SF Site Interview with LKH

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

I found the following interview with Ms. Hamilton done September 2004 by the SF Site. The Complete Interview


There were a few choice bits that just had to be brought up. Ms. Hamilton is in italics. My comments are plain.

I have two degrees: English and biology. . . . I also was about two or three classes from having a history or Political Science major (it would have depended on what classes I finished up with, which the degree would have been in).

This is the first time I have seen her mention an English degree. The verve and originality for punctuation that she displays in her published works make one wonder how she got an English degree. I was under the impression that to acquire an English degree one had to grasp at least the basics of punctuation; full stop, comma and apostrophe.


Between the age of thirteen and fourteen I discovered fantasy and horror. From that moment on, I was hooked.

WTF! All those times she fondly talked about wanting to watch horror movies a 2, and Granny telling her fables didn't happen? Or don't they count as horror and fantasy?

And then farther on in the interview she says this:
I've been fascinated with horror movies since I was a very little girl, like under six. When I discovered the old Hammer vampire films around seven or so, I was enthralled. . . . my Scottish-Irish grandmother used to tell me that Rawhead and Bloody Bones would get me if I wasn't good.

And just something unabashedly interesting and potentially good.
We will be going back to New Mexico and doing a follow up book with Edward and his would-be family. We will see how the children have coped with what happened. . . . [it will happen during one of] the next five books probably.

Comments

[vanity-lost.livejournal.com]

I was under the impression that to acquire an English degree one had to grasp at least the basics of punctuation; full stop, comma and apostrophe.
Well, she didn't say she graduated with honors. And we don't know the GPAs involved. Maybe 'finishing up' a class is code for 'retaking because I flunked it.'

Oh, and side note that I just learned on History Channel: Scots-Irish does not mean Scottish and Irish descent. Scots-Irish were Irish who were protestant and didn't want to be associated with that mass wave of Catholic Irish immigrants. So leave Scotland alone, LKH.

I think she did just contradict herself in the same interview. Unless she meant 'fantasy and horror' books. But still. The Hammer vampire films explains her current grasp of plot continuity...

I am not sure I want to see her write the Edward book. I'm kind of scared of seeing Edward as The Matador, with kids. Or Mr and Mrs Smith-ing it. Yipes. Worse will be if the kids are now the MiniDeaths.

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

Well there was that mention of Edward phoning Anita to ask for parenting advice. Or was it sex advice? Could this be a hint as to what revisiting Edward and Co. will be like? *engaging optimistic drive* Maybe that will involve a lot of plot, little sex, and Anita maturing.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

Great movie comparisons, there! Though, how would MiniDeaths be worse than Matador!Edward? The lil' boy was already pretty close there at the end of OB.

...Nothing could be worse that Mr and Mrs Smith-ing it. I have to go and attempt to dig that image out of my brain with a spoon.

[vanity-lost.livejournal.com]

I suggest brain bleach. The spoon always misses a bit.

I was thinking of the Matador with MiniDeaths. But the idea of Edward as playing daddy to two kiddie asassins just reminds me of Spy Kids for some reason. *shudder* I watch too many movies.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

Ah, see, you have to approach it from a comic book pov. There's some pretty freaky examples of parents and kids going around killing people. Like, in WildCATS they have this thing called "The Nuclear Family" which is this family of CIA assassins who act like some 1950s sitcom family when they're not kicking ass with huge guns ^.^

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

What is WildCATS? I keep finding sports teams and I know that isn't right.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

It's a comic book, superhero type deal but with a few more antiheroes than average.

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

Mr and Mrs Smith-ing wouldn't even be following the cannon Donna character. LKH has never reversed a charater to the extend of what would be needed to change Donna from her OB incarnation to a Mrs. Smith charater. So I think that option is out. Unless, Donna gets taken out and a new lady-love appears for Ted/Edward the grieving widower with two children.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

I was thinking more along the lines of her becoming an assassin.

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

That's just too awful. It would be like another Richard-turn about.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

Because LKH would just NEVER change a character.

It's not just RAZ who's had a turn about, Edward used to be a really awesome sociopath.

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

I look at Ted as Edward playing around. Ted is a cover and he's not going to drop Ted just for Anita, especially when he's in Ted's home turf. Maybe he lets Anita glimpse that Edward is still there but that's not the same as dropping cover. See OB, not as Edward's story, but as the story of one of Edward's covers makes his behavior much more acceptable and incharacter.

[mneiai.livejournal.com]

Perhaps, but OB is all from Anita's near-omniscient POV, which means that what Anita thinks can basically be said to be canon. And Anita thinks Edward isn't a sociopath, isn't some sort of psycho, no, she thinks Edward has Dissociative Identity Disorder, or multiple personalities. Ted is Ted and Edward is Edward. And he displays enough signs of this that if one were to take Laurell's usual half-assed research into account...well, it's probably true. Sociopaths aren't like that, they only embrace society and its ideals as much as they want. With everything that happened in OB Edward's pretty far from the true sociopathic bent and pretty far into the "truly crazy in a complete different way".

[delphinapterus.livejournal.com]

You know that just makes me sad. I know only a very general intro to psych, but yeah that sure sounds a lot more like Edward. I guess my pet theory doesn't hold up.

[http://users.livejournal.com/belladonna_/]

Yes, she could easily have, like, an associates' in English from some craptastic two-year community college.