One nagging question in the back of my mind as I have worked to build and sustain various websites has been, “What’s it all for?” I’ve wondered if the effort to climb the blogging charts has really been worth it, or if I’ve simply been fooling myself, placing my faith in empty statistics.

I’m not being sour grapes here. For all intents and purposes, I’ve owned blogs which looked successful, at least if you looked at the stats.

So the question isn’t so much whether or not a blog is successful, and therefore worth our precious time and resources, but if our blogs are successful, what truly makes them “successful blogs”?

Oh sure, good content, meeting a need, performing a service, I’ve heard all that before and I do believe content and service are important. But many “successful” bloggers provide neither original content or a meaningful service, while the stats all seem to indicate their blogs are top notch.

Here are four of the top ways bloggers claim to be successful, and a few of my thoughts why blogging success seems to lie in the eyes of the beholder:

RSS Subscribers - Sure it looks impressive when you can say you’ve got X-thousand subscribers to your RSS feed. That little FeedCount chicklet graces many a blog, boasting hoards of loyal followers waiting with baited breath for the next post.

Not to take the wind out of anyone’s sail, but I’ve subscribed to a dozen or so blogs in my feedreader and I hardly ever read them. And the thing is, I bet lots of people have done the same thing. In a moment of half-hearted interest, I click the subscribe button on a blog. But how often do I sign into my feedreader and actually read the feeds I’ve subscribed to? Hardly ever.

There are some blogs I’ve subscribed to for email updates. Since I’ve switched email addresses many times, I’m subscribed to several blogs more than once, again artificially inflating their RSS subscriber counts.

Those RSS chicklets keep counting my subscriptions, even if I’m not actively following the blog.

RSS subscriber counts are inflated in other ways too. If a blogger maintains a mailing list through Aweber, and broadcasts his feed to that list, the members of that list are added to the RSS feedcount even if those emails are going straight to a spam folder or are never even opened.

When Feedburner started integrating with Aweber this way, I saw one well known blogger go from about 5,000 RSS subscribers to over 17,000 overnight because he had built an extensive email list. Another well known blogger had been riding on the strength of his mailing list for a long time, since FeedBlitz had already been counting RSS broadcasts to email lists in their feed subscriber counts.

Comment Count - Every day I remove several comments from moderation without publishing them in my blog. These aren’t the obvious spam comments, since those are usually caught by my Akismet plugin. These are short comments which don’t really add anything to the discussion, things like “great post” or “thanks for the information”. It seems obvious these commentators are looking more for backlinks than an online discussion, which brings me to another point.

One of the basic precepts of SEO is building backlinks from related blogs by leaving comments. If the blog practices do-follow, these backlinks add up and are supposed to do all sorts of wonderful things like increase page rank and such.

So if a blog has lots of comments, does that mean it’s successful? Or could it mean that blog is someplace where lots of people leave comments to build backlinks?

To me, the really significant comments are those which invite discussion. Although those comments still build backlinks to the commentator’s site, at least they indicate some level of participation, especially when those commentators return frequently to participate in discussions.

Otherwise, high comment counts seem about as meaningless as inactive RSS subscribers, at least when it comes to establishing a blog’s popularity.

Alexa Rating - At one point I had a blog break past the top 40,000 blogs as rated by Alexis. I thought that was pretty exciting. I’ve had two or three others break into the top 100,000 and it looks impressive, at least on the surface.

But does an Alexa rating really indicate the popularity of a blog? Not really. Did you know the typical visit with Internet Explorer isn’t counted by Alexa? That is one reason tech related websites tend to rate higher, since more tech users browse with FireFox, and those visits are counted by Alexa.

By the way if you really want a higher Alexa count, put an Alexa widget on your site so all visits are counted toward your Alexa ranking.

Page Rank - Everyone says they know a site’s PR (Google Page Rank) is meaningless, but I know I pay at least a little attention to it. On an intellectual level I know PR can be manipulated by meaningless linkbuilding campaigns (like leaving comments to build backlinks on other blogs), but somehow I’m still excited when one of my sites gets a PR promotion. One of my domains made it to PR4 - woo hoo!

So aside from the obvious, how do you measure whether or not a blog is successful?

It’s similar to what happens when you realize you’ve taken a wrong turn, but getting back on the right route means backtracking and extra time. Again, in the long run you know it’s what needs to happen.

I’ve been nursing my SEO blog for quite some time, even though my interests had gone in another direction. I tried adding related topics, hoping to somehow rekindle the flame, but to no avail.

So now it’s time to pull off the bandage, get off the wrong street, and make my blogging efforts count. Sure, I could continue and establish myself as a plausible SEO expert. Sure, I could blog about blogging and add mine to a long list of similar websites.

Or I could stop, adjust, and create a website which supports my current interest and involvement.

Of course, I hope some of you have been so enchanted by my Internet Marketing Fairy Tales that you’ll want to stick around and see how I apply them to new areas. And I hope you’ll visit once in awhile to see how things are going. But I have to think what’s best for me as a blogger, a grad student in English, a real estate agent, and all the other things which make up “me”.

So let’s see if I can make this one something a little different, shall we?

Fitzgerald drove the reader into his novel with the question of Gatsby’s greatness. We wondered who this man might be. We come with a prejudice from the title, then Fitzgerald further guides us to accept Gatsby’s greatness by showing us his wealth. He has such wealth we are willing to accept the man must be great as well. But an ambiguity exists at the same time; nobody knows where this man came from, where his wealth originated, or indeed what makes him so great. But we believe it just the same. Here we have a man who has wealth and seems willing to share it. He seems well mannered and genteel, yet he reaches down from his pedestal and befriends our narrator, Nick. It seems somewhat a paradox, but real life is full of such opposites that the story only seems more real because of it. Because the paradox seems so real we believe the story, and because we believe the story we commit even deeper to believing the story’s title; the man must indeed be great.

But Fitzgerald also introduces a tension, possibly springing from the sense of ambiguity. As a reader we want to know where Gatsby came from, why he is wealthy, but we are afraid we won’t like the answer. Fitzgerald strings us along then plants little seeds of doubt, and we begin to worry. What if Gatsby is a bootlegger or a gambler, would we be able to reconcile the belief we have already adopted that he is indeed great? We need him to be great, because we already believe he is. Eventually, however, we come to realize Gatsby was not born to greatness nor did he really aspire toward it. Even his schooling is questionable. He does not have any of the sure signs of greatness we have come to expect, yet we realize there is still something great about him. It might simply be that we want to justify the decision we’ve already made about him. We need him to be great because we’ve already made up our minds that he is, but this brings a certain irony into play because we have committed to his greatness even though he isn’t great by the definition we originally would have given the word.

Again, it is like the charlatan who made us believe in snake oil. When the snake oil doesn’t cure baldness or make your hiccups go away, we tell ourselves “The Great and Powerful” charlatan was a great entertainer. He is still great, just not in the way we originally expected him to be. In “The Great Gatsby” Fitzgerald first made us believe Gatsby was great, then left us to justify the reasoning in spite of the evidence. But that is just like real life.

Psychologically, Daisy, Jordan, and Myrtle are obviously quite different from each other. In fact, it could be said they are like three corners of a triangle, supporting each others’ role in the story but entirely separate at the same time. Daisy is portrayed as a classic beauty who uses an innate sex appeal to gather some amount of control over her surroundings. As an athlete Jordan might carry the greatest potential to stray from a typical gender role; she could easily have been characterized as a lesbian because of her detachment from men, her self-centered lifestyle, and her unexplained connection to Daisy. Myrtle seems to be a more earthy woman, possibly possessing a raw sexual energy, but Fitzgerald stops short of portraying her as an independent, sexual being, empowered to pursue her own sexual experiences. In many respects these characters could have been deeper had Fitzgerald felt free to expound upon these possibilities; it seems the story would only have been enriched if he had explored these women deeper. However, the fact that Fitzgerald was not willing to fill out these women to their potential could indicate a desire, either of his own or one he felt society had placed upon him, to keep them within the expected stereotypes of their gender.

A similar opportunity showed itself within the characterization of his narrator, Nick. Nick’s reluctance to enter into a relationship with Jordan was not sufficiently justified by the ol’ “girl back home” routine. No attempt at all was made to explain why Nick found himself at the bedside of an effeminate man, who was in his underwear. Nor did Fitzgerald explore Nick’s admiration for Gatsby on what seemed to be a more physical basis than of friendship; Nick made frequent schoolgirl-like references to Gatsby, but there didn’t seem to be much reason for a friendship. Gatsby’s motivation was clearly to make contact with Daisy, but why did Nick want to be close to Gatsby? These issues could have easily led to some discussion or admittance that Nick might have been gay or at least questioning his gender role. But the author’s unwillingness to breach these subjects seems to indicate he had made himself subject to the established patriarchy. By not saying anything against it, Fitzgerald inadvertently spoke in favor of the established order.

From a purely economic standpoint, the patriarchal agenda is evident in how all three of the major female characters are dependent to varied degrees upon the men in their lives. Even Jordan has some need for a man. Daisy and Myrtle are more obviously and traditionally dependent. The patriarchal agenda is also supported in the way men do “business” and women sit around and gossip. Even Nick, who in some ways is portrayed in a traditionally feminine role because of his financial dependence upon his family, is given a nice “man’s” job in the stock market to remove any anti-patriarchal doubts. Simultaneously, a deconstructionistic dichotomy exists within the novel; the characters live in the decadent and supposedly “free” Jazz age, but at the same time seem unwilling or unable to free themselves from the patriarchal elements of society.

Overall, a Feminist criticism of this novel allows the reader to understand how subtle and pervasive the patriarchal influences are within our society. Through the questions Feminists ask of the text we are able to see a possibility for deeper characterization and a more enriched human experience without the shackles of patriarchal tyranny.

E.B. White is often quoted with, “Be obscure clearly.”

The three-cushion shot and obscure clarity could be seen as extensions of the “show, don’t tell” advice often given to fiction writers. Their use can add texture to a piece of writing, allowing the reader to fill in the blanks from his own experience. Of course the technique may be utilized in description and narrative, but when a work carries a political, social or religious message, the three-cushion shot can be utilized to provide these pieces with an added level of breadth and scope.

Utopian literature has long been a stronghold for the imaginative use of obscurity; inventing new societies, new governments, and new social norms has been the hallmark of this genre. In the process it has often capitalized on the use of satire, symbolism and euphemism. Utopian authors created obscure clarity through the names assigned to characters, locations, themes, and everyday vocabulary used within the context of the story.

In his Utopia, Thomas More criticized the religious and political views of his contemporaries by obscuring his true intentions through the use of satire. Ayn Rand used religious symbolism in Anthem to exalt the pursuit of one’s true self. In The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood applies the use of euphemisms to show how we might become used to just about anything, however tyrannical or foreign it initially seems.

Other writers, as well as film makers, built euphemisms, established symbolism, and wrote in a satirical manner to both cloak and intensify their messages.

By the use of obscure clarity, the resulting pieces of literature have become powerful works of fiction, capable of clearly delivering messages beyond what might have been possible without the use of such three-cushion shots.

This is the first in a series on using obscure clarity in fiction. I’ll use Utopian Literature in my examples, but the same concepts would apply to any genre.

Thomas More was a man of deep religious convictions, a devout Roman Catholic who was canonized in 1935, four hundred years after his death, by Pope Pius XI. More was declared the patron saint of politicians and statesmen by Pope John Paul II. It should be reasonable then to assume More’s religious and political views would be similar to those of the church he served. But More’s fictional piece Utopia, completed in 1516, flies in the face of his century’s religious convention with its free society of religious experimentation and political socialism.

Understanding the names of places, people and even the book’s title will reveal More’s satirical purposes in writing the book.

Modern readers have come to understand a “utopia” as a paradise, a world built on higher ideals where the lamb lays down with the lion. As such, it would be natural to assume that in this book More had explained his designs for a more perfect world, with his own religious, political, and moral beliefs fulfilled. But in fact, the word “utopia” (which was coined by More himself from Latin) would be literally translated as “no place”. By calling his dreamland “Utopia” More is betraying his story, showing it is a made up tale; he is literally calling it a place which does not, and presumably cannot, exist. He further betrays his true view by the names he assigns to various characters and places within the story.

The primary narrator, the character who describes this paradise to his companions, is a traveler named Raphael Hythlodaeus. Although he is telling his tale to two real-life, historical characters, Thomas More and his friend Peter Gilles, Raphael is a fictional character. Since the character’s name is chosen by the author, it opens the door to investigate the reason this particular name was assigned.

Because More was widely known to be a deeply religious man, it doesn’t require too much stretching of the imagination to assume More chose the name “Raphael” with its Biblical counterpart in mind. In the Bible, Raphael was the name of an angel.

The angel Raphael was mentioned in the Book of Tobit. He guides Tobias and later cures his father of his blindness and helps him recover his property. Because of this story, Raphael is considered an angel-physician, an agent of healing who cured both the bodies and the souls of men. In fact, the name “Raphael” is from the Hebrew for “God has healed”.

Throughout the Bible, angels are seen as ministers of light and illumination, proclaiming messages from God. The angel Gabriel was said to have delivered tidings to a virgin named Mary, who was to bear the son of God. The archangel Michael is one of the principal angels in Abrahamic tradition; his name was said to have been the war-cry of the angels in the battle fought in heaven against Satan and his followers. Therefore, the name Raphael carries connotations of a healing messenger, with a message of possible divine origin. Taking this into consideration it might appear More professed his Utopia to possess an illuminated culture, and that imitating their society would mean the deliverance of humanity. Deeper exploration of the book shows this isn’t the case at all.

More assigned Raphael the surname Hythlodaeus, which when translated from the Latin means “dispenser of nonsense”. So although he may have been named after an angel, a messenger of light, the Raphael Hythlodaeus character is designed to be simply a messenger of nonsense. More’s satiric intent was further underscored when he used this character to describe a country whose name literally means “no place”, and its river of no water and its ruler with no people. Most of the proper names More used in Utopia are words of Greek derivation, invented for More’s purposes. Anydrus (the name of a river in Utopia) means “not water”, and Ademus (the chief magistrate’s title) means “not people”.

In the introduction to his translation from the original Latin, Paul Turner states:

It is clear from an ironical passage in a letter to Peter Gilles that More expected the educated reader to understand these names; and, to ensure that their significance was not overlooked, he mentioned in the book itself that the Utopian language contains some traces of Greek in place-names and official titles.

The implied benefits of divorce, euthanasia, married priests, and women priests, expressed in Utopia, disagreed with More’s celebrated dedication to devout Catholicism. More was a persecutor of heretics (Protestants) yet the book extolled the virtues of embracing varied religions, and even under the same roof. The piece engaged in political criticism, but More himself was Lord Chancellor, an influential English lawyer. Communism and the idea of communal living expressed as an ideal in Utopia could be seen as the opposite view expected from a rich landowner such as More.

Satire was an established staple in Medieval and Renaissance literature; the periods gave birth to such greats as Geoffrey Chaucer and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. English pieces from the late Medieval period were aimed primarily at hypocrisy within the church. Even if he did not criticize the church, within the protective walls of satire’s three-cushion punch More was afforded the safety to criticize other religious and political fancies of the day.

Few would dispute that Twentieth Century literature has been impacted by the work of Ayn Rand. Every book written by Ayn Rand is still in print and sales each year number in the hundred thousands. More than 20 million copies of her books have been sold to date.

In the summer of 1937 Rand constructed a dystopian tale of mankind in the distant future called Anthem. Unlike More, Rand’s reasons for writing the short
novel are fairly transparent; she did not obscure her message through the use of Greek. If her motives are not readily apparent within the story, then the title “Anthem” can easily be broken down to reveal Rand’s motives. An anthem is a piece of music with religious significance. It is often made of scripture, and is sung or recited as a proclamation of faith. In naming her story “Anthem”, Rand declares its purposes, but in this case these purposes are not religious in the traditional sense of the word. In a letter Rand explains the final two chapters of the book are the actual anthem, and it is obviously an anthem to the individual.

The working title Rand used for this short novel was “Ego”. However, as she corresponded in November of 1946 to Richard de Mille:

I used the word in its exact, literal meaning, I did not mean a symbol of the self – but specifically and actually Man’s Self.

In an introduction to the 50th Anniversary American Edition of Anthem, Leonard Peikoff explains:

Although the word ego remains essential to the text, the title was changed to ‘Anthem’ for publication. This was not an attempt to soften the book; it was a step that Ayn Rand took on every novel. Her working titles were invariably blunt and unemotional, naming explicitly, for her own clarity, the central issue of the book.

On another level the names she assigned to her characters, as well as their social significance and assignment within the story, add another layer of meaning to the text. In the world she has created, our own world but in the distant future, people are expected to view themselves only as part of a larger whole, a single cog in a larger machine. The individual is not recognized, and preferences are not permitted. To further this agenda, names are assigned at birth via committee, and are such socially oriented names as “Unity”, “Union” and “International”. No surnames are used, but instead a string of numbers is attached. These names have no individual meaning and are merely used to indicate which cog a person is in the great machine of society.

As the story progresses, two of Rand’s characters explore possibilities of the naming convention. Rand uses this realization as a stepping stone toward their ultimate realization and understanding of the concept of an individual. They assign descriptive names, which appear more like titles, such as “The Golden One” and “The Unconquered”. In this case, Rand’s naming choices revealed the characters’ growing understanding of “self”.

As Rand’s characters gain further awareness, they begin to explore the symbolic possibilities of an individualized name. Rand’s protagonist names himself Prometheus, symbolic of his attempt to share his light box invention with his brethren and the resulting persecution. Prometheus then names his female partner “Gaea” to symbolically show that she is to be the mother of a new race. The lives of both characters have shown parallels to their mythological-god namesakes, and we are led to expect further godlike parallels from them in the future.

Throughout the piece, Rand employs forms of symbolism by means other than name. For instance to deepen the humanistic values of her text, she pulls images from the Bible. Her protagonist pulls light from the heavens and delivers it to his brothers with a message of hope for the future, but is rejected and persecuted. He discovers a word from ancient times, the word “I”, and proclaims it is a god, to be followed and worshiped for its own ends. Rand draws from the Biblical account of Adam and Eve as well. Overall, Rand uses the depth of symbolism to enrich the messages within her text.

Margaret Atwood is a Booker Prize-Winning author who has received numerous awards and several honorary degrees, including the Canadian Governor General’s Award, Le Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France, and the National Arts Club Medal of Honor for Literature. Her works have been published in more than twenty-five countries. In her novel The Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood capitalizes on society’s tendency to euphemize difficult situations as a way to gain their general acceptance.

The Handmaid’s Tale paints the picture of a dystopia from the then-near future. One of the distinctive features of this world is how names are assigned to a position, a job, and each handmaid assumes that name when they take that job placement. The names of handmaids in the story, such as Offred, Ofwarren, or Ofglen merely show that handmaid is the property of Fred, of Warren, or of Glen; as such, the women are reduced to the level of an object. Just as I may own a car and call it “my car”, when it’s sold a new car takes its place and is given the moniker “my car”; the names of handmaid characters in Atwood’s story show a similar lack of personal regard.

While not directly named for their assignments, two other official forms of employment for women are assigned generalized names, the “Aunts” who train the handmaids, and the “Marthas” who run the households. Guards are called “Angels” and men in leadership roles (within the Gilead regime, the government within the story) are called “Commanders”. Atwood utilizes such “friendly” names to assist in hiding the grim realities within the story; such euphemisms as “angels”, “handmaids”, and “aunts” hide the real duties of characters assigned to these positions.

In particular, the term “handmaid” is applied to the nameless surrogate mothers forced into slavery to bare children for the country’s sterile elite. The term is taken from the Biblical account of Rachel and Jacob.

“And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die.And Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel; and he said, Am I in God’s stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?And she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her, and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her.” (Genesis 30:1-3)

Reminiscent of the section titles in Geoffrey Chaucer’s medieval narrative poem The Canterbury Tales, where Chaucer’s text personalizes his storytellers even though they are identified by their profession, Atwood creates a complex narrator for her story.

The complexity of the narrator, Offred, is in contrast to the generic qualities of her name.

My name isn’t Offred, I have another name, which nobody uses now because it’s forbidden. I tell myself it doesn’t matter, your name is like your telephone number, useful only to others; but what I tell myself is wrong, it does matter.

Atwood utilized other euphemisms to reflect the utilitarian sensibilities of the governing culture within her story. A short Biblical reading and the subsequent act of fornication imposed upon the handmaidens was called a “ceremony”. The resultant babies, when they were not correctly formed or had some other defect, were called “Unbabies”, and women who could not conceive were called “Unwomen”. Assassinations of the rebellious and disobedient were not called executions, but “Salvaging” and were seen merely as an “unpleasant necessity”. Even the handmaids’ slogan, “From each according to her ability; to each according to his needs” could be seen as a euphemism for the reality of slavery which it strove to mask.

With such words as these, Margaret Atwood made the dystopian hell of The Handmaid’s Tale seem a place of benevolent inconveniences where anyone could grow accustomed. Ironically, in Atwood’s tale where such occasions as public hangings and slavery can be accepted as commonplace, the simple game of “Scrabble” is viewed as a dangerous, forbidden activity.

The use of euphemism as a means of creating obscure clarity may also be seen in the smog-choked dystopian Los Angeles of 2019 in Ridley Scott’s 1982 film, B
lade Runner. In this film, a class of androids has been created to perform slave labor on remote planets. In some instances these androids are too smart for their own good and become dangerous. However they are not “exterminated”, despite their decidedly human appearance and actions; the term used for their annihilation is that they are simply “retired”. One could only guess if such a euphemism is applied to the “retirement” of human individuals as well.

The use of obscure clarity and the three-cushion shot is not limited to Utopian Literature alone. However, whether by the use of satire, symbolism, euphemisms, or some other means, the Utopian Literature genre has drawn a long line across history from its works with hidden, or at least partially veiled, agendas.

Where Edward Bellamy’s novel Looking Backward caused the formation of small book discussion groups called “Bellamy Groups” across the nation, its indirect attack on the Industrial Age from whence it came brought new attempts at social reform and affected the future for several generations. In a like manner, George Orwell’s book and the movie version of 1984 sent reverberations around the globe for introducing the concept of a futuristic “Big Brother” who is always watching us.

The self-proclaimed prophets of our modern society stand on street corners within the city. They hold up their cardboard signs and warn us to “repent.” As we cross their paths we duck our heads and hide our eyes, pretending they are not there and never considering their messages. At the most we might throw a dollar in their hat with the small hope that somehow it will make them go away. Such prophets have always been with us.

But other prophets approach us on the literary sidewalks. They capture our imaginations with tales of a time to come and the possibilities of the future. These prophets also warn us of our folly, but we listen carefully. We give these prophets of the literary sidewalk our rapt attention because they do not hit us with their messages head on. These prophets shrewdly approach us and spin their tales with an obscure clarity. They tell us of our folly, but soften the blow with a three-cushion shot so we are not offended. For this sensibility, we regard these writers as our best and brightest, the wise sages among us.

In Herland three men are held captive by an isolated all-female nation and attempt to understand what women could have been if not for the influences of man and his idea of domestic bliss. Gilman uses the device of role reversal to make explore the irony of the situation. The men are overpowered and detained by the women and we’re given the idea these women are far from the weaker sex. The women wear short hair, and the men’s hair grows long while in captivity. The women are the leaders and the decision makers, while the men are forced to follow. The men seem to be the emotional creatures in the story, while the women are more rational. Through these devices, Gilman attempts to show sex roles are learned and imposed by society; sex roles are not seen as something inherent or biological.

In Oz’s The Stepford Wives, the role reversal has largely taken place before the opening credits. A collection of high-power women executives overpower their spineless “it must have been cold there in my shadow” husbands (I wonder if the Bette Midler “Wind Beneath My Wings/Beaches” connection was intentional). The men respond in the only way their neurotic-macho sensibilities allow, they divide and conquer the potentially superior race, reducing them to a society of AOL-slow blond bimbos. Not only were these wives the bread winners, but several of them had the audacity to be taller than their husbands! However, it might be said that the women in this story never did relinquish control to the men; even though they appeared nothing more than a battalion of domestic-goddess slaves, the men were still controlled by the lust hold these women had on them. The control didn’t happen to be helpful to the women, but they had it nevertheless. In the end, of course, the ultimate role reversal is revealed when a woman is revealed as the evil genius behind the entire plot; and I thought only men could be evil geniuses!

While gender role reversal did go a long way to highlight our expected norms and cause us to question their validity, unfortunately both pieces suffer from two-dimensional characterizations which discredit the potential strength of the exploration. The three male characters in Herland conveniently represent three stereotypes of manhood, the philosopher, the romantic, and the man’s man, and none of them are given much opportunity to contemplate any other point of view. The women in Herland suffer a similar fate and at times seem more a race of clones than an advanced matriarchal society; they are too wise, too noble and too even tempered to be human, and might not engage us enough to ponder what makes them seem traditionally male or female. While the wind-up-toy women of The Stepford Wives are understandably a little less than human, their husbands are also portrayed as caricatures of men; each of the husbands were so universal in their desires, any of them (except the gay man) could have swapped places an nobody would notice.

In reality, people, both men and women, are more complicated than either of these stories would allow. An Utopia for one sex does not have to be a dystopia for the other. While the swapping of gender roles did go a long way toward showing tendencies in both sexes which we commonly assign to one or the other (and I did enjoy watching the bozo husbands’ shop-till-you-drop punishment in The Stepford Wives), real life is seldom so cut and dry. The effects of both estrogen and testosterone were denied when Herland explored society’s contributions to sex roles. What would happen if a man enjoyed cooking and didn’t know how to fix a car, could his Stepford wife be that flexible? What if the he-man had a tender side and what if there was variety of temperament within the Herland race? While things must by necessity be simplified for the constraints of a story, the subject of gender and its shallow characterization in these works left important issues unexplored.

While the Random House Unabridged Dictionary defines “satire” as a literary composition, in verse or prose, in which human folly and vice are held up to scorn, derision, or ridicule, satirical writing or drama often scorns such folly by pretending to approve of values which are the diametric opposite of what the satirist actually wishes to promote. The implied benefits of divorce, euthanasia, married priests, and women priests, expressed in his Utopia, disagreed with More’s celebrated dedication to devout Catholicism. More was a persecutor of heretics (Protestants) yet the book extolled the virtues of embracing varied religions, and even under the same roof. The piece engaged in political criticism, but More himself was Lord Chancellor, an influential English lawyer. Communism and the idea of communal living expressed as an ideal in Utopia could be seen as the opposite view expected from a rich landowner such as More.

More uses the Renaissance pilgrim-guide to describe the idyllic country of Utopia and named this guide Raphael Hythlodaeus. Raphael was the name of an Archangel mentioned in the Book of Tobit, who guides Tobias and later cures his father of his blindness. The angel Raphael was seen as an angel-physician who cured both the bodies and the souls of men. Angels have elsewhere been considered messengers of illumination, as was the angel Gabriel who told Mary she would give birth to the Son of the Most High God. But in giving his pilgrim character the surname Hythlodaeus, which means “nonsense”, More inverted the character’s role as a bringer of profitable illumination. The name Raphael Hythlodaeus could be interpreted as “angel of nonsense”. More’s satiric intent was further underscored when he used this character to describe a country whose name literally means “noplace”, and its river of no water and its ruler with no people.

One central feature of Renaissance humanism was the commitment to study the primary sources of the best writing from ancient Greece and Rome. This commitment was shown in the Renaissance humanists’ motto “ad fontes”, which means “to the sources”. Renaissance humanists glorified the ancient civilizations, and in a similar way some popular and glorified tales of New World civilizations were emerging from cross-Atlantic exploration. It seems possible More could have been tipping his hat to humanists by setting his work in Latin, and telling of an ancient idyllic civilization built on “superior” ideals. If this was More’s intent, and if the tale of a perfect communal society was a reference to New World legend (although in reality Amerigo Vespucci’s Incas practiced cannibalism), then this would be further proof that More viewed his “Utopia” as satire.

It’s not uncommon for authors to never realize the stretch their works will ultimately reach, and a piece can inadvertently morph into a new invention without the author’s conscious effort. More used literary tools of his time such as wordplay, referred to current events such as tales of New World civilizations, and spoofed a contemporary movement by playing upon the Renaissance humanists’ love of Latin texts, to create a work of satire. But in the 500 years since it was introduced, “Utopia” has given birth to a genre which has been used to explore and improve the same religious, social and political shortcomings More had previously satired in his work.

The Queen realized Snow White’s marketing talents far surpassed her own, and it really got on her nerves. The Queen practiced daily visualization exercises, looking in an enchanted mirror and asking if she was the best Internet Marketer in the land. Being an enchanted but not necessarily honest mirror, it always covered its glass and stroked the Queen’s fragile self esteem.

But one day the enchanted mirror had enough brown nosing and answered the Queen, “Sure you’re one hot Internet Marketing goddess, but that stepdaughter of yours is a real smart cookie.” As you might imagine this infuriated the vain Queen, so she summoned her most loyal troll.

“Bring me the heart of Snow White,” she said.

The troll bowed and left the palace, but he felt really conflicted because he and Snow White sent text messages back and forth all the time. So he pulled out his cell phone and sent her a text.

“OMG QWN H8S U”

“WTF?”

“HED 4 WUDS”

“L8R”

“BFFL”

“BFF”

Then Snow White headed out for the deepest and darkest section of the woods because she heard the Wi-Fi signal was great out there.

Upon arriving in the darkest part of the woods she found a friendly looking cottage. Over the door a sign read “Fairyland Outsourcing”. Snow White knocked at the door, but nobody was home so she went inside.

Inside she found tiny furniture, dishes, and clothing strewn about. Snow White didn’t form any height-related prejudices against whoever might live in the cottage because she deeply believed the vertically challenged should be empowered against oppressive cultural stereotypes, but she did think they were slobs. She swept the floor, washed the dishes, and defragged the seven laptops she found in the back office.

When the seven inhabitants of the cottage returned home they were happy to see Snow White had tidied up after them. They also told her it was fine to refer to them as dwarfs because they didn’t feel their smallness should be an issue and anyway they were proud of their cultural heritage.

Snow White recognized the opportunity she had stumbled upon to move forward on a product idea she had been formulating. Although she was an exceptionally talented marketer herself, she believed in the power of synergy and knew outsourcing the details would leave her free to give the project her personal best. So before the end of the day Snow White and the seven outsourcing dwarfs had entered into a JV and set a launch date.

It wasn’t long before the Queen heard the buzz about Snow White’s new product. She knew it had the potential to really dominate her niche, and she got really jealous. She was also pretty ticked because the troll hadn’t killed Snow White so she fired her entire staff saying, “If you want something done right you have to do it yourself.”

The Queen disguised herself as an old crone and had no trouble finding the little cottage in the dark woods. The dwarfs still had day jobs working for a large entertainment conglomerate, so Snow White was home alone.

“Buy an apple from a poor old woman?” she croaked when Snow White answered the door.

Although Snow White was trying to cut back on carbs, she justified the apple on the grounds of the old woman’s distressed economic state and obvious need of a more brand-conscious mentor such as herself. But when she bit into the apple, Snow White instantly fell into a deep, deep sleep.

When the seven dwarfs returned home and found Snow White laid out like she was dead they went right to work. They Googled a freelance prince who came and broke the spell in exchange for a backlink to one of their PR6 blogs.

The Queen was so angry when she heard what happened she started a comment spam campaign to undermine Snow White’s online authority, but got her own domain blacklisted instead. She also resorted to some black hat SEO tricks to steal Snow White’s traffic, but before long the Queen’s website disappeared forever in the Google sandbox.

All this publicity increased the buzz about Snow White’s new product and her launch was a big success. Soon the seven dwarfs were able to quit their day jobs and Snow White became a regular speaker on the Internet Marketing seminar circuit. So of course everyone lived happily ever after.

Some characters in Atwood’s story saw their freedoms being limited and chose to escape. They tried to escape their captors through means either physical, mental, or both. The handmaid Janine tried escaping mentally, escaping to insanity. Others, including Offred’s predecessor, escaped through suicide. Some escaped by leaving the country through covert means, as Offred and her family tried to do in the beginning of the story, and as she may have managed in the end. Even those within the Gilead regime had methods of escape, whether through an underground nightclub or the fantasy of motherhood.

Other characters chose to fight. This may have only been a stage in their struggle; Moira tried to fight the system but in the end chose mental escape, resigning herself to her fate and living out her days as an underground prostitute. The Mayday group chose fighting on a more obvious level, elevating their struggle to the level of a war. Throughout the story characters chose to fight in small ways, exchanging a forbidden glance or touch, stealing butter to keep the skin soft, or hiding a match just to entertain the potential for starting a fire.

Some chose to adapt, but not necessarily for the same reasons. The girls at the Red Center tried to adapt in order to avoid punishment or death. Nick and others in the Mayday movement tried to adapt so they could work from within, furthering the work of their group. To an extent, many within the Gilead regime tried to adapt; Serena Joy tried to adapt to the idea of sharing her husband with a handmaid. As Offred observed, it is amazing what one can get used to.

Offred is faced with her own freedoms and her own choices. As a handmaid the freedom from many choices is thrust upon her, but other choices hang over her head throughout the novel. Literally so, since the remains of a light fixture that looked like a big eye hung over her bed as both a reminder of the suicide choice another girl made there, and of the eyes that are watching her every move. She has to chose how to fill her time and thoughts, who to trust, how to act, what to say, and to whom she could say it.

It’s possible one message of the book is that if we don’t make our own choices, choices will be thrust upon us. In the time before this story takes place, the nation behaved in an irresponsible manner; it was quickly becoming a toxic wasteland in a state of moral decay. Without noticing, people were led closer and closer to a place where the Gilead regime could move in and take over. Often when we make poor choices someone or some group will step in and make other choices for us. By the end of the story Offred has taken very few stands and made few real choices, and the Mayday group makes a choice for her and plans her escape.

Another theme ran through the choices each character faced along the way, and that’s the question whether our choices are right or not. Is it best to adapt and live, or would death be better? If we trust someone, will they betray us? We can’t look into the future and see how things will turn out, so how can we really know what’s best? We never know how things will end up, and that’s why we are never told what becomes of Moira, what happened to Ofglen, what really happened to Luke, and in the end why we don’t really know what happens to Offred once she climbs into the black van. The results of real choices are not cut and dry.

When I sat down to write this essay I didn’t know what to say about The Handmaid’s Tale. It moved me on several levels in many different ways, and like all similar circumstances these things cannot be easily reduced to a page or two of text. The movie version faced a similar task, trying to simplify the complicated textures of Atwood’s work and leaving details behind in the interest of time. It’s easy for me to say there could have been more, but like this essay, there is only so much you can say in a limited format. Like the characters in Atwood’s story, we have to choose what’s important to us at the time; other things have to fall by the wayside.

Where in the Biblical account transgression lead to mankind’s self awareness, Equality 7-2521’s transgressions lead him down a path which ultimately provided awareness of individuality and ego. Where Biblical man is expelled from a Utopian garden for his sin, Equality 7-7521 flees and is left to wander The Uncharted Forest. As Adam was given the task of naming woman and his surroundings, Equality 7-2521 names himself, the woman who has come after him, and presumably will name their children. In Biblical tradition Adam and Eve were the mother and father of mankind, in a like fashion Equality 7-2521 and The Golden One will give birth to a new society. When Equality 7-2521 chooses a name for The Golden One, he names her Gaea, “who was the mother of the earth and of all the gods” (99).The use of light draws another parallel between the Bible and Rand’s Anthem. Biblical narrative describes the entrance of a light into the world. This light was to be the delivering light of men, but man in his ignorance rejected it. Equality 7-2521 brought light to his “brothers” but they did not understand the light, rejected it, and persecuted him. Rand went as far as recreating the lashing tradition ascribes to Jesus.

Although it was rejected by men, the light in Rand’s story brought the deliverance of man from the darkness and led him to establish a new society; this parallels the Bible’s prophesy that the light will lead to the establishment of a new heaven and a new earth. When Equality 7-2521 chooses a name for himself, he chooses the name of Prometheus who “took the light of the gods and he brought it to men, and he taught men to be gods. And he suffered for his deed as all bearers of light must suffer.” (99)

A parallel can also be drawn from the Biblical concept of the “Word” being given to mankind, the Word which leads to the fulfillment of man’s potential. In Rand’s story, the word “I” is given to man and it is called a god (97). It “can never die on this earth, for it is the heart of it and the meaning and the glory” (105). This word leads to man’s realization of the “self”.

A less direct religious reference in Anthem is Rand’s use of a semi-archaic narrative style. It’s formality is reminiscent of Biblical narrative. Since an anthem is “a piece of sacred vocal music, usually with words taken from the scriptures” (from the book’s introduction by Leonard Peikoff), use of a style which imitates scripture seems appropriate. In a letter written by Rand, she notes that the actual anthem is the book’s final two chapters. However, the preceding ten chapters does much to establish the mood and effectiveness of the final two chapters, the anthem.

Again, in spite of the religious parallels Rand employed, her ultimate purposes for writing Anthem were not religious. Rand has stated, “Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.” (http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=objectivism_intro) This statement is echoed in “My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose” as well as “neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish” (95).

I wouldn’t say this book borrows any authority by imitating its religious counterparts, but is meant to stand alone, drawing parallels to other truths, but standing independently as a truth in its self.