i who have never known men - impressions 70% of the way thru, and other tales of my daily life

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacquelin Harpman - I don't speak French either so I'm reading the translation by Ros Schwartz.

I was recommended this book on the basis of two fingers up: one, that it was some kind of epic feminist tome of speculative fiction, secondly that it was a weird book that had "wlw" themes. 

And by 'recommended' I of course don't mean to suggest anyone personally told me this book was worth it and this was why. I'm a damned fool and fell for the words of social media propagators. You know, the kinds of people that will write an entire attempt at numerological analysis under the guise of seeming smart for the meme. No ill will towards that person. I myself simply commented "silence at once" on such a farce, which is also quoting a fucking Tweet.

Thusly, this book sucks ass. Swallows copious amounts of ass too.

I'm only (only) 70% of the way through, but I get the impression from the text that very little else will happen, little else will become known to the protagonist, and so few things will come out from under what I presumed was a blanket of narrative mobility. I guess my fault is that I thought the book had a point. Maybe you have to be going into it with no expectations to come away from it with feminist analysis (that's not true--lol) or lesbian relationships as a relevant part of it... I'm not even someone who hates when things are dreary and bleak and listless and hopeless. So that's not what's wrong.

What's wrong is that this book has a clear setup. The women are imprisoned by nameless men. The women are given little to eat, so little that they joke about how it was essentially a diet that kept them thin. The women are under constant supervision. They cannot touch each other, or raise their voices, or be direct or violent. One is reminded of Janice G. Raymond's fucking ass-shit book "A Passion for Friends" which spends so much time pretending women are lifeless, thoughtless puppets who simply abide by all the wishes, means, and ends of a man (and that, women in worse situations who defy them are heckin' inspirationalerino woohoohoo). It says that women are made to be thin by men, er, and even if it doesn't...that's what feminists say! You get where I'm going at this point.

So then why, I wonder, do the women just die sadly? I'm only 70% of the way through, but that's all of them except the narrator. Does she ever discover the reason they're on the mystery planet? I'm guessing not. But I'd like to be surprised. But do you see how this book doesn't really give the impression that it's going to give me answers. It just feels like a tumble forward, no aims, no goals, and any aims or goals that you might hope so are just going to dissipate at once. And it's not that I don't like that, it's that the book seemed to want to be something more for just a moment. When we see feminist inclinations in a text, we start to think, say, maybe more is going to be said about this...ironically, that's what disappointed me most about "A Passion for Friends." 

I'll see how it spins out from here of course. If it really does suck I can feel happy to remove all those bookmarks on my Twitter account of book recommendations from random social media people. Which maybe I should do anyway.

Anyway! I'm doing my Fire Emblem Heroes dailies. I got some money and I spent a good, formidable chunk of it. Uh, yeah, some of it on my gacha game. Sorry to all my ancestors that suffered a peasant's life and couldn't even dream of spending money on toys, games, let alone something scummy like FEH. And I think like, my entire family's bloodline draws from Italian peasants. So that's a lot of ancestors I'm shitting all over. Is it too late to do ancestor work like the Catholic folk magicians of olde and new?

I'm trying to use SpaceHey and other simple, old or old-style websites more. I find that they don't trigger my OCD as much. Then I don't feel as motivated to use them, but then they're also more leisurely to use. So I'm putting my effort into doing something that doesn't trigger my OCD, something that I can truly "leave well enough alone."

I live in a desert climate, so we don't get much snow, let alone a proper sense of winter time until next month, let's say. The leaves that are able to change color here fall from the trees in their brilliant autumnal hues around this time. And yeah, we're mostly mesquites out here, and no--they're not actually native to this land to my knowledge. So I'm getting both autumn and winter. When the solstice comes, it is the shortest day of the year, after all. Just like the rest of the hemisphere. We just don't get the other cues for the seasons as much or as timely.

Still on the job hunt. Hoping I strike gold soon! Or diamonds. Hell, I'll strike anything at this point, even brimstone.

Til next time...if there will even BE a next time!