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Phantom


Charlieee

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I'm reading Phantom by Susan Kay, which is the story of Erik's (Phantom of the Opera) life before Leroux's book comes into play. It's an amazing book :D And it has lots of asexual-ful and aromantic-ful passages, like

The light of my lantern traced the curve of her breast and a thought came to me that I hastily pushed away in disgust. I did not touch her; and after a while the urgent desire to do so egbed away, leaving me calm and cold once more, entirely in control of my body. That first adolescent stirring of desire was fierce but transient, and I felt curiously triumphant at having mastered it. I was suddenly quite warmly disposed to this girl who had made me feel that I need never fear the ravages of love. Lust was nothing special aftr all, simply a rush of blood, an animal instinct that I could contain and control, just as successfully as I contained my voice. This girl was pretty but I did not love her, so perhaps God had been merciful after all and not made me as other boys; perhaps I would never love anyone. Elation and relief surged through me at the thought and I wished she would wake up so that I could begin to thank her for this wonderful sense of release. Lust was nothing, and I did not love her. I did not love her and I no longer felt the need to die of crushing misery. Everything was going to be all right after all.

and

The khanum was the worst perpetrator of his irritable frustration.

"I am bored," she complained, stretching languorously on the satin cushions in her private chamber, where, I am told, she had taken to receiving him separated only by a thin gauze curtain. "I am bored, bored, bored! What name do you give to this tedious emotion in your country, Erik?"

"L'ennui, madame."

"L'ennui," echoed the khanum softly. "What a charmingly seductive turn of phrase you Frenchmen have. Do you ever feel... l'ennui... Erik?"

"Hardly, madame. Time and idleness are both necessary prerequisites to boredom, and God knows I have little enough of either comodity these days."

"Don't scowl at me like that, you wretch!" said the khanum peevishly. "You are sufficiently ugly already without twisting your horrible face in that fashioin! In fact you are so incredibly and unbelievably repulsive that it's almost... attractive... in a strange way."

He was silent. I am told she often tormented him in this fashion, seeking to exact some unknown response, but he only stared back at her with stony-eyed contempt.

"So... you do not feel boredom, then. What, I wonder, are you capable of feeling... Erik?"

"Anger," he said softly, "murderous anger. You will find me more than capable of that, madame!"

"I think I should like to see you angry," mused the khanum thoughtfully. "Yes... I think perhaps it would be very... interesting. Anger, too, can be strangely attractive, you know... in the right person." The khanum sat up against her cushions suddenly, watching him through the thin gauze curtain with interest. "Tell me, Erik, cave you ever had a woman?"

There was a tense, throbbing silence between them.

"Come, I demand to be answered," she prompted angrily. "Are you a virgin?"

"Madame"--he sighed--"I am very busy."

"Too busy for a woman? No true man is that, my friend. Would you like a woman, Erik? I could arrange it, you know, I could arrange it very easily. And is not that what you surely desire above all things?"

Those who were watching say that his hands closef convulsively on the folds of his cloak and began to twist with a slow savage rhythm.

"What I desire above all things," he said coldly, "is to be left in peace to complete my commission without disturbance."

I hate the khanum :lol: I love Erik, though <3 He's so fuzzy when he's a kid :D He's about 9 to 11 in the first passage, and maybe 16 or 17 in the second.

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  • 2 weeks later...
"What I desire above all things," he said coldly, "is to be left in peace to complete my commission without disturbance."

Ain't that the truth...

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I love Erik! I must read this book...

Yes you must! :D It was really really good. ^_^

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Ah! Phantom! I loved that book!

Although the musical dripped with a little too much sexual symbolism for me.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I love that book! I've always thought he was more like 18-19 in the second passage, but yeah. :D

I'm looking for more quotes. Here's one from when he was around 12, just before your quote.

That spring in Verdu it seemed to me that the whole world was pairing off together, sharing a universal secret that would always be closed to me. And suddenly it was not enough to be the devil's apprentice, the star turn of an increasingly famous traveling show.

All I wanted was to be like everyone else.

While the wedding celebrations were at their height, the fiddles throbbing with that extraordinary love of life which is so peculiar to Gypsies throughout the world, I slipped away into black, shapeless night and stole what I needed from the wisewoman's tent.

I could live with cruelty and hatred; it was the happiness of others that I could no longer endure, the sudden realization that none of my talents was ever going to win me acceptance as a human being. My tent might be comfortable now, I might be free to come and go as I pleased, but in all essentials I still lived in a cage, surrounded by invisible bars. The world wanted nothing from me except the gratification of the sensory organs of sight and sound.

I was alone and nothing was going to change that.

Perhaps it was time to leave this world behind.

And here's another passage that struck me as interesting, from when he was maybe 17-18. It seems that he disconnects himself from humanity here.

Human remains made me nervous and I was horrified when he began to assemble the relics of an entire skeleton, placing it patiently, bone by bone, into a bag.

"What do you want with that?" I demanded uneasily. "You're surely not going to take it away with you."

"But of course." He replied calmly. "I have rarely seen such a perfectly preserved specimen. Look...it is possible to see where the knife chipped the rib bone on penetration."

"How can you tell it was a knife?"

"I have dissected sufficient corpses who died of knife wounds to know that the signs are unmistakable.

"Dissected!" I stared at him aghast. "You have performed dissections?"

"From time to time. It is the only way to reach any true understanding of the human body. I have an academic interest in the physiology of Homo sapiens... a certain curiosity, you understand."

The way he spoke of the human race was very unsettling. It was as though he did not include himself within the species at all. A shiver passed through my body, and I was deeply relieved when we were out in the sunlight again. I asked him no more questions. I did not want to know what kind of a man collected skeletons from tombs and dissected dead bodies to satisfy an "academic interest."

I love this book. :)

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Ahh, I love the second passage! :D :D

Actually, I love the whole book... ahh, I wanna reread it now :lol:

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Ahh, I love the second passage! :D :D

Actually, I love the whole book... ahh, I wanna reread it now :lol:

I do, too. :D

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