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| The Beetle [message #6682] |
Tue, 02 December 2008 18:56  |
 b_twin_1
Messages: 2593
Registered: September 2008
Location: Victoria, Australia |
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The Beetle
I've got a plan so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel ~ Blackadder
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6691 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Tue, 02 December 2008 19:38  |
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it was only me, the bedside light, and a lot of silence and darkness, and some huge flying buzzing thing zapped in from nowhere and caromed off the light
Aarghh! I'd have been ahead of you! One time, though I don't mind moths, I remember being half asleep and hearing an especially fat individual blundering around near my head in the dark - the light was back on so quickly that I defied the laws of physics 
Worthwhile has its uses but enjoyably silly has to be a vital ingredient of any literary diet; I started with Northanger Abbey, and worked on from there - Udolpho was pretty enjoyably silly, I seem to remember. Maybe enjoyably silly should be a category of literature in bookshops and libraries, with subdivisions...
Someone says "pie" and we all go on alert, like meercats. "Pie? Where?" - Blackbear
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6700 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Tue, 02 December 2008 19:50 |
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ArtfulMagpie
Messages: 34
Registered: November 2008
Location: Chicago area |
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The first problem is the obvious one of racism: the powerful and disgusting cult is Egyptian, and the beetle character is often referred to as an ‘Arab’. I don’t actually think this is real true xenophobic racism; Marsh states pretty carefully that this is a rogue cult and the Egyptians don’t like it either, but he could have had his cult in Seven Dials or Swiss Cottage††, and he didn’t.
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Yes, I find that's often a problem when reading horror written in the 1800s or early 1900s. H.P. Lovecraft was particularly egregious with it...often his horrid eldritch evil villains were "Esquimaux" or some other indigenous tribe...Polynesians figure heavily into his mythos of evil, of course.
And there was one story I read...I don't recall now if it was Lovecraft or one of his contemporaries...in which the true horror of the story is supposed to be, not that the man's wife turned out to be an evil devil-worshiping sorceress, but that she was HALF BLACK AND PASSING AS WHITE, oh my god!!
Ugh. But if you can get past that kind of thing, High Victorian Tosh and its ilk are often quite satisfying.
"...nothing is more fatal to maidenly delicacy of speech than the run of a good library."
— Robertson Davies
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6741 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Tue, 02 December 2008 22:39 |
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Black Bear
Messages: 3216
Registered: September 2008
Location: Indianapolis, IN USA |
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Uh oh. I may have a hard time getting past the cat....
I'm a lover of early 20th c adventure/horror pulp myself, despite its wincingly dated depictions of anyone Not White. I had a friend once tell me that he "couldn't" read Lovecraft, as the casual racism so turned his stomach--and he was a bit disappointed in me that I could and DID enjoy HPL and his ilk. But these guys are products of their times, and I actually find it rather fascinating--the whole idea of exotic as "other" and "other" as something to be distrusted at best and feared at worst. In their overly white and Anglo dominated outlook on the world, this is the thing they find most fundamentally terrifying. How interesting is THAT, you know? And of course it's not just HPL in his little New Englandy corner--RE Howard's pretty dreadful too, and Burroughs is downright painful in spots. And oh, Sax Rohmer....oh dear. But I would never skip out on reading Tarzan et al period. It is what it is--and that's great prose and engrossing stories, with a whacking great dose of over-the-top anglocentric xenophobia. That makes it very dated, but doesn't make it less fun for me to read.
"The time is always right to do what's right."--MLK Jr.
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6755 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 02:41 |
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Diane in MN
Messages: 2728
Registered: October 2008
Location: Twin Cities, MN, USA |
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'It pressed lightly against my clothing with what might, for all the world, have been spider’s legs. There was an amazing host of them–I felt the pressure of each separate one. They embraced me softly, stickily, as if the creature glued and unglued them, each time it moved. . . . ‘
Okay, nothing at all against nineteenth-century novels in general or high-Victorian thrillers in particular, but bugs--NO. I lived in Baltimore during one of the 17-year cicada hatches, which meant being bombarded by VERY large VERY heavy flying insects whenever you went outside, plus dodging the corpses on the sidewalks--they crunch--for a period of time I can't remember but seemed like months. I have recoiled from the sight of three-inch cockroaches in Florida (not IN the hotel, or I would have been OUT of the hotel; I tried not to think about the bug spray). I got a tick IN BED, which triggered a summer of extreme paranoia. I don't think I could snuggle down under the comforter with this one. Familiar horrors can be the worst . . .
"The point of books is to have way too many but to always feel you never have enough . . . " Louise Erdrich
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6764 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 05:45 |
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Yep, bugs of any sort make me squeamish, too (most especially arachnids). I got up and left the theatre in the middle of The Mummy. . . you know the part. I'd have to read The Beetle in a large group of people in broad daylight. But I think I will have to read it.
Scar
"People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it's the other way around."
T.P.
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6766 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 06:49 |
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i totally agree.bugs [shudders] my husband and youngest daughter love the horror movies, the grosser the better.anyone see the one called eight-legged freaks ,if you don't like spiders, don't watch this one.i had night mares for weeks..giant spiders [ugh].
[Updated on: Wed, 03 December 2008 06:50]
Bonnie Holmes the faster ahead I go, the more behind I get
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6773 is a reply to message #6755 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 08:07 |
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Black Bear
Messages: 3216
Registered: September 2008
Location: Indianapolis, IN USA |
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| Diane in MN wrote on Wed, 03 December 2008 02:41 |
I lived in Baltimore during one of the 17-year cicada hatches, which meant being bombarded by VERY large VERY heavy flying insects whenever you went outside, plus dodging the corpses on the sidewalks--they crunch--for a period of time I can't remember but seemed like months.
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LOL! I was born in late July of one of the hottest, most humid summers Indiana has seen, and it was a 17-year cicada summer as well. My mother says this is one of the reasons I have no brothers or sisters. 2 sweltering months of heavy pregnancy in a small apartment, and every time she went outside she was bombarded by heat, sweat, and bugs going SKREE SKREE SKREE... Thus, I grew up a singlet.
At least it's easy for me to remember when the next emergence will be! I'll be 51.
"The time is always right to do what's right."--MLK Jr.
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6779 is a reply to message #6755 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 09:54 |
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ArtfulMagpie
Messages: 34
Registered: November 2008
Location: Chicago area |
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| Diane in MN wrote on Wed, 03 December 2008 01:41 |
I lived in Baltimore during one of the 17-year cicada hatches, which meant being bombarded by VERY large VERY heavy flying insects whenever you went outside, plus dodging the corpses on the sidewalks--they crunch--for a period of time I can't remember but seemed like months.
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We had a 17-year cicada hatch in my area last summer. I actually loved it! I generally dislike most bugs, especially large ones...but there was something about those cicadas. It was like, "WHY seventeen years? Why not sixteen? Or eighteen? And how do they all KNOW? And how and why does something like that evolve in the first place?" It was quite mysterious and wonderful. I was reminded of the last line of On the Origin of Species:
"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one ... from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
(Regardless of whether you consider the "few forms or one" to have been created by a Creator or by random chance in the primordial stew, the sentence still holds true!)
And despite their size, I found the 17-year cicadas to be very laid-back bugs. They don't buzz you, except by accident while desperately trying to find a mate in the few days or weeks they have to live. They don't bite, or sting. If you pick one up, it will just sort of sit on your hand, totally unconcerned. They're just...large.
"...nothing is more fatal to maidenly delicacy of speech than the run of a good library."
— Robertson Davies
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6784 is a reply to message #6741 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 11:28 |
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shalea
Messages: 779
Registered: October 2008
Location: Raleigh, North Carolina, ... |
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| Black Bear wrote on Tue, 02 December 2008 22:39 |
Uh oh. I may have a hard time getting past the cat....
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You and me both. But I'll give it a try.
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But these guys are products of their times, and I actually find it rather fascinating--the whole idea of exotic as "other" and "other" as something to be distrusted at best and feared at worst. In their overly white and Anglo dominated outlook on the world, this is the thing they find most fundamentally terrifying. How interesting is THAT, you know?
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Very. Particularly since Lovecraft was apparently also fundamentally terrified by "degenerate" rural populations in the US as well.  Basically, no amount of revisionism is going to make these authors into modern "enlightened" folks, but there's a lot to be said for their work if you keep that firmly in mind.
On an only semi-related note, I was THRILLED when they re-released Howard's work in unmucked-about-with versions!
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6832 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 21:32 |
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we have very large june bugs and they just freak me right out[shudders].
Bonnie Holmes the faster ahead I go, the more behind I get
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6834 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 21:49 |
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This conversation reminds me of Summer Camp one year - someone opened the door to the cabin and a june bug flew in, and landed on my shirt(I was on the top bunk right by the door). I screamed and tore the shirt off and proceeded to whack it against the side of the bunk in my flailing... After I could breathe again and ascertain that the bug was no longer on my shirt and put it back on, one of the other campers announced that a group of boys had just walked by*, and of course the door was still open!
*and likely seen the flailing and screaming of a shirtless girl on the top bunk...
"The center of every man's existence is a dream. Death, disease, insanity, are merely material accidents, like a toothache or a twisted ankle. That these brutal forces always besiege and often capture the citadel does not prove that they are the citadel."
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6841 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Wed, 03 December 2008 22:45 |
skating librarian
Messages: 570
Registered: October 2008
Location: Vermont |
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I've been told by a denizen of the Sunshine State that Palmetto Bug is the polite name for Cockroach.
I have not been able to get into HP Lovecraft ... and the funny thing is that according to certain references he spent time in Guilford VT ... guess I'm one of those degenerate rural types. Some day I have to dig a bit deeper and find out which part of "town" he lived in.
We're actually quite literary here (or were) the first Black American poet (Lucy Prince) lived here, as did Royall Tyler, the first American playwright.
"Winning a war is like winning an earthquake" Jeanette Rankin
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6851 is a reply to message #6779 ] |
Thu, 04 December 2008 00:45 |
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Diane in MN
Messages: 2728
Registered: October 2008
Location: Twin Cities, MN, USA |
Senior Member |
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| ArtfulMagpie wrote on Wed, 03 December 2008 08:54 |
but there was something about those cicadas. It was like, "WHY seventeen years? Why not sixteen? Or eighteen? And how do they all KNOW? And how and why does something like that evolve in the first place?" It was quite mysterious and wonderful. I was reminded of the last line of On the Origin of Species:
"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one ... from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
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Well, it IS mysterious and wonderful. But I am very bad at bugs, so my appreciation of the mystery and wonder is purely intellectual and preferably from a distance!
"The point of books is to have way too many but to always feel you never have enough . . . " Louise Erdrich
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6877 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Thu, 04 December 2008 07:01 |
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oh my god, you poor thing,[laughing hysterically ] sorry but the image that came into my head when i read that was awesome.
Bonnie Holmes the faster ahead I go, the more behind I get
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6903 is a reply to message #6867 ] |
Thu, 04 December 2008 13:02 |
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| Susan from Athens wrote on Thu, 04 December 2008 08:38 |
Oh cockroaches, pshaw! (I always wanted to use pshaw in a sentence ) I deal with them on a daily basis. My one true horror story was one hot summer night, I woke up overwhelmed by thirst, made my way to the kitchen, blearily took out a glass, filled it with water and took a drink, and opened my eyes wide to find myself face-to-face with a cockroach riding the lip of the glass. That image comes back to me in nightmares.
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Yeeauughh!
I'm with Dianne on big bugs - I can deal with them but I prefer avoidance. When I worked nights in a big old psychiatric asylum I used to do a noisy wardance before entering the ward kitchen, giving the roaches time to make dignified exits; I just hate the crunching as you walk across a solidly covered floor of cockroaches.. 
Someone says "pie" and we all go on alert, like meercats. "Pie? Where?" - Blackbear
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6914 is a reply to message #6682 ] |
Thu, 04 December 2008 15:28 |
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You guys--I'M EATING!
Nothing worse than a cockroach to me. HATE THEM. The only thing that scares me worse are scorpions. Really. When I was a kid my house was full of roaches--all sizes. And we had those giant flying cockroaches.
Once my sister felt a bug on her arm in the night, and flung it, came up yelling, so I turned on the lights (we shared a room) and we looked everywhere for it, but couldn't find it, until she looked down, and there, hanging on inside her nightgown, was the roach. She did the fastest strip tease I've ever seen, screaming her lungs out. That brought everybody running, you bet. And her with only her underwear on--it was a scene, let me tell you.
[Updated on: Thu, 04 December 2008 15:29]
"And by the way you look fantastic in your boots of Chinese plastic."
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| Re: The Beetle [message #6941 is a reply to message #6912 ] |
Thu, 04 December 2008 19:01 |
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| Susan from Athens wrote on Thu, 04 December 2008 15:01 |
| holmes44 wrote on Thu, 04 December 2008 14:01 |
oh my god, you poor thing,[laughing hysterically ] sorry but the image that came into my head when i read that was awesome.
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| L.R.K. wrote |
Yes, that was utterly horrible - and funny!
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yes laugh at me ***sob, sob*** It was traumatic!!! (But funny in retelling, I admit).
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there..there, we would never laugh at you, always with you[hands over tissue].
Bonnie Holmes the faster ahead I go, the more behind I get
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