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Graceling (Paperback)
Cashore, Kristin / Graphia / 2009년 9월
평점 : 
Well, I don't like stories where the male protagonist becomes disabled. That's why I deducted 1 star.
I think the writer struggled a lot with the "superhuman" female protagonist because we (or at least 'I') have this conventional belief that for a romance to happen, our heroine should fall in love with a man who is (at least slightly) superior to her. (I know i am biased, and I can't help it!)
Haven't we already watched this type in Rochester, a tyrant-turned-disabled hero in Jane Eyre? Reading Jane Eyre and another work by Bronte, Villette, I wondered if maming the male protagonist or making him disappear is the only way for a female author to negotiate her heroine's free will in the choking partriarcal society? Okay, let's say that was a dilemma more than a century ago.
Back to Graceling, if I say that from this superhuman or super-strong heorine, I see modern women stuck in the same dilemma, am I going too far? Oh, I don't think so. I saw many women still struggling with the delimma (including myself). It was shocking to see my Canadian flatmate Lorna, who was supposed to be 'radical' as an anthopologist major, still had a strong fantasy about a man's courting - the kneeling down and popping the question stuff.
In reality, it has been painful to live with two contradicting desires - one to be independent, professional and strong, and the other to project this bugging ego to someone bigger, stronger than me in the bliss of romance. And my romance has always ended up as 'multiple splices' in me, usually hurting the men and hurting myself more. A 'so-called' feminist wirter in my culture more than a decade ago said that we are waiting for "a prince" waving the banner of feminism. I pretended to be very critical to the statement, but, honsetly,....Damn.....how I was jealous about the girls who were extremly~~~~ lucky to find the prince with the right banner.
Again back to Graceling, well...I am conveniently biased and I want to see could-have-beens in reality come true in fiction, which means....."Hey, give me the prince, not a man disabled enough to guarantee a female partner's independence, and don't give a shit that, men, when only disabled, are able to 'alllow' women to be independent and have their own way." I want to dismiss fictions that remind me of the reality - It is only the wolves' reality that an alpha female and an alpha male are nicely together; in human reality, alpha males don't want leader females (they just want trophies - beautifully stuffed and comfortably dumb)! Is it too much to expect to see a single man who can 'bear' strong and powerful women while still holding his strength and masculinity intact? Show me such men in fiction; I don't expect to see one living example in reality. So please give me (at least) vicarious satisfaction - That's why I read fictions, not documentaries.
Lastly, I don't like a fiction that leaves me in discontent!
* I ordered the prequel of this novel - Fire