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The Stories We Wish We'd Written · The Women Are Plotting

• 0:02
  Etienne: Welcome listeners.
• 0:03
  Etienne: This is The Women Are Plotting.
• 0:05
  Etienne: I'm Etienne Rose Olivier, and I'm here with my friends and co-hosts, heidi Willis and Jane Gari.
• 0:12
  Etienne: Today's episode is things we wish we had written, and this could cover novels, short stories I guess it could cover nonfiction as well and movies or television shows basically any kind of entertainment or media.
• 0:28
  Etienne: One of my favorite authors is Stephen King, and I googled what Stephen King wished that he had written, and it was actually the 2022 movie called Fall, and I don't know if you guys have seen this.
• 0:40
  Etienne: I actually did see this.
• 0:41
  Etienne: It's about two Australian friends who climb the top of an abandoned radio tower which is 2000 feet high, and then the ladder breaks and they're stranded up there.
• 0:52
  Etienne: I came upon it one day accidentally and was enthralled.
• 0:55
  Etienne: It's a really good movie, so I suggest you see that.
• 0:58
  Etienne: But, jane, what's your fun fact for today's episode?
• 1:01
  Jane: It's very funny that yours was about a specific author and what they wish they had written.
• 1:05
  Jane: I looked up like what do the majority of writers say that they wish that they had written?
• 1:12
  Jane: And so the top three.
• 1:13
  Jane: I was like I don't know.
• 1:15
  Jane: I was so disappointed in what the top one was.
• 1:17
  Etienne: I can't wait to hear this why.
• 1:21
  Jane: So the top one that the most authors said that they wish that they had written was Don Quixote, and I'm like that cannot be right.
• 1:26
  Heidi: What
• 1:27
  Etienne: I'm embarrassed, but I've actually never read Don Quixote.
• 1:29
  Jane: I did read it.
• 1:30
  Jane: I did not enjoy it as much as I felt like I was supposed to.
• 1:34
  Jane: You know, when you hear like a classic and you feel like you're supposed to just be in love with it and I was like it's okay, I mean, I get it Like I felt bad for the dude chasing windmills and all that.
• 1:43
  Jane: He thought that he wanted to be a knight on this great quest and it just made me sad.
• 1:47
  Jane: But maybe because I didn't read it and English is my native language and so maybe that's why I wasn't as enthralled with it.
• 1:54
  Jane: And then another one that was second place Moby Dick.
• 1:59
  Etienne: Oh Lord, I've never read Moby Dick either
• 2:01
  Heidi: I have.
• 2:02
  Heidi: It's not good.
• 2:03
  Jane: And I freaking hated.
• 2:05
  Jane: I love other things that Herman Melville wrote.
• 2:08
  Jane: I love his short stories.
• 2:09
  Heidi: That's how I am with Hemingway.
• 2:11
  Jane: Yes
• 2:11
  Heidi: I like his short stories better.
• 2:12
  Jane: Oh, his short stories are, like bonkers, good, but Moby Dick snooze fest.
• 2:17
  Heidi: Not good.
• 2:19
  Etienne: Snooze fest.
• 2:19
  Jane: I know I'm supposed to be, like you know they call me ishmael and like you know, but I just don't want to call him anything.
• 2:24
  Jane: I want to call it done, but that's what I wanted to call that book I wanted to call it done
• 2:28
  Etienne: the book is done, every page is done
• 2:30
  Jane: but then number three.
• 2:32
  Jane: Number three is great gatsby, and that one is come on now.
• 2:36
  Jane: I was yeah
• 2:37
  Etienne: fantastic
• 2:38
  Jane: I do remember when I read that, just being completely enthralled by the language, by the story.
• 2:44
  Jane: It was the first time I think I read something where I got so angry at some characters.
• 2:49
  Jane: I was just like man, this woman's a bit that kind of thing.
• 2:51
  Jane: So the fun fact redeemed itself with the Great Gatsby.
• 2:58
  Jane: But Cervantes and Melville, they put me to sleep a little bit.
• 2:59
  Etienne: The first two on that list make it sound like they're just saying that's the book they wish they had written, because it's classic and everybody knows those two books maybe.
• 3:07
  Etienne: That doesn't seem real to me.
• 3:10
  Jane: It didn't seem real to me either, but that's what the statistics showed and it's whatever we don't have to agree with it.
• 3:16
  Jane: But, heidi, I hope your fun fact is more fun than mine.
• 3:22
  Heidi: Well, I have two different things that I wish I I had written.
• 3:24
  Heidi: One's a book and one's a movie.
• 3:26
  Heidi: But the book deals with time travel, and so my fun fact just is related to time travel, so it's kind of random, okay, so I'll be the random fun fact.
• 3:37
  Heidi: So originally, muhammad ali was chosen to play the terminator, the time time-traveling cyborg.
• 3:46
  Etienne: There's a fun fact for you.
• 3:47
  Jane: Like the actual boxer.
• 3:49
  Heidi: Huh
• 3:50
  Jane: the actual boxer Muhammad Ali was going to play the Terminator
• 3:54
  Heidi: yeah
• 3:55
  Etienne: Well, it sounds like James Cameron definitely had a body type he was going for in that situation.
• 3:59
  Etienne: Right
• 4:00
  Heidi: I guess, but can you imagine?
• 4:02
  Heidi: That's just crazy.
• 4:03
  Heidi: Anyway
• 4:04
  Etienne: that's an interesting fun fact.
• 4:05
  Etienne: Okay, yeah, that's way out there.
• 4:07
  Etienne: I would never have guessed that was gonna be one of our fun facts today.
• 4:12
  Heidi: I'm gonna be random sometimes.
• 4:17
  Etienne: Well, I mean, since you brought up your book let's just go into yours then, Heidi.
• 4:18
  Etienne: Yeah.
• 4:18
  Heidi: So, the book that I wish I had written, and it's just a beautiful book and it includes all the things that I love.
• 4:28
  Heidi: So it's the time traveler's wife by audrey niffenanger, and I love the movie.
• 4:33
  Heidi: I haven't even watched the television series yet, but there's a television series now.
• 4:38
  Heidi: Yeah,
• 4:38
  Etienne: it's good
• 4:39
  Heidi: so yeah, so that's the book.
• 4:41
  Heidi: And then the movie I wish I had written is buried, written by chris barling, it's the contained thriller.
• 4:47
  Heidi: In the coffin with ryan reynolds.
• 4:50
  Etienne: Oh
• 4:50
  Heidi: it shouldn't work.
• 4:51
  Heidi: Um, when you
• 4:52
  Etienne: wait, what's the name of the movie again, because I thought
• 4:54
  Heidi: buried
• 4:54
  Etienne: oh, buried
• 4:55
  Etienne: I thought you said berry, like a guy's name.
• 4:57
  Etienne: I'm like that's a tv show on hbo, not a movie
• 4:59
  Heidi: no, no buried
• 5:00
  Etienne: okay buried,
• 5:01
  Heidi: so
• 5:01
  Etienne: I do
• 5:02
  Etienne: know, that movie, that thing is yeah
• 5:03
  Jane: it like buried alive in a coffin
• 5:05
  Etienne: yeah, he's in a yeah
• 5:07
  Jane: nope
• 5:07
  Heidi: yeah and um, it shouldn't work.
• 5:12
  Heidi: It should not work because you never leave the coffin.
• 5:14
  Heidi: And I actually met chris barling at a film festival and I got to talk to him and he said that when he was first going to shoot this movie he was ready to go independently.
• 5:27
  Heidi: The studio came in and was like yeah, we want to make this, but we want to come outside of the coffin.
• 5:32
  Heidi: And he stood his ground and was like absolutely not, we're staying in the coffin.
• 5:36
  Heidi: And thank god they did, because it intensifies the
• 5:39
  Etienne: yeah, the claustrophobia and the thriller like the
• 5:41
  Heidi: feeling yeah the claustrophobia.
• 5:43
  Heidi: It works.
• 5:44
  Heidi: It somehow works that you never leave the coffin.
• 5:47
  Heidi: You're in there with Ryan Reynolds the whole time and it's one of my favorite movies because it should not work.
• 5:53
  Etienne: You're just shaking your head, Jane.
• 5:55
  Jane: No, I'm getting claustrophobic just thinking about this and I'm really making a note to myself.
• 6:00
  Heidi: Jane, have you never seen it?
• 6:01
  Jane: Don't see.
• 6:02
  Etienne: Don't see Buried.
• 6:04
  Jane: Because it's going to now, I'll get freaked out.
• 6:06
  Heidi: It's so good.
• 6:07
  Heidi: It's so good, it's so worth it.
• 6:09
  Heidi: It shouldn't work, but it does, and I just got to be a fangirl all over him because I was like it's such a brilliant movie.
• 6:16
  Heidi: I thought it was a great story.
• 6:18
  Heidi: It was fun getting to meet Chris Marlene.
• 6:20
  Etienne: So is he the writer of it?
• 6:22
  Etienne: Was he also directed, or or he did both?
• 6:24
  Heidi: Yeah, I'm not sure.
• 6:27
  Etienne: Not that he had to.
• 6:27
  Etienne: I just wanted to see.
• 6:28
  Heidi: Let me see here.
• 6:29
  Heidi: Actually, in the end it was directed by someone else, but um I don't know.
• 6:33
  Heidi: Yeah, he was ready to go to be the writer-director of his own independent production.
• 6:38
  Etienne: Was he going to have Ryan Reynolds?
• 6:39
  Etienne: Did he already have Ryan Reynolds for the part?
• 6:41
  Heidi: Don't believe so.
• 6:42
  Heidi: No.
• 6:42
  Etienne: Okay, I was going to say that probably came with the studio.
• 6:45
  Etienne: Yeah.
• 6:46
  Heidi: Yeah, ryan Reynolds came with the studio.
• 6:48
  Heidi: So, yeah, I think it was going to be a very, very low-budget independent, but he stuck to his guns like no, we, we gotta stay in the coffin.
• 7:00
  Heidi: Thank god,
• 7:00
  Etienne: jane's like never, never saved
• 7:01
  Heidi: studios they try and fuck up shit and that's why you see terrible movies, because some producer who thinks he's a creative messed up because you'll read the script and you're like the script is so much better what happened.
• 7:13
  Etienne: Art by committee is not usually as good as art by independent artists, you know, I think
• 7:19
  Heidi: yeah
• 7:20
  Etienne: I actually chose for my novel Bel Canto by Ann Patchett.
• 7:24
  Etienne: I feel like that was the first time that I was reading actual literature.
• 7:29
  Etienne: That was gripping, where I couldn't put the book down.
• 7:33
  Etienne: I remember I read it around the time that it came out.
• 7:35
  Etienne: I was part of a book club at Paramount Pictures with a couple ladies and that was the very first book that we chose.
• 7:40
  Etienne: We didn't even know each other.
• 7:41
  Etienne: We're like what book are we going to read?
• 7:43
  Etienne: And then we got together first time, meeting each other talking about this book, and when I started reading it it was night and I literally had to force myself to put it down to go to bed.
• 7:52
  Etienne: It's so good.
• 7:58
  Etienne: And if you don't know anything about bel canto, I do have the little particulars for anybody listening.
• 8:01
  Etienne: It takes place in an unnamed south american country and there is a very famous opera singer singing at a japanese businessman's house for his birthday party, and then the house is invaded by terrorists who then hold everybody hostage and the relationships that form between the hostages and the terrorists.
• 8:21
  Etienne: It's unbelievable.
• 8:22
  Etienne: And I guess just back in November Ann Patchett published an annotated version of it.
• 8:27
  Etienne: I've not read it since 2001.
• 8:29
  Etienne: So I want to reread the book and then read the annotated version, and the library offers both.
• 8:35
  Etienne: So that's my plan, because I never had formal school training in writing like novels, short stories or literature so this might be something that could actually help me learn a little bit more about somebody else's writing process.
• 8:49
  Etienne: And I was trying to figure out a short story and I'm terrible.
• 8:53
  Etienne: I don't read that many short stories.
• 8:55
  Etienne: I feel like such an idiot for that.
• 8:57
  Etienne: So I didn't pick a short story.
• 8:58
  Etienne: I thought that wasn't right since I couldn't think of one.
• 9:00
  Etienne: So for a movie I picked, one that I wish I'd written was LA Confidential.
• 9:05
  Etienne: When that movie came out, I got the DVD as soon as I could and watched it so many times and just wish that I had written it.
• 9:12
  Etienne: I mean, it did win the Academy Award for screenwriting and it's based on a James Elroy novel.
• 9:18
  Etienne: Brian Helgeland also is one of the writers of that screenplay and it's so good I want to go back and re-watch it.
• 9:24
  Etienne: I mean I have still the DVD so I can pop it in any time.
• 9:26
  Etienne: But yeah, it's such a good movie I don't know if you guys have seen it or how you feel about Bel Canto you guys can say if you, have read that book?
• 9:34
  Jane: I've never read that book.
• 9:36
  Jane: No.
• 9:36
  Heidi: I have never heard of that.
• 9:37
  Heidi: Yeah, I'll have to read it Maybe we can form
• 9:40
  Etienne: our own book club.
• 9:41
  Heidi: I'll read it.
• 9:43
  Etienne: Yeah
• 9:43
  Heidi: yes,
• 9:44
  Etienne: that would be great.
• 9:45
  Heidi: We'll get the annotated one.
• 9:47
  Jane: I did see LA Confidential, but
• 9:49
  Etienne: you did.
• 9:50
  Etienne: Okay, but did it leave an impression on you like it did for me?
• 10:22
  Jane: Unfortunately it was spoiled for me by my mother-in-law, may she rest in peace, but she spoiled that movie because she was so confused while she was watching it, she kept asking questions and I don't remember anything about the movie except for the fact that kept asking questions.
• 10:23
  Jane: I was watching it with my mother-in-law, my father-in-law and so what I remember of that film is them arguing about her asking questions and me being very frustrated that she kept asking questions.
• 10:23
  Jane: And so I just decided to start drinking tequila, and that is my memory of LA Confidential.
• 10:23
  Etienne: So you got drunk
• 10:24
  Jane: I got drunk and decided just to be entertained by their banter and them arguing, like the two old men up in the balcony of the muppets, like that's what la confidential turned into for me
• 10:35
  Etienne: oh my lord.
• 10:36
  Etienne: Well, I think you all right.
• 10:38
  Etienne: We should see what streaming service it's on right now, or in the future you can definitely
• 10:43
  Heidi: have a watch party
• 10:45
  Etienne: it's worth it, I promise
• 10:47
  Jane: we'll see, I'll have like
• 10:49
  Etienne: oh my gosh
• 10:50
  Jane: like flashbacks to like, you know like what's happening?
• 10:52
  Jane: why is she doing that?
• 10:54
  Etienne: you're like I don't know if I could see this without tequila.
• 10:56
  Etienne: It just feels like a tequila moment for some reason.
• 11:00
  Etienne: Oh well, what about you, jane?
• 11:04
  Etienne: What's your uh?
• 11:05
  Etienne: things you wish you had written
• 11:07
  Jane: oh, this was very hard for me, guys, because there's so many things that, um, I'm like, oh, it's so good that, um.
• 11:13
  Jane: But I didn't pick screenplays or short stories, although there are many.
• 11:17
  Jane: I actually just picked three authors.
• 11:20
  Jane: When I get enthralled by a writer, I kind of treat the reading of their material like a masterclass in writing.
• 11:27
  Jane: There's so many writers that I love.
• 11:27
  Jane: I picked three novelists who I have read recently, in the past two years, that once I read their flagship novel, if you will, I then proceeded to read everything they have written.
• 11:48
  Jane: So I read Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel and then was so swept up in the writing and just completely immersed, where i hadn't read a book in a while, where the world totally fell away and that I was sacrificing sleep, even though I had to wake up early the next day, felt like a little kid, like under my covers with the reading light, my husband is fast asleep and I'm like what happens next?
• 12:09
  Jane: But and not just what happens next, just the, the absolute beauty of the prose and just the heartbreak and just how it was conveyed.
• 12:19
  Jane: And also I was a sucker for.
• 12:20
  Jane: Station Eleven, because you know, it centers around this Shakespearean performance company and, as a person who used to teach Shakespeare, I was just yeah.
• 12:30
  Heidi: So perfect for you.
• 12:31
  Etienne: It's like she wrote it for you, jane
• 12:33
  Heidi: I knew you'd like it.
• 12:35
  Jane: And then the multiple timelines, it helped me.
• 12:36
  Jane: You know, I was working on a rework of my own manuscript that also has elements of Shakespearean plays in it.
• 12:43
  Jane: So I was just like, oh my gosh, this woman is talking to me and has multiple timelines.
• 12:48
  Jane: Mine were not as disparate as hers, but the way that hers were very disparate and she brought them all together and you're with multiple perspectives and they're tied together, I fell in love with it and I wondered are all of her books like that?
• 13:01
  Jane: They are Right.
• 13:02
  Jane: So then I read all of the books after that and they all did that.
• 13:05
  Jane: And not only that, but some of the characters that you meet in Station Eleven pop up in a couple of her other books.
• 13:11
  Jane: So if you haven't read her other books, awesome.
• 13:15
  Etienne: I've only read Station Eleven.
• 13:19
  Heidi: I have not.
• 13:19
  Jane: I would recommend as the next read after Station Eleven the Sea of Tranquility.
• 13:21
  Etienne: Oh wait, I did read that
• 13:23
  Jane: and it had like some okay, it had some simulation theory ideas in it and it was just phenomenal.
• 13:29
  Jane: And then another author I did that with recently was Matt Haig, who wrote the Midnight Library.
• 13:35
  Heidi: Yes.
• 13:36
  Etienne: Did you read the Life Impossible?
• 13:38
  Jane: Yep, yeah, and Humans,
• 13:40
  Etienne: yep
• 13:41
  Jane: And the Radleys
• 13:41
  Etienne: how to Stop Time Like
• 13:42
  Jane: literally it was
• 13:43
  Etienne: Yep
• 13:45
  Jane: yep Again.
• 13:46
  Jane: He was another one that once I just fell in love with his style and just became so absorbed in his characters and that how he does artfully what I'm trying to do, which is like you've got a world that's ordinary by every other measure.
• 13:58
  Jane: But then there's this one weird thing and you're trying to sell me on what's this one weird thing?
• 14:02
  Jane: But the Midnight Library, for those I'm not going to.
• 14:05
  Jane: It's not a spoiler because it's in the first two chapters.
• 14:08
  Jane: You know what's going on.
• 14:09
  Jane: But I will just say, if you love, it's a Wonderful Life.
• 14:12
  Jane: As a movie, the Midnight Library is almost like a weird modern retelling of it, not directly as a corollary, but thematically, and it is beautifully, beautifully told and I was sobbing.
• 14:25
  Jane: And then another one that I picked because it was kind of comedic balance, because those other two authors write pretty heavy stuff.
• 14:32
  Jane: Although no, it wasn't true.
• 14:33
  Jane: Matt Haig's, now the Humans.
• 14:36
  Jane: He writes it's told from the perspective of an alien who is doing recon on people, and he's writing a book about what it's like from his perspective as an alien what it's like to be a person.
• 14:46
  Etienne: Oh no, because I've just read this a month ago the Humans.
• 14:49
  Jane: Oh, the Humans.
• 14:50
  Etienne: Yes, I've been going through all of his books.
• 14:52
  Etienne: I have the Midnight Library Upstairs that I'm halfway through again.
• 14:54
  Etienne: I read it the first time around when it came out.
• 14:56
  Etienne: But I just read The Humans, Reasons To Stay Alive I just finished that a couple days ago.
• 15:04
  Etienne: But the humans he's coming because the person's body who he inhabits has just come up with this mathematical theorem that would change the course of human history or human life.
• 15:14
  Etienne: Yes, and he's got to stop it.
• 15:15
  Etienne: So that's the reason why he takes over that person.
• 15:24
  Jane: But just him then talking though about what it's like to be a person is hilarious His description
• 15:27
  Etienne: so freaking funny.
• 15:28
  Jane: Oh, he's like one page dedicated to just describing how testicles are actually the most beautiful part of the human body and how he doesn't understand why we're so obsessed with our stupid faces, because they're hideous.
• 15:38
  Jane: And I was laughing out for you to be laughing out loud alone reading a book yes is a hard thing to do, and another author who did that for me is christopher moore
• 15:50
  Heidi: oh my god
• 15:51
  Etienne: oh my god
• 15:52
  Jane: he wrote
• 15:53
  Heidi: that's like resident alien.
• 15:55
  Jane: Oh, really
• 15:56
  Heidi: that show.
• 15:57
  Jane: No
• 15:57
  Etienne: oh, wait, wait, I have seen that
• 16:01
  Heidi: Yes.
• 16:02
  Etienne: but christopher moore did.
• 16:03
  Etienne: What is the name of the book?
• 16:04
  Heidi: Yeah, he plays
• 16:06
  Jane: the well, the two that I read by him.
• 16:07
  Jane: He's written many, but I read fluke, which is about a humpback whale researcher who's trying to find out why whales sing.
• 16:14
  Jane: And he does find out why they sing and the reason why is so bonkers I'm not.
• 16:17
  Jane: No, I'm not going I'm not gonna spoil it for you because you don't find out until deep, deep into the book, and but it is.
• 16:27
  Jane: It is a very funny book.
• 16:29
  Jane: And then the other book I read by christopher moore is called lamb the gospel according to biff, christ's childhood pal.
• 16:36
  Jane: It is so funny, okay.
• 16:42
  Jane: So it's told from the perspective of biff, who is jesus's like buddy growing up and he was like, listen, he was called josh when he was a kid.
• 16:51
  Jane: All right, that was jesus's name when he was a kid
• 16:53
  Etienne: josh
• 16:54
  Jane: josh, and josh is like really naive.
• 16:56
  Jane: But then he like finds out he's supposed to be the Messiah and Josh is like I have to figure out how to, I don't know what I'm doing.
• 17:04
  Jane: And so it tracks their young childhood and their teenagehood, because there's no stories about this in the Bible.
• 17:10
  Jane: So this is kind of like Christopher Moore, I guess, taking crazy license with apocryphal possibilities.
• 17:15
  Jane: But it's so funny.
• 17:16
  Jane: And they go on an adventure to track down and talk to all the wise men who visited Josh as a baby, because Josh is convinced like that's going to help him learn how to be the Messiah.
• 17:26
  Jane: And it's like all the mayhem and mischief and little capers.
• 17:30
  Jane: They go on and they travel like all over Asia and learn Kung Fu.
• 17:36
  Jane: Anyway, it's really.
• 17:37
  Jane: It is so heartfelt but so laugh out loud, funny and so freaking clever that I was like I wish that I had come up with this, because I love stories that weave in some kind of religious aspect and like historical aspects and then like real landscapes but then have some kind of other ludicrous, almost level of just originality to them.
• 18:00
  Jane: And it's his voice is so funny and anyway it's a fabulous book and as is Fluke, and I've just never read it anything so weird but so so great.
• 18:14
  Etienne: While you were talking, I looked up both of those books on Libby, which they were for me.
• 18:17
  Etienne: They're not available, but I was able to just put them on hold through my library.
• 18:21
  Etienne: So I'll get the hard copies when they arrive at my library.
• 18:24
  Etienne: So I'm excited
• 18:25
  Jane: good times with those books, like for real.
• 18:27
  Jane: And then I just felt weird, though I was reading it in public and like, so what's that book about?
• 18:32
  Jane: I'm like how do you explain that to someone?
• 18:35
  Jane: Especially like that in the Bible belt?
• 18:37
  Jane: I'm not like walking around, going like the gospel, according to Biff.
• 18:40
  Jane: I felt like I was going to get struck by lightning in the doctor's waiting room or something, because I had it on my Kindle so nobody could see, you know.
• 18:46
  Jane: But like, some older lady was like what are you reading?
• 18:48
  Jane: And I'm like it's a good book.
• 18:50
  Jane: That's why I'm so sleepy.
• 18:59
  Jane: Moby Dick is a book you only read once and it's because someone made you
• 19:02
  Heidi: yeah, exactly.
• 19:05
  Heidi: It was assigned.
• 19:06
  Etienne: I, literally, when I was in school, one of the different classes, either above or below me, had to read Moby Dick.
• 19:11
  Etienne: And I was like, oh, please, please, god don't, please, don't, let my class have to be the had to read Moby Dick.
• 19:14
  Etienne: And I was like, oh, please, please, god don't, please, don't let my class have to be the one to also read Moby Dick when I get to that level in school and I did not have to, and I was so happy.
• 19:20
  Jane: There's so many other things that you could read.
• 19:21
  Jane: I think I love that story Bartleby by Herman Melville.
• 19:26
  Jane: It was just such a weird.
• 19:28
  Etienne: Is it Bartleby the the Scrivener?
• 19:30
  Etienne: I think I did read that yeah.
• 19:32
  Heidi: I freaking loved that one.
• 19:33
  Etienne: Yeah.
• 19:34
  Heidi: I loved it
• 19:35
  Jane: Just read that there's no need to torture yourself with Moby
• 19:39
  Jane: Dick
• 19:39
  Etienne: With Moby Dick
• 19:41
  Heidi: no Bartleby, all the way, I agree.
• 19:43
  Jane: I prefer not to.
• 19:44
  Jane: That haunts me.
• 19:45
  Jane: That story haunts me
• 19:47
  Heidi: yes
• 19:48
  Etienne: the Bartleby and Scrivener.
• 19:49
  Etienne: Oh yeah
• 19:50
  Heidi: me
• 19:50
  Heidi: too.
• 19:50
  Etienne: I
• 19:50
  Etienne: have to read it again, because it was a long time ago, I think, when I read that.
• 19:53
  Jane: He made me so angry as a character.
• 19:55
  Jane: I was just like do something, feel something, be something Like.
• 19:59
  Jane: It was just that.
• 20:00
  Jane: And then the other book that I had a visceral reaction to was the Stranger by Albert Camus.
• 20:09
  Etienne: That I had to read for school.
• 20:10
  Jane: I hated Meursault.
• 20:13
  Heidi: I don't remember that one.
• 20:14
  Etienne: It's a book about existentialism.
• 20:16
  Jane: Yes, the first line of the book is mother died today, or was it yesterday, and I was immediately like I hate this person.
• 20:24
  Jane: Who?
• 20:24
  Jane: Who is this?
• 20:26
  Jane: The whole having to kill somebody to feel something?
• 20:30
  Jane: I threw the book across the room and it was not my copy, it was the school's copy and it tore and I had to like tape it up and explain to Mrs Westaway, who gave me the most likely to be published award at the end of AP English.
• 20:44
  Jane: But she was just like what happened to this book and I confessed to her.
• 20:47
  Jane: I said I'm really sorry.
• 20:49
  Jane: I'll replace it if needed, but it made me so angry.
• 20:52
  Jane: I hate Merceau, I hate him so much.
• 20:55
  Jane: And she just looked at me and smiled and she was just like that's the point.
• 20:59
  Jane: She's like, yes, you felt something.
• 21:07
  Jane: She was so happy that I was so angry and she said I'm not going to fix this book.
• 21:09
  Jane: It'll always make me think of just how much you felt and I'm like, oh God.
• 21:12
  Etienne: Might still be on her shelf at home.
• 21:14
  Etienne: She took it from the school.
• 21:15
  Jane: She's like way retired but oh, oh, like at home yeah.
• 21:18
  Etienne: Yeah, she's like, I'm taking this copy with me.
• 21:20
  Jane: I should ask her.
• 21:20
  Jane: We're friends on Facebook.
• 21:21
  Jane: I'll be like Mrs Westaway.
• 21:23
  Jane: Whatever happened to the copy that was the victim of my rage?
• 21:28
  Etienne: Albert Camus the Stranger.
• 21:36
  Jane: Oh
• 21:36
  Etienne: oh, my god.
• 21:36
  Etienne: Well, yeah, maybe we should have had a second part to this episode.
• 21:38
  Etienne: Not things we wish we had written, but things we wish we had never read,
• 21:40
  Heidi: uh
• 21:40
  Jane: yeah, but you know what, though?
• 21:41
  Jane: I actually, though, still think that it's a fabulous work of literature.
• 21:45
  Jane: I mean, it was well written and everything.
• 21:47
  Jane: It just made me angry, and I think that it should make you feel something and like mission accomplished, camus, mission accomplished
• 21:56
  Etienne: When I first went to college.
• 21:58
  Etienne: There were some books that I didn't get to read in high school, so I started reading them on my own, and one of them was Lord of the Flies.
• 22:04
  Heidi: Lord of the Flies yeah, that's a good one.
• 22:06
  Etienne: I loved it so much that I still, to this day, have the last paragraph memorized of that book, and I can literally recite that to you.
• 22:13
  Jane: Okay, you have to do it now.
• 22:14
  Etienne: Yeah, okay.
• 22:15
  Etienne: So, and in the middle of them, with filthy body, matted hair and unwiped nose, ralph wept for the end of the innocence, the darkness of man's heart and the fall through the air of his one true friend called Piggy.
• 22:31
  Etienne: I think that's the end of it, oh.
• 22:32
  Etienne: God, yeah
• 22:33
  Jane: oh, I loved that book and I got to teach that book and it was just so
• 22:37
  Heidi: Me too.
• 22:39
  Jane: But I recently read there was a real life situation where these boys
• 22:44
  Heidi: yeah.
• 22:44
  Jane: You know about this, Heidi.
• 22:46
  Etienne: They said it was the opposite.
• 22:47
  Heidi: Yeah, and they all worked together, like for a year.
• 22:50
  Heidi: For a year they were on this deserted island together and worked together to survive
• 22:55
  Etienne: if this happened, that it wouldn't have turned out the way that it did.
• 22:59
  Heidi: They were like a real life case of lord of the flies and they didn't know.
• 23:03
  Jane: Instead, it was like each other because if you're in a small tribe and your survival is dependent upon cooperation, that's why the human species is, you know, like.
• 23:14
  Jane: This is actually a good full circle moment of like leaving the world better than you found it.
• 23:17
  Jane: It's really easy to go into a novel like that and of course there are dark impulses and of course there's people who are just going to beat their chest and be like everybody.
• 23:26
  Jane: Follow me, even though I'm a malignant narcissist, I'm in control.
• 23:29
  Jane: But what would really happen is that we would have each other's backs, and that's what really happened to the boys on that island is that they survived.
• 23:36
  Jane: They were growing crops Like they.
• 23:39
  Jane: Yes, they were growing their own food.
• 23:42
  Jane: They had different watches set up to keep a fire going and to try to get rescued, I think like somebody even like broke a bone and they learned how to set it Like they had each other's backs and I think that when the chips are down and you could do this in small groups of people probably more easily than large but our instinct is actually to help each other and to bond together and have a shared experience of love and community, Like that's really, I guess, what Lincoln talks about, right, Like our better angels.
• 24:09
  Jane: That's what really would prevail in a situation like that.
• 24:13
  Etienne: Oh, my goodness, that's lovely.
• 24:15
  Etienne: Please be good to each other.
• 24:17
  Heidi: And then I start thinking about the Mormons and that rough winter they had.
• 24:21
  Etienne: Oh Lord, you don't mean going through the.
• 24:23
  Etienne: What is it?
• 24:24
  Etienne: The pass
• 24:27
  Jane: oh my God.
• 24:28
  Jane: Are you talking about the Donner party, where they're eating each other?
• 24:31
  Heidi: Yeah, yeah
• 24:31
  Etienne: is that what we're talking?
• 24:32
  Etienne: About
• 24:33
  Jane: I think so
• 24:34
  Etienne: come on, really, heidi we were having, we were on this island where the boys were opposite lord of the flies and you bring up the donner party.
• 24:43
  Heidi: I was like well, there is some other examples where it went terribly wrong
• 24:49
  Etienne: no, but that's different.
• 24:51
  Etienne: Come on, it was winter, they shouldn't have done that.
• 24:55
  Etienne: Come on, it makes sense.
• 24:57
  Etienne: It makes sense.
• 24:58
  Jane: And then the real life, the soccer folks who like
• 25:02
  Etienne: the plane crash
• 25:03
  Heidi: the soccer team.
• 25:04
  Etienne: At least they wait until somebody dies before eating them.
• 25:07
  Jane: But, they
• 25:08
  Heidi: yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 25:08
  Jane: Reunite.
• 25:09
  Jane: They have a reunion every year the survivors and they have healed from that and they support each other to this day.
• 25:18
  Jane: They were absolved by the Catholic Church for their cannibalism?
• 25:22
  Jane: Oh yeah, no, because they struggled with it, but they helped each other through it.
• 25:25
  Jane: I'm bringing it full circle again, heidi, don't don't go dark.
• 25:29
  Etienne: Wait, I have a question though Do they all fly?
• 25:31
  Etienne: Do they all like?
• 25:32
  Etienne: Are they passengers of planes?
• 25:34
  Etienne: Do they fly in planes after that?
• 25:36
  Jane: You know what?
• 25:36
  Jane: I don't know that, but I know I would not.
• 25:38
  Jane: But maybe they take, maybe they're trained people now.
• 25:41
  Etienne: It already happened, so we're good.
• 25:42
  Etienne: At least I know what's the worst that could happen.
• 25:45
  Etienne: It already happened, so we're good.
• 25:47
  Heidi: This is true.
• 25:47
  Heidi: What are the odds of it happening again to them?
• 25:50
  Heidi: Right, seriously, have no fear of flying from then on.
• 25:54
  Heidi: And that's our show You've been listening to the Women Are Plotting.
• 26:03
  Heidi: If you have a story you'd like to share or have any comments, we'd love to hear from you.
• 26:05
  Heidi: Email us at info@ thewomenareplottingcom, and, of course, you can find us on all the socials.
• 26:10
  Heidi: Thanks and until next time.
• 26:12
  Heidi: Be safe and be excellent to each other.