[ Me ]
Nickname: Ursula
Birthday: 7th January 1985
Zodiac: Capricorn
Where From: Singapore
Laidback, sensitive, fickle, easily-tickled, fiercely loyal
Manga and anime lover, enthusist, collector and critic/ Coffee lover, addict and expert maker/ Aspiring future wife of famous culinary chef/ Aspiring future wife of a 1.8m tall hunk
My Friendster link:
http://www.friendster.com/vivis
[ Likes ]
Sleeping, dancing, books, manga, anime, chocolates, coffee, Jap food, Italian food, Ayumi Hamasaki, people, my sister
[ Fave Books ]
Harry Potter series, Artemis Fowl series, The Inheritence Trilogy series, The Da Vinci Code, Memoir of a Geisha, I Don't Know How She Does It... and all my comics n manga!!!
[ Currently Reading ]
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
by Susanna Clarke
Inkheart
by Cornelia Funke
The Well Of Loneliness
by Radclyffe Hall
Midnight's Children
by Salman Rushdie
Madame Sadayakko: The Geisha Who Seduced The West
by Lesley Downer
The Unbearable Lightness Of Being
by Milan Kundera
The Historian
by Elizabeth Kostova
[ The Wishlist ]
My Amazon.com Wishlist:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/ref=yourlists_pop_1/103-2401787-9502236
Phillips MC235 Thin Stereo Microsystem
Kathy Van Zeeland bag
(saw on amazon.com going for bout US$65... Why dun Singapore stock her goods??! >.< I wan it in Topaz colour~!!!)
The Lord of the Rings
by J.R.R. Tolkien
Inu-Yasha Theme Song Collection
12 Kingdoms/ Juuni Kokuki anime VCD sets
GUESS bag (darn, i dun have the $120 required to buy it now and i noe it'll be gone soon, Guess always changing their apparels every month or so u_u)
DKNY gold and crystal-studded watch (very ornamental, more a dress watch then an every-funtion watch. still, pretty~)
Mphosis pale gold SLIPPERS (i run through my shoes and slippers like they cost nth X/)
The BodyShop BLUSHER in Golden Pink
The BodyShop blusher BRUSH
Shiseido eyelash CURLER
Full-length wall MIRROR(s) for my room
A new big every-purpose BAG
Pretty SHOES
A Digital CAMERA
A bloody new PC or laptop with the speed of light and a gazillion GB of memory!! =[
The Sims 2 (PC game edition)
[ The Memories ]
Saturday, October 08, 2005
Art vs. Aestheticized Erotica
Been watching the anime Peace Maker on Central, and in the past two days, discovered how it is getting more and more sexually implicit...
its not jus the spy shagging the enemy to get info thingy - thats quite explicit even to the undiscerning viewer - but the unspoken but thinly disguised yaoi elements in it...
wat with all the blushings when two male characters held hands, the master-servant relationships, the sexual insinuations between samurai comrades, all the peach blossoms and sakura petals flying about when two male characters exchange words or looks... and the biggest giveaway of all: the effiminated, androgynous-looking and behaving male characters.
Quite frankly, i dun see wat bigger roles the female characters (i.e. Saya and the female spies) have other than as an effort of the producers to incorporate some 'healthy', feminine attraction in the anime in a bid to convince the rest of the viewers that this show is not blatantly gay. Taking them away to be replaced by more androgynous male characters certainly wun alter the story plot much.
I wonder how the male fans of this anime wud think of all these?
Obviously this anime attracts the male becos of all the fighting, the violence, the characters comraderie, the real-life history background on which the story is based (during Japan's Meiji era), the intriguing spies-ninjas-samurais plot and code of honour bullshit. Oh, and the beautiful art/animation and soundtrack too.
While some girls will also be attracted by these genre of animation, i think the majority also become enthralled becos of the yaoi elements in it.
Though most gals will deny this when asked face to face, till they're blue in the face and out of breath, it remains that there's jus something beguiling about the boy-boy love affair.
Jus like how lesbian love (or rather, jus the sex act) attracts boys so much.
(Wats better than one naked female body? Two naked female bodies. Wats better than one naked male bod? Two naked male bods. Wats better than two naked male bods? Three naked male bods...)
And in the world of manga and animation, there is jus something inexorably appealing about the aesthetics of the bodies of two same-sex characters entwined together, accentuated by a usually mood-enhancing background or atmosphere created by the artist's expert hand.
Even for the straight person, i suspect it wud be the same.
Jus some voyeuristic insight into how the not-so-straight pple think, feel or behave.
(But then again, most such manga and anime scenarios are very aesthetically-enhanced and the plot romanticized. Or they may jus incorporate too much exaggeration or humour. And most of the artists who drew them may not even be crooked themselves and therefore, have drawn these stories out of their own romanticized and tweaked imaginations. Then again, its interesting to see things from their point of views also, so this may not be totally incongruent.)
This anime and its themes sure wud make a very interesting study for english literature, no?
+ Ursula r e m e m b e r s again + 3:33 AM
