Carrie, where do I begin..

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carrie's younger brother

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2012
5,428
25,651
NJ
I had forgotten all about Soft Cell. They went kind of to the dark side in the later albums i.e the song 'Sex Dwarf', etc. but still made great music! Love Yazoo (called simply Yaz here in the US)!
My friends and I relived our youth a few years ago and saw Yaz on a "reunion" tour. They were amazing! Allison Moyet's voice was absolutely perfect!
 

kingricefan

All-being, keeper of Space, Time & Dimension.
Jul 11, 2006
30,011
127,446
Spokane, WA
My friends and I relived our youth a few years ago and saw Yaz on a "reunion" tour. They were amazing! Allison Moyet's voice was absolutely perfect!

I love the extended version that segue's into The Supremes' Where Did Our Love Go!
Her voice is amazing! I can do a pretty good edition of 'Only You'- if we ever meet we'll have to go do some karaoke!! ;-D Allison did a guest spot on a French & Saunders episode (it was their Christmas Special) where she sang lead and F & S did background vocals but they were horrible (intentionally, for laughs) but Allison never once lost her composure and sang pitch perfect, which is very hard to do if someone is singing off-key next to you.
 

champ1966

Well-Known Member
Dec 3, 2011
4,008
10,840
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Wakefield Yorkshire England
Thanks for posting champ.
Spent many a night at clubs dancing to that song in the 80s but always keeping in mind what the lyrics were talking about. While the bullying was over by that time in my life the "scars" were still healing. I think that was something a lot of us club goers shared back in the 80s and we were expressing it in the music we listened to, art and the way we dressed.
Just downloading The Age of Consent from ITunes. Listening to Why? as the rest of the album's downloading. Scrap that, I'm listening to Ain't Necessarily So now. It's been over 25 years since I heard this song.
 

krwhiting

Well-Known Member
Jan 5, 2015
258
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Oh man where do I began with Carrie. I guess ill start by saying that every now and then a book comes along and violently blind sides you, its words triggering a monumental shift in your thinking like a magical incantation. You never see it coming, but when it does it ruthlessly plows through your mind smashing concepts into dust and turning on lights. In the end It leaves you reeling, confused and suddenly questioning everything. Such a book changes you, and in a way becomes a part of who you are.

Thats how Carrie was for me and Ill tell you why if you have the patience. I was just a kid when I read it. It was the first non kids book I ever read and once I started I couldnt put it down. As the story of Carrie revealed itself to me i remember feeling a sliver of disquiet, like I was doing something wrong.

As I came to understand the plot that sliver of disquiet flared into full blown anxiety. Carrie is a simple and unapologetically brutal story about a victimised girl who finally says "enough", she takes a stand and holds those who harmed her accountable, and that scared me for some reason. But I continued reading regardless. Uncomfortable or not I suddenly felt this powerful compulsion to finish it. I had this overwhelming certainty that there was something in the story I needed to see, something important between the lines. So, grabbing a flash light I crawled into the small storage space under the stairs, shut the door and continued to read.

My anxiety grew as I read through the first half. I knew there was something there, something crucial, I needed to understand but for the life of me I couldnt grasp it. I remember feeling a sense of panic at this point. I was afraid I would miss it or get caught by my uncle for reading and never get to finish. At this point I was no longer reading a fiction, i was reading a survival manual though I didnt know why.

Then, half way through the story it hit me. Anger, I was suddenly angry at the people who abused Carrie, angry because they where wrong, and because Carrie didnt deserve it. By the time I finished the book I felt shaken and confused. The confusion came from my anger, because in my world abuse was a normal part of day to day life. I never even considered the possibility that it was wrong for them to treat me that way, or that it didnt happen to everybody, untill now.

Being kicked around was normal and expected, but more than that it was the only way I got attention. Now that I knew it was wrong i found myself afraid it would stop. Because that would mean getting no attention at all, leaving me ignored and alone.

Being a kid, I ignorantly believed that the physical abuse would stop once I told them it was actually wrong. So when I finally worked up the courage to tell them as much it went over like a turd in punch bowl. I quickly discovered I didnt need to worry about being ignored because after our talk they paid a LOT of attention to me. That beating was the worse I ever caught, but it was also the first time it made me angry. Needing an escape, I read Carrie again and my eyes where opened even more.

Eventually the beatings stopped, I got big enough to hit back, and as they say, the rest is history. I owe a lot to Stephen King for writing that book. Not only did It showe me that people didnt have the right to be abusive or disrespectful towards, it opened my eyes and encouraged me to stand up for myself.

Sorry for the rant, I just wanted to share my experience with Carrie.

So my question to you is this, have you experienced anything similar with a book? If so which one?

-Erik

To Erik's last question: Yes. When I read "A Separate Peace" and it exposed my inner darkness to myself.

Here's something I saw in Carrie that spoke to me:

"But hardly anybody ever finds out that their actions really, actually, hurt other people! People don't get better, they just get smarter. When you get smarter, you don't stop pulling the wings off flies, you just think of better reasons for doing it."

True. Amen brother. Park it right there and Preach it!

William Buckley once said the same thing on Firing Line (in different words of course). My quote won't be perfect, but this is the gist of it:

"We think we've advanced morally from our ancestors because we no longer burn witches. But we haven't. We simply no longer believe in witches. If we did believe in them, we'd be burning them."

Kelly
 

krwhiting

Well-Known Member
Jan 5, 2015
258
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I remember years ago not reading Carrie (I'd never seen the movie) because I didn't find the idea frightening. I mean, a girl with telekinesis? Whatever. This time I read it because I'm trying to read more of King's work and because I felt as if I'd missed something. I did watch the newer movie with my older kids a couple weeks ago (it was ok). But once I was reading it, I saw the fright in it. I mean, a hormonal, mistreated teen-age girl, raised in a weird and distorted religious swamp, with no outlets for her personality, who has the power to kill on a whim...that is frightening. Makes me think about how important it is to raise our kids carefully, and right.

Kelly