Alice Leung has discovered the secrets of bats: how they see without seeing, how they own darkness, as we own light. She walks the halls with a black headband across her eyes, keening a high C ----- cheat cheat cheat cheat cheat cheat ----- never once veering off course, as if drawn by an invisible thread. Echolocation, she tells me, it’s not as difficult as you might think. Now she sees a light around objects when she looks at them, like halos on her retinas from staring at the sun. In her journal she writes, I had a dream that was all in blackness. Tell me how to describe.
It is January: my fifth month in Hong Kong.
In the margin I write, I wish I knew.
After six, when the custodians leave, the school becomes a perfect acoustic chamber; she wanders from the basement laboratories to the basketball courts like a trapped bird looking for a window. She finds my door completely blind, she says, not counting flights or paces. Twisting her head from side to side like Stevie Wonder, she announces her progress: another room mapped, a door, a desk, a globe, detected and identified by its aura.
--Jess Row, “The Secret of Bats” From Ploughshares and 2001 Best American Short Stories
The first thing the author chose to present was the fact that this young school girl from Hong Kong had done something remarkable; discovered a secret. In the first sentence it is blatant of who the story is about and rationale behind the title, in that makes one want continue reading to learn how she made the discovery.
We meet the narrator and Alice Leung in this first paragraph. It is unknown at this point what relationship they have however it’s clear that Alice confides in the narrator and seeks advisement. The journal exchanges lets us know that the narrator is someone of authority, a teacher maybe.
Questions that are raised in my mind as a reader are:
Why has Alice decided to confide in the narrator, is it because they are both different?
How could one describe an all black dream?
Can you see auras of objects in the dark? Are they different from those we see in the light?
Is this discovery considered a difficulty feat?
I think the writer chose to start this way because it’s an intriguing setup to a story that shows a young lady who is obviously lonely, since she is hanging around school after six, and just makes you wonder what is going on at home as well as what bought on her interest in the secret of bats. It’s a different take on the education of bats that makes you realize she is unique in her thoughts. The only really inclination that the teacher/narrator might be curious is in the simple response in margin of Alice’s margin. It draws us all into the secret one girl has.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Critical Reflection #1
In the introduction of The Best American Short Stories, Barbara Kingsolver states "I love it for what it tells me about life. If it tells me something I didn't already know, or that I maybe suspected but never framed quite that way, or that never before socked me divinely in the solar plexus, then the story is worth the read." Its amazing how the things we consider to be less than normal draws us in day by day, inch by inch. The Secret of Bats is a story that does this as it truly touches two lonely individuals and connects them in a way that no one could ever understand. Its not often enough that we allow ourselves to go beyond the surface to actually feel the spirit in all in which is around us.
The story fits Kingsolver’s statement perfectly in that from the beginning the audience is drawn into this strange girl from Hong Kong and her obsession with bats. Her obsession was not one we can all consider ourselves to be familiar with instead hers was deep in that she wanted to know how bats recognized each other based solely on sound. I think Kingsolver had this surprise in mind because indeed as the story moves along the reason is revealed and it is intriguing. There is a since of wonderment in the story that after reading it you can’t help but stop and think of how would you recognize a loved one.
Kingsolver’s idea of what makes a short story good fits the idea of where I want to go as an artist. It is clearly the rebel within that requires me to find a way to shock someone into wanting more. As a writer, an individual I am constantly seeking new ways to explain things. Now, I think the idea that is different however needed in my writing is a reason for telling the story. I think Kingsolver is absolutely right that the stories that we hold near and dear are those in which taught us a truth about life and even most so, ourselves.
In the stories I write I look for familiarity with a mysterious quirk. In mysterious, I simply mean something that draws us closer, that makes us want to know more. I love characters who are both sad and humorous because I think they represent how I see life. If I can see the movements and hear the ripples in the story, that to me is good fiction. Even more so, if afterwards I am having a conversation with someone and I revert back to something in the story and repeat it as though it were a truth. I’m sure others have had that moment where you recall an event and can’t pinpoint where you received the information. That’s good stuff to me because it has become two things; something I hold truth and believe and something that made an impression on me enough to remember and want to share.
As I have said before I am not good with having a reason, moral, which leads to the ultimate weakness lacking voice. Voice is knowing your beliefs, truths and sharing them with the world. I think to have a voice comes when one believes in themselves and what they have to offer those around them.
The story fits Kingsolver’s statement perfectly in that from the beginning the audience is drawn into this strange girl from Hong Kong and her obsession with bats. Her obsession was not one we can all consider ourselves to be familiar with instead hers was deep in that she wanted to know how bats recognized each other based solely on sound. I think Kingsolver had this surprise in mind because indeed as the story moves along the reason is revealed and it is intriguing. There is a since of wonderment in the story that after reading it you can’t help but stop and think of how would you recognize a loved one.
Kingsolver’s idea of what makes a short story good fits the idea of where I want to go as an artist. It is clearly the rebel within that requires me to find a way to shock someone into wanting more. As a writer, an individual I am constantly seeking new ways to explain things. Now, I think the idea that is different however needed in my writing is a reason for telling the story. I think Kingsolver is absolutely right that the stories that we hold near and dear are those in which taught us a truth about life and even most so, ourselves.
In the stories I write I look for familiarity with a mysterious quirk. In mysterious, I simply mean something that draws us closer, that makes us want to know more. I love characters who are both sad and humorous because I think they represent how I see life. If I can see the movements and hear the ripples in the story, that to me is good fiction. Even more so, if afterwards I am having a conversation with someone and I revert back to something in the story and repeat it as though it were a truth. I’m sure others have had that moment where you recall an event and can’t pinpoint where you received the information. That’s good stuff to me because it has become two things; something I hold truth and believe and something that made an impression on me enough to remember and want to share.
As I have said before I am not good with having a reason, moral, which leads to the ultimate weakness lacking voice. Voice is knowing your beliefs, truths and sharing them with the world. I think to have a voice comes when one believes in themselves and what they have to offer those around them.
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