Carly's Ramblings Blog - Style

Access To Emotions

Blog City - Day 1078

Prompt: Jacques Derrida in the Ear of the Other, writes: “Prayer works for many people; sometimes therapy works for me, but literature has really been the most reliable way for me to access emotion.”
What is your take on the quote? Do you get emotional with some of what you read or does your reading encourage you to discover different emotions for specific subjects?

This is one of those prompts that has me scratching my head and wondering where my brain disappeared to... I got a case of the 'stupids'. If I break this down I get 'the most reliable way to access emotion.' Does this mean being moved by what you read when literature is involved?

I think of the three Derrida mentions I think reading is the most accessible for me. I have never tried therapy - unless you consider writing as my therapy; and prayer... well, it is on a completely different level. I don't think I would go so far as to say literature because some of the stuff that moves me is lighthearted genre based reading. Jill Shalvis makes me laugh at myself as I am able to relate to the zany, authenticness of her female characters... and her male characters, as well.

The book I am reading today, Fortune Cookies by Heather J. Wood, had me crying when she discussed the Montreal Massacre - the killing of 14 women at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique. It happened 27 years ago, but the horrificness of it grabs me every time I read a reference to it. I feel the rage and the injustice of it, as well as the brutalness and insanity of the situation. Being killed just because some idiot can't stand women or feminists. Where do men get off thinking that they need to do this just because some woman turned them down? I realize not all men are like this... but women are often raised feel they need to coddle a man's ego. We have the right to turn down a date... we should not feel like we have to accept, just to keep some idiot's ego in check. If he is too weak to handle the rejection... maybe he should have killed himself first before brutally murdering 14 women. That goes for any murder - suicide situation. (Gotta rant)

In Wood's story, the heroine is dealing with the events as they unfold around her. The Massacre is only a snippet of many of the events she relates in the year of 1989... each event contributing to her own self construct of being a young woman and needing to protect oneself.