Gotta Love Expulsion

Whilst reading a manuscript on Jame Campion's films for a tenure letter I'm writing on behalf of a professor, I came across the following gems:

"Campion has a particular fondness for depicting women urinating outdoors...outdoor urination grants...a kind of bodily or physical credibility to match [a] depiction of family dysfunction"
(Why is it that folks are willing to notice that bodily expulsion is an important trope in feminist narratives, but say nothing more about it than to simply note it?! Man! I need to figure it out soon so I can write the damn book! My obsession with this is weird, but there IS something there, no?...)

"a woman writer's loss of focus and ability to write after she has been seduced and politely abandoned"
(Now, instead of saying, "this guy, he broke up with me" [or some other silly fiction that helps you get out of deadlines], you can now say: "I'm a writer and I was seduced and politely rejected; hence, my writing has suffered")

In Campion's Mishaps: a man looks through a woman's keyhole only to see her writing and working. He becomes obsessed with her and desires her sexual attention. She keeps him at a distance. At the same time, the man's brother attempts to climb Mt Everest. The sexually obsessed brother, meanwhile, obtains the woman's affections. Once she shows a returned interest, he is done with her. Mt Everest and unobtainable women: "the closer you get, the less you want it." The desiring figure is always abject--so, once the desired object becomes desiring subject, s/he is rendered abject and no longer desired. Sigh.

I'm off to the Bay on Wednesday morning...Happy Tofurkey Day, everyone! (or, as my friend Tharon would say, Happy Thanks-taking!)