I am currently reading "The Girl Who Played With Fire" by Stieg Larsson, the second book of the series, "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo." I recently found out that the original, Swedish title is "Män som hatar kvinnor", which directly translates into "Men Who Hate Women". When I first found this out, I was pretty surprised. That sounds nothing like "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo". The more that I thought about it however, I started to see why it was originally titled that.
Throughout this story, there are many, to put it so, "men who hate women". When I was reading the book, before I had this new information, I hadn't really considered them like that, or really thought about just how much sexism there really was throughout the book. There are quite a few male roles in the first and second book that are extremely prejudice and gross towards women, and I never really realized the fact that they do just plainly hate women. It's gross. Many of these characters include Nils Bjurman, Martin Vanger, Gottfried Vanger, Nikolas Hedström, Gunnar Björck, Richard Forbes, Carl-Magnus Lundin, and Alexander Zalachenko. Nils Bjurman, Salander's "guardian", is a sadistic rapist. Gunnar Björck had hired prostitutes that were there against their will, and Alexander Zalachenko, the root of it all, repeatedly hired prostitutes and had many murdered, and continuously raped and beat Salander's mother. All of these men consider males to be superior to females, call woman by awful names, and often commit volatile crimes against women such as rape, murder, and other related offenses.
All of these men are in some way related to, or have had some encounter with Salander. Lisbeth Salander, a moral, independent woman, with what some might call an odd physique. Salander is such a unique character. Although legally declared "socially inept" and not able to handle her own affairs, she is extremely smart, and fully capable of handling her own affairs. She is not socially or politically important or well known, and yet, all of those men mentioned above have been one way or another defeated by her, often physically, and in extremely dangerous situations, proving that women are clearly not inferior to men.
I think this is one of the main ideas of this series. The first and second book (I haven't yet read the third) are filled with heinous crimes, and dangerous mystery that the reader often gets wrapped up in. Throughout the book, you find yourself wishing with all of your might that these "johns" will get punished, and that their crimes will be discovered, and that that sexist police officer will get fired, and that Mikael Blomkvist will publish another scandalous article on some sort of wrong doing, etc., but you get so wrapped up in it all that you don't think about the message as much.
The fact of the matter is, there are still men out there who "hate women" and think of themselves superior, and there are racists, and people who's opinions are not morally right. There's always going to be someone out there like that, no matter what. In fact, something I really admire about Stieg Larsson's writing is that he's able to make the reader angry. By choosing specific phrases of dialogue, and giving minor details to actions and portrayals, he is able to get the reader to really hate those terrible men. He makes the reader fired up, and definitely gets the reader to root for Lisbeth Salander. Salander, who is bisexual, "incompetent", and doesn't confide in government and takes matters into her own hands, conquers all of those men. This shows that anyone, no matter who you are, can fight for yourself, stand up, and do something about terrible wrongs in the world, even if they are incredibly dangerous.
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Unchalantly Salander
I am currently reading "The Girl Who Played With Fire" by Stieg Larsson, the second book of the trilogy. So far the trilogy is a pretty insane, action-packed, incredibly well written set of books. In the second book, Lisbeth Salander is accused of a triple murder. Salander is a very aloof woman, and does not entrust in government, or rarely anyone other than herself. She almost always uses a fake identity, and is constantly traveling all over. She may not trust in the authorities, but she is an extremely moral person, and often takes matters into her own hands. And yet, when she is accused of murder, she does not do much to stop it.
Anyway, Salander is accused of a horrendous triple murder, and is put on high profile; everyone in Sweden has seen her terrible quality passport photo, and everyone is looking for her. During this period of time, Mikael Blomkvist is convinced she is innocent. Salander and Blomkvist had had a relationship in the previous year, but since then had not spoken to each other. Blomkvist knows that she is innocent, and is doing all he can to prove it.
A major flaw in Salander's accusation is that she is portrayed to the public as a psychopathic murderer, who will harm anyone who gets in her way. Why? When Salander was younger, she was declared "incompetent", simply because she refused to talk on many occasions, and was not very socially active. This alone makes me furious. Just because someone does not like to talk, or does not fit society's idea of a "social" person, does not mean they should be declared socially inept! That declaration led to tons of other very serious problems later in Salander's life, because of that barrier. Salander is actually incredibly brilliant. I would say she's ingenious. But because she is anti-social (even if very), she is cast off as a nutjob. Because of this, to the public audience, she is a psychopath.
For a long time, we read about the accusation. The discovery of the victims, the police teams, the process, the investigations, etc., all the while thinking, "What the hell happened? Is Salander innocent? What is she thinking right now? What is she doing?" Finally, the story goes back to Salander. The first few sentences we're hearing about her during the frenzy are, "Salander spent the first week of the police hunt far from the drama. She remained in peace and quiet in her apartment on Fiskargatan." then later, "She was irritated by the passport photograph that appeared everywhere. She looked stupid." Not only is she quite relaxed about the entire escapade, she is prominently annoyed about the passport photo used in the newspapers. As we find out shortly after, Salander is innocent of what they are accusing her of. Innocent. Yet, she is relaxing in her apartment as she moves farther and farther up "Sweden's Most Wanted". I simply don't understand it. She perplexes me, and frustrates me at the same time.
Back to Mikael Blomkvist, one of the things he tries extremely hard to do is contact Lisbeth Salander. He needs to talk to her, to make sure she's innocent, to get some grasp of what's going on. When he is finally able to contact her, she responds in vague messages. One of the messages she sent Blomkvist was one word, "Zala". Blomkvist then responded "Lisbeth, You damn troublesome person. Who the hell is Zala? Is he the link? Do you know who murdered Dag & Mia? If so, tell me so we can solve this mess and go to sleep. Mikael." Seems like some pretty reasonable questions, considering, right? Salander responds with another cryptic message, "You're the journalist. Find out." If she knows something that could help prove her innocence, why doesn't she just go out and say it? I can't tell if she's waiting for someone else to figure it out, or if she just doesn't trust anyone else to prove her innocence, or what! Maybe she feels like she doesn't even have the responsibility to prove herself innocent, considering she is so under the radar normally, anyway. I don't know.
If something is wrong, or injust, you have to do something about it. You simply cannot just sit in your apartment waiting for someone else to do it for you! It's choices like that that do not result in any accomplishments whatsoever. This situation is extremely frustrating to me. The fact that she is being blamed for such a horrific crime, and she has something that could prove her innocence that she isn't bringing to the table really upsets me, and I just don't understand it!
Anyway, Salander is accused of a horrendous triple murder, and is put on high profile; everyone in Sweden has seen her terrible quality passport photo, and everyone is looking for her. During this period of time, Mikael Blomkvist is convinced she is innocent. Salander and Blomkvist had had a relationship in the previous year, but since then had not spoken to each other. Blomkvist knows that she is innocent, and is doing all he can to prove it.
A major flaw in Salander's accusation is that she is portrayed to the public as a psychopathic murderer, who will harm anyone who gets in her way. Why? When Salander was younger, she was declared "incompetent", simply because she refused to talk on many occasions, and was not very socially active. This alone makes me furious. Just because someone does not like to talk, or does not fit society's idea of a "social" person, does not mean they should be declared socially inept! That declaration led to tons of other very serious problems later in Salander's life, because of that barrier. Salander is actually incredibly brilliant. I would say she's ingenious. But because she is anti-social (even if very), she is cast off as a nutjob. Because of this, to the public audience, she is a psychopath.
For a long time, we read about the accusation. The discovery of the victims, the police teams, the process, the investigations, etc., all the while thinking, "What the hell happened? Is Salander innocent? What is she thinking right now? What is she doing?" Finally, the story goes back to Salander. The first few sentences we're hearing about her during the frenzy are, "Salander spent the first week of the police hunt far from the drama. She remained in peace and quiet in her apartment on Fiskargatan." then later, "She was irritated by the passport photograph that appeared everywhere. She looked stupid." Not only is she quite relaxed about the entire escapade, she is prominently annoyed about the passport photo used in the newspapers. As we find out shortly after, Salander is innocent of what they are accusing her of. Innocent. Yet, she is relaxing in her apartment as she moves farther and farther up "Sweden's Most Wanted". I simply don't understand it. She perplexes me, and frustrates me at the same time.
Back to Mikael Blomkvist, one of the things he tries extremely hard to do is contact Lisbeth Salander. He needs to talk to her, to make sure she's innocent, to get some grasp of what's going on. When he is finally able to contact her, she responds in vague messages. One of the messages she sent Blomkvist was one word, "Zala". Blomkvist then responded "Lisbeth, You damn troublesome person. Who the hell is Zala? Is he the link? Do you know who murdered Dag & Mia? If so, tell me so we can solve this mess and go to sleep. Mikael." Seems like some pretty reasonable questions, considering, right? Salander responds with another cryptic message, "You're the journalist. Find out." If she knows something that could help prove her innocence, why doesn't she just go out and say it? I can't tell if she's waiting for someone else to figure it out, or if she just doesn't trust anyone else to prove her innocence, or what! Maybe she feels like she doesn't even have the responsibility to prove herself innocent, considering she is so under the radar normally, anyway. I don't know.
If something is wrong, or injust, you have to do something about it. You simply cannot just sit in your apartment waiting for someone else to do it for you! It's choices like that that do not result in any accomplishments whatsoever. This situation is extremely frustrating to me. The fact that she is being blamed for such a horrific crime, and she has something that could prove her innocence that she isn't bringing to the table really upsets me, and I just don't understand it!
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Dr. Seuss's Hidden Political Views?
In class, we recently read "The Lorax" by Dr. Seuss. The purpose of this read aloud was to really look deeper into children's books and find the true, and often hidden messages. One thing we talked about was symbolism. Dr. Seuss was a strongly political person, and people were often questioning his ideas and opinions. "The Lorax" centers around The Onceler, a greedy man who comes upon these marvelous truffula trees and starts cutting them down and turning them into Thneeds.
"Everyone needs a thneed!" The Once-ler is originally, and firstly cutting down the truffula trees to make money. He knits the truffula trees into "thneeds", which can be used as a shirt, a sock, a glove, a hat, a carpet, a pillow, a sheet, or a curtain. The truffula trees, and the land surrounding it are home to many many animals and creatures. Once the truffula trees start getting cut down, the Lorax, who was "shortish and oldish and brownish and mossy"protests. "I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues". The Once-ler can't cut down the truffula trees! They're not up for the taking! The little guy is standing up, representing the trees who don't have voices.
The Once-ler however, ignores his pleas. Everyone needs a thneed! What's wrong with cutting down some trees in exchange for something everyone needs? Soon, the truffula trees decrease in population; there are barely any left. The greedy man took away all of the creatures' truffula trees just so he could make them into Thneeds, sell them, and make money. Now their homes are gone, the land is polluted, and they're forced to move away.
One thing I noticed in the Lorax is that you never see the Once-ler's face. It's always stuck inside his car, then shop, then factory. Whenever he talks all you see are his hands. This reminded me of big corporations, and therefore made me start to suspect that Dr. Seuss was using symbolism to portray the Once-ler as the head of a big corporation. Heads of widely known corporations are often very vague. They don't make a lot of appearances and they don't often have opinions; business is often done throughout the rest of the employees. The Once-ler comes in a takes everything away from the "little guys" to make profit. When he is asked to stop, his greed overcomes his sympathy and he ignores them and continues with his business.
Like I said, for the most part, in real-life situations, you never get to deal with the head of a big corporation directly. In the book, the Lorax does in fact talk to the Once-ler directly, but as I said before, you never see his face, you only see his hands, knitting Thneeds. For me, this part of the illustration made me think of a head of a big corporation having lower executive employees and using them as puppets, on his hands, always working. He's involved in the corporation but he has so many lower employees that he kind of speaks through them indirectly.
Big corporations also tend to have big factories that guzzle resources and pollute the air. In the Lorax, the factories pollute the air, demolish the truffula trees, and pollute the lakes. When asked by the Lorax, who is speaking for the people who don't have voices, the Once-ler keeps working because he justifies his work in thinking that everyone needs a thneed, so it's okay! Just like in real life, when someone is standing up against big corporations, often for the people who aren't able to really speak for themselves, sometimes, the big companies don't do anything because they feel as if their work justifies what they're doing to the "little guys".
There are quite a few pieces of story and illustration that lead me to think Dr. Seuss was symbolically representing big corporations through the Once-ler. I have heard that he was also a very political person, and was often questioned about his political views, which just leads me to think even more that that's what he was hinting at.
"Everyone needs a thneed!" The Once-ler is originally, and firstly cutting down the truffula trees to make money. He knits the truffula trees into "thneeds", which can be used as a shirt, a sock, a glove, a hat, a carpet, a pillow, a sheet, or a curtain. The truffula trees, and the land surrounding it are home to many many animals and creatures. Once the truffula trees start getting cut down, the Lorax, who was "shortish and oldish and brownish and mossy"protests. "I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues". The Once-ler can't cut down the truffula trees! They're not up for the taking! The little guy is standing up, representing the trees who don't have voices.
The Once-ler however, ignores his pleas. Everyone needs a thneed! What's wrong with cutting down some trees in exchange for something everyone needs? Soon, the truffula trees decrease in population; there are barely any left. The greedy man took away all of the creatures' truffula trees just so he could make them into Thneeds, sell them, and make money. Now their homes are gone, the land is polluted, and they're forced to move away.
One thing I noticed in the Lorax is that you never see the Once-ler's face. It's always stuck inside his car, then shop, then factory. Whenever he talks all you see are his hands. This reminded me of big corporations, and therefore made me start to suspect that Dr. Seuss was using symbolism to portray the Once-ler as the head of a big corporation. Heads of widely known corporations are often very vague. They don't make a lot of appearances and they don't often have opinions; business is often done throughout the rest of the employees. The Once-ler comes in a takes everything away from the "little guys" to make profit. When he is asked to stop, his greed overcomes his sympathy and he ignores them and continues with his business.
Like I said, for the most part, in real-life situations, you never get to deal with the head of a big corporation directly. In the book, the Lorax does in fact talk to the Once-ler directly, but as I said before, you never see his face, you only see his hands, knitting Thneeds. For me, this part of the illustration made me think of a head of a big corporation having lower executive employees and using them as puppets, on his hands, always working. He's involved in the corporation but he has so many lower employees that he kind of speaks through them indirectly.
Big corporations also tend to have big factories that guzzle resources and pollute the air. In the Lorax, the factories pollute the air, demolish the truffula trees, and pollute the lakes. When asked by the Lorax, who is speaking for the people who don't have voices, the Once-ler keeps working because he justifies his work in thinking that everyone needs a thneed, so it's okay! Just like in real life, when someone is standing up against big corporations, often for the people who aren't able to really speak for themselves, sometimes, the big companies don't do anything because they feel as if their work justifies what they're doing to the "little guys".
There are quite a few pieces of story and illustration that lead me to think Dr. Seuss was symbolically representing big corporations through the Once-ler. I have heard that he was also a very political person, and was often questioned about his political views, which just leads me to think even more that that's what he was hinting at.
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