flight paths discussion

vampire stories: what's the reason for their intense & (it seems to me) overlong popularity at the moment? What metaphor are people struggling to find or using it to express?
What does it mean about us that the dead are more interesting than the live, what message do we want to force them to yield? Do we feel our blood has been drained from us?

Do our young really want in some sense to marry the dead?

And what this zombie stuff about?

this question articulated by Ellie, thanks

well before this vampire craze started, I was hired as a background extra, to play a zombie. In both cases, there was extensive hair and makeup damage done to me and at the end of that process, no question, I was UGLY.
Its always puzzled me, this current vampire glam.

Has the original myth been romanticized or perverted, so that evil is can be seen as good?

Magdelanye wrote: "Could it be that I have offended possibly everyone else in this group who love Stephen King and Anne Rice? I have noticed that many of you like thrillers, horror, and vampire stuff."
HRO replied
I wasn't offended by your earlier comment about Stephen King, but I do feel a need to say something. It drives me completely bonkers that people think of King as someone who writes hack horror crap. These are usually people who either (1) never read anything King wrote or only read some of his worst work and/or (2) also think M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs" is about aliens.

The "ghoulies and ghosties and long legged beasties" in King's best books aren't there just to provide shock and gore. They are always symbolic of something deeper - something unexplored and unsaid, something painful and ugly. They are representative of the dark side of the human soul, our hiddenness and fear of being known, and how all of us kinna see the world as the monster lurking 'neath the bed.

King is also the most amazing storyteller I have ever read. I love his worlds and his characters, and the amazing way he uses words to describe them. Whenever I finish a King book, I always feel homesick for awhile...like I've been taken away from the place and the people that I most love.

Ann said:I think Stephen King is one of the most gifted writers around. Having said that, I've only read 3 or 4 of his books because he scares the bejesus out of me. I agree with Royal Orangeness that it's not "hack horror", it's something deeper than that. You live in his world. I don't remember a lot of what I read, but King's books stay with me.

I cannot even begin to conjecture what the appeal is for other readers. For me, it's all about the symbolism, which I stated in my message about Stephen King. It's a way of acknowledging and grappling with hidden fears and the dark places of the soul, but in an oblique manner. Only truly gifted authors (like Stephen King and Anne Rice) can do this with horror, however. Other authors (like Dean Koontz) are simply trying to scare you to pieces.

Her Royal Orangeness wrote: "I cannot even begin to conjecture what the appeal is for other readers. For me, it's all about the symbolism.... It's a way of acknowledging and grappling with hidden fears and the dark places of the soul..."

It is all so subjective, as you suggest.
Surely my aversion to horror as a genre is influenced by the fact that there was a real serial killer in our neighbourhood, who killed women I knew; that someone was stabbed to death in the park across the street two weeks ago; that my 2nd cousin, a dentist from the suburbs with 3 young children, was killed by a terrorist bomb; and that I have myself witnessed and experienced more violence than I ever need to revisit...I have enough horror in my life to ever want to read about it.

I grapple with my dark side through dance and art and reading material that takes a less oblique approach, like Care of the Soul AND reading science fiction, and getting drunk at least once every change of seasonn

Musing: Maybe the monsters in the real world are exactly why some people need them in books? They need to read that the monsters can be defeated? Good triumphs over evil, always?

In real life, Just had a blood test, for me that is scary - in my top 3 fear factor list.

Her Royal Orangeness wrote: "Musing: Maybe the monsters in the real world are exactly why some people need them in books? They need to read that the monsters can be defeated? Good triumphs over evil, always?"

Thats a good thought.
But it doesn't explain why zombies have so thoroughly permeated worldwide culture, books, movies, games, even parades of zombies.

Could this have something to do with the awakening of the mass mind to its condition in a consumer society? Shaking off the deadness and reaching for love.....

Ice wrote: "In real life, Just had a blood test, for me that is scary - in my top 3 fear factor list."

I'm right there with you for that one,& right beside that is the dentist.When I am in the dentists chair in a few hours I will pretend that it is not real life and meditate myself into a fantasy world in an attempt to transcend the sordid transaction going on in my mouth.

Hope your blood is good, not too cold.

I finally gave in to pain & made a dentist's appointment on Thursday.

Now I have to actually go.

I think I'd rather face a vampire. :(

Paradoxically I don't mind the Dentist, I have more of an irrational concern over seeing the doctor. Perceiving that I am never ill (except Man flu apparently)

I've evaded Vampire's so far, not even sure I have read the original Dracula but I have been to Whitby several times, and due there again in early September.

As for my blood, it was effervescent today, but probably still too full of glucose :-(

Thanks Judy.

I've actually been puzzling over the vamp appeal for a while. I liked the writing on Buffy & David Boreanaz as Angel (as well as the humor in that series) but I'm lost as to the general appeal. I feel those 2 series + the original Dracula is probably enough vamp for my lifetime.

Ice wrote: "Paradoxically I don't mind the Dentist, I have more of an irrational concern over seeing the doctor....

Well Ice my dad was a doctor and I hardly ever got to see him....

Thanks everybody for being such a nice distraction while I endured the procedure. I had quite a detailed fantasy that led us over a swaying rope ladder high above a remote canyon accessed through a warehouse that I entered every time that drill went on. I was dreading at least a month of awkward and painful sessions, but it looked worse than it was, he was able to do all right then and there and I now have a nice new front tooth.
seems ironic that over the short span of this discussion mfront tooth broke into a curving fang.

this conversation on vampires has become snagged at the dentist. I.m not sure thats something that vampires do

Good use of the word "snagged" Magdelanye (as in snaggle tooth-dentist-vampire fangs). Ties it all together!

Sometimes watching Buffy with my daughter, I'd turn to her and just say, You do know that vampires are supposed to be bad. That it's not supposed to be a good thing to be.

Let alone something to marry into! I keep telling my children they need to marry "up"-gene pool-wise that is! Vampires would be like, null-gene-pool.

I also say, We're Catholics. You can only like vampires up to a point.

I'm not sure if that's true but it works for me.

My daughter & I were discussing today (we went to Montauk Beach-3 hours driving each way but fabulous!) how we prefer more internalized stories: ghosts & vampires being completely externalized evils. That can be fun sometimes, but not as a steady diet. It's more interesting what our psychological ghosts are, what drains our life forces from within us than the dangers outside.

Sometimes, it's a relief to pretend all the enemies are outside us. But it's more interesting to see what we do to ourselves-and there are possibilities for resolution.

Of course, I'm all about resolutions and redemptions. You can only be redeemed from your own self. That's the heart of stuff for me.

Ellie said>>It's more interesting what our psychological ghosts are, what drains our life forces from within us than the dangers outside.

I so agree, but also I think we cant just ignore the enemies of freedom as they encroach upon our space.
And dont you think we can be redeemed of our resolutions?

Yes. I hope so.

And I agree: there are real enemies outside us to be defeated. I just find the internal enemies more interesting, especially in fiction.