Why 35?

Source: Why 35?

This give me hope for my own meagre ramblings

What does ‘wolf’ mean?

I used to write about wolves a lot as a kid. I used to write a lot as a kid, period, and I loved it, but I always felt I could never quite escape the stereotypes and expectations of the culture I was in (I didn’t articulate it that clearly of course – or at all, really, I just felt there was something I was missing, or that was missing me, and I kept on struggling to nail down my amorphous feelings of dysphoria and perfection… but that’s another story altogether).

So there were wolves, and castles, and magic and luxuriant green forests in my stories – all Northern hemisphere narrative elements, nothing more local or familiar, because I hadn’t yet begun to appreciate the place I was in, back then.

Lately I have been re-writing a few of these old stories, and the whole process of looking back to those stories and seeing myself as I was, through the lens of the story itself, is rather a revealing and interesting one. At the same time, I have been noticing a large number of recently published books seem to have something to with wolves.

And so I got to thinking about what a wolf is – not its biology or taxonomy, but what it means to people, to cultures and individuals. I was prompted to consider this in particular after hearing Sarah Hall speak about wolves and her newly released book The Wolf Border on Radio National’s Books and Arts program.

So what is a wolf, really? Right down in the roots of culture, and even genetic memory, or the monkey hind-brain, what does ‘wolf’ mean? And what has it come to mean, since they have almost disappeared from the ordinary world, and from the forefront of experience?

1. A wolf is loyal, and even noble. These are elements that have long been attributed to the wolf, not just to the nature of a wolf, but to what wolf means. Would an individual wolf display characteristics that a human observer might construe to be consistent with the human ideals of nobility and honour? Maybe so, but not for the same reasons that are concurrently attributed to such behaviours – for it isn’t only the recognisable behaviour in a wolf that is esteemed, it is also the belief in the underlying nature driving the wolf that humanises these ideals.
2. A wolf is physically beautiful, or perhaps more accurately, wonderful – in the truest sense of the word. Its body and its movement through the world cause wonder, and awe, in those who see it. Does the wonder and awe stem from an underlying fear of the predatory force, and from a desire to study the threat in order to better be able to beat it? Maybe. Or maybe it is more ingenuous than that – the simple wonder at something which is perfected.
3. A wolf is powerful, and dangerous. A wolf pack might present these factors, but I’m not sure if there are many, or indeed any, of the ancient variety of wolf alive anymore – the one of nightmare and horror-movie, of giant size, well-fed and horrifying for their sheer might and size, even before powerful jaws and ravenous appetites, and speed beyond comprehension, are even considered. A wolf is, however, still and always, a predator. This is something that our monkey-brains might never forget. A predator is danger, a predator is a powerful source of fear, and the presence of a predator – if not the actual predator itself – must be respected if survival is to be achieved.

I begin to think about the way in which The Beast, from the Disney film Beauty and the Beast, was created as a composite of forms, not all of which were modelled on predators, but which were all taken from elements of actual animals, and mashed together into a rather pleasing whole. Was he recognisably a predator? I think not, though some of his elements of form were taken from predatory animals. The only obvious aspect that might be perceived as predatory are the prominent tusks protruding beyond his lips from the lower jaw, but they are not in fact based on a predator but on a wild boar. And it is this that I begin to consider alongside the thought of creating a new kind of predatory animal, a form that can be free from the assumptions and cultural preconceptions that surround the wolf, but which can also retain some of those elements as well.

And then I begin also to think about the construct of the werewolf in the film Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. That is recognisably a dangerous and ferocious form, but it achieves this sense not simply through resemblance to a wolf-like predator, but because it is in fact more recognisably humanoid. Its long limbs, and occasional ability to walk upright, are what make it even more fearsome than an ordinary wolf. This is nearer to what I would like to achieve.

But considering this particular form, I also find myself wondering if such a creature can be admirable, even lovable, in some way – because it’s important to have the wolf-like character be something that a reader can relate to, in order to believe that the character might actually be able to do so, too. Or is that important, after all?

As I wrote that, I suddenly wondered, is it really important for it to be lovable, or is it actually more important that it be a horrific thing, making a path for the story to become more compelling in the extremity of difference between the man and the beast?

And so I have been trying to imagine an animal that is everything that people perceive a wolf to be, but which is not a wolf – a made-up creature that fulfils the role of a wolf in a fantasy tale, but which is freed from all the expectations that encumber the idea of ‘wolf’. I wonder what will come of this.

A page worth reading is this Live Science contribution about wolf types etc.:   http://www.livescience.com/27909-wolves.html

Link to interview with Sarah Hall on Radio National’s Books and Arts Dailey program: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/booksandarts/sarah-hall27s-novel-the-wolf-border/6430958

Link to the image of Disney’s Beast: http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/26600000/Animals-making-beast-up-beauty-and-the-beast-26646589-570-570.jpg

The werewolf from the film Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban: http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070918120817/harrypotter/images/4/4b/Werewolf.jpg

Also the a link to the scene in the same film on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-agTClDfpcQ

Feminism is Not Skin-Deep

During a conversation with S. last night, over a small dram of single malt, we got to talking about feminism, as we so often do. I held forth on the nature and reality of being undermined so constantly and consistently that is becomes a normal way of being. And it occurred to me that even with my writer’s imagination, and my salvation[1] through feminism, I still find it difficult to imagine what a world would look or feel like where equality reigned. Every thought and assumption, in the process of building such an imaginative world, must necessarily be questioned. Would this or that happen? Would this or that be necessary, or problematic? How would that person or character be, having never had to contend against assumed inferiority (or superiority, for that matter) based on genitalia and chromosomes? How would buildings be designed? How would books and technologies and education differ from what we know as normal? And so on, and on, and on. These are just the questions that immediately present themselves, and barely represent a scratching of the surface of thoughts and questions that swim about in my imaginative universe (yes, it’s as intense as it sounds).

Considering this endless body of questions that surface while forming an imagined alternative to this reality, it becomes blatantly apparent that feminism is not just a necessity for women, it is a necessity for the whole world! Because the sheer endlessness of the questions points to the fact that holding down one sex in favour of another[2] permeates every element and level of existence. When a system of belief has dictated how everything has played out, at every level of existence, for so long, then any change can only be effective if it permeates every level also. For feminism to become, it must first be imagined, and in order to imagine, the questioning must be robust, brave and ongoing.

[1] I almost hesitated to use the word ‘salvation’ due to its unpleasant religious overtones, but that is what feminism has been to be – a way of being and thinking that has saved me from my own past, and the shit-tsunami of emotional baggage that left in its wake! So yes – feminism has been, and continues to be, my salvation. Because religion doesn’t have the monopoly on rescuing people from themselves.

[2] Yes, I realise there are numerous genders, but for the expediency of this particular element of my argument, I am using the linguistically dual descriptor. I am adding this note here as both an acknowledgment and to emphasise my point: that feminism is for the benefit of everyone.

The Undermining of Mothers

It occurred to me this morning that modern mothers are expected to function on par with CEOs. Expectations of success are relentless, as they would be for any CEO, and are fired from every corner of existence, yet at the same moment as these expectations are poured on our heads, for every mother, undermining forces are also at play – continuously, ubiquitously, in pictures and sounds and voices, in unspoken actions, in the very fabric of modern reality.

Consider this reality, and then imagine how a CEO (probably a male, probably white) of a large and relatively successful, possibly marginally dysfunctional company would function under similar forces, both of expectation and of constant undermining. Because the undermining element of this scenario does not exist in anything like a similar ratio for those CEOs, and yet mothers are expected to succeed under these dual pressures – the expectation of success, and the expectation of failure.

How is this possible? How can anyone hope to come off best, or even in one metaphorical piece, when impossible expectations are set out, and you are told, at every intake of breath, that you will fail, that you have already failed, and that you are virtually subhuman for failing?

And, it can’t be ignored, this mothering work is unpaid – but that’s a whole other story!

It begins here, finally

I find myself staring at the screen one more time, and feeling the same fear bubbling up in me – what do I write? There are other sub-questions to this one, of course, like ‘what if people’ think I am an idiot?’, ‘what if I look back at this later and realise it’s terrible?’, and even ‘what do I write, anyway?’ That seems the most fraught, in fact – what do I write that really gives a sense of who and what I am? There are so many options, and all of them have some degree of danger attached to them. Not leaping-off-a-cliff danger, but worse – humiliation danger! Horror of horrors.

All the usual fears surface, amongst the bubbles of self-doubt, and even loathing. But they are just the same fears and bubbles, and they are as insubstantial as air, once examined. Under scrutiny, in fact, with their veil of plain words stripped off, they are just blobs, in the shape of a wedge perhaps, or a brake pedal – some kind of clichéd metaphor that indicates their true nature, which is as a means to putting a stop to anything that is confronting or challenging.

There, I hope you like my first bout of inward-facing pop-psychology – I’m sure it will be the first of many, as self-examination seems to be my primary method of getting the words out of my head and onto a page somewhere. There will be more, but for now, I have finally begun.

I wonder, how many blogs begin this way, as some form of a mad dash, head-down, sidestepping the self-doubt and rushing forward into something which might not be particularly good, but at least it’s there, finally, and (kind of) irretrievably? Any thoughts, I shout into the dark area between me and some possible ‘you’? I’d like to hear how others begin, and if it is as scary for you as it has been for me.

Until soon, this has been ‘me’.