The title of Jess' blog is "A Thespian in Academia," which I think says a lot about how Jess has approached the reading and the writing assignments in class thus far. There's a very exciting sense of curiosity, a desire to probe and ask questions, and a willingness to be in the dark about certain things, that I found both relate-able and inspiring. Sometimes in class Jess will say something like, "I'm not sure if this is right, but I'll just jump in," and that's exactly what reading her blog is like. She invites us to discover Don Giovanni through discussion of the fat body onstage, approaches Debord through the lens of monster trucks, and connects States and Artaud to a series of hilarious Youtube videos. She makes connections I would never have even guessed at, and by the end of the post, she makes sure I'm nodding along with her.
I think the posts where Jess really shines are those in which she talks about her family. She is deeply committed to memorializing those she's lost, and includes some beautiful old photographs and vivid descriptions of her family members- the story of how she introduced her partner to her deceased father brought tears to my eyes. Her writing is emotional without ever seeming overwrought- it's very easy to fall in step with her and follow wherever she takes you.
In her last posts, Jess brings up some of the bigger questions she wants to examine in her studies. She's intrigued by the absence of the fat body onstage and how it relates to the "hidden-ness" of the fat body in our culture, as well as the way that "in American culture, fatness neuters the body," rendering it a sexless form. She goes on to muse about the correlation between race and fat bodies onstage, and the strange dissonance of actors eating onstage. I don't where she'll go with these inquiries, but I'm fascinated to find out- Jess writes from a beautifully thoughtful place, and I'm excited to see where she goes next.
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