At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teresa?

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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by [Eden] » Fri Mar 30, 2012 8:37 am

a_contemplative_life wrote:
I think you have hit on something here with the concept of being condemned and without hope from the get-go. It is even more tragic that her parents felt things slipping away and were, in the end, powerless to stop it. One must wonder how often this story is repeated, in greater or lesser degree, in real life families across the globe. It is probably close to a universal fear for any parent--to lose one's child to the world.
You've a father's sensitivity.
I thought I had it but I actually didn't focus that much on Teresa's parents, althought I felt I should.

They just had to... let her go, I guess.
You can't turn back the tide, huh?

Her mother did wrong, anyway.
Tried to make her somebody else...
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by sauvin » Fri Oct 19, 2012 6:20 pm

I can't say that I've ever had anything resembling sympathy (or empathy) with or for Theres. It's hard to have these things for spiders and snakes that never seem to have anything resembling emotion. Unlike Eli, who is presumably fully human (except when she's not) and therefore has a head to get into, miseries to understand and foibles to forgive, I just can't get into Theres' head. It's almost as if she's just human enough to be able to read human emotional states without having what it takes to understand them at all, and she's completely insectile otherwise.

Is it possible to have "sympathy" and suchlike for somebody you don't particularly like? Teresa was clearly in emotional trouble at twelve when she asked her boyfriend to play the "lay down and pretend to be dead" game. This might be somebody to pity, but not necessarily somebody you'd want to have any kind of relationship with. She lost more "human being" points just a bit later when she tormented the flies with such detachment, an even clearer potential sign of trouble. Maybe it's true, as she speculates somewhere in the story, that if she hadn't met Theres, she'd have just gone on to be a mousy little thing, but she did.

When they killed the shopkeeper, there wasn't much left to lose, and I measure that "much" by how little it surprised me that Teresa took the hammer, and how little it surprised me that there was no emotional consequence to her. In retrospect, it shouldn't have been much of a surprise; empathy and sympathy seem to be largely absent from Teresa's makeup throughout the entire story, and she seems to have very little need to be a part of the social scene.

There are a couple of places where she questions her position. When she to visit Theres and found her bedroom full of other girls, she found that Theres didn't just have eyes for her. When she later consented to attend a party, I interpreted it as an attempt to reconnect to something she might never actually have had. She needed to belong somewhere, and anywhere would do, even if it comes with a "warm piece of meat".

The second place of position-reconsidering was when she killed Jannes. If she hadn't been able to go through with it, she might have still been human, and so I take her statement "just to be sure" at face value. It makes sense that it'd have to be Jannes, the one person towards whom she might still have some tenuous connexion; if she could cut this thread, she could do anything.

Somewhere in the LS section, somebody had likened one (or both) of the girls to Stephen King's "Carrie", calling it a revenge flick. I disagree completely. Just about the only way Theres might have resembled Carrie was in having lived in isolation as a child.

Carrie had dreams, hopes, desires and fears; she could be hurt, and she could get into an emotional dithers when the boy who'd promised her a date to the prom looked like he wasn't going to show. If the prank hadn't happened, it's not implausible that she'd have gone on to marry Tommy, have 3.2 kids, hold down a job as a seamstress and bounce grandchildren on her knee. The massacre at the high school was a result of being given a little slice of heaven interrupted by an intolerable humiliation - the poor girl's mind just snapped. The massacre was unplanned, unexpected and unassisted - and completely understandable.

The sing-along massacre was planned, and what's baking my noodle is: at what point along the story did Theres start engineering it (or something of similar nature)? What's worse, was there a reason for it apart from the girls' transient gratification?
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by lombano » Sat Oct 20, 2012 5:34 am

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I don't see Theres as an insect-like creature. She's obviously profoundly emotionally disturbed, and doesn't bond with others or express affection the way normal people do, but I don't see her as reptilian. I think she genuinely, in her own very twisted way, loved Teresa, and all the killing is in some way out of affection for the girls. That's why she protects Jerry, why she takes Teresa's hand, etc.

[Eden] wrote: Johannes? Was he a 'good friend'? Is it really correct?
To me he wasn't...
Johannes was a chance. He was what society had to offer to an individual like Teresa.
Somebody who made it, kind enough to slow down a bit and walk besides her for a while.

He probably was interested in her when they were younger... when Teresa wasn't 'fat' yet.
'And so it is' (again).
Then he found Agnes and someway let her go. Didn't need her anymore, and that's something so human.[/spoiler]
I don't think Teresa was ever interested in him in that way. If neither is romantically interested in the other, what was the problem exactly? Wounded pride? Teresa wasn't much fun as a friend, and kept pushing Johannes away, who derived no material advantage from being her friend. He didn't just drop her when he started dating Agnes. He was a loyal friend.
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by gattoparde59 » Sat Oct 20, 2012 10:39 am

lombano wrote:Maybe I'm in the minority, but I don't see Theres as an insect-like creature. She's obviously profoundly emotionally disturbed, and doesn't bond with others or express affection the way normal people do, but I don't see her as reptilian. I think she genuinely, in her own very twisted way, loved Teresa, and all the killing is in some way out of affection for the girls. That's why she protects Jerry, why she takes Teresa's hand, etc.
Theres is a real puzzle since we never get inside her head to see what is going on. From the clues we get I would say that Theres is searching for emotional connection to other people, her problem being that the ordinary routes to these connections are denied to her. Remember as a child Theres was always searching for something in the house. Theres seems to find what she is looking for through singing, music, the internet- finding kindred spirits like herself, like Teresa.
lombano wrote:[Eden] wrote:
Johannes? Was he a 'good friend'? Is it really correct?
To me he wasn't...
Johannes was a chance. He was what society had to offer to an individual like Teresa.
Somebody who made it, kind enough to slow down a bit and walk besides her for a while.

He probably was interested in her when they were younger... when Teresa wasn't 'fat' yet.
'And so it is' (again).
Then he found Agnes and someway let her go. Didn't need her anymore, and that's something so human.[/spoiler]


I don't think Teresa was ever interested in him in that way. If neither is romantically interested in the other, what was the problem exactly? Wounded pride? Teresa wasn't much fun as a friend, and kept pushing Johannes away, who derived no material advantage from being her friend. He didn't just drop her when he started dating Agnes. He was a loyal friend.
When they were young children, Teresa and Johannes were both weird little children who had this special bond with each other. Then Johannes' family situation changed, dramatically, and Johannes was able to grow and free himself from his earlier miseries. Teresa was not able to do this and she was left behind. Her problem with Johannes was that she still clung to the memory of that special relationship they had as children. Teresa does not admit this to herself, but killing Johannes may have been a crime of passion (rather than non-passion), Johannes being seen in Teresa's mind as somehow betraying her by growing up and becoming a normal adolescent. Teresa goes through the same thing with Theres before being won back to her affections.

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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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by a_contemplative_life » Sat Oct 20, 2012 1:25 pm

sauvin wrote:I can't say that I've ever had anything resembling sympathy (or empathy) with or for Theres. It's hard to have these things for spiders and snakes that never seem to have anything resembling emotion. Unlike Eli, who is presumably fully human (except when she's not) and therefore has a head to get into, miseries to understand and foibles to forgive, I just can't get into Theres' head. It's almost as if she's just human enough to be able to read human emotional states without having what it takes to understand them at all, and she's completely insectile otherwise.
I felt sympathy for Theres because of what happened to her as an infant. She did not choose any of that. Her parents abandoned her in the woods, and she was found and raised by some kooky people who found it acceptable to lock her up in a basement and use her talent for pitching the perfect note for their own ends. She never received the love that any child deserves and needs to grow into a well-rounded adult.
sauvin wrote:Is it possible to have "sympathy" and suchlike for somebody you don't particularly like? Teresa was clearly in emotional trouble at twelve when she asked her boyfriend to play the "lay down and pretend to be dead" game. This might be somebody to pity, but not necessarily somebody you'd want to have any kind of relationship with. She lost more "human being" points just a bit later when she tormented the flies with such detachment, an even clearer potential sign of trouble. Maybe it's true, as she speculates somewhere in the story, that if she hadn't met Theres, she'd have just gone on to be a mousy little thing, but she did.
But isn't real love about continuing to love someone despite their flaws and problems? I think that in an important way, JAL is asking us, as a society, to look in the mirror and honestly state whether we like what we see. To make a judgment about whether they way we treat the ugly, the uninteresting (particularly during the critical years of childhood and adolescence), is measured by genuine love, or not. That perhaps we, as a society, should be holding ourselves to a higher standard about how we are going to raise our children. That perhaps we should be more thoughtful and engage in some self-examination about how we end up choosing which children are fostered and which are shunned. For example, was treating Teresa's depression with medication alone an appropriate response? What about psychotherapy? Would that have helped her? If so, what were the forces in society that failed to provide that to her? I think that JAL looks around at the world and sees much material prosperity, but emotional scarcity--and wants us to challenge the status quo. To step back and say, could we do better? Why do the lives of some children have to develop in this way?
sauvin wrote:There are a couple of places where she questions her position. When she to visit Theres and found her bedroom full of other girls, she found that Theres didn't just have eyes for her. When she later consented to attend a party, I interpreted it as an attempt to reconnect to something she might never actually have had. She needed to belong somewhere, and anywhere would do, even if it comes with a "warm piece of meat".
She discovers what genuine jealousy is. In her case, one might argue that the ability to feel that emotion might actually be a marker for a rising humanity in her conscience. This is a girl who is desperately reaching for an emotional connection with the world, and not finding it. And being met with indifference, she chooses poorly and fellates Micke. A shitty-ass substitute for the real deal, made in a false hope that it would prompt him to have genuine feelings for her, and thereby just pushing herself harder into her downward spiral.

In some ways, the story asks, what do you fear most? How about losing your own humanity? The degree that you fear that marks the degree of your humanity. How about losing it from mental illness? I listened to a This American Life podcast last night about people who have had near-death experiences. The last interviewee was a woman who developed a severe obsessive-compulsive disorder that made her swallow inedible objects--nails, straws, plastic silverware, radio antennas, you name it. She was afraid that if she didn't swallow these things, something bad would happen to her mother. She felt tremendous relief once the nail or other object was inside of her, because it would abate, at least temporarily, the incessant thoughts about swallowing things. She was institutionalized and put into a straight jacket. Her story, to me, was terrifying. To be not in control of one's self. To lose one's mind. She finally underwent two surgeries to destroy a particular part of her brain that was causing the compulsion. (It was really interesting to hear her talk about how amazing it was to sit down to dinner with her mother after her surgeries and be surrounded by silverware! :lol: )

So, the point is, I fear losing my ability to feel sympathy and empathy for others, and I find it troubling to read this story, where Teresa slowly loses hers, both through her own choices, and maybe because the social safety net--be that a friend, a parent, a therapist, etc.--could have been stronger. Could have tried harder. Could have taken more time to just be with her. I think we are being asked to re-examine what we are willing to let pass as the status quo with regard to our love and commitment to one another. Because everyone has a talent for something; everyone has something they can contribute and find a measure of self-worth.
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by gattoparde59 » Sat Oct 20, 2012 5:15 pm

a_contemplative_life wrote:n some ways, the story asks, what do you fear most? How about losing your own humanity? The degree that you fear that marks the degree of your humanity. How about losing it from mental illness? I listened to a This American Life podcast last night about people who have had near-death experiences. The last interviewee was a woman who developed a severe obsessive-compulsive disorder that made her swallow inedible objects--nails, straws, plastic silverware, radio antennas, you name it. She was afraid that if she didn't swallow these things, something bad would happen to her mother. She felt tremendous relief once the nail or other object was inside of her, because it would abate, at least temporarily, the incessant thoughts about swallowing things. She was institutionalized and put into a straight jacket. Her story, to me, was terrifying. To be not in control of one's self. To lose one's mind. She finally underwent two surgeries to destroy a particular part of her brain that was causing the compulsion. (It was really interesting to hear her talk about how amazing it was to sit down to dinner with her mother after her surgeries and be surrounded by silverware! )
Interesting to think about this fear of mental illness in terms of our story. The obsessive-compulsive person compensates for this fear by doing something that gives them a sense of control over their life, swallowing keys, washing hands, hoarding etc. In Little Star, Teresa takes satisfaction in violence and general mischief. Impaling flies and blow torching them. Oskar does the same thing, at least in his imagination. Those are some mighty disturbing fantasies Oskar has at the beginning of Let the Right One In, only he asserts his control over a rotting tree rather than houseflies. Each child also tries to master their destiny by choosing an alternate identity for themselves. Oskar wants to be the omnipotent "killer." Teresa decides she wants to be a wolf and goes all out in becoming a, uh, wolf child. :oops:

I don't know if this is so much a matter of losing your humanity (a valid image for this novel) as it is claiming an identity for yourself. Better to have a strong identity than be what the rest of the world seems to think you are, which is "nothing." That dread of being non-existent might actually lie at the heart of this horror story, and does indeed make it one that involves all of society and not just the misfit few. Love has a place in this horror story as well, but I have run out of time.

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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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by a_contemplative_life » Sat Oct 20, 2012 7:21 pm

Well you right, they certainly do claim an identity. Quaere whether it was an identity that Teresa would have embraced five or six years earlier, had she foreseen it; I would suggest not. And it was an identity that had terrible ramifications to the social fabric.

Although we're talking about a piece of fiction, I don't think these are idle questions, certainly not here in the States where it seems that several times a year, we have someone going off the deep end and taking out a bunch of strangers with them.
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by lombano » Sun Oct 21, 2012 1:11 pm

gattoparde59 wrote:...Teresa takes satisfaction in violence and general mischief. Impaling flies and blow torching them. Oskar does the same thing, at least in his imagination. Those are some mighty disturbing fantasies Oskar has at the beginning of Let the Right One In, only he asserts his control over a rotting tree rather than houseflies. Each child also tries to master their destiny by choosing an alternate identity for themselves. Oskar wants to be the omnipotent "killer." Teresa decides she wants to be a wolf and goes all out in becoming a, uh, wolf child. :oops: ...
Apples to oranges. As per the original novel, Oskar's fantasies are mere fantasies, and when push comes to shove he's a good kid. Oskar's fantasies are disturbing only in their insistence on realism and their obsessive nature; as for the degree of violence, boys' fantasies tend to be pretty violent.
sauvin wrote: Is it possible to have "sympathy" and suchlike for somebody you don't particularly like? Teresa was clearly in emotional trouble at twelve when she asked her boyfriend to play the "lay down and pretend to be dead" game. This might be somebody to pity, but not necessarily somebody you'd want to have any kind of relationship with. She lost more "human being" points just a bit later when she tormented the flies with such detachment, an even clearer potential sign of trouble. Maybe it's true, as she speculates somewhere in the story, that if she hadn't met Theres, she'd have just gone on to be a mousy little thing, but she did.

When they killed the shopkeeper, there wasn't much left to lose, and I measure that "much" by how little it surprised me that Teresa took the hammer, and how little it surprised me that there was no emotional consequence to her. In retrospect, it shouldn't have been much of a surprise; empathy and sympathy seem to be largely absent from Teresa's makeup throughout the entire story, and she seems to have very little need to be a part of the social scene.
I vaguely remember, at least once as a child (not sure at what age), playing at pretending to be dead. But, while whether I turned out OK is highly debatable, I didn't go around blowtorching flies and I've not murdered anyone. But I agree, when Teresa took the hammer, it was no surprise that she went through with it - JAL had by then constructed her character well enough that we knew she'd go for it, and suffer no emotional cost.
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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by gattoparde59 » Sun Oct 21, 2012 2:10 pm

lombano wrote:Apples to oranges. As per the original novel, Oskar's fantasies are mere fantasies, and when push comes to shove he's a good kid. Oskar's fantasies are disturbing only in their insistence on realism and their obsessive nature; as for the degree of violence, boys' fantasies tend to be pretty violent.
This is the same type of fruit in terms of motivation. The difference lies in outcome, and I think I took care to make that distinction. I am not trying to justify action, or in action, my question is why? Oskar also has his candy eating ritual, and like Teresa is not an especially attractive child, at least in the novel. In their own way , Eli and Theres also suffer from this type of anxiety.

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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Re: At What Point Did You Lose Sympathy for Theres and Teres

Post by sauvin » Sun Oct 21, 2012 3:33 pm

In what way was the oppression and torment similar to Oskar's? What drove her to the things she did? Oskar's attack on the tree in the courtyard was impassioned; what Teresa did to the flies was detached.
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