fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2292 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2292 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.

[Criminal Minds]

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02.

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04.

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05.

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06.

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07.

[Zero Escape]

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08. [repeat]

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09.

[Veronica Mars]

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10.

[Mariqueen Maandig/How to Destroy Angels]

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11.

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12.

[Fire Emblem Awakening]

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[ ----- SPOILERY SECRETS AHEAD ----- ]

14. [SPOILERS for Teen Wolf]

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15. [SPOILERS for Walking Dead]

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16. [SPOILERS for Walking Dead]

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17. [SPOILERS for Walking Dead]

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18. [SPOILERS for Hell on Wheels]

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[ ----- TRIGGERY SECRETS AHEAD ----- ]

19. [WARNING for rape]

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20. [WARNING for guro, non-con]
http://i.imgur.com/1TrlMId.jpg

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 000 secrets from Secret Submission Post #327.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I... can't really think of any. Not because I was a super smart kid, but because I had an ultra-religious upbringing. I knew who Aslan/Tom Bombadil were immediately, what Gandalf's fall represented, etc.

I've also been particularly sensitive to heavy-handed symbolism or allegory my whole life. I still hate it. I hate it even when it's a message that I agree with. It ruins the art completely for me and I can't help but wonder why they didn't just write an essay or make a non-fiction documentary or opinion piece or something. I love those. Good non-fiction is wonderful, there's no need to bend good art over a barrel and ram your message up in it. Go subtle or go home. Case in point: I was deeply Christian when I read Narnia and I despised Aslan as a character. He's not a character! He's BibleGod! Just call him God and have done with it. If Dante managed it, so can CS Lewis. Just write something where God shows up. And now, as an atheist, Pullman's heavy-handedness bothers me too.

My high school English teacher taught me that the hierarchy of quality media went like this:

1) Art with a message done well

2) Art with a message done poorly

3) Art for art's sake done well

4) Art for art's sake done poorly

But I rather disagree - it looks like this:

1) Art for art's sake done well/Non-fiction done well

2) Art with a message done well

3) Art for art's sake done poorly/Non-fiction done poorly

9000101320382224200000) Art with a message done poorly

In other words, whatever your axe to grind or point to make, there's no need to shit all over poor art to make it. What did art ever do to you? I don't even care if your point is entirely noble like "racism is bad" or "we need to preserve the environment". It's true! It is! We do! So either pay art the respect it deserves and do it well or write goddamn non-fiction.

I would argue that Tolkien's figures aren't usually as symbolic as all that - certainly I think that Bombadil's not standing in for any figure in Christian mythology, and I don't think that Gandalf's fall is directly symbolic (although you could certainly argue that it has a figural role in regards to concepts of Christian theology).

He's not CS Lewis. He's way better than CS Lewis. In fact, I would argue that he gave a lot of thought to the religious underpinnings of Middle-earth, and that it's very specifically not Christian allegory, and that if it were Christian allegory, it would not serve the function that Tolkien intended it to serve. In other words, the ways in which the world is not Christian are super important, from the Christian, Catholic point of view which Tolkien held deeply and which certainly suffused the entirety of the world. In some ways, one might make the argument that it's the fact that the world of Middle-earth is not allegorical that allows the world of Middle-earth to be figural, although I don't know that I'd go that far. The relation between the religious sensibility and the world is pretty tricky and complicated, as befits a great work of literature. But I would definitely say that the Christianity in Tolkien's work is not symbolic or allegorical; at most it is figural.

Oh, I agree, that's why I used Aslan, rather than Tom Bombadil, as my example of it done poorly.

Well, fair enough. I'm still not sure I'd agree that Tom Bombadil is the same thing done well - I don't know if it's the same thing at all, and I don't know if there's many allegorical readings of Bombadil that I'd agree with. But fair enough.

Well, I'm sure you know that I agree completely with you. And possibly love you.

Orson Scott Card, for all his toolery and the fact that he uses three names, said something about writing that really resonated with me. It was something about how you can write with themes in mind certainly, but when you write "empty-minded" the themes and messages that will inevitably rise to the surface are actually what you believe, and say much more about who you are. And I was like "duh" when I heard it but apparently some people think the message is the absolute tip of the story spear. You can tell who they are by reading their shit and I do mean shit.

/stumbles off soap box

The artist creates life through forms, and that alone is enough to connect him with the fundamental elements of life, that is, with a potency more actual and more enduring than markets or machines. The artist whom the sense of beauty inspires to create always creates more than 'mere beauty'.

- Ernst Robert Curitus

That's a lovely quote, though it's a little tangential to what I said. I guess I agree?

[ SECRET POST #2292 ]

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory

Re: Books you read as a kid, but didn't quite get the allegory