Gender, Race, Body Image, and the Repetitive Cast in David Eddings' Novels

So, I've been thinking a lot about David Eddings' work, mainly because out of all the authors I am familiar with I have read more of his books than any other writer. I mean, with only three of his series, that's over 10 books. There are a number of themes I want to address in all of these works, but this analysis will mainly focus on The Elenium--the series I've completed most recently. I think it should be mentioned that David Eddings is a wonderful storyteller, in that his stories entertain. I first fell in love with The Belgariad when I was in high school, and I thought he was the most amazing writer ever to have existed. Now that I'm older, however, and have been exposed to more writing, analyses, etc., I realize that David Eddings' stories all follow similar patterns and formulas as far as the storylines go, and the themes, characters, and how these characters are gendered. I've already touched on some of these similarities in my previous post on Eddings' work, but I think it's important to expand on these to illustrate that throughout his writing career David Eddings has strayed little in how he portrays his men and women; how his story goes from Point A to Point B with some conflict, but it's still easy to see where it's going; and how the characters all follow the same format: he's just given them different names and sometimes haircolor.

First, I would like to give a quick timeline of Eddings' works, to sort of put it into perspective by attributing a point in time in which each work was published. Here is a list of publication dates; I have chosen to list only the works I will be referencing (since there are a couple of books I have yet to read):
The Belgariad:

• Pawn of Prophecy (1982)
• Queen of Sorcery (1982)
• Magician's Gambit (1983)
• Castle of Wizardry (1984)
• Enchanter's End Game (1984)

The Malloreon:

• Guardians of the West (1987)
• King of the Murgos (1988)
• Demon Lord of Karanda (1988)
• Sorceress of Darshiva (1989)
• The Seeress of Kell (1991)
  

The Elenium:

• The Diamond Throne (1989)
• The Ruby Knight (1990)
• The Sapphire Rose (1991)

Prequals:

• Belgarath the Sorcerer (1995) with Leigh Eddings
• Polgara the Sorceress (1997) with Leigh Eddings

The Dreamers:

• The Elder Gods (2003) with Leigh Eddings
• The Treasured One (2004) with Leigh Eddings
• Crystal Gorge (2005) with Leigh Eddings
• The Younger Gods (2006) with Leigh Eddings

Stand alone novel:

• The Redemption of Althalus (2000) with Leigh Eddings

It should be noted that although his wife, Leigh Eddings, is listed as a co-author, she's technically the co-author for all of the works listed; she's just uncredited.

I will now address each issue of the works in separate sections (this is going to be a long one, so I've tried to divide it up).

Gender
I have already addressed th sexism in Eddings' works. A quick overview of his works would suggest that it's nonexistent since many of his female characters are so powerful, but their power itself is sexist. Their power is relateable to motherhood. The women create worlds or universes, and so they mother all creatures. This is evident in Althalus' Dweia, The Belgariad's Polgara, and The Dreamers' Ara. Even as teachers these women are mothers, as Sephrenia is in The Elenium. Sephrenia is a powerful magic user, an instructor to the male knights of the Elene Church, yet even the "endearing" term of address to her is another insult to her femininity: "little mother."

Moreover, these women are veritable Virgin Marys. Their sexuality is modest, or muted, and though they love, they do not lust. Even the ones who are married (Polgara, Dweia, and Ara--most later in the stories) do not seem to exude any physical desires. Sex is a matter-of-fact, for the purpose of procreation. Their husbands blush at any mention of reproduction, and seem to have almost no desire themselves. They are good, pure women. Some, like Polgara, are guilty of flirting, but they are nonetheless virtuous because they do not have sex with anyone but their husbands--and if they do no marry there is no sex. In Polgara's case, she did not marry Durnik until she was well-past 5000 years old. No sex for 5000 years, you say? I find that hard to believe. Though we do find out in Polgara the Sorceress, Polgara was in love well-before Durnik, there is nothing to suggest that she had sex with Ontrose.

Conversely, there are bad women. Their sexuality is explicit, in your face, and portrayed as disgusting. The Elenium's bad girl is Arissa, a Princess who seduced her brother, then spent some time after her brother's wedding to another woman in a disreputable brothel servicing every sailor in a disreputable brothel for a week, not to mention all the men she had sex with in between these events (Elenium 132). Here's a snippet of the conversation between Arissa, Sparhawk (a knight of the Church), and Dolmant (future archprelate of the Church):

"A rumor has surfaced[...]that prior to your being cloisered here, you were secretly married to Duke Osten[...] Would you care to confirm--or deny--that rumor?" [Dolmant asked].
"Osten?" She laughed. "That dried-up old stick? Who in her right mind would marry a man like that? I like my men younger, more ardent."
"You deny the rumor, then?"
"Of course I deny it. I'm like the Church, Dolmant. I offer my bounty to all men--as everyone in Cimmura knows."

She goes on to tell them how enjoyable the time in the brothel was:

"It was both enjoyable and profitable. I made a very great deal of money. Most of the girls there overpriced themselves, but I learned as a child that the secret of great wealth is to sell cheaply to many." She looked maliciously at Dolmant. "Besides," she added, "it's a renewable resource." (132).

She also reads erotic poetry during her confinement at a nunnery--more evidence of her remorselessness and unwillingness to absolve herself of her sins. The mere fact that the authhor points out her remorselessness portrays her as a disgusting slut who should be sorry for having sex. Because she uses her sexuality to gain power illustrates that she's an evil character, and an impure woman. I would also like to point out that the male characters are guilty of adultery (Kurik, who has a bastard son, Talen) and having sex with strangers (Kalten, who often admires naked women, and has sex with a barmaid) are not painted so evilly. Men are neither impure or pure00they are men who either make mistakes, or are just out having some fun.

I could let this slide once, but prior to the publication of the Elenium, you have the Belgariad. The bad woman here is Salmissra, the Serpent Queen, who is a vain, drug-addicted whore. She is an evil, lustful woman, who is only stopped when Polgara transforms her into an actual serpent, and is suddenly rendered desire-less. Therefore, the cure for a slut is the Virgin Mary's intervention.

As for gender roles, they are always well-defined divisions. There is no androgyny; there is masculine and feminine. The men fight with swords. The women stand aside while the men battle (yes, even the powerful sorceresses; the sorceresses manipulate people and events--they do not fight). Polgara manipulates the weather to slow an army, but she doesn't kill. In the Elenium, Flute (the child-form of the goddess, Aphrael), uses magic to age the frightening Seeker, thus passively eliminating it as a threat, but she never fights it (Elenium 479).

In The Dreamers, we are presented with a woman named Queen Trenicia, warrior woman of an Amazon nation. She is the only woman brought in to assist in the war in Dhrall, yet she provides no troops (like Sorgan, Narasan, and Ekial of their respective nations). She is masculinized--a large woman wielding weapons, yet she never takes part in any fighting. She ovserves the men, offers suggestions, but never draws her sword. She does often run ahead of the armies as a scout, but is chided by Narasan for doing so (apparantly she shouldn't be putting herself in such danger without the supervision of a man). Eddings offers us some insight into her character, and we find that her nation is like any other, but the gender roles are completely flipped. It is still clear masculine or feminine, only the women practice swordplay and the men pretty themselves up like vain airheads to attract the opposite sex (apparently there's no agriculture in Akalla). It's just frustrating, because when Eddings finally gives us a tough badass lady, he still manages to stick to his gender roles, and there's the Virgin Mary thing again. Trenicia is pretty much sans sexuality, though she does endearingly flirt with Narasan, the commander of one of the armies; yet the only reason she's so attracted to Narasan is because he's so unlike the apparant ninnies in Akalla--he's a real penis-wielding man.

Similarly, in the latter part of the Elenium, Eddings introduces us to Mirtai, a large woman who acts as Queen Ehlana's bodyguard. At first, she seems awesome: a large woman carrying a dozen unseen blades seems like a great character, but David Eddings just can't give us a bad ass woman unless she's motherly. On page 730, she insists on Ehlana eating, fretting over her like a mother would over her child; on this one page she says it at least twice. She tells her again to eat her breafast on page 760. This seems to be the extent of her character: threatening to dismember a man, or insisting that the Queen eat.

This brings me to my next point. Everyone in the story infantilizes Queen Ehlana. I realize her character is only 18 years old when this story is supposed to take place, but she's a queen. One would think that she should be treated as a woman, yet she is consistently refered to as "girl," or "girl-child" (754). Sparhawk just about constantly remembers how she was when she was a child, and is thus conflicted when seeing her as an adult. On page 744 she carries on like a child instead of a composed monarch, bursting into tears and clinging to Dolmant's sleeve in a pitiful attempt at a tantram. At other times, she acts like a giddy child, clapping her hands together when she wins an argument (718), and a couple of times someone mentions wanting to spank her as one would a child (716), or refers to her a "naughty girl" (714).

Now that I've ranted about women's gender, I will move on to a somewhat related topic. In the Elenium, our foe is Azash, a God of the East who's afflicted by impotence, the cure for which is apparently the coveted blue rose, Bhelliom--a pretty obvious symbol for female genitalia. Azash even states that having Bhelliom would result in having his " 'maleness restored' " (543). Sephrenia even mocks him, enraging him with a scathing speech:

"Then thine endless centuries of confinement have bereft thee of thy wits as well as they manhood[...]Impotent godling," Sephrenia continued her goading, "return to foul Zemoch and gnaw upon thy soul in vain regret for the delights now eternally denied thee" (478).

Despite Bhelliom being a symbol of vaginas--ultimate physical femaleness--no woman uses it (of course not; that would be gay!). In the course of the Elenium's history, only males (human or otherwise) use the blue rose, doing so by channeling their orders through a pair of rings they must wear while holding the jewel. A male troll named Ghwerig crafts the stone, and the Troll Gods infuse it with power, which Ghwerig taps into using the twin rings he makes with shards from Bhelliom. As far as I can tell, these Troll Gods are also male, since Eddings does refer to feminine deities as "goddess." It is Aphrael--Goddess of the heathen Styric race--that steals the rings from Ghwerig. The rings unlock the power of Bhelliom, acting as keys in a lock--thus using them to penetrate the blue rose. This theft results in a loss for Ghwerig; he is no longer able to control the rose.

Later, Aphrael delivers the rose to the hero, Sparhawk, but she doesn't ever use it--she only renders it useless by stealing the keys, or she delivers it to another man. The only other woman involved with Bhelliom is Sephrenia, who coaches Sparhawk on using the rose (the rings he already had, them having been passed down to him by his ancestors as a symbol linking the king's champion to the throne--both male symbols until Ehlana claims the throne). Sephrenia never uses the jewel, but Sparhawk does not know how to use it. Sephrenia is a woman; the jewel is a vagina. She knows how vaginas work, imparting that knowledge to a man. I'm slightly disturbed that Eddings has written it so a waman teaches a man how to control the vagina. It would be different if a woman actually used the jewel, or it had been any other symbol, but Eddings usues a known symbol for female genitalia, makes it a cure for godly impotence, and only has men control it.

Body Image
In many of his stories, Eddings often has at least one fat character, usually a man, though he does describe some women as "plump." The fat men usually stand out, however, because it seems that their "paunch" is a character in itself. In the Elenium, our fat man is patriarch Emban. Like other fat characters Eddings has dreamt up, Emban generally uses his fatness as a joke to put others at ease, as in this example:

"Perhaps, my brother," Emban continued, "This might be the proper time to adjourn for lunch." He smiled rather broadly and clapped his hands to his paunch. "That suggestion coming from me didn't really surprise anyone very much, did it?"
They laughed, and that seemed to relax the tension.

In other places, Eddings causes us to pay particular attention to Emban's fatness, such as when he "laboriously hauled himsef to his feet and waddled" across the room (704). In several places his movements are described as "waddling." Anything having to do with hunger or food is immediately attributed to Emban, such as feeding the hungry:

Besides, Emban did feel a certain compassion for the truly hungry. His own bulk made him peculiarly sensitive to the pangs of hunger (725).

So, according to this, having a larger belly means you suffer from hunger more often than "normal" weighted characters, and can therefore relate to people who haven't eaten in a number of days?

Race
In The Belgariad, The Malloreon, and The Elenium, the good guys are all in the west, and the bad guys are from the east. It's always the eastern kingdoms invading the western kingdoms, and the west overcoming the invasion, pushing them back to the east and decimating the eastern armies so that they can't invade again (at least not for a few centuries).

Besides this east vs. west theme going on, there are some interesting notions of race in these worlds Eddings has created. Here's an interesting conversation between Sephrenia and Dolmant regarding the Zemochs, the race that worships Azash:

"Anyway," [Sephrenia] continued, "when Otha agreed to worship Azash, the God granted him enormous power, and Otha eventually became emperor of Zemoch. The Styrics and the Elenes in Zemoch have intermarried, and so a Zemoch is not truly a member of either race."
"An abomination in the eyes of God," Dolmant added.
"The Styric Gods feel much the same way," Sephrenia agreed. (134-5)

What I can't understand is what exactly is the abomination: that two races intermarried, or that these combined races worship Azash? Either way, it's a strange opinion for Sephrenia to have since she obviously has feelings for an Elene, and is Styric herself.

There is also this generalization of races. The southern Rendors are characterized as "undependable" (682) and mindless "fanatics" (683). There's also talk of exterminating the Rendors. Oh, and the Rendors are so mindless that the slaying of their religious leader effectively ends their attack (708). The Elenes (here, the white, western kingdoms) have their own generalities--mainly they're barbarians, but that's okay because they're working to stop the east from invading. Oh, and they drink a lot, but that's okay too, because it makes them that more loveable.

There's also some animalization of race going on here, with the Zemochs. One character mentions that they " 'breed like rabbits' " (740). This sort of animalization is common, since it's easier to kill an enemy that you don't think of as human.

The Standard Eddings Cast
I would like to conclude this essay with what I've called The Standard Eddings Cast. In all of his series (The Belgariad, The Malloreon, The Elenium, and The Dreamers) and in the stand alone novel The Redemption of Althalus I have noticed that not only are the stories similar (something's invading, generally east into the west; or some god is pissed off and trying to take over the world, etc), but Eddings seems to use the same template for his characters over and over again. So I have made a list of his standard cast of characters, which I have reproduced here:

• The Hero: This is the guy (yes, it's a man, or as in The Belgariad, a boy) who must conquer invading armies or vanquish angry, evil gods. He generally has high morals, though they are flexible, because the Hero must do everything that's necessary to come out on top. Garion is the Hero in The Belgariad, his task being to kill Torak, the evil god in the east. Sparhawk is the Hero in The Elenium, and he is to face Azash. Both Sparhawk and Garion wield gems: Bhelliom and the Orb of Aldur. Longbow is pretty much the Hero in The Dreamers, though it's a little harder to determine since that series basically ends with "oh wait, none of it happened thank you time-traveling gods." But before the deus ex machina, Longbow's the main man.
• The Powerful Woman: There's one in every story. She's mighty, she's wielding magic, and she cooks--she's your "superwoman." She's Polgara, Dweia, Ara, and Sephrenia. And they're all pretty much the same. And they all remind the men that drinking is bad. Fucking Virgin Marys...
• The Devout Religious Man: He's the man who follows his religion by the book, putting his god before all else. He's also ashamed of his penis and abhors boobs and vaginas because it makes his god sad to have sexual desires. He's usually cured by being seduced by a woman who's not ashamed of her lady parts. The Belgariad has Relg, Althalus has Bheid, and The Elenium has Bevier.
• The Impetuous Man: This man thinks with his weapon first, is often dramatic, and is the epitome of brawn; usually resembles a bear. A big hairy bear. Barak is the bear (literally) in The Belgariad.
• The Thief: There is always that one guy (or boy) with quick hands and no moral qualms about theft. In fact, he sees it as a game. A woman is never the thief because Virgin Marys, mothers, and whores have other hobbies to occupy their time. Silk is the infamous thief in The Belgariad, Althalus is a recovering thief, and Talen is a young thief-prodigy.
• The Wise Man: This man is easy to spot since he usually has gray hair and a beard. He's known to drink on occasion, but the younger men flock to him for his wisdom. Belgarath from the Belgariad, Dolmant from The Elenium, Narasan and One-Who-Heals in The Dreamers, are all wise men in their respective stories. They advise armies, and are quite masculine.
  
• The Humble Working Man: This man is characterized by his extensive knowledge of everything. He knows this because he's a common man who has worked in all trades at some point in his life. He's the voice of everyman; he's educated in life and can advise all the higher class people. He is Durnik in The Belgariad, Kurik in the Elenium, Keselo in The Dreamers.
  
• The Really Obese Man: This man is usually jolly. He makes jokes about his girth, loves eating so much, and is usually very sly. This man is Emban in The Elenium, and Rhodar in The Belgariad.
• The Easy-to-Spot Bad-guy: This man is obviously bad. Something about him makes him stand out in a crows, enabling the good guys to follow him with ease. Martel in the Elenium has stark white hair though he is a young man, and his henchman, Adus, resembles a gorilla; Ghend in Althalus has fiery eyes; Brill in the Belgariad has pungent body-odor; Naradas in The Malloreon has white eyes, but is not blind.
• The Snotty/Childish Princess/Queen/Goddess: Though she's an adult, she either acts like a child or is treated as one. She's spoiled and often gets her way. She's also quite shrill, and the men whither at her command. She's Andine in Althalus, Ehlana in The Elenium, Ce'Nedra in The Belgariad, Aracia in The Dreamers. She's also known to be very vain--she's beautiful and she knows it.
  

I would like to point out that some of the characters sometimes embody more than one category, like how Althalus is the Thief and the Hero. It seems that Eddings has not broken out of this mold because the same characters and storylines are evident in all of these stories, and even in time has not shifted significantly. In fact, with the most recent series, The Dreamers, it seems David Eddings is content to present the same tired story (and with this one, we must suffer through the same battle again and again as it's presented through the perception of another character, making the reader feel like taking one step forward and two steps back), and then he decides that it should end by all the events never taking place in the first place.

So, with that, I would like to request that he stop writing. He's not improved at all, it's the same story, and people, and clearly he's just run out of ideas if he's now ending his four book series by having one of the gods wave their hands and make all the events meaningless.

And so I conclude another Eddings rant. Hopefully it was entertaining, at the very least. I enjoyed being angry about it.

There's more I could have done with gender and race, but this was long enough I think. I welcome any conversation about this.

Works cited:
Eddings, David. The Elenium. Ballantine Books: New York, 2007.

The Last Airbender casting

I found this on Alas, a blog, which is from the angry black woman, and I thought I would share it here since it's interesting how M. Night Shyamalan seems bent on ruining the image of Avatar: The Last Airbender live-action movie by casting all white people. It's disappointing really, because I love the series. I feel like something very important will be lost in this translation of Avatar. I know this is an American-based cartoon, but it's set in an all Asian world, and not just the "standard" stereotypical depictions. I guess nojojojo says it best here:

The thing is, all of these stereotypes are present in Avatar to some degree. But because the whole world is Asian, they’re lost in a sea of non-stereotypical, non-exoticized, perfectly normal human beings. How amazing is that? Not only that, but Avatar actually depicts different Asian ethnicities. Though this is a fantasy world, there are clear allusions to the Inuit, Koreans, Mongols, Tibetans, several flavors of southeast Asian, various Indians, and more. The Chinese- and Japanese-analogues of the story actually come in several varieties (Earth Kingdom and Fire Kingdom, Kyoshi warriors, etc.).

It surprises me most because I don't understand the justification for this. Couldn't M. Night have easily cast some up and coming Asian actors? Certainly these white kids are not so fabulous that they can outshine some equally talented Asian actors that would at least be keeping the flavor of the cartoon alive...

At any rate, I'm hoping that there will be some quick changes to the cast before filming begins. It would be different if the variety of Asian cultures didn't play so significantly into the story and world of Avatar, but it does, and changing the ethnicity of the characters is too significant to ignore. I mean, isn't it a little strange putting these suddenly white characters into an identity rich with Asian cultures??

I'll probably still end up seeing the movie, but it will suffer with this cast...
Thoughts?

A note on the displayed artwork

Wow, two posts in one day...perhaps this will be that beginning of a good habit?

Anyway, I thought I'd write a quick note explaining the significance of the artwork I've chosen for this blog. It is a collaboration between my best friend and myself. Her artwork mainly focuses on the working man, and much of her earlier work depicts scenes in iron foundries, the symbol in these prints being from the trademark of one foundry. She also incorporated Russian text at the top, using a stencil to distance herself from the work rather than personalizing it with her own handwriting and language. On the side panel, in my handwriting, I wrote lines of a poem in charcoal. The poem was written specifically for her work, inspired by her subject matter and techniques, as well as my own personal love of the work of Baudelaire. The collaborative prints we made together symbolize how we can combine our influences and ourselves in one form, also exhibiting how artwork and poetry are really quite similar.

Pretty sexy, huh?

Seriously?

I know this isn't what I was going to post (don't worry, the new essay will be finished soon) but while I was doing some research on publishers for short stories, I stumbled across the site for the Electric Dragon Cafe. The most recent news post is from October, but it's enough for me to decide this publisher isn't for me. The post reads:

Electric Dragon News - October, 12, 2008
Since this quarters writing contest was meant to commemorate the birth of our daughter Eleanor, we decided to let her be the sole judge. Instead of reading each and every entry, as we did with all contests last year, we read only the author’s name and the title of the story aloud to our baby. If she smiled or cooed at the sound of a name, then that story made it through to the next round. We repeated the process until only three remained. Ellie is no cupcake. She is a tough judge and a harsh critic. It is a small miracle that these stories entered the gauntlet and emerged whole on the other side. We offer thanks to all entrants, congratulations to the winners, and condolences to the families of those that fell along the way.

Really? You let a baby decide based on you reading the author's name and title? Why would anyone bother submitting to such an idiotic site, one which trivializes writing by not even judging the writing--you know, the stuff after the author's name and title?

It's terribly frustrating to writers having their work judged by people who think they know writing (yes, I know I'm being terribly elitist here) but what Electric Dragon Cafe has done here just confounds me. I mean, it's one of those things that is so utterly ridiculous that you can't believe that it's real.

I hope no serious writers submit to this site. Ever.

New article coming soon

On the off chance that someone has been regularly checking this (ha) I just wanted to write a quick post apologizing for not having updated since August. I still can't believe it's been that long. At any rate, I am currently writing an essay that should be posted sometime in the next week. Heads up: it's another "I hate you David Eddings" and sort of expands on some of my earlier points, as well as a few new ones, mainly due to my reading The Elenium. After this series is finished, however, I will quit my avid reading of David Eddings and try to focus on more creative individuals...or at least find someone else to yell at...

Also, I have been doing quite a bit of other reading, so hopefully I can blurt out some stuff about that too (probably something on China Mieville since I worship him, as well as Baudelaire). So check back and we can have an intelligent conversation!

The Last Unicorn--a Study in Gender in Fairy-Tale

I recently just reread Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn, and I strongly recommend that if you haven't already, you read this. You aren't allowed to call yourself a fantasy-lover if you haven't read this.

This story is very self-aware, meaning it's a story that knows it's a story. Despite what you may be thinking, this is not at all annoying or distracting. The characters willingly (or at least, reluctantly) take on their prescribed roles as dictated by the standard fairy-tale formula. You have the hero, the lady, the magician, the less-pretty lady, and the witch and her curse. Prince Lir even points out that "'The happy ending cannot come in the middle of the story'" (180). Though these roles are archetypes, Peter S. Beagle manages to create a magical story which immerses the reader. Even the side characters are amazing: Mommy Fortuna and King Haggard being prime examples of greed and hunger, finding happiness in trickery, capturing real magical creatures and containing them, finding joy only in their control of these magical beings.
Prince Lir is a self-made hero, but he only becomes a hero to impress Lady Amalthea (who the unicorn becomes when Schmendrick "saves" her from the Red Bull). He tells Molly Grue that "'For her sake, I have become a hero--I sleepy Lir, my father's sport and shame--but I might just as well have remained the dull fool I was" (129). Lir has become a hero--in this case, a masculine archetype that goes around slaying dragons for his lady. The lady has transformed him through no effort. She does not acknowledge him; she just exists beautifully, and her beauty has inspired him to become heroic.

Lir is an excellent character to examine because of his transformation. He was a prince with no accomplishments before the Lady Amalthea appeared at his father's castle, and once he became a hero he (forgive this next comment) found his balls. However, that distanced him from the female species:

It was not [Lady Amalthea's] dream that chilled him, but that she did not weep as she told it. As a hero, he understood weeping women and knew how to make them stop crying--generally you killed something--her her calm terror confused and unmanned him, while the shape of her face crumbled the distant dignity he had been so pleased at maintaining.

He became a man for her sake, yet when she behaves in ways that confuse him (in what he perceives to be unladylike behavior) she "unmans" him. Ladies are supposed to be hysterical sobbing creatures, waiting for a hero to swoop in and kill something to make them happy again. The reason I cannot be upset with Peter Beagle for Lir's misconception is because of two reasons: one, the rest of the characters follow fairy-tale law as well, becoming the characters they're supposed to be because that's what the story says they're supposed to be; and two, the Lady Amalthea is not a swooning prescribed "lady." However, this is due to her being a unicorn turned woman--she is a higher, purer form of woman because she's a magical perfect being encased in woman flesh. She is beyond lady, which unsaddles Lir and his limited understanding of the female creature.

This should upset me as well, but once again Peter Beagle saves himself toward the end of the story with Molly Grue. When we first meet Molly, we come to understand that she's not perfection, she's not particularly beautiful (though I am always finding the beauty in the ugly simply by the words used to describe said thing):

"I don't know what he is maself," Jack Jingly rumbled. He began to tell the story of the Mayor and the hat, but he had hardly reached the roaring descent upon the town when he was interrupted by a thing thorn of a woman who came pushing through the ring of men to shrill, "I'll not have it, Cully, th soup's no thicker than sweat as it is!" She had a pale, bony face with fierce, tawny eyes, and hair the color of dead grass (69).

She is a shrill-voiced woman, cooking for a band of dirty men, but also is described almost as a shrew. She is the antithesis of the lady the unicorn becomes: "Dress and dirty hair tattered alike, bare feet bleeding and beslimed, she gave him a bat's grin" (69). She dirty and scrawny; she's not even wearing shoes. To further her distinction between Molly and the unicorn, I would like to point out this passage:

But Molly pushed him aside and went up to the unicorn, scolding her as though she were a strayed milk cow. "Where have you been?" Before the whiteness and the shining horn, Molly shrank to a shrilling beetle, but this time it was the unicorn's old dark eyes that looked down.
"I am here now," she said at last.
Molly laughed with her lips flat. "And what good is it to me that you're here now? Where were you twenty years ago, ten years ago? How dare you, how dare you come to me now, when I am this?" With a flap of her hand she summed herself up: barren face, desert eyes, and yellowing heart. "I wish you had never come. Why do you come now?"[...]
The unicorn made no reply, and Schmendrick said, "She is the last. She is the last unicorn in the world."
"She would be." Molly sniffed. "It would be the last unicorn in the world that came to Molly Grue" (71).

The unicorn represents purity in her white beauty, whereas Molly Grue is dirty, spoiled and aged.

Now, the part where Beagle saves it: "But Molly Grue only laughed and shook her head till her hair came down, and she was more beautiful than the Lady Amalthea" (209). Despite all her "flaws" she still manages to surpass a unicorn trapped as a woman in beauty--but I feel that this is because Molly Grue's depth surpasses Lady Amalthea, who is just the semblance of a woman.

Works Cited:
Beagle, Peter S. The Last Unicorn. New York: ROC, 1991.

Intolerance of Orson Scott Card

Update: I found this courtesy of Yonmei over at Feminist SF - The Blog! Apparently Mr. Card's opinions were quite the opposite more than twenty years ago, which can be found here and here.

What does one do when an author with phenomenal talent turns out to be a disgusting excuse for a human?

I was just reading my favorite feminist blog today, and was pretty much horrified by their newest thread about Orson Scott Card. I read Ender's Game years ago, I think it was actually in high school (not for class or anything, but because I had heard good things about the book) and was amazed by it. The overall sadness, the encompassing futility in war, and the corruption of the innocent blew my mind. I also read Ender's Shadow and was even more compelled to love these books, and continued with Speaker for the Dead. These novels were amazing. However, it has been some time since I read them, so maybe it was just me in my sub-educated naivety that I thought they were so amazing (please note that this is around the same time that I first read The Belgariad).

At any rate, it's disappointing to find out that one of your influences has such detestable beliefs (China Mieville, please do not fall from the pedestal on which I've placed you, I beg of you). I actually find that this is more disgusting than David Eddings' sexism. I mean, Mr. Card states

Already in several states, there are textbooks for children in the earliest grades that show "gay marriages" as normal. How long do you think it will be before such textbooks become mandatory -- and parents have no way to opt out of having their children taught from them?

And if you choose to home-school your children so they are not propagandized with the "normality" of "gay marriage," you will find more states trying to do as California is doing -- making it illegal to take your children out of the propaganda mill that our schools are rapidly becoming.

Who the hell decided that heterosexual people are normal? Probably the same assholes that decided that "white" is normal. I must say I love Mr. Card's ironic quotes around "gay marriage."

I can't believe that we're still arguing about these issues. People are people and they are attracted to who they are attracted to, and have the same human rights as everyone else. Why are we still "othering" people that don't fit the "norm" (see, I know how to use "quotes" as well, sir).

I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Many of our greatest authors were disgusting beyond their work: Shakespeare (if not a homosexual, then certainly homosocial) was racist (show me a work by him that isn't...seriously, I don't believe one exists); Chaucer was a rapist (not that I like Chaucer to begin with, but at least I can point that out every time someone wants to lavish him with praise); and James Joyce was anti-Semitic. And, I will not play favorites here: Baudelaire had a touch of the racism as well, though his favorite lover was black (it's a little creepy how he fetishized her body).

I don't understand why people act as if gay people sprouted from no where. I've met people who actually think it's a decision, and that it's only "gained in popularity" in the last 20 years or so.


Yeah, because gay people didn't exist until a decade ago. Tell that to the Romans, asshole.

Oh, and if the majority got its way every damn time, I doubt we would have anything remotely resembling progress. Orson Scott Card points out that

These judges are making new law without any democratic process; in fact, their decisions are striking down laws enacted by majority vote.

Well, maybe the majority isn't always right. Civil Rights Movement, anyone?

Stop Using Wikipedia

I'm sick of people siting Wikipedia--for anything. Wikipedia is not an authoritative site; the information is not peer reviewed, meaning that what you're reading could be inaccurate. In fact, there are people who make a hobby out of changing random articles in Wikipedia, changing dates and "facts." Most professors I've come across wouldn't accept Wikipedia as a reliable source, because IT ISN'T.

So look elsewhere for credible information, especially when you need to reinforce a point you've made.

Finished The Dreamers

Okay, so I just finished The Dreamers and thought I would post a mini-review of it (well, mini-ish). Basically, I couldn't wait to finish it, but since I had already started it I figured I would just finish it, and when I did my reaction was exclaiming "Finally" as I chucked it across the room. How is this a best-seller?? I mean, it's exactly like the previous books David (and Leigh) Eddings has written. And by the time I got to the end, it was a deus ex machina, basically a big "Fuck you, none of this happened after all, haha," to the readers because the gods went back in time and prevented all of the events ever happening. So I ask, WHY EVEN WRITE THE BOOK IN THE FIRST PLACE? If you're going to spend the time to write a story only to take it back by the end, why even bother? Oh wait, you want your money. So now, David Eddings, you have become the Dean Koontz of fantasy. I once would have worshiped you, but now you've pissed me off.

I encourage people to stay away from The Dreamers, since if you have already read The Belgariad or The Redemption of Althalus you've essentially already read The Dreamers. I can't believe I made it through: the prose was uninventive, the characters were the same old reused ones we've seen before, and the story line was the same: start at point A, achieve point B--but then wait!--never mind, I take it all back. I want to know who loved this series, and why. Seriously, if you loved this series, you tell me how it was amazing and best-seller worthy--how was it different from what David Eddings has already given us?

Meanwhile, I'm going to find something else to read, and hopefully it won't infuriate me.

The Sexism of David Eddings

Okay, so I am a huge fan of David (and Leigh) Eddings, but I’ve recently discovered some things about their work that has me outraged (and my personality loves it when I’m outraged, so here we go).

I’ve read almost everything by the Eddings’s (The Belgariad and Mallorean consisting of five books each, plus Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress, The Redemption of Althalus, and more recently the four books of The Dreamers, so you can safely say that I’m a devout follower of their work).

Being a feminist ultimately means that I cannot avoid tearing apart popular culture—which means I annoy my boyfriend pretty much every time we see a movie or watch a t.v. show because I like to point out sexist and racist rhetoric. So I will now vent in a blog. Hooray.

Anyway, as much as I love David Eddings, I have been reading The Dreamers and have noticed a pattern with the Eddings’ work. His female characters are pretty much the same. Polgara, Ara, Dweia—they’re all the same, just different names and hair color. Oh, way to go on making characters unique. But it gets worse. Much worse. These women are the most powerful characters in the stories, but the stories are never about them because even though they’re powerful, they’re somehow limited so that they still need a man to fulfill some prophecy, win some war, or whatever. These women are just there to protect and raise the men (basically mother figures), but when it comes to the real fight or work, the men step in. But wait, there’s more. These women are all described as stunning—they’re beauty is so great that men are willing to do the hard work for them, but their beauty is always partnered with their cooking skills. They are goddesses, mothers of the universe, and powerful sorceresses, but nothing can match their power over food! Any time one of the male characters notes the woman’s beauty, it is almost always followed by another male character complimenting her cooking. And I would say these comments appear quite often—just about every time the female in question makes an appearance to alert the men that dinner is ready.

The women characters also seem to follow structured gender roles (or assumptions) in the way they speak or act. I love the stories, but I have to roll my eyes every time one male character whines about how the women get together and talk about clothes and hair. Really?? There’s major shit happening in the world: bad people are threatening the West, the world could be destroyed, and invasions of bug-people must be stopped. WHY WOULD THE WOMEN CHAT ABOUT HAIR AND CLOTHES????? I think what makes it worse is that David Eddings’s wife, Leigh Eddings, co-writes some of these books, and consults on all of them. I wonder if she just ignores these things, or if she’s the one that says, “Hmmm, the men are hungry dear. Better have that powerful and fearsome sorceress whip up some dinner. Can’t save the world without a hot meal, now can we?”

I just got to a part of the fourth book in The Dreamers series, where the army was moving too slow, so the most powerful woman (creator of the gods and goddesses and planets, and the whole freakin’ universe) went ahead of the army and lured them up the mountains with smells of her food. Why not conjure up a lightning storm and zap some motivation into their slow asses? I mean, in the previous book she sent a flaming tornado through a gorge to torch the entire opposing army of bad people!

So, I ask, is David Eddings sexist, or is he of that older generation that grew up with set ways that cannot be changed, and is his wife in the same boat?

I cannot deny that the Eddings’s have been very influential to me, since I’ve been reading their books for years, but I’ve reached a point where I read one of their books now and stop and think how I could make it better, stronger, less sexist, more empowering, and overall a story that carries more depth. As much as I love the stories, I feel that each one has the same characters (even the men follow the same patterns of tough leaders—and they all have the same voice and sense of humor—it gets really tedious after awhile. It’s similar to reading a Piers Anthony novel of Xanth; I mean, we all love the puns, but there are so many that we can’t help rolling our eyes after awhile). I’m certainly not trying to discourage anyone from reading these books, but please tell me I’m not the only person annoyed by this.

I just find it all irritating. Thank god for China Miéville, right? If there is sexism, I can’t tell. All his characters are individuals, and just when you think there might be a pattern, Miéville changes it up until you can’t predict anything. Now that’s a writer.

I have yet to read The Elenium, and I’m hoping it will redeem their credibility. I just wish they could break the mold, but so far they all follow the same formula.

If the writers most famous in the fantasy genre are ones with these sorts of gender roles, how am I going to survive? Piers Anthony is another one: in Zombie Lover the men are continually mesmerized by the power of boobs, usually to the point where they can’t speak until the boobs are concealed. Give me a fucking break.

Questions and comments are appreciated and encouraged. I’m stuck here and am dying to have an intellectual conversation with someone.