december 2015
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–– esme barrell
the revenge Issue Getting even is not an odd thing to desire. REVENGE (v): to exact punishment or expiation for a wrong on behalf of, especially in a resentful or vindictive spirit Add some venomous poetry, prose, film, features and original artwork to this formula, and you’ve got the equation for a prime zine. And what a selection we’ve got for you: VMA duels to Gucci trainers; Tarantino to tubas; Homer to Paris Hilton and everything in between. If we’ve learned one thing this month, it’s that revenge never gets old. Huge thanks to those who contributed: you make these zines possible. The rest of you, keep sending stuff our way. Look out for our next theme and get in touch at heliconmagazine@gmail.com with submissions and suggestions, and keep an eye (for an eye) out on our social media for upcoming events. Now that all the cordialities are out of the way, what are we waiting for? Let’s settle some scores. Welcome to Hel(l)icon. (twitter) @HeliconMagazine (instagram) heliconmag (facebook) Helicon (email) helicon.magazine@gmail.com
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MASTER OF PAIN “But pain is perfet miserie, the worst
Of evils, and excessive, overturnes All patience”. (Milton)
Pain cowers under the kitchen table, The hands and knees on which you made it crawl Bone-scraped and bloody. Pathetic and flesh-mutilated, Naked, flayed, eyelids sliced off and Spine exposed; its innards trickle Beneath translucent skin (You call it retribution) Bearing a necklace of blisters, throat-bound, It tugs at the leash you have tied to the chair, Nudges its scab-crusted muzzle against your hand. You glance down, toss it a scrap from your plate Meet my gaze above the table and laugh While Pain whimpers, Blinks its lidless eyes And shits itself at our feet.
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–– charlotte wilder
–– jess baxter
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QUENTIN TARANTINO AND THE REVENGE REDEMPTION The revenge tragedy has often been analysed in the context of its origins in classical and renaissance theatre, with modern examples of the genre frequently attempting to faithfully recreate the well-worn structure of its classical examples. I believe, however, that the revenge tragedy has begun to undergo a transformation in cinema in recent years, with Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill establishing a new form of revenge drama, the possibilities of which continue to be explored by the films that have followed it. Tarantino engages with the typical themes and structure of revenge tragedies in Kill Bill. In this story, the Bride appears to lose her child, and consequentially embarks on a quest for vengeance against the Deadly Vipers. This process causes her to take up the violent methods she once tried to abandon. The stage is set for a conventional revenge tragedy. But as the narrative unfolds, we come to realise how significantly Kill Bill deviates from this genre. By necessity, all tragedies must end on a sombre note. This frequently depicts the protagonist’s conclusion to their path to self-destruction. A tragedy with no disastrous conclusion would be comparable to a comedy with no humour. The film even suggests throughout the narrative that there is no way out for our main character, such as the moment Hanzo tells her “Revenge is never a straight line. It’s a forest. And like a forest, it’s
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easy to lose your way.” And yet Kill Bill, despite these hints, ends with the Bride not only obtaining her revenge, but regaining the very thing she lost– her daughter. It cannot be stressed how unusual this is for a revenge tragedy. Ordinarily, the revenger aims to enact a kind of symbolic rewriting of the past through revenge. By taking violence against the individual(s) that inflicted violence upon them, the revenger goes back to the moment they were wronged and exchanges roles with the party that hurt them. But in Kill Bill, this isn’t an unrealistic goal that the revenger strives for but can never properly achieve, but something the Bride actually accomplishes when she takes back the daughter she thought she lost forever. Even more fatal to Kill Bill’s tragic element than this, however, is the final scene in which the Bride cries tears of joy in the bathroom, and comes out rejuvenated and reborn, ready to spend a happy life with her daughter. You could claim that there are still tragic elements to this ending, as Uma Thurman’s performance is ultimately down to interpretation. But Tarantino reveals his intentions in the screenplay for the film that the audience thinks that the Bride is crying, only to realise she is joyfully laughing. Indeed, while the possibility still remains that the survivors of the Bride’s rampage may one day take revenge against her, the ending chooses not to focus on this, but rather the happi-7
ness shared between mother and daughter. Despite all odds, this revenger finds not tragedy, but redemption with her daughter. Revenge being a precursor to redemption has been explored in other films since the release of Kill Bill. Park Chan-Wook’s film Sympathy for Lady Vengeance depicts a similar tale of a woman taking revenge against the man who took her away from her daughter. Again, this film suggests that the protagonist will suffer a tragic end, only for her to return to her daughter after taking revenge, and receive redemption from her child. Even Tarantino’s subsequent films Inglorious Basterds and Django Unchained have revenge signify society’s redemption. Both films depict villainous groups from history, Nazis and slavers, being cathartically killed by representatives of the minority groups they have wronged. These modern fantasies highlight how far society has moved on from the cruel moments in history that Tarantino examines. These recent films do not necessarily present revenge as entirely free from moral complexity, but they do present it in a new light in which revenge can precipitate redemption. If redemption is the process of moral purification, then revenge is both the immoral state from which these characters move on from, as well as the means by which they do so in these films.
words –– toby jungius
8 images –– kate dickinson
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WINE DARK I wonder if Homer felt blue without colourful language and so instead drank wine until the world turned dark. Odysseus: Feeling blue is thirsty for colour and shade you cannot drink because the sea is muted dim and your lips are stained with wine.
words and image –– ellie drewry
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–– lucy kraftman
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THE GUCCI When I came into the kitchen, he was sitting patiently at the table, amidst great big piles of dirty plates and pans, as though he were some sort of absurd bird of prey perched in a dystopian forest. The room was lit only by a small lamp in the corner behind him, so that his face was dark and obscured. The floor was soiled in great swathes with a caked layer of dirt and bits of old food. Where the bin had overflowed, plastic Sainsbury’s bags had been filled with rubbish and were encroaching upon the middle of the room. I flicked the switch for the overhead light, before remembering that the bulb was broken (as it always had been, and perhaps always would be). Squeezing past the small rubbish pile, I filled the kettle and turned it on, waiting quietly as it boiled. The kettle clanked. I could hear his breathing coming heavy and lethargic, rattling through his phlegmy chest. The tap was broken as well as the light, and no matter how tightly you twisted the handle, there was a continuous drip-drip of water. I fetched the last clean mug from the cupboard, and placed it on the counter, which was covered in sticky meat grease and old cheese rinds. Although I was turned away from him, I was very much aware of his presence: he was oozing a good plethora of bad auras. In the chilly dark, with the inexorable, maddening drip-drip of the broken tap, and surrounded by our squalor, he resembled the last working furnace in an abandoned city, sucking in air and quietly groaning as it runs out of heating oil. His body creaked as the ominous, powerful energy broke. He changed position to talk to me. “This can’t go on.” I glanced appraisingly around the sordid little room. “You may have a point there James.”
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“You know full well who it is, don’t you? We all do.” I did know full well. But James wasn’t done yet. “He’s an ugly little man, with disgusting table manners, and he’s literally reduced us to squalor. I mean for fuck’s sake, I’m middle class!” At this point his voice caught briefly in his throat. “I am not, and was never, meant to live this way,” he declared stiffly. “Admittedly, it has got pretty bad. He is quite annoying.” He shot me a glance that implied I was fundamentally a twat. “Pretty? Quite?!” At this point he stood up, and spilt a bowl full of old milk and mould over his socks. His fists clenched; he was seething to the core. Something demented was trying to claw its way out of his skull. “He is an incorrigible cunt, and life is sick and twisted to have put me in a position where I have to live with him for another six months.” I sighed. “You’re being over dramatic. It can’t all be him.” I gestured feebly at the mess, knowing too well that it was, indeed, all him. James was fuming. I looked at him beseechingly. His body was shaking: he looked like he was on the verge of trapping a nerve. The back half of our kitchen extends out from beneath the floor plan of the upper upstairs floor in the form of a conservatory, so that the windows of the first floor bedrooms open out several feet above the glass ceiling. At this point, we were interrupted by something rattling off the glass above him. Several banana skins and what looked like a used condom had fallen out of the sky onto our conservatory roof. Or out of someone’s bedroom window, I thought. “That’s it!” James shouldered past me roughly into the corridor. I half expected him to tear off his clothes, lopsidedly climb up the stairs on all fours, disconnect someone’s arm from their body, and use it to beat them unconscious. Instead, I heard the front door open and slam shut.
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Intrigued, I followed outside. The wind was howling, and his clothes were billowing madly against his skinny body, like sails trying to get loose of their rigging. Our uncollected rubbish bags had been blown across the street, and some had split. The contents had been taken up by the wind to form vortices of waste, with James at the epicentre, like he was some sort of manic sorcerer. A car’s brake lights had been left on nearby, casting half the scene in a terrifying red light. He was holding a pair of trainers in his hand. I instantly recognised them. “Not the Gucci!” I gasped. “Yes the fucking Gucci!” And with that he cast them in a high arc into one of our empty bins. There was silence for a moment: the wind had suddenly abated. I went over and stood next to him, peering into the bin. They lay at the bottom in a good foot of slimy water. “Jesus James, they cost £200.” He was already looking remorseful. His bout of anger was being replaced by panic. “Oh fuck, oh Jesus.” There was nothing to do about it now. Neither he nor I were ever going to reach into that bin and fish them out. “Oh fuck,” he said again. “Don’t worry about it mate, they looked like something Drake would have worn in 2008 anyway. Or a Turkish chav.” He grimaced. “Pub?” A pause. “Yeah, OK.”
––rhett ribuh-shone
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WILD TALES 23/11/15: Helicon Film Club screened Damian Szifron’s deliciously deranged anthology of revenge stories, “Wild Tales” - Argentinian retribution at its finest. Here are some of our audience’s responses.
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BED My mother taught me to bleed based on the instructions of my grandmother–– she made sure I might never forget. My daughters’ birthdays hurt like bee stings. He says I am ugly, which is why he wanted to touch me, my breasts swollen unchristian things, and painful; there was darkness wrapped inside my apology. (my sex) He looked upon my girls, who slept. He said they sleep as buds sleep, those carved nubs which only flower bright in funeral dress. I paid for anaesthetics. Cut a little deeper, I told him, cut high up into the beds in their hard round bellies, cut, for if it hurts enough I heard you might find Him, deep, deeper… (resting)
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On a small pink pad––like a petal, you said–– He’ll wait, for the only explanation is the paradise you’re trying to extract, entering my little cubs in hard neat slits.
If you find Him, tell Him to come to me. Tell Him I’m sorry. Tell Him He’s wet my appetite–– I want to be a fruit, or foam on the sea, I want, I want, I want… (they bleed)
words –– melissa pettitt image –– tasha snaith
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A NEW QUEEN BEE
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[all text from information sheets from
m last month’s beekeeping workshop]
–– lucy atkinson
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–– julia gardener
–– hannah robathan
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HANNIBAL: THE ULTIMATE REVENGE STORY? (spoiler alert) Anyone who watched Brian Fuller’s adaptation of Hannibal for NBC will be aware of how much the characters’ yearning for revenge shaped the show. Following the budding relationship of enmity and love between disturbed former FBI agent Will Graham and his therapist Hannibal Lecter, who also happens to be the serial killer Will is hunting, Hannibal is a constant rollercoaster of betrayal and revenge that has made it, in my opinion, the most emotionally complex TV series to grace the small screen. Hannibal (Mads Mikkelsen) kills largely to enact revenge on people he believes are “rude” to him. His apparent disdain for his victims is an excellent portrayal of the link between vengeful feelings and those of disgust. This is also apparent in other adaptations of the original books by Thomas Harris, such as Silence of the Lambs, where Hannibal (Anthony Hopkins) murders a fellow inmate because he made distasteful comments about Clarice, his fellow protagonist. This demonstration of superiority reveals another key aspect of revenge – the desire for power. The urge for vengeance does not extend solely to Hannibal. Rather, it seems to infect everyone with whom he forms lasting relationships, whether they are manipulated into his own plots, or whether they are seeking to avenge themselves on him. Alana Bloom, for example, who is nearly killed by Hannibal in the Series Two finale, becomes a character centered around her own yearning to make Hannibal pay. Throughout the series we are left to wonder whether her rage is driven by the physical pain she suffered at Hannibal’s hands or the emotional upset that her trust in Hannibal, with whom she enters into a romantic relationship, is so horribly misplaced. This leads us to the most intricate relationship in the series, between
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Hannibal and Will. Series Two focuses on Will seeking to avenge himself on Hannibal, who framed Will for his own crimes at the end of the last series. Will’s struggle to come to terms with the fact that the only person who truly understands him is also the man who betrayed him demonstrates the huge spectrum of emotions involved in seeking revenge. Will’s rage at Hannibal soon turns into obsession, even longing, while Hannibal too is fascinated by Will. The two try to kill one another again and again, yet this only seems to draw them ever closer, bonding them faster, like an elaborate dance. We, like the characters, are left unable to make sense of their complex relationship, questioning whether it is one of hate or love. The desire for characters to take revenge undoubtedly drives the plot, and this shows just how well the writers know us, their audience. We love revenge. There seems to be something in us that is fascinated by both its darker corners and its more comical aspects. The very fact that revenge is so often confused with love in the series is demonstrative of its seductive power over us. We are drawn to every facet of it, whether stone cold and removed or passionate and fanatical. Revenge is never an indifferent emotion, and for a culture that is so often branded as one of apathy perhaps this exploration is a step towards bringing us together. Considering that revenge brought us something so brilliant as Hannibal, it may not be such a bad thing after all. 25 words –– ella spottiswood image –– isobel litten
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–– faith newcombe
DON’T GETTY MAD - GETTY EVEN The act of revenge entails a complicated blend of emotions that can be difficult to comprehend. But don’t worry - stock photos are here to help you! Through their acute misunderstanding of the subtlety of human emotions, iStockphoto, Getty Images & co provide a much-needed simplification of a complex concept. Here’s what you get when you type in “Revenge”.
–– ben driscoll and josie finlay
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FEAST ON THIS - THE POWER OF REVEN
It’s no coincidence that the most hackneyed of revenge metaphors (dish; col alistic nature of meals and the meaningless customs and codes that come ine film or play. Essentially a form of interactive performance, a banquet bears a revenge tragedies. In the manner of Hamlet, who calls his family to watch his determine his uncle’s guilt or innocence in regards to his father’s murder, Chr mous birthday banquet as a means of assembling an audience and forcing the dinner scene exemplifies the power of uprooting the strict codes of family un the flavour of the soup are interrupted by the familiar sound of metal clinking past misdeeds of his father, throwing the previous minute’s broth based bana of all involved. The function of a meal allows the revenger to force their victim to come not means of food that poisons rather than sustains, the revenger is able to exac physically intrusive, invasive form of retribution. Forced cannibalism in Seneca’s “Thyestes” and Shakespeare’s “Titus Andronicus” presents the ultimate subversion of the eating ritual - and Peter Greenaway’s 1989 “The Cook, the Thief, the Wife and her Lover” recreates it in a jarringly sensual fashion - we are acutely aware that we are watching something artificial. The luscious, glittering set, reminiscent of the excess of a Dutch still-life painting, is juxtaposed unsettlingly against extreme scatological language and all the baroque bloodiness of a Renaissance revenge play, as well as truly terrible table manners from wifebeating gangster Albert Spica. Needless to say, his behaviour doesn’t go unpunished. Albert gets his just desserts - and they aren’t petits fours. words –– josie finlay image –– from “still life with fruit and ham” by jan davidszoom de heem
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NGE BANQUETS
ld) associates vengeance with food and the process of consumption. The rituextricably attached provide the perfect framework for the climax of a revenge a similar function to the trope of a “play within a play” that is used so often in s performance of “The Murder of Gonzago” - or “The Mousetrap” - in order to ristian in Thomas Vinterberg’s 1998 “Festen” (A Celebration) uses the eponyem to come face to face with the true toxicity at the heart of the family. The nity and table fellowship. Excruciating small talk and protracted debates about g on glass. All is normal, polite, delicate - until Christian reveals the appalling alities into sickening relief in a violation of etiquette that shocks the sensibilities
t only face to face but flesh to flesh with their own wrongdoings - via the ct a
e e
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► revenge playlist fuck you - cee lo green >> what goes around...comes around - justin timberlake >> you’re so vain - carly simon >> kim - eminem >> since u been gone - kelly clarkson >> so what - p!nk >> goodbye earl - dixie chicks >> picture to burn - taylor swift >> bust your windows - jazmine sullivan >> fuck it (i don’t want you back) - eamon >> f u right back - frankee >> hit em up - tupac ▪
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–– annie stowell
–– esme barrell
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