Brokeplex,
Injest as moderator was very right to contact me about my response to you, very right to point out we are among friends here. Her statement about most of us being upset right now is the truth. Her suggestion that we need to take a deep breath and THINK before hitting the send button is totally on the mark...
I became irate at what was percieved ---wrongly--- to be nasty condescension on your part, mistook ordinary grumpiness for an attack and jumped all over you. No, Brokeplex, I'm not wiggling out of this one; what I said was wrong, nasty and against everything BetterMost stands for. It was an intentionally meant insult from me to you and I am mortified at having done it. Please accept my apology, it will not happen again. I would also like to apologise to anyone on the thread who may have read that post. We do not come here for crap like that. We come here because we all love Brokeback.
Just because I am upset is no reason to spread it around. You are probably just as upset. It will not happen again, and I think both of us have learned something here....
Attacking another poster is not acceptable. I don't like reading such things from others>>>> which makes
doing them even MORE unacceptable.
Regarding your request that the 2 of us "unzip to compare"?? Well, it would be counter-productive... since age 14 I have won that contest 9 x's out of 10
roflmao. On the other hand.....at age 50, unzipping is inappropriate. so.....back to your request. Hopefully I can answer what you asked like an adult and not some greying child.
Annie relies on an informed readership when she writes her work. She does not spell it all out, her readers often need to infer and extrapolate a larger meaning from her allusions. She expects her readership 'to fill in the blanks.'
When it comes to the classical, ie, Helleno-Romanic allusions within BBM there are many...she made Jack a Bull Rider [prehellenic/minoan] for example... and one is expected to grasp and extrapolate other things from those references.
But that is
NOT what I was referring to, Brokeplex. And I have to go waaaay off topic to answer the question, so I hope it is worth it.
When I mentioned missing the forest for the trees, I was referring to Annie's actual construction of the story,
the style used when she wrote Brokeback Mountain .
With Brokeback, Annie accomplished successfully what no other modern English language writer has managed to do>>>she successfully transmuted transmogrified and transformed the principles of classical Athenian drama into modern short story format.
Aeschylos or Sophocles would recognise her technique instantly. It is blatantly classical, blatant yet subtle. She wrote a drama using principles developed 2,500 years ago. She wrote a tragedy in prose, not verse. Yet the verse is there, poetry within prose. It was not a play. I don't even think she
knows how to write a play. She sat down and wrote it in a genre she's comfortable with, the short story.
Ok, you wanted to know when and where she said these things.
There is a problem in answering that question. Unfortunately there are no 'major documented interviews' in which she said any of this. There
are two exceptions to that statement, but neither was in any major publication. They were questions answered for us, for brokies from BM and Cullen.
Back in Oct 2006 I asked her questions about the technique and construction of Brokeback. Ellen put my interview
and hers into the Daily Sheet over at Cullen. I'll look up which issue and send you a link. On that day she also spoke to us about other matters which we did not write about in any detail, or even at all. It would have been both inappropriate and a breach of trust.
During the same day in Wyoming, FrontRanger asked Annie a marvelous question about the importance of classical references within the Brokeback story. If you contact Lee she can probably link to the BM thread she put the answers in, although a much more detailed version was written by her in response to the rabid questions people had for her in one of the analysis threads over at Cullen. She or Miniangel may have a link to that post. In February[?] 2007, after an awards ceremony in Boulder we asked her about other aspects of the story. I remember my question, asked while she signed my book, was again about technique, although we also spoke about the 30 years it took THIS Ennis to say I Love You to my now wife [it was pretty funny lol].
She was gracious enough to give long and detailed answers to brokies at other times during the last what, 12-14 months or so, largely on the subject of the story's construction and technique. Answers to questions we are meant to discover for ourselves, she NEVER gives, ever. She guards the legacy of Brokeback Mountain well.
The thing is, virtually none of that has ever been in public, nor is any of it documented.
Nor should it be: they were not interviews; these were conversations.
Look this is just my opinion, but I firmly believe the key to a better understanding of Brokeback Mountain in all aspects not
directly concerned with specific questions lies within Annie's construction of her story, within the way the tale was crafted. When you understand her technique, much--MUCH--falls into place. When you understand the construction, MUCH becomes clear.
Brokeback was concieved FROM ITS CONCEPTION within Annie Proulx's mind as a work which progressively unfolded within a series of flashbacks. This is paramount to understanding the story. The unfolding flashbacks have an importance which transcends the linear chronology. The emotional build within the reader--rather then a linear chronology--is what was kept first and foremost when she constructed Brokeback.
The Prologue was concieved within her mind from the very beginning as
the piece which sets the tone, sets the stage for her entire story. Over before it began, in more ways then one....The importance of the Prologue, while it might be sometimes OVERestimated, should under no circumstances be UNDERRATED.
It was left out of the initial publication in the New Yorker completely by mistake. That mistake was made by the 'typesetters', nobody really knows exactly how to this very day: in other words 'the classic screwup' lol. When she first saw it, she almost had a coronary and felt her masterpiece had been mutilated, wrecked, rendered unintelligable. THAT is how important her prologue is to the story of Brokeback Mountain.
The technique of her story is circular rather then linear. In more ways then one, The End is the beginning, while the Prologue is The End. Again, the story is over when it begins....in a sad way, just like Jack and Ennis.
OK, circularity within a story is common enough. Attempts to recreate classical drama are common enough. Flashbacks are common enough. What is unique is her taking all of that, and combining the ingredients so successfully you don't even realise she's done it. That story as crafted is a stylistic tour de force. One which WORKS.
Understanding the technique as written will bring us no closer to answering those questions we want answered: "Is Jack Still Alive?", "Did Jack Quit Ennis?", "How Did Jack Really Die?".
Why?
As constructed--and as the author has said on MANY very well documented occasions--we, the readers, are
MEANT TO ASK THOSE QUESTIONS. THE ANSWER TO ALL OF THEM LIES WITHIN OUR OWN EXPERIENCE AND HEART. There is no right or wrong answer. Every reader has his or her interpretation, his or her belief. That is what she WANTED when she wrote it!
The characters are destroyed by their own inner character flaws and defects, which is the hallmark of classical tragedy. Hence, the story bites deep, as classical tragedy bites deeply within our hearts to this very day.
In the classic Euripidean manner Brokeback Mountain leaves us with more questions then answers>>>>which is why we are HERE! Hell, Annie is the AUTHOR---and SHE wondered what happened to Ennis after Jack's death. Yes, she is their creator: yet she wrote herself a private short story about Ennis, wrote it to exorcise the ghosts of Jack Twist and Ennis DelMar, wrote it so she could SLEEP lol!!!
Read it again, read it as if you were reading one of the great Athenian dramatic works from the Golden age. Look at it from that standpoint. Your interpretation will...shift.
I hope this helps a bit. And again, apologies for my previous nastiness. Somewhere in my files I have a few unpublished pieces, including a talk she gave us on 'Cowboy Myths and Realities' which partly discusses Jack and Ennis; if you would like to read any of it, let me know.
