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I would be interested in either of these versions of How Far the Light Reaches, if the two had been separated: the memoir or the science. Imbler’s writing on marine biology is accessible and fascinating, so while it’s not my usual genre, I was completely pulled in. By braiding these two threads together, though, it’s more than the sum of its parts.
According to the mythology of Cantabria located in the north of Spain, there exists a mythical sea creature known as the Fish-man of Lierganes. It has been noted that the Fish-Man looks like an amphibious, human being who has come to resemble a man who has been lost at sea for quite some time. 50. Abaia In Greek mythology, Nereus is a mythical sea creature who lives at the bottom of the Aegean Sea. He is the father of 50 nereids, and he is said to be a God who never lies and in whom one can trust. Sometimes referred to as “the old man and the sea”, Nereus is a god whose empire lies in the Aegean Sea. 7. Triton As the title suggests, in each essay Imbler takes a sea creature — an octopus that starves while guarding its eggs for four years, a giant worm called a sand striker, a rogue goldfish, a yeti crab — and writes about its life while extrapolating into themes of family, loneliness, queerness, community care, assault, and the extreme beauty and precarity of Earth and its vast oceans. One essay about whale fall, which is when the body of a dead whale lands at the bottom of the ocean, providing vital nutrients to other sea creatures, and necropsy reports might make you cry; Imbler’s prose manages to be both poignant and very funny. This book is perfect for anyone who ever feels curious about or in awe of sea creatures, humanity, and the vast emotional landscapes inside ourselves. Most scholars believe that sailors who encountered giant squid living off the coast of Norway and Greenland most likely spun their likeness into a monster, and named it the Kraken. SN: In that essay, you write about the difference between living and reliving and how both can be, for a jellyfish, a physiological experience, but it can also be a psychological or emotional process for people. Can you elaborate on the difference between living and reliving, and nonlinear trajectories of life?
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Reading notes This book is after a few chapters, so far successful, very strange mix of science, being young and gay and full of angst, and the story of her mother in China. It's quite unclassifiable but interesting. There are quite mind-boggling sentences, "My grandmother grew up believing she was ugly because everyone told her so. A friend of her father's, their wealthy neighbour's sixth concubine always told my mother she was ugly, even for a five year old." Like a mythical sea creature from Japanese folklore, the Akkorkamui is a gigantic octopus. He is believed to reside in the waters off of Funka Bay and is said to be about 390 feet long. He is entirely red in appearance and is big enough to swallow whole boats and whales In one big gulp. He is also known to frequent the nearby waters of Taiwan and Korea. 29. Kaijin As someone who has had the luxury of taking their identity for granted, it was the exposing authenticity of Imbler’s personal journey that gripped me most. The descriptions of their fluctuating sense of gender, their desire to transform their body and the joy of finding their queer family were lyrical and profound.
Mermen are the male mythical sea creature counterpart to the mermaid. They are men from the waist up and fish from the waist down. They range from hideous in some folklore accounts to handsome in others. 13. Nereid The Vodyanoy is a male water spirit living at the bottom of the Great Sea. According to Slavic mythology, Vodyanoy is an evil spirit who delights in drowning humans, so beware! 24. CadBorosaurus I think my expectations for this book of hybrid memoir / essays was a bit too high, so I ended up being disappointed. Although I enjoyed both aspects of Imbler's writing -- science journalism about interesting sea creatures and personal stories about their queer identity and experiences -- the essays felt like two alternating threads that weren't well integrated. Bakunawa is a serpent-like dragon from Philippine mythology. This mythical sea creature is quite gigantic and is believed to be the cause of eclipses, earthquakes, rains, and wind. Bakuwana is a sea serpent but is also capable of inhabiting both the sky and the underworld. 26. Calypso
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Almost every system we exist in is cruel, and it is our job to hold ourselves accountable to a moral center separate from the arbitrary ganglion of laws that, so often, get things wrong. ” Why can't she just exist without explanation?" I complain, and as I complain, I know that I am being a hypocrite; if her parentage wasn't given, I would wonder what her mix was, if it was like mine." So having to have the Chinese defined is upsetting, why can't she just exist? But the Jewish bit, well that's ok. It's the only mention of 'Jewish' in the book, so it's pretty obvious that she doesn't think there is anything wrong with defining the white partner as Jewish. Jews, in her head, don't have the same right to 'just exist'. The author is a journalist and writer who covers science and queer issues. They are both queer in terms of sexuality and gender as well as being mixed race. This brilliant collection of essays covers many of these elements of their identity by contrasting them with sea creatures that illustrate key elements. In Greek mythology, Charybdis along with Scylla, another fallen sea nymph turned sea monster, is a feared mythical sea creature who patrols the Strait of Messina. Together with Scylla, Charybdis terrorizes sailors and other Greek heroes including Odysseus, Jason, and Aeneas. 6. Nereus From a brooding octopus mother that starves herself while looking after her eggs we get the author's thoughts on their relationship with their mother and their unhealthy body image. From the life of a Chinese Sturgeon we get their thoughts on their grandmother and mother's origins in China and their family's immigration to the US. Particularly harrowing is their essay on the Sand Striker Worm (formerly named after an abuser whose penis was severed by his victim) and their thoughts on consent and sexual assault in their own life. There are many more essays here as well, each fascinating for the illustrations they provide for all the identities that the author embodies.
The Kraken is said to be so fierce and terrorizing that it has become a legend many times over due to its gigantic, intimidating size. 3. Mermaids Unlike the organ hippocampus in the human brain, there is a mythical sea creature from Phoenician and Greek mythology known as the Hippocampus. He has the lower body of a fish and the upper body of a horse, and he is said t0 have drawn the chariot of the god Poseidon. 49. The Fish-Man of LierganesKaijin is a mythical sea creature, also from Japan, who is mentioned quite often in books from the Edo period. He had some human traits, such as eyebrows and skin around the waist, but Kaijin never spoke and could not live more than a few days out of the sea. 30. Selma The personal reveries frequently cross the subtle line between candour and solipsism, the cute and the gauche, artlessness and shallowness, sincerity and cringeworthiness. Instances of romantic awakening, admissions of self-loathing, explorations of sexuality and contemplations of racial identity (Imbler is mixed race) convey personal pain but ultimately don’t strike home with much force or edge. One exception is a powerful chapter called Beware the Sand Striker, which combines a study of predators’ strategies in the natural world with incidents of male violence and harassment in the author’s own life, as well as those reported in public #MeToo testimonies. In Greek mythology, Calypso is a nymph living on the island of Ogygia. This mythical sea creature has special powers and was believed to have detained Odysseus for 7 years according to Homer’s Odyssey. Thus, in Greek, the definition of calypso is “she who hides”. 27. Cetus
These giant fish survived the asteroid and the Ice Age and so much more only to be wiped out by cosmically puny obstacles: our dams, our boats, our chemicals, our taste for caviar.”If You Flush a Goldfish: I had no idea how devastating goldfish were in the environment, which makes the fact that they are so common a little bit horrifying. I would have wanted to learn a little more about this. I understand that this is a childhood fascination, but given where the essay ended, with a story of mutually discovered transformation, I would have chosen a different water creature. Perhaps a coral, which utilize a variety of reproductive techniques and go through some cool physical transformations. There was one stunning paragraph where the author knows she is being hypocritical, but is talking only of her own half-Chinese ethnicity and complaining of it. I am complaining about the moment when the Asian woman's parentage is explained by one white person to another - Chinese mom and Jewish dad - like a caption, a specimen ID. You could add a piece of cuttlefish bone, which is high in calcium and would dissolve in the water. I also thought thematically the connections between the sea creatures and Imbler's life didn't quite resonate. Although I loved the idea of combining these two disparate genres, the execution didn't work for me. That said, I learned a lot of cool stuff about the ocean and its inhabitants that I won't forget and I appreciated getting this information from a queer feminist mixed race perspective. I would have liked a book that was just that better, I think. We Swarm: Riis Beach, New York: famous for queer culture, there was a time they were there during an inundation of blobby creatures, perhaps salps. Salps periodically swarm for food, unlike Pride in NYC, which is for a variety of reasons. This is a fun piece, a delightful break from the emotional challenge of 'Striker,' or the intellectual challenge of 'Hybrid.'
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