There Are Tigers In Ireland?

This week’s reading was a mixture of sadness, unfortunate events, and powerfulness. The Gathering is a book that I remember looking at two years ago while browsing for books at my local library, and it’s so strange that I came across it again in this class. I thought that the options we had to write about for this blog were interesting, and I thought that for this week I would do some historical research (since I never choose that option) and see what I could find that pertains to this story.

I decided to look up Celtic Tiger and found that Celtic Tiger is actually a term that describes a time of supreme growth economically, which occurred between 1995 and 2007 in Ireland. When I read this it mildly shocked me that this was quite recent---more recent than I had predicted. We have been studying novels and excerpts from texts that date back, well, further than two years ago and so it was a nice surprise to know that I have been alive during this time when this occurred! One other interesting thing I found was the real meaning behind the term Celtic Tiger. The term stemmed from the supreme growth of tigers in East Asia from the late 80’s to early 90’s. This represented the same growth but with economical facets in Ireland. I’m not a big economics fanatic nor do I fully understand the topic but I know that the economy always has a cycle, and once you reach the top, the next step is to decline (like we are in right now) and Ireland did that in 2009. Recently this past February, a report commented that the money in Ireland wasn’t invested intelligently or efficiently, and now they are worse off than they were before the boom. Now other countries (seeing Ireland’s mistake and having all the potential Ireland had before the Celtic Tiger) claim that they are capable of creating the same sort of Celtic Tiger phenomenon, except by removing the name Tiger and putting another type of big cat or animal in its place (like Scotland using the term Lion.)

The aftermath of this situation looks grim. Exclusive people have been describing the outlook of Ireland’s economic situation as poor, bleak, and dire. However, they are at least not the only country in the world experiencing this sort of economic downfall and turmoil. When the economy does it’s cycle, the whole world is involved and things eventually take their place and resume once again. However, with the growing world and development of stronger countries, who knows WHEN that will be.

In relation to material items and the value of things, the Celtic Tiger really was a big change for Ireland’s possession of wealth. In the stories we have read in class, almost all of the characters were far from being well-off. But what’s interesting about the stories is that most of the characters (at least the main characters) preferred non-materialistic things over materialistic things. For example, in Carmilla, all that Carmilla desired was Laura. And the people of Ireland endured tough hardships like the plague and the Irish potato famine, but still found beauty and pride in their country. In Dorian Gray, the desire wasn’t material, it was to be forever youthful, or to preserve his age. In Portrait of the Artist, the main goal was finding oneself, not having all the riches in the world or anything like that. And finally in Breakfast, all Pussy really longed for was a family and a sense of belonging (although a cute pair of shoes wouldn’t hurt!) For Veronica in The Gathering, her main goal was just finding out the reason of things---finding out what drove her brother to kill himself, and uncovering the rest of her family’s secrets. It just goes to show that although Ireland wasn’t a wealthy country, through its stories you can find solace in non-materialistic things, and you don’t need those things in order to be happy, and I think this message is subliminally or maybe intentionally brought out in many of the novels we have read so far this semester.

Literary Criticism on Lacanian Pussy

Lit Crit. On Lacanian Pussy

*So, this week I’m happy to report that I’m feeling somewhat better and am caught up with my work. Although doing a literary analysis on “Lacanian Pussy” wasn’t the easiest job in the world (especially in terms of keeping my focus!), I managed to get it done. I wasn’t exactly expecting to incorporate so much psychology information in my essay but I also didn’t expect “Lacanian Pussy” to have so many psychological references in it! Though I am taking a psychology class online, it is way less advanced than the terms mentioned in this piece. So although it may seem a bit scatterbrained and unsure, I did my best.*

With the numerous mentions of “Lacanian psychoanalysis” throughout this piece, I decided to first look up the definition of that. I found that Lacanian psychoanalysis is the theory and clinical practice of psychoanalyst James Lacan. James Lacan brings us back to Freud and Carmilla, but goes even further on the road of bizarre. Like Sigmund Freud, James Lacan’s work is based mainly on the unconscious and the ego (id, ego, and superego). It also features something called the “castration complex,” which I found was by definition: the fear of emasculation literally and metaphorically. There are also notable ideas which are talked about in the article that Lacan came up with himself. These include The Real, The Symbolic, The Imaginary, and the Mirror Stage. The discussion of “Breakfast on Pluto” doesn’t really start until the mentioning of Lacanian psychoanalysis, and up until then Peter Mahon discusses Irish culture, history, and background in context to other Irish films and novels of the time.

When he begins mentioning “Pluto,” he states, “What is perhaps unique about Breakfast on Pluto is that its exploration of the psycho-dynamics of the Troubles is suggestive of the concepts and techniques of Lacanian psychoanalysis.” He mentions the Troubles in this statement, which are another term for the period of ethno-political issues dating from 1960-1998.He then continues with an in depth explanation of the relationship of Lacanian psychoanalysis and the novel. It is in this paragraph where most of his analysis is stated, so I wanted to further dissect both this paragraph and the novel to state my analysis. Before I do that though, Mahon also mentions something called “The rhetoric of sameness.” I had to research what exactly he meant by that, and couldn’t really pin point anything. So, I broke down the saying and translated “rhetoric” into “persuasive speech” and “sameness” into “similarity”. I am not sure if Mahon meant a deeper meaning of “rhetoric of sameness” but what I got from it is considering males and females as ‘one’ or ‘the same.’ But I am not completely sure since I couldn’t find a good definition or explanation of it on the internet. What I did find was a use of that phrase while comparing a strong-willed female to a male, so I had to take a guess on what it really meant.

Mahon continues the paragraph with, “The text's exploration of the Troubles in this manner makes it possible to see how the rhetoric of sameness is not only indebted to Lacanian psychoanalysis, but is also, as a result, shaped by the phallo-centric politics of authoritarianism that restricts the formulation of desire and the signifier as developed in Lacan's work. In the place of this politically charged, authoritarian, and phallocentric rhetoric of sameness, Breakfast on Pluto offers the reader an alternative, non-phallic mode of intervening in the discourse of sameness and political violence.” Now, back to the psychological part of the analysis. To further understand Lacanian psychoanalysis, Mirror Stage needs to be further explained. The Mirror Stage is Lacan’s first real contribution to his work, and it “describes the formation of the Ego via the process of objectification, the Ego being the result of feeling dissension between one's perceived visual appearance and one's perceived emotional reality.” (Wiki7) This is also known as alienation. This is seen in the book with Pussy’s cross-dressing and desire to be a woman. There is a deeper and more elaborate explanation of the Mirror Stage, but it doesn’t immediately pertain to neither the book or Mahon’s piece, so I’m not going to divulge into it. The three orders are also part of Lacanian psychoanalysis, but I don’t feel that it is necessary to understanding this novel; technically, you could apply any amount of psychology on this piece and every psychoanalyst or psychologist will have some sort of explanation of what goes on in the book on a psychological level. However, Mahon writes an interesting paragraph concerning one of the orders, The Imaginary, which I found interesting. It reads, “For Lacan, the imaginary is the psychical site where the child's ego is formed through its identification with the bodily image that the child sees in either a mirror or another child (Ecrits, p.130). Once this idealized bodily image takes shape, it becomes what Lacan calls the 'semblable' or double--the 'other' that forevermore shapes, and simultaneously frustrates, the ego and its desire. (20) Because the ego is always exiled in the image of another, it is always marked with separation, alienation, and doubling, which in turns affects what the ego wants: T will always want what the 'other' has, not because T 'really' and 'truly' want it, but because the 'other' has or wants it.”

After reading this paragraph it has come to my knowledge that although Mahon has talked quite a bit about Lacanian psychoanalysis, he hasn’t really made any significant comparisons to “Breakfast on Pluto.” Did he describe perhaps why Pussy has a violently compulsive and obsessive relationship with finding his mother? He mentions it but never explains what realm of psychology could prove why he feels that way. Forgive me for writing in a “stream of consciousness”-like method here but as I read this piece I couldn’t really figure out who Mahon was trying to prove his theories to—the reader or himself? He does a fine job of explaining for instance what The Imaginary is and what Mirror Stage is but he never really explains how that relates to Breakfast On Pluto. I would have enjoyed this literary criticism piece a whole lot more if I saw more conclusions drawn between the novel and Lacanian psychoanalysis, and though I would draw those conclusions myself, I’m no psychologist. In other words, I am not really sure what the purpose of this piece was! I would love if anyone else held an explanation for me. Does anyone else have a guess or disagreement?

Works Cited

“Lacanian Psychoanalysis: Description”. Changing-minds.org. Web. 20 Apr. 2010.

http://changingminds.org/disciplines/psychoanalysis/articles/lacanian_psychoanalysis.htm

Clark, Robert. "Castration Complex". The Literary Encyclopedia. Web. 20 Apr 2010 http://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=1601

“Jacques Lacan”. Wikipedia. Web. 19 Apr 2010.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Lacan

Mahon, Peter. “Lacanian Pussy: towards a psychoanalytic reading of Patrick McCabe’s Breakfast on Pluto”. Web. 20 Apr 2010.
http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-172978392/lacanian-pussy-towards-psychoanalytic.html

I missed Breakfast this morning...Now onto my Creative Project..

So this week I have been sick with the flu and have been at home 3 hours away from campus. Needless to say I have fallen behind on work this week :/ so I haven't started Breakfast On Pluto yet, but I plan on going to the library once I feel better and will have a blog ready for next week.
Anyways, for my creative project I was thinking of doing a video-montage type thing maybe of Carmilla or Portrait or Dorian Gray. I think it would be interesting to re-create the sea scene in Portrait of the Artist, or the scene in Carmilla when they meet for the first (2nd) time. I still have to think about what exactly I'm going to do, but I know it will be some sort of video or picture. I love to express myself creatively and take advantage of every opportunity I have to do it. I know this blog is vague (not to mention, late!) and I apologize but this week has been no bueno for me. If anyone has any ideas they would like to pitch to me, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks!

Feed The Fish...Creative take on A Portrait

I LOVE doing creative work so I was excited when we got the opportunity to write about an epiphany in our own lives! Needless to say, I chose that option for this week’s reading. I never really told anyone this story before, because I hate reliving it and seeing the opportunity I had missed. Door County is an extremely small county composed of several small towns. The town I live in has the highest concentration of elderly people in the United States. Or at least that’s what’s been rumored. I tried my best to write this in the voice of James Joyce but found it very difficult considering two things: One, I am currently taking a blues poetry class and have been writing compositions for that class, so if this sounds poetic, that’s why and I apologize! And two, James Joyce does not write modernly, using words like cell phone or Hollywood. So it sounds sort of silly when I tried to make it sound like him. It also sounds silly how I wrote it in third person but that’s how A Portrait was written. Moreover, I hope you enjoy this story, and yes it is true!

It was crowded. Children, adults, elders packed the musty room, smelling of snow. December in Door County was never bare of that burden. However that was expected—that was wanted for the sheriff scene, outside of the town hall were those people were now waiting. The light was fading and they wrapped up filming, but not before one last take. Tony Shalhoub in his fake mustache and police jacket put on his character and finished, not a second too late when the sun disappeared. He gazed out at it as the director yelled “Cut!” and a small smiled crept across his face. Time for the next scene.

Inside the town hall, amidst people she’d seen many times in her life, sat a seventeen-year-old girl in a white and black plaid coat. Her hair hung low, styled in soft brown curls, and her hands fidgeted in her lap. Morgan was her name. She had lived in this town all of her life and never had she been graced with such an opportunity. Her heart had always longed for the film, trying out for plays, musicals and whatnot, hoping to play a different character in a different life; hoping to break free from a town full of the elderly and unmotivated. She saw a sign a few weeks prior for extras and suddenly there was hope again in her world. Even if it was the smallest contribution to something bigger than herself, she wanted to do it. So she had gotten out of her high school early on the day of the shoot, and made an appointment at the salon, the clients around her in for their monthly touch-ups. It may seem silly to some, but this was important to her…so important. When she was finished she headed down to the film spot, and waited, for five hours. Sometimes Hollywood runs the clock. And so she waited.

The drone of a fifty-year-old’s smoke-heavy voice woke her from her daze: “Alright people we’re ready to film the Christmas concert scene. Please keep your cellular phones OFF, not on vibrate. We are going to rearrange some seating now as well. Thanks for your patience.” The old wooden benches creaked and groaned with the removal and replacement of the people who were dressed the best. About fifty people in horrible holiday sweaters, puffy coats and festive dresses were moved around, one of them including Morgan. “We love your jacket, and want you to be in the focused shot,” a guy who looked like Ryan Dunn told her. She was moved from the back middle to the inside front; her stomach bubbled with blissful excitement. She smiled to herself. Although it was going to be only a shot from her back, she felt like she was on top of the world.

A few more preparations were made and then it was put into action. Ross Partridge ran in and down the town hall through the benches that were set up like pews. At the slam of the door, the audience members were to look back, confused, and Morgan did just that. During a break from that scene, the man who looked like Ryan Dunn checked on the extras and gave tips. When he got to her row, he touched her shoulder and said, “Nice job, that was perfect.” Needless to say she got butterflies again. And during another break after the shoot of the scene, with a camera positioned right next to her, Morgan struck up a conversation with the operator. The director was there too. She shyly mentioned that he looked like George Clooney, and he laughed, “Well I have gotten that before, I have to say. You know, you could be somebody.” And with that line Morgan was soaring. She should have told him how baldy she wanted to be an actress. She should have said how it was her dream. But instead she told herself no, for what reason she could not remember and said, “People have told me that I look like Leona Lewis…” Michael Matzdorff claimed that he wasn’t aware of who she was, smiled politely, and walked off to continue directing. It was as he was walking away that Morgan realized something. She just blew a possible chance to network a connection with a movie director. The one time when her town actually gets a movie filmed in it—the one opportunity she has to even have a chance at becoming known, she blows it.

At that moment, through the disappointment and disbelief, Morgan had an epiphany, and swore to never again let an important opportunity pass her up. She had held back from a lot of things in life that could have helped her get farther than she is today because she used excuses, was too lazy, or “didn’t feel like it” at the time. After the director walked away, filming only continued for twenty minutes, and then the extras were no longer needed. Michael Matzdorff disappeared into a private area, and Morgan was ushered out. She appeared in the movie, her back being the actress, but that moment still lives inside her. It has pushed her to make the most out of life today, and she now knows never to let such an opportunity pass her up again.

The movie is a small independent movie called Feed The Fish, and has not been released yet but should be relatively soon! J