Date: Tue, 3 Sep 2002 22:48:30 -0400 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU Labor Day weekend has come and gone, and it's time to discuss *The Annunciate*. What did you make of this book? Was it simply a dark adventure tale, or did it have a deeper message? Of the various blurbs included with the book, I found Maureen McHugh's most interesting: "*The Annunciate* has nanotechnology and spaceships, but at its heart is Severna Park's delicate calculus of human need -- the need for information, for a fix, for a place to live, for a lover and for a mother... the need for hope." Eve's need for a mother figure certainly keeps her with Annmarie long after she should have left. Determined not to repeat this history, she assumes the role of mother to the succubus baby. Is this a hopeful ending or an apocalyptic one? A propos of this question, I looked up William Burroughs' "Algebra of Need" (mentioned in the book's dedication): "Junk [opium and its derivatives, including heroine and morphine] is the ideal product...the ultimate merchandise. [...] Junk yields a basic formula of "evil" virus: The Algebra of Need. The face of "evil" is always the face of total need. A dope fiend is a man in total need of dope. Beyond a certain frequency need knows absolutely no limit or control. In the words of total need: "Wouldn't you?" Yes you would. You would lie, cheat, inform on your friends, steal, do anything to satisfy total need. Because you would be in a state of total sickness, total possession, and not in a position to act in any other way." From http://www.cures-not-wars.org/ibogaine/iboga.html The Burroughs quote is obviously relevant to Staze and Annemarie, Rose and Corey's plan to addict as many of their enemies as possible. But Burroughs extended the Algebra of Need to other areas of life besides drug addiction: "For Burroughs, all systems of control are but "mathematical extensions of the Algebra of Need beyond the Junk virus" -- and all social struggle is analogous to his own battle against heroin addiction." From http://eserver.org/clogic/1-1/youdelman.html I think this larger meaning is more relevant to *The Annunciate*. The Staze addicts are relatively powerless and ineffective -- hardly evil compared to the controlling, practically sociopathic Annmarie and Corey. Was anyone else reminded of the Nazi doctors upon reading about their experiments on human subjects? I found them quite horrifying. (Corey's "re-pro-duc-tion" trial with Naverdi was particularly gut-churning and brought back the unpleasant memory of a short story called "Precious" by Roberta Lannes. Think gynecologist, sedated patient, worm that can live in uterus and snack on invading man-meat. Revolting is an understatement.) What is evil in this book seems to be the use of technology, drugs and religion to control others. The mythology of the Annunciate was intertwined with the story to such an extent that it was obviously important, but I was never sure what to make of it. Was it an "opiate of the masses" or a metaphor for the overall story? The dictionary says that "annunciate" is either a verb, meaning "to announce" or an adjective meaning "foretold". Both imply a future event. A transformation of the human race? The arrival of a human/alien messiah bearing the fruit of the tree of knowledge? Or just the end of the book? What do you think? ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://therem.net/ Listening to: Coldplay -- A Rush of Blood to the Head "I've built my white picket fence around the Now, with a commanding view of the Soon-to-Be." -- The Tick ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2002 08:17:52 +1000 From: nike Organization: Griffith University Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU i never seem to have enough time - these days - to respond to this list quite as in-depth as i'd like BUT - here's my two cents on the meaning of annunciate. i was raised catholic so my understanding is that the annunciate is quite likely a reference to the catholic/xian story of the Annunciation - ie: when the Archangel arrives to tell Mary she is going to bear the christ child. you can draw all kinds of implications form this - but key i think is that your reading of this moment in M's life depends largely on whether you are a believer or not. if you are, fine, it seems reasonable enough to be the vessel of godhood (maybe!), but if not it's a fairly horrific thing to have some *alien* have impregnated you without your knowledge and/or permission. (I apologise for how brutally insensitive that reading of the Annunciation may sound if you happen to be a xian of any persuasion, btw) After this Mary may have all kinds of conflicted feelings reflected in this novel - and drawn out far more, I'm not suggesting that it is a rewriting, merely that it reflects on the implications of the Annun mythology - the need for love/protection in both its negative and ugly forms, as addiction and nurturance. anyway - enough of my inconsequent ramblings :) nike > The dictionary says that "annunciate" is either a verb, meaning "to > announce" or an adjective meaning "foretold". Both imply a future event. A > transformation of the human race? The arrival of a human/alien messiah > bearing the fruit of the tree of knowledge? Or just the end of the book? > > What do you think? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2002 08:25:57 +1000 From: nike Organization: Griffith University Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU ok - so i couldn't resist going that one step further :) to me this is linked to the staze - ie: the forced addiction to staze - the love of the addict for their particular junk - the self-deluding mythologies we can build up around our addictions, how they make us better/more creative/more loving/more able to live in this ugly world lol. IF you read the Annunciation as a forced impregnation you can see, i think, the analogy with staze addiction - and with more ubiquitous 'addictions' to religion, technology etc. Sure, some of these 'addictions' have benevolent qualities, but they are also incredibly dehumanising - including immaculate conception, staze addiction, human experimentation, etc. ok - i'm going now - promise :) nike ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2002 23:30:01 -0700 From: Jennifer Krauel Subject: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU I just finished the book -- I didn't realize this was a different S. Park book than the others I had already read, so I had to get it and read it after discussion started. I enjoyed this book as a page-turner and escape. The technology was interesting and the story twists kept me guessing. Luckily I didn't read the blurb on the back of the book, since it spoiled several aspects of the story. At first, I was strongly reminded of Park's earlier stories. Staze seemed like another analogy for slavery, especially how she presented it here. The first part of the book, until they get to Paradise and things get wierd, reminded me a lot of her other books. I didn't see the connection with the Christian story of the virgin mother -- despite what seemed like glaring Cathollic analogies. Nike's suggestion that Mary's experience might parallel Naverdi's if she were an unbeliever feels right on to me and adds a lot to the depth of the book. That's why I love discussing books in this group, I just get so much more out of the stories. I found it interesting that I really didn't like any of the characters. Most of them I didn't like because they were only partly there, most of the time they were trapped in the Algebra of Need (thanks Janice). Also I think there's some judgement going on from me, since I have a hard time seeing addiction in a positive or neutral way. I kept wanting them to find a way to break the addiction, the way they did in Hand of Prophecy. I did think it was interesting the way she tried to show that the addiction could turn into something neutral or actually positive. But it didn't seem like a clear resolution of that for me. In fact, I thought there were a lot of things that didn't get clearly resolved. As Janice suggests, I did feel the ending was a disappointment. Perhaps she's thinking about a sequel? I had a hard time resolving the idea of the alien actually draining staze from addicts all over the universe... if it could do that, why did it need more? And it seemed unsatisfying to me to have Eve turn on Ann Marie so completely, I had a hard time understanding such a hard-line response. And it didn't feel right that she should feel so fulfilled as a mother. I hope others were tardy in reading the book, like I was, and that we can get a little more discussion going. Jennifer ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2002 18:56:01 +0100 From: Angela Barclay Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU >I hope others were tardy in reading the book, like I was, and that we can >get a little more discussion going. Jennifer: I have to confess that I am so tardy, I haven't started reading it (I have been completely turned into a worker drone by a second job). I was looking forward to the discussion too because I found Park's _Hand of Prophecy_ to be so powerful. Would you say that _The Annunciate_ is as descriptive and entertaining as _Hand_? You mentioned that you didn't like any of the characters. I found that even the vile characters in _Hand_ were so convincing and round that I 'liked' them. Angela ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2002 12:17:03 -0700 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU At 08:25 AM 9/5/02 +1000, nike wrote: >ok - so i couldn't resist going that one step further :) I think all these things are implied, especially including Burroughs' analysis of addiction. Interestingly, the Catholic church has been much in the news of late involving the addictions of some of its hierarchy, with the furtive homosexuality implied in its Greek exposition and foundation in Paul, in its collective concupiscence for wealth and status, and in its lust for secular power which has led it into bed with those who hold that power, no matter how strange those bedfellows might be, or how alienated from the self-styled intentions of the soi-disant keepers of the keys of Peter. But the cure for all these addictions is found in the same book they supposedly find inspiration in, whose sage advice hasn't been followed in our civilization for thousands of years despite considerable lip service paid to its ideals. "Proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof." Leviticus 25:10 Unacknowledged in the words inscribed on the Liberty Bell, and in the foundation myths of this country, is the whole context of the verses in which this fragment appears, from V'Yikrah, Behar. "Cold turkey withdrawal." This portion states that land and material wealth should be distributed equitably, but realizing that some people managed their wealth better than others, that some people fell on hard times, it forced everyone to restore the status quo periodically, redistribute the means of production to the entire population, and start over. It's nothing less than a radical statement about the acquisition of material wealth, and a call for social and economic justice for every citizen. How our founding "fathers" reconciled this with slavery is a matter for conjecture, but we can assume that greed played a large part in it. Of course proclaiming the Jubilee with the shofar hasn't been done in quite a long time, but it's an interesting thought experiment to imagine how it might work. During the Jubilee, one must rely on stored supplies for everything, since it is forbidden to harvest (work). This would probably force most drug addicts to quit, since an addict with a year's supply of dope is probably dead. And it forces landlords to give away their holdings, so no family is forced into perpetual rents and servitude. The means of production, which in ancient Israel was the land, have to be redelivered into the hands of *every* person every fifty years. There's no place in this scheme for any long-lasting addiction, since everything one accumulates will eventually be given away, just as the North-West Indian tribes held "potlatch," giveaways, that radically redistributed wealth from time to time so that dynasties of wealth and power were never allowed to build to the point of resentment and injustice. So renunciation is built into the system, and a built-in incentive to concentrate on one's ecological relationship with the land and with one's community. While your family may be rich is this generation, the shoe may be on the other foot in the next, and so each citizen is told to do justice to the neighbor, to the hired servant, for we all have higher obligations and indebtedness. You can't ruin a property with poisons or physical degradation and then sell it to some unsuspecting buyer, for it will come back to you in fifty years and you, or your children, will have to live on it and with the consequences of your actions because the earth is not yours, but is a gift to all of us. So the hollow lifestyle depicted in Park's novel, fostering and supplying addiction, is inherently immoral and is shown to be so in the fact that the practitioners of this flimflam are perpetually on the run as they ruin one society after another. The only way out of this vicious cycle is to utterly renounce one's wicked, wicked ways, and repent. And I think that both annunciation and renunciation is implied in Park's story, both as word play and in the plot. The only salvation lies in renunciation of "power over" and the acceptance of mutual responsibility, even to the point of offering up one's life, or womb, for another. It's a mitzvah, a holy obligation. Here's the whole thing: "And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and there shall be unto thee the days of seven sabbaths of years, even forty and nine years. Then shalt thou make proclamation with the blast of the horn on the tenth day of the seventh month; in the day of atonement shall ye make proclamation with the horn throughout all your land. And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof; it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be unto you; ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of the undressed vines. For it is a jubilee; it shall be holy unto you; ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field. In this year of jubilee ye shall return every man unto his possession. And if thou sell aught unto thy neighbour, or buy of thy neighbour's hand, ye shall not wrong one another. According to the number of years after the jubilee thou shalt buy of thy neighbour, and according unto the number of years of the crops he shall sell unto thee. According to the multitude of the years thou shalt increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of the years thou shalt diminish the price of it; for the number of crops doth he sell unto thee. And ye shall not wrong one another; but thou shalt fear thy God; for I am the LORD your God. Wherefore ye shall do My statutes, and keep Mine ordinances and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety. And the land shall yield her fruit, and ye shall eat until ye have enough, and dwell therein in safety. And if ye shall say: 'What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we may not sow, nor gather in our increase'; then I will command My blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth produce for the three years. And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat of the produce, the old store; until the ninth year, until her produce come in, ye shall eat the old store. And the land shall not be sold in perpetuity; for the land is Mine; for ye are strangers and settlers with Me. And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land. If thy brother be waxen poor, and sell some of his possession, then shall his kinsman that is next unto him come, and shall redeem that which his brother hath sold. And if a man have no one to redeem it, and he be waxen rich and find sufficient means to redeem it; then let him count the years of the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; and he shall return unto his possession. But if he have not sufficient means to get it back for himself, then that which he hath sold shall remain in the hand of him that hath bought it until the year of jubilee; and in the jubilee it shall go out, and he shall return unto his possession. And if a man sell a dwelling-house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a whole year after it is sold; for a full year shall he have the right of redemption. And if it be not redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house that is in the walled city shall be made sure in perpetuity to him that bought it, throughout his generations; it shall not go out in the jubilee. But the houses of the villages which have no wall round about them shall be reckoned with the fields of the country; they may be redeemed, and they shall go out in the jubilee. And if thy brother be waxen poor, and his means fail with thee; then thou shalt uphold him: as a stranger and a settler shall he live with thee. Take thou no interest of him or increase; but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee. Thou shalt not give him thy money upon interest, nor give him thy victuals for increase. I am the LORD your God, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, to be your God. And if thy brother be waxen poor with thee, and sell himself unto thee, thou shalt not make him to serve as a bondservant. As a hired servant, and as a settler, he shall be with thee; he shall serve with thee unto the year of jubilee. Then shall he go out from thee, he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto the possession of his fathers shall he return. For they are My servants, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as bondmen. Thou shalt not rule over him with rigour; but shalt fear thy God. . ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2002 22:10:48 -0700 From: Jennifer Krauel Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU Angela, At 10:56 AM 9/19/02, you wrote: >Would you say that _The Annunciate_ is as descriptive and >entertaining as _Hand_? You mentioned that you didn't like any of the >characters. I found that even the vile characters in _Hand_ were so >convincing and round that I 'liked' them. > >Angela I actually don't think I enjoyed Annunciate as much as Hand, perhaps because of the characters. The main character in this new book was just unrelentingly naive. She didn't seem to grow that much in self-awareness during the book despite going through some very challenging experiences. Perhaps the author was saving some of that development for a sequel. I thought the addict characters were pretty one-dimensional. Maybe slavery creates more interesting characters than addiction. I did think the writing was good, the descriptions were captivating, and the story moved along quickly and drew me right in. The idea of socioeconomic classes based on net access is worth exploring, especially in these times. But that aspect of it got a little lost in the religious story I think. Jennifer ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 20 Sep 2002 09:53:09 -0400 From: "Deborah A. Oosterhouse" Organization: DAO Editorial Services Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU Although I wasn't really tardy reading the book, I have been thinking about it for a while before throwing out some of my thoughts. This is the first Severna Park novel I've read. Especially after Jennifer's comments on some of her other stuff, I may have to look up those. I was most intrigued by the alien creature who seemed quite the chameleon to me. Eve was the first one to meet it and, because it bit her, she called it a "succubus". I can't help wondering how Eve's reactions to the whole situation would have been different if she hadn't had that first negative experience and used that negative term to describe the creature. To Corey, it was a sex object; to Annmarie, it was a child; to the Staze addicts, it was a savior (of sorts). And every time it ran into one of these preconceptions about who/what it was, it slid right into that role and behaved that way. One of the things that I find most interesting about this is that everyone else is trying to slap a label onto this alien, when it really is just an infant being that doesn't have much experience of its universe. In some ways I suppose this could relate to the standard "Ave/Eva" view of women in which they are either unrealistically holy (like Mary, the virgin mother) or completely depraved (like Eve, that wicked first sinner). In reality women, like all people and like this alien, have both positive and negative characteristics in combination. By the end, Eve seemed to be the only one who got beyond her initial perceptions of the alien as evil and dangerous. I did also like the concept of turning the Staze addiction into something more positive. Instead of all these individuals wasting half their lives in an isolated dream world, they were able to interact with each other within the Staze visions. But I would also have to agree with the lack of resolution. Once the alien is born as a human baby, where does that go? There does seem to be a lot left open yet at the end. I wasn't really surprised that Eve turned on Annmarie. She knew that she was the one who had saved Annmarie from dying in the fire at Sanctuary, yet Annmarie had this vision of Eve as a sort of needy, grasping troll child. Eve just finally came to the realization that Annmarie had been manipulating her and didn't care anything about her, and she also needed to save the alien from the sort of life that she had experienced with Annmarie as her "mother". What I found most interesting about that bit was that Eve had to teach the alien how to fight because it didn't know how. And then, it stopped fighting anyway and absorbed Annmarie into itself. I think that whole scene was important to Eve's realization that this alien wasn't as evil as she had thought it was. Deborah ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 11:29:15 -0400 From: Gwen Veazey Subject: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU Have enjoyed the comments on _The Annunciate_ although sparse. I liked the novel despite its depressing story. Having attempted some fiction writing, I really appreciate sparkling wordsmiths like Severna Park because I know how hard it is to write this well. Memorable, vivid images for me included seeing inside Naverdi's body - the alien blobs taking hold, and the barren planet, Paradise, with its "charred silhouettes of broken buildings . . .flat as cardboard against the violet horizon." In regard to earlier comments about the meaning of the word Annunciate, I would add: The powerful story of the Angel Gabriel's visit to Mary is unique to Luke. (The only other birth narrative in the Bible, from Matthew, has the angel speaking to Joseph.) In Luke, a betrothed virgin receives a visit by the angel of God and learns of her forthcoming pregnancy and God's empowering protection of her. This passage allows readers to think of Mary, unrealistically, as a non-sexual being and honor her for being maternal. She may be seen as submissive. Yet . . . in the cultural context of the first century, the only beings who gave birth to gods were themselves sacred. This may be the closest the Christian tradition comes to female divinity, other than Sophia references in Proverbs. Mary may be understood as a divine being. She is partner with God. She is God-bearer. Some would say this passage is a stunning instance of God's direct interest in a woman. I'd love to see a feminist theology critique of this novel. Peace, Gwen ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 12:12:05 -0400 From: Dave Belden Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU Gwen wrote: >Have enjoyed the comments on _The Annunciate_ although sparse. Not sure how other silent voices have felt, but I confess my lack of comment on the book was because I just couldn't get into it. I gave up after a struggle at page 60 something. Felt like everything was a downer. Some sf books just seem to have everybody against everybody in dog-eat-dog fashion(I think of it as Frank Herbert sickness, especially the later Dune books). The most interesting ideas by page 65, for me, had concerned the network they were linked into, but it was never described clearly enough for me to get a real sense of how it worked - it never became plausible to me. There was a fight among spaceships, where I was really lost in understanding what was going on. Probably required a deal more concentration than I could give it, or more prior understanding of nanotech ideas in sf than I seem to have. Anyone else feel that way, or am I just out of it this month? Dave ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Oct 2002 21:07:45 -0400 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU At 12:12 PM 10/1/2002 -0400, Dave Belden wrote: >The most interesting ideas by page 65, for me, had concerned the network >they were linked into, but it was never described clearly enough for me to >get a real sense of how it worked - it never became plausible to me. There >was a fight among spaceships, where I was really lost in understanding what >was going on. Probably required a deal more concentration than I could give >it, or more prior understanding of nanotech ideas in sf than I seem to have. >Anyone else feel that way, or am I just out of it this month? I'm with you, Dave. The propagats as described in the book made no sense, unless they possessed faster-than-light communication ability. Information just doesn't pass instantaneously from one corner of a triple-star system to another unless it's being transmitted by an ansible or something like it. Yet there was no mention of this detail. Likewise, there was no real investigation of how the succubus so conveniently transported people from planet to planet. It was frustrating, but after a while, I concluded that technology just wasn't a priority of the book. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://therem.net/ Listening to: Coldplay -- A Rush of Blood to the Head "I've built my white picket fence around the Now, with a commanding view of the Soon-to-Be." -- The Tick ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2002 19:01:52 +0200 From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: [*FSF-L*] AW: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU As we are on the less convincing points in the book: what did you think of the economy described? For me it was incomprehensible to unbelievable. People who are shifted from camp to camp. A sect of addicts (Father Dunne) at one camp that helps refugees. Queen Red who distributes Staze for free. Smugglers at another point. Spare parts and environmental suits bought at a street-market. Where does the money, the ressources come from? Who does the repairs to the spaceships? Where does the food come from? The Kevate to produce Staze ... If stazed people sit around quietly dreaming half the time and the other half try to find more Staze and most people are addicts, how is anything accomplished? Apparently somewhere in ThreeSys is a working economy but does this mean there's no civil war there as in the parts we are shown? As I see it the society/people described could not keep up this high-tech level. But as somebody else already said, I enjoyed the book. I read it in one sitting and hardly could put it down. It was my first book by Severna Park, I think, I will read some more. Petra -- Petra Mayerhofer p.mayerhofer@web.de www.feministische-sf.de ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2002 11:14:04 -0700 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] AW: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU At 07:01 PM 10/3/02 +0200, Petra Mayerhofer wrote: >As we are on the less convincing points in the book: what did you think of >the economy described? For me it was incomprehensible to unbelievable. >People who are shifted from camp to camp. A sect of addicts (Father Dunne) >at one camp that helps refugees. Queen Red who distributes Staze for free. >Smugglers at another point. Spare parts and environmental suits bought at a >street-market. Where does the money, the ressources come from? Who does the >repairs to the spaceships? Where does the food come from? The Kevate to >produce Staze ... If stazed people sit around quietly dreaming half the time >and the other half try to find more Staze and most people are addicts, how >is anything accomplished? Apparently somewhere in ThreeSys is a working >economy but does this mean there's no civil war there as in the parts we are >shown? As I see it the society/people described could not keep up this >high-tech level. I don't think that this is unbelievable at all. If you wander the streets in the inner city, any inner city, the people you notice are the addicted, mentally ill, criminal, and some good citizens busily hurrying past these unsavory characters to enter another safe enclave. All the immediately products of our modern technology are available on the street, often through illegal channels; cell phones, TVs, stereos, software, computers; why is it so difficult to imagine that in a future world these products and more are easily to hand? The US economy seems to trundle along with very high levels of substance abuse, and in fact gin was subsidized in Dickensian England to keep the masses content in their squalor. There are many who believe that crack cocaine serves a similar purpose to the powers that be and has been deliberately introduced into the ghetto for exactly the same reason gin was cheap in Industrial Revolution London. Slums themselves are a relatively modern invention, with their appearance in the US made about 1820 in the Five Points area of New York City. As productivity improves, it is little stretch to believe that a handful of people with production facilities in a single room can affect the course of a civilization and most of the world go to Hell in a handbasket while things just keep ticking along otherwise. Isn't that what Bush and company are in the process of starting a war over? War too is no bar to production. No war is everywhere, even if it seems so when in the thick of it or from reading the papers. Many in England only heard about the war on the radio, or saw airplanes overhead, or had a husband or son in it and killed. And the same process that makes, or will make at some point in the imaginary future, ragtag groups of terrorists a threat to "world peace," may make it possible for a select few of a largely nonessential society able to produce more than enough for all. We'll leave aside in this analogy the tiny but inconvenient facts that there is currently no such thing as world peace and and that anyone who believes that our shiny new modern technologies could have, for example, had any real effect on the scourge of smallpox without the help of an army of aid workers spread throughout the world is a self-deluded cretin. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2002 11:24:29 -0700 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] AW: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU At 11:14 AM 10/3/02 -0700, Lee Anne Phillips wrote: >All the immediately ***USEFUL*** products of our modern Whoops. And to belatedly add another bit to the mix on The Annunciate, Severna Park is an African-American woman. It doesn't take too much imagination to see where she's coming from with Staze. http://www.assumption.edu/WebVAX/ProRe/FAIR19Dec96.html ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2002 20:11:02 -0400 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] The Annunciate To: FEMINISTSF-LIT@UIC.EDU At 11:24 AM 10/3/2002 -0700, Lee Anne Phillips wrote: >And to belatedly add another bit to the mix >on The Annunciate, Severna Park is an >African-American woman. It doesn't take >too much imagination to see where she's >coming from with Staze. Severna Park is a pseudonym. The author's real name is Suzanne Feldman. Check out her web page at http://users.erols.com/feldsipe/Index.htm -- I don't think she's African American. Even if she were, it would seem reductive to me to say that Staze MUST be a reference to a particular conspiracy theory about crack cocaine. A person's race does not automatically tell you where they are coming from on any particular issue. I took Staze to be just one flavor of the control metaphor that filled the book. We've been talking a bit about plausibility lately. I thought it odd that no one in this book ever attempted to go cold turkey. The idea of a drug that is addictive after one dose and that remains addictive *forever*, for *all* addicts, is pretty absurd. What's even more absurd is that no one appeared to be researching an antidote! The possible dollar value alone ought to have been funding multitudes of labs on every planet. But economic and scientific possibility was secondary to the metaphor of "power over" that IMO took its most disturbing form with Naverdi's experimental "pregnancy". I've probably watched the *Alien* movies many more times than is good for me. I kept imagining the alien bursting from Naverdi's body in a fountain of blood, leaving her an empty, dead husk. That didn't happen, thank peep. In fact, I thought it interesting that both the pregnancy, which began with such a hideous violation, and the Staze addictions of billions of people, which seemed so hopeless, turned out to be not nearly as bad as I expected. The author seemed to be saying, "even if you're mercilessly oppressed and helpless, there is hope; things might not turn out the way you think." ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://therem.net/ Listening to: Coldplay -- A Rush of Blood to the Head "I've built my white picket fence around the Now, with a commanding view of the Soon-to-Be." -- The Tick