{"id":1201,"date":"2009-09-04T16:12:00","date_gmt":"2009-09-04T16:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1201"},"modified":"2009-09-04T16:12:00","modified_gmt":"2009-09-04T16:12:00","slug":"rivers-of-true-blood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1201","title":{"rendered":"Rivers of (True) Blood."},"content":{"rendered":"

Ever resolutely two years behind the pop-culture curve, M. and I recently watched some of True Blood<\/span>,<\/a> season 1. We had already read a little of Charlaine Harris<\/a> (one novel for me, two for her), so we knew about the whole Sookie Stackhouse milieu of “vamps” and “weres” and Harris’ whole bodice-ripping-and-biting atmosphere.<\/p>\n

We knew, for example, that the collie dog was really Sam the restaurant owner, who is a were-collie. (Our collie is a ninja collie–much easier to deal with.)<\/p>\n

(If Louisiana did not exist, would it be necessary to invent it?)<\/p>\n

Partway through the opening sequence, we realized thatTrue Blood<\/em> was based on Harris’ novels, and our expectations immediately cratered. Been there, done that.<\/p>\n

But it … like Buffy<\/span> … like Twilight<\/span> … has the critics wondering, “What’s with this vampire craze, anyway<\/a>?”<\/p>\n

When \u201cTrue Blood\u201d appeared, it was easy to assume it was a metaphor for late-stage capitalism gone haywire, not simply because it began with an insolent store clerk reading Naomi Klein<\/a>\u2019s \u201cShock Doctrine\u201d but also because the show seemed predicated on an interest in the retail addict\u2019s belief that we\u2019re made of what we buy.<\/em><\/p>\n

Read the rest on “reactionary gender politics,” etc.<\/p>\n

Via GetReligion<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ever resolutely two years behind the pop-culture curve, M. and I recently watched some of True Blood, season 1. We had already read a little of Charlaine Harris (one novel for me, two for her), so we knew about the whole Sookie Stackhouse milieu of “vamps” and “weres” and Harris’ whole bodice-ripping-and-biting atmosphere. We knew, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[10,22],"class_list":["post-1201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-american-religion","tag-weirdness"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-jn","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":571,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=571","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":0},"title":"Cold Weather","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 7, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"I came home Tuesday evening and found that M. was upset because one of the dogs was missing. Shelby is a collie-mix who was one step above feral when we got her, and although she has learned to appreciate having her own bed, regular meals, and belly rubs, she will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"dogs\"","block_context":{"text":"dogs","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=dogs"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1193,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1193","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":1},"title":"Just Another Saturday","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 17, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Wake up, feed the dogs, make coffee. Take Fisher, the newly adopted (last May) Chessie, for a walk. (Shelby, the ninja-collie, goes to visit her Rottweiler friend Bruno on her own.)Start working on laying out an article for Pomegranate 11.1 in Adobe InDesign.M. gets up. We eat breakfast. I cut\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2988,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=2988","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":2},"title":"The Wanton Green\u2014Both Book and Blog","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 4, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Adrian Harris describes a new Pagans-and-place publishing project, The Wanton Green. For many contemporary Pagans the relationship between bodymind and place is fundamental, but that\u00a0relationship has\u00a0rarely been explored in any depth. Paganism is often\u00a0described\u00a0as being\u00a0polytheistic, animist or about \u2018nature\u00a0worship\u2019, and while that\u2019s all true in a vague and\u00a0anodyne way, it\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"animism\"","block_context":{"text":"animism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=animism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1300,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1300","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":3},"title":"Are Epiphany Dreams Found only in the Past?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 4, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"The Bryn Mawr Classical Review's book-review feed recently served up a review of William V. Harris's Dreams and Experience in Classical Antiquity The reviewer writes, Some combination of [cultural expectations, generic demands, and the imperatives of performance and publication.], Harris argues ...\u00a0 accounts for the relative frequency in antiquity of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"dreams\"","block_context":{"text":"dreams","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=dreams"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=chascli-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0674032977","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":709,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=709","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":4},"title":"Pagans in interfaith work","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 28, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"I do not do much interfaith work--I think that I have attended one such luncheon on my life--but some Pagans do, and they do it well.Grove Harris is one of them, and here she reflects on her experience in an essay subtitled \"Exclusions, Dualities, and Contributions.\"Hat tip: Arachne. Tags: Paganism,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1179,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1179","url_meta":{"origin":1201,"position":5},"title":"Druidry and Made-up History","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 21, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Here is the YouTube trailer for a new documentary on British Druidry. Yes, that is Ronald Hutton at the beginning (long hair, glasses). (If the YouTube link does not work, try this one.)And here is the video clip dissected with a sharp knife by a different British Pagan academic.It's true:\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Druids\"","block_context":{"text":"Druids","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=druids"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=chascli-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0300144857","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1201\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}