Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 13:22:56 -0800 From: Susan Kornfeld Subject: [*FSFFU*] Vonarburg's DREAMS OF THE SEA To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU This kicks off the discussion of Elisabeth Vonarburg's Dreams of the Sea . I hope you enjoyed this book. I find it has a haunting beauty, a sense of shifting reality that echoes across time and space in much the way an ancient site echoes with unseen presence. I'll start by saying that I've seldom marked up a book as much as this one. I've got a map on one blank page, a revised map on another, lists of Ekelli mentions, and a variety of miscellaneous tables. One reason I did this was because it made the book easier to understand. This leads me to my first discussion question: 1) The fragmentary nature of the book--narratives crisscrossing each other on page and in time and space--makes the book a bit unfathomable for the first several chapters (and some later chapters, too). On the other hand, this structural element reinforces the idea of fragmentary dreams that come to different dreamers in no particular order. How did you respond to this fragmentary structure? Did you find it made the book opaque or tantalizing? Or what? 2) I mentioned in my original nomination of this book that it was not, strictly speaking, a feminist work. Although many strong characters are women, most of the main characters (and the ones with most power) are men or boys. Nonetheless, the narrative itself is presented as the culminating work of a woman --one who has dreamed and compiled dreams of the Strangers. She tells her own story as she tells the stories of others, and it is her narrative that lends the book its arch, its underlying dissonance. Many of the "themes" and images also lend themselves to a feminist reading. Do you find this to be a feminist book or not? And, of course, wny? 3) Throughout the book, Eilai reminds her readers that Dreams are uncertain. She reminds us that they may not be true, or may be only partially true, or may only be true in some other Universe. She also tells us that she herself located and compiled Dreams of others, and put them in the order she thought best. Did you find that this consistent undermining of "truth" adds to or detracts from the book? Are you less willing to lose yourself in the characters when they may not be "real," or portrayed as they "really" are? 4) We spent some time discussing the world building of Steerswomen, and I wondered what you felt about Vonarburg's Tyranael. I found myself enchanted by the glowing and responsive stones, the red paragate flagstones, the golden buildings, and the wonderful water-pumping trees. 5) Finally, I know that this is the first book in the Tyranael series (the rest are awaiting translation), and so many questions will be answered. Still, does anyone have any ideas about what the Sea is and where the Passage will take Eilai's people?? I look forward to your responses, Susan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 12:39:13 -0500 From: davebelden Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Vonarburg's DREAMS OF THE SEA To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU I haven't read this first post because I am finding the book terribly hard to get into. Can anyone help me out here? I just didn't connect with the last book, and my pretty complete failure to understand what was going on there generated some enlightening posts. With this one it's as if she is deliberately making everything dreamy and obscure, which is fair enough and I like the poetic qualities of the writing, but I put the book down at page 25 this morning because I just wasn't getting anywhere in understanding what was going on. It felt like I had to remember a lot of clues but I wasn't doing so successfully. I have so much other stuff to read in my life that I count on a novel drawing me in rather than expecting me to work hard for it - I guess that disqualifies me from a lot off fiction, but that's just where I am. Are others having the same problem? Dave ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 10:24:30 -0800 From: Laura Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] DREAMS OF THE SEA and dreamlike writing To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU I enjoy dreamy, oddly described writing if it's done as a deliberate effect in a book's plot. For example, to show that a character is experiencing an unusual state of consciousness or to show that the fundamental definitions of a world or society are changing. Ursula K. LeGuin does this at the end of "Tehanu" and "The Other Wind," and Madeline L'Engle does it more subtly in the Murry family books. It can be somewhat disorienting if you're not prepared for it. I got more out of the dreamlike sections of those books the second time I read them. My reader's eye already had fuzzy outlines of the flow of the words from the first reading, so my imagination was better able to focus on the narrative the second time. Whenever I have to read a whole book written in this manner (a lot of 19th century literature comes across dreamily to me, probably mostly because our word usage is quite different today than it was when the books were written, and because of the general Romanticism of the era) it is a real challenge. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 15:02:45 -0500 From: davebelden Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] DREAMS OF THE SEA and dreamlike writing To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU > I enjoy dreamy, oddly described writing if it's done as a deliberate effect > in a book's plot. For example, to show that a character is experiencing an > unusual state of consciousness or to show that the fundamental definitions of > a world or society are changing. Ursula K. LeGuin does this at the end of > "Tehanu" and "The Other Wind," and Madeline L'Engle does it more subtly in > the Murry family books. I was intrigued by the reference to the two Le Guin books, which are favorites of mine, because I couldn't bring the dream sequences that you mention to mind. I quickly looked through the last quarter of Tehanu and couldn't find one. In the Other Wind I think you are referring to the dreams described at the start of chpater V? As you imply, these are dreams in context - poetic and dreamy, but evocative and explicable in terms of the characters and the story. Le Guin and L'Engle are both great story-tellers, and pay attention to drawing the reader into the story - and Earthsea and the Murry books were originally marketed and I assume written for a child and teenage audience, which usually requires excellent story telling. I'm not sure whether Le Guin wrote those two extensions to the Earthsea trilogy for a general audience, meaning adults as well as children, I don't really see any need to make the distinction, but certainly they draw you in. I think it would be a very rare teen who would stick with the Vonarburg book long enough to find the story... But I'm hoping for someone to tell me I'm wrong about that... Dave ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 14:27:16 -0800 From: Laura Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] DREAMS OF THE SEA and dreamlike writing To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU "I was intrigued by the reference to the two Le Guin books, which are favorites of mine, because I couldn't bring the dream sequences that you mention to mind..." I am referring to the part in "Tehanu" at the end (I will try not to spoil the ending for those who haven't read it) where the perspective suddenly switches from Tenar's to Therru's, and Therru's actions drive the end of the story. I found the writing in that part to be "dreamlike" and indistinct in quality, because the reader can see Therru's mind for the first time, in the moment where she transforms from passivity to acting on what she mysteriously knows. I'm also referring to the sections in "The Other Wind" where characters are at the Wall, especially in the final scene there. I don't mean "dreamlike" as if people are literally dreaming, but I'm referring to the way reality warps/shifts/transforms/changes in our dreams sometimes. "...the Murry books were originally marketed and I assume written for a child and teenage audience, which usually requires excellent story telling." I'm paraphrasing, but I recall once that L'Engle said in an interview that she writes for People, not for children. And she said that because her books are about children, most people assume they are for children, though that isn't her intent. I get just as much out of Wrinkle at 26 as I did at 13. :) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 17:50:18 -0500 From: davebelden Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] DREAMS OF THE SEA and dreamlike writing To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Thanks - now I understand your point about the dreamlike sequences. > I get just as much out of Wrinkle at 26 as I > did at 13. :) I agree that the books work for adults and was happy to see that the publisher marketed the later Earthsea books as adult books. But I love good writing that is directed at teens anyway (even when the writers intend it to be), and I'm more than twice 26. Dave ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 13:43:21 -0800 From: Susan Kornfeld Subject: [*FSFFU*] Dreams of the Sea To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU The discussion period for Dreams of the Sea is almost over, and I keep hoping for response to my discussion questions, or some other type of response.. Has no one read the book or have any comments? I know Dave said he had a hard time getting into it. Have any of the rest of you had similar problems? Or is this just a bad time of year for recreational reading? Oh oh, teacher nag tone. Sorry! But I am curious . . . Susan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 16:58:43 -0500 From: davebelden Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Dreams of the Sea To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Susan, I am about three quarters of the way through now. I have discovered that there are some wonderful things about this book, so thank you for getting me to persevere with it. But it is a slow read for me. There is evocative and beautiful imagery in it, and yet I have a strange feeling as of seeing it all underwater - that's a powerful image in the book, the Sea, - but I feel this partly because the narrative line is complex, it's hard to keep track of the different stories, especially since the main narrator sometimes talks in first person and sometimes is described by others, and is having all these Dreams in which chronological time is sometimes mixed up. I get frustrated sometimes that I just don't know what is going on, that I would have to scroll back through the book to find out who this character is and what happened to them last - if I had an e-version that would actually be easier. I don't really know why she had to make the actually story-telling so challenging, except that there is also something true to life, in my experience, about how you write a novel - that scenes can come to you like dreams and you have to fit them together and make sense of them - and something like that is happening in this book. Part of the trouble is that we get into a character and their story and then it is dropped. It is all building up to a fine mystery and I hope an explanation. It seems to be playing out the old saying that in most sf the idea is hero. I find myself wishing that she was as good a story teller as Le Guin or McIntyre - I think she could get the effects she wants while making it more accessible. Dave > The discussion period for Dreams of the Sea is almost over, and I keep > hoping for response to my discussion questions, or some other type of > response.. Has no one read the book or have any comments? I know Dave > said he had a hard time getting into it. Have any of the rest of you had > similar problems? Or is this just a bad time of year for recreational > reading? > > Oh oh, teacher nag tone. Sorry! But I am curious . . . > Susan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2004 17:12:41 -0500 From: Gaile Pohlhaus Organization: coordinator Villanova Theology Institute Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Dreams of the Sea To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Dear Susan, I did try to get into the book but never managed beyond the first 40 or so pages. I hope to finish it after the semester is over. Gaile Susan Kornfeld wrote: > The discussion period for Dreams of the Sea is almost over, and I keep > hoping for response to my discussion questions, or some other type of > response.. Has no one read the book or have any comments? I know Dave > said he had a hard time getting into it. Have any of the rest of you had > similar problems? Or is this just a bad time of year for recreational > reading? > > Oh oh, teacher nag tone. Sorry! But I am curious . . . > Susan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2004 23:41:48 -0800 From: Laura Quilter Subject: [*FSFFU*] elisabeth vonarburg To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU i'm going to put elisabeth on the list, since it's the end of the discussion period laura -- ------------------- Laura Quilter, Fellow Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic University of California, Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law lquilter@berkeley.edu / 510.642.7515 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 10:50:39 -0500 From: Pamela Taylor Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] elisabeth vonarburg To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Fine with me, but I hope when the rest of us actually finish the book we can revive some discussion? Pamela ----- Original Message ----- From: "Laura Quilter" To: Sent: Sunday, November 21, 2004 2:41 AM Subject: [*FSFFU*] elisabeth vonarburg > i'm going to put elisabeth on the list, since it's the end of the > discussion period > > laura ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 17:51:56 -0400 From: Elisabeth Vonarburg Subject: [*FSFFU*] Dreams & Nightmares To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Hello, you-all, and thanks for having me. And don't worry, Pamela, I'm not going to say anything for a while. You're not the only one depressed by recents political events. All the best -- Elisabeth Vonarburg "Il s'agit de vivre et non d'avoir raison" http://www.sfwa.org/members/vonarburg/ Nouveau livre/New Book : Vraies Histoires fausses, (nouvelles), Vents d'Ouest, ISBN : 2-89537-083-4 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 21:01:14 -0500 From: Pamela Taylor Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Dreams & Nightmares To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU Welcome Elisabeth! I just got your book a few days ago due to some mixup with Barnes and Noble, so I was looking forward to some continued discussion. I'm thrilled you're here so we can talk with you about it too! Pamela ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 21:59:55 -0500 From: davebelden Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Dreams of the Sea To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU "I hope you enjoyed this book. I find it has a haunting beauty, a sense of shifting reality that echoes across time and space in much the way an ancient site echoes with unseen presence." I agree - I had a strong feeling of reality, despite the difficulties in reaching it. This felt like a genuine world, a genuine quest by the main character, Eilai, and a real mystery. Much more real than Myst, the video game, but with a similar sense of wandering around trying to find what it was all about. "I'll start by saying that I've seldom marked up a book as much as this one. I've got a map on one blank page, a revised map on another, lists of Ekelli mentions, and a variety of miscellaneous tables. One reason I did this was because it made the book easier to understand." I felt the need to do that myself, because it was frustrating to be so lost so much of the time. It felt like a book to study. But instead I wanted a fast narrative read. When I gave up that idea and just sorted of floated with the poetry of it, I did much better, reading a few pages a night and giving up when my frustration level rose too high, then enjoying more the next night; and finding some sequences where the plot and characters built into a story that kept me going for a while. But I still needed the annotated version that would have done the hard work for me of pulling together the clues that in my poetic-appreciation-mode I was letting slip by. Right to the end of the book new characters were introduced in a way that made me feel they must have been mentioned before, and I would page back looking for them usually without success. I guess I just wasn't in a mood to study - too much of that elsewhere in my life already. "1) The fragmentary nature of the book--narratives crisscrossing each other on page and in time and space--makes the book a bit unfathomable for the first several chapters (and some later chapters, too). On the other hand, this structural element reinforces the idea of fragmentary dreams that come to different dreamers in no particular order. How did you respond to this fragmentary structure? Did you find it made the book opaque or tantalizing? Or what?" Opaque and annoying, more like, and yet there was this sense of reality about it that is what kept me going. I would love to ask Elisabeth whether she felt, looking back, that this was a successful way to write the book, or whether there might have been a way somewhere between this method and a more accessible story-telling method that might have worked better. It seems to me that I was not as intrigued and drawn in as Susan was, and that I needed to be taught how to read this book, in the same way that I have had to be taught to appreciate some new music. "2) I mentioned in my original nomination of this book that it was not, strictly speaking, a feminist work. Although many strong characters are women, most of the main characters (and the ones with most power) are men or boys. Nonetheless, the narrative itself is presented as the culminating work of a woman --one who has dreamed and compiled dreams of the Strangers. She tells her own story as she tells the stories of others, and it is her narrative that lends the book its arch, its underlying dissonance. Many of the "themes" and images also lend themselves to a feminist reading. Do you find this to be a feminist book or not? And, of course, why?" I have no idea how to answer this. It certainly wasn't a non-feminist book. Eventually, in an imagined world where women and men are equally respected, equally able to be themselves, will there be any 'feminist' books? This was doing something else, not fighting a feminist battle in any obvious way. But it does seem to be leading towards a utopia, a sense of what grown up people will be and do, the tutoring of the human species by a more advanced species, who have already tutored Eilai's people. "3) Throughout the book, Eilai reminds her readers that Dreams are uncertain. She reminds us that they may not be true, or may be only partially true, or may only be true in some other Universe. She also tells us that she herself located and compiled Dreams of others, and put them in the order she thought best. Did you find that this consistent undermining of "truth" adds to or detracts from the book? Are you less willing to lose yourself in the characters when they may not be "real," or portrayed as they "really" are?" This was a good aspect of the book - after all, what are we 'really'? something different to every person and not sure who we are to ourselves. Just trying to understand ourselves is hard enough, and others way harder. We see each other in glimpses. And storytellers may see stories in glimpses, and wonder how they fit together. We recall the past in glimpses that are usually incorrect in various ways, as well as different from the way others recall the same incident. So why not the future too? This helped to create the sense of realism. If I wanted to quibble I would say I wasn't really happy with the idea of different universes where different choices were made, not when those universes are presented as real phenomena - these are the fantastical notions of physicists, and it seemed unnecessary to add them into the already confusing mix. Enough was going on without them. But no big deal. To go off on a tangent: you could compare this book to the Time Travelers Wife, which I find a truly wonderful story, told in flashbacks and flash forwards with great potential for confusing the reader, and some friends have told me they found it confusing at the start; but I found it completely and compulsively readable, and where I wasn't sure, I felt able to wait as I had total confidence in the storyteller's ability to enlighten me when I needed to be enlightened. That also was a story that seemed utterly real. Because it takes place in our world and time it's maybe not so hard to achieve that sense of reality, and yet I have never read a time travel story that was so convincingly plausible (as opposed to the time travel being a useful convention, as in Willis' Domesday Book). TTWife didn't try to do too much - it was enough that time travel happened, we didn't need multiple universes as well, which might have actually been too much and so undercut the sense of realism. When I wondered if Dreams could have been written in a more accessible way, I didn't mean losing the dreams, the uncertainties, the 'postmodern' qualities; I meant keeping all that good stuff and just making it easier for the reader to enter into and follow the story, and now I think of it, TTWife seems like a good example of a book trying to do something similar and pulling it off 100%. "4) We spent some time discussing the world building of Steerswomen, and I wondered what you felt about Vonarburg's Tyranael. I found myself enchanted by the glowing and responsive stones, the red paragate flagstones, the golden buildings, and the wonderful water-pumping trees." It's easy for me to imagine the book illustrated by the children's author Van Allsburg (Polar Express etc.) - stylized, the strange enduring quality of pylons that are millions of years old and suddenly glow, and buildings that last uninhabited for centuries, the fog that you can ride on in boats, the tunnel and vast cavern and strange materials that glow and shine from within, the barrier around the island dissolving as the little boats go in - all very mysterious and evocative, suggesting limitless power but of a beneficent kind. "5) Finally, I know that this is the first book in the Tyranael series (the rest are awaiting translation), and so many questions will be answered. Still, does anyone have any ideas about what the Sea is and where the Passage will take Eilai's people??" A better place beyond the sunset and the sea... The next Level in the game of evolution. Dave ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 18:45:11 -0800 From: Susan Kornfeld Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] Dreams of the Sea To: FEMINISTSF@UIC.EDU I must admit that once I'd drawn a map of the continents, sketched in the towns with both the earth and Tyranael names, noted where temples are, and drawn in geologic features, the book became a lot easier and more enjoyable. Of course this took 2 readings . . . but once I did it, I not only followed the dream stories better, but I realized how truly rich Vonarburg's world is. [I think a map would be a great feature for a future edition.] Maybe I can fix it up so it's legible, scan it, and e-mail it to interested parties. Better yet: maybe the author has her own secret map????? Susan