new Projects for Old ideas

I believe I shall record myself reading "IT" aloud. I don't know why, but something about that book fascinates me. I think it the genius of all the subtleties of the clown Pennywise that so many people miss. Well, they don't miss them, but they don't acknowledge them either. It's the subtleties that make Pennywise the basis of fear for so many people, child and adult alike. Those small nuances that we all see in ourselves that cause that irrational fear of an imaginary villain to plague us throughout our lives. Or maybe it's that we doubt the non-existence. Perhaps somewhere the fear is that Pennywise is REAL.

A good fear to have. Because Pennywise is real. He exists all over. He is the personification of intolerance, violence, misunderstanding, new ideas, sexual desire, hatred, anger, and unquestioned tradition. It is those things that he represents that thrive today. Unchecked almost by society. These things that we hold on to as a society. The ugly that hides behind the white picket fences and the buicks in the driveways. Racism, Abuse, Grudges that are held to long, Anger that boils inside the persecuted. That is what Pennywise represents.

All these things that we walk over, and don't talk about above a whisper. The small evils inside each of us that fly about invisible overhead. The ones that everyone sees, but nobody talks about. The secret carnal desires to kill and maim that we all harbor. Pennywise the clown, is the manifestation of all of that and more. He waits for his moment, he calculates his chances, he strikes on cue. Never misses a beat, never in quite the same way, but always with the same method. Always in the same places. The places that we walk right past, and ignore because without those places all that ugly that we hide would have no where to go when it finally gets tired of being dormant and ignored. The places that we shake our heads at, but don't tear down because we are afraid that that old, crusty clown will take of residence on our doorsteps if we tear down the not-so-secrets places that he lurks in with our permission. Our unspoken consent for his evil.

So, why a clown? Why not? The irony is that while most of the time we laugh at clowns, Pennywise laughs at us. He is colorful and tempting, we can't look away, even though we know we should. he is enticing, intoxicating, but he doesn't fool anyone. We can all see through his disguise. We can smell beneath the caramel corn and cotton candy, the rotting flesh, we can hear beneath the laughter and the sweetly lilting voice, the screams of terror and the gleeful undercurrent of evil intentions. BUt even though he doesn't fool us, he entertains us. Until he gets too close, then the fear seeps in and we run away screaming afraid of we may have been victim of, afraid also of what we may have unconsciously given him permission to do. And some of us, stare him in the face and allow him to put his putrid hands on our shoulder and usher us to our deaths, or to the deaths of someone else at our hands.

That is the real genius in Stephen Kings creation. The reality that it represents.