Overheard at the dinner table

Every night, we go around the table and everyone says at least one good thing that happened that day. Fiona, uncharacteristically, wasn't able to come up with anything.

Rob: "Didn't you finish reading that fanfic story? Did you like it?"
Fiona (shrugging): "Meh. I've read it before."
Peg (eying her askance): "'Meh'? You're turning into. . ."
Fiona (brightly): A monosyllabic teenager?"

Rob and I cracked up.

Fiona: "How annoying that you can't be monosyllabic and use the word 'monosyllabic.' It has five syllables." (crosses her arms in mock teenager disgust).

Today's Wizard Rock Discovery

Oliver Boyd and the Remembralls. I have downloaded as .mp3 his first album and I am enjoying it to a truly absurd degree. Yes, I am that much of a geek. You can buy it, too, here at Soundclick. The band consists of one person: he does all parts of the music and singing himself.

Here's his MySpace page, where you can listen to more samples of his forthcoming album.

I've been brittle lately

And testy in this journal. Sorry. There's some unspoken stuff going on, but I really don't mean to take it out on you. Please don't take it personally. Love you, friendslist, and appreciate your support. Really.

Comments are disabled, not because I don't want to hear what you have to say, but because I want to emphasize that this is a message from me to you, rather than you having to reassure me.

WHERE IS MY BRAIN?

I am still trying to come up with a proposal for Fantasy Matters.

Okay, for once I really am looking for advice. Amazing, Peg's actually asking for advice! I just have to get them 250 words of a proposal by Friday, something that looks half-baked enough that they might actually accept it.

Hearts of flesh and stone. Gee, I want to do something about this, because I've been chewing over it for so long, but right now whenever I attempt to corral my thoughts on this, they scatter unhelpfully in all directions like skittering mice, refusing to coalesce. Perhaps its the lingering effect of anaesthesia on the brain. I'd prefer to think it's that, rather than rank stupidity. However, whatever the cause, the problem remains the same: I need to come up with something!

Thinking about: The Snow Queen (the mirror cracks, a piece of glass lodges in Kay's heart, making it cold and frozen). I could re-visit A.S. Byatt's essay "Ice, Snow, Glass" in Mirror, Mirror on the Wall which I ran across while researching the ice palace book, and it really impressed me at the at time. But then I'm kinda pissed with A.S. Byatt at the moment (see "A.S. Byatt and the Goblet of Bile").

I've been thinking of my earlier essays on Heart of Flesh/Heart of Stone. I'm thinking about the afterward to Tam Lin, which started my whole obsession with this subject (although pameladean said the book was about the study of literature, and how that prevents the heart of stone, rather than about fantasy per se. But why did she choose a fantasy to tell the story? Other than the fact that, duh, she's a fantasy writer?) I've been thinking about George MacDonald's "The Light Princess," which is kinda getting at sort of the same stuff, sideways (using "gravity" and tears as the metaphor for the stamp of humanity, rather than the heart of flesh). Can people name other stories or tales which feature a heart of stone, or that explore this dichotomy? Esp. fantasy stories? Here is a pretty cool story that gets at what I'm struggling to articulate: "The Girl With the Heart of Stone." I've talked about seeing the theme in fiction in general (i.e., in Austen and Dickens) but what does fantasy in particular have to say about this theme?

Throw me a lifeline, anybody, help! Any thoughts that this sparks in you. I'll be ever so touchingly grateful.

Peg, hopefully

Thank you, Friendslist! You're the best! I knew you would come through!

I am now feeling much more confident.

Love and kisses,
Peg