Oskar at 40

A forum for discussing fan fiction related to Let The Right One In
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drakkar
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by drakkar » Wed Jul 07, 2010 4:45 am

a_contemplative_life wrote:Well as usual, Sauvin has taken us to new vistas of grittiness that I suspect even JAL never imagined. :lol:

It seems to me that this is what it means for Eli and Oskar to become an "old married couple." In their own completely bizarre and twisted way, of course. :shock:

Seriously, though...is this really an existence worth living? I think this piece, together with "Oskar at 40," points to that as a central question, that maybe isn't clear in any of the other fan fic written so far. Do they really experience enough happiness to justify all of the misery? If this is how it's going to turn out, maybe it really is finally time to consider doing the "easy" thing.
Hopefully we will have JAL's point of view on that question within a year.
For the heart life is simple. It beats as long as it can.
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thestich
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by thestich » Wed Jul 07, 2010 2:25 pm

I am enjoying these discussions a lot.

I especially like the long discussion by Sauvin.

Much to think about driven by those paragraphs.

Thanks!
While wandering here between posts and FF, I am gradually getting convinced, that I haven't seen anywhere more beautiful madness than on this forum. Clubmeister

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genie47
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by genie47 » Wed Jul 07, 2010 2:45 pm

I've posted on the music thread of my strange dream that Oskar and Eli parted. I think this is in response to what I read as discussed in this thread. They parted with the tune of Kelly Clarkson's Already Gone. :cry:
Låt den rätte komma in in both its printed and celluloid form is a slow acting poison. You will be poisoned white. White from arsenic and innocence.

To love someone deeply gives you strength. Being loved by someone deeply gives you courage. - Lao Tzu

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lombano
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by lombano » Thu Jul 08, 2010 2:05 am

genie47 wrote:I've posted on the music thread of my strange dream that Oskar and Eli parted. I think this is in response to what I read as discussed in this thread. They parted with the tune of Kelly Clarkson's Already Gone. :cry:
Hmmm, I dreamed with Oskar last night, and it was pretty grim, you may be right and it's not coincidence...
Bli mig lite.

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PeteMork
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by PeteMork » Thu Jul 08, 2010 3:27 am

sauvin wrote:----- PeterMork, Oskar wouldn't view sensuality with child Eli as unimaginable (or even particularly disturbing, truth to tell) if their lives together unfurled the way my stories suggest because he'd have the memories of having experienced it. In fact, if they'd lived in total isolation, Eli's child-like appearance would probably never be brought to the fore to impact this aspect of their lives. His natural aging and attendant socialisation (such as it may be) would imbue her with more and more of a child-like appearance, and thus naturally less sexual appeal.

He loved her before sex, and he'll continue loving her long afterwards, but not with his nads.

Their growing sexual estrangement is something that I fear Eli would misinterpret, given she's just a child and especially in light of her probable background. I could very easily see this stressing their relationship in ways we'd consider paradoxical: when the adult stops having sex with the child, does this mean he doesn't love her anymore? If not, can she still trust him? How? Remember, even after long years of being with Oskar's empathy and concern for her true welfare, Eli would still be wrestling with two centuries of conditioning as a masturbatory device and the only "real" influence she has with her "daddies". The paradox is this: normal human children normally experience indescribable relief when chronic sexual abuse stops; Eli's first thought would be "Uh oh... wa fan...?"


PeterMork, I also don't see that Eli was no longer able to support Oskar in any way. She might not have the emotional depth and the perspectives to understand his various crises to help in any directly significant way, but she can continue being the one unchanging fact of his life, the comfort of immutability no other girl could give him. In material terms, she's got him covered a few million ways from Sunday; she's rich, she can get lots more money if she has to, and if the chopped steak she cooks for him don't always come from the grocery store, well, ain't it wonderful what a few spices can hide? As Oskar grows, he'd need "support" less and less, and he actually needed so little by the time he'd left Blackeberg anyway, Eli didn't actually have much to fear on this score.

However, I'm forced to agree with PeterMork that the Oskar at 40 monologue is just an extension and reasonably plausible expansion of the irresolvable conflict Eli's vampirism imposes on her, and an extension of Wolfchild's assertion that Lindqvist deliberately engineered a story for which there is no possibility of a "happily ever after".

I'd never considered it in these terms, and never intended it, but it does seem so. These poor kids are tragic :\
I can find nothing in this entire essay to disagree with. Frankly, I find it filled with well-thought-out logical consequences of Oskar growing old with Eli. I never believed that you were saying that either of them would stop loving the other on some level, and I hope I never appeared to be holding Eli's sexual confusion against her. Quite the contrary. I would still consider her an innocent no matter how 'deviant' her sexual behavior seemed to 'normal' society, for many of the reasons you describe above. It's especially sad for me to think that Eli WOULD probably interpret their sexual estrangement as meaning that Oskar no longer loves her.

In my nightmares I see them desperately clinging to each other 'till the end, as darkness engulfs them...

D__n Lindqvist! He made it so difficult for us rank amateurs to pull them up out of the depths, but because of the force and beauty of his book and his wonderful film, we feel compelled to try. :(
Last edited by PeteMork on Sat Oct 29, 2011 9:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.
We never stop reading, although every book comes to an end, just as we never stop living, although death is certain. (Roberto Bolaño)

WhiteBackground
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by WhiteBackground » Thu Jul 08, 2010 4:50 am

PeteMork wrote:I can find nothing in this entire essay to disagree with. Frankly, I find it filled with well-thought-out logical consequences of Oskar growing old with Eli. It's especially sad for me to think that Eli WOULD probably interpret their sexual estrangement as meaning that Oskar no longer loves her.
I agree that unless Oskar, as an adult, eventually gets to take some control of their lives, this tragic course of events is likely. I still see it as a bit implausible that Eli is uncapable of changing her habits despite their eroding effects on Oskar and their relationship. Oskar in "Oscar at 40" seems just so terribly passive, pushing all the responsibility on Eli's shoulders, as if he does not understand that at that time he is the adult and she is still a child. I'd imagine him being more responsible and imaginative, perhaps even as the Oskar in a fanfic where he goes into medical profession to allow Eli access to hospitals. While this is not as easy and safe as buying "daddies", this would definitely make them happier.
"The one with enough courage and patience to dare gaze all his life into the darkness will be the first one to see in it a glimmer of light" (c)

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sauvin
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by sauvin » Thu Jul 08, 2010 5:47 am

WhiteBackground wrote:
PeteMork wrote:I can find nothing in this entire essay to disagree with. Frankly, I find it filled with well-thought-out logical consequences of Oskar growing old with Eli. It's especially sad for me to think that Eli WOULD probably interpret their sexual estrangement as meaning that Oskar no longer loves her.
I agree that unless Oskar, as an adult, eventually gets to take some control of their lives, this tragic course of events is likely. I still see it as a bit implausible that Eli is uncapable of changing her habits despite their eroding effects on Oskar and their relationship. Oskar in "Oscar at 40" seems just so terribly passive, pushing all the responsibility on Eli's shoulders, as if he does not understand that at that time he is the adult and she is still a child. I'd imagine him being more responsible and imaginative, perhaps even as the Oskar in a fanfic where he goes into medical profession to allow Eli access to hospitals. While this is not as easy and safe as buying "daddies", this would definitely make them happier.
In both pieces this thread treats, Eli never asked Oskar to procure for her. He did so against her wishes because he saw no viable choice. It's not on Eli's shoulders that the weight of responsibility for their fates together rests, it's on the very fact that she is a vampire. Both their lives are nomadic (fugitive). In face of the beast living in Eli's chest that kills people, how do you see Oskar "taking control"?
Fais tomber les barrières entre nous qui sommes tous des frères

decltype
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by decltype » Thu Jul 08, 2010 12:45 pm

sauvin wrote: I'm going to let the story stand as it is. It's not only good for comedy relief, it's also not terribly inconsistent with the majority of the fanfic on this site. Also, it's one heartfelt perspective from a gibbering old fool with a genuine fondness for LTROI camp and kitsch.
Comedy relief? More like "kerosene for the soul" if you ask me. Perhaps it's just because it's Oskar sitting there by the bar, and not Henry Chinaski, or some other American low-life. Also, the prose is so good that it need not rely on these characters. If this short interlude had taken place in a different universe, with another backstory, I'm sure I'd enjoyed it a lot more. Hope you take that as a compliment because it's intended as such. :roll:

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Wolfchild
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by Wolfchild » Thu Jul 08, 2010 8:10 pm

PeteMork wrote:Damn Lindqvist! He made it so difficult for us rank amateurs to pull them up out of the depths, but because of the force and beauty of his book and his wonderful film, we feel compelled to try. :(
The force and beauty of JAL's story are just the flip side of coin from the tragic depths in which you find its protagonists. I can't quite articulate how, but they are causally linked. If Eli were not so tragic, he would also not be so compelling. If Oskar's falling in love with Eli did not entail him moving from the tragedy of his own life to the greater tragedy of Eli's, LDRKI would lose much of its power.

I think that there is a conflict created between the tragedy of the story and the involvement with the characters that is spawned by that tragedy. When this conflict becomes intolerable, I get a PM asking me for upload privileges. :)

I much prefer the fan fic that retains that conflict. The stories that explore the tragedy, the stories that say that tragedy, however great, cannot exterminate happiness or love. For me those stories come the closest to maintaining the power of JAL's original story.

Every time I try to figure out why this is so, I start getting all existential. In preference to getting existential, I'll just drink some more absinthe. And maybe pop in the DVD. ;)
...the story derives a lot of its appeal from its sense of despair and a darkness in which the love of Eli and Oskar seems to shine with a strange and disturbing light.
-Lacenaire

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gattoparde59
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Re: Oskar at 40

Post by gattoparde59 » Fri Jul 09, 2010 12:20 am

Oskar at 40?

I have thought about this, and I have actually started to write something. Assuming that Oskar is not turned into a vampire soon after the story ends, the most likely thing to happen would be for Eli to up and leave Oskar. This is not be because "its the right thing to do" or anything like that. The two have not been together for all that long in our story. Eli is as one person put it, a "nomad," a marginal person who has lived through things that no one can imagine. She is the loose cannon of the story, and I think on a whim really she would become depressed and simply walk out of Oskar's life. This would be hard for Oskar, but in the long run he would be better off for it as "Oskar at 40," makes very clear.

Oskar at 40 I would imagine as a reunion of the two for a short time. Eli would reemerge from the darkness once again and get together with an Oskar that has been leading a normal, happy life and is now a middle aged man.

I'll break open the story and tell you what is there. Then, like the others that have fallen out onto the sand, I will finish with it, and the wind will take it away.

Nisa

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