Context is Key

[Wifetheif]

As time passes, the subtexts of so many works of art get lost. We forget that fear of "yellow Peril," an Asian dominated world was the launching pad for Buck Rogers. Today, we just see it as a dated comic strip with some odious racist stereotyping because its foundational conceit is not part of our world view. Similarly, artist Alex Raymond was not only portraying a fantasy world, Flash Gordon had a firm footing in the Great Depression economics in which it was launched. This is especially portrayed in the sexual relationship between Dale and Flash. Flash, despite his alpha male trappings is fairly regularly cucked by Dale. He is, like so many American men of that era, moving from job to job and location to location to find any kind of work. Dale, like the wives and sweethearts of those desperate Depression men, could and did extend the family budget or delay an apartment eviction by engaging in a bit of flirtation up to and including actual prostitution, is more than an object of affection. She is a potent symbol of American womanhood. This is the subtile dynamic of Dale and Flash's torrid when its on and distant when its off romance. Many of Dale's most emotional moments are subverted by Flash to make them about himself. Putting your man first was a dictum many women lived by during the Depression as nearly all of them had fragile egos do to no job prospects, no real identity, and cripplingly low self-esteem. Despite his bravado and derring do, Flash is painfully insecure. This is why Dale is not merely a damsel in distress, she is also the embodiment of Flash's ego and sexual identity. Her flirtations cut him to the quick and cause him to spiral out in jealousy and anger, HIS flirtations are completely understandable as they provide Flash validation, and reinforce his view of himself as an Alpha. At least that is how he sees things. As for Dale? Even after all their time together and many adventures, she hasn't quite made up her mind about Flash. He still has no steady job, is in a precarious position, has a roving eye, and dismisses Dale's imput with regularity. None of these are dealbreakers in themselves, but together? Let's just say, she is keeping her options open and Prince Barin is SO handsome!
It is only by immersing ourselves in the era in which so much art was created that we can fully appreciate it. Today's film students, for example just don't get why "Citizen Kane" was so revolutionary. At the time it was, "Ceilings on sets! Oh my God!" "Everything in focus at once? What wizardry is this?" and so on.
Remember fellow writers, context is key!

 

[ronde]

I totally agree. I often write stories based in the time period of the American Civil War. I get comments from people who apparently have no idea about what that war did to the common people on both sides who were not combatants. Too often they seem to apply today's morals and ethics to that time period when in fact, society was a completely different place then. Slavery was an abhorrent way to treat people, but most whites in both the North and South didn't have it much better. The majority on both sides were subsistence farmers, and when the war came to their farm, they lost everything, often including their lives. Regardless of the reason those farmers sent their sons and often husbands off to fight, the fact is that many did not come back to pick up where they left off. That left women to fend for themselves as best they could. There were very few occupations available to women of that time. Almost all work was manual labor, and women often had children at home. More than a few turned to prostitution to keep their families fed until they could find another man to provide for them.

Without that understanding, it easy to read one of my stories and assume I'm portraying one side or the other as "right", when all I'm doing is trying to show the emotional toll that war took on every person on both sides.

 

[Wifetheif]

I totally agree. I often write stories based in the time period of the American Civil War. I get comments from people who apparently have no idea about what that war did to the common people on both sides who were not combatants. Too often they seem to apply today's morals and ethics to that time period when in fact, society was a completely different place then. Slavery was an abhorrent way to treat people, but most whites in both the North and South didn't have it much better. The majority on both sides were subsistence farmers, and when the war came to their farm, they lost everything, often including their lives. Regardless of the reason those farmers sent their sons and often husbands off to fight, the fact is that many did not come back to pick up where they left off. That left women to fend for themselves as best they could. There were very few occupations available to women of that time. Almost all work was manual labor, and women often had children at home. More than a few turned to prostitution to keep their families fed until they could find another man to provide for them.

Without that understanding, it easy to read one of my stories and assume I'm portraying one side or the other as "right", when all I'm doing is trying to show the emotional toll that war took on every person on both sides.

You make a lot of valid points. I'm something of a student of the civil war as well and agree with you. Before the war and during the war Americans on both sides were conflicted about slavery. The right to keep slaves was the main reason the confederate states seceeded but it was not the only one as some slave states like Delaware stayed in the union. There was a plan by Lincoln to try and forestall the war by offering the slave owners compensation for their slaves. To buy all of them with the intention of freeing them. He called in Delaware's lone representative to congress to discuss it. The Rep. said it was great idea but would never work because many slave owners saw their chattel as more than mere property. The loved them, after a fashion, and considered them part of the family; even felt a kind of kinship with them. They didn't love them enough to free them or treat them decently, but those are different issues. I like reading alternative histories, the best are really good but the bad ones stand out more because of how bad and implausible they are. "Bad Civil War Alternate Histories" would make a wicked literary "Jeopardy" catagory. Thank you for your comments.