NNEDV’s Comments (group member since Sep 24, 2013)

NNEDV’s comments from the Reader with a Cause group.

At the end of the paperback version of the book, Veronica Roth provides her playlist for Divergent. Music has the power to transform the mood of a story, or your feelings toward a character, or even how you react to a given scene.

Did you have any ideas about what music would play during a given scene or chapter while you read the book?

Here’s Roth’s full playlist:
1. “Starts With One” by Shiny Toy Guns: “This song gets me in touch with the good aspects of Beatrice’s chosen faction.”
2. “Chasm” by Flyleaf: “And this song gets me in touch with the bad aspects of Beatrice’s chosen faction.”
3. “Come Alive” by Foo Fighters: “This is the love interest’s song for Beatrice.”
4. “Again” by Flyleaf: “And this is Beatrice’s song for her love interest.”
5. “Help I’m Alive” by Metric: “This is Beatrice’s initiation song.”
6. “We Die Young” by The Showdown: “This might as well be the theme song for Beatrice’s chosen faction -- it’s what they would choose for themselves.”
7. “Canvas” by Imogen Heap: “This is the “riding on trains” song.”
8. “Running Up That Hill” by Placebo: “The tone of this song matches the tone of much of the book, for me.”
9. “Sweet Sacrifice” by Evanescence: “I was listening to this song when the first scene I wrote (in chapter 6) popped into my head. That scene led me to the world of the book and its basic plot.”
10. “Arise” by Flyleaf: “A powerful song that’s perfect for chapters 38 & 39.”

Is this different from what you expected? What songs would you add?

“My will is mine...I shall not make it soft for you.” -Aeschylus, Agamemnon

Roth describes this quote as “integral to my discovery of Tris’s voice. I wanted to create a character who could and would deliver that line...Her voice is clipped, direct, and strong, just like these lines.”

After being told she was Divergent, and ultimately choosing Dauntless, Tris struggled with her identity and sense of belonging. In the end, she finds her strength and direction by defining herself as more than just her faction.

“I have no home, no path, and no certainty. I am no longer Tris the selfless, or Tris the brave. I suppose that now, I must become more than either.” (Chapter 39)

What do you think of our slight, yet strong heroine?

Did you like her or identify with her? Are there any passages from the book that really made you understand or empathize with Tris?

How do you think she compares to heroines in other contemporary Young Adult series – like Bella Swan (Twilight), Katniss Everdeen (The Hunger Games), Hermione Granger (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone), or Clary Fray (City of Bones)?

In the book, after Tris moves up in the challenges and ranking, she is sexually assaulted and nearly murdered by three of her fellow initiates - including someone she looked at as a friend - before Four swoops in and saves her life by beating up her assailants. After the attack, Four advises Tris that “the others won’t be as jealous if you show some vulnerability. Even if it isn’t real...you should let that bruise on your cheek show and keep your head down.” (285-6)

Four was trying to be helpful -- he believed that “it is more important for you to be safe than right, for the time being” (286) -- yet, his actions smacked a little of blaming the victim. If only Tris hadn’t been so good at the second part of initiation, maybe she wouldn’t have been targeted.

In the movie adaptation, Tris is physically attacked by the same three assailants and is again saved by Four, but the sexual assault is removed. Instead, one of her fears in her “Fear Landscape” is rape -- another major change. In the book, Tris fears intimacy:

“You’re afraid of me?”
“Not you,” I say. I bite my lip to keep it still. “Being with you...with anyone. I’ve never been involved with someone before, and...you’re older, and I don’t know what your expectations are…” (402)

By making this change in the movie, Tris is given more agency. As this article (“The Divergent Rape Scene: Why It’s Important”) rightly points out, “Divergent marks the first time I have ever seen a teenage girl articulate, in no uncertain terms, that her body belongs to her. That she gets to decide who touches it, and how, and when. That her yes and her no are final, and unambiguous, and worthy of respect.”

If you saw the movie, did you also notice this change? What did you think about Divergent’s (the book or the movie) treatment of sexual assault?

Fear plays a large part in this book, as the faction that Tris opts to join, Dauntless, is based on conquering fear or becoming fearless -- depending on who you talk to.

Four learns about Tris’s status as Divergent and offers to help her pass as Dauntless by sharing his “Fear Landscape” with her. In this simulation, Four must face his deepest, darkest fears and conquer them.

In the movie, Four describes your final fear as the deepest and darkest you have. Four, who famously earned his nickname by having only four fears, is revealed to most deeply fear the violence and brutality of his father. Four, arguably one of the best in Dauntless (aka the most fearless), continues to grapple with the consequences and fear years after the fact.

“I look from Marcus, who walks slowly toward us, to Four, who inches slowly back, and everything comes together.” (Chapter 25)

As a culture, we often expect victims – particularly men & boys – to get past their fears or “over” the abuse (and quickly!) in order to succeed or “move on” in life. Four is an excellent example, for both men and women, that abuse isn’t something that can easily be forgotten, but it also needn’t define us.

What did you think about the depiction of fear and family violence in Divergent?

Do you think these scenes would have played differently if Four had been a woman and Tris had been a man? Culturally, do you think we have different expectations for women and men, girls and boys, when it comes to addressing and moving on from any form of abuse?

A movie adaptation premiered in theaters March 21, 2014 and pulled in a cool $56 million in its opening weekend alone (the sequel is already in the works).

For those of us who have read the book and seen the movie - how did the two compare for you?

What scenes do you think translated especially well? Which scenes were you waiting for, but were ultimately left out of the movie version?

Post-apocalyptic Chicago is divided into five factions in Veronica Roth’s Divergent: Amity - the kind, Abnegation - the selfless, Candor - the honest, Dauntless - the brave, and Erudite - the smart.

What did you think about the faction structure that Roth created for this book? These five factions attempt to include the totality of approaches and important roles people play in societies – do you think the five factions include everyone? If not, what faction(s) would you add?

And now, the obligatory question...which faction are you??

P.S. Here’s a Buzzfeed quiz in case you need help choosing: http://www.buzzfeed.com/ariellecalder...

As book one in a series, the ending of Divergent seemed more like a pause before an intermission than an ending. Even so, what did you think??

Did you like the book overall?

Kerman’s race, education, and socioeconomic status are noted – often – in the book as being different than the “average” inmate. She speculates that her sentence is shorter than it could have been due to these factors.

(112) Finn looked me up and down. “What the f*ck are you doing in here? We don’t see women like you much.”

How does racism and classism impact the experiences of Piper and the other inmates on the inside? And how does it impact the issues women face when re-entering society after leaving prison?

Kerman did a great job writing about the women she met in prison, and writing them in an honest, empathetic way. (We only wish she would have told us more!) Who did you most enjoy reading about – Jae, Yoga Janet, Delicious, Pop, Carlotta, Nina, Little Janet, Miss Malcolm, or someone else? Who did you want to learn more about?

Did you look up the articles Kerman mentioned while you read the book, because we sure did! (Links below) What did you think about the characterizations of prison life that were made by the authors of these articles vs. Kerman’s characterizations? Who are you more inclined to believe?

--

(198) “I have been subscribing to People magazine for over 35 years. And now I’m the scum of the earth? Are you the scum of the earth, Piper?” [Annette]
>>“A World Turned Upside Down,” People Magazine, 3/22/2004 http://www.people.com/people/archive/...

(200) “The reporter got many minor facts wrong, such as that there were four nuns resident, and that we could buy CD players at the commissary. Women were outraged by the false claim that we could buy Haagen-Dazs ice cream.”
>>“Don’t Worry, Martha, It’s Like a Big Hotel,” Hartford Courant, 9/19/2004
http://articles.courant.com/2004-09-1...

(254) On December 27 people got their Sunday New York Times in the Monday mail…I scurried to my bunk with the paper; Larry had a piece in it, and not just any piece. It was the “Modern Love” column, the weekly personal essay about love and relationships.
>>“Hear That Wedding March Often Enough, You Fall in Step,” The New York Times, 12/26/2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/26/fas...

Follow-up Modern Love column (not mentioned in the book):
>>“A Life to Live, This Side of the Bars,” The New York Times, 3/25/2010 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/28/fas...

…and letters in response:
>>“Letters on a Modern Love Essay About a Woman in Prison,” 4/2/2010 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/04/fas...

How well do you think Kerman depicted life behind bars for women in low-security prisons? Were there any aspects of prison life that surprised you?

Now that you’ve read the book and watched the Netflix show, what do you think about the differences between the two? (Of which there are MANY!) Did you think one did a better job over the other telling the story of women in prison?

While OITNB isn't fiction -- so there aren't technically any "spoilers" -- there is still plenty to react to! What did you think of the book, overall?

Ashley wrote: "Hi Neil,
Each state and territory had a domestic violence coalition that works very hard in their state to make an impact on state laws. I would contact your state coalition to see what you can do ..."

Agreed - for more information at a local level, get in touch with your state domestic violence coalition.

On a national level, we work proactively on Capitol Hill to make ending domestic violence a national priority. Learn more about our Public Policy and Advocacy work from our website: http://nnedv.org/policy

A movie version of Gone Girl is slated to come out October 3, 2014 – and the cover of Entertainment Weekly this week is a teaser for the movie* that features Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) spooning the apparently dead corpse of Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike) on a morgue tray, surrounded by mortuary equipment.

The decision to style the actress playing Amy as a corpse is disturbing and confusing, considering (view spoiler)[Amy doesn’t actually die in the book, nor does a scene resembling this tableau appear anywhere in the story (hide spoiler)]. Why do you think EW made the decision to promote the coming movie this way? What message is this image sending about women and the book?

It’s not hard to think of examples where dead female bodies are used to sell products or as window dressing – yet every time we see it happen in popular culture, it is shocking, disturbing, and distressing. What do you think we can do to combat this trend?


* Entertainment Weekly (January 8, 2014) http://popwatch.ew.com/2014/01/08/cov...


Want to learn more about the media’s portrayal of women? Check out the following resources:
(1) Jean Kilbourne, Videos http://www.jeankilbourne.com/videos/ and the Killing Us Softly 4 – Trailer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWKXit...
(2) PolicyMic, Elizabeth Plank, “Dear Advertisers, There’s Nothing Sexy About Violence Against Women,” http://www.policymic.com/articles/747...
(3) The Representation Project, “How the Media Failed Women in 2013” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NswJ4k...
(4) TED, Cameron Russell, “Looks aren’t everything. Believe me, I’m a model.” (October 2012) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM4Xe6...
(5) MamaMia, Nicky Champ, “Dear advertisers: Violence against women is not sexy,” http://www.mamamia.com.au/style/fashi...

In the book, Amy denounces and criticizes the local police and their investigation. Do you think they did a good job of investigating her disappearance? Do you think that this portrayal of law enforcement procedure is true-to-life, or is it more like something you’d see in an episode of Law & Order?

Near the end of the book, Amy quasi-defends her actions as follows:

“’I just want you to be happy, Amy.’ How many times did he say that and I took it to mean: ‘I just want you to be happy, Amy, because that’s less work for me.’ But maybe I was unfair. Well not unfair, but confused. No one I’ve loved has ever not had an agenda. So how could I know?” (394)

NNEDV’s VP of Development & Innovation, Cindy Southworth, decries the “intergenerational cycle of violence” as follows: “When you think that one in three girls, one in six boys will be a victim of child sexual abuse before they’re 18; one in three women, or one in six men are not perpetrating crimes against people every day. So the majority of victims are resilient and strong and fabulous and live wonderful lives and don’t hurt anyone. [Abusers] make intentional choices to do these horrific acts, and while I feel bad for the small child [they were], there’s no excuse.”*

What do you think about “the intergenerational cycle of violence”? Do you think abusers are victims of their past, or do they make choices to harm others?


* All In with Chris Hayes http://video.msnbc.msn.com/all-in-/52... (August 1, 2013)

We hope we weren’t alone in silently cheering for Diary Amy – during several passages, we found ourselves nodding and thinking “been there!”

“As I go to endless rounds of parties and bar nights, perfumed and sprayed and hopeful, rotating myself around the room like some dubious dessert.” (33)

“My dating life seems to rotate around three types of men: preppy Ivy Leaguers who believe they are characters in a Fitzgerald novel; slick Wall Streeters with $ in their eyes, their ears, their mouths; and sensitive smart-boys who are so self-aware that everything feels like a joke.” (14)

“We are all overdressed in our little flashy frocks, our slasher heels, and we all eat small plates of food bites that are as decorative and insubstantial as we are.” (60)

When we discovered that Diary Amy was a fairy tale, many of us balked – how could we have fallen for that hook, line, and sinker?? And then we found more to enjoy…

“Tampon commercial, detergent commercial, maxipad commercial, Windex commercial. You’d think all women do is clean and bleed.” (275)

“Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, & burping…Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot & understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their man do whatever they want.” (250)

“Again, I don’t get it: If you let a man cancel plans or decline to do things for you, you lose. You don’t get what you want. It’s pretty clear. Sure, he may be happy, he may say you’re the coolest girl ever, but he’s saying it because he got his way. He’s calling you a cool girl to fool you!” (253)

What did you think about the construction of gender and femininity according to either Diary Amy or “Real” Amy’s passages? Did anything resonate with you?

I think we could talk all day about relationships and Gone Girl.

We weren’t sure what to think about “just one olive though.” Was there love there at the beginning? Did Nick & Amy have a desire for a “regular,” loving relationship? Or was it manufactured from the beginning?

Amy’s fixation on the “Just one olive though” concept seemed to be fraught with a desire for true love and perfection from the start that we see so often in popular culture (the current spate of YA novels would have you believe that if you haven’t met The One by graduation/ initiation/ whatever-coming-of-age-ritual-is-appropriate-for-the-story, You’re Doing It Wrong). This is a troubling and damaging concept for adults as well – not to mention the difficult [impossible?] expectations it dredges up for each partner to try to live up to.

We think Tamora Pierce, a prominent YA author, would agree – she has talked about the dangerous concepts currently being sold to young adults in glittering packages: “[While] there are people who have met their first love, and it has worked out for the rest of their lives, they are a lot more rare than the current spate of novels would have you believe. A lot of us don't find a really good love…until we've been through quite a few other false starts and some other fun times first…It frightens me that girls are growing up reading books that say, ‘You'll meet him in high school, and you'll live together forever, and ever, and ever.’”*

What do you think about the state of relationship and the search for love in our modern world? In popular culture?


* Tamora Pierce, National Book Festival http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feat... (September 22, 2013)

We think that some people will be quick to point to Amy and say “See??! All women are crazy” or “Women are crazy and ‘just as violent or controlling’ as men!” While we always recognize that men are victims of domestic violence, this is a troubling perspective, since statistics* clearly document that violence is perpetrated predominantly by men against women. This may make for an interesting, chilling read – but it’s not an accurate reflection of domestic violence in real life for many reasons.

It’s almost as if this book solidifies a concept that is clearly the exception and not the rule – yet it’s getting a lot of attention** largely probably due to the “female violence” angle. The author has said that she writes her books because “[men] have a vocabulary for sex and violence that women just don’t,” that her books give people the space to talk about female violence, both physical and mental.

Amy’s (view spoiler)[false rape claim at the end of the book (hide spoiler)] upholds a very dangerous and damaging concept that constantly gets bandied about in popular culture (season three of Veronica Mars, The Life of David Gale [film], Wild Things [film], Atonement [book & film], season four of South Park, Under the Dome [book], and many, many more), thus contributing to a rape culture that disproportionately demonizes and disbelieves victims.

But what do you think? What did you think about while you were reading this book?


* (1) Across all types of violence, the majority of female victims reported that their perpetrators were male. National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention...
(2) Nonfatal intimate partner violence is most frequently committed by individuals of opposite genders…on average from 2001 to 2005 - about 96% of females experiencing nonfatal intimate partner violence were victimized by a male and about 3% reported that the offender was another female. U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/...
(3) Nearly 75 percent of family violence victims are female, and nearly 75 percent of family violence perpetrators are male. U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/fv...

** Did you hear there’s a movie coming out this fall? We have another thread going all about that!