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thecissamalfoy · 5 years ago

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1. Let’s start with a tricky one; what is the real reason you are confused right now? 2. Do you ever get “good morning” owls from anyone? 3. If your significant other smoked pot, would you care? 4. Do you find it easy to trust others? 5. What were you doing at 11PM last night? 6. You’re drunk and lost walking down the road; who is with you? 7. What would you do if you found out you had been cheated on? 8. Are you close with your dad? 9. I bet you kissed someone last night, right? 10. What are you listening to? 11. You can only drink ONE liquid for the rest of your life - what is it? 12. Do you like hickeys? 13. What time do you go to bed? 14. Is there someone who continuously lets you down? 15. Do you always answer your owls? 16. Do you hate the person you fell the hardest for? 17. When was the last time you talked to one of your best friends? 18. Is there someone that makes you happy every time you see them? 19. What was your last thought before you went to bed last night? 20. Do you believe what goes around comes around? 21. Were you happier four months ago than you are now? 22. Is there someone you wish you could fix things with? 23. In the past week, have you cried? 24. What colour is the shirt you are wearing? 25. Do people ever call you by your last name? 26. Is anyone ignoring you right now? 27. Do you have a best friend? 28. Would it be hard seeing someone else kiss the last person you kissed? 29. Are you mad at anyone? 30. Have you ever kissed someone older than you? 31. How old will the last person you kissed be on his/her next birthday? 32. How many more days until your birthday? 33. Do you have any summer plans yet? 34. Do you have any good friends of the opposite sex? 35. Are you keeping anything from your best friend(s) now? 36. Do you have a secret that you’ve never told anyone? 37. Have you ever regretted kissing someone? 38. Do you think age matters in relationships? 39. Are you available? 40. How many people have you had real, strong feelings for since high school ended? 41. If you had to get a piercing (not ears), what would you get? 42. Do you believe exes can be friends? 43. Do you regret anything? 44. Honestly, what’s on your mind right now? 45. Did you ever lose a best friend? 46. Was your last kiss a mistake? 47. Why aren’t you pursuing the person you like? 48. Has the last person you kissed ever seen you cry? 49. Do you still talk with the person you LAST kissed? 50. What was the last thing you ate? 51. Did you get any compliments today? 52. Where are you going on your next vacation? 53. Do you own anything from other countries? 54. Are most of your friend guys or girls? 55. Where have you lived most of your life? 56. When was the last time you took a long drive? 57. Have you ever played Spin the Bottle? 58. What was the last movie you saw? 59. What’s preventing your current boyfriend/girlfriend from going back to their ex? 60. Is the last person you kissed younger than you? 61. Do you curse around your parents? 62. Are you happy with where you live? 63. Are you a monogamous person or do you believe in open-ended relationships? 64. Have you ever been dumped? 65. What do you most like about making out? 66. Have you ever casually made out with someone who you weren’t seriously involved with? 67. When you kiss someone for the first time, is it usually you who initiates it or the other? 68. What part of a person’s body do you find most attractive? 69. Who was the last person you talked to last night before you went to bed? 70. Had sex with someone you knew less than an hour? 71. Had sex with someone you didn’t know their name? 72. What makes your heart flutter and brings a big cheesy smile to your face? 73. Would you get involved with someone if they had a child already? 74. Has someone who had a crush on you ever confessed to you? 75. Do you tell a lot of people when you have a crush? 76. Do you miss your last sweetie? 77. Last time you slow danced with someone? 78. Have you ever ‘dated’ someone you’ve never met? 79. How can I win your heart? 80. What is your astrological sign? 81. What were you doing last night at 12 AM? 82. Do you cook? 83. Have you ever gotten back in touch with an old flame after a time of more than 3 months of no communication? 84. If you’re single right now, do you wish you were in a relationship? 85. Do you prefer to date various people or do you pretty much fall into monogamous relationships quickly? 86. What physical traits do you look for in a potential interest? 87. Name four things that you wish you had! 88. Are you a player? 89. Have you ever kissed 2 people in one day? 90. Are you a tease? 91. Have you ever been deeply in love with someone? 92. Hugs or Kisses? 93. Are you too shy to ask someone out? 94. The first thing you notice about the opposite sex? 95. Is it cute when a boy/girl calls you babe? 96. If a sexy person was pursuing you, but you knew he/she was in relationship, would you go for it? 97. Do you flirt a lot? 98. Your last kiss? 99. Have you kissed anyone in the past month? 100. If you could kiss anyone who would it be? 101. Do you know who you’ll kiss next? 102. Does someone like you currently? 103. Do you currently have feelings for anyone? 104. Do you like to be in serious relationships or just flings? 105. Ever made out with just a friend? 106. Are you happier single or in a relationship? 107. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you? 108. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you? 109. The person you would never want to meet? 110. What is your favorite word? 111. If you were a type of tree, what would you be? 112. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought? 113. What shirt are you wearing? 114. What do you label yourself as? 115. Bright room or dark room? 116. Favorite age you’ve been so far? 117. Who told you they loved you last? 118. Your worst enemy? 119. What is your current desktop picture? 120. Do you like someone? 121. The last song you listened to? 122. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up? 123. Who would you really like to just punch in the face? 124. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do? 125. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional) 126. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do? 127. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it? 128. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of? 129. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal. 130. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it? 131. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go? 132. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be? 133. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place? 134.What is your favorite expletive? 135. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno? 136. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? 137. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world! 138. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back? 139. What was your last dream about? 140. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]? 141. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital? 142. Have you ever built a snowman? 143. What is the color of your socks? 144. What type of music do you like? 145. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets? 146. What is your favorite milkshake flavor? 147. What quidditch team do you support? 148. Do you have any scars? 149. What do you want to be when you graduate? 150. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? 151. Are you reliable? 152. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be? 153. Do you hold grudges? 154. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create? 155. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had? 156. Are you a good liar? 157. How long could you go without talking? 158. What has been you worst haircut/style? 159. Have you ever baked your own cake? 160. Can you do any accents other than your own? 161. What do you like on your toast? 162. What is the last thing you drew a picture of? 163. What would be you dream car? 164. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain. 165. Do you believe in aliens? 166. Do you often read your horoscope? 167. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet? 168. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons? 169. What do you think about babies? 170: Your own question that you want me to answer. Just write it.

#askgame

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gwyn-ollivander · 5 years ago

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#askgame

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lucydesastre · 4 years ago

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1. Let’s start with a tricky one; what is the real reason you are confused right now? 2. Do you ever get “good morning” owls from anyone? 3. If your significant other smoked pot, would you care? 4. Do you find it easy to trust others? 5. What were you doing at 11PM last night? 6. You’re drunk and lost walking down the road; who is with you? 7. What would you do if you found out you had been cheated on? 8. Are you close with your dad? 9. I bet you kissed someone last night, right? 10. What are you listening to? 11. You can only drink ONE liquid for the rest of your life - what is it? 12. Do you like hickeys? 13. What time do you go to bed? 14. Is there someone who continuously lets you down? 15. Do you always answer your owls? 16. Do you hate the person you fell the hardest for? 17. When was the last time you talked to one of your best friends? 18. Is there someone that makes you happy every time you see them? 19. What was your last thought before you went to bed last night? 20. Do you believe what goes around comes around? 21. Were you happier four months ago than you are now? 22. Is there someone you wish you could fix things with? 23. In the past week, have you cried? 24. What colour is the shirt you are wearing? 25. Do people ever call you by your last name? 26. Is anyone ignoring you right now? 27. Do you have a best friend? 28. Would it be hard seeing someone else kiss the last person you kissed? 29. Are you mad at anyone? 30. Have you ever kissed someone older than you? 31. How old will the last person you kissed be on his/her next birthday? 32. How many more days until your birthday? 33. Do you have any summer plans yet? 34. Do you have any good friends of the opposite sex? 35. Are you keeping anything from your best friend(s) now? 36. Do you have a secret that you’ve never told anyone? 37. Have you ever regretted kissing someone? 38. Do you think age matters in relationships? 39. Are you available? 40. How many people have you had real, strong feelings for since high school ended? 41. If you had to get a piercing (not ears), what would you get? 42. Do you believe exes can be friends? 43. Do you regret anything? 44. Honestly, what’s on your mind right now? 45. Did you ever lose a best friend? 46. Was your last kiss a mistake? 47. Why aren’t you pursuing the person you like? 48. Has the last person you kissed ever seen you cry? 49. Do you still talk with the person you LAST kissed? 50. What was the last thing you ate? 51. Did you get any compliments today? 52. Where are you going on your next vacation? 53. Do you own anything from other countries? 54. Are most of your friend guys or girls? 55. Where have you lived most of your life? 56. When was the last time you took a long drive? 57. Have you ever played Spin the Bottle? 58. What was the last movie you saw? 59. What’s preventing your current boyfriend/girlfriend from going back to their ex? 60. Is the last person you kissed younger than you? 61. Do you curse around your parents? 62. Are you happy with where you live? 63. Are you a monogamous person or do you believe in open-ended relationships? 64. Have you ever been dumped? 65. What do you most like about making out? 66. Have you ever casually made out with someone who you weren’t seriously involved with? 67. When you kiss someone for the first time, is it usually you who initiates it or the other? 68. What part of a person’s body do you find most attractive? 69. Who was the last person you talked to last night before you went to bed? 70. Had sex with someone you knew less than an hour? 71. Had sex with someone you didn’t know their name? 72. What makes your heart flutter and brings a big cheesy smile to your face? 73. Would you get involved with someone if they had a child already? 74. Has someone who had a crush on you ever confessed to you? 75. Do you tell a lot of people when you have a crush? 76. Do you miss your last sweetie? 77. Last time you slow danced with someone? 78. Have you ever ‘dated’ someone you’ve never met? 79. How can I win your heart? 80. What is your astrological sign? 81. What were you doing last night at 12 AM? 82. Do you cook? 83. Have you ever gotten back in touch with an old flame after a time of more than 3 months of no communication? 84. If you’re single right now, do you wish you were in a relationship? 85. Do you prefer to date various people or do you pretty much fall into monogamous relationships quickly? 86. What physical traits do you look for in a potential interest? 87. Name four things that you wish you had! 88. Are you a player? 89. Have you ever kissed 2 people in one day? 90. Are you a tease? 91. Have you ever been deeply in love with someone? 92. Hugs or Kisses? 93. Are you too shy to ask someone out? 94. The first thing you notice about the opposite sex? 95. Is it cute when a boy/girl calls you babe? 96. If a sexy person was pursuing you, but you knew he/she was in relationship, would you go for it? 97. Do you flirt a lot? 98. Your last kiss? 99. Have you kissed anyone in the past month? 100. If you could kiss anyone who would it be? 101. Do you know who you’ll kiss next? 102. Does someone like you currently? 103. Do you currently have feelings for anyone? 104. Do you like to be in serious relationships or just flings? 105. Ever made out with just a friend? 106. Are you happier single or in a relationship? 107. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you? 108. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you? 109. The person you would never want to meet? 110. What is your favorite word? 111. If you were a type of tree, what would you be? 112. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought? 113. What shirt are you wearing? 114. What do you label yourself as? 115. Bright room or dark room? 116. Favorite age you’ve been so far? 117. Who told you they loved you last? 118. Your worst enemy? 119. What is your current desktop picture? 120. Do you like someone? 121. The last song you listened to? 122. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up? 123. Who would you really like to just punch in the face? 124. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do? 125. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional) 126. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do? 127. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it? 128. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of? 129. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal. 130. You just found 100 galleons! How are you going to spend it? 131. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go? 132. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be? 133. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place? 134.What is your favorite expletive? 135. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno? 136. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? 137. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world! 138. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back? 139. What was your last dream about? 140. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]? 141. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital? 142. Have you ever built a snowman? 143. What is the color of your socks? 144. What type of music do you like? 145. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets? 146. What is your favorite milkshake flavor? 147. What quidditch team do you support? 148. Do you have any scars? 149. What do you want to be when you graduate? 150. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? 151. Are you reliable? 152. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be? 153. Do you hold grudges? 154. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create? 155. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had? 156. Are you a good liar? 157. How long could you go without talking? 158. What has been you worst haircut/style? 159. Have you ever baked your own cake? 160. Can you do any accents other than your own? 161. What do you like on your toast? 162. What is the last thing you drew a picture of? 163. What would be you dream car? 164. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain. 165. Do you believe in aliens? 166. Do you often read your horoscope? 167. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet? 168. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons? 169. What do you think about babies? 170: Your own question that you want me to answer. Just write it.

#askgame

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poorquentyn · 8 years ago

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I'm re reading IT right now (slowly, as adult life is getting in the way) and was wondering what other bad storytelling choices you thought king made besides the. Uh. Sewer scene? Its been years since ive read it and nothing else really stood out to me as poor storytelling that i can remember. I'll read it for myself eventually but was curious of your thoughts. Love your blog!

Thanks! Stephen King often veers into caricature with his supporting characters, and It is no exception. The way he describes Eddie’s mom and wife physically goes well beyond the narratively useful purpose of establishing how their weight disorders have intertwined with Eddie’s hypochondria and into “ugh fat people are gross” territory. I don’t think King has conscious malignance in this area, because he finds a proper balance with Ben: the latter describes in realistic detail how he lost weight over time, his mom is upset that he’s eating less but is presented humanely (as someone who associates her son eating a lot with her doing well as a single mother), and King manages to avoid shaming Ben for his weight while also acknowledging that Ben personally feels a lot better about himself after having shed it–or rather, because of the confidence he gained in himself by taking charge of the situation. The idea here is not “Ben needs to lose weight because gross” but rather “Ben needs to be in control of his body.”

The good doesn’t wipe out the bad, nor vice versa; gotta consider them both in context. Main characters are naturally going to get more nuance than supporting characters, but necessary shorthand can easily turn into harmful caricature. And of course, a storytelling choice that seems solid in isolation can become a problem within the work as a whole. Beverly is sexualized throughout It in a way that’s often very unpleasant to read, associated throughout with violence and misogyny. Sometimes this works, as a way of peeling back the layers of petty ego driving a man’s man like her husband Tom; he explodes at her in their introductory scene because her paying attention to Mike’s call instead of him makes him feel like he’s literally not there. Other times it doesn’t, like when King lingers on the “smell” that Bev and her father “make together” now that she’s reaching puberty. We don’t need that to get the point that Bev’s father has inappropriate feelings for her–we got that from Bev’s mom asking if he ever touches her. When you put both sides of the coin together with the infamous sex scene in the sewers and the amount of time spent on whether Bev will choose Ben or Bill, it starts to look less like King was taking a stand against objectification by showing its omnipresence than that he simply didn’t know what to do with Bev as a character without constantly making reference to sex, rape, assault, and molestation. While she does get some right to response on these matters, I don’t think it’s nearly enough. It pushes back against a mindset that casually treats women like objects, but fails to establish a counter-narrative rooted in the female characters as individuals, fleshed out beyond their relationships to the men around them. It’s less a question of Does Stephen King Hate Women than one of imagination and empathy.

Of course, some flaws are lessened by context, rather than enhanced by it. Take, for example, our protagonist William Denbrough, a blatant author insert. Bill is a popular horror author (check) whose books are increasingly being adapted for TV and film (check) and who has a rather tense relationship with critics and academics (double check). The latter is spelled out in an extended flashback to Bill’s college days, in which he takes a stand that ought to be very familiar to anyone steeped in modern media discourse:

Here is a poor boy from the state of Maine who goes to the University on a scholarship. All his life he has wanted to be a writer, but when he enrolls in the writing courses he finds himself lost without a compass in a strange and frightening land. There’s one guy who wants to be Updike. There’s another one who wants to be a New England version of Faulkner-only he wants to write novels about the grim lives of the poor in blank verse. There’s a girl who admires Joyce Carol Gates but feels that because Oates was nurtured in a sexist society she is “radioactive in a literary sense.” Oates is unable to be clean, this girl says. She will be cleaner. There’s the short fat grad student who can’t or won’t speak above a mutter. This guy has written a play in which there are nine characters. Each of them says only a single word. Little by little the playgoers realize that when you put the single words together you come out with “War is the tool of the sexist death merchants.” This fellow’s play receives an A from the man who teaches Eh-141 (Creative Writing Honors Seminar). This instructor has published four books of poetry and his master’s thesis, all with the University Press. He smokes pot and wears a peace medallion. The fat mutterer’s play is produced by a guerrilla theater group during the strike to end the war which shuts down the campus in May of 1970. The instructor plays one of the characters.

Bill Denbrough, meanwhile, has written one locked-room mystery tale, three science-fiction stories, and several horror tales which owe a great deal to Edgar Allan Poe, H. P. Lovecraft, and Richard Matheson-in later years he will say those stories resembled a mid-1800s funeral hack equipped with a supercharger and painted Day-Glo red.

One of the sf tales earns him a B.

“This is better,” the instructor writes on the title page. “In the alien counterstrike we see the vicious circle in which violence begets violence; I particularly liked the “needle-nosed” spacecraft as a symbol of socio-sexual incursion. While this remains a slightly confused undertone throughout, it is interesting.”

All the others do no better than a C.

Finally he stands up in class one day, after the discussion of a sallow young woman’s vignette about a cow’s examination of a discarded engine block in a deserted field (this may or may not be after a nuclear war) has gone on for seventy minutes or so. The sallow girl, who smokes one Winston after another and picks occasionally at the pimples which nestle in the hollows of her temples, insists that the vignette is a socio-political statement in the manner of the early Orwell. Most of the class-and the instructor-agree, but still the discussion drones on.

When Bill stands up, the class looks at him. He is tail, and has a certain presence.

Speaking carefully, not stuttering (he has not stuttered in better than five years), he says: “I don’t understand this at all. I don’t understand any of this. Why does a story have to be socio-anything? Politics… culture… history… aren’t those natural ingredients in any story, if it’s told well? I mean… ” He looks around, sees hostile eyes, and realizes dimly that they see this as some sort of attack. Maybe it even is. They are thinking, he realizes, that maybe there is a sexist death merchant in their midst. “I mean… can’t you guys just let a story be a story?”

No one replies. Silence spins out. He stands there looking from one cool set of eyes to the next. The sallow girl chuffs out smoke and snubs her cigarette in an ashtray she has brought along in her backpack.

Finally the instructor says softly, as if to a child having an inexplicable tantrum, “do you believe William Faulkner was ‘just telling stories’? Do you believe Shakespeare was just interested in making a buck? Come now, Bill. Tell us what you think.”

“I think that’s pretty close to the truth,” Bill says after a long moment in which he honestly considers the question, and in their eyes he reads a kind of damnation.

“I suggest,” the instructor says, toying with his pen and smiling at Bill with half-lidded eyes, “that you have a great deal to learn.”

The applause starts somewhere in the back of the room.

Bill leaves… but returns the next week, determined to stick with it. In the time between he has written a story called “The Dark,” a tale about a small boy who discovers a monster in the cellar of his house. The little boy faces it, battles it, finally kills it. He feels a land of holy exaltation as he goes about the business of writing this story; he even feels that he is not so much telling the story as he is allowing the story to flow through him. At one point he puts his pen down and takes his hot and aching hand out into ten-degree December cold where it nearly smokes from the temperature change. He walks around, green cut-off boots squeaking in the snow like tiny shutter-hinges which need oil, and his head seems to bulge with the story; it is a little scary, the way it needs to get out. He feels that if it cannot escape by way of his racing hand that it will pop his eyes out in its urgency to escape and be concrete. “Going to knock the shit out of it,” he confides to the blowing winter dark, and laughs a little-a shaky laugh. He is aware that he has finally discovered how to do just that-after ten years of trying he has suddenly found the starter button on the vast dead bulldozer taking up so much space inside his head. It has started up. It is revving, revving. It is nothing pretty, this big machine. It was not made for taking pretty girls to proms. It is not a status symbol. It means business. It can knock things down. If he isn’t careful, it will knock him down.

He rushes inside and finishes “The Dark” at white heat, writing until four o'clock in the morning and finally falling asleep over his ring-binder. If someone had suggested to him that he was really writing about his brother, George, he would have been surprised. He has not thought about George in years-or so he honestly believes.

The story comes back from the instructor with an F slashed into the tide page. Two words are scrawled beneath, in capital letters. PULP, screams one. CRAP, screams the other.

Bill takes the fifteen-page sheaf of manuscript over to the wood-stove and opens the door. He is within a bare inch of tossing it in when the absurdity of what he is doing strikes him. He sits down in his rocking chair, looks at a Grateful Dead poster, and starts to laugh. Pulp? Fine! Let it be pulp! The woods were full of it!

“Let them fucking trees fall!” Bill exclaims, and laughs until tears spurt from his eyes and roll down his face.

He retypes the title page, the one with the instructor’s judgment on it, and sends it off to a men’s magazine named White Tie (although from what Bill can see, it really should be titled Naked Girls Who Look Like Drug Users). Yet his battered Writer’s Market says they buy horror stories, and the two issues he has bought down at the local mom-and-pop store have indeed contained four horror stories sandwiched between the naked girls and the ads for dirty movies and potency pills. One of them, by a man named Dennis Etchison, is actually quite good.

He sends “The Dark” off with no real hopes-he has submitted a good many stories to magazines before with nothing to show for it but rejection slips-and is flabbergasted and delighted when the fiction editor of White Tie buys it for two hundred dollars, payment on publication. The assistant editor adds a short note which calls it “the best damned horror story since Ray Bradbury’s "The Jar.” He adds, “Too bad only about seventy people coast to coast will read it,” but Bill Denbrough does not care. Two hundred dollars!

He goes to his advisor with a drop card for Eh-141. His advisor initials it. Bill Denbrough staples the drop card to the assistant fiction editor’s congratulatory note and tacks both to the bulletin board on the creative-writing instructor’s door. In the corner of the bulletin board he sees an anti-war cartoon. And suddenly, as if moving of its own accord, his fingers pluck his pen from his breast pocket and across the cartoon he writes this: If fiction and politics ever really do become interchangeable, I’m going to kill myself, because I won’t know what else to do. You see, politics always change. Stories never do. He pauses, and then, feeling a bit small (but unable to help himself), he adds: I suggest you have a lot to learn.

You can easily imagine this argument–a timeless appeal is being ruined by lefty college kids and their postmodern analyses–being made today by an alt-right YouTuber out to cleanse the game industry of SJWs. Throughout It, King keeps cutting back to an image of a librarian reading “The Billy Goats Gruff” to a group of kids, the latter enthralled (King tells us) by the primal purity of the kind of monster stories upon which both King and Denbrough have built their careers. “Will the monster be bested…or will It feed?” That’s King declaring that Bill’s his professors were wrong to wave aside his short horror stories. See? See?! I made it, and you pretentious eggheads were wrong to ever doubt me! This aspect of It is frankly embarrassing, especially as time marches on and we see how this mindset has taken root in the next generation.

But! While King very clearly believes this stuff, he’s also self-aware enough to include auto-critiques in his writing. Stan’s wife Patty picks up one of Bill’s novels and dismisses it as practically pornographic in its horror imagery. King goes too far in casting Patty’s dislike of Bill’s work as reflecting a lack of imagination on her part, but he then goes on to sympathetically explore how the grounded relatable struggles Patty has faced (anti-Semitism, her father mocking and dismissing Stan, their inability to have children) have led her to consider “horrorbooks” as shallow escapism. The real world, It admits, has horrors beyond anything the Kings and Denbroughs can come up with. “Werewolves, shit. What did a man like that know about werewolves?”

Later on, when Ben is telling his triumphant story about calling out a high school coach who taunted him for his weight, Bill gently notes that as an author, he has trouble believing any kid really talked like that. That’s King using his self-insert to wryly poke fun at his own oft-overheated dialogue. Self-awareness and self-deprecation are absolutely vital to making a book as thematically and structurally ambitious as this one work.

And while some of It’s politics make me cringe, other aspects make me perk up and take notice. King wrote It over the course of four years in which HIV and AIDS became a national crisis that was being largely ignored by said nation’s government. There was a growing conventional wisdom that the afflicted deserved their punishment and should be more or less left to rot. This was all part and parcel with the ascension of the religious right in American politics, especially within the Reagan White House. A huge part of the Reagan narrative (as we see in the “Morning in America” ad, also released while King was writing It) was a portrait of lily-white small-town America as a social ideal being beset by all sorts of ills that the left was either letting happen or actively supporting, and The Gays were most certainly among them.

It opens with a scene that seems to dovetail with that narrative: an idealized ‘50s small town in which an adorable innocent white boy from a good Christian family is horribly murdered by (what seems to be) a nightmarish external force that takes advantage of that innocence. Already, you can see a potential Reaganite spin–It as the Other, the “bear in the woods” threatening the ideal of Derry.

But that’s not what It is about. The second chapter jumps forward a generation, into the mid-1980s in which King was writing, and onto a scene of violence that cannot be wrapped into the meta-narrative of the religious right. Three men attack a gay man on a bridge, their delicate sensibilities offended by his flamboyance. They beat him within an inch of his life and toss him over the side…where he finds It waiting for him with a gleaming sharp-toothed smile. Both the victim’s boyfriend and one of the assailants tell the cops and lawyers involved about the demon clown who finished the victim off, but the powers that be cover it up for the sake of a successful prosecution.

The idea being that they’re dealing with the symptoms, not the disease–the violence, but not the hand-me-down hate driving it. The bereft boyfriend tells the cops that he tried to warn his new-to-town lover that despite its cheery appearance, Derry is a “bad place,” one positively crawling with “AIDS is God’s punishment” homophobia. Moreover, he whispers through his tears, he realized while staring into Its silver eyes as It ate his true love that “It was Derry…It was this town.”

So while the first chapter seemingly wrapped the era’s conservative politics in a cozy semiotic blanket, it was only baiting the hook so that the second can rip that blanket off like a Band-Aid. As Reagan strolled to re-election with 49 states at his back, as the Democrats’ convictions wavered and they began to drift rightward, as thousands of Americans wasted away while their government and so many of their fellow citizens watched pitilessly, here comes Stevie King to stick his middle finger in the Moral Majority’s face and say: gays aren’t the monsters, you are the monsters, you are the ones eating your children. He built a thousand-page Lovecraftian epic around that idea, and made it a bestseller. How fucking awesome is that?

Again, it’s all always going to be complicated. The good not only coexists with the bad–they’re often inextricable. The author who slipped a rant against leftist academics ruinin’ his storybooks into It is also the guy who now declares his support for BLM and his disgust for Trump, and It is both a deeply flawed work and one of my very favorite novels.

#it #stephen king

112 notes · View notes

guinevereb · 5 years ago

Link

1. Let’s start with a tricky one; what is the real reason you are confused right now?

2. Do you ever get “good morning” owls from anyone?

3. If your significant other smoked pot, would you care?

4. Do you find it easy to trust others?

5. What were you doing at 11PM last night?

6. You’re drunk and lost walking down the road; who is with you?

7. What would you do if you found out you had been cheated on?

8. Are you close with your dad?

9. I bet you kissed someone last night, right?

10. What are you listening to?

11. You can only drink ONE liquid for the rest of your life - what is it?

12. Do you like hickeys?

13. What time do you go to bed?

14. Is there someone who continuously lets you down?

15. Do you always answer your owls?

16. Do you hate the person you fell the hardest for?

17. When was the last time you talked to one of your best friends?

18. Is there someone that makes you happy every time you see them?

19. What was your last thought before you went to bed last night?

20. Do you believe what goes around comes around?

21. Were you happier four months ago than you are now?

22. Is there someone you wish you could fix things with?

23. In the past week, have you cried?

24. What colour is the shirt you are wearing?

25. Do people ever call you by your last name?

26. Is anyone ignoring you right now?

27. Do you have a best friend?

28. Would it be hard seeing someone else kiss the last person you kissed?

29. Are you mad at anyone?

30. Have you ever kissed someone older than you?

31. How old will the last person you kissed be on his/her next birthday?

32. How many more days until your birthday?

33. Do you have any summer plans yet?

34. Do you have any good friends of the opposite sex?

35. Are you keeping anything from your best friend(s) now?

36. Do you have a secret that you’ve never told anyone?

37. Have you ever regretted kissing someone?

38. Do you think age matters in relationships?

39. Are you available?

40. How many people have you had real, strong feelings for since high school ended?

41. If you had to get a piercing (not ears), what would you get?

42. Do you believe exes can be friends?

43. Do you regret anything?

44. Honestly, what’s on your mind right now?

45. Did you ever lose a best friend?

46. Was your last kiss a mistake?

47. Why aren’t you pursuing the person you like?

48. Has the last person you kissed ever seen you cry?

49. Do you still talk with the person you LAST kissed?

50. What was the last thing you ate?

51. Did you get any compliments today?

52. Where are you going on your next vacation?

53. Do you own anything from other countries?

54. Are most of your friend guys or girls?

55. Where have you lived most of your life?

56. When was the last time you took a long drive?

57. Have you ever played Spin the Bottle?

58. What was the last movie you saw?

59. What’s preventing your current boyfriend/girlfriend from going back to their ex?

60. Is the last person you kissed younger than you?

61. Do you curse around your parents?

62. Are you happy with where you live?

63. Are you a monogamous person or do you believe in open-ended relationships?

64. Have you ever been dumped?

65. What do you most like about making out?

66. Have you ever casually made out with someone who you weren’t seriously involved with?

67. When you kiss someone for the first time, is it usually you who initiates it or the other?

68. What part of a person’s body do you find most attractive?

69. Who was the last person you talked to last night before you went to bed?

70. Had sex with someone you knew less than an hour?

71. Had sex with someone you didn’t know their name?

72. What makes your heart flutter and brings a big cheesy smile to your face?

73. Would you get involved with someone if they had a child already?

74. Has someone who had a crush on you ever confessed to you?

75. Do you tell a lot of people when you have a crush?

76. Do you miss your last sweetie?

77. Last time you slow danced with someone?

78. Have you ever ‘dated’ someone you’ve never met?

79. How can I win your heart?

80. What is your astrological sign?

81. What were you doing last night at 12 AM?

82. Do you cook?

83. Have you ever gotten back in touch with an old flame after a time of more than 3 months of no communication?

84. If you’re single right now, do you wish you were in a relationship?

85. Do you prefer to date various people or do you pretty much fall into monogamous relationships quickly?

86. What physical traits do you look for in a potential interest?

87. Name four things that you wish you had!

88. Are you a player?

89. Have you ever kissed 2 people in one day?

90. Are you a tease?

91. Have you ever been deeply in love with someone?

92. Hugs or Kisses?

93. Are you too shy to ask someone out?

94. The first thing you notice about the opposite sex?

95. Is it cute when a boy/girl calls you babe?

96. If a sexy person was pursuing you, but you knew he/she was in relationship, would you go for it?

97. Do you flirt a lot?

98. Your last kiss?

99. Have you kissed anyone in the past month?

100. If you could kiss anyone who would it be?

101. Do you know who you’ll kiss next?

102. Does someone like you currently?

103. Do you currently have feelings for anyone?

104. Do you like to be in serious relationships or just flings?

105. Ever made out with just a friend?

106. Are you happier single or in a relationship?

107. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?

108. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?

109. The person you would never want to meet?

110. What is your favorite word?

111. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?

112. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?

113. What shirt are you wearing?

114. What do you label yourself as?

115. Bright room or dark room?

116. Favorite age you’ve been so far?

117. Who told you they loved you last?

118. Your worst enemy?

119. What is your current desktop picture?

120. Do you like someone?

121. The last song you listened to?

122. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?

123. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?

124. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?

125. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)

126. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?

127. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?

128. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?

129. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.

130. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?

131. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?

132. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be?

133. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place?

134.What is your favorite expletive?

135. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno?

136. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

137. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!

138. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back? 139. What was your last dream about?

140. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]?

141. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?

142. Have you ever built a snowman?

143. What is the color of your socks?

144. What type of music do you like?

145. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

146. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?

147. What quidditch team do you support?

148. Do you have any scars?

149. What do you want to be when you graduate?

150. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

151. Are you reliable?

152. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be?

153. Do you hold grudges?

154. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?

155. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?

156. Are you a good liar?

157. How long could you go without talking?

158. What has been you worst haircut/style?

159. Have you ever baked your own cake?

160. Can you do any accents other than your own?

161. What do you like on your toast?

162. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?

163. What would be you dream car?

164. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain.

165. Do you believe in aliens?

166. Do you often read your horoscope?

167. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

168. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?

169. What do you think about babies?

170: Your own question that you want me to answer. Just write it.

0 notes

lukebwood · 5 years ago

Link

1. Let’s start with a tricky one; what is the real reason you are confused right now?

2. Do you ever get “good morning” owls from anyone?

3. If your significant other smoked pot, would you care?

4. Do you find it easy to trust others?

5. What were you doing at 11PM last night?

6. You’re drunk and lost walking down the road; who is with you?

7. What would you do if you found out you had been cheated on?

8. Are you close with your dad?

9. I bet you kissed someone last night, right?

10. What are you listening to?

11. You can only drink ONE liquid for the rest of your life - what is it?

12. Do you like hickeys?

13. What time do you go to bed?

14. Is there someone who continuously lets you down?

15. Do you always answer your owls?

16. Do you hate the person you fell the hardest for?

17. When was the last time you talked to one of your best friends?

18. Is there someone that makes you happy every time you see them?

19. What was your last thought before you went to bed last night?

20. Do you believe what goes around comes around?

21. Were you happier four months ago than you are now?

22. Is there someone you wish you could fix things with?

23. In the past week, have you cried?

24. What colour is the shirt you are wearing?

25. Do people ever call you by your last name?

26. Is anyone ignoring you right now?

27. Do you have a best friend?

28. Would it be hard seeing someone else kiss the last person you kissed?

29. Are you mad at anyone?

30. Have you ever kissed someone older than you?

31. How old will the last person you kissed be on his/her next birthday?

32. How many more days until your birthday?

33. Do you have any summer plans yet?

34. Do you have any good friends of the opposite sex?

35. Are you keeping anything from your best friend(s) now?

36. Do you have a secret that you’ve never told anyone?

37. Have you ever regretted kissing someone?

38. Do you think age matters in relationships?

39. Are you available?

40. How many people have you had real, strong feelings for since high school ended?

41. If you had to get a piercing (not ears), what would you get?

42. Do you believe exes can be friends?

43. Do you regret anything?

44. Honestly, what’s on your mind right now?

45. Did you ever lose a best friend?

46. Was your last kiss a mistake?

47. Why aren’t you pursuing the person you like?

48. Has the last person you kissed ever seen you cry?

49. Do you still talk with the person you LAST kissed?

50. What was the last thing you ate?

51. Did you get any compliments today?

52. Where are you going on your next vacation?

53. Do you own anything from other countries?

54. Are most of your friend guys or girls?

55. Where have you lived most of your life?

56. When was the last time you took a long drive?

57. Have you ever played Spin the Bottle?

58. What was the last movie you saw?

59. What’s preventing your current boyfriend/girlfriend from going back to their ex?

60. Is the last person you kissed younger than you?

61. Do you curse around your parents?

62. Are you happy with where you live?

63. Are you a monogamous person or do you believe in open-ended relationships?

64. Have you ever been dumped?

65. What do you most like about making out?

66. Have you ever casually made out with someone who you weren’t seriously involved with?

67. When you kiss someone for the first time, is it usually you who initiates it or the other?

68. What part of a person’s body do you find most attractive?

69. Who was the last person you talked to last night before you went to bed?

70. Had sex with someone you knew less than an hour?

71. Had sex with someone you didn’t know their name?

72. What makes your heart flutter and brings a big cheesy smile to your face?

73. Would you get involved with someone if they had a child already?

74. Has someone who had a crush on you ever confessed to you?

75. Do you tell a lot of people when you have a crush?

76. Do you miss your last sweetie?

77. Last time you slow danced with someone?

78. Have you ever ‘dated’ someone you’ve never met?

79. How can I win your heart?

80. What is your astrological sign?

81. What were you doing last night at 12 AM?

82. Do you cook?

83. Have you ever gotten back in touch with an old flame after a time of more than 3 months of no communication?

84. If you’re single right now, do you wish you were in a relationship?

85. Do you prefer to date various people or do you pretty much fall into monogamous relationships quickly?

86. What physical traits do you look for in a potential interest?

87. Name four things that you wish you had!

88. Are you a player?

89. Have you ever kissed 2 people in one day?

90. Are you a tease?

91. Have you ever been deeply in love with someone?

92. Hugs or Kisses?

93. Are you too shy to ask someone out?

94. The first thing you notice about the opposite sex?

95. Is it cute when a boy/girl calls you babe?

96. If a sexy person was pursuing you, but you knew he/she was in relationship, would you go for it?

97. Do you flirt a lot?

98. Your last kiss?

99. Have you kissed anyone in the past month?

100. If you could kiss anyone who would it be?

101. Do you know who you’ll kiss next?

102. Does someone like you currently?

103. Do you currently have feelings for anyone?

104. Do you like to be in serious relationships or just flings?

105. Ever made out with just a friend?

106. Are you happier single or in a relationship?

107. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?

108. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?

109. The person you would never want to meet?

110. What is your favorite word?

111. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?

112. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?

113. What shirt are you wearing?

114. What do you label yourself as?

115. Bright room or dark room?

116. Favorite age you’ve been so far?

117. Who told you they loved you last?

118. Your worst enemy?

119. What is your current desktop picture?

120. Do you like someone?

121. The last song you listened to?

122. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?

123. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?

124. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?

125. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)

126. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?

127. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?

128. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?

129. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.

130. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?

131. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?

133. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place?

134.What is your favorite expletive?

136. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

137. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!

140. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]?

141. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?

142. Have you ever built a snowman?

143. What is the color of your socks?

144. What type of music do you like?

145. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

146. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?

147. What quidditch team do you support?

148. Do you have any scars?

149. What do you want to be when you graduate?

150. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

151. Are you reliable?

152. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be?

153. Do you hold grudges?

154. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?

155. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?

156. Are you a good liar?

157. How long could you go without talking?

158. What has been you worst haircut/style?

159. Have you ever baked your own cake?

160. Can you do any accents other than your own?

161. What do you like on your toast?

162. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?

163. What would be you dream car?

164. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain.

165. Do you believe in aliens?

166. Do you often read your horoscope?

167. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

168. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?

169. What do you think about babies?

170: Your own question that you want me to answer. Just write it.

0 notes

mordredbaxter · 5 years ago

Link

#askgame

0 notes