From: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org (stillpt-digest) To: stillpt-digest@smoe.org Subject: stillpt-digest V2 #153 Reply-To: stillpt@smoe.org Sender: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk stillpt-digest Monday, July 17 2000 Volume 02 : Number 153 Today's Subjects: ----------------- b/comments7/16 ["Donald G. Keller" ] o/stevens ["Donald G. Keller" ] b/vampnotes ["Donald G. Keller" ] b/klhmemo ["Donald G. Keller" ] b/Eliza Dushku [allenw ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2000 23:56:37 -0400 (EDT) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: b/comments7/16 I want to second Meredith's recommendation of that "alternative exegesis" of "Restless"; it's at least as long and at least as thorough as mine, and it's absolutely fascinating to see how many things one of us took for granted that the other one didn't even pick up on. Can't say I'm surprised, when we're dealing with such a complex work of art. I'm planning to reread it more carefully and get in touch with the writer. And thanks to David for the pointer to the =Salon= review of =Harry Potter=; the reference to "Becoming" certainly makes me more interested in reading the book. I bought the first of the series in paperback and got about three-quarters through before being sidetracked, but thought it was certainly good enough to read the rest of the series...when I get around to it. Berni: Bullseye! in re applying the "4 character schema" to =Harry Potter=; and yes, the schoolmaster would be in the Giles position. Now you know the way I've been thinking these last couple years. And I really liked your phrase about Slayerhood being "a form of grace." David: I'm glad you shared your reaction to "Becoming"; feel free to discuss any other ones as you see them. (The Scelsi joke about "I Only..." made me laugh, of course. But what did you think of what I see as a really clever episode?) I still don't see the distinction you're making between the torture scenes in "Becoming" and "Five by Five." But we've been over this before. (Oh, =that= Maslovian hierarchy. Just ran across it in a book I bought yesterday.) Just to reiterate/summarize about "Becoming": Evil Angel is probably Boreanaz' finest hour(s) in either of the series. Up until the last minute Buffy hoped to restore Angel's soul and save him; but she agreed with Xander (as in the scene at Giles' in "Passion"--have you seen that one?) that, failing soul restoration, she was going to have to kill Angel. She did =not= know that Willow was going to try the spell again from her hospital bed, because Xander deliberately =did not tell her=. (This has never been a bone of contention between them because it's never come up; as we see in "Faith, Hope, and Trick," Buffy can barely bring herself to talk about the situation, and probably has never discussed it since with either Xander or Willow; she may not even know that Willow told Xander to tell her, and Willow may not know that Xander =didn't= tell her.) And, as others have said, by the time Angel's soul was restored, it was too late: the gate to Hell was opening, and she had to "kill" Angel (his blood was necessary to close it up again, we've never been told why). Plausibly, if there had been time, Angel may never have had to go to Hell...but there wasn't time. I've got a note here to agree with you (don't remember the context) about Sherlock Holmes being a new archetype. Or new version of an old archetype; I think there may be orders and degrees of archetypes--I still haven't got it absolutely clear. I think Jung might say that Holmes is a particularly vivid version of the "wise old man" archetype (Merlin, Giles, etc. etc.), but the detective is slightly different from that...it's similar to how I think the vampire is a recent (17th century?) archetype, although the devouring monster is much more basic than that. It's a complicated subject, what with Jung's writing scattered through so many large books, his detractors arguing with their (possibly limited or mistaken) understanding of what he meant, and his followers thoughtfully pulling the idea (which they seem to understand) more into line with later understanding of brain function. Re the Jeff Pruitt matter...I never got around to commenting here on his little fairytale, which was very sobering indeed, and a remarkable piece of work ("the fatherless princess"!!). One hates to find one's heroes have feet of clay. But just as interesting is this other set of remarks of his; he really does seem to have a God complex about fight scenes. I hate to tell him that to me =Buffy= isn't an action show at all, and that on rewatching episodes I tend to fast-forward through the fights (though not the one in "Revelations," which still impresses me). (This is why I don't have the problem with the stunt doubles Berni and Meredith were discussing; obviously I'm not paying close enough attention. Which is fine by me.) My two cents about =Xena=: I probably watch, oh, a third to a half of the episodes in any given season, and enjoy most of them quite a bit (though often with an "Isn't this ridiculous?" attitude). I'm not as fascinated as many are by the Xena/Gabrielle relationship, but I think they do a good job with it. I thought the Hindu episodes (something I know a little bit about) were done very well, and with respect. I tend to like the Faith-equivalent characters (Callisto and now Eve)--doubtless just because I have a weakness for shadow- stuff--and I'm frequently boggled by the (probably unwitting) parallels between the two shows. Meredith would be able to explain in more detail how the end of the corresponding =Xena= season closely matched the end of =Buffy='s second season. So I don't like =Xena= as much as =Buffy=, and don't feel I'm missing out when I don't watch it, but I do enjoy it somewhat. (=X- Files= falls in between: I see nearly every episode, like most of them, but still don't quite have the fascination I do for =Buffy=.) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2000 23:58:34 -0400 (EDT) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: o/stevens Wanted to note a really excellent book I just found by accident (cheap, too!) called =Private Myths: Dreams and Dreaming= by Anthony Stevens. I had known Stevens' name already: he's a Jungian who has written two books, =Jung= (short) and =On Jung= (medium) about the man himself, and a number of books on psychoanalysis. I wasn't aware of this book, though, but a quick glance had me reaching for my meager cash, because it's a book I need right now. In a modest 350 pages, it ambitiously attempts to outline the history of dream-analysis from =Gilgamesh= on down (something it took Freud hundreds of pages to do), followed by a long chapter on Freud, Jung, and their followers; then a chapter putting together the latest neurobiological dream research with psychoanalytical evidence (something he notes has not really been done before), and then move into dream analyisis itself, including some famous dreams (Hitler, Descartes, etc.). Very sensibly written: he's very critical of Freud (though he gives him credit for some things), and mildly critical of Jung (who didn't know =quite= enough biology). And already (I've only read part of it so far) I've found several bits that can be folded into my dream essay (which is still inching along). Tomorrow's research: Stevens mentions a book called =The Alchemy of Discourse= (wonderful title!) by Paul Kugler that reportedly deals with language, Freud, Lacan, etc. Maybe I don't need to write that essay after all... ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2000 00:01:18 -0400 (EDT) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: b/vampnotes This is basically a note to myself, since it answers a question I had, but I thought it might be of more general interest. Found in the library =The Vampire: A Casebook= (University of Wisconsin Press, 1998) edited by Alan Dundes, a very distinguished folklorist, and as I hoped its initial essay, "The History of the Word =Vampire=" by Agnes Murgoci, gave some evidence towards when the vampire became a part of the European imagination (since it clearly did not exist as we understand it now in Renaissance alchemy). As far as she can discern, the word entered the European languages =roughly= about 1700, give or take a decade or so. (The best guess is that the original word is Bulgarian, or other Slavic language.) She states that the =OED= earliest citation is wrong, having found an instance (metaphorical, no less! "Vampires of the Publick") written in 1688. But this sort of thing can be dodgy to pin down. But it does seem that the concept was not a general European archetype until the demise of Hermeticism (that blanket term) and the rise of scientific thinking. Also of interest is Dundes' closing essay, "The Vampire as Bloodthirsty Revenant: A Psychoanalytic Post Mortem," which he admits is a frankly Freudian approach to what vampires "mean." Basically, being dead means being dry and thirsty (a pretty sensible surmise), though he extrapolates rather far and at length from this. But he does cite "two specific characteristics...which I believe any persuasive theory of the vampire must account for." One of them is that according to legend the vampire first returns to attack his/her own family; certainly this applies to =Buffy= and Angel's oft-cited history. The other is the idea that vampires sometimes drink milk instead of blood. This is =not= =Buffy=-relevant...but it does relate to that weird proto-vampiric image from alchemy of the maiden suckling the green lion (substituting for Christ and the unicorn) while drinking blood from his side. Which is also closely related to the oft- reproduced alchemical illustration of the green lion taking a bite out of the sun, with blood dripping down. Weird stuff, symbology. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2000 00:04:39 -0400 (EDT) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: b/klhmemo Memo to Mr. Houghton (in the third person): As frequently happens Mr. Houghton has managed to express himself in so hyperreferential and impacted a fashion that even the academics he disdains are not more hermetic. I find myself once again somewhat at a loss as to his meaning, especially his cited "de Lint factor." It =is= clear, especially from his list of reasons for excusing =Buffy= its flaws, that he is much more of the "Freudian" than the "Jungian" persuasion (I'll keep those terms in quotes, as he did with his "factor," to indicate their provisionality), since said list accords with Anthony Stevens' description of Freud's belief that it was "always the worst possible explanation of our behaviour that came nearest to the truth" (p. 336) And through a glass, darkly, I can dimly perceive that in the hands of such commentators "de Lint" =approximately= translates as "watered down Jungian fantasy." But I invite Mr. Houghton's amplification and elaboration. I also note that all of his factors are distinctly =nonliterary=; we've been through this argument before, and I'll state plainly that the =primary= virtues of =Buffy= are literary: the strength of the writing. That's fundamental, and everything else (acting, production, nonliterary values) would collapse without it. And one more important factor: despite its explicit "Freudian" elements, =Buffy= is primarily "Jungian" fantasy, and the power of many episodes (of which "Restless," especially the desert climax, is a prime example) is pure numinousness--and numinousness is a quality, a register, to which the "Freudian" commentator seems entirely deaf--very much in the way that I am deaf to the enchantments of major key. (P.S. On the offchance anybody thinks I'm flaming Ken: this is an old game between us, and Ken's big enough to take it.) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2000 00:04:46 -0500 (CDT) From: allenw Subject: b/Eliza Dushku The aforementioned Eliza Dushku movie may be "Bye Bye Love" (1995). I haven't seen it, but there's lots of refernces to it on Buffy sites since: 1: It starred Eliza Dushku (aka Faith); 2: It featured Amber Benson (aka Tara) as a friend of Eliza's character; 3: It also featured Lindsay Crouse (aka Prof. Walsh). - -Allen ------------------------------ End of stillpt-digest V2 #153 *****************************