I know I compared Christmas decorations to Chaga on the other blog, somewhat facetiously, but now that I consider it a little more, I wonder whether the decorations being present might begin to change people’s demeanor in a similar way to how the Chaga changes and explores what it means to be human in Evolution’s Shore, for those who’ve read that one. Or maybe I’m giving metallic foil shreds, dangly ball things, and faux evergreen plastics too much credit.

In other news, as I’ve been re-reading that same novel, and feeling my usual I-wish-I-could-have-written-my-thesis-on-this feelings upon reading it, I noticed a parallel between it and what I did actually write my thesis on (Frank Herbert’s Dune). While McDonald doesn’t quite use it to the manic degree that Herbert did, a perspective that shifts on the fly from chapter to chapter and even paragraph to paragraph is still there. In one sense this is interesting because of the skill required of the author to pull it off and keep the narrative thread coherent.

I find McDonald’s quirks in using it to be of particular interest in that while some of the shifts are a consequence of what’s appropriate within the narrative, such as a simple example of a shift to a different character for a moment to reveal something first-person narration couldn’t (adeptly based in the narrative by having that character physically walking up to the situation in question), other shifts are brought by a more obvious and yet more subtle device.

That is, Blair Witch style – for instance, the main character ranting into a video camera, as an expression of her character’s comfort in front of such and use of such as a diary as a journalist, which have their own meanings, and then the shift in perspective occurring when another character walks in the room: the perspective shifts from the reader essentially being the camera that the character is talking into (tiny motes of metafiction, or post-modernism, there?) to a more ghostly third-person perspective while the two characters talk.

And a sidenote, on a more personal level. I’ve been writing this sort of poem-diary-journal thing on and off for a while now; I changed the name from “Alchemy” to “Threnody’s Song” (after learning more about alchemy and after the direction the writing took). The thing is, it brings forth conflicting feelings in me. On one level, it’s a diary, which seems to be by definition very, very private, and something to never be shared. Besides the inherent conflict there that’s obvious for those who know me well, that this diary is also a poem is an issue – a poem seems like something that’s generally written to be shared. So, in that sense, the logic/compromise might be to perhaps share it with only the very closest person or people, but that’s not a compromise I’m ready to deal with addressing yet. So, apparently, y’all just get the title for now.