BSC in review: Claudia and the Sad Goodbye
Aug. 9th, 2005 09:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wisdomeagleI read Claudia and the Sad Goodbye last night. It was actually surprisingly good, though the last few chapters fell off a bit.
For those of you who don't remember, the B-plot of that book involves a girl named Callie or something similar whose mommy makes her go to all sorts of lessons and activities because she doesn't have time to spend with her. Callie falls instantly in love with Claud (I'm not being pervy, honestly! It's my honest interpretation of the text) and Claudia is pretty fond of her as well. Kristy suggests that while Claudia is a surrogate motherish person for Callie, Callie might be a surrogate-Mimi type person for Claudia. "Don't give her up," she says, "when you start feeling better about Mimi. I know we think kids can't break, but they can. I know, because I broke when my dad left us."
And Claudia says in the narrative, sometimes I think Kristy understands kids better than any of us. That's just so intriguing (omg, not in a pervy way!). I adore Kristy and keep trying to grok her... we don't often get to see the others thinking of her like this, though obviously they admire her ideas... but she's really intelligent in other ways too. And understands kids' psychology and... I don't know. That line just kind of broke me.
[Went into gigglefits at Kristy's letter home in SS#2, where she says, "I love kids, but I'm not having more than one of my own. Well, maybe two. Okay, but not more than five or six!" Dude, Kristy, you and Mary Anne can work it out when the time comes. I bet there'll be fights about that.]
We don't have Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger, so I'll have to borrow that from the library, as Sharon and Richard started dating again in one of the books I skipped, and I think it's that one... I'm still obsessed with them, and very excited about getting to #30, Mary Anne and the Great Romance. Because, eep! het OTP.
Anyhow, on the subject of Claudia and the Sad Goodbye, in which Mimi dies, I didn't cry, which I was half expecting to, given its topical nature. But no tears. I was impressed, though, with the way the book was arc'd, with the death about halfway through, and Claud's grief, not Mimi's illness, being the real conflict in the book. And Claudia grieved... realistically, at least as far as I could tell. [Although, I don't know. Jeane died when I was about that age, and my grief lingered unhealthily long, as you know. It's frustrating that the structure of the books and the series mean Claudia's grief has to be essentially self-contained, though there is of course continuity. On the other hand, Mimi's death was very sad, but not a tragedy, as Jeane's death was, which I really do think makes the grieving process different.]
After that rather long tangent... Claudia was allowed to have some real emotions -- numbness, resentment, anger, frustration... she tried to block all the Mimi-memories, kept pushing them down to keep herself aloof. That's not my experience of grief but it feels *very* real to me.
In some ways, this book is a reprise of Claudia and Mean Janine. Again, Claudia resents that her family seems to force her to take responsibility for Mimi because her activities aren't important and theirs are. (In C&MJ, this is explicitly refuted, but it's not in this book. I want to know why. I know Claudia's parents think grades are important, but is the inferiority complex their fault really? I'm not sure what we're supposed to understand.) And again, Janine's human side becomes evident. She spends lots of time with Claudia in the weeks after Mimi's death, and even gives her a hug at one point (which is totally uncharacteristic.)
In the climactic scene of the book, Janine goes into Mimi's room (which the whole family has been avoiding) and starts going through her jewelry box, dividing up the things she's left behind. Claudia finds her and is totally irate; this seems callous and cruel to her, with Mimi hardly in her grave and Janine is dividing up the spoils. I like that scene quite a lot. I think both Janine's humanity and her Other-ness come through. I think there is something of the Emotionally Autistic Genius in her. (Favorite. Character Type. Ever.) Not that I think she's really as cold-hearted as Claudia thinks, of course, but that she's object-oriented in that way. That she wants mementos of Mimi that are tangible.
Discuss: Claudia's genius is object-oriented (art), but Janine's seems to be theoretical, numbers/physics-oriented. Why then this moment where Janine's relationship with physical objects seems to be more visceral than Claudia's? Or perhaps Claudia, in using physical objects in her works, has a more violent reaction to dividing up the jewelry because to her it's not just an object but a symbol?
Discuss: During the book, Claudia is working on a stop-action painting, capturing objects and people in the middle of action, the moment before they fall, a bird just about to land. How does this type of painting relate to the themes of the book? I'm kind of at a loss.
Artwork is an important theme in the book. There are several pieces of art that are discussed repeatedly... there's the portrait of Mimi that Claudia takes off her wall the morning she dies and hides in the attic, until finally some of the unresolved issues of her grief become resolved and she feels comfortable returning the portrait to its place. This piece is obviously mirrored by the portrait of Callie makes of Claudia as a "tribute," which ties in with the other tributes -- the collage Claudia makes to memorialize Mimi, and the mural-collage Callie and the rest of the art class make for the same reason.
Art has meaning. Objects have value. Janine remembers by wearing Mimi's diamond earrings. Claudia remembers by crafting a collage that captures the essence of who Mimi was. Callie is proud of the puppet she makes and wants to give it to her mother as a token of her love; when her mother shows up late once again, she hastily gives the puppet to Claudia; her mother doesn't deserve her love-token. Later, when her mother shows she does care, Callie scrawls her name on a collage and gives it to her mother -- another love-token. Artwork has meaning. Objects have value.
[How awesome would it be to put River in the same 'verse as these people? How awesome would River/Janine/Claudia be? Or just River/Claudia? Or just River/Janine? It's just an object.]
One thing that bugs me about the series is how whenever they go to parents with problems -- deep, kid-psychology problems, like "you're ignoring your daughter" and "the twins want to be individuals" -- the parents are always like, "Oh, I never realized! *reforms*" What bosh.
I think Claudia and the Sad Goodbye is also notable as it's the book in which the timeline is Officially Frelled. Up till that point, it's wavering on not-okay, but BtVS level screwedness -- too many months in the school year kind of thing. Books 1-5 are 7th grade. Books 6-9 are the summer between. Books 10-25(?) are 8th grade; SS#2 is the summer after 8th grade; #26, they're in 8th grade again. Ah, the loopy timeline. How I do love you.
There's way more continuity in the BSC books (at least the early ones) than I'd realized. There's a definite sense of what's to come -- Mimi has been deteriorating since she had her stroke, and is really pretty confused in Kristy and the Mother's Day Surprise. In turn, Elizabeth and Watson have been talking about wanting children since long before that book. Jeff's problems at school are stretched over several books before he finally goes back to California. Even Edward and Maureen McGill's fights have been increasing in intensity, laying the groundwork for the divorce, and we almost never dip into Stacey's point of view.
Er, randomly. Another problem I have with the BSC is the way moving seems to be reversible. There's Jeff going to live in California, and then Stacey's back-and-forth, and Dawn's eventual move back to CA... I guess I understand why some of this had to happen (and to her credit, Ann M. Martin did a good job of keeping things fresh while not seeming TOO unrealistic, at least so far -- I'm just waiting for the point where she runs out of ideas, though, and I think it's right about now), but it's frustrating, and probably not a good lesson to teach impressionable young girls. The vast majority of us who move when we're young don't get to go back, not even if we're having "lots of trouble in school." Not even if our best friend in the old location needs us desperately. We grit our teeth and beg and plead and our parents say, "Tough it out, kid."
I'm not the child of divorce, so I don't know an awful lot about custody arrangements, but the custody laws in the BSCverse seem awfully easy to manipulate. See also, Karen and Andrew getting more time at the big house (oh. Hee. I never noticed that before) because they really really want to. (Though admittedly, in their case equal time makes more sense, since both parents live in the same town and have extremely stable homelives.) Dawn and Jeff, though... *shakes head* I had a miserable time in all of elementary school, but no one sent me back to Massachusetts. [For those of you trying desperately to follow along at home -- I was born in Massachusetts. We moved to New Jersey when I was eight, and I hated it for years until finally, finally, I settled in, loved my church, loved my teachers, had good friends. Then I went to college, and after my freshman year, my family moved BACK to Massachusetts (because of my dad's job) and I pretty much had to follow. Being here is okay, except for the part where the church isn't mine, my friends are scattered to the winds, and I am breathtakingly lonely.]
Er! To see if I can write![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
femslash_minis assignment. I have a germ of an idea, but I'm not sure exactly what direction I want to take it.
For those of you who don't remember, the B-plot of that book involves a girl named Callie or something similar whose mommy makes her go to all sorts of lessons and activities because she doesn't have time to spend with her. Callie falls instantly in love with Claud (I'm not being pervy, honestly! It's my honest interpretation of the text) and Claudia is pretty fond of her as well. Kristy suggests that while Claudia is a surrogate motherish person for Callie, Callie might be a surrogate-Mimi type person for Claudia. "Don't give her up," she says, "when you start feeling better about Mimi. I know we think kids can't break, but they can. I know, because I broke when my dad left us."
And Claudia says in the narrative, sometimes I think Kristy understands kids better than any of us. That's just so intriguing (omg, not in a pervy way!). I adore Kristy and keep trying to grok her... we don't often get to see the others thinking of her like this, though obviously they admire her ideas... but she's really intelligent in other ways too. And understands kids' psychology and... I don't know. That line just kind of broke me.
[Went into gigglefits at Kristy's letter home in SS#2, where she says, "I love kids, but I'm not having more than one of my own. Well, maybe two. Okay, but not more than five or six!" Dude, Kristy, you and Mary Anne can work it out when the time comes. I bet there'll be fights about that.]
We don't have Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger, so I'll have to borrow that from the library, as Sharon and Richard started dating again in one of the books I skipped, and I think it's that one... I'm still obsessed with them, and very excited about getting to #30, Mary Anne and the Great Romance. Because, eep! het OTP.
Anyhow, on the subject of Claudia and the Sad Goodbye, in which Mimi dies, I didn't cry, which I was half expecting to, given its topical nature. But no tears. I was impressed, though, with the way the book was arc'd, with the death about halfway through, and Claud's grief, not Mimi's illness, being the real conflict in the book. And Claudia grieved... realistically, at least as far as I could tell. [Although, I don't know. Jeane died when I was about that age, and my grief lingered unhealthily long, as you know. It's frustrating that the structure of the books and the series mean Claudia's grief has to be essentially self-contained, though there is of course continuity. On the other hand, Mimi's death was very sad, but not a tragedy, as Jeane's death was, which I really do think makes the grieving process different.]
After that rather long tangent... Claudia was allowed to have some real emotions -- numbness, resentment, anger, frustration... she tried to block all the Mimi-memories, kept pushing them down to keep herself aloof. That's not my experience of grief but it feels *very* real to me.
In some ways, this book is a reprise of Claudia and Mean Janine. Again, Claudia resents that her family seems to force her to take responsibility for Mimi because her activities aren't important and theirs are. (In C&MJ, this is explicitly refuted, but it's not in this book. I want to know why. I know Claudia's parents think grades are important, but is the inferiority complex their fault really? I'm not sure what we're supposed to understand.) And again, Janine's human side becomes evident. She spends lots of time with Claudia in the weeks after Mimi's death, and even gives her a hug at one point (which is totally uncharacteristic.)
In the climactic scene of the book, Janine goes into Mimi's room (which the whole family has been avoiding) and starts going through her jewelry box, dividing up the things she's left behind. Claudia finds her and is totally irate; this seems callous and cruel to her, with Mimi hardly in her grave and Janine is dividing up the spoils. I like that scene quite a lot. I think both Janine's humanity and her Other-ness come through. I think there is something of the Emotionally Autistic Genius in her. (Favorite. Character Type. Ever.) Not that I think she's really as cold-hearted as Claudia thinks, of course, but that she's object-oriented in that way. That she wants mementos of Mimi that are tangible.
Discuss: Claudia's genius is object-oriented (art), but Janine's seems to be theoretical, numbers/physics-oriented. Why then this moment where Janine's relationship with physical objects seems to be more visceral than Claudia's? Or perhaps Claudia, in using physical objects in her works, has a more violent reaction to dividing up the jewelry because to her it's not just an object but a symbol?
Discuss: During the book, Claudia is working on a stop-action painting, capturing objects and people in the middle of action, the moment before they fall, a bird just about to land. How does this type of painting relate to the themes of the book? I'm kind of at a loss.
Artwork is an important theme in the book. There are several pieces of art that are discussed repeatedly... there's the portrait of Mimi that Claudia takes off her wall the morning she dies and hides in the attic, until finally some of the unresolved issues of her grief become resolved and she feels comfortable returning the portrait to its place. This piece is obviously mirrored by the portrait of Callie makes of Claudia as a "tribute," which ties in with the other tributes -- the collage Claudia makes to memorialize Mimi, and the mural-collage Callie and the rest of the art class make for the same reason.
Art has meaning. Objects have value. Janine remembers by wearing Mimi's diamond earrings. Claudia remembers by crafting a collage that captures the essence of who Mimi was. Callie is proud of the puppet she makes and wants to give it to her mother as a token of her love; when her mother shows up late once again, she hastily gives the puppet to Claudia; her mother doesn't deserve her love-token. Later, when her mother shows she does care, Callie scrawls her name on a collage and gives it to her mother -- another love-token. Artwork has meaning. Objects have value.
[How awesome would it be to put River in the same 'verse as these people? How awesome would River/Janine/Claudia be? Or just River/Claudia? Or just River/Janine? It's just an object.]
One thing that bugs me about the series is how whenever they go to parents with problems -- deep, kid-psychology problems, like "you're ignoring your daughter" and "the twins want to be individuals" -- the parents are always like, "Oh, I never realized! *reforms*" What bosh.
I think Claudia and the Sad Goodbye is also notable as it's the book in which the timeline is Officially Frelled. Up till that point, it's wavering on not-okay, but BtVS level screwedness -- too many months in the school year kind of thing. Books 1-5 are 7th grade. Books 6-9 are the summer between. Books 10-25(?) are 8th grade; SS#2 is the summer after 8th grade; #26, they're in 8th grade again. Ah, the loopy timeline. How I do love you.
There's way more continuity in the BSC books (at least the early ones) than I'd realized. There's a definite sense of what's to come -- Mimi has been deteriorating since she had her stroke, and is really pretty confused in Kristy and the Mother's Day Surprise. In turn, Elizabeth and Watson have been talking about wanting children since long before that book. Jeff's problems at school are stretched over several books before he finally goes back to California. Even Edward and Maureen McGill's fights have been increasing in intensity, laying the groundwork for the divorce, and we almost never dip into Stacey's point of view.
Er, randomly. Another problem I have with the BSC is the way moving seems to be reversible. There's Jeff going to live in California, and then Stacey's back-and-forth, and Dawn's eventual move back to CA... I guess I understand why some of this had to happen (and to her credit, Ann M. Martin did a good job of keeping things fresh while not seeming TOO unrealistic, at least so far -- I'm just waiting for the point where she runs out of ideas, though, and I think it's right about now), but it's frustrating, and probably not a good lesson to teach impressionable young girls. The vast majority of us who move when we're young don't get to go back, not even if we're having "lots of trouble in school." Not even if our best friend in the old location needs us desperately. We grit our teeth and beg and plead and our parents say, "Tough it out, kid."
I'm not the child of divorce, so I don't know an awful lot about custody arrangements, but the custody laws in the BSCverse seem awfully easy to manipulate. See also, Karen and Andrew getting more time at the big house (oh. Hee. I never noticed that before) because they really really want to. (Though admittedly, in their case equal time makes more sense, since both parents live in the same town and have extremely stable homelives.) Dawn and Jeff, though... *shakes head* I had a miserable time in all of elementary school, but no one sent me back to Massachusetts. [For those of you trying desperately to follow along at home -- I was born in Massachusetts. We moved to New Jersey when I was eight, and I hated it for years until finally, finally, I settled in, loved my church, loved my teachers, had good friends. Then I went to college, and after my freshman year, my family moved BACK to Massachusetts (because of my dad's job) and I pretty much had to follow. Being here is okay, except for the part where the church isn't mine, my friends are scattered to the winds, and I am breathtakingly lonely.]
Er! To see if I can write
femslash_minis assignment. I have a germ of an idea, but I'm not sure exactly what direction I want to take it.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 02:24 pm (UTC)The first dozen or so really were pretty good.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 02:28 pm (UTC)And the first dozen or so? Really surprisingly good.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 04:21 pm (UTC)This is the point where my eyes go wide and I fall over and make high-pitched incoherent gibbering noises of sheer "what-if" rapture.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 12:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 04:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 12:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 08:48 pm (UTC)Discuss: During the book, Claudia is working on a stop-action painting, capturing objects and people in the middle of action, the moment before they fall, a bird just about to land. How does this type of painting relate to the themes of the book? I'm kind of at a loss.
By freezing time, she doesn't have to face the inevitable. She can hit pause on Mimi's health, so that Mimi is always alive and with her. She can hit pause on her own feelings, so she doesn't have to deal with the reality of working through the grief. By pausing in the middle, you still have potential, still have possibilities. Once the motion is completed, the bird lands, the object hits the ground, all potential is lost. (This is physics too. An object suspended 3 feet above the ground is all potential energy, no kinetic energy. Falling, it is a bit of both, and as it keeps falling, it continues to shed potential energy until it hits the ground and none is left. It's all kinetic.)
But of course it's not healthy to stay suspended. Like Lorne says in "Happy Anniversary":
"It's like a song. Now, I can hold a note for a long time -- actually I can hold a note forever. But eventually that's just noise. It's the change we're listening for. The note coming after, and the one after that. That's what makes it music."
I haven't read the Sad Good-bye in, heh, ages. But Janine taking the first step to go through Mimi's stuff seems to be like what Lorne is talking about. She's moving on, though it seems too soon for Claudia. Janine is taking what was Mimi's and making her own, changing things.
Hmm, interesting. And I can't believe I just metaed about The Baby-Sitters Club. O.O
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-09 08:51 pm (UTC)Well, there was that book about the racist/bigotted mother. I don't remember her ever reforming. I don't remember the kids ever showing up in following books either, so I don't know if they did any real changing either. Lowell, I think the family name was. Eep! If I'm right, I'll be amazed I can remember that much!
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 12:54 am (UTC)Yes, yes, yes, that's it! The stop-action painting is a representation of Claudia's emotional state, always at the second before memory overwhelms her, using everything she has to stop that memory from overwhelming, to keep her in the always-already moment of not remembering yet. But life is not art, and she has to grieve eventually, has to remember, has to experience the pain. She tries to hide the pain by hiding Mimi's portrait but she can't; she has to look; she has to remember!
And I can't believe I just metaed about The Baby-Sitters Club. O.O
If it exists, it should be meta'd about.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 01:25 am (UTC)I used to have all the books when I was little - naturally I no longer have them - and the library only has about 4 copies :(
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 02:31 am (UTC)And Claudia says in the narrative, sometimes I think Kristy understands kids better than any of us. That's just so intriguing (omg, not in a pervy way!). I adore Kristy and keep trying to grok her... we don't often get to see the others thinking of her like this, though obviously they admire her ideas... but she's really intelligent in other ways too. And understands kids' psychology and... I don't know. That line just kind of broke me.
This? My favourite Kristy moment in the entire series. I never forgot that line.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-10 05:45 pm (UTC)