Tag Archives: Red Riding Hood

Does It Have Pockets and #TankaTuesday

This week, Colleen’s #TankaTuesday prompt is to write a syllabic poem inspired by your Celtic tree. I had never heard of this before. It seems similar to an astrological sign in that your birthday determines the tree. My tree is holly, which I had never thought about before. I mean, I know the holly berries and leaves design for Christmas decorations, but that is about it. I discovered:

HOLLY – THE RULER

JULY 8 – AUGUST 4

Among the Celtic tree astrology signs, the Holly is one of regal status. Noble, and high-minded, Holly signs take on positions of leadership and power. If you are a Holly sign you take on challenges easily and overcome obstacles with rare skill and tact. When you encounter setbacks, you remain vigilant to obtain your end goals. People look up to you and follow you as their leader as you are rarely defeated. You are competitive and ambitious even in the most casual settings. You are quite generous, kind and affectionate. Highly intelligent, you skate through academics where others may struggle. Holly signs may look to Ash and Elder signs for balance and partnership.

https://onetreeplanted.org/pages/what-kind-of-tree-are-you

No doubt these descriptions are set up to flatter, but there are aspects of this description I can relate to. Taking on challenges, (trying to be) kind, things like that. But the ruler? My husband would laugh himself silly because we both agree that while some are leaders, some are followers, there are those like me that are neither. I don’t like being a boss as in: do this, do that, don’t do that, I’ll judge you, etc. I do like the “noble and high-minded” thing, though. Whether it’s simple flattery or something more, I can take a guess 😉 but one of my literary role models (and here I use literature to mean Broadway musical haha) is King Arthur in Camelot. He has to choose between the legal choice for the good of the country (meaning lots of people) or his love for his wife. Really really admire that character.

I thought I would try a tectractys today, and I’ll tell you why in a minute. So here it is:

Your

ruling

quality

must come from tact

and the ability to see both sides.

Tectractys is a five-line poem with this syllabic configuration: 1, 2, 3, 4, 10.

The literary journal Does It Have Pockets? has published a Red Riding Hood story of mine that is darker than anything found in my chapbook Our Wolves. “Why I Always Wear Red” is flash fiction that finishes with a tectractys, making it a hybrid genre. You can read it here:

https://www.doesithavepockets.com/fiction/luannecastle

If you missed my reblog of Rebecca Budd’s podcast interview of me, here is the Spotify link. You can also find it on Soundcloud.

You can also follow Rebecca’s Tea Toast & Trivia series for more author interviews.

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Our Wolves: Readers’ Thoughts

Our Wolves has received some lovely and “interesting” attention that I thought I would share with you.

There are some wonderful reviews on Goodreads (and Amazon), including those by veteran reviewers Elizabeth Gauffreau, Suanne Schafer, a couple of Library Things reviewers, etc. I also received my first one star rating ever!!! Yes, “Donna” wrote: “An interesting take on Red Riding Hood. Dark and shades of abuse. Might be someone else’s cup of tea but not mine.” Apparently, even though it’s an interesting take, because it’s not her cup of tea, it warrants a one star.

Read the reviews here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/111018194-our-wolves

You can purchase a copy here for $10.99: https://www.amazon.com/Our-Wolves-Luanne-Castle/dp/B0BTKNP31D/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1Q5U4FV04LXCI&keywords=our+wolves&qid=1683584909&sprefix=our+wolves%2Caps%2C142&sr=8-1

Little Red-Riding Hood's Meeting With the Wolf
Little Red-Riding Hood’s Meeting With the Wolf by John Doyle is licensed under CC-CC0 1.0

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#Tanka Tuesday and Poetry Reading

See below for the video that goes with this fireplace photo.

Today Colleen’s prompt for #TankaTuesday involved writing a syllabic poem using a photo by https://secondwindleisure.com/about-me/ as a prompt.

I’ve been wanting to try a cherita, which is 3 stanzas–one line, two lines, three lines. So this is what I came up with.

I can hear the thunder and spray before I see it.

Then it appears before me in its many textures
of wood and stone and the glorious movement of water.

As I stand on the viewing platform overlooking all,
the mist parts from the water, rising up toward 
the blue sky, hugging me in its wet embrace.

Then I started to question if a cherita was really syllabic poetry because you don’t count the syllables, so I quickly came up with a haiku to make sure I’m covered!

powerful water
sheeting down to be as one
with its still-wild self

The publisher, Alien Buddha Press, of Our Wolves has created a YouTube playlist of authors reading from their new books. I read four poems from the chapbook. Oh, and if you do check it out, watch for when I say the most UNINTENTIONALLY FUNNIEST thing. Hint: it has to do with whether Antarctica has folk and fairy tales.

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Wolves-Luanne-Castle/dp/B0BTKNP31D/ref=sr_1_1?crid=8PAK9E03LTBV&keywords=our+wolves&qid=1677978570&sprefix=our+wo%2Caps%2C355&sr=8-1&asin=B0BTKNP31D&revisionId=&format=4&depth=1

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Day 2 of Our Wolves Release

On this day 2 of the 2-day release of Our Wolves, I would like to share an interview by journalist Deborah Kalb on her book blog. In this interview, she asks questions that probe the origins of the project, including why I chose Red Riding Hood as my “fractured fairy tale.”

https://deborahkalbbooks.blogspot.com/2023/03/q-with-luanne-castle.html?fbclid=IwAR3PRNHUs0FQRKtPml2ObZ1cGMmTVYQUI8ARSOjf6QdC5qefzl_CoLOxarY

Here’s a photo of the champagne I shared with the gardener yesterday for the launch. Note that he tried to order me yellow gerbera daisies which would have been in the photo, but he called Saturday and the florist had already left for the day. So he owes me flowers.

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Wolves-Luanne-Castle/dp/B0BTKNP31D/ref=sr_1_1?crid=8PAK9E03LTBV&keywords=our+wolves&qid=1677978570&sprefix=our+wo%2Caps%2C355&sr=8-1&asin=B0BTKNP31D&revisionId=&format=4&depth=1

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Our Wolves is Featured on Sally’s Smorgasbord Blog Magazine!

Today is Release Day for Our Wolves. You can read more about it on Sally’s Smorgasbord Blog Magazine here:

https://smorgasbordinvitation.wordpress.com/2023/03/05/smorgasbord-book-promotions-new-book-on-the-shelves-poetry-our-wolves-by-luanne-castle/

A big thank you to Sally!

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Wolves-Luanne-Castle/dp/B0BTKNP31D/ref=sr_1_1?crid=8PAK9E03LTBV&keywords=our+wolves&qid=1677978570&sprefix=our+wo%2Caps%2C355&sr=8-1&asin=B0BTKNP31D&revisionId=&format=4&depth=1

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Today is the Day

Today is Release Day for Our Wolves. Today and tomorrow. I wanted March 5 because the date has personal significance to me. It’s the anniversary of the first date my husband and I went on, and the chapbook is dedicated to him. Because today is a Sunday, I consider tomorrow Release Day, too!

I hope you will consider heading over to Amazon to pick up a copy of this lil big-mouthed book.

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Wolves-Luanne-Castle/dp/B0BTKNP31D/ref=sr_1_1?crid=8PAK9E03LTBV&keywords=our+wolves&qid=1677978570&sprefix=our+wo%2Caps%2C355&sr=8-1&asin=B0BTKNP31D&revisionId=&format=4&depth=1

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Blog Tour for OUR WOLVES

Before I talk about the tour, editor James Lewis so kindly published three of my Rooted and Winged poems in Verse-Virtual‘s March issue: https://www.verse-virtual.org/2023/March/castle-luanne-2023-march.html I hope you like these poems. “Gravity” is about my grandfather gardening in the muck of Kalamazoo. Yes, muck. That is the wet black soil that Kalamazoo is known for, which is why Kalamazoo is known for being the Celery City.

I’m thrilled to announce the blog tour for my new poetry chapbook Our Wolves which features poems about the Red Riding Hood story. You can find out about the tour here: https://poeticbooktours.wordpress.com/2023/02/20/our-wolves-by-luanne-castle-spring-2023/ I hope you’ll follow along!!!The paperback book is published by Alien Buddha Press and will be available starting this Sunday for $10.99.

Bloggers: if you would like to piggyback onto the tour in the month of March, I would be happy to share an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy pdf) of the chapbook in the hopes that you will like it enough to review it on your blog and on Amazon (and any other social media sites you care to) in March. If so, please let me know.

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The Origin of Poetry, According to Me

Where did the poems come from? What I mean is, how did I come to be a poet? The beginning goes back to infancy.

It all started in my little bedroom on Trimble Street. We moved there before my first birthday, and we didn’t move away until I was 8 1/2, mid-way through 3rd grade. Some of my earliest memories are in that bedroom–in fact, in my crib in that bedroom. I would have been younger than two.

I had a little blue music box that my mother would wind up and play before she put me down for a nap or bedtime. When it wound down, sometimes I would fall asleep. More often, though, I would call to her and beg her to rewind it. The music was haunting and dare I say addictive! Two years ago I wrote about the music box, which I still have, and asked if anyone could identify the song it plays. Nobody could at that time, but the other day a reader found the post and told me that the music is “La Paloma,” composed in 1863 by a Spanish Basque man named Sebastian Yradier. It might be the most well-known tune in Spanish-language countries, especially Mexico!

Here is “La Paloma” (the Dove) as played by a fancier antique music box.

And here it is played as a guitar solo:

Here is my little music box:

Hearing that music over and over again was the foundation for poetry. The next layer, added over the few years before I began school, was nursery rhymes, folk songs, and picture books that used poetic devices such as rhyme and repetition. These were all found in my room. The books were not expensive–merely Little Golden Books from the grocery store. The records were little 45s played on my plastic children’s record player. Probably the biggest influence after that music box tune was the lullaby lyrics in a picture book my mother read to me: “All The Pretty Little Horses.”

Hush-a-bye, don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy little baby.
When you wake, you shall have,
All the pretty little horses.

Blacks and bays, dapples and greys,
Go to sleepy you little baby,

Hush-a-bye, don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy little baby.
Hush-a-bye, don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy little baby,
When you wake, you shall have,
All the pretty little horses.

There were layers after this that included a children’s poetry anthology my mother gave me, teachers who let us recite poems without analyzing them, and eventually I discovered Edna St. Vincent Millay reading her poetry on a record which I found as a teen at the public library.  I was mesmerized by the poem “Renascence.” Here is a recording of the poem she wrote at age 19!!!! although, alas, not recorded by Millay. I sure wish I had that library record as Millay reading it herself was phenomenal.

I know that poet XJ Kennedy wrote the following:

Ars Poetica

 

The goose that laid the golden egg

Died looking up its crotch

To find out how its sphincter worked.

 

Would you lay well?  Don’t watch.

Nevertheless, now that it’s come to me what the greatest influences were in making me a poet, I can’t “unknow” them.

###

I’ve put my memoir on the back burner again, but feel I am so much closer with it. Now I am writing a poetry chapbook that explores the “Red Riding Hood” stories.

Did you hear or read fairy tales when you were a child (besides Disney)? If so, which ones influenced you the most?

 

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Red in the Words

I decided to leap back into prose by taking a look at the drafts I wrote for the flash nonfiction course I took in July. While I was searching for those in my closet, I ran across a few of my Red Riding Hood books.

As a fictional character, she’s been quite an influence on me and my writing.

But who is she?

There are hundreds of versions of the story and they come from many different countries. Some are old versions from traditional literature and some are contemporary retellings of the tale. Some are children’s stories; some, such as those that spring from the oral tradition, are for the general public; and some, usually feminist or sexualized versions, are for adults.

I’m guessing that most of us are steeped in the European tradition of red hooded cloak, little girl, wolf, grandmother, and woods. We might or might not think of a huntsman. Our Little Red might get a warning from her mother–or she might not. She might get eaten up just before the reader is left with a strong “moral.” She might kill the wolf in a gruesome manner. Or the wolf might run into the woods, never to return. Pinterest is full of images that resonate, so I started collecting them onto a “Red in the Woods” board. I’ve only got 35 pins so far, but there are some beauties. Many of the classic book illustrators have created Little Red art.

Arthur Rackham’s Little Red Riding Hood

Every culture incorporates some of these elements in their little red stories, but the most important part is that a little girl is threatened by a dangerous animal (usually a wolf, but in Asian countries, sometimes a tiger) and either she becomes a victim, is rescued by someone else, or she is victorious over the “bad guy.” The undercurrents involve a girl going out into a threatening world on her own for the first time and the possibility of sexual violation. But those are adult readings, of course.

Sometimes Little Red is a bad ass. Those are the best versions! One of my favorite picture books for children is Ed Young’s Lon PoPo where the Little Red protagonist is a smart, strong oldest sister who outwits the wolf and protects her siblings.

Have you ever seen Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s musical Into the Woods? In this version, Little Red is definitely a sexual target for the wolf, but the question becomes: is she complicit? Does she  in some way lead on the wolf? Is the red hood to draw attention? (And where does the red garment come from? Not from the girl herself). Or is that an adult male (pervert) reading–a Humbert version of Lolita? Another adult reading is that the red hood is a metaphor for Red’s vagina/clitoris/youpick.

In this clip of the 1991 Broadway show, the lyrics say a lot about our culture’s interpretation. It becomes clear that this version is about the loss of innocence.

In the Sam the Sham and the Pharoahs’ song, the wolf leers at Red.

There are other strange bits and pieces that show up in some Little Red stories. The wolf tricks Red into eating her Granny’s flesh. Red tries to get out of bed with the wolf by telling him she has to go pee. At that point he tells her to pee in the bed, but she says she can’t and he lets her go outside tied to a long rope. Some of these elements that seem vulgar  or creepy have been edited out of the most popular versions published in the last few hundred years. The confusion between wolf and grandmother is still with us, though. And that alone is pretty strange. Dangerous wolf looks like beloved grandmother? Beyond strange.

Is the wolf a perv or is Red a Lolita? Or is that a red herring (sorry)? Is the story really about something else?

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