Birthday Answers

[susandennis]

(For my birthday, I asked for Ask Me Anything Questions. I got so many wonderful ones. I'm answering them in entries from here until I get to the end. If you think of something you want to ask, just leave a comment or a note. Deadline is totally not a thing.)


miss_ljv asks:

5. A book, movie, poem, any kind of media that had a profound impact on the way you view the world.


For as long as I can remember, my goal was independence. I looked for the 'how' everywhere. And mostly I saw women needed men to live. So, no surprise, my 'profound impacts' came from places where I could see examples of women doing things on their own.

I was really profoundly influenced by Nancy Drew. I devoured every single one of her books. I’d wait impatiently for the new one to come out. She was the early and really the only, for a while, example of what I wanted. Independence and respect for my brain.

But, also… and this is a little embarrassing but the movie Where The Boys Are - which, by the way, is credited with starting the whole ‘go to florida for spring break thing’. I was just the right age when it came out - 12. And while I have not seen it in 60 years, I can still remember scenes and lines from it. There was a lot of boy and boyfriend plot there but, those girls - not that much older than me - went on vacation on their own. They made mistakes but they were their own mistakes. Again, independence.

Comments

[chocolate-frapp.livejournal.com]

Going to Florida for spring break and all the getting drunk and partying, etc. that came with it existed before that movie (and the novel it was based on) but the movie definitely popularized it.

[sherlock999.livejournal.com]

Lover of Nancy Drew here, too! I have my mom's versions from the 40s and 50s, along with more recent reprints. Delightful stuff.

[rhodielady-47.livejournal.com]

"I have my mom's versions from the 40s and 50s...."
I wonder if those Nancy Drew's are available through Project Gutenberg?
:^)

[bill-schubert.livejournal.com]

Oddly, really oddly, that was a favorite movie of mine too. I'm not even sure why. But the people in it were great. Jim Hutton, George Hamilton, Paula Prentiss, Yvette Mimieux, Frank Gorshin (a wonderful jazz geeky part for him). It was all so far away and out of my league but was so fun to watch.

[susandennis]

that's wild... and delores whatshernamebeforeshebecameanun

[bill-schubert.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I missed that saga but see it now. She's got her own web site:

https://www.ignatius.com/promotions/ear-of-the-heart/#sthash.8KJTEedd.sqbHcyzp.dpbs

[howeird]

Tangential pun:
Q: How do you catch a Mouseketeer?
A: Use Annette

[rhodielady-47.livejournal.com]

"I was really profoundly influenced by Nancy Drew. I devoured every single one of her books. I’d wait impatiently for the new one to come out. She was the early and really the only, for a while, example of what I wanted. Independence and respect for my brain."

I quickly lost all interest in "girls' books" since everyone of them acted like the only thing we had on our brains was dating, boys and how to acquire one of our own. I honestly couldn't even find girls' books where girls even did tame stuff on their own. This was the thing that sent me into fantasy and science fiction reading.
Don't know why, but I can't remember ever seeing any Nancy Drew books at our local library during my teen years.
:^)

[maju01.livejournal.com]

When I was growing up I read quite a few girls' adventure books from (and set in) the UK, which featured girls doing stuff independently of boys. Then there were the Chalet School books, the first of which were published in the 1920s, about English girls having independent adventures in Switzerland.

[mollywheezy.livejournal.com]

I read and loved all of the Nancy Drew books, too! :)