#if Nona is Alecto and Alecto is John does that make Nona Hollywood Hair Barbie?

[thewhitefluffyhat]

barbie doll not in a barbie world

We know John based Alecto’s body on his favorite Barbie doll. Does that mean Alecto literally has Barbie Doll Anatomy as per the trope?

Like, no body hair, no female-presenting nipples, nothing but featureless smooth skin between her legs?

Because I agree that John didn’t intentionally put Alecto in a doll-like body to make her “sexy.” But what if - accidentally or not - he instead made her sexless?

So first of all, we know that Alecto-as-Nona finds Harrow’s scrawny, lumpy-brain, unattractive-by-popular-vote body to be beautiful. And yet, in Nona the Ninth, Alecto describes her own body as a “hideousness.”

Now, it could be that Alecto hates the body John made her just because he got the proportions kinda wonky, or because there’s something unique to the Alecto-body that keeps her trapped there unlike when she’s in Harrow’s body.

But I can’t help but also think of the passage where Nona describes the “cradle creature” that she drew to the Angel. Because she doesn’t defend her drawing on how creative, or beautiful, or accurate the doodle was:

Nona looked down at the animal she had drawn, and thought perhaps she understood. She said, “No, I made it up. It does work, I promise. See these things? They're its ears,” she said in much the same tones as she would have explained to Kevin. “This thing is its nose, and you can’t see it because I didn’t draw it, but the mouth is under here. When it was first born it used to live in a river, but then it got cold so it had to get large. I know the legs can’t rotate, but you don’t think that’s stupid, do you?”

Nona the Ninth, p251

Instead, Nona is completely focused on the fact that despite her doodle’s unusual features, it’s an animal that “works.” It’s a being that could live.

Is Alecto… not a being that “works”?

At the very least, Nona doesn’t seem to like or need normal human food. Presumably, Alecto was the same way. So her lacking an anus or genitals likely wouldn’t be an issue given that this is a woman who thinks rubber and graphite are a yummy snack. Also who, per Mercymorn, might not even have DNA.

So why would this matter?

It’s because there’s something especially potent and horrifying about taking the soul of Earth, of Mother Nature herself, and then forcing her into a body without a functional digestive tract or reproductive system. Not, to be clear, that people lacking those things are in any way less human or less worthy of life. It’s just… speaking of life and nature in the most broad and planetary terms, ’can eat and reproduce’ are the significant features that set living organisms apart from rocks. The uniqueness of which is also what sets Earth apart from every other planet in the solar system.

Plus there’s the way Gaia (the ancient goddess, not Kiriona) was somewhat associated with fertility and the harvest. Meanwhile Christmas tree fairies, Renaissance angels, Adam and Eve in their innocent state, Galatea the statue, Frankenstein who was denied a mate… they’re more associated with the opposite of that.

So when it comes to the symbolism of Alecto, there’s these Classical thematic connections between womanhood and abundance and fertility, now being placed in dialogue with a very Christian idealization of abstinence from food and sex. It’s Muir using two mythological building blocks and putting them in tension with each other.

(There’s also the building block of Māori traditions that Muir draws on with Alecto and her saltwater, though I am nowhere near qualified to comment on that… would love to read more about it, though!)

Last but not least, there’s the modern context to consider. Alecto’s body is specifically a Hollywood Hair Barbie. Hollywood formerly of the Hays Code, Hollywood now in the age of “everyone is beautiful and no one is horny.” The gilded facsimile of life, distanced from the messy, primordial desires underneath.

I don’t have any kind of grand thesis to tie all these observations together, but the juxtapositions are interesting, aren’t they? Especially in a series that is less shy than many about normalizing queer (often female) desire. In that context, taking such desires away would be a hideousness, wouldn’t it?

.

And you know, while we’re on this subject… it’s unclear whether Gideon can eat or feel arousal in her revenant form either. (Yes, I’m sure fanfic writers have opinions on this, but I haven’t gotten to post-Nona works in my chronological AO3 binge and we’re just talking about the text of NtN here.)

Did John take those pleasures away from Gideon too?

I hadn’t even really thought about all the Kiriona/Alecto parallels, but they sure are plentiful. John puts both women into bodies that seem superficially wonderful yet which they both resent and dislike. And they also both act/consider acting as John’s cavalier, with the implication that this is because they don’t have any other options or people who care about them. At least John seems to like their company, even as he manipulates and hurts the ones they love.

So yeah, what is with this dude and turning people into his perfect dolls? Once might have been an accident, but this starting to look like a pattern my guy.

[sundayswiththeilluminati]

I’m spilling over my thoughts on Nona the Ninth and John’s behavior and here’s the thing, John has always had good intentions; but good intentions are not enough. You have to listen. It’s not about the help you want to give, it’s about the help someone needs to get.

There’s the surface layer of “John dumped Earth’s soul into a Barbie doll” of like “of course a man dumped a woman’s soul into a Barbie” but to stop there is, no. We’re doing the man the myth the legend a disservice. It’s so much worse. Because he doesn’t want Alecto like that. He doesn’t want her in a sexy way. It’s not about the Barbie. It’s about the toy. He says, I wanted Galatea, I wanted a Christmas tree fairy, I wanted a Renaissance angel. I wanted an icon, I worshipped you, I thought you were the most splendid thing that ever existed, the only way I could wrap my head around you was to frame you in every concept I had of beauty and power. But I did all that because I wanted to have you. “It’s human nature to want something.” That’s the only excuse he gives for eating the Sun. “It’s human nature to take.” EATING THE SUN. DOOMING THE SOLAR SYSTEM. “I wanted it. I took it. It’s human nature to take.” He had to put her in a body because he was scared she would get away. “I thought you would escape before I was done.” He thought of Hollywood Hair Barbie not because that was his ideal of beauty and sex and not even just because that was his favorite possession but because that’s the relationship he wants to have with her. “She got to have all the adventures.” He wants to be with the Earth! He wants to have adventures with it! He wants it to be his. He wants it. “It’s human nature to take.” It’s not about fitting Alecto into a body, it’s about fitting Alecto into a story. 

First he wants her to be his companion, his solace, his other half; then he wants her to be Alecto the avenging Fury, the devil, the beast, his unmaking; then he wants her to be Annabel Lee, buried by the sea, the tragic lost love whose grief he must always carry; but it’s always about the story he’s writing in his head. Why do kids catch butterflies? They see this beautiful, fascinating thing, and they love it, and they want it, and so they need to have it. To catch it so it doesn’t get away. John had to chain Alecto because she might get away. She was a liability. She held too much of his heart, metaphorically, and his soul, literally, and he couldn’t stand the idea of not having her. What if he chained Alecto because she wanted to leave? Or, worse, because she wanted to go back? What if Earth was doing a lot better now, a few centuries on, and she was tired of being meat? And John just couldn’t stand the idea of losing her? “It’s human nature to take.” It’s human nature to love, and to not want to let go of what you love, and to take it, to make sure it can’t leave, because you can’t risk the idea that it might not love you back. It might not want to be part of your story.

Compare that to Nona’s life. The very first time we meet Nona’s caretakers, they’re listening to her. Camilla turns on the recorder and asks Nona to describe her dream, and then listens. That scene so wonderfully establishes what’s the most important about Nona’s life: she has people who take care of her, protect her, but also leave room for her. Pyrrha and Cam and Pal order her around. They keep secrets from her. They do things that might harm her right now or go against her wishes and justify it as being for her protection. They use her, too: they’re listening and watching to see what she might become, to know how she might play a role in their war. They do everything John does to his lyctors. The difference is, they also listen to her. They don’t make her follow the story in their heads. They change themselves to accommodate her, the way they expect her to change to accommodate them. Nona doesn’t always get what she wants, because often it isn’t good for her. The people raising her need to keep her safe and fed and well. They don’t take orders from her. But they listen to her. 

And Nona tells them. Nona doesn’t want to be a Renaissance angel, she wants her hair in braids and a cheeseburger t-shirt. John would have given Alecto every thing of great beauty and power, every thing he thought might ever be appropriate to the grandeur he’d built in his mind, but he would never have bought her a shirt from Salt Chip Fish Shop. Pyrrha doesn’t give her anything of beauty and power. Pyrrha makes Nona eat her eggs because she needs food to keep that human body going, even though Nona whines and complains and demands pikelets and birthday gifts; Pyrrha says, eat your eggs, because it’s good for you, and go to school, because it’ll keep you occupied, and don’t come to my dig site, because it’s dangerous for you. Then Pyrrha sells her cigarettes for cash to bribe someone, sure, but what do you want to bet some of that money also went to buy the pikelet mix she makes for Nona the next day, and the shirt she buys for Nona’s birthday too? She doesn’t give Nona exactly what she wants, because Nona is a child and needs protection and guidance. But she doesn’t give the gifts she wants to give; she gives the gifts she knows Nona wants to get. She listens.

And that’s what saves them all. Blood of Eden wants Nona to be Harrow, or Gideon, or both, or a lyctor; an ally, an enemy, something they understand, and if they’d been able to force that on Nona things would have probably gone catastrophically wrong. Instead Pyrrha, Cam, and Pal let her tell them who she is. Tell me your memories. Try out this sword. What do you think about bones? And as much as they want her (or don’t want her) to react to those things, to have certain answers, they listen to the ones she actually gives and react accordingly, and that saves them from making the terrible mistake of not realizing her true identity.

Now finally look at Harrow, handed, over and over again, everything she could ever want: power, immortality, freedom, family, god’s favor, answers, even a way to finally win the love she believed impossible. And all she has to do is take. Take Gideon Nav’s soul. Freely offered! Again and again! All she has to do is take it. And she won’t. She will not take, not even what’s given to her. She won’t take the help of the other Houses because she thinks it will destroy the Ninth - because they won’t listen to the Ninth, even as they help it. She won’t take Gideon Nav’s soul because she won’t take another life to save her own. She will not concede the idea that power can only be gained by one by taking from another. She will not privilege her story above others. She will not say, it’s human nature to take. That’s why Alecto loves her. That’s why she’s going to kill God. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.