![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Infinity Smashed: Golem Girl
Golem Girl
Series: Infinity Smashed
Summary: As a little girl, Grey sees an old silent film that makes her realize exactly what kind of woman she wants to become. Unfortunately, it's not the right kind.
Word Count: 500
Notes: The movie being mentioned, the Golem: How He Came Into The World, is a classic of silent horror film from 1920 and thus is in the public domain. You can watch it here, and the golem looks like this. Content warning for implied child abuse.
When Grey is little, she sees an old silent movie called der Golem on dollar day at the drive-in theater, which is owned by a friend of her father’s.
The film is faded and flickery, parts seem to be missing, and all the text is in German, but none of that matters, because in a silent movie, nobody talks. What’s more, when the golem appears, Grey’s riveted. She’s too young to know what that leap in her heart means, but when she sees the golem’s hair and dress, her strength to hold up a collapsing ceiling, she knows that’s who she wants to be. She wants to be the girl who can save everyone. She wants to be a woman who can hold up the world.
And the golem gets away, in the end! Grey watches the climax breathlessly the golem runs amok. She escapes the bossy men who keep ordering her around and ripping the magic words out of her heart, she leaves that horrible house and sets it on fire, even. She gets away. She escapes.
She dies in the end, but she gets away.
When it’s over, her father goes, “Humph. They changed it.”
Her mother asks Grey what she thought of it.
The words are a struggle, but Grey is so starry-eyed that she’s determined to say it: “Want to be her.”
Her father goes rigid. Her mother asks, “Miriam?”
Grey shakes her head, a little indignant that her mother would even suggest such a thing. She points to the poster up on the post nearby, showing the Golem’s funny scowling face. “Her.”
She quickly realizes that she has made a terrible mistake.
There is an ugly scene, best unremembered. Grey’s parents inform her that the golem is not a girl. He wears a tunic, not a dress, and everyone had long hair in those days, so it doesn’t mean “girl” the way it would now. Furthermore, the golem is not a heroine, not something to emulate or aspire to. It is a silent, stupid monster. The Maharal, the righteous man who creates the golem, is the true hero. In the real story, the proper story (which they tell Grey now, to make sure she understands properly), the golem never rebels, never escapes. She does everything she is supposed to, without resistance or complaint, and when her work is done, the Maharal takes her up into the attic of the synagogue, and turns her off, leaving her there among the torn prayer books and worn prayer shawls.
That is how the story is supposed to go.
They make absolutely sure that Grey understands, make sure that she repeats it back to them no matter how many times it takes to get the words past her tangled throat. Then they leave her alone.
As they shut the door behind them, Grey realizes why the golem is always silent. Silence can be strategic.
If she keeps her truth written on her heart but never speaks it, then it can’t be torn from her.
Series: Infinity Smashed
Summary: As a little girl, Grey sees an old silent film that makes her realize exactly what kind of woman she wants to become. Unfortunately, it's not the right kind.
Word Count: 500
Notes: The movie being mentioned, the Golem: How He Came Into The World, is a classic of silent horror film from 1920 and thus is in the public domain. You can watch it here, and the golem looks like this. Content warning for implied child abuse.
When Grey is little, she sees an old silent movie called der Golem on dollar day at the drive-in theater, which is owned by a friend of her father’s.
The film is faded and flickery, parts seem to be missing, and all the text is in German, but none of that matters, because in a silent movie, nobody talks. What’s more, when the golem appears, Grey’s riveted. She’s too young to know what that leap in her heart means, but when she sees the golem’s hair and dress, her strength to hold up a collapsing ceiling, she knows that’s who she wants to be. She wants to be the girl who can save everyone. She wants to be a woman who can hold up the world.
And the golem gets away, in the end! Grey watches the climax breathlessly the golem runs amok. She escapes the bossy men who keep ordering her around and ripping the magic words out of her heart, she leaves that horrible house and sets it on fire, even. She gets away. She escapes.
She dies in the end, but she gets away.
When it’s over, her father goes, “Humph. They changed it.”
Her mother asks Grey what she thought of it.
The words are a struggle, but Grey is so starry-eyed that she’s determined to say it: “Want to be her.”
Her father goes rigid. Her mother asks, “Miriam?”
Grey shakes her head, a little indignant that her mother would even suggest such a thing. She points to the poster up on the post nearby, showing the Golem’s funny scowling face. “Her.”
She quickly realizes that she has made a terrible mistake.
There is an ugly scene, best unremembered. Grey’s parents inform her that the golem is not a girl. He wears a tunic, not a dress, and everyone had long hair in those days, so it doesn’t mean “girl” the way it would now. Furthermore, the golem is not a heroine, not something to emulate or aspire to. It is a silent, stupid monster. The Maharal, the righteous man who creates the golem, is the true hero. In the real story, the proper story (which they tell Grey now, to make sure she understands properly), the golem never rebels, never escapes. She does everything she is supposed to, without resistance or complaint, and when her work is done, the Maharal takes her up into the attic of the synagogue, and turns her off, leaving her there among the torn prayer books and worn prayer shawls.
That is how the story is supposed to go.
They make absolutely sure that Grey understands, make sure that she repeats it back to them no matter how many times it takes to get the words past her tangled throat. Then they leave her alone.
As they shut the door behind them, Grey realizes why the golem is always silent. Silence can be strategic.
If she keeps her truth written on her heart but never speaks it, then it can’t be torn from her.