Reimagining: Kuno's Perspective
As I watch her be whisked away by the machine, I feel something I’ve never felt so greatly before. I don’t know whether to be enraged at her ignorance or upset that I’ve no one to talk to. I told her to visit me not only to try and help her see the truth about this place, but just to have someone to share my experiences with, share my… well, they’re beyond ideas. I guess there’s not a word for them. Yet there she goes, so sure of herself and her superficial bland ideas that the machine has programmed her to blurt out every now and then. She doesn’t know anything yet she thinks the world is made for her. I suppose it is made for people like her: complacent and uninspired servants of the machine who don’t care about anything besides their daily lectures and repetitive meals. Why is it that nobody but me can see any problem with this, it’s so blatantly wrong and unnatural, I guess that’s just how they were all born.
I owe my mother my life, but what life is there to owe if I stay complacently trapped in this horror that is the machine. I wish she understood. I wish everyone understood, but I want to give her life as she did for me. I love her, but she’s just so infuriating. I suppose she’s too far gone, too engulfed by the comforts and simplicity of the machine just as everyone else. When I was younger she would share her ideas with me, simple things like “What if we could get shirts that were blue, or green instead of this plain gray” but as I grew older those ideas changed to “I heard that they might get rid of those useless airships” or “what if there was never a need for us to use the restroom, that would be easier”. She had lost any spark or creativity she had before, she’s now just another product of the machine. The machine was created to serve us, but at this point we are the ones doing the serving. We give the machine a reason for existence, and that’s all we’re here for.
If only there was a way to show everyone the outside world. But surely most would choose to be euthanized over homelessness. And most of those who dared face the outside would likely be too weak to make any progress on the outside unless the others found them. I wonder how the others are doing… I wonder if they hope to see me again, or if they’ve moved from where I last found them. I want to go out again, I want to know what silence means again, and experience life as it was experienced by our ancestors before the machine. I want others to do the same, but these damn sheep won’t even choose to step outside their bland hexagons for even a second. I guess I shouldn’t blame them, they were born into it. So who do I blame? The people who built the machine? The people who took advantage of that work others did for them? Perhaps I blame everyone. Maybe I even blame the people on the outside for not doing more to free us. I don’t know. I don’t really know much anymore, although I guess I know more than I used to, and more than practically everyone else down here for that matter.
Your post is really well done - you did a great job on keying into the isolation Kuno must have felt after he was captured during his journey outside. Outcast within society and kept from being with the homeless surface-dwellers who are truly his people, Kuno certainly would have felt the wistfulness you depict in the third paragraph. I wonder if he was the only person who felt this way - if Kuno's anti-machine sentiments were so relentlessly suppressed, it's possible that many (most?) others felt as he did but were kept in similar isolation.
ReplyDeleteGiven that we don't know Kuno's direct experiences or thoughts, I feel like this was well written to provide an alternate side/view to the story, other than through Vashti's eyes. I really like how the second paragraph offers up insight as to how Kuno's mother may have changed over time growing accustomed to the Machine's subservience, and additionally seeing his true emotions about that change as well! I also appreciate how the last paragraph also offers up more deeper rationalizations about who to blame, the machine itself, the people or even everyone, as this would understandably be very confusing to the characters who know so little about the world around them.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really well written post! In my opinion, Kuno is a much more dynamic character, as he has a unique view on the world, making reading about his perspective all the more interesting. You do a great job of depicting Kuno's relationship with his mother, showing how he is torn between his feelings for her, both grateful for the life that she has given him and resentful that she has been complacent in the creation and development of the machine. Good work.
ReplyDeleteI loved this take of the story. Personally, I really despised Vashti (her ideas can go die in a hole) so it is nice to have the perspective be from the eyes of Kuno who is a much more sympathetic character. I enjoyed you highlighting the isolation and almost helplessness that Kuno felt with the hive mind of the machine all around him. I also really loved that you decided to write a paragraph about Kuno's mixed and disappointed view of his own mother.
ReplyDeleteThis was super fun to read! I like how you captured a lot of the emotions that Kuno probably felt and how you communicated his anger and frustration really well. The backstory that you included about his mother changing also added another layer of complexity to the story and gave some insight into why Kuno might be different than others. I thought you brought up a really interesting point in your last paragraph about who is to blame for the situation. There are a lot of problems with the world today, and your post made me think about if there is any specific person or group that should be blamed, if the "system" should be blamed, or if there even is an answer to who should be blamed.
ReplyDeleteI really liked how you narrated Kuno's thought process in your blog post, and it mirrors a lot of the thoughts I had reading this story. One line I especially loved was "I want to give her life as she did for me." There is so much in this line, because it shows their connection as mother and son, as well as Kuno's yearning and disappointment about his current situation. It must be devastating to see your mother, the woman who gave birth to you, a slave to a machine who does not understand what you say, and I think you showed this feeling really well.
ReplyDeleteI liked how your reimagining immediately recaptured the personality of Kuno through your descriptions of his isolation in the first paragraph. I also thought your interpretation of Kuno's feelings of loving frustration towards his mother in the second paragraph were really well done and matched with the original story's Kuno very well. Well done.
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