Author Archives: Bryan Ho

A different kind of story

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For this post I read The Legend of Melusina” (Penguin, pgs. 85-88)

While I can talk about how the story can be interpreted as power, with Melusine’s incredible power (her wealth and being able to build “the castle of Lusignan”(87)), and or that it is about the trust in relationships (Melusine making her husband promise not to come see her on Saturdays when she’s transformed). I would like to highlight how different this story is from the usual ones of its time and type, where such a secret would have seen Melusine not only shamed and hunted for her curse, but demonized heavily. Which the prelude text highlights that in different tellings, most likely NOT created by the original author, allude to. But rather the husband, Raymondin,“is not horrified but only saddened” (85). This is where I liked the story, because rather than immediately judge Melusine and her condition, showing that he truly only loved her for her looks, he becomes what I interpreted as relief, because he was egged on by someone else, driven by jealously. It wasn’t his words that convinced Melusine to ultimately leave, but Geoffroi, to be honest I would kick him in the shins for calling my wife a “snake and odious serpent” (88).

This also highlights my next interesting point, when Raymondin witnessed Melusine’s hybrid form the text described it as “in a snake, gray and sky-blue, mixed with white”, but this doesn’t actually apply to snakes, but to fish. As the beginning text said, “fish and water hold a redemptive symbolism”, which tells me that possibly Raymondin would’ve accepted Melusine for her curse and redeemed the curse (not her) in her eyes. Considering when their children were born, they were described as deformed, yet for Raymondin, “Raymond’s love for the beauty that ravished both heart and eyes remained unshaken”. Considering how common a trope it is for the husband to blame and scorn the mother if a child ends up with anything undesirable, it proves how much he genuinely loved Melusine. That she found someone accepting of her but another had to go off and ruin it. I can see the story having a message of acceptance as well, but that’s the tragedy.

Sirens – humanity’s curiosity

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When reading ‘Odysseus and the Sirens’, it brings to attention that Sirens and Mermaids were originally separate entities in mythology. While later depictions of mermaids emphasize about their beauty and seductive natures, Sirens were not characterized by the same sexualized traits. Rather it was their powerful songs that define them as noted in the line on page 9, “it is the power of their song and music rather than their appearance that characterizes them across time”. Alongside what the songs held.

In the passage from the poem, the Siren’s song is the main focus, as it can be read Odysseus is curious about the contents.

‘In flowery meads the sportive Sirens play, Touch the soft lyre, and tune the vocal lay; Me, me alone, with fetters firmly bound, The gods allow to hear the dangerous sound. Hear and obey; if freedom I demand, Be every fetter strain’d, be added band to band.’

I believe Sirens may have been a metaphor for the human curiosity that drives some of us to explore the unknown, but also the possible dangers coming with that pursuit. Odysseus wanting his men to restrain him so he could listen to the Siren’s song fully may represent how there must be limits and restraint to avoid being destroyed by it. The song symbolizing new knowledge, which can both enlighten and consume someone if not approached with caution. This could’ve aligned with early sea travel, that the ocean held mysteries able to benefit earlier humans but also held within it dangers that did claim many ships and lives.

A harmless ‘known’ makes a scary ‘unknown’

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What caught my eye was the beginning of “Their Bodies, Our Anxieties,” where it discusses how we prefer our world to be well-ordered and sharply defined in categories, but it highlights the similarities between hybrid monsters and humans. They’re able to eat, sleep, and breathe like us, but seemingly hold enough distinctions for us to shy away from them. This reminded me of some recent trends in horror since at least 2014, where we take what was ‘safe,’ for example, a children’s mascot, and proceed to make it monstrous in a subtle way, for example, having the mascot act irregularly hostile towards children when it shouldn’t be. It adds to the uncanny anxiety we feel towards the subject, but it also fascinates people, myself included, as mermaids, or at least their early versions, don’t seem all that harmful. Then later, they’re made out to be temptresses whose goal is to lead men astray and consume them. When reading about the part where the text talks about the beauty of a mermaid, it got me thinking about how both halves of a mermaid show our odd interest in the known and unknown. The upper half is what we’re used to and can recognize as distinctly normal; this carries on with the lower half too, as our brains can recognize that it’s a fish. But when you put it all together, what is ‘known’ becomes a fearful yet interesting ‘unknown.’ We can recognize its not a natural thing for a woman’s upper half to be conjoined to a fish lower half, however, it still has that ‘harmless’ feel allowing later interceptions to add unsetting traits that would attract both fear AND attention. It’s interesting to know what looks harmless to us might be the most dangerous thing in the room, and it isn’t solely a modern trend but has been going on for centuries.

My Introduction

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Hello my name is Bryan Ho and this is my second year (possibly final, hopefully) at SDSU and my fifth year in total being in college/university. I am a transfer student from Mesa Community College, and my major is English and Comparative Literature. What I hope to achieve in life is becoming an author as I’ve always wanted to entertain people with my stories. I mainly write fantasy fiction and using tropes/story elements my way or in a way I would enjoy writing rather than following what’s popular within the genre. As a kid I never really liked reading, even fantasy books like Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings didn’t excite me and I always (kind of still do depending on what I’m reading) saw doing it as a chore. Flash forward to middle school and I find out it wasn’t reading itself that I didn’t like, it was that none of the books around me clicked, and when I found out what I truly loved to read? I began to collect these kinds of books a lot throughout the years, and currently I have three completely full shelves in my room alongside a desire to become an author. I’m a little bit embarrassed to share what those books are but they’re mainly from Japan and are called Light Novels, the reason being they’re comparatively ‘short’ to regular novels. Just the style of the stories and the way the authors wrote notes at the end of the books, thanking their readers sincerely for picking their novels up, thanking everyone from editors and artists in allowing their work to be published left a huge impression on me. Here’s hoping that this class will inspire my writing and that I’ll be having fun in it too. Thanks for reading.

(Me and my brother during Thanksgiving)