"LeAvE iT tO Me"

"Leave it to me" is a novel written by Bharati Mukerjee. Topics such as multiculturalism, adoption, seek for identity, hippie movement, Hinduism, ... are developed in the novel.
Clear Water Iris Daughter, Faustine, Debbi di Martino and Devi Dee are the names the protagonist has had in her span life, each name assigned by a different person and the last one by herself.
Devi Dee is a girl in her twenties trying to find out who her bio-parents are. She was raised in an Italian-American family that adopted her at age of two. After high school she leaves New York city and moves to San Francisco in order to track her parents.
Once in San Francisco, she assumes a hippie lifestyle, lives in her car, lives for the day, uses drugs and has sex without major prejudices. She finds her bio-mother and bio-father. She, American and he, Indian. She has been a hippie, and he has been a serial killer.

The novel presents features of Hinduism and Easter beliefs througout the novel and there is an explicit analogy between Devi de goddess and Devi the main character of the novel.
"Leave it to me" is a contemporary novel, not only because of its date of publication but also because of the topics mentioned there.

Not everything is a turd

The title of this post is dedicated to Prof. Fernández. Thank God not everything is a turd for us! And you know why? Because we all had a nice, quiet and safe childhood. Otherwise, we would have thought that evrything was a turd. As in the short story presented by Prof. Guevara in which the main character deals with a turd because of his drug addiction.
Other short stories were presented in our last session. The presenters focused on Reader Response theory and on Carter & long's model in order to analyze "the last sunset" and "tackakahannakeana" After that we discussed the differences between science fiction and fantasy, and whether the short story " For the life of Sheila Morgan" was science fiction or fantasy. So we all agreed, the short story deals with magic rather than science or technology.

Before last

Before last session, we had the chance to hear Prof Vielma's oral prsentation which was called Blue, blue, blue pictures of you. This story presented a great contemporary issue which it was drug abuse, once again! Through the story the author showed the two main characters' lifestyles and the way they wanted to change eachother's life. But why would they want to change their life? Why don't they like their lives? The author author attempts to answer these questions through the whole story. As we can see not only drug abuse is present in the story a lot of contradiction about life itself is present as well. Definitely contemporary aspects from contemporary writers. After the presentation, we discussed the story called Fermi and Frost. This story is how technology is used, and if we, human beings, should trust technology or not. The short story also has "gaps" in order for the reader to have his or her own interpretation.

Leave it to me...

Is everything a turd?

Last class session, we had the chance to hear about "the tale of the turd". A quite different experience in which the allegorical narration of a middle-age man dealing with a turd reflects his own life as a product of drug-use, loss of sel-control, weak personality, etc. This story was discussed by prof. Guevara whose explanations and comments pointed to a very accurate interpretation of the text and and a description within the framework of cultural studies.
On the same session, two other short stories were presented: "the last sunset" and "haka...."
Both stories were approached from two different perspectives: reader response critiscism and Carter and Long's model respectively.
As if it hadn't been enough, we had a glance to the story: "For the life of Sheila Morgan". This story uses elements of technology to portray a mere fantastic story. A good message we can get from it: Even the silliest thought may bring its consquences, so be responsible for your deeds.

Our last session consisted of four short stories, three as student presentations and a last one we all had to read. Once again, as it has been mentioned in previous posts, all of these stories, regardless of whether they are SF, Fiction, or Fantasy deal with created alternative realities that one way or another reflect the current actual reality we are living in. The reader may relate to the contemporary issues discussed in these stories, such as seizing the moment, respecting identity, acknowledgement of one's actions and their implications, meeting deadlines, the sacrifices on behalf of keeping up with our social engagements, among others.

Prof. María Teresa Fernández began with The Last Sunset, by Geoffrey A. Landis. In this SF short story some scientists get about and hour and a half's warning of the end of the world. One of them decides to invite a woman whom he likes, and who works nearby, on a date. They spend their last minutes holding hands, as they watch the beautiful luminosity that in a few seconds would destroy the planet. The story seems to invite us to take advantage of our finite time and to take action before it may be too late.

Prof. Lusvic followed with a story (Name needed) about a situation in which a man helps out an Amerindian family by giving them some food when they were in need. Their baby had no name at the time, and the stranger insisted a name should be given to the creature. He was named after this man as a gesture of gratitude and following their beliefs. The man finds out about this and asks them to change the baby's name, for that was his and should not be anyone else's. The family changes the name, to suit the purpose of both respecting their beliefs and the man's request, as well.

Prof. Cipdeg Guevara conducted Hanif Kureishi's The Tale of the Turd's presentation.
It is the story of an addict who, while in a dinner party at his in-laws', is unable to get rid of a stool in the bathroom. The dread in his life is compared to the stool and the fact that he cannot put either of them behind. In the end, he fetches the stool and throws it out the window, as he has he seems to have done with his own life.

Finally, For the Life of Sheila Morgan, by Dennis Lester McKiernan, was discussed as a group. It is the story of a freelance writer who buys a computer in order to meet a deadline for her piece. A magical software which could grant any spell in exchange for part of the remaining time of the user's life came in the CD-ROM unit of the machine. She misses her deadline and incidentally takes it out on the rude fat man who sold her the machine. Her financial situation gets tight, and the story leaves an open ending from which one may assume she would wish for money or something else to avoid being evicted, for it is implied by the footsteps she hears approaching her apartment, as her car is being towed away.

SELF DESTRUCTION!

Blue, blue, blue pictures of you... That is the name of the story presented by prof. Vielma. In the story, contemporary issues were developed by the author when he presents the middle-age crisis. He portrays through two different characters, different lifestyle which are linked by something in common: drugs. After a series of conflicts, both men ended up envying each other's lifestyles and pitying because of their own one. That as a typical human behavior, human beings sometimes do not treasure what they have and want to have what others do.

We also read a story written by the SF writer Frederick Pohl, this story is called Fermi and Frost. It questions the use or better the misuse of technology against humanity. The setting is the world, specifically USA and Iceland during and after World War III. The narrator presents two possible endings giving the chance to the reader to select the ending he wants for the story.
In both texts, the destruction of the human being as a consequences of his own decisions is stated.