Poor Billy Bigelow

[rolanni]

Here's your man, with no skills to speak of, saving a hunkiness not readily apparent to this viewer, but which has the ladies in the movie salivating, who has found a stable situation as a barker for a carousel and bedwarmer for the owner. He is seduced out of this safe and suitable niche by Julie, who entraps him into marriage and immediately becomes pregnant, thus thrusting Billy into two situations for which he is utterly unsuited. He tries to rise to the occasion of incipient fatherhood in the only way he knows how, and gets dead for his efforts.

I did not finish watching "Carousel;" I can't remember the last time I rejected a story so wholeheartedly. Perhaps I've seen too many true-life versions to be entertained.

It's funny. I saw this movie once before -- my grandmother took me to see it -- I must've been all of five or six. (The way movie-going worked in my family is that my dad took me to see war movies and the occasional Disney feature, and my grandmother took me to see musicals and Jerry Lewis movies.) But, anyway, "Carousel" which, she said, I would like because it had a merry-go-round in it (it would be this same quality of logic that would later see her handing an 8-year-old me Jane Eyre, which I would like because it was "about a little girl."). In any case, I remembered the star-polishing and I remembered the carousel, but I had, as you might expect, Completely Forgotten everything about the story, retaining only a muddled idea of lots of people singing loudly and jumping off of roofs, and a lingering fondness for "The Carousel Waltz."

I should've watched "Enchanted" again, and allowed my memory to remain unsullied.

In other news, Steve is on the road. At last report, about 8 a.m., it was uphill driving (which you can see that it would be by viewing any map of the eastern seaboard of the US), enlivened by high winds and rain.

Here at the day-job, I am not defrosting the refrigerator, dern it, because my connection in the janitorial department has today off. Tomorrow, we try again. I am also in receipt of news that summer will be starting a week earlier than previous advertised, and extend two weeks longer. *Looks at checkbook* Um, oops?

There was frost on the car this morning; it's now a cool and sunny day. Tomorrow, it's supposed to be cold, windy and rainy -- I guess that'll be the weather Steve is bringing up-coast with him.

Comments

[herefox.livejournal.com]

Carousel's plot is terrible, especially when it gets around to the point of "It's okay I hit you because I really love you!" Blah. Pity it's got some pretty songs in it.

Fledgling

[(Anonymous)]

I just read the final draft of the first chapter of Fledgling over on baen.com. WOW!!! So that's how you do it. It's quite lovely. And it was very educational for me to see both the first draft and the final version. THANKS!!!

It looks like I have more ebooks in my future... :-)

Adrianne

Re: Fledgling

[(Anonymous)]

Oh agreed. It has been a privilege and a delight to watch Fledgling from birth to publish.
Barbara

Re: Fledgling

[chaddai.livejournal.com]

I myself acquired the eARC pack as fast as possible and must avow myself delighted to have witnessed the draft state (only recently since I discovered Liad some month ago) and its evolution to the much more polished and robust novel it is now.

The awkwardness of transitions has been neatly reduced, the dangling threads of the plot admirably resolved and the final result is a little jewel of a novel like we have been accustomed to read from you ! :)

Of course that only makes me more impatient to read the final version of Saltation... ;)
(Do you have any idea of the publication date or the eArc version availability ? Since I seem to remember the amended draft has been sent to Baen.)

--
Jedaï

Re: Fledgling

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

(Do you have any idea of the publication date or the eArc version availability ?

I would think not for months and months. Fledgling The Book is due in September -- so the e-arc is...four months out.

Saltation is scheduled for "spring" 2010. Assuming "spring" is May, we're probably looking at an e-arc in...February?

Since I seem to remember the amended draft has been sent to Baen.)

Yes, but now Toni gets her chance to read it and tell us if there are Still More Things that need to be fixed. It's not "accepted" until any editorial comments are addressed.

I prefer the songs to the plot too

[(Anonymous)]

Especially the one where Billy is resigning himself to fatherhood. In the right hands/voice, it's a marvel of of a soliloquy. Shakespeare would be happy to call it his own.

Yep, if you get Maryland's weather tomorrow - it will be cold and nasty. Not frosty though. We're done with that.
Lauretta
@ConstellationBooks

[amm-me.livejournal.com]

I don't think I have ever actually seen Carousel, but known from a synopsis that I didn't want to. Though "June Is Bustin' out All Over" is a favorite to bust out into when I'm feeling spring-ish.

We did selections in a community chorus concert once, I think a few years after the same chorus (before I joined) did a staged version. The great big buxom fiftyish contralto from a nearby tiny town reprised her "When You Walk Through A Storm, Hold Your Head Up High." Incredible deep full powerful voice and an awesome performance, even though she had already started chemo for what most people realized would be a losing fight with cancer. It was ... it's hard to say what one's emotions were. Such an incredibly schmalzy movie sort of stereotyped situation, only real ...

Abigail

[house-draven.livejournal.com]

I've never been able to get through a viewing of Carousel. I hate all the characters.