I have a group of crazy friends, who I met through a forum dedicated to the then unkown actor, Gerard Butler. Thing is, the dude’s Scottish, and as he unleashed his fan’s baser passions, he also dragged us all to a frenzy for all things Scottish, celtic music and the indiscriminated reading of any novel that includes a character playing a badpipe. We even reached the extreme of maddly worshipping a guy who lives in the head of a writer that has no scruples, and who has dedicated her life to playing with our hearts and emptying our pockets in order to buy this erotic-festive-literature.
This article was originally posted in one of the websites dedicated to this Scottish actor and deals with the main character from the books by the perfidious writer, Diana Gabaldon.
Damn you, among all women, Jamie Fraser.
Just as Karen Marie Moning’s Highlander series are rife among Butler’s fans, Jamie Fraser is mandatory reading for any fan who claims to be one. I have no idea Gerard James Butler was linked to Diana Gabaldon’s bibliography, only that I was intimated into reading them, while opposing outright resistance to doing so. I put a thousand excuses and I promised to buy them, which in the end did. One day, I finally put my nose in the first book of the series and since that dark time, I’ve cursed my life as I know it and I’ve cursed Diana Gabaldon for turning my life into a miserable pursuit of a non-existent being. Thanks Diana!
Jamie Fraser has been manufactured by the writer and crafted as a perfect, state-of-the-art, Japanese technology, to stimulate all female neurons responsible for creating happiness, infatuation, sexual awareness, unconditional love, need to procreate and the desire to set foot in Scottish soil. In this drunken state of sex and love in which one is slowly introduced, as one who dips her toes in the tub to test the water, one is unable to discern between fact and fiction, which has downright catastrophic results. The author describes a being who is one of a kind, physically imposing, tall, strong, wild, redheaded, eyes the color of the ocean, piercing eyes and a body made for sin. As if this were not enough to rock any woman with two grams of estrogen in her blood, Gabaldon gives him the intelligence of a fox, the culture of a wordly man (he speaks French, English, Gaelic, Greek and Latin), the tenderness of a baby, the manhood of an alpha male, the nobility of the best of the Highlanders, the knack for war of both Attila and Leonidas combined, Casanova’s amatory skills and a heart of gold. If to this already explosive cocktail, we add Diana’s ability to describe skin and clothing textures with supreme suitability, the aromas from different body parts, and also their temperature and colors, the taste of liquids and fluids (inclusive from the body), we have in our hands a passport to the past and the closest neuropsychiatric clinic.
It lies in the wonderful writing of Gabaldon, the ability to turn her fictional characters into flesh and blood people in our heads. And within the first fifty pages, it is impossible for us not to believe that there is actually a Jamie Fraser somewhere, hidden in some Scottish moor or rabbit hunting in Fraser’s Ridge. Just closing your eyes, one can see him wandering the prairies wearing his kilt and see his beloved Claire, wrapped in his plaid, against the chill. The guy is the embodiment of the perfect husband, lover, friend, father and leader. He is fair, has a high sense of honor and justice, is faithful to his wife, puts the interests of his loved ones before his own and would let himself be killed in orther to protect his people. Oh! And has a health as strong as steel or more lives than a dozen cats together. Everything happens to him but he always survives, not before making us suffer as women of death-row. This is how one discovers herself crying her eyes out because he was bitten by a snake or because he was beaten to an inch of his life and clinging to life only by the memory of his beloved wife.
The books go along slowly, as the lives of the characters themselves, and as the story progresses, the addiction becomes so great that one can not function normally because it is impossible to stay away from the books for more than three or four hours. Besides, the MacKenzie and Fraser families take possession of our home and is very common to see them wandering through the rooms of our house, in the same way that the kid from the “Sixth Sense” movie saw deade people everywhere. The magic is such that one feels a desire to know the historical sites, learn more about the customs of the time, analyze every sentence and every line and learn Gaelic. And then we outgrown the context of the book we and we discover ourselves violating Google while looking for more and more, sharing experiences with other readers and devouring every little piece of information related slightly Scotland in the 1700’s.
The love story is perfect. It is a treat for all those romantic minds wanting in need of a festival of kisses, cuddles and well written erotic scenes. She is perfect. And he is perfect for her. Their meetings are great, as the collision of two planets, he kisses like no other, he hugs, licks and caresses masterfully, while whispering words in Gaelic. Meanwhile, we gather our panties from the floor and hate our miserable lives. Needless to say, Jamie wanders through life in his kilt, always ready and willing for a romp, sometimes tender and gentle and sometimes wild as a charging bull. What every girl needs, without going any further. But he not only dedicates his lihe to compulsively making love and reciting the most tender words of love without even blinking; he also spends seven books saving his wife’s life, who seems to not be able to syat out of trouble. He rescues fer from the hands of pirates, rapists, British soldiers and even a plague that threatens to take her straight to heaven. Scenes that, after the initial shock, give way to the most wonderful sex-scenes in the history of romance novels. So one spends her time wishing that Claire gets herself into some kind of trouble, for Jamie to appear amid the sound of bodhrans, wearing his kilt, armed with his sword ready to behead criminals with one hand while dragging his little woman with the other hand and mount her on his untamed stallion. Then comes the pampering, guilt, confessions and a sex-scene that reaches a 10 on the Richter madnitude scale. They sleep cuddling together, they even want one another while asleep, they read each others mind, are attentive to the needs of the other and lavish love every day of their lives.
And this is how problems start. Because fiction is fiction and ones husband is not even remotely a thousandth of a molecule of James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser. The specimen that one knew hoe to get, after hours of hard-labor, is relegated to a project of prokaryotic bacteria and their mere presence makes us sick. In the first place, because they don’t wear kilts and, secondly, because he lacks hair on his head and if they have any, it doesn’t reach his shoulders. The thing in question not only doesn’t have our Jamie’s physical attributes, he neither behaves like the Highlander of our dreams. So the clash with the harsh reality is devastating and leaves us mired in the deepest depression. The book then becomes a double-edged sword, on one hand, one needs to believe that Jamie is real, probable and possible; on the other hand, one needs urgently to get rid of our bedroom companion, to go after the redheaded guy who has taken control of our minds. The contrasts are alienating and the line between fiction and reality gets pixelated like the pictures you enlarge, making our lives unbearable.
Here is a compilation of differences between a REAL HUSBAND and JAMIE FRASER (just to learn more about the effect Gabaldon had in our lives).
Jamie wears a kilt so nicely, that we want to tear it with our teeth. Real husband, the bath towel wrap around his waist looks creepily horrible, revealing an incipient belly and two huge tits (no way would I break a tooth trying to remove that towel from that body). Jamie feeds Claire in the mouth when she is sick. Real husband yells from the kitchen ” WHAT TO EAT?” when one has a high fever fever and shivering in bed. Jamie defends Claire from the English. Real husband defends the auto-mechanic from our own outbursts, when he tries to charge you for something he never repaired. Jamie makes love passionately. Real husband makes love once in lifetime while passionately channel surfing. Jamie says lovely things in Gaelic. Real husband swears in Aramaic when he can’t find his glasses or the remote control. Jamie gives Claire the microscope she so wanted. Real husband gives you the frying pan he wanted. Jamie remembers anniversaries. Real husband makes an effort to forget them. As do we. Why remember the day when screwed up her life? Jamie rides like the Gods. Real husband can’t even ride a bike without falling down. Jamie fixes everything with his bare hands, from the roof of his house to his horse’s bridle. Real husband is unable to open the mayonnaise without assistance and has to pay to unclog the toilet because he can’t use the plunger without splashing. Jamie knows how to listen to Claire and cares about her problems. Real husband says he s tired from work and goes to sleep when it’s time for you to tell him about your troubles. Jamie does not need to speak to know what’s wrong with his wife, he just has to look her in the eye. Real husband needs a Power Point presentation with text and photos, to decode your feelings. That if they read it. Which does not happen often. Jamie, even dirty, smells good. Real husband, even when clean, smells rancid. Jamie smeares toast at breakfast for Claire. Real husband smeares the floor with butter and jelly because in the early hours of the day, he doesn’t coordinate his movements and can’t manage to place the toast in his mouth. Jamie warms Claire’s bed with his body. Real husband warms up the bed with his own farts. Jamie loves his wife however she looks. Real husband looks at you up and down and you says “you’ve gained weight” every time he has a chance to fuck up your life. Jamie can not survive a day without Claire. Real husband can not survive without his car, cell phone, PC and TV .
Given the circumstances, and despite consider myself a devout fan of Diana Gabaldon, I think her literartura endangers millions of households who will see their daily harmony cut off by these contrasts. Needless to say, it is anot dvisable to read these books while suffering from PMS because you might fall into a terrible depression with endless crying crises or commit horrendous crimes against yor husbands / boyfriends / lovers / pets and customer service staff.
Jamie Fraser is the ideal man that every woman wants, desires and needs. The problem is that Jamie lives in the mind of Diana Gabaldon. Make no mistake, he doesn’t exist, he is not real, he is almost sci-fi, a being both unattainable and inaccessible. There is no man on this earth that resembles him and the one that says that she has one like that at home, is lieying through her teeth and deserves to die in the same fire which almost killed Claire. So my advice is to beware of overexposure to this literature and that side effects are usually devastating.
A reader in trouble.
Who are you calling crazy missy?
You? Us? Me? Them? :O