Sophia Holland

A stereotype is defined as " a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing" versus an archetype which is defined as " a very typical example of a certain person or thing." By these definitions, I find that the witches featured in Aunt Maria by Diana Wynne Jones are archetypes of witches. Aunt Maria fits the nasty old woman witch, Zoe Greene fits the archetype of a crazy woman with magical powers, Elaine is the harsh, cold, and always-wearing-black witch, and Naomi (the daughter of Aunt Maria, not main character Mig) is the young girl rebelling against her mother witch.  Interestingly enough, all these archetypes could also describe female characters in power. Even "young girl rebelling against mother", as that is typically the background of a female character in power.  I think that this similar archetype-ing came about as a way to demonize women with power, whether it be magical or business. But recentl...

For this week I am going to read some H.P. Lovecraft to give legitimacy to my weird Cthulhu obsession in middle school. But before reading this I want to give a first impression on what is "weird". From our class discussion, I gathered mostly that the weird is hard to explain. A quick google search defines "weird" as something supernatural or uncanny. Uncanny is defined as "strange or mysterious, especially in an unsettling way." I am going to guess that the short stories I read for the new weird are going to be unsettling supernatural events, that are difficult to describe and difficult to pinpoint what makes them "weird." The first story I read was "The Unnameable." The supernatural event in this story was a local legend of a creature that no one but the victims had ever seen, and the victims could rarely describe. The town is unsettled by the legends surrounding this creature, and it's presence is very mysterious making the unn...

For J-Horror/Asian Horror week I decided to focus on manga. I actually found the first manga I read after telling my roommate about the theme for this week. I vaguely knew of the one she mentioned, but had never actually read it.  The Enigma of Amigara Fault is about human-shaped holes that are found after an earthquake reveals the inside of a mountain. This story is actually quite gothic, because each person can find a hole shaped exactly like them. And what would you do if you found a hole shaped just like you? You would get in it. And the issue in this story is the holes were constructed in such a way that no one who climbed in was able to move out, eventually leading to their own torture. Reading this manga also reminded me of an online Korean comic I had stumbled across years ago.  I was actually too afraid to finish this Korean comic then, and am honestly still too afraid to read it now (I startle easily). After researching, I learned that this comic was called  ...

As we have discussed in class, a key part of the Gothic genre is that the antagonistic force has some allure to it. The "evil" is not truly evil because it needs to be seductive to both the main character and the reader. Mary Shelley did an excellent job with this in her piece, Frankenstein . In Frankenstein , we learn the story of Dr. Victor Frankenstein: a young scientist who while at school learns what it is that makes a being alive, and uses that knowledge to animate a monster of his own creation. The knowledge that Dr. Frankenstein discovers is cleverly disguised in the book, making it mysterious, all-powerful, and most importantly, alluring. This is only the first instance of the allure of the evil. We then get to learn Frankenstein's monster's story and the reader finds him almost pitiful. Frankenstein's monster is essentially an abandoned child, who is extremely lonely because there is no other being on earth like him, and outcast for his appearance. The...