The Feminist Elf (Or Why I Object to Tolkien Tinkering)

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I am a confirmed (re: obsessive) Tolkien fan, both of the original books about Middle Earth and of the Peter Jackson movies. I thought that, for the most part, Mr. Jackson and his team have done a masterful, beautiful job at bringing the books to film despite the difficulties the books present to that medium. While I swear first loyalty to the books, I am not so protective of their narrative integrity that I cannot understand (or at least tolerate) changes to the plot made for sake of a good film. I understand that while I would completely adore a scene-for-scene filming of the books-- complete with every single poem or song in all verses-- that you can't fill movie theaters with slow, dense plots and poetic trees. (Sorry Treebeard).

When I went to see the film version of the Hobbit, I came expecting differences from the books. I knew that the film drew from the appendixes heavily and altered events of the book in a few places. I accepted these alterations because they made sense within the story and seemed faithful to Tolkien's story. With this in mind, I enjoyed the movie immensely, though I did engage in a bit of detail-oriented grumbling at the end. Such is the right and privilege of geeks.

But then I learned about Tauriel.

She is a character invented solely for the movies, an elf warrior who, along with Legolas, sticks it to the Mirkwood spiders. She is a “high ranking” member of the elf army and “knows how to wield any weapon.” I am a bit irritated that they changed the nature of the Mirkwood elves (I always enjoyed the counterpart they provided to the notion that all Middle-earth elves are inherently noble, and sociable creatures) but I can tolerate that. I can tolerate Legolas appearing and even the character of Tauriel herself were it not for one thing-- why she was created at all. The buzz around her character online, and the descriptions given by the movie creators, were that she was added to rectify the “lack of female characters” in the book.

Now I'm mad.

Feminist critics have attacked Tolkien for the supposed bias in his writing towards male characters and away from female characters. Clearly they are ignoring Eowyn, Luthien, and the Galadriel of the Silmarillion, but it's true that the majority of major characters in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are male. The myths that inspired Tolkien were also male-driven. But why is that such an offense?

Writers should be allowed the creative freedom to choose their own inspirations and create their own worlds without having to be shackled by adherence to some politically correct ratio of men to women. I have read and loved stories in which there were no male characters period. I have read and loved stories in which there were mostly male characters. I have loved the stories in which there has been a mix. But artificially reshaping narrative so women can feel “included” is censorship by way of revision and-- if I may say so-- is insulting.

I am not fond, Mr. Jackson, of your insinuation that a woman cannot enjoy a fantasy movie unless she sees another women swinging daggers and rescuing men. Give my mind more credit than that. Don't patronize me by adding a feminist elf to pacify me. It's like adding a female soldier to Saving Private Ryan. It is awkward and untrue to the world the story inhabits.

No one is forced to read Tolkien. If a reader decides that the gender politics of his world (and of most of ancient mythology) are too offensive, he or she may find entertainment elsewhere. There are some great female-oriented fantasy books, which I have read and love. I would not want to alter those books by adding random men. Nor do I want to politicize Tolkien by adding random women.

Tolkien's female fans love his work on its own terms and we have no trouble identifying with the characters of the movie despite the fact that they are men. I search for goodness with Gandalf, discover unexpected courage with Bilbo, and long for home with Thorin and his band. That's what the best storytelling does.....it stirs the part of our souls which are all the same. It is a cheap and unnecessary bargain to trade that power to quiet a few grumpy feminists.

Seeing Gollum: Adventures Beyond the Shire

The girls and I have been reading the Hobbit lately and we've traced Bilbo and the dwarf company from the Shire all the way to the den of Smaug.Upon request from Big Girl to see pictures from the story, I brought up a few images of characters from the movie. She wanted to see Bilbo (who was not as round and hairy as she had imagined) and Smaug (who did not in the pictures live up to the ferocity of the dragon in her mind) and the dwarves. And she wanted to see Gollum. I found an image gallery. She wanted to see what he looked like when he was sad.

And then she didn't want to see any more.

It makes me feel uncomfortable in my tummy, she said. He's icky.

Yes, he is icky. I told her. We talked about greed, and how it was an terrible thing to be so consumed by desire for something that it made you ugly and miserable. We talked about how Tolkein made Gollum look icky to show that truth. That our hearts, without God, were just as horrid as Gollum.

I still wish I hadn't seen him. She said. He might give me bad dreams. I'm scared of him.

Uh-oh. Cue the Mama Guilt moment.

It's okay to be scared, I said. When you are scared of something you just have to put it in the proper place in your mind. Remember that Gollum was just something Tolkein imagined. He's not real.

Maybe I'll imagine Gollum's head on Smaug's body, she said, and started laughing. (How that is less scary I'm not sure but apparently it worked.)

But the Mama Guilt stuck. Maybe I'd gotten too excited at her newfound love of "adventurous stories" as she called them. Maybe I should have figured out that Gollum would be creepy in a way Smaug wasn't.....because Smaug, in all his scale and flame is completely /other/. When you look at Gollum, there is something that makes you squirm. He's vaguely familiar. He's the inversion of the hobbits we love and with whom we identify-- as if we're looking at our own darker and more wretched parts laid bare. Perhaps something in my little girl's heart picked up on an echo of that.

I thought. Then thought some more. She's halfway to seven. She's moving out of the safe, beautiful stories in which evil is toothless and good rarely
threatened. She's out of the Shire now. She wants adventure stories and she is going to sooner or later-- in the stories and in her life-- confront
uncomfortable characters. The more we read together, and the more she grows up, she'll learn the sad truth of what such characters can do to make trouble
and ruin. She'll learn what trouble and ruin lies in her own heart. I would, truth be told, rather her first encounter with "icky" to be the things we find
in a book. While I take seriously my job as her mother to guard her young heart and tender mind, I would rather her learn now how to put uncomfortable things in their proper place. Now, when I can shut the bad guy away and put him up on a shelf then cuddle her.

I don't want to see the movie, she said.

You don't have to.

Maybe when I'm seven. I'll be big then.

Oh baby girl, your Mama knows that. Your mama knows.

Half-Homemade Mama

Let's get one thing straight: as much I love pinning recipes for cute cupcakes, yummy cookies and endless varieties of chocolate things, I am a bit of a slacker. Like today, when I really wanted to bake something for the girls but have spent the day scaling a mountain of backed up laundry (okay, totally my fault there) and am short on Baking Fairy Magic. I did, however, have a Funfetti Cake Mix. A boxed cake mix. Every time you mention those words, a Real Baking Mom breaks out in hives. (Sorry)

But, thanks still to Pinterest and the slacker-friendly folks at Pillsbury, I found this awesome recipe for Funfetti Cookies. I had never made cookies from a cake mix before, so I followed the (simple) recipe with a mix of eagerness and apprehension. The last time I tried to make cookies with River we went through two batches of strange tasting half-burned bits of almost cookie before I gave up and bought her an icecream from McDonalds. (Bad Mommy!)

But these cookies were amazing. I'm not taking much credit for said amazement. My job was to stir the mix and watch the edges of the cookies like an OCD hawk so I could snatch them out the second they crisped golden brown. Also, I misread the oven temperature and cooked them most of the way on 350 rather than 375. That could have been the secret to their success. They came out fluffy, chewy, soft, and generally heavenly. Especially when you add icing and sprinkles.

The girls got to decorate the cookies themselves and chowed down on their handiwork while they finished Secret of the Wings.
 
Homemade is great.

Half-homemade, especially on a Saturday when all I've seemed to do is wash and fold and pick up semi-smushed things from the floor, is also pretty darn good.

A Little Old Fashioned (Signature Style)

Since Christmas, I have taken it slow on sewing, and I decided to sit out most of the current cycle of Project Run and Play. There's been some fabulous clothing posted, as always. It's been nice to focus on enjoying everyone's creativity but I did want to try to do something for the last week. My signature style is probably best defined by its lack of definition. I am eclectic, distracted, and a bit random.

But I have another confession: I am old-fashioned. While I admire the utter coolness of many of the sewing mamas I follow, my sewing is completely not cool. Not trendy. If anything, it's inspired (more than I want to admit) by the almost-country Virginia suburbs of my childhood, by nostalgia for poofy peach dresses and gingham folk arty design aesthetic. By sleeveless summer dresses and jumpers and sunhats. I find myself, more and more, creating clothes that remind me of what it felt like to be young and running through pine trees and tall grass. There's just no fighting it.

When a friend gave me a bag of jeans to cut up for refashioning, I knew I wanted to make my baby girl a jumper of her own. I wanted hand-stitched details. And ruffles. And rainbows. Here's what came off the sewing table:

 It is not a fancy dress but it's bright and cheery and can stand up to all the playing and running after big sisters that fills Baby Girl's day.

 Picking flowers for Mommy (okay, picking grass and thinking its a flower)

A back view

 

Stand still for a picture? I think not

The hand stitching (and indulgence in nostalgia) came from the teddy bears I

embroidered on the bodice. The simple shape reminds me of the country bears I saw in craft magazines growing up.

No you can't really see details here but Baby Girl is being cute.

I also wanted ruffles. If there is anything consistent about my style, it's that I love a good ruffle. And I love rainbow color schemes (having long since given up on a single favorite color). The bright colors just pop against the dark denim.

 

I took this project one tiny step at a time, which I found quite a relaxing change from my normal sew-until-midnight frenzy. I don't mind continuing the trend. Fewer projects, more mindfulness in the making. 

It's been another inspiring season of Project Run and Play. I'm happy to sew along.