That’s the subtext in both the scene where he first shows her the diamond and in the scene where he flips the table along with after Cal finding out he calls her a “slut” and his (jacks) “whore”.

Edit: it’s why the “draw me like one of your French girls” and the sex scenes pay off as well as they do. Her asking Jack to draw her and him doing so is explicitly tied to eroticism and ownership of herself. An ownership that she denied Cal throughout the film.

Marilyn Monroe is a character that was created to sell a product. A lot of time that product was sex in an environment that was relatively sexless. We still use that character to sell shit like posters and candy bars. I think to look at Monroe as a role model is just another reinvention of that brand.

Norma Jean was the person behind that and whether or not she is a role model is a complicated question that doesn’t have one definitive answer. She was a woman with a lot of brilliance that managed to get ahead at times in a system designed to digest her, but at the end of the day it did in fact consume her.

Blonde is an exploration of the way we create and consume celebrities. I think rather than asking if she is a role model, we should be investigating the way in which we as an audience consume these women.

I kind of like the way he sets up his monologues, but most of them end up contributing nothing to the story and are just there as either his self insert or to make sure the audience understands what he had just shown them.

I mean, sure there’s some talent there, but that doesn’t mean that he’s not jump pumping out unimaginative riffs of other peoples work. His last 5 out of 6 shows/films have been adaptations, not great ones at that, and his next 3 projects are adaptations. Most of those adaptations just turn into a Stephen King flick. His one original work amongst those is a relatively weak look at religious fanaticism that provides little new to the conversation. Most of his monologues either don’t contribute anything further to the story or are just a regurgitation of what’s already happened. And let’s not forget that in every one of his series, except for the fake out in Midnight Club, a major character dies in episode five.

I could be upset about this or I could double down.

Most of Mike Flanagan’s work is just an unimaginative riff on other peoples work.

The Haunting of Hill House

The first five episodes of that could have worked really good as a film and still maintained a better connection to the book. There’s just not enough there to extend it to ten episodes. It also just drops quality considerable after the fifth/sixth episode and becomes weirdly saccharine and soft.

You have to wonder if there was anybody who just stood back and thought “ya know this might not go well”.

This is my go to “if you like Shirley Jackson try one of these” lists

White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi

The Icuras Girl by Helen Oyeyemi

My Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado (memoir about an abusive same sex relationship)

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter (grotesque, erotic, gothic, feminist fairytales)

The Magic Toyshop by Angela Carter

The Woman in Black by Susan Hill

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Mouthful of Birds by Samanta Schweblin

Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh

Literary horror doesn’t equate to horrific

Literary horror is sort of just highbrow horror and horror is more or less a narrative that attempts to horrify, terrify, disgust, etc to tell its story along with using “horror” elements (ghosts, werewolves, spooky houses).

Fear is subjective. What horrifies, terrifies, or disgusts me might not horrify, terrify, or disgust you. I’m sure there are people that find this book super scary and others that don’t. Neither of those things on their own mean it is or isn’t horror.

This also means that just because something is a horrific topic doesn’t mean it’s horror. There are plenty of books about awful, terrible topics that aren’t horror.

Beloved, in my opinion, gets classified as literary horror because it is essentially a ghost story and a haunted house story. It uses that framework to tell its story. Her work, especially Beloved, also seems to have some gothic elements. To me, I consider Beloved to be a masterful example of the American gothic and, because I have a pretty broad definition of the horror genre, I also consider it to be a horror novel.

There will be plenty of people that have a much stricter definition or a different understanding of the topic that will disagree with me. It’s one of those books that is hard to shove into one specific genre. Either way, Toni Morrison was an absolute genius!

Yeah. It’s a fine show just not a great adaptation. If it used less of her text I might be able to separate the two more, but some of those quotes are quite jarring when used in the way they were. Idk. It’s just a strange one to me.

“Whatever walked there, walked TOGETHER”

Ummm, I’m sorry how dare one miss the point so hard they think they can change Shirley “queen of the American gothic” Jackson’s last line of her masterful deconstruction of domesticity and heteronormativity and in the process actively undo everything they had spent 9 episodes building toward.

I truly do not understand the reason for making that last line change. It’s silly, it’s absurd, and it’s soft.

“Whatever walked there, walked ALONE” - Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House

I think it just depends on what you already like, but Stephen King, while hit or miss for me, is a pretty accessible place to start. Other than that if you like more serious literary fiction I would recommend any of Shirley Jackson’s books or Toni Morrison’s Beloved. Both are gothic fiction so they’re going to be more atmospheric than anything else. I saw you replied to someone’s else you like nonfiction so Carmen Maria Machado’s In The Dream House, which uses the haunted house framework to tell the story of an abusive same sex relationship the author was in, might be interesting. And if nothing else, pick up some goosebumps or point horror. They’re teen horror and a bit campy, but still fun and where a lot of us started.

500ish books and its probably mostly horror.

I mean, they are objectively poorly written books. However, sometimes reading trashy stuff is fun. I read a lot of horror and literary fiction so taking a break to read a badly written romance was nice. Look, I read Verity, I hated it, but would read it again.

“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.” - The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

Like, my books got dirty even when I was trying to keep them clean so why not embrace the fact that books are something to use and experience in whatever way the reader sees fit or feels comfortable. As long as you own them, do whatever you want to them. Some of mine look super nice and some are so marked up and doodled in that you almost can’t read them.

I’m not sure what YA books the other poster is reading, but Jackson is a master of language. Her stories aren’t very plot heavy if that’s something you like, but if you appreciate good writing and character studies her work is up there with the best.

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Yeah, I pretty much agree with that I just haven’t seen it put that way. I’ve recently been reading it as a sort of exploration of the beginning of a bad marriage. The house spends most of its time isolating Eleanor and making her feel wanted/needed (hence using her mothers voice), but even when she joins the house it will only be the same isolation and loneliness she felt when she was with her mother.

I just so genuinely love that you really never read the book the same way and it doesn’t matter how many times I read it or how many times I talk to people about it there’s always some new layer to be revealed.

I get that complaint totally. I think the broader point is that Eleanor’s striping of identity at the hands of her mother has left her vulnerable to the house. In much the same way that people from abusive households often find themselves in abusive relationships as adults. I would actually argue that Eleanor’s journey to Hill House resembles a walk down the aisle. Its not making her mad it’s preying on the madness that’s already there simply by making her feel wanted. “Journeys end in lovers meeting”

Okay, now I need to hear the reading of it where she doesn’t end up with the house and how the beginning and end tie into that.

Two Shirley Jackson posts on this sub in one day. I just love the recognition she’s been getting lately.

I will admit that Hangsaman isn’t my favorite of work. I think that’s mostly do to the structure and the fact that I just don’t totally get it. With that said, it’s still magnificent. It’s really very disorienting in a way that her other work isn’t or doesn’t push the boundaries on. It’s just another example of her skill with language and how important she was to literature.

Oh I know. No one I know off the internet has read it and it’s such a good book to discuss. Jackson’s writing is just so subtle and layered. I hope you enjoy the rest of her work!

Don’t go into it thinking it’s the same and you’ll probably like it. There’s a lot of the book in the show, but it’s also vastly different.

Welcome to the world of Shirley Jackson. She’s utterly brilliant and exploring her bibliography is such a treat.

Hill House is one of my favorite books ever. I don’t find it scary as much as I find it both claustrophobic and unmooring. Eleanor is such a well written character. Her decent into madness is both a spectacle and wildly relatable. It’s, IMO, one of the best explorations of caretaker abuse and how both the trauma of that and the female experience leads to a devouring by the heteronormative and domestic.

If you haven’t already, check out Laura Millers introduction to the piece and keep digging into Jackson, because she’s still so relevant and so talented.

Edit: I also just want to mention that Jackson is funny and there’s a lot of humor and wit throughout her work. If you want a really good example of that check out either one of her memoirs, Life Among the Saves and Raising Demons, or The Sundial