I'm a senior contributor at Book Riot. My fiction has been published in Kaleidoscope, Deaf Poets Society, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, and Corporeal Lit Mag. My fiction and literary criticism on disability and feminism is frequently cited and taught all around the world. As a college junior in 2009, I wrote " 'Light is the Left Hand of Darkness': Deconstructing Gender Binarisms," an essay on Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness that is still read and taught today. More work, including fan fiction, personal essays, and my interpretations of ableism in Freud's The Uncanny, is at my personal website: https://gracelapointe.wordpress.com/.
KAOS, which premiered on Netflix on August 29th, is often described as the ancient Greek gods in ... more KAOS, which premiered on Netflix on August 29th, is often described as the ancient Greek gods in a modern setting. I initially described it this way myself when watching the early episodes, but by the end of Season 1, my interpretation was much more complex. I noticed lots of Latin words and influences from ancient Roman history, although many articles about KAOS mention Greek mythology only. KAOS combines influences from ancient Greek and Roman cultures, 21st-century science fiction like The Hunger Games and Black Mirror, and more. It's a modern SFF show with mythological trappings. Charlie Covell, who described themselves as a mythology nerd in interviews, wrote and created the show. They have a lot of knowledge of ancient mythology, along with creative departures from the source materials. However, like most streaming shows, KAOS has been marketed in reductive ways that do it and viewers a disservice. This show is polarizing, but I think this is partly because marketing creates unclear audience expectations.
I recently blogged about The Bright Sword and its use of the ableist magical cure trope. I also w... more I recently blogged about The Bright Sword and its use of the ableist magical cure trope. I also wrote, "One of my favorite aspects of recent Arthurian retellings is that they expose Merlin as an abuser" who enables rape. In that post, I mentioned another recent Arthurian novel: Morgan Is My Name by Sophie Keetch. By now, I've also read Le Fay, the second book of Keetch's excellent series. I also watched Excalibur, John Boorman's 1981 film inspired by Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory. All three of these modern King Arthur adaptations depict Merlin as a sexual abuser. Merlin's glamoring of Uther Pendragon enables Uther to deceive and rape Gorlois' wife, Igraine. Earlier, I mentioned that when I was in college, our professor, Helga Duncan, explained that Merlin uses magic to enable rape in Malory's text Le Morte D'Arthur. She showed us clips from the film Excalibur in class in 2011. The beginning of the film follows Le Morte D'Arthur well. It depicts Merlin glamouring Uther to look like Gorlois. I've never seen that in any of the numerous other King Arthur movies I've watched. Young Morgan (called Morgana here) watches Uther enter her mother's bedroom after dreaming that her father is already dead. Uther later complains that Morgana "keeps watching me with her father's eyes." Igraine is traumatized and furious when she realizes what Uther did to her.
In this novel, thousands of years after a nuclear war, the Catholic Church is one of the world’s ... more In this novel, thousands of years after a nuclear war, the Catholic Church is one of the world’s only remaining educational, news, and societal institutions. This gives the novel a medieval European atmosphere, despite its far-future setting. In an ancient fallout shelter, the protagonist finds everyday artifacts from a 20th-century engineer, but he considers them the relics of a saint. This book was originally published in 1959, and it contains a lot of racist stereotypes of Indigenous peoples from the Americas. Though it’s imaginative and contains interesting ideas, I wanted to list and analyze some examples of this novel’s constant racism, antisemitism, and ableism.
In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, the monster exhibits several qualities associated with poet... more In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, the monster exhibits several qualities associated with poets and artists in the Romantic tradition. Like many poets and artist figures in Romantic writing, he is often physically isolated from others, and his intellect seems to alienate him emotionally...The monster illustrates qualities often associated with artists in Romantic poetry, such as sensitivity, curiosity, and alienation, showing that these traits are inherent rather than instilled through culture.
Bella Baxter’s existence is obviously impossible but nevertheless functions as a disability in th... more Bella Baxter’s existence is obviously impossible but nevertheless functions as a disability in the sci-fi setting of the film. The film fetishizes the fact that Bella Baxter doesn’t understand sex, consent, or social mores. Yorgos Lanthimos' movie also adds a new, reanimated character, Felicity, who embodies ableist stereotypes even more than Bella does.
This is a follow-up to my recent essay on ableism in Poor Things and The Lobster. This post may n... more This is a follow-up to my recent essay on ableism in Poor Things and The Lobster. This post may not make sense without reading my earlier post first. I couldn't fit all my thoughts into one essay, as usual! Poor Things was nominated for 11 Academy Awards. It just won four: production design, costume design, hair & makeup, and best actress (Emma Stone as Bella Baxter). I hoped Lily Gladstone would win instead. Even if Poor Things is attempting satire, it is ableist anyway, because of actors mimicking disabilities and the director and writers using disability for comedic effect or shock value. I believe all works of art are subject to many, possibly contradictory, interpretations, beyond
Poor Things is ableist because of its use of prosthetics to simulate facial differences and its e... more Poor Things is ableist because of its use of prosthetics to simulate facial differences and its explicit comparison of Bella Baxter, who has a baby’s brain and an adult’s body, to people with intellectual disabilities....Bella literally has a baby’s brain in an adult’s body. She literalizes and embodies a common, ableist myth about disabled people: that adults with intellectual or developmental disabilities are children or have child-like brains in adult bodies...So, if there is a possible disability or feminist parallel here, it’s a misguided and faulty one.
Through Prince Lír’s doomed infatuation with Lady Amalthea (the unicorn’s human form), The Last U... more Through Prince Lír’s doomed infatuation with Lady Amalthea (the unicorn’s human form), The Last Unicorn exposes the ironies and illusions of courtly love.
I wrote a slightly different version of this essay in fall 2010 for Helga Duncan’s Shakespeare co... more I wrote a slightly different version of this essay in fall 2010 for Helga Duncan’s Shakespeare course at Stonehill College and presented it in April 2011 at Stonehill’s Undergrad Literary Conference. I’ve copied the essay below but edited it slightly now. Like with my 2009 essay on The Left Hand of Darkness, I’d write it differently today. So, I tried to edit out any language that seemed unintentionally trans-exclusionary.
My thesis: it’s not “femininity,” which is hard to define anyway, that’s a threat to power in Macbeth. It’s more generally anyone who confounds or defies gender binaries and hierarchies. The play itself supports this reading — for example, when Banquo meets the witches and struggles to characterize their gender(s).
This is a follow-up to my essay "Dune's Intellectual Ableism as a Function of Its White Supremacy... more This is a follow-up to my essay "Dune's Intellectual Ableism as a Function of Its White Supremacy," which I posted on my Medium blog in October 2022. Although the series tries to critique absolute power, the extent to which Paul Atreides succeeds at transforming Arrakis ecologically, supplanting existing religions, subjugating entire planets, and being worshipped is itself white supremacist. I also try to analyze the series' racism and ableism and its attempts to satirize Christ figures.
In 2020, I posted an essay on my Medium blog arguing that Rhysand from Sarah J. Maas' series A Co... more In 2020, I posted an essay on my Medium blog arguing that Rhysand from Sarah J. Maas' series A Court of Thorns and Roses is an abuser, not a feminist or a good partner. This is important because Rhys repeatedly is described as a feminist, both inside and outside the text. The books themselves are also often called feminist. I'd have less of an issue with ACoTaR if the series and its fans described the story as abusive, or a villain or bully fantasy, instead of a feminist romance.
My overall opinion hasn’t changed since then, but I wanted to clarify my arguments and add new observations. I couldn’t address everything I wanted to in my first essay. I focused on their relationship, not every important aspect of the series. Here, I’ll also examine the series’ double standards regarding sexual assault and gender and its world-building that’s insensitive to real history.
O Caledonia is a nuanced depiction of a lonely, bookish child’s consciousness, but it’s also cons... more O Caledonia is a nuanced depiction of a lonely, bookish child’s consciousness, but it’s also consistently ableist. It depicts disabled people, particularly men with obvious, physical disabilities, as horrifying and violent. The novel never dispels this ableist impression. In fact, it foreshadows disabled men as threatening, leads up to this idea, and reinforces it in the final pages.
Readers may be familiar with Lady Chatterley's Lover, a Modernist novel by D. H. Lawrence, becaus... more Readers may be familiar with Lady Chatterley's Lover, a Modernist novel by D. H. Lawrence, because it faced censorship and obscenity trials around the world. First published privately in 1928, it was not widely available in the U.S. and the UK until the early 1960s. It's infamous for explicit sex scenes, and many readers consider it feminist for frankly depicting a woman's sexual desires. Among disabled readers, it's infamous for another reason: its ableism. As a disabled woman, I'll never consider it feminist. A female, non-disabled character's sexual liberation shouldn't be at the expense of disparaging a disabled, male character.
In this casual Medium blog post, I analyze which New Who plot and character design elements hold ... more In this casual Medium blog post, I analyze which New Who plot and character design elements hold up well and which ones "would never fly today." Overall, I find the show unusually diverse and progressive. Its diversity regarding race, LGBTQIA identities, religion, and disability has improved over the past few years.
My casual, angry January 2020 blog post on antisemitism, LGBTmisia, ableism, and the use of the u... more My casual, angry January 2020 blog post on antisemitism, LGBTmisia, ableism, and the use of the uncanny in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ
The 2022 fantasy novel Fairy Tale by Stephen King is replete with ableist tropes, as is typical o... more The 2022 fantasy novel Fairy Tale by Stephen King is replete with ableist tropes, as is typical of many novels inspired by fairy tales. The inhabitants of the magical land of Empis experience a disabling epidemic. The story depicts disability as monstrous, grotesque, punishment, revenge, and a curse, which is magically cured. The residents also need the protagonist, Charlie Reade, a white, non-disabled boy whose hair turns from brown to blond and whose eyes turn from brown to blue during his time in Empis-to save them from the curse. This combines an abled savior from another world, who fits prophecies of a Chosen One figure, with a magical cure narrative. The novel's constant, casually ableist language repeatedly calls non-disabled people "whole people" and conflates people with dwarfism with malevolent, fairy tale dwarfs. Fairy Tale relies on ancient, ableist stereotypes and archetypes from folklore, which are often unintentional and unconscious. This can make them hard to avoid unless authors and publishers are familiar with literary ableism and consciously try not to perpetuate it.
Paul Atreides, the protagonist and controversial messiah figure from the classic 1965 sci-fi nove... more Paul Atreides, the protagonist and controversial messiah figure from the classic 1965 sci-fi novel Dune by Frank Herbert, is a result of the Bene Gesserit Order’s centuries-long eugenics program. A nominally religious organization, the Order uses telepathy, secrecy, religious trappings, and mythology to secure political power. Many critics have addressed the white supremacy, white saviorism, and Orientalist tropes inherent in these prophecies. As a eugenics program to breed a male messiah called the Kwisatz Haderach, the Bene Gesserit’s overarching plan is manipulative, sexist, and racist. Their goal of creating a brilliant, intellectually gifted man is necessarily intellectually ableist as well.
Note: I wanted to write this blog post on my Medium because I couldn’t find anything calling the Bene Gesserit intellectually ableist. The Kwisatz Haderach is the logical culmination of eugenic quests to produce a “superior” or “gifted” child.
I use Cy Jillian Weise's term tryborg and apply it to Neolution, the cult from the Space/BBC Amer... more I use Cy Jillian Weise's term tryborg and apply it to Neolution, the cult from the Space/BBC America TV show. As tryborgs and transhumanists, Neolutionists seek to transcend and improve upon humanity and consider disabled people defective and inferior. Although some of their tryborg tech may resemble the assistive tech that disabled people use, their eugenicist ideology is diametrically opposed to disabled people, diversity, and accessibility. Neolution wants to be or control the next stage of human evolution. I checked Google and Twitter, and I think I may be the first to call Orphan Black’s Neolution tryborgs. I first called them tryborgs on my Twitter and in a WordPress blog post on March 27, 2022.
Rachel Duncan, a clone who is raised as a member of Neolution, becomes a cyborg, not a tryborg, after she becomes disabled. She later leaves Neolution.
KAOS, which premiered on Netflix on August 29th, is often described as the ancient Greek gods in ... more KAOS, which premiered on Netflix on August 29th, is often described as the ancient Greek gods in a modern setting. I initially described it this way myself when watching the early episodes, but by the end of Season 1, my interpretation was much more complex. I noticed lots of Latin words and influences from ancient Roman history, although many articles about KAOS mention Greek mythology only. KAOS combines influences from ancient Greek and Roman cultures, 21st-century science fiction like The Hunger Games and Black Mirror, and more. It's a modern SFF show with mythological trappings. Charlie Covell, who described themselves as a mythology nerd in interviews, wrote and created the show. They have a lot of knowledge of ancient mythology, along with creative departures from the source materials. However, like most streaming shows, KAOS has been marketed in reductive ways that do it and viewers a disservice. This show is polarizing, but I think this is partly because marketing creates unclear audience expectations.
I recently blogged about The Bright Sword and its use of the ableist magical cure trope. I also w... more I recently blogged about The Bright Sword and its use of the ableist magical cure trope. I also wrote, "One of my favorite aspects of recent Arthurian retellings is that they expose Merlin as an abuser" who enables rape. In that post, I mentioned another recent Arthurian novel: Morgan Is My Name by Sophie Keetch. By now, I've also read Le Fay, the second book of Keetch's excellent series. I also watched Excalibur, John Boorman's 1981 film inspired by Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory. All three of these modern King Arthur adaptations depict Merlin as a sexual abuser. Merlin's glamoring of Uther Pendragon enables Uther to deceive and rape Gorlois' wife, Igraine. Earlier, I mentioned that when I was in college, our professor, Helga Duncan, explained that Merlin uses magic to enable rape in Malory's text Le Morte D'Arthur. She showed us clips from the film Excalibur in class in 2011. The beginning of the film follows Le Morte D'Arthur well. It depicts Merlin glamouring Uther to look like Gorlois. I've never seen that in any of the numerous other King Arthur movies I've watched. Young Morgan (called Morgana here) watches Uther enter her mother's bedroom after dreaming that her father is already dead. Uther later complains that Morgana "keeps watching me with her father's eyes." Igraine is traumatized and furious when she realizes what Uther did to her.
In this novel, thousands of years after a nuclear war, the Catholic Church is one of the world’s ... more In this novel, thousands of years after a nuclear war, the Catholic Church is one of the world’s only remaining educational, news, and societal institutions. This gives the novel a medieval European atmosphere, despite its far-future setting. In an ancient fallout shelter, the protagonist finds everyday artifacts from a 20th-century engineer, but he considers them the relics of a saint. This book was originally published in 1959, and it contains a lot of racist stereotypes of Indigenous peoples from the Americas. Though it’s imaginative and contains interesting ideas, I wanted to list and analyze some examples of this novel’s constant racism, antisemitism, and ableism.
In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, the monster exhibits several qualities associated with poet... more In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, the monster exhibits several qualities associated with poets and artists in the Romantic tradition. Like many poets and artist figures in Romantic writing, he is often physically isolated from others, and his intellect seems to alienate him emotionally...The monster illustrates qualities often associated with artists in Romantic poetry, such as sensitivity, curiosity, and alienation, showing that these traits are inherent rather than instilled through culture.
Bella Baxter’s existence is obviously impossible but nevertheless functions as a disability in th... more Bella Baxter’s existence is obviously impossible but nevertheless functions as a disability in the sci-fi setting of the film. The film fetishizes the fact that Bella Baxter doesn’t understand sex, consent, or social mores. Yorgos Lanthimos' movie also adds a new, reanimated character, Felicity, who embodies ableist stereotypes even more than Bella does.
This is a follow-up to my recent essay on ableism in Poor Things and The Lobster. This post may n... more This is a follow-up to my recent essay on ableism in Poor Things and The Lobster. This post may not make sense without reading my earlier post first. I couldn't fit all my thoughts into one essay, as usual! Poor Things was nominated for 11 Academy Awards. It just won four: production design, costume design, hair & makeup, and best actress (Emma Stone as Bella Baxter). I hoped Lily Gladstone would win instead. Even if Poor Things is attempting satire, it is ableist anyway, because of actors mimicking disabilities and the director and writers using disability for comedic effect or shock value. I believe all works of art are subject to many, possibly contradictory, interpretations, beyond
Poor Things is ableist because of its use of prosthetics to simulate facial differences and its e... more Poor Things is ableist because of its use of prosthetics to simulate facial differences and its explicit comparison of Bella Baxter, who has a baby’s brain and an adult’s body, to people with intellectual disabilities....Bella literally has a baby’s brain in an adult’s body. She literalizes and embodies a common, ableist myth about disabled people: that adults with intellectual or developmental disabilities are children or have child-like brains in adult bodies...So, if there is a possible disability or feminist parallel here, it’s a misguided and faulty one.
Through Prince Lír’s doomed infatuation with Lady Amalthea (the unicorn’s human form), The Last U... more Through Prince Lír’s doomed infatuation with Lady Amalthea (the unicorn’s human form), The Last Unicorn exposes the ironies and illusions of courtly love.
I wrote a slightly different version of this essay in fall 2010 for Helga Duncan’s Shakespeare co... more I wrote a slightly different version of this essay in fall 2010 for Helga Duncan’s Shakespeare course at Stonehill College and presented it in April 2011 at Stonehill’s Undergrad Literary Conference. I’ve copied the essay below but edited it slightly now. Like with my 2009 essay on The Left Hand of Darkness, I’d write it differently today. So, I tried to edit out any language that seemed unintentionally trans-exclusionary.
My thesis: it’s not “femininity,” which is hard to define anyway, that’s a threat to power in Macbeth. It’s more generally anyone who confounds or defies gender binaries and hierarchies. The play itself supports this reading — for example, when Banquo meets the witches and struggles to characterize their gender(s).
This is a follow-up to my essay "Dune's Intellectual Ableism as a Function of Its White Supremacy... more This is a follow-up to my essay "Dune's Intellectual Ableism as a Function of Its White Supremacy," which I posted on my Medium blog in October 2022. Although the series tries to critique absolute power, the extent to which Paul Atreides succeeds at transforming Arrakis ecologically, supplanting existing religions, subjugating entire planets, and being worshipped is itself white supremacist. I also try to analyze the series' racism and ableism and its attempts to satirize Christ figures.
In 2020, I posted an essay on my Medium blog arguing that Rhysand from Sarah J. Maas' series A Co... more In 2020, I posted an essay on my Medium blog arguing that Rhysand from Sarah J. Maas' series A Court of Thorns and Roses is an abuser, not a feminist or a good partner. This is important because Rhys repeatedly is described as a feminist, both inside and outside the text. The books themselves are also often called feminist. I'd have less of an issue with ACoTaR if the series and its fans described the story as abusive, or a villain or bully fantasy, instead of a feminist romance.
My overall opinion hasn’t changed since then, but I wanted to clarify my arguments and add new observations. I couldn’t address everything I wanted to in my first essay. I focused on their relationship, not every important aspect of the series. Here, I’ll also examine the series’ double standards regarding sexual assault and gender and its world-building that’s insensitive to real history.
O Caledonia is a nuanced depiction of a lonely, bookish child’s consciousness, but it’s also cons... more O Caledonia is a nuanced depiction of a lonely, bookish child’s consciousness, but it’s also consistently ableist. It depicts disabled people, particularly men with obvious, physical disabilities, as horrifying and violent. The novel never dispels this ableist impression. In fact, it foreshadows disabled men as threatening, leads up to this idea, and reinforces it in the final pages.
Readers may be familiar with Lady Chatterley's Lover, a Modernist novel by D. H. Lawrence, becaus... more Readers may be familiar with Lady Chatterley's Lover, a Modernist novel by D. H. Lawrence, because it faced censorship and obscenity trials around the world. First published privately in 1928, it was not widely available in the U.S. and the UK until the early 1960s. It's infamous for explicit sex scenes, and many readers consider it feminist for frankly depicting a woman's sexual desires. Among disabled readers, it's infamous for another reason: its ableism. As a disabled woman, I'll never consider it feminist. A female, non-disabled character's sexual liberation shouldn't be at the expense of disparaging a disabled, male character.
In this casual Medium blog post, I analyze which New Who plot and character design elements hold ... more In this casual Medium blog post, I analyze which New Who plot and character design elements hold up well and which ones "would never fly today." Overall, I find the show unusually diverse and progressive. Its diversity regarding race, LGBTQIA identities, religion, and disability has improved over the past few years.
My casual, angry January 2020 blog post on antisemitism, LGBTmisia, ableism, and the use of the u... more My casual, angry January 2020 blog post on antisemitism, LGBTmisia, ableism, and the use of the uncanny in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ
The 2022 fantasy novel Fairy Tale by Stephen King is replete with ableist tropes, as is typical o... more The 2022 fantasy novel Fairy Tale by Stephen King is replete with ableist tropes, as is typical of many novels inspired by fairy tales. The inhabitants of the magical land of Empis experience a disabling epidemic. The story depicts disability as monstrous, grotesque, punishment, revenge, and a curse, which is magically cured. The residents also need the protagonist, Charlie Reade, a white, non-disabled boy whose hair turns from brown to blond and whose eyes turn from brown to blue during his time in Empis-to save them from the curse. This combines an abled savior from another world, who fits prophecies of a Chosen One figure, with a magical cure narrative. The novel's constant, casually ableist language repeatedly calls non-disabled people "whole people" and conflates people with dwarfism with malevolent, fairy tale dwarfs. Fairy Tale relies on ancient, ableist stereotypes and archetypes from folklore, which are often unintentional and unconscious. This can make them hard to avoid unless authors and publishers are familiar with literary ableism and consciously try not to perpetuate it.
Paul Atreides, the protagonist and controversial messiah figure from the classic 1965 sci-fi nove... more Paul Atreides, the protagonist and controversial messiah figure from the classic 1965 sci-fi novel Dune by Frank Herbert, is a result of the Bene Gesserit Order’s centuries-long eugenics program. A nominally religious organization, the Order uses telepathy, secrecy, religious trappings, and mythology to secure political power. Many critics have addressed the white supremacy, white saviorism, and Orientalist tropes inherent in these prophecies. As a eugenics program to breed a male messiah called the Kwisatz Haderach, the Bene Gesserit’s overarching plan is manipulative, sexist, and racist. Their goal of creating a brilliant, intellectually gifted man is necessarily intellectually ableist as well.
Note: I wanted to write this blog post on my Medium because I couldn’t find anything calling the Bene Gesserit intellectually ableist. The Kwisatz Haderach is the logical culmination of eugenic quests to produce a “superior” or “gifted” child.
I use Cy Jillian Weise's term tryborg and apply it to Neolution, the cult from the Space/BBC Amer... more I use Cy Jillian Weise's term tryborg and apply it to Neolution, the cult from the Space/BBC America TV show. As tryborgs and transhumanists, Neolutionists seek to transcend and improve upon humanity and consider disabled people defective and inferior. Although some of their tryborg tech may resemble the assistive tech that disabled people use, their eugenicist ideology is diametrically opposed to disabled people, diversity, and accessibility. Neolution wants to be or control the next stage of human evolution. I checked Google and Twitter, and I think I may be the first to call Orphan Black’s Neolution tryborgs. I first called them tryborgs on my Twitter and in a WordPress blog post on March 27, 2022.
Rachel Duncan, a clone who is raised as a member of Neolution, becomes a cyborg, not a tryborg, after she becomes disabled. She later leaves Neolution.
I enjoyed The Bright Sword, Lev Grossman's new fantasy novel, despite some issues. I loved its de... more I enjoyed The Bright Sword, Lev Grossman's new fantasy novel, despite some issues. I loved its depiction of fairies, the Otherworld, and Morgan Le Fay's justified hatred of Merlin. In many Arthurian legends, Merlin facilitates rape. This is why I hate depictions of Merlin as a benign mentor figure. I was relieved that, like several other recent retellings, The Bright Sword depicts Merlin as abusive and refuses to gloss over this. I enjoyed its reimagining of Arthurian legends, but I disliked the use of the magical cure trope to remove Sir Bedivere's disability.
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My thesis: it’s not “femininity,” which is hard to define anyway, that’s a threat to power in Macbeth. It’s more generally anyone who confounds or defies gender binaries and hierarchies. The play itself supports this reading — for example, when Banquo meets the witches and struggles to characterize their gender(s).
My overall opinion hasn’t changed since then, but I wanted to clarify my arguments and add new observations. I couldn’t address everything I wanted to in my first essay. I focused on their relationship, not every important aspect of the series. Here, I’ll also examine the series’ double standards regarding sexual assault and gender and its world-building that’s insensitive to real history.
Note: I wanted to write this blog post on my Medium because I couldn’t find anything calling the Bene Gesserit intellectually ableist. The Kwisatz Haderach is the logical culmination of eugenic quests to produce a “superior” or “gifted” child.
Rachel Duncan, a clone who is raised as a member of Neolution, becomes a cyborg, not a tryborg, after she becomes disabled. She later leaves Neolution.
My thesis: it’s not “femininity,” which is hard to define anyway, that’s a threat to power in Macbeth. It’s more generally anyone who confounds or defies gender binaries and hierarchies. The play itself supports this reading — for example, when Banquo meets the witches and struggles to characterize their gender(s).
My overall opinion hasn’t changed since then, but I wanted to clarify my arguments and add new observations. I couldn’t address everything I wanted to in my first essay. I focused on their relationship, not every important aspect of the series. Here, I’ll also examine the series’ double standards regarding sexual assault and gender and its world-building that’s insensitive to real history.
Note: I wanted to write this blog post on my Medium because I couldn’t find anything calling the Bene Gesserit intellectually ableist. The Kwisatz Haderach is the logical culmination of eugenic quests to produce a “superior” or “gifted” child.
Rachel Duncan, a clone who is raised as a member of Neolution, becomes a cyborg, not a tryborg, after she becomes disabled. She later leaves Neolution.
Correction: I think I made a typo in the works cited.
This review discusses The Guinevere Deception (2019), The Camelot Betrayal (2020), and The Excalibur Curse (2021).