posted
aka, did Bean and Petra actually fall in love?
Romeo and Juliet. In our culture it's regarded the most romantic play of all time. The name Romeo has become the generic term for any devoted, romatic lover. And yet, in the actual play, Romeo and Juliet are not actually in love. They're just wildly dramatic (and in at least Romeo's case horny) teenagers.
The Bean/Petra thing never worked for me. It felt very inauthentic. And while there's some talking about how they fell in love, there's little to no evidence that they are actually lovers.
After reading SOTG, I had this thought.
Petra (like Virlomi but for a different reason - i.e. cracking under the pressure instead of not being in Ender's jeesh) feels a deep sense of uncertainty about her own abilities. But, she has a very high level of ambition. She also harks back to the woman in Real Genius in that she has fantasies of marrying the smartest guy around. Her feelings about Bean were spilled out as wanting to have his children. There's no doubt that she feels affection for Bean, but it seems like the primary thing she might be getting out of their marriage is really smart children. Notice that she's unconcerned about the Anton's key effect, which really fits in because her non-genetically modified children would pretty much the same as Nikolai's (who was a second or even third string Battle Schooler). When Bean is gone, she goes for the real genetic prize, Peter Wiggin.
Bean, on the other hand, has followed the common path of many emotionally blocked people. From going to not acknowledging any emotions or social connectedness, he becomes overly emotionally expressive to the point of expressing inauthentic emotions. The near-deification of Poke and Sister Carlotta show this. He's overreaching. He also has become very invested in forming the sort of emotional, social attachments he used to shun. He marries Petra because he's desperate to fit into the human race and he feels warmly towards her and because she makes him. He is unable to stand up to her on the matter of marriage or having children because he doesn't want to lose his most viable social bond, as well as those things being things he mostly wants to do.
posted
I don't like this thought at all.. Romeo and Juliet were so ignorant and stupid.. Bean and Petra were just, brilliant and human. - Petra loved Bean, I knew that much. But Bean.. eh.. I was wondering where the little cynical boy went when he grew up, almost seemed like a different person entirely.. maybe he was just putting up a facade though to hide his empty emotions.
posted
None of the Battle Schoolers were what we would consider normal humans. Besides their extreme intelligence and temperments, they didn't really have a childhood. They were put under constant pressure, especially the people in Ender's jeesh. Under such a situation, you'd expect them to be emotionally stunted.
Interestingly enough, I'd say that, if my thinking here is kind of right, I'd think that Bean was a lot more emotionally connected to Petra than the other way around. Petra seemed to be a scheming user who was able to fool people into think she cared for them ever since she was re-introduced in the SOTH.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Humans are hungry for love. We also tend to love those we serve. The more we invest, the more we're connected to the object of our love. There are, of course, many other complicating factors, and it's worth remembering that I am not at all talking about romantic love (aka "lust"). A rational decision to love someone does not make it impossible that the strong emotional bonds will also grow; indeed, my observation is that it is a much better predictor of a successful, loving relationship than mere desire, which too often and too quickly fades.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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posted
I'm coming at it from maybe a different place. I wouldn't say that the love breaks down into just lust and rational attachment. There's another component to the concept of romantic love, celebrated in other plays (Willy's and others, my favorites being Much Ado About Nothing and Cyrano de Bergerac) that is not rational or even necessarily conscious, but isn't reducible to mere lust. It's more (I like to believe) a super-conscious appreciation for the totality that the other person makes up (as opposed to the analytical conscious appreciation of parts). This type of love is transcendental and transformative.
I think that people were imputing this type of love to Bean and Petra where I was seeing their relationship as more mercenary and relatively lacking in concern and devotion to the other person. It's sort of like, Romeo would have "loved" anyone who fit into a Juliet-shaped box and vice versa, whereas here Petra would have "loved" anyone who would give her super-smart children and Bean would have "loved" anyone who offered the connectedness that he craved. Obviously this is oversimplifying and there's nothing to say that they wouldn't have developed a more mutual relationship, but it seemed to me to be a possible basis of their relationship that would explain why I had problems seeing them as falling in love.
I was wondering if other people saw it this way and if they thought that it might be intentional. Or it could just be a product of my perspective.
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It's interesting that you're equating romantic love to just lust. That puts a different spin on things.
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posted
*sigh* Ok kat, because it seems like you really, really want me to ask, what the heck is that all about? I mean, besides your almost obligatory "I don't like you."
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Oh and when you say something is also known as something else, you are defining them as exhaustively equivilent. So, saying Romantic Love (aka lust) is saying that Romantic Love = lust. With nothing left over. Or to put it in rhyme, it's just lust.
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posted
If we were speaking in "formal logic," then "aka lust" could be taken as the assertion of an exhaustive equivalence. But in regular English, we juxtapose meanings all the time without imagining anyone would wish to score points by taking it as a formal statement.
We can subdivide love into lots of categories. There are crushes, for instance - a first rush of liking that makes us want to be endlessly close to another person - and that doesn't have to be a person of the opposite sex, it can simply be an intense bonding, with same or opposite sex.
OR there's the mature love that grows between two people who have committed to each other (for whatever reason).
And the love that grows between people who never even really liked each other, but have been together for so long, through various circumstances, that trust has grown.
And the boundaries between love and trust or love and loyalty or love and pity are VERY hard to draw.
But so what?
To me one thing seems obvious: "Romantic love" seems to do the evolutionary job of lust, but with a better story and a better chance of having a couple stay together. And the fact that so much "romantic love" seems to fade the moment that the other person has been "won" suggests that in many cases, what is called "romantic love" is in fact the thrill-of-the-chase.
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posted
You know, I'm not looking to score points. I've never come across someone using aka to not denote equivilence, except when it's used in an indirect, derogatory way, like saing Christians (aka "raving homophobes") or Democrats (aka "scheming traitors"), and that isn't really worthy of respect. I honestly thought you were trying to saying Romantic Love, which is another name for lust.
I don't see this as a intrinsically bad position or indefensible to hold. The love between say a husband and wife would differ from that of friends in that it contained (actualized) physical desire, an intellectual commitment towards stability and children, and a higher degree of intimacy. In this case, people don't "fall into love" so much as develop love over time based on a relationship that is initally based on physical attraction, the excitement of starting a relationship, and a consideration of one's interests.
I figured that's what you were trying to say. I'm not sure, but it still sounds sort of like what you were saying in your response. It's possible, however, I'm completely misreading you.
If my interpretaion is close, than I think that is actually sort of what I was getting at with my initial post. I think people were viewing the Bean and Petra relationship through the lens of American culture's description of "falling in love", whereas I didn't really see this.
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