Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer [Paperback]

Rhonda V. Wilcox (Author)

Book Description

Release date: October 13, 2005

Rhonda Wilcox is the world's foremost authority on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, its characters, and its themes. Wilcox argues that Buffy is enduring as art by exploring its excellence in both long-term story arc construction and in producing individual episodes that are powerful on their own. She examines the larger patterns that extend through all seven seasons: the hero myth, imagery of light, naming symbolism, Buffy's relationship with Spike, sex, and redemption. Wilcox also focuses on acclaimed and noteworthy episodes, including the musical "Once More, with Feeling," the largely silent and wordless "Hush," and the dream episode "Restless." She examines Buffy's literary narrative, symbolism, visual imagery, and sound. Combining great intelligence and wit, written for fans, this is the worthy companion to the show that has claimed and kept the minds and hearts of watchers worldwide.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This accessible collection of essays on Buffy the Vampire Slayer defends the artistic merit of the fantasy TV show with equal parts wit and insight. Wilcox, an English professor at Gordon College, is a fan of the series and doesn't condescend to other fans or disparage what she believes is "art, and deserves to be so studied. It is a work of literature, of language...of visual art...of music and sound." Wilcox looks at the big-picture narrative arc and at individual episodes, finding impressive, but sometimes tenuously connected, influences at work: Joseph Campbell's momomyth, Shakespeare, T.S. Eliot, John Donne, Virgil and Charles Dickens. "One of the great themes of Dickens's Bleak House," she writes, "is our interconnection; and one of the great themes of Buffy is the virtue of community." Not surprisingly, the author has no patience for critics and academics who dismiss Buffy as mere "cult TV" on the basis of its genre and argues that fantasy can have more emotional resonance than realism. Though not convincing as a work of genuine scholarship, Wilcox's book is a serviceable addition to the canon of Buffy.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Although television is often looked down upon, Wilcox, one editor of Slayage, the online journal devoted to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, presents a compelling argument for it as an art form as worthy of respect and acknowledgment as film or literature. She furthers her argument by using Joss Whedon's iconic show as a salient example, drawing on the depth of the characters, the symbolism in the show, and the many real-world commentaries that permeate its narrative. The first half of the book deals with everything from the significance of the characters' names in relation to their identities to parallels between Buffy and the Harry Potter saga, while the second half offers detailed analyses of seven of Buffy's finest, most complex episodes, including the ones that deal with the loss of Buffy's virginity and the almost entirely silent episode "Hush." The library of scholarly Buffy titles continues to grow, with Wilcox's thoughtful, accessible volume an honorable addition to it. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: I. B. Tauris; First Edition edition (October 13, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1845110293
• ISBN-13: 978-1845110291
• Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.8 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #320,223 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars More than meets the eye November 19, 2005

By Kenneth Hannsgen

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

After you've watched several episodes of the 7-year TV series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," you begin to suspect that, just as in Sunnydale, something is going on beneath the surface. Wilcox explores the depths, revealing the artistic devices with which the series' creators built their marvelous world. This hardened "Buffy" follower found new insights and observations throughout the book. (Try, for example, the chapters on Buffy/Spike, "The Body," and "Once More, With Feeling.") Wilcox convinced me, too, that there's still much more to think about here - a telling point in the argument that Buffy matters.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Academic Buffy Without A Lot of Jargon March 8, 2006

By Breezie

Format:Paperback

I bought this book after Christmas and really enjoyed it. I found Wilcox's writing to be clear and often concise. I really enjoyed the essay topics that she included, especially "When Buffy Meets Harry" which compares Buffy and Harry Potter. She does a remarkable job comparing to two of them. As a student in Media Studies and Philosophy, I found her analysis on various subjects to be very insightful.

Non-academics can really appreciate this book and understand her essays. While I do have some philosophical background, I was still able to grasp her material much easier the first time around than some of the essays I have found in other academic Buffy books.

My only complaint is her fixation with Freud, I felt that Freud and phallic comparisons were made far more often than necessary and in ways that I didn't feel were warranted. But it could just be that I'm not a big fan a Freud.

In conclusion, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

29 of 38 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars An important set of essays on a seminal television series January 6, 2006

By Robert Moore HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

To this day, when discussing aesthetic matters with my more intellectual friends, if I mention BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, the initial reaction is usually a snicker, as if bringing BUFFY into a serious discussion was indistinguishable from doing the same with BARNEY or HEE HAW. Once they realize that I'm not making a joke but being serious, there is a somewhat stunned reaction, then amazement upon realizing that this television show with the inconceivably silly name might be taken seriously by anyone. Then there is further amazement when I inform them that BUFFY is probably the most popular show of all time among academics, who often tend to write about it not merely as detached spectators, but fans. In fact, nearly three years after the end of the series, Buffy Studies remains a vital and even expanding field. As television studies moves more and more towards the textual discussion of individual shows, a canon of the great shows is gradually forming. Though the list of canonical shows is rather small and still very much in flux, there is no question that BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER is one of those few shows. Rhonda Wilcox, author of this fine collection of essays, has done as much as anyone within academia to further the serious discussion of the show.

Why does Wilcox's book matter? I can best illustrate this by referring to a proposal that C. S. Lewis makes in AN EXPERIMENT IN CRITICISM. Most critics, Lewis points out, primarily focus on what works are good or bad, a practice Lewis laments because what is regarded as great in one generation is frowned upon in another, while a reviled book in one era is considered a classic in another. Instead, Lewis suggests, we should focus instead on what works promote good reading and which preclude it. John Donne, for instance, in any age can be read in a good fashion, while a romance novel cannot. What is good reading? It incorporates such things as rereading, constant reflection over certain passages, ongoing discussion about it, and perhaps memorization of some passages. These are merely a few of the activities that works that promote good reading can generate. I believe Lewis's proposal applies equally to film and television viewing. And BUFFY can be read in a "good" fashion. If anyone doubts me on this, I would point to Wilcox's book as concrete proof that my contention is true. I believe Wilcox proves beyond doubt that BUFFY generates good viewing. She does this in a host of ways. For instance, she frequently teases out various themes in the series, such as the use of light imagery in the show or the role that names plays. She explains the logic of the series, many of the major narrative devices, the role and use of music in the series, and the way language is employed. She furthermore takes up in the second half of the book a number of individual episodes and amplifies many of the explicit or latent themes contained within. I will not say that everyone will like BUFFY after reading Wilcox's boo, but I will state that it will quiet any snickers and they will at least admit that it is a show to be taken seriously.

Although Wilcox is an academic, I believe the book will appeal to less academically inclined fans of the show. Her writing is very clear and always accessible. Certainly fans of the show will find the going at least as easy as those academics that are unfamiliar with the show but more accustomed to academic writing. I found the book to be very smooth sailing. I not only have a strong academic background but am one of those fans of the show who can name most of the show's 144 episodes in order and by title. My point is that I think the book will have broad appeal.

I do have two bones to pick with the book. First, Wilcox doesn't quite make good on the title. There is never a point at which she either states that BUFFY should matter or why the show does. There is an odd disjunct between the book's title and the content of the book. The subtitle really should have been the title of the book. Second, Joseph Campbell. For my tastes Campbell is mentioned way, way too much. My academic background is in the study of religion and in philosophy (the former earlier in my career and the latter later). Joseph Campbell is strongly reviled among academic students of religion and is widely considered something of an intellectual mountebank. Significantly, few in comparative religion or theology take any of Campbell's work seriously at all. Virtually all of Campbell's fans within academia are in Literature and outside academia New Age religionists or fans of Carl Jung. I don't have the space here to explain all the problems serious students of religion have with Campbell (let me opaquely state that Campbell makes a vast number of unargued for assumptions that if questioned-and they ought to be-undermine virtually everything he says). I think it perhaps significant to acknowledge that Joss Whedon was familiar with Joseph Campbell's work, but I found every use of Campbell to illumine BUFFY an unwarranted distraction.

Those two complaints aside, this is clearly a book of the first importance for fans of BUFFY. But it is also an important book for those who find the expanding textual discussion (i.e., treating TV shows as texts in their own right, and not merely studying them for their wider cultural or sociological significance) to be one of the most stimulating alterations in Television Studies in recent years. Hopefully we will see more studies like this not merely on BUFFY but on some of the other shows that are candidates for television's emerging canon.