Writer in San Francisco, CA
These are words that have been stuck in my head for the last few days now.
Boiling,
the blood beneath the surface. And rage
that licks
the skin, enticing violence.
The bone breaks,
the blood spills
and the world becomes a
blur;
in your
blackest
hour.
If you are reading this, Thank You for taking time out of your day to read my writing! I hope you return in the future!
-Alina
This is a response to tmbenjamin10 ‘s suggested topic from my post National Poetry Month , “…I’ve been recently wondering and reading around the subject of phenomenology and its effect on how we treat the body in poetry. Please feel free to take a stab at the subject…” .
This is a big subject and a lot to chew on so it’s taken me while to compose a response but I hope that my insight/reflection helps.
First, I want to break down the word ‘Phenomenology’, it is a long and complicated term that means simply ‘the study of phenomena’ which is often related to Philosophy (dictionary.com)
The Philosophical study of Phenomenology can be defined as, ‘…the study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view.’ (plato.stanford.edu)
I want to stick to these two definitions of Phenomenology as I apply the body in poetry to this term.
The body in poetry can sometimes be used to represent or express what is happening internally with the ‘subject’ of the poem. The body can also represent what is happening externally. It is the relationship of subject and representation in poetry that can be linked to phenomena and the body.
For example,
(The body has become a physical interpretation for the decay of the city)
“The body breaks
away with
the rubble of
the city”
(my own words)
(Body is representing phenomena in the outside environment regardless if the expression and event are linked by action or not)
Second Example,
“Thunder rumbled above me, ( Here the outside event -phenomena- is linked to the body, expressed in a reaction that can be deciphered as either emotional or physical)
my body static with electricity,
vibrates.”
(my own words)
Another example that came to my mind, when I read the words phenomenology, body and poetry in the same sentence, was the ancient belief that there were gods that could control natural forces (i.e. Greek and Roman Mythology) and that if you pissed off the gods they would kill you (often by natural forces; earthquakes, floods, storms). So if I were to apply the same principles to poetry and the body it would be something like this,
phenomena/natural forces+body/response (internal/external)= poetry
I can also switch around ‘body’ with ‘gods’ and ‘phenomena’ with ’emotions/expression/poetry’.
Overall, it depends entirely on what you want to do with the ‘body’ in a poem and how you want the ‘body’ to relate (either internally or externally) to the outside world (phenomena/natural forces) in this way the body has the ability of being both God and Human, either expressing how the God can manipulate the environment or vice versa.
Here’s another example that crossed my mind after thinking about Gods. The movie Carrie (1976) Directed by Brian De Palma, is about a teenage girl with psychic powers (imdb.com). Carrie as a body in a poem can directly influence her environment through phenomena and in another way the supernatural events that happen around Carrie can be related to phenomena affecting the body (the emotions of these events would be Poetry).
I am not sure if this last example really helps. In my mind I think of Gods and Poltergeists when I read about the study of Phenomenology. I think that a good literary example of how there is a close connection between poetry, body and phenomena would be ‘A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man‘ by James Joyce. Although it is often thought of as a difficult and dense text, it can be related to these subjects easily through an analysis of the technique and style that Joyce uses to tell the story of young Stephen Dedalus.
Well, tmbenjamin10 please let me know what you think of my response (if you get a chance to read this). I really appreciate your suggestion and Thank You for helping me contribute to NaPoMo!!!
sources: http://www.dictionary.com/browse/phenomena
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/phenomenology/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074285/ (‘Carrie’ original story by Stephen King)
If you are reading this THANK YOU for taking time out of your day to read my writing! I hope you return in the future!
-Alina
I found some great books recently at the UofU’s book sale. I plan on reading these books over the summer and thought I’d make a list of them for my readers.
Poetry
The POETRY Anthology 1912-1977 (Sixty-Five Years of America’s Most Distinguished Verse Magazine) Edited by Daryl Hine and Joseph Parisi
Poets on Poetry Edited, with an Introduction, by Charles Norman
The Contemporary Poet as Artist and Critic eight symposia Edited by Anthony Ostroff
Critical Analysis
(Twentieth Century Views) Yeats: A collection of Critical Essays Edited by John Unterecker
(Twentieth Century Views) T.S. Eliot: A collection of Critical Essays Edited by Hugh Kenner
Fiction
Loot at the Harlequins! By Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov: Selected Letters 1940-1977 Edited by Dmitri Nabokov and Matthew J. Bruccoli
I subscribe and get POETRY magazine, and when I found the anthology (listed above) I was elated!
I am a big fan of reading Critical Essays, especially when I am really familiar with most of the writer’s works. The ‘Twentieth Century View’ books in particular are my favorites. I recently read one on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s works and it was pretty amazing.
I am a lover of Vladimir Nabokov and have been for a long time now. I always find his books to be kind of pricey in local bookstores so when I found these two books (in brand new condition) for $1 each I was super stoked!
If I finish any of these soon and feel like doing a short response/reflection, I will post one under the ‘Poetry’ tab.
If you are reading this Thank You for taking time out of your day to read my writing! I hope you return in the future!
-Alina
Here is a short story I wrote for a writer’s club competition that was declined. I’ve been thinking about this story a lot recently and was considering rewriting a few parts and expanding. I decided to post the original here, in case I post ‘An Encounter: Version #2’ when I make edits. This is to show readers the creative process involved in writing and the decisions that I make as a writer.
approx. word count: 1,200
An Encounter
by Alina Hansen (original work, all rights reserved)
I brought Mark here so I’d get fucked in a haunted house. He was too scared; too freaked to even kiss me. This is why I should’ve brought Josh instead; Josh was down for anything. Doesn’t matter now. I’m screaming, Marks screaming and there is something cold attached to my arm. I look back and there is the woman in the corner holding onto each of us. I feel her nails digging into my skin and with a shudder and snap I hear the bone break in my arm.
Should’ve brought Josh, he carries a gun and I left my pepper spray in my purse in the car. I fall and I’m in something wet; it takes me a moment to realize it’s that girl’s blood. Her body is only a few feet away, her neck is torn out. I think Mark pissed himself, he’s curled up, face down and shaking. I’ve had broken bones before, comes with being an athlete and even though it fucking hurts I scramble to get up. The woman hasn’t moved she is just staring at us. She looks sickly with her face and dress covered in blood. This psycho’s gonna kill us too.
There’s a table leg on the ground a few feet away next to some broken beer bottles. I get on my knees and crawl with one hand, my broken arm useless. I’m waiting for her to come up behind me, to grab me again but I keep moving hoping I have just enough time to get that table leg. I fall forward, my face hitting the floor, my fingers wrap around the wood, and I pull it towards me. I can see a few nails sticking out of the end. I stumble as I get up. I brace myself against the wall and turn around. The woman’s now crouched over mark and I hear him whimpering. I can’t see her face but her hand is poised in the air, her nails long and sharp. I take a breath and scream, lunging at her. I swing the leg at her head and she looks up just in time for connection. The woman howls and jumps back from Mark. The table leg stuck in her head, the nails digging into her eye and forehead. She grasps the wood and scuttles into the next room.
Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit I’m going to die! I’m going to die and I had a chance to fuck Jenny! Fuck fuck fuck fuck it hurts! That thing broke my arm! Is that blood? Oh my god it’s blood! I’m lying in blood! Should’ve convinced Jenny to go back to my place, why’d we have to come here?! I can’t look; it’s staring at me, those eyes, those dark eyes like an animal. Like the time we went to the zoo and the new exhibit had a black panther. The panther was just pacing, its eyes on the kids, big black eyes just glued to the little bodies and everyone could feel the hunger just emanating from it and they all laughed nervously pointing at the caged killer.
Jenny grabbed my hand, put it on her tit and told me to kiss her. Then the sound of someone walking up the steps, outside the house, opening the door; sound of girls giggling. Jenny said, ‘Be quiet and we’ll scare them.’ We waited we waited until the kissing stopped then she asked why I was breathing heavily. I wasn’t. There was a muffled cry and a crunch. We saw the woman her face buried in the neck of the girl and then the blood, the blood, all that blood. I looked at Jenny and her eyes were glued on them. I grabbed Jenny’s face and forced her to look at me. I tried to mouth the words, ‘We’ve got to get out of here!’ but she tore her face out of my hand and whispered, ‘Where’d she go?’ I looked back and the woman disappeared; the girl’s body motionless on the floor.
I hear a scuffle and scream then a howl right above me. I look up and there’s a club stuck in the things head, I can see nails in its eye. It moves back into a dark room.
“Mark get up! GET UP!” Jenny’s pulling me up and we’re running out of the house.
The car’s about a mile up the road. Jenny’s running ahead of me, she’s in better shape. Jenny’s yelling back at me, “Run! Dammit! RUN MARK!”
That little bitch blinded me! I want her dead! I want her and that little worm of a man! They ruined it! Ruined my night! I don’t want their blood, I want them dead!
I see the car. She’s opening the door and getting in, starting the car. I get in. The car tires squeal and we speed away. There’s a loud crash on top of the car, the car jerks to the left almost veering off the road. I look up and the hood’s dented inward almost touching our heads. Jenny’s yelling at me to call the cops. She’s speeding up and I’m screaming as I see the long claws of that thing reaching down over the windshield.
Blood pools like sweet honey around the edges of my mouth. It overflows and I feel like the sun is inside me and I’m radiant, glowing with life. Her hair falls softly to the side as her head slumps against my chest. Her hair is so beautiful, looks like gold. I push her aside and she falls to the ground. My dress is stained with blood. How could I resist her? My affections have always been toward fresh young women with a glimmer of innocence, a shine behind the eyes; a heart not yet broken. Oh how sweet! Yes! I can still taste her on my mouth. I can feel the rush of heat spreading from my stomach to my arms and legs.
This house is dilapidated and shudders with every movement I make. A wonderful abandoned home on the edge of town to attract teens for sex, drugs and spiritual encounters. I hear a rustle in the next room, a scuffle of feet and whispers. I slip into a corner. I can hear them now; I think it’s a boy and girl. They’re muttering to themselves, I smell dirt and a hint of sweat. In a rush, there is a crash and a stampede of footsteps running for the doorway beside me. The house trembles in excitement. My instincts take over and I snatch them in the darkness, their screams bellow in pure terror hurting my ears. I tighten my grip, breaking one bone then another. I release them and they fall to the floor.
THE END
If you are reading this Thank You for taking time out of your day to read my work! I hope you return in the future!
-Alina
(source: imdb.com)
The shots, cuts and camera angles used in T2 reflect the style and tone of Trainspotting (1996). Paired with a gritty soundtrack that ranges from classics-remixed or toned down- from Trainspotting and contemporary music, the film exudes in its technique the theme of T2; nostalgia and coming to terms with your past.
Returning to Edinburgh, Renton decides to make amends and pay back his friends whom he betrayed twenty years ago (except Begbie, who he avoids at all costs). What he finds is Sick Boy and Spud doing exactly what they were doing when he left, and Begbie still in prison (soon to break free).
T2 follows Renton and the crew ‘getting together’ one last time in an epic junkie battle of revenge and heart wrenching flashbacks of adolescent beginnings. Emphasizing on nostalgia for a past that has died and gone to junkie heaven, T2 artistically echoes key moments that made Trainspotting unforgettable; ‘Choose Life’ speeches, Renton colliding with vehicles, Begbie and his love for violence, Spud as the loved and innocent junkie of the crew and Sick Boy (Simon) still working as a con artist and thief. Although it echoes similar actions in Trainspotting, it does not feel like T2 is copying these actions in an attempt to ride the waves of what made it popular in the first place. The repeated or similar actions feel like they stand on their own, echoing maybe the message that sometimes you are always doomed to repeat yourself.
What is added to the mix is the role of Veronica, a young twenty something whose expertise in sex and her partnership (girlfriend?) with Sick Boy puts her at the center of an old man dog fight over events that probably happened when she was just a toddler. Veronica in the book Porno (by Irvine Welsh, and sequel to Trainspotting) has more parts and prevalence as a sex worker who later works for Sick Boy in his venture of creating Pornographic films above his bar. These parts are changed and toned down in the movie T2 and Veronica is portrayed as a possibly more ‘clean’ woman to audiences but in the end she does exactly what she does in Porno; taking the torch from the generation before her of “First there is opportunity, then there is Betrayal.”(imdb.com). I think by toning down Veronica in T2 Danny Boyle may have taken into consideration just how much grit and slime audiences can take (creating an R-Rated film versus a neon flashing NC-17).
Although I was curious from the instant I heard about T2 and after reading the book Porno just how much of book would be in T2, I am satisfied with this cookie cutter version which is easier to swallow for most, although I definitely craved more of the book in the end.
Overall, T2 holds true to Trainspotting as an art device used for social critique and exposure of the disgusting but often real underbelly of modern life (a predominant trait of Irvine Welsh’s works). With added references and use of today’s technology and comments on how ‘conning’ can’t be done like how it used to be, T2 shows the evolution of addiction, lies, and thievery in our present day in a heart-wrenching story of opportunity and betrayal among best friends.
I could write more on T2 and go into depth on certain key scenes/aspects that stood out to me but I will have to think about this. I do plan on seeing T2 again and in the theatre so I can enjoy the big screen experience and if after watching it for a second time I do decide to do another reflection I will post one, probably longer (long long read) and in a couple of weeks.
(sources: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2763304/?ref_=nv_sr_1, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117951/?ref_=nv_sr_2 )
If you are reading this Thank You for taking time out of your day to read my writing. I hope you return in the future!
-Alina