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lizshayne's review
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
I don't think I ever read a work of theory this fast in my life. I was fascinated by the ways that people have read Bujold as a writer and as a person who upends narrative tropes and familiar arguments.
My absolute favorite essay was "Pain Made Holy" on Cazaril and disability and the complexities of the disabled experience as read into and out of his character.
I also really appreciated the ongoing conversation about Bujold, gender, and reconfiguring of masculinity (and would have loved for some of the ADS discourse at the end to pick up on that as another form of canon-compliancy.)
The theological reads of the Chalion was the most frustrating because of how Christian most theology is in the style of questions it asks about god/s. Look, I just want midrash on the five gods, is that so much to ask?
(I mean, not to get too revelatory, but the reason that WotFG works is that it's doing theology in narrative. Midrash is a little more allegorical, when it isn't also doing a lot of other stuff. But it tells the human story and makes that also the story of the Divine, which is what the gods and souls of the holy family do. Idk, it's complicated, but the way that most theologians write is within the Christian tradition of talking about what God is, rather than the Jewish tradition of telling stories about ourselves and saying "you see that. God too." And the text itself is already doing that. The gods have no hands in this world etc.)
Look, it made me see books I already really like through a new lens and understand what the texts are doing (with or without authorial imprimatur) in an interesting way. What more could you want?
On that note - go check out John Lennard's essay on Sharing Knife as a critique of Lord of the Rings because it is ridiculously good.
My absolute favorite essay was "Pain Made Holy" on Cazaril and disability and the complexities of the disabled experience as read into and out of his character.
I also really appreciated the ongoing conversation about Bujold, gender, and reconfiguring of masculinity (and would have loved for some of the ADS discourse at the end to pick up on that as another form of canon-compliancy.)
The theological reads of the Chalion was the most frustrating because of how Christian most theology is in the style of questions it asks about god/s. Look, I just want midrash on the five gods, is that so much to ask?
(I mean, not to get too revelatory, but the reason that WotFG works is that it's doing theology in narrative. Midrash is a little more allegorical, when it isn't also doing a lot of other stuff. But it tells the human story and makes that also the story of the Divine, which is what the gods and souls of the holy family do. Idk, it's complicated, but the way that most theologians write is within the Christian tradition of talking about what God is, rather than the Jewish tradition of telling stories about ourselves and saying "you see that. God too." And the text itself is already doing that. The gods have no hands in this world etc.)
Look, it made me see books I already really like through a new lens and understand what the texts are doing (with or without authorial imprimatur) in an interesting way. What more could you want?
On that note - go check out John Lennard's essay on Sharing Knife as a critique of Lord of the Rings because it is ridiculously good.
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