Tag Archives: Social Media

Frankenstein Meets The Children of the Hill

The cover of Jennifer McMahon’s The Children on the Hill includes a quote from a book promoter who proclaims, “This novel is an all-nighter!” That’s called marketing, my friends. You can tell because it ends with an exclamation. Having read that assessment, I was surprised to find I had no problem putting this novel down for a good night’s sleep. That happened on successive evenings until I finished the book.

Ms. McMahon is a fan of Frankenstein, and The Children on the Hill is her reinterpretation of Mary Shelley’s classic set in contemporary times. She succeeds there but you shouldn’t wait for a string of movies culminating with The Bride of The Children on the Hill or The Children on the Hill Meet the Wolfman.

The story bounces between 1978 and 2019. In 1978, Vi is living with her brother and grandmother in Vermont. The grandmother is a doctor “famous or helping patients others couldn’t help.” These patients are “people who had done terrible things not because they were terrible people, but because they were sick.” One day Gran brings home a thirteen year old girl to live with them. She’s the same age as Vi, and they become “Sisters . . . not by blood, but by something else. Something deeper.”

The intense connection is related somehow to Gran’s work. That should be no big deal, but the girls learn sweet old Gran is into eugenics and believes the “survival and overall success of the species is dependent on those who are superior weeding out the weak and inferior.” This discovery sets off a chain of events leading to disaster. One sister disappears and the other goes to foster care.

In 2019, one sister is a self-described monster who is likely responsible for the disappearance of several teenage girls. The other sister has changed her name to Lizzy Shelley (with an intentional nod to Mary Shelley) and has (conveniently) become a monster hunter with a significant social media following. The monster initiates a cat and mouse game with Lizzy, and we all know what happens to the mouse in that game.

Lizzy loves monsters. Ms. McMahon does too, and she’s happy to get pedantic about it. “Here’s why the world needs monsters: Because they are us and we are them.” Huh? Assuming that’s true or intelligible, it doesn’t explain why the world needs monsters. She follows that incongruous statement with “We all have a little monster hiding inside us.” Now, that’s true and intelligible, but it isn’t new and insightful.

Of course, the sisters confront each other in a surprise ending that disrespects the reader. Up until this point, the novel was diverting. The ending, however, is abrupt and silly. The cat and mouse game was gratuitous, a mere plot device to enable Ms. McMahon to write a Frankenstein story. A simple phone call or a handful of texts between the sisters would have saved everyone a lot of time and highway miles.

Gladiola Overdrive, Chief Editor

A Tribute to Unknown

So many people have created stunning art, and we don’t know their names.  Many more have committed full frontal assaults on humanity, and because they’re impossible to shame, everyone knows their names.  In terms of literature, some of the most provocative and enlivening works were written by history’s most prodigious writer:  Unknown. 

It’s Unknown who wrote the Old Testament, as it’s called by Christians.  Jews call it the Torah, which means Jesus Christ!  Quit coopting our stuff.  You do this all the time.  It’s also Unknown who wrote Pearl, Sundiata, El Cid, The Epic of Gilgamesh, Fifty Shades of Grey (The Geriatric Years), Beowulf, and many more masterpieces that give bone and flesh to the human condition.

We don’t need social media to notify us that Fame is fickle. We don’t need more grieving parents to remind us that Equity and Justice have never lived here. Time destroys everything we treasure, so it’s a blessing these works have survived in any form.  Even if the poets’ names are lost in the dank cellar of Antiquity’s library, their voices have survived . . . thus far.  Remember hexed Sappho, her name survives but insensate Time has denied us so much of her voice. 

Gladiola Overdrive, Chief Editor

A Tribute to Unknown

So many people have created stunning works of art, and we don’t know their names.  So many more people have created crap and because they are impossible to shame, everyone knows their names.  In terms of literature, some of the most interesting and inspiring works were written by history’s most prolific author:  Unknown. 

It’s Unknown who wrote the Old Testament, as it’s called by Christians.  Jews call it the Torah, which means Jesus Christ!  Quit coopting our stuff.  You do this all the time.  It’s also Unknown who wrote Pearl, Sundiata, El Cid, The Epic of Gilgamesh, Fifty Shades of Grey (The Geriatric Years), Beowulf, and many more works that put bone and flesh on the human condition.

We don’t need social media to inform us that Fame is fickle. We don’t need more grieving parents to remind us that Equity and Justice have never lived here. Time strips away everything we treasure, so it’s a blessing these works have survived in any form.  Even if the poets’ names are lost in the dank cellar of Antiquity’s library, their voices have survived . . . thus far.  Remember poor Sappho.  Her name survives but callous Time has denied us so much of her voice. 

Gladiola Overdrive, Chief Editor – July 17, 2017

White Noise: Always There, Just Like Death and Commercials

In White Noise Don DeLillo notes “All plots tend to move deathward.” I’m not sure if he is surprised by this, but he shouldn’t be. All life moves deathward. So how can plots do otherwise?

Let’s put that question aside and simply agree that DeLillo in White Noise is obsessed with death. But Gladiola, white noise is my favorite noise. How can it be linked to death? Sorry, my friend, white noise is always there in the background. Just like death. And Jack (the narrator) can’t stop thinking about death. Even when he’s thinking with his penis, his penis is thinking about death. He chairs the Hitler Studies Department at a small college on the hill. Why Hitler? “Some people are larger than life. Hitler is larger than death.”

Jack is married to Babette, and they have a blended family with a child from their own marriage but also children from several prior marriages. Babette is taking some kind of medication that she refuses to admit she’s taking. Like Jack, she is terrified by death. Even when she’s thinking with her vagina . . . well, you get it. “We (humans) are the highest form of life on earth and yet ineffably sad because we know what no other animal knows, that we must die.” When a train accident happens on the edge of town, a deadly toxic cloud gets released. Jack is exposed to the poison, and his fear of death becomes all-consuming. The novel explores the reckless ways Jack and Babette try and fail to manage this intense fear.

Published in 1984, the novel also skewers consumerism and our culture’s reliance on television – a precursor of the internet and social media. “When TV didn’t fill them with rage, it scared them half to death.” And it touches on inequality and inequity. During the toxic event, Jack thinks “These things happen to poor people who live in exposed areas. Society is set up in such a way that it’s the poor and uneducated who suffer the main impact of natural and man-made disasters.” The novel succeeds best when it is focused on these themes. But back to death.

The lengths Babette and Jack go to calm their fear are hard to relate to. When they wonder why no one else is overwhelmed by the fear as they are, Jack acknowledges that “Some people are better at repressing it than others.” He’s wrong. Everyone is better at repressing it. They become the poster children for repression and denial being the correct strategy. And that’s good news for me because I repress and deny everything. So I must be healthy as hell.

Gladiola Overdrive, Chief Editor

Cerebral Thoughts on How to Live a Purpose-Driven Life

When I see or hear someone doing or saying something I find offensive or the least bit disruptive to my sense of propriety, I ask myself a question. Does this idiot’s conduct affect me? If I can come up with some possible way it does, I immediately tell the degenerate to stop, or I will post his picture on Grumblr where me and my fellow like-minded Grumblrs will Grumbl at him.

If the answer is no, this malcontent’s conduct doesn’t affect me in the slightest, I ask another question. Is this pervert finding joy in doing whatever it is she’s doing? If so, I immediately tell her to stop. And if she doesn’t, it’s straight to Grumblr with her.

Knowgood Carp, Owner of all the Hotels on Block Island (and Some in Connecticut)

Little Boy Blue

Little boy Blue,
social media guru,
play with your tiny horn
until your lips are blistered 
and your bony fingers are worn.

Preening boy Blue,
amazed by all you do,
is there nothing you won't say
in your constant quest for praise?
Your dry deeds are only clicks away
because posting them's what you do all day.

Righteous boy Blue,
sitting alone in your pew,
you are the sun and air - 
the gaudiest billboard in Times Square.
In a beat-up bathrobe you decide all - 
a wicked judge with a cellular maul.
You render rulings in a few bytes or less.
You condemn instantly but you do not bless.

Luvgood Carp, Editor-in-Chief

Breaking News

A cow covered with hundreds of mouth-like lesions   
each containing a tongue that lovingly licks my ear -    
tells me all the black lies I desperately want to hear;    
a massive udder with hundreds of mottled leathery teats    
and I suck the sour milk.

Luvgood Carp, Editor-in-Chief

Mission Accomplished

Nowadays, we ignore good poetry
and bad poetry is all we read.

Which is great news!
Because based on the time and energy 
we Facebook friends have devoted 
to pummeling this wretched rhyming piece,
insipid drivel must be the last
evil thing to walk the world.

Congratulations to us!
We have saved humanity
(as I knew we would)
with our sarcasm and snide tweets.

Such a preening and sanctimonious fixation
on bursting this quivering bubble of buffoonery tells me
snowcaps have reappeared on mountaintops
and polar bears sit on new icebergs merrily munching seals,
liars have recanted and corrected the record,
dictators have restored freedoms and retired,
torturers have questioned career choices and quit,
pedophile priests have been put in prison
and the Vatican has sold its gold for Bitcoin
to compensate the unfortunate children 
it allowed to be raped.

So having saved the world 
from every evil but one,
we can now dedicate
our capricious communal scorn
to crushing this thin, gasping thing.

Luvgood Carp, Editor-in-Chief

The Right to Remain Silent

If you are a prominent person with a large social media presence and you excel at one thing (for example, acting, sports, shamelessness, or being born into extreme luxury), I would like to suggest that you don’t need to comment on everything. You don’t need to wait until you are dead or arrested to exercise your right to remain silent.

Let’s pretend you are a major sports star, and you intentionally misled millions of people about whether you have been vaccinated or not. You should remain silent after losing a play-off game. If you are incapable of doing that, you should at least not complain about how people are angry with you and how some of them are happy you lost. People get angry when they are lied to.

Or let’s pretend you disagree with someone about whether vaccines are effective. You should not call that person a Nazi or compare how you are being treated to the Holocaust. Here are 3 rules that may be helpful to you:

Do not call people Nazis unless they voluntarily dress in Nazi paraphernalia. Even then ask yourself – are they performing in a revival of The Sound of Music? If so, they still may not be Nazis regardless of how they are dressed.

Do not say your situation is like the Holocaust, unless you are being starved and tortured in a concentration camp.

Use your words wisely. Ask yourself – if I were to die tomorrow, are these the last words I would want to be remembered by?

See you soon.

Raven Breathless (fka Death), Senior Human Rights Correspondent

Your Attention is Holy – “No One is Talking About This”

About a quarter into Patricia Lockwood’s No One is Talking About This , a character declares “[y]our attention is holy.” This is true, but it doesn’t seem like it in the portal – Ms. Lockwood’s term for the internet. That’s because everyday your “attention must turn, like the shine on a school of fish, all at once, toward a new person to hate. Sometimes the subject was a war criminal, but other times it was someone who made a heinous substitution in guacamole.” This is among the most apt and poetic descriptions of the internet. And the first half of this thoughtful and engaging story examines the internet’s weird vagaries and addictive adrenaline. And at times you will think you are reading poetry.

The main character, who is never named, is a woman who became famous in the portal (a “communal stream-of-consciousness”) for a single five-word post. After it went Corona-viral, people from all over the world invite her to lecture about the “new communication.” Frequently, her comments are inane, but so is the portal – so it works. She travels everywhere, shares bizarre opinions about everything, and because the world is connected, her name (whatever it is – perhaps it doesn’t matter) is now recognized everywhere. Still, oddly, she feels disconnected. “This did not feel like real life, exactly, but nowadays what did?” It brings her to that universal question asked by anyone who has been on social media for more than one hour straight. Have I been wasting my time? Probably, but let’s see what Twitter has to say about that.

Reality (in the form of a text from her mother – because reality these days always arrives as a text from your mother) soon intrudes on virtual reality. Her mother writes “[s]omething has gone wrong . . . How soon can you get here?” Suddenly, our nameless expert on everything is jolted out of the portal. “She fell heavily out of the broad warm us, out of the story that had seemed, up till the very last minute, to require her perpetual co-writing.”

Indeed, something has gone dreadfully wrong. Her pregnant sister learns that her baby has a rare disease and will probably die in the womb – which also puts her sister’s life in danger. Against all odds, the baby and mother survive the birth, but everyday thereafter the baby’s survival is at risk. So what’s more real than the portal/internet? A baby with a congenital disease. And no one in the real or virtual world (is there a difference?) is talking about it.

The baby now has the nameless aunt’s whole (and holy) attention. “Through the membrane of a white hospital wall she could feel the thump of the life that went on without her, the hugeness of the arguments about whether you could say the word retard on a podcast. She laid her hand against the white wall and the heart beat, strong and striding, even healthy. But she was no longer in that body.” Eventually, the issue of whether the baby will survive is resolved. Then, gradually, the connected world calls our nameless friend back. But how connected is she to it now?

The internet says Patricia Lockwood is a poet, and the internet gets that one right. Her metaphors throughout are incisive and wondrous. Her style is a choppy stream-of-consciousness that would give James Joyce a happy little boner. The style suits an examination of social media’s impact on society. This is a poetic novella filled with humor and sadness. It is a smudge-free mirror reflecting what passes for real life these days.

Thank you for reading. Your attention is holy.

Gladiola Overdrive, Chief Editor