the fact that she wrote a little life and yet also jokingly called people who were effected by it to the point of crying "pussies" is... she's what happens when teenage girls don't grow out of the "weirdly fixated on queer men" phase.
@fictionesque19923 ай бұрын
omg whaaaaat?? first of all that is SO not feminist praxis second of all as someone that has real PTSD maybe people are affected by the book bc they have uhhh real problems beyond what silk pillowcase they choose to sleep on that night 🖤 but whatever gay fetishists will keep reading her torture porn regardless!
@wolf-gh2dz3 ай бұрын
@@fictionesque1992 fr. i dont recall exactly what event it was but you can find footage of her describing when either an editor or a test reader or something like that got back to her with feedback and was crying and she called them a pussy like??? girl??? and sure one could argue that she was just joking but even if it was a joke like... girl read the room...
@houstonwehaveagamermoment11 ай бұрын
I’m sad little life was her book that blew up her debut novels concept is so much more interesting than a guy getting into looney tunes styles of misfortunes for 700 pages straight
@fictionesque199211 ай бұрын
"looney tunes" SCREAM
@bingobongobrynn7 ай бұрын
Tiktok promised me a little life would make me cry. I didn't cry but I may never recover from it.
@user-js2cg7xs6c3 ай бұрын
I only cried at the very end but i dont remember the last time i ever sobbed that hard tbh, it felt like my psyche was broken down
@LittleMissTotoro4 ай бұрын
The actually explicitly stated gay people in A Little Life are abusive or coded as assholes (Caleb and JB). Jude is a sort of "asexual sex-repulsed because broken" trope which sucks for my sexuality. And Willem "isn't gay, he just likes Jude"
@fictionesque19924 ай бұрын
it's craaaazy to me that people are calling this the "great gay novel" 😐 when really it's 800 pages of torturing and degrading gay men for the reader's self-indulgent tears
@el3anormasonАй бұрын
but Willem is known to the media as a gay actor in the book, however he isn't gay he stated in the book that he slept with anyone and everyone so really more pansexual. i never really thought about this take whilst reading but i can entirely see your perspective. for me i didn't think she was conveying gay people as assholes and all negative, she was just conveying assholes as assholes (Caleb), regardless of sexuality. i suppose i automatically assumed that people like Dr Traylor weren't actually gay, or limited to abusing men, but just abused Jude and the people around them. Brother Luke in my mind he would have abused young girls too he just didn't have them as easily available as he worked in the monastery for boys. in my opinion those two characters aren't gay but pedophilic which is a completely different sexual orientation, one that does deserve that negative portrayal. additionally, JB was the most difficult to like out of all four of them, but for me not because he was gay but instead because he was more self centered than the others. i feel like his sexuality had nothing to do with it, especially considering Willem and Jude's sexualities which were never really stated. 3/4 of the boys weren't straight, but 4/4 of the boys were all wonderful and shown for all their flaws and gifts. I also think in regard to Jude's sexuality, this is true and a real effect from sexual assault but it doesn't limit asexuality to being abused in that way, just shows Jude's side of it.
@zi784 Жыл бұрын
"Andy,” he says, “tell me honestly: Is he mentally ill?” There’s a very long silence, until Andy says, “I don’t think so, Willem. Or rather: I don’t think there’s anything chemically wrong with him. I think his craziness is all man-made.”
@fictionesque1992 Жыл бұрын
insane that they really call CPTSD from multiple rapes, abandonments, abusive relationships, ableism, and homophobia "craziness" 😐
@teneshaanderson4761 Жыл бұрын
Honestly god bless you I’ve only read a little life and may never recover
@fictionesque1992 Жыл бұрын
COVER TO COVER?? you deserve compensation lmao
@luna20_636 ай бұрын
hinestly im half way through n i will burn calem portman with these two hands i am beyond traumatised
@LittleMissTotoro4 ай бұрын
Thank you for making this video! I needed help sorting my thoughts after A Little Life! I feel validated now
@fictionesque19924 ай бұрын
ur welcome queen 😁🎉
@MsGreenlauren Жыл бұрын
Wow! This was really interesting. Glad I came across this video! Hahaha the song was brutal and I loved it. Brava!!! I have not read her books, good for you for reading all three and taking them in, and then sharing with us! I went to the play (A Little Life) about a week ago, and had been wondering about the source material! Imagine my surprise when I found out it wasn’t based on someone’s life experience, but was a novel written by a heterosexual woman! That supported my feelings about this play being incredibly disingenuous and silly. When I finally read more about the author, and saw what she had to say about not reading research about people who have been through trauma, and what she had to say about talk therapy…I felt sick to my stomach. First, at what appeared to be a lack of curiosity about what real people experience, as well as no desire to try to make her beloved character’s experiences realistic. Second, that she feels so strongly about her point (that those who are lost are simply lost) that she feels compelled to write a long book letting readers know. To get this point across, she imagined horrific scenarios that she thinks would give people reasons to not want to live, and to have no self-regard. This feels incredibly slimy to me, because a lot of survivors of trauma and people with disabilities do want to live and DO have self-regard. I don’t know why she wanted to write so much about sexual abuse. Especially refusing to learn about it, or use her writing to somehow help someone else. It doesn’t add up. If you’re going to go there, and it isn’t a metaphor, and you’re not going there to help someone somehow, or say something useful, then why go there? Why was sexual abuse her chosen vehicle? I just find it all dubious. From what bits I read of the book, the play was very true to it. I didn’t read the whole book, I only skimmed to try to get a sense of her style, and get an idea of how much of the book is focused on friendships, and how much on the bad things that happen to Jude. It’s weird how unbelievable so much of it is. I don’t know if this is bad storytelling, laziness, or my own failure for not believing. But I don’t really believe he could go from being abused, to pimped, to kidnapped, to becoming a highly educated and successful corporate litigator with best friends who are all also incredibly wealthy and at the top of their careers in NYC. Maybe this is explained in the book. In the play it was just repeated over and over again that he is a genius. It could happen, sure, but it wasn’t depicted in a believable way in the play. I don’t have a problem with a protagonist not getting better, and I don’t think I have a problem with making the point of the story be that some people can’t or won’t see themselves as worth saving. But something feels off about the play/book to me. It doesn’t feel true, it does not feel like it came from a place of earnestness to depict what’s true. I realize it’s subjective and my experience of A Little Life being slimy and disingenuous doesn’t mean the author or the playwright really were being fake as hell, but I’m not going to discount my own experience. I’m not convinced her point is all that thoughtful, sensitive, or responsible. Just to share…a bit off topic since it is not the book…the play was over 4 hours long and in Dutch. There was a lot of fake blood, simulated rape, and unbelievable friendships/relationships between characters with no personalities (including Jude). I almost got the giggles when the car crash happened, because so much bad stuff had happened up to that point, of course that would happen, too! Amputation? Sure, why not? What else should we throw in? Well, we’re coming up on hour 4, let’s just let him kill himself in a painful way, then have his adopted father say some cliche crap about how he can see Jude’s face in every flower (or something to that effect), end the play, and whoever hasn’t already walked out will give the play a standing ovation. It makes me laugh, but also makes me worried, that someone (I guess the author, playwright, and director), REALLY want us to feel affected by watching a character in a perpetual state of suffering, and watch them hurt themselves or be hurt over and over again - and that they REALLY want us to believe that darkness and cruelty and suffering is deep and meaningful in a way we they seek to think we haven’t thought about enough. I want to shout at them, “GET A LIFE! Go help someone!” This was a long comment. Hope that is ok. Thanks again for your great video.
@thelowercaseperson Жыл бұрын
This video needs more hype!!
@Kittikee10 Жыл бұрын
hi! loved this video, a little life might be a shit book but at least it led me to your channel and for that i am grateful :) the part where you talked about women voting against ourselves caught my attention and i was wondering if you could perhaps recommend some reading materials on this topic, as i'm not sure I can fully grasp the concept. thanks!!
@fictionesque1992 Жыл бұрын
omg girl! right wing women by andrea dworkin is THE book on that topic. that was a major part of my feminist awakening and i can't recommend it enough :^) also thank you for the compliments, i'm glad you like my channel. more videos coming very soon, i have big plans. until then enjoy what i've got up!
@giginilsson Жыл бұрын
i agree with you a hundred percent!! thank you for this
@Ce2009ce11 ай бұрын
Thank u for sharing ur insights abt this author. I do hve the book “Little Life” waiting to b read.. since I bought it I might as well read it, once I finish reading Stephen Kings “Talisman”.. I’m hving a hard time liking.. I’m pushing through..I will not b reading any other of her other books bcz I agreed w/u she writes from a entitled Ivory Tower life..
@OzmaOfOzz4 ай бұрын
The Talisman is so good though and its sequel too
@patiencekillzАй бұрын
i totally get criticisms of a little life - personally i found it cathartic bc i went into it knowing it would be sad and i wanted to see if a book could make me cry (it did), and so i got what i wanted out of it. there’s also something about it that keeps drawing me in, but i haven’t done enough inner soul-searching or whatever to really understand why. anyway this was a good video!
@carlatate76783 ай бұрын
Subscribed. I have considered reading Yanagihara, but I won't bother now... I was very impacted by your dystopia rant. I love the idea of novels about solutions. Can you offer a list?
@fictionesque19923 ай бұрын
yayy welcome :^) and the closest thing I've found is something like The Power by Naomi Alderman, which is a novel about women suddenly becoming more physically powerful than men and the gender roles basically switching
@carlatate76783 ай бұрын
@@fictionesque1992 I've not only read it, I had my reading group read it. 🙂 (I work in a public library)
@susanburgess8204 ай бұрын
What an icky lady. Wish i would have known all this before i bought 2 books of hers. Finding them and getting rid of them in a heartbeat.❤❤
@fictionesque19924 ай бұрын
that seems a little dramatic tbh...you should make up your own mind. don't trash books on my behalf, I'm only one person. also not sure what proof we have she's "icky" save that she's rich...?
@lukasznowak91383 ай бұрын
I think you need to start to read solarpunk books if that's the future you want to read about :)
@fictionesque19923 ай бұрын
ooh maybeee. do you have any recs?
@viancavarma3455 Жыл бұрын
no but i enjoyed this so much please
@carlangasa46222 ай бұрын
5:50 read ficciones by Borges, don't know if you know Spanish but if you do preferably read it in Spanish
@carolinewheeler77 Жыл бұрын
So it really sounds like you’re against an honest portrayal of what the depressed and traumatized mind is like. That’s how we think about ourselves. Is it wrong to establish that about a character?
@fictionesque1992 Жыл бұрын
This is a really interesting question and it got me thinking for a moment! From where I'm standing, yes, it is morally wrong, but 1. that's no reason not to write something...Yanagihara is totally within her rights to write Jude, it's just that it's also my right to think it distasteful 2. it's only morally wrong imo because of a few factors. A Little Life is inappropriately long, and sometimes gratuitously detailed in a way that I found almost pornographic in its view of Jude's violence against himself. Moreover, A Little Life stands out from other artistic portrayals of suffering because Yanagihara is talking about suffering that is not her own (Jude is a physically disabled gay man, and she isn't) IN SUCH A DISTASTEFUL AND GRATUITOUS WAY. I recently read The Bell Jar, which is also a narrative about suffering, but I enjoyed it because of its brevity and because it was clearly authentic, drawing on the author's own suffering as a woman in a woman-hating society. Free Lunch by Rex Ogle is another narrative like this, except it's about growing up impoverished. Those are both brilliant books and they don't pornify suffering and adverse experiences, because they know how awful they are and it shows. I really despise the current culture of privileged people fetishizing suffering, specifically people who suffer 'more.' Booktube does this a lot with marginalized narratives and people, and Yanagihara is the pinnacle of it. She writes about and worships the very fact that disabled people suffer, or at least A Little Life makes it seem that way. Also if you've seen my GR you know that I really just have no taste or patience for ~mental illness narratives~ anymore. The only narratives about mental illness that have ever helped me as someone with severe depression, attempts under her belt, cut scars, a history of anorexia, etc have honest to god been the more conservative ones like 'the alchemist' that are just like 'life is beautiful, be brave, stfu and stop complaining.' I have a problem with most modern books on mental illness (older stuff like Prozac Nation is generally really good though!) like I just rollllll my eyes whenever we get another anorexia novel for young impressionable girls to learn how to harm themselves through. Hate it 4ever! Oh and speaking of Prozac Nation I think the writer of that was totally spot on when she said she thinks we live in a Depression Culture that kind of worships being sick in that way. A Little Life is just one part of that culture (miss Taylor Swift has done a bit of contributing to it recently w anti hero) but to be frank I just find it so damn LAME. It is LAME to relinquish your life to depression and worship your own misery like it's all so damn egotistical and pathetic and poor little meow meow. Like grow up do your yoga go to bed on time and force yourself to text your friends and family back like the rest of us lmfao. Sorry this is super long your question is interesting so I hope this clarifies my thinking on it.
@carolinewheeler77 Жыл бұрын
@@fictionesque1992 I don’t mind your comment being long, I appreciate you actually taking my question into consideration! Thank you for being civil
@mackos007 Жыл бұрын
But A Little Life is not an honest portrayal of what the depressed and traumatized mind is like, that is why it is a cynical and distasteful book. Yanagihara herself admitted that she did absolutely no research while writing this book and that she don't believe that psychology and therapy works. This is just her broken imagination of how a depressed person thinks. That book is a cheap suffering pornography removed from reality. Let's be honest that book becomes a parody of itself after firts 200 pages