There is a small handful of movies and books I covet that stay secret in my cupboard, or jumbled up amongst other files somewhere inside my external hard drive. Not because I’m hiding an obsession for fetish porn, and not because I’m one of those elitists who run around stamping their feet every time their favourite bands gets their big break because ISAWTHEMFIRSTGAHCONFORMITYBLAHBLAH. I don’t really talk about my secret love of riot grrrl, or my predilection for reading Sylvia Plath before bed, or how I really, really related to Owen Wilson’s character in Midnight in Paris because I would seriously just die if Gertrude Stein offered to read my manuscript. I’m not wont to talk about how when I was 10, my idol was neighbourhood super-sleuth Harriet the Spy, the protagonist of Louise Fitzhugh’s children’s novel of the same name. Nor do I expect any nods of recognition when I mentioned that my favourite singer is Fiona Apple, or that in spite of her narcotic addiction and history for leaving the broken hearts of fallen men in her wake, I completely and utterly idolise Elizabeth Wurtzel’s autobiographical style of writing (no matter how self-indulgent it may be!). Talking about the people I admire is usually met with a blank fluttering of eyelashes, and within the past year or two of chinos/blunt fringes/granny clothes/over-sized spectacles becoming the the riguer du jour of self-confessed”non-comformist’s”, I’m usually dodging the hipster label (I like mainstream too! I swear!) and waxing lyrical about authenticity and artifice in 2011.
I like a lot of artists/authors/thought leaders who could probably slot in quite easily within the categories of obscure, or alternative, or weird. I also love Katy Perry, Hannah Montana, Sex and the City and Top Model. I don’t shy away from these particular interests. Perhaps it’s because when you’re drawn to both the long tail, or counter-culture, and the short tail, (i.e.: mainstream), you’re more likely to find common ground amongst your peers when you throw as few long shots as possible, and pick a safe topic to talk about.
However, I don’t want to hoard an extensive list of underground artists in an attempt to appear different, unusual or culturally evolved. So as proof, here I offer a list of talented, interesting, amazing and sometimes fictional women/girls whom I hold close to my heart, and invite you revel in their precocious, disturbing and inspiring abilities as well.
Fiona Apple
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFOzayDpWoI]
Born Fiona Apple McAffee Maggart, the 19-year-old received her first Grammy award at age 19 for her debut release Tidal, an album I saved up all my pocket money at age 12 to buy. A survivor of a rape in her preteen years, Apple’s opened up about her eating disorder and the attack in her music and interviews. As she sings “I was washed ashore/And he took my pearl”, Apple’s harrowing lament for the loss of her innocence cemented her melancholic music a favourite amongst my collections of CDs. Hardly known as an iron woman (she’s been known to openly burst into tears throughout interviews), Apple’s display of raw and unadultered emotion was something I could always relate to. Her music these days is a lot less sorrowful, but she still maintains the jazzy alternative rock sound she’s become famous for.
Harriet the Spy
I can’t remember my professional ambitions before I wanted to be a writer, so, fittingly, I can’t remember a lot of my aspirations before I read Harriet the Spy. A be-speckled eleven-year-old with writerly ambitions, Harriet is also a super-sleuth. She wants to be a writer, so she notes down any and all observations of those around her – no person or topic is sacred. Not only does she scrutinise the lives of those closest to her, every afternoon after school she takes a regular “spy route”, surveiling the neighbourhood town folk with a curious, anthropological eye. She even goes so far as to breaking and entering other peoples’ homes as she records their daily lives, hoping for inspiration and a story to tell. Not only is Harriet fearless, she’s feisty and super smart to boot. I imagine she’s probably grow up to be an upper class Veronica Mars.
Elizabeth Wurtzel
Shockingly candid and unapologetic, Elizabeth Wurtzel is most (in)famous for her signature confessional-style prose. She’s well-known for writing the novel Prozac Nation, an account of a youth spent reveling in decadence, a cocktail of narcotics, self-loathing, SSRIs and extraneous craziness (the book was later made into a film, with Hollywood’s dark horse Christina Ricci in the starring role of Wurtzel in her college years, an adaptation Wurtzel herself has described as quite shit). Now somewhat of a reformed bad girl, Wurtzel is now an accredited American corporate attorney. She still writes occasionally, detailing the exploits of her past through eyes now older and somewhat wiser. But if you’re going to read one book of her’s, make it Bitch. It’s an extended ode to women behaving badly, and is enough to inspire the rabble-rouser in us all.
Evan Rachel Wood
Photo Credit: Albert L. Ortega
After some mild apprehension about featuring the face of Gucci, I decided to include ERW in this list because although she’s in a fragrance campaign for an international luxury brand, she is still very far from house-hold name status in Australia. Most famous for dating Marilyn Manson, and most recently playing the role of Sophie-Anne the lesbian vampire queen in True Blood, ERW first caught my eye as Jessie Sammler on Once Again. She is, as you would say, an “indie darling”, choosing roles in primarily independent films, portraying a myriad of troubled teens. Wood’s performances leave no doubt that not only is she enamoured with the characters she creates for the screen, she’s also fiercely intelligent, which makes me think she’d be an awesome karaoke partner, or the perfect person to be stuck in a Jet Star toilet with. Brownie points: she’s openly bisexual, and got to kiss Mischa Barton pre-OC.
Daisies
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO2EjetlAoM]
A 1966 Czech film about two girls, Marie I and Marie II, Daisies is the ultimate rebellion film for girls who feel like making a ruckus. The film has no plot (what surrealist film makes sense though, honestly?), and is basically just a montage of the Maries playing pranks and causing chaos in a world that’s gone to shit, so like, why not?
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Young Adult Fiction: Will someone please think of the children?!
Source: weheartit.com
I think I developed my obsession with reading after watching the film adaptation of Matilda. How ironic that a film inspired me to read. A film about a girl who reads like there’s some Olympics for retina-strain actually inspired me to unleash my inner book worm, when it was actually based on a book. Anywho, I’m not sure how I came to the logic that consuming printed matter would give me AWESOME TOTALLY RADICAL super powers to like, chase my teacher out the door with a chalkboard duster or make my brother’s underwear give him a giant wedgie, but I did. So I read. Every freakin’ day. Big books, small books. Books about fairies. Books about boys, books about girls, books about people with blue skin and magic and vials of unicorn blood carried down the mountains on the back of a yack. It’s a habit I’ve continued to this day, although now I’m tre hipster and tote around orange penguin classics (cultural capital, yo!)
One of my favourite genres is Young Adult fiction. I secretly, really dig teeny bopper garbage. Growing up, I read Harry Potter and the sisterhood of the travelling pants, which are nice enough books about friendz for evah and loyalty and blah blah blah, but you know, I just can’t feel on par with these characters. I didn’t have a broomstick or a summer of love to gush about with my three best friends. They’re great forms of escapism, the perfect
kryptonitetool for procrastinators anonymous, and the best way to forget you’re stuck in a bus in the rain an hour away from home. But one gets to a point in one’s life when one’s fantasy novels just don’t cut the mustard. They lack grit, they lack punch, and they lack bitingly obvious normalcy. So I started reading other things.In a response to an article in the Wall Street Journal about the impact of ‘dark’ Young Adult fiction, S.E Smith has written in defense of books which chronicle more serious themes such as rape, suicide, murder and racism. I love all forms of Young Adult fiction – from the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (gooey gooey friendships summer love BOYZ BOYZ OMG!) and Animorphs (does anyone remember their cool holographic covers!?) , to Laurie Halse Andersen’s Speak, a story of a young girl who refuses to speak after being raped at a party, and Candy by Kevin Brooks, the story of a young British prostitute (not to be confused with Luke Davies’ novel of the same name).
Whilst Gurdon over at WSJ condemns these books which “may even spread their plausibility and likelihood to young people who might otherwise never have imagined such extreme measures”, I’m gonna take my debased and immoral ass over to the camp which supports YA fiction. I think people fail to recognise the emotional depth of teenagers. I feel like there’s this perception that their frail and fragile minds will be too easily corrupted. In Gurdon’s defense, she does mention a good list of alternative reads for young girls and boys to read, which are not fantasy novels and which do describe the coming of age experience and triumphs over trials and tribulations (interestingly, she categorises these books by gender, which I think illustrates a running theme of segregation, i.e: young vs. old, male vs. female). Apparently, YA Fiction is responsible for perpetuating the behaviour they describe. It is, as Gurdon describes, a ‘darkness too visible’.
When I read this my mind instantly drew back to an episode of Q and A on the 23rd of May. When asked about the social/moral duties of an author, here’s what Leslie Cannold had to say:
One of the important thing to remember is that without darkness, there can be no light. That sounded strangely metaphysical, so let me put it this way: without the bad shit, there can be no good shit. This isn’t to say we need crime and violence in order to enjoy the amazing things that life has to offer, but they’re not going to go away if we write them out of literature.
Books with real, human issues and concerns that chronicle the trials and tribulations of a breathing living, talking, walking, breathing, shitting, cussing, fornicating, backstabbing human being don’t uphold the actions of the characters. They create an understanding of the human experience. Adolescence is a time in your life where your own emotions are so incomprehensible, so intangible and so alientating you can barely articulate your inner monologue (which probably accounts for the monosyllabic responses between parents and their kids). As you navigate the carefully molded worlds which an author has created, it’s like your creating a more comprehensible vision of your life experience. Which I guess relates back to the question of whether art should reflect life? I answer in the affirmative.
What are your thoughts?
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