A thread for those who don't want to IGNORE or HIDE Anna Smith threads...

to post their venom. Thank you.

Some of us find this tawdry drama, like any good story -- whether from Greek mythology or Dickens or cable TV -- rather interesting.

ON EDIT: Anna threads get a fair amount of responses -- but one hell of a lot of views!

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LAT: Dickens, Trollope -- and Anna Nicole?

Looking at classic fiction, it's easy to understand our fascination with the deceased model.
By John Sutherland (JOHN SUTHERLAND is professor emeritus of modern English literature at University College, London, and a visiting professor of literature at Caltech.)
February 23, 2007

AS EVERYONE who is not locked in a dungeon knows, the story of Anna Nicole Smith has received overwhelming attention in recent weeks. The mainstream American press, in fact, has taken a good deal of stick from its more highbrow readers for devoting so many inches to the unfolding narrative of this woman, her lovers and her child.

But how could it be otherwise? This story was destined from the outset to take over Page 1 — precisely because it is a classic, a melodrama with exactly the kind of plot that has fascinated people as long as there's been literature and stories to tell. Following its twists and turns, it's impossible not to get the blurry feeling that one is reading a good old-fashioned novel.

Does this, for instance, sound familiar? In 1878, Anthony Trollope (that greatest of Victorian storytellers) offered his loyal readers "Is He Popenjoy?" It's my favorite of the 47 novels he published, and it has an irresistible, hook-in-the-jaw story. A British aristocrat, fabulously wealthy, goes off to Italy and is trapped into marriage by a scheming foreign Delilah. He has a son and heir — thus disowning the thoroughly decent, and somewhat distant, English relative who had expected to inherit. But did the Marquis of Brotherton actually marry his foreign floozy? Is this young son indeed the heir, or is he a bastard? Can the lawyers save the day? A title, a vast fortune, a great country house hang in the balance.

That fundamental plot — the child without clear parentage who ultimately stands (when his identity is finally revealed) to inherit a vast fortune — was a favorite of the Victorian era. Think of Dickens' "Great Expectations" or "Oliver Twist."...There is a lot of snobbery about our addictive love of all kinds of stories — whether those stories appear in newspapers or trashy potboilers or even in the great Victorian novels. The fact is, we need them as much as we need oxygenated air....Nonetheless, we persist in being reflexively snooty about storytelling. The best books, according to some critics, are those with the least amount of plot. There are more important issues, we're told, than Anna Nicole Smith, just as there are better writers than Jaqueline Susann. Why waste the space on Smith, they want to know? Answer: because she satisfies our need for a good story....

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-sutherland23feb23,0,107315.story?track=mostemailedlink

in my mind's eye...

about someone who was lost, found her way, then got caught up in the cruelties of class prejudices, then necessarily became entangled in the rigid arms of the law and our courts, tried to deal emotionally any way she could, then got barraged again, with professional and paternity lawsuits because of the money she still doesn't have. If I lost one of my sons, I don't know how I could go on, and like the judge in Florida said, we have our professional and family support systems; she had neither.

how this girl forged her own path, but then somehow became lost. And not knowing who she could lean on for support, because of the possibility of the fortune she might one day have...And then, as you say, the final loss, of her son --

escaped an impoverished and authoritarian household at the age of sixteen by qualifying for college grants and loans. I don't think I really ever understood the world till I met my present husband about ten years ago. I misunderstood and was misunderstood, for reasons of looks, ambition, and a combination of book smarts and lack of street smarts. Even recently, I went through a series of life disasters, borne out of trust and openness to the wrong people and forces. I am determined to beat it, and that's why I empathize with A.N. At the worst time, I even self-medicated with alcohol for awhile, so I know what that temptation is about, too.

who's made and is making your own path. I posted one anecdote from my own life in another thread -- just a small thing that made Anna resonate with me. Anna's mother wanted Anna buried in her native Texas, and said on the stand she'd never known anyone not buried in the state of their birth. I, too, left the state of my birth, early on, and my own mother (who, thankfully, wasn't a mother from hell like Anna's) did say once, in front of someone else, that I left the Southern state of my birth because I thought I was "too good" for it. It hurt.

I've seen some issues that, like you, resonated with me personally.