Discussion on Twilightners from Speculative Fiction Class

Hey Twilightners Fans--thought I'd post a summary of the discussion of Twilightners from class today.  Was an awesome discussion as I'm sure you'll be able to tell.  I love it when discussing things with a class leads me to see something so much more clearly than I had on my own.  Heh, it's that power of the collective. 

I asked them to name what they saw as important themes—they came up with a number of oppositions: reality/game, reality/dream, life/death, good/evil, individual/collective, belief/skepticism, free will/determinism, light/dark—and one person said immediately that the dream world was between life and death so that these divisions into two weren’t completely accurate.  So we started talking about how much of an opposition any of those were.

In the prologue—talked about the style of writing in the first couple paragraphs and how that clued in the reader to being in a “game”—the ominous sound of the closing of the prologue (and then contrasted that latter with the last line of Chap. 1—dark vs. light.)

Talked about Sharon’s character—what we know about her just from the opening page of Chapter 1—how she’s between sleep and waking, between life and death.  Then contrasted that with Brian—both of them not wanting to live, but Sharon connected to Sadie, thinking of her when she puts her in the room (leaving the door ajar, preparing for her own death but protecting Sadie).  And that connection to another being was one sign of how much stronger she was than Brian—also her direct facing of death rather than anesthetizing herself.  Brian seems suicidal—but interestingly suicidal seems to mean equally afraid of both life and death.  Sharon’s connectedness--why she can feel all the other minds as she dies, what allows her to create realities in the dream world.

Her flashbacks—how her independence is important, and yet the first thing she remembers is Tim’s protection and her friendship to Tim, Glen, and Brian.  The abuse her mother suffers and her mother’s death as the thing that isolates her and puts her in touch with darkness—but comes out of that to connect at the windmill.  That led to a discussion of the symbolism of the windmill and the pendant.  Windmill—moving around—means not the static of opposition but movement through opposing points.  Movement through opposing points creates energy=power.  Pendant—yin yang—balance of opposition; the dragon=power.

Brian-his fear=his guilt, fear of his responsibility for his actions—this is where his skepticism comes from.  Why he can’t accept God—because of suffering, but what he really can’t accept is his own responsibility for suffering.  So his isolation is extreme.

His journey with Soo—his irony and humor coming out of his separation from the world and lack of belief vs. her straightforwardness.  As the journey continues—he wants the adventure to continue.  He gets involved in the story.  His imagination gets the better of him.  The relation of imagination to empathy and connection to others.  Chapter 8—what it means when Sharon says she doesn’t fear herself (and how Brian does fear himself).  But that Sharon is a rationalist and this means that uncertainty still is her weakness—how Ian might represent rationality.

In Chap. 9 we talked about how a lot of the things we had seen implicitly became explicit in the conversation and how what Leathan had said about Fear reflects on Sharon/Ian (and generally we talked about how what happened from chapters about Brian to chapters about Sharon were juxtaposed and why). 

Then Chap. 10—another side of Sharon’s fear—from rationality in Chap. 8 and belief in herself—into something darker and deeper.  Holding onto Ian to guide her but losing him and winding up with the Queen.  How the Queen stands for Sharon’s own darkness.  Then the fact that both Ian and the Queen both get left behind.

From Sharon’s darkness—to Brian being fired on and fearing that he has once again brought about an accident and death.  Anger pushed out onto Soo.  “Reality is fear”  because there is no grand design—why do things have to be random?  How that randomness is again Brian abrogating responsibility.  But then feels for Soo’s pain when she talks about human beings alone in the universe—begins to finally connect with someone.  Brian finally finding belief by being willing to die.  So he can then think of Glen, and can see the windmill (synchronicity bringing Sharon and Brian to the windmill at the same time.)  And then the ending for him—when he chases after Soo—that whether it was real or not doesn’t matter.  What matters for him is staying in touch with her and that staying in touch will prove good either for her or for him—the good that comes out of their connection is what is important and not whether the connection is based on a real or game experience.

The epilogue—the mirroring of the prologue’s ending and how the fear of what happens to the men, and the power of whatever has them in its grip is what is important there.