Author Topic: Annie Proulx's still pissed...  (Read 79931 times)

Offline Front-Ranger

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #90 on: May 07, 2009, 10:14:01 am »
What if...there were a relative or a friend who is closeted whose privacy she is trying to protect? Would you feel differently about her in that case??
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Offline optom3

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #91 on: May 07, 2009, 10:37:20 am »
The phrase that really jars for me, is when she says, I guess they just became too real.I would have thought that was one of the highest accolades an author could receive. Is not the whole purpose of writing a fictional work, to build up characters which resonate with the reader and produce a response, any response.
When she openly admits that Jack and Ennis became very real for her, as she as writing, why would she be upset that they became real for so many of us.
I read the story first and sobbed for days as I fervently read and re read it. I felt the pain of both Jack and Ennis and it resonated deep inside, touching a wound and reopening it, long after I thought it had healed. I was very wary of going to see the film and prevaricated for some time. I had my own very fixed images of Jack and Ennis by then and was wary of walking away from the film, bitter and angry as I have on many occasions when I have read a book first and then seen a film.

It is a testament to the genius of Ang, script writers, Heath and Jake, that I absorbed the film and took something new from it. The film was of course filled with more detail than the sparsely penned  S.S. but that enhanced, rather than is often the case detracting from my experience.Ennis and Jack were reborn and again I started into another downward spiral of regret, chances handed to me so freely, yet like Ennis, rejected as I lacked the courage to move forward with what intuitively I knew would make me happy.

So Proulx rather than bemoaning the fact that maybe the characters became too real, should rejoice that they were given life by Heath and Jake, and from that rebirth emerged a film which stopped those affected in their tracks.Not just for a day, but for a lifetime, giving courage, where previously none had existed, to go out and grab life by the balls !!

If that was my only success in life I would die a happy lady.She is undoubtedly fed up with, as she sees it, inferior works of fiction, my advice on that subject would be, buy a bigger bin. It is like the people who bewail the mind numbing fodder we are fed via our T.V. if you do not like it, use the off button.It is not rocket science.

As for the lady herself, if I go to my grave feeling I have made just one persons life richer emotionally, if I changed the opinion of only one bigot, or gave courage to someone to pursue the life they want, I would die a happy lady. For Annie, I think she should be happy that her epitaph could easily and honestly be, I made a difference and opened a few eyes. Not a particularly shabby way to be remembered.

Offline Front-Ranger

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #92 on: May 07, 2009, 01:33:51 pm »
I don't know much about fanfiction, but it seems like the quality of the writing is in inverse proportion to the need of the author to be praised for his/her work. That's the thing that alarms me about the genre, so I stopped reading any and all fanfiction because, once some of the authors knew I had read part of their work, they pestered me for feedback, and only the most positive and gushing feedback would do. I'm a professional writer, so giving honest feedback was impossible. I imagine AP got caught in the same, or similar boat.

"chewing gum and duct tape"

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #93 on: May 07, 2009, 02:21:44 pm »
The phrase that really jars for me, is when she says, I guess they just became too real.I would have thought that was one of the highest accolades an author could receive. Is not the whole purpose of writing a fictional work, to build up characters which resonate with the reader and produce a response, any response.
When she openly admits that Jack and Ennis became very real for her, as she as writing, why would she be upset that they became real for so many of us?

I don't think she is. As quoted in Eric's post that began this thread, she said:

Quote
"So yeah, they got a life of their own. And unfortunately, they got a life of their own for too many other people too."

Annie certainly doesn't use words casually. I believe there is a distinction between characters become "real," both for an author and a reader, and taking on "a life of their own," and I bet Annie does, too. It seems to me her beef is not with readers for whom Ennis and Jack became "real" but with readers unable to accept the life--the fate--that their creater--Annie--gave them, so they have to go on and rewrite her story to show her how her own story should have been written.

Quote
So Proulx rather than bemoaning the fact that maybe the characters became too real, should rejoice that they were given life by Heath and Jake, and from that rebirth emerged a film which stopped those affected in their tracks.

I think she does. She spoke very highly of both of them in her essay, "Getting Movied," in Story to Screenplay.

"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline loneleeb3

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #94 on: May 07, 2009, 05:47:40 pm »
This is a great thread that I have enjoyed reading.
Quote
a film which stopped those affected in their tracks.Not just for a day, but for a lifetime, giving courage, where previously none had existed, to go out and grab life by the balls !!
What a great quote! That happened for me and describes my reaction to a tee!

I can understands Annies frustration though. It would be like someone coming up to me and telling me that the way i was parenting Elizabeth is all wrong and I should do it like this. I would be pissed.
But, thats what happens when you put your stuff out there in the public arena!
I have written fan fic. Not because I thought AP did a substandard job or i thought more should be added to the story, I did it cause i was inspired.'
The story (movie and short story) affected me so much I had to find some way to get the emotion it caused out.
For me thats how I did it.
"The biggest obstacle to most of us achieving our dreams isn't reality, it's our own fear"

"Saint Paul had his Epiphany on the road to Damascus, Mine was on Brokeback Mountain"

Offline Katie77

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #95 on: May 07, 2009, 08:30:07 pm »
The bottome line is.....BBM became bigger than Annie Proulx.

For the average movie goer who enjoyed the movie, most of them probably dont even know her name.

When you mention BBM to anyone, do they bring her name up.....none that I have ever spoken to, except on here. She is way down the list of credits.......and I dont think she likes that, and interviews like this latest one, seem to be her way of re-stamping her name on the story, like a dog pissing out his territory.

Its like SHE is the only one allowed to interpret the story, because she wrote it, its like you can like it, but you must like it the way I want you to like it. "If you dont play by my rules, Im gonna take my bat and ball and go home"....

She put it out there, she gave it to McMurtry and Ossama.....they gave it to Ang....who gave it to Heath and Jake.....each one doing with it, the way they inerpretted it......then they gave it to us......and we are doing with it, what all the others did.

She is a long long way down the chain...........Annie ???........Annie WHO ????
Being happy doesn't mean everything is perfect.

It means you've decided to see beyond the imperfection

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #96 on: May 07, 2009, 09:43:05 pm »
This is, indeed, a fascinating thread, but I'll tell you what. I must be missing something, because I think I'm seeing a lot of free-flowing anger directed at Annie Proulx that really seems to me to have very little relationship to what she actually said in the interview that Eric quoted in his first post:

Quote
PROULX: Oh, yeah. In Wyoming they won’t read it. A large section of the population is still outraged. But that’s not where the problem was. I’m used to that response from people here, who generally do not like the way I write. But the problem has come since the film. So many people have completely misunderstood the story. I think it’s important to leave spaces in a story for readers to fill in from their own experience, but unfortunately the audience that Brokeback reached most strongly have powerful fantasy lives. And one of the reasons we keep the gates locked here is that a lot of men have decided that the story should have had a happy ending. They can’t bear the way it ends—they just can’t stand it. So they rewrite the story, including all kinds of boyfriends and new lovers and so forth after Jack is killed. And it just drives me wild. They can’t understand that the story isn’t about Jack and Ennis. It’s about homophobia; it’s about a social situation; it’s about a place and a particular mindset and morality. They just don’t get it. I can’t tell you how many of these things have been sent to me as though they’re expecting me to say, oh great, if only I’d had the sense to write it that way. And they all begin the same way—I’m not gay, but . . . The implication is that because they’re men they understand much better than I how these people would have behaved. And maybe they do. But that’s not the story I wrote. Those are not their characters. The characters belong to me by law.

Where is all this anger coming from?
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline Katie77

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #97 on: May 07, 2009, 10:03:35 pm »
It did not take that particular interview to make me dislike her.

I have read several interviews and read several posts, and they all describe "whats her name" in a similar light....

"Dont want to talk about BBM, thats history, Ive made my money, now lets get onto something new that I can make some money from and boost my ego".

I was pissed off with her the first time I read her bloody story......120 fucking pages......120....if it wasnt for McMurtry, Ossama, Ang, Heath and Jake it would still be tomorrows fish and chip wrappings.
Being happy doesn't mean everything is perfect.

It means you've decided to see beyond the imperfection

Offline ifyoucantfixit

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #98 on: May 07, 2009, 10:17:40 pm »
     They can’t understand that the story isn’t about Jack and Ennis. It’s about homophobia; it’s about a social situation; it’s about a place and a particular mindset and morality. They just don’t get it. I can’t tell you how many of these things have been sent to me as though they’re expecting me to say, oh great, if only I’d had the sense to write it that way. And they all begin the same way—I’m not gay, but . . . The implication is that because they’re men they understand much better than I how these people would have behaved. And maybe they do. But that’s not the story I wrote. Those are not their characters. The characters belong to me by law.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Now in my opinion there is no way possible, to misinterpret that particular statement.  She is saying that
we don't  get it.  We don't understand the story, is about homophobia, not about Jack and Ennis.  She is
not giving any respect to the people that "do" understand the entire thing.  We know that it is about how
people behave when confronted by homophobia.  We know that it could have been about any two men, by
any other names.  However it is about them, because she did give them names, and made it about the way
they reacted because of the atmosphere they were in. 
  We who read and even those who write fanfiction about these two characters, dont do it for the benefit
of telling her that her story is more capably finished by others in a different way.  I think she is only saying
that in order to justify her own attitude.  I think that the people that do send her information, which I doubt
is a very few.  Are merely doing it to try and show her how they enjoyed the story so much that they wish to have it continue to live in more than one way.  I doubt if she is sincere in her attitude about it all,  because
she knows that.  She is not losing any money on it.  They certainly are not demeaning her terrific story.  However having said that, I do think that if she stands by her own statement that people should finish the
story the way they feel it should be, according to their own experiences.  Then she will understand that the
stories that are written are only continuing a love affair with the story she started.  I for one am very
disappointed that she has such an uncaring attitude toward the people that so obviously revere the story
as written, and filmed, and remembered.  It will continue to grow as time goes by, in spite of her onus
attitude, or her mean spirited talk.

"

 



     Beautiful mind

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Annie Proulx's still pissed...
« Reply #99 on: May 07, 2009, 10:26:14 pm »
It did not take that particular interview to make me dislike her.

I have read several interviews and read several posts, and they all describe "whats her name" in a similar light....

"Dont want to talk about BBM, thats history, Ive made my money, now lets get onto something new that I can make some money from and boost my ego".

I was pissed off with her the first time I read her bloody story......120 fucking pages......120....if it wasnt for McMurtry, Ossama, Ang, Heath and Jake it would still be tomorrows fish and chip wrappings.

Well, I hope you're enjoying wallowing in your anger. Whether you like her or not, without her there would have been no film--that's a fact no one can escape whether they like Annie Proulx or despise her.

And no, "Brokeback Mountain" was a prize-winning short story long before Ang Lee, etc., came along. So it would not have been tomorrow's fish and chips wrappings.

I have no idea what you're referring to by "120 fucking pages," so let be, let be.
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.