I cannot speak on behalf of other cultures of individuals of those cultures. I cannot even speak for my culture as a whole because I’m only me. I can only speak for myself.

When reading these collections of narratives, I felt that the author did an excellent job of portraying individual experience with racial stigma in Canada, but I felt that these narratives should not be used to represent all people of the culture that was being presented. In the case of Janet, I was torn between what she was more concerned with, the fact that she was brown or the fact that she was a homosexual. Both of these identities do not label her, yet I felt that she was trying to make it so these titles made her who she was. I’m happy that her character was not ashamed of either, yet I feel that being brown and a lesbian do not attribute to who she was as a person and how life affected her. I believe that searching for the one word, in her case “Trinidadian”, to fully capture who we are as people is next to impossible.

I believe, and I know that some would disagree, that culture and race was simple details of who people are. They are the foundation of the house, but that’s it. They aren’t the home. So for that reason I felt that Out on Main Street did justly in giving insight to how some individuals see their racial difference, but much of it felt like generalizations.

Sex.

The sexualization of the story was one of the major differences between Coppola’s and Stoker’s “Dracula”. In the book, Stoker did touch on sexual details, such as the demeanour of his two female characters changing after their encounters with the vampires. However, Stoker did not touch on a back romance between the count and Mina, as well as a sexual encounter with Lucy and the wolf in the garden. Of course, it’s Hollywood and there needed to be some type of attraction for the audience to go by. Part of the fact that every female in the movie was topless is part of what made it successful. I also felt that they made the character of Lucy much more flirtatious and somewhat inappropriate than in the book. Lucy, though she was at one point courting three men, is still a lady in London and would not have subjected herself to act as she was portrayed in the film. I felt that her character was always flirtatious, but not a floozy. Whereas in the film she acted as if she were always working a brothel.

To add further to the sexual desires of each character, Coppola played down the role of J. Harker and up the role of his finacee Mina. By doing this he was able to focus the movie on a love story between Dracula and Mina, whereas in the book, the two shared no previous deep romantic connection. Harker only served real purpose at the start of the film, and when he did return in the end it seemed like he did not accomplish of develop. He became more of a back character.

The book will always be better than the movie. In many cases, not just with Dracula. For someone who wants a more action packed and grabbing plot line I would suggest the movie, since the book doesn’t have as much tension as Coppola added. I feel that though the movie came from the book, it’s more “loosely based” due to the many changes.

Kiss of the Fur Queen is one of those novels that was able to make me smile on one page and then break my heart a couple later.

The book itself, although technically “fiction”, isn’t imaginary at all. Which is what makes it so hard to wrap one’s mind around after it’s over. The entire book in it’s events are based upon real things that happened to the author Tomson Highway as he was growing up as a First-Nations member in Manitoba. Tomson Highway experienced first hand abuse during this time in the residential school system, and knowing this fact made each part of his novel that much harder to read. When Gabriel was inappropriately touched by the priest as he slept, that was real. It may have not happened to Highway directly, but it did happen to young boys or girls in the school system. And when the two brothers felt that their families would no longer understand them or their situation, those feelings were true. Many children became cut off from their old lives and were left to be conflicted from who they were and who they were told they should be. Highway, like his two protagonists’, first language is Cree. Upon entering the school system Cree was banned. There was no transition from Cree to English, the children were simply forced to never use their native tongue or names. Both boys grew up to pursue a career in the fine arts. Jeremiah had his music and Gabriel his dance. This can easily be traced back to Highway for his success in writing.

Throughout the novel, I went back and forth from what the Fur Queen meant to Highway in comparison to his characters. At the start of the novel, the Fur Queen, was a beautiful young woman who was a symbol of glory for Abraham. For this sons, however, the Fur Queen is a playful unattainable figure who appears in and out of their lives. I feel that this “Fur Queen” is meant to act as some form of light or hope for the boys. In the midst of their situation, there is a lively element that inspires them to keep going on. Perhaps this is the same small grain of hope that Highway held on to so dearly during his time in the Residential School system. If that’s the case, then this novel is almost a memoir.

EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT: Vampires are not all young, sparkly, teenaged, hollywood-looking starlets who like to prey on high school girls. Who would have known?

But all joking aside, it is nice to go back and take a look at where the world was before the Vampire Frenzy of 2009 hit the world. “The Blood Drawing Ghost” takes a much different outlook on our traditional and contemporary view of the mysterious vampires.

As per usual there is a heroin to lead the readers to the vampire, but in this case it was a girl named Kate. What I did admire about Kate was that after her encounter with the old and un-dead Michael, she became more empowered as a woman. Suddenly she wasn’t willing to travel three miles to fetch a petty walking stick for her beloved John.  During this time women were not forward with men, yet she gave her father-in-law an ultimatum to let her marry her son or leave him dead. This new type of empowerment, though not illuminated further in the story, is one that touches many vampire stories. In Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Lucy, a woman who was bitten goes from being a poised, but quite flirtatious lady, to all of a sudden become a seductress. As much as going into Twilight annoys me, I will say that the heroin, Bella, became a more bold person after her time spent with her vampire boyfriend. Could it be possible that literature wants to paint a picture that being a woman vampire all of a sudden gives women the idea that they can strive to superiority? I’d like to think so.

Another interesting point in “The Blood Drawing Ghost” was that our vampire, Michael, wasn’t portrayed in a way to be evil towards Kate. Aside from the drinking of blood, he appeared to be like any old man. He needed Kate’s assistance with travelling, he spoke of his old life before his death, and he even told Kate how she may secure herself for the future. Our modern idea of vampires has been geared towards a Nosferatu in a cape who can change into a bat at any given moment. “The Blood Drawing Ghost” was not at all like this. This further adds to the question of what a vampire really is. Is it being un-dead that gives the definition? Is it the thirst for blood? Pale skin? There is not set DNA or characteristics of a vampire due to the fact that there are hundreds of interpretations of vampires.