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| Rereading Cyteen And Regenesis; I know this is really not the time, but. | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Mar 30 2017, 12:40 AM (534 Views) | |
| Kokipy | Mar 30 2017, 12:40 AM Post #1 |
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I have just reread Cyteen and am rereading Regenesis, almost done now. It occurs to me that Ari Sr. must have put in a block in Justin that would totally prevent him from having any sexual interest in her or her PR. I always used to think that she had damaged him, and probably he wasn't what he would have been if she had been able to complete her intervention, which was halted by her murder. But she knew that she was attracted to Jordan, and Jordan was attracted to her, and she knew that Ari Jr. would be around Justin, and I think she must have felt that while Jr. would yearn towards Justin she should have him as teacher and partner but not a lover. She could not control that in her PR so she mucked around with Justin to ensure that he would never ever be sexually interested in Jr. your thoughts would be welcome. I know it is unwise to speculate about an author's lacunae , but in this case perhaps it is justified since we don't really know what was up with that intervention. |
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| Xheralt | Mar 30 2017, 03:21 AM Post #2 |
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I don't think Ari did anything sort of "blocking" of that sort....she didn't need to, it is simply the case that Justin is strongly (but not absolutely) oriented towards being homosexual (and has a tropism for redheads). Kinsey number 5, maybe four-and-a-half. Even against his usual inclination, remember Ari Sr. is an operator (lower case AND capitalized), the veritable best in the field, and could find the ways to get him to respond. She was also using his own sexual hormonal responses to set the "fixes" she was doing in her intervention, literally homebrewed chemistry instead of using lab chemicals. It wasn't attraction the led her to seduce Justin, it was pure pragmatic work. If nothing else it insured perfect chemical compatibility with his brain! Given that he was an incipient Special (which Ari would recognize), she wouldn't want to risk his brain chemistry with anything generic; she understood this better than the paranoid brothers. And I'm not that sure she found Jordan attractive. Nor he her, save as a conduit for more power, and cultivated as such. As the joke goes, his only sexual orientation was towards power. Also bear in mind Justin turned out gay, which means Jordan at the very least had a strong predisposition towards it, therefore attraction to her by either is probably not something Ari had to worry about overmuch. |
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| starexplorer | Mar 30 2017, 05:21 AM Post #3 |
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First Contact Assassin
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I'm afraid I haven't reread it recently enough to recall all the relevant details. So it's really the case that Justin has no interest at all in Ari II? My quick reaction was like Xh-ji's: Justin was probably not especially attracted to Ari II because he was gay, or considerably more drawn to men than to women, as evidenced by his long term relationship with Grant. But (and this is fuzzy in my memory) he did respond to Ari I during her -- whatever you want to call it -- "session" with him, right? But it still seems that the preponderance of the evidence leans toward his being gay. Perhaps Koki-ji you are suggesting that Ari I's intervention was to influence Justin's sexual orientation? And in any case, why do you think Ari I would have believed it was so important that Ari II and Justin not become involved? Anyway, I need a bit more to fully embrace this theory. I did come away from the book pretty convinced that she had done him permanent psychological damage, which explained a lot of his future reticence, vulnerability, fragility and fear of intimacy. But not necessarily that Ari had intended him not to be attracted to her successor. (Was it clear what her goals and motives were for her messing with him?) Finally, and again memory prevents me from supporting or believing this strongly, but I have a recollection that at the time I last read it that I believed Justin actually did have some attraction to Ari II. He avoided it for the longest time because it was prohibited, and later it would be complicated by the power dynamics and maybe his relationship with Grant. Oh, and also: didn't Ari II attempt to repair Justin? To what extent was this effort successful? What did she make of Justin's response (or lack thereof) to her, once she was old enough to have some perspective on the matter? |
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| Kokipy | Mar 30 2017, 11:45 AM Post #4 |
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there is a strong suggestion in Regenisis that Jordan thought he loved Ari Sr, even while he was in a relationship with Paul. There is also the clear view that Jordan really only cared for himself at bottom, except for Paul, and he was able to put his care for Paul aside for long stretches of time. But there seems no doubt that for a while he thought he also loved Ari Sr. and Ari Sr. confesses to Jr. in the tapes that she loved people and had her feelings hurt before she pulled back. And we know that Sr. and Jordan had a sexual relationship. So my idea was that ari Sr. was aware that her PR could likely be attracted to the same gene set that she herself was attracted to, and she knew that the failure of the sexual/romantic relationship she had with Jordan damaged their working relationship and thus damaged Reseune. She wanted Jr. to have full access to Jordan's PR without the complicating mess of a sexual/romantic relationship. We also know Jr. was attracted to Justin. She attempted to seduce him when she was about 16 and towards the end of the book she tells him she loves him, always has. But she has realized that Sr. was right and that it was best that their relationship stay platonic. She has also realized and accepted that Justin is devoted to Grant and that he will never reciprocate her feelings. Hence my wondering about what Sr. was up to in her intervention with Justin. We do know that she wanted to shift him away from Jordan's brand of arrogance, and indeed he had a great deal of self doubt. We also know that Florian plays a role in the sex at Sr's apartment and that Ari Sr. told Jr. that she felt guilt for having hurt Florian. I believe it is also suggested that the sexual relationship between Justin and Grant began after Sr.'s death when they were alone and abused and harassed by ResuneSec. It is not clear to me that Sr. actually engages in sex with Justin. But that whole episode is deliberately obscure. So I think that while Justin probabaly inherently shared Jordan's sexual orientation, he could have sustained a sexual relationship with a woman as Jordan did, and could have been attracted to Jr. as Jordan was to Sr. but in fact every time Jr. came close to him he had flashbacks and fled in terror. Until Jr. ran her own intervention to calm him down enough that they could work together. |
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| starexplorer | Mar 30 2017, 03:56 PM Post #5 |
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First Contact Assassin
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So it does seem possible that the entire episode, which for lack of a more definitive term appeared to me in part as the sexual abuse of Justin, may indeed have had as its goal keeping him away from Jr. Clearly a possibility, but in this book it is hard to be sure. One of the marks of the book's greatness! It sounds like you share my perception that Justin was not TOTALLY without attraction for Jr. |
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| BlueCatShip | Mar 30 2017, 04:10 PM Post #6 |
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Unlabelled Browncoat Scaper
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I've skimmed through the above and it's been too long since I read Cyteen, back when it was still presented in three separate volumes. I'd need to reread to see when I think Justin and Grant's relationship moved from "close friends" to romantic and sexual, to partnership. I had thought it was somewhat prior to any interference from security, though. I was, I think, still somewhere around college age when the books first came out and I read them eagerly. I was (not) dealing with my own feelings (sexual orientation) then, but knew by then I was gay. So I went along reading and enjoying the books, as always with CJC's books, and I can tell you when it finally dawned on me that Justin and Grant had more than a friendship, that they had a love relationship, were gay partners. There's a scene where they've met with one of the senior people among Reseune staff executives, around Ari Sr., while she is still fairly young, I think, and they are, if I recall, both junior staffers, perhaps 20's, was my impression. They've just met with one of the execs. The tw then talk privately. They get into an argument between themselves, they go into a bathroom among staff offices, they confront each other, one puts the other against the wall, but they end up resolving it. I think it isn't stated if they hug or kiss, but it was then that their dialogue and interior thoughts made it clear they loved each other and had a physical relationship too. This was a huge, "Huh? What? Justin and Grant are...together...gay? Ohhh.... Wow!" This was followed by sitting there, reassessing what I'd read in that book and in the previous volume, I think. (I believe it was in the second book.) And then I sat there wondering why it was that I could have read so much and did not clue in, because it was subtly written, but mainly because I had an emotional blind spot then about both myself and anyone else being gay. This was a huge revelation and a great relief for me. One of my absolute favorite writers had written two nuanced, subtly together gay partners? So this meant she could be OK with that? And here I was, reading an example of an imperfect, yet successful and positive and healthy, relationship between two young men close to my age? This was a hugely supportive thing for me, and helped a lot at the time, when I was still in the middle of trying to understand myself, as someone raised with a strong religious / faith family background, yet who had, from pre-teens on, had growing gay feelings, to the point I'd had to acknowledge it and yet had not dealt with it well. (I was still at A&M, I think, or shortly thereafter, and my grades had tanked so that I'd lost my scholarship and soon was asked to leave the university due to low GPA.) But that single, subtle message, that two guys could have a great friendship and be in love too and have a sexual / romantic relationship, could be gay, and be accepted by those around them, and that my favorite author had written this subtle, simple example, and thus was friendly, accepting of that, was a very big deal for my own development. (I had no idea about CJC's own personal life then. She was an author, a face on a book jacket, whose books I'd been reading for a few years by then.) Upon rereading, I wonder now what I'd think of all of it, and when and how I'd see how Justin and Grant develop from newly acquainted friends, older boys, to young men, professional colleagues, and into a loving relationship, as partners. It would still be years before I could accept myself better and begin to deal with things constructively. Note too, that I had no experience of a positive gay relationship, even with the fumbling pre-teens or adolescents do. I'd only had one strongly negative experience of that, and had had rejections, crushed crushes, and one that might have been a missed chance but never got the chance to become anything more than a best friendship, before that friend moved. My parents had not let us, at 15, go somewhere on our own. At the time, I'd thought that he might like me too (I had a big crush on him by then) but likely, he knew they were moving and only wanted to spend time with me and tell me the news before they moved. By early college, I'd faced so much active hostility from kids my age, and enough low-level lack of any discussion r acceptance of it at home that I'd entered a very religious phase and was caught up in inner turmoil, trying to figure out if it was OK for me to be gay, if God would still love and accept me, and so on. I could be fine with friends if they were gay; some friends at school had been (like me) "everyone knows (says) they're gay," without knowing if, in fact, they were, including some good friends and one former best friend from childhood. So my head was not in a good space as far as my own, or other people's gay orientation. This made it really a surprise, and a positive influence, to have an author I liked and respected so much, write about a low-key but vitally important and good relationship, same-sex, between two young men. It meant the someone I looked up to a lot thought it could be truly accepted, positive, and loving. Again, I had no idea of CJC's own personal feelings or private life then. It was one piece of the long puzzle that went into place toward acceptance, coming out, a more positive self. It's funny, I like the Chanur books and Downbelow Station and Finity's End probably more than Cyteen, yet Cyteen clearly was a strong influence, a turning point maybe for me. Hmm, I'm going to reread it and Regenesis, and see what I think of them now. -- I very much liked the books as a whole, and Ari, despite her good and bad qualities. (At the time, I did NOT realize just how very controlling my own parents were. I knew they were overprotective, but was only beginning to see how controlling they were. I think that, as with Justin and Grant, it was so close to my own inner landscape that I had trouble recognizing it. Yes, a very personal take on things, but it was a key revelation for me. -- I still wonder why it took me so long to see that Justin and Grant were more than good friends. Heh. |
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| Xheralt | Mar 31 2017, 01:05 AM Post #7 |
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IIRC (would need to reread), what messed Justin up re Ari 1's intervention was the fact that it was left unfinished by her unexpectedly abrupt death. She thought she still had some time to work; not a lot, but enough. It was apparent to Jordan (and/or Denys and/or Giraud) that the boy has been "fixated" on Ari, but while the biochemical means of setting the hook involved sex, kind of like the overvoltage needed to program an EEPROM, I don't think she wanted the fixation itself to be sexual, but rather a sort of permanent pedestal that he would look up to her, and to have some of that regard transfer to her eventual successor. Although I don't doubt that Ari 1, being apparently Kinsey 4, enjoyed having the attentions of a vigorous young man. It let her indulge herself in several different dimensions simultaneously; getting laid, problem-solving a knotty psychological issue, and exerting a little personal dominance. A winning reward for her in all respects! Ari 2 seems to have inherited the same orientation/inclination, based on her tumbles with both Caitlin 2 & Florian 2, but hasn't really ventured outside the guaranteed safety of her aishid yet. She also intellectually recognizes that because of the politics, bedsport with Justin is a Number One Bad Idea. |
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| Reptile | Apr 4 2017, 03:40 AM Post #8 |
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I read Cyteen a little later than many of you, mid 1990s, and rRegenesis when it came out early-mid 200s? Cyteen is a blow-me-away book on many, many levels. Regenesis is very ambitious in a somewhat different vein. Some of the issues that Cherryh is dealing with are, well, different, in my opinion. I understand about talking about politics, but these are profoundly political books by an author taking a position. Regenesis is a complex, multifaceted work, but one of the facets, the core conflict or dynamic I believe, is how a society can, step-by-step begin to dissolve, disintegrate, slide into autocracy and dictatorship--or be pushed and maneuvered in that direction, punctuated by violent destructiveness at key moments. That sense, that feeling, is very much what the Bush years felt like as a sort of culmination of a longer process. That's what they still feel like; not solely resulting in a truly evil person like Trump empowered by office (and he has always been evil, in his 20s he obviously took great joy in illegally harassing people--really nasty stuff--to get them to move so he could jack up the rent, or develop properties.) Im thinking Rome in the last 100 years of the Republic for one other comparison. Cherryh's genius was to communicate this slow, sometimes subtle, sense of dissolution as the characters are struggling over other issues, at first. Things ended on a positive note, but it was clear that nothing remained quite the same in the universe. Nor have things since Bush; processes that preceded Bush culminated in catastrophe; even Europe, for example, is now on a tobagan run (sp?) into the pit, and the empowered have shown themselves willing to sacrifof Europeans hunger and die. The rulers don't have a clue. and don't want to adnmit their befuddlement, even to themselves. Next to this, barring nuclear war, I bet Trump is an epiphenomenon. And I truly fear that as events accellerate, it's now too late to divert the momentum into a safe siding. I hope I'm wrong. But Cherryh's genius evokes premonitions. |
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| starexplorer | Apr 4 2017, 03:59 AM Post #9 |
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First Contact Assassin
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Part of the genius of Cyteen is that it works on some many levels. CJC's handling of politics is masterly. But for me, what most grabbed me about Cyteen is the exhilarating question of what makes a person who she is. The why was Ari II different question. Nature/nurture. Oh, and you read it long before I did, Reptile. :croc. I read my first Cherryh in 2005, and found this group shortly thereafter. I've been trying to catch up ever since! |
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| BlueCatShip | Apr 4 2017, 07:46 AM Post #10 |
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Unlabelled Browncoat Scaper
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My pb copies of Cyteen and Regenesis are stuck in storage, to be rescued upon my next foray there. I've discovered Cyteen is still not out in ebook, though it has been in audiobook for some time, and Regenesis is available in ebook, but I need to recheck on the audiobook. So I'll be doing a listen for a reread. ;) CJC has a degree in, and taught classics / antiquities, Latin and Greek, along with French, college-level, then teaching French at high school level, if I'm recalling her history correctly. So this is why she'd be so fluent with culture and language, history and their processes in her writing. But she's masterful at it in ways many writers are not so gifted. |
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