
"I hate feeling like I need to batten all the hatches against the strorm of humanity that comes through my room."
"But that's the reality of where we work," she said.
She was right. I lacked the mental discipline though, to implement all this. The laoptop, I locked the room, but I know some kids have keys to the rooms. I should have carried it with me. I was relazed, it was the last day of school, but at the same time, the students figured it was their moment to live free, and act with out consequences.
Another colleague tells me its not my fault, my room was locked.
We have our end of the year party that night. I dont' tell anyone abut the laptop, I don't want them to have their flow interrupted. I whisper an expletive to myself every few minutes. I manage to still wrest some enjoyment from the night, and drive home. I type an email giving admin the times bewteen which the laptop was taken. I also feel bad because I'm taking personal days the last two days of the year, staff only days, because I've had a vacation planned since March, and the snow day switch isn't going to take my vacation. On the ride out to the woods and the river, I talk to my friend Liz about it. I wish I was more careful. I wish people didn't steal.
The first two days of vacation, I keep feeling like I left things undone, and I'm unsure about what my administration will do about it. Will they write me up? Do I maybe deserve to be written up?
Monday, finally back from vacation, I know I have to get myself to school and try and talk to somepeople about what happened, but I check facebook and email twice. I request two friends. I make coffee, and turn on the television before I tell myself that I need to to this.
When I get to school I qwk the guy at the security station, a metal detector and an xray machine, if any admin are in. Nobody is except the AP I've already talked to, she's running an assembly for our summer program. I call the tech guy. He says they looked and couldn't find the laptop, and that they might garnish my wages. It was a Macbook, so that works out to about a thirtieth of my salary. A paycheck.
I go down to the auditorium and listen as they explain the summer program. It's going to be pretty good. They've got about three different outside groups in here, and ten juniors as mentors. I'm hopeful. I thought about helping but realized I needed to do nothing all summer if I was gonig to come back with renewed energy in the Fall. Mr. C sees me and sits down. I tell him about the laptop. He lets me know that another teacher had her laptop stolen that day, and when I mention the garnishing bit, he laughs and says how can they garnish wages when we only make three bucks an hour. I laugh.
He says I should go see Ms. Andrews. She is the sweet lady who is our school's financial officer. When I go tell her, she asks me if my computer is a CFF computer. I tell her it is. She says that means they can garnish my wages. To give me the serial number she gives me a copy of the signout sheet for the laptop. I read it, and I signed, say I understood I was responsible to replace it if necessary. I type up an incident report and leave.
Next year will be better than this year. This is what I keep telling myself.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Donnie Darko, and a growing passion-
So I've been watching Donnie Darko. Not once. Every day. I don't throw chairs at my roommates with they refuse to see it again, I just use mild obscenity to explain how I feel about their lack of aesthetic sensibilities, not to mention their lack of dedication. Also I don't normally like to watch things over and over.
What follows is my explanation of why Donnie Darko is so rocking.
Incredible mise-en-scene, characters, and dialogue make for constant fun. Most scenes merit a laugh.
This is a high school movie without the obsession with the cool kids. Such movies always rock- "The Breakfast Club", and "Ten Things I Hate About You". The high school movie cast is there- We have the bully, the adults with their various eccentricities, notably Ms. Farmer, the devotee of Jim Cunningham, and the passionate coach of the dance team, "Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion." We have our cool teachers as well. There is the comfort of the complete vision of the social world- paired with the strange edges- where another world interacts with this one.
It's not your generic high school movie. It isn't about social standing, and it doesn't offer untruthful platitudes about how it will all work out. Inevitably, even the high school movies I like would tire me for their incomplete and inaccurate portrayal of the world. This is real, partly because it doesn't intend to circumscribe the known world with the creation of eight clicks in the lunch room.
It is the character of Donnie Darko that fascinates me. "What kind of name is that? Donnie Darko? It sounds like a super hero or something." Donnie is an iconoclast, offering to "forcibly insert the life line activities card into" his teacher's "anus," breaking the school's watermain, and, after declaring in front of a whole school his belief that a prominent speaker is the anti-christ, and then burning down his house. More importantly, he offers one of the cuttingest critiques of the Smurf way of life of all time.
His rationale for rebellion is murky. He suffers from strange visions, in which a man-rabbit directs him to break and burn. Also he has a hard time with any one who wants to simplify the complexity of life. Still, I joy in each rebellion, in the conviction with which he walks up to his teacher, and the wry smile that crosses his face before he tells Cunningham he is the anti-Christ. Nothing wrong with stopping school for a day, in fact there is an awesome montage of bus stops, in which children rejoice at the missed day. Cunningham turns out to be a child pornographer- and Mrs. Farmer is someone who annoys everyone already. His rebellion is against unwarranted authority, evil, and compunction (school).
There is a convoluted and made up mythology that explains this movie. I'm sure there are people who are waiting for their own Artifact, ready to be the Manipulated Living, or the Manipulated Dead, but this wacky stuff is the thing with which I have the hardest time in this movie. It's weird, makes no sense, and it's hard to know how anyone would invent this, and think it was worth burying in an awesome movie.
But it do contribute. It, (no director's cut, por favor) creates a world in which the sense of an alternate reality slowly permeating the real world freaks me out- and the sense that something important is going to happen- that evil forces, and imminent destruction are waiting right beyond the horizon of Carpathian ridge.
It is perhaps this conjunction which must fascinates me- the rebellion of a too intelligent high school kid, and the promise of salvation- two reasons.
There is then, a necesity to rebellion, in the specific form of high school rebellion. In high school, adults introduce teenagers to their values and their society. If the young do not see faults in this world, if they do not react and change it, two bad things happen. The world does not change. The ensconced and unwarranted authorities continue in their stupidity and oppression. People don't become what they can be. So we can look at Donnie as a metaphor- he must sacrifice comfort, and what he knows, in order to preserve the world's ongoing revolution- it is a grinding halt that he prevents. His heroism is his investigation of obscura, his insane belief that the story is not complete.
I also like Donnie for the way his character relates to the first Messiah. They are both figures whose death saves the world. They both work out their calling through strange and forgotten scripts- and they both fear dying alone.
I have a difficulty with the church's belief in Jesus' foreknowledge of everything. What's the big deal about dying, if you know you are going to rise in a couple of days? No, I believe that Jesus found God's will the same way that I do. If we believe this stuff, let's not make it unbelievable with wacky super powers. He prayed, he talked to people, he read scripture. Then he had faith. Which is not like knowing, but it is- and somehow he figured out his mission. Then, when he was going to Jerusalem, and they were waiting for him and everyone else said he was nutty- he felt really alone.
Donnie has the same fear. He is afraid of dying alone, afraid there is no God, and has to work out his way, the way to save the world, through a complex and weird mythology.
What follows is my explanation of why Donnie Darko is so rocking.
Incredible mise-en-scene, characters, and dialogue make for constant fun. Most scenes merit a laugh.
This is a high school movie without the obsession with the cool kids. Such movies always rock- "The Breakfast Club", and "Ten Things I Hate About You". The high school movie cast is there- We have the bully, the adults with their various eccentricities, notably Ms. Farmer, the devotee of Jim Cunningham, and the passionate coach of the dance team, "Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion." We have our cool teachers as well. There is the comfort of the complete vision of the social world- paired with the strange edges- where another world interacts with this one.
It's not your generic high school movie. It isn't about social standing, and it doesn't offer untruthful platitudes about how it will all work out. Inevitably, even the high school movies I like would tire me for their incomplete and inaccurate portrayal of the world. This is real, partly because it doesn't intend to circumscribe the known world with the creation of eight clicks in the lunch room.
It is the character of Donnie Darko that fascinates me. "What kind of name is that? Donnie Darko? It sounds like a super hero or something." Donnie is an iconoclast, offering to "forcibly insert the life line activities card into" his teacher's "anus," breaking the school's watermain, and, after declaring in front of a whole school his belief that a prominent speaker is the anti-christ, and then burning down his house. More importantly, he offers one of the cuttingest critiques of the Smurf way of life of all time.
His rationale for rebellion is murky. He suffers from strange visions, in which a man-rabbit directs him to break and burn. Also he has a hard time with any one who wants to simplify the complexity of life. Still, I joy in each rebellion, in the conviction with which he walks up to his teacher, and the wry smile that crosses his face before he tells Cunningham he is the anti-Christ. Nothing wrong with stopping school for a day, in fact there is an awesome montage of bus stops, in which children rejoice at the missed day. Cunningham turns out to be a child pornographer- and Mrs. Farmer is someone who annoys everyone already. His rebellion is against unwarranted authority, evil, and compunction (school).
There is a convoluted and made up mythology that explains this movie. I'm sure there are people who are waiting for their own Artifact, ready to be the Manipulated Living, or the Manipulated Dead, but this wacky stuff is the thing with which I have the hardest time in this movie. It's weird, makes no sense, and it's hard to know how anyone would invent this, and think it was worth burying in an awesome movie.
But it do contribute. It, (no director's cut, por favor) creates a world in which the sense of an alternate reality slowly permeating the real world freaks me out- and the sense that something important is going to happen- that evil forces, and imminent destruction are waiting right beyond the horizon of Carpathian ridge.
It is perhaps this conjunction which must fascinates me- the rebellion of a too intelligent high school kid, and the promise of salvation- two reasons.
There is then, a necesity to rebellion, in the specific form of high school rebellion. In high school, adults introduce teenagers to their values and their society. If the young do not see faults in this world, if they do not react and change it, two bad things happen. The world does not change. The ensconced and unwarranted authorities continue in their stupidity and oppression. People don't become what they can be. So we can look at Donnie as a metaphor- he must sacrifice comfort, and what he knows, in order to preserve the world's ongoing revolution- it is a grinding halt that he prevents. His heroism is his investigation of obscura, his insane belief that the story is not complete.
I also like Donnie for the way his character relates to the first Messiah. They are both figures whose death saves the world. They both work out their calling through strange and forgotten scripts- and they both fear dying alone.
I have a difficulty with the church's belief in Jesus' foreknowledge of everything. What's the big deal about dying, if you know you are going to rise in a couple of days? No, I believe that Jesus found God's will the same way that I do. If we believe this stuff, let's not make it unbelievable with wacky super powers. He prayed, he talked to people, he read scripture. Then he had faith. Which is not like knowing, but it is- and somehow he figured out his mission. Then, when he was going to Jerusalem, and they were waiting for him and everyone else said he was nutty- he felt really alone.
Donnie has the same fear. He is afraid of dying alone, afraid there is no God, and has to work out his way, the way to save the world, through a complex and weird mythology.
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