The Pensieve

it’s the end of psychological medicine posting! so sad… for once i’m not too glad that a posting has ended. heh, but i do need the break. i’ve been travelling at breakneck speed that i’m going to burn-out soon.

psychiatry is hmmm… cooler than i’d expected it to be. it reminded me of the 18 year-old moi who declared stubbornly to the pple at dstar & psc that i would not do anything other than psychology! (heheh…) i remember though, the nice psychologists at civil svc college who told me, ‘if you can become a doctor, then go be a psychiatrist, don’t justdo psychology.’

i like psy! yay! makes me feel so HIGH! and manic. woohoo! sleep less, irritable, distractable, got incongruous mood even… thankfully no spending spree or sexual promiscuity. heheheh…

i’m still very HIGH! haha, i sound like lulu doing anesthesia, i think she breathed in too much gas!

hypnosis was cool too! hehehe… but i’m not very able to get myself hypnotised thanks to -someone- smsing during one session and creaking the chair as well. *tsk!* hypnosis isn’t as scary as pple make it out to be… for one, you can’t exactly ‘control’ a person after the session is over… the first session was a direct hypnosis type, where the tutor got us to focus on a point on our finger, and then she blah blah blah and started saying ‘your hand feels heavy, heavier and heavier and you would like to let it fall’… serious manz, at that time, i did feel a bit of pull/drag on my hand. it would have been cooler if she’s tried to levitate our hands instead. heheheh i’m not too easily freaked out. second method was the confusional method, i suppose it works better for pple who get too caught up with ‘the word’… seemed like it worked for wenky best. it definitely didn’t work as well for me. i think i have control issues. not that i’m surprised. maybe cuz too many people around there, find it harder to ‘let go’.

there’s so much to see and write in psychiatry and what we’ve only done in these 4 weeks are just the tip of the iceberg! i want to get a more in-depth look at psychiatry and the work the psychologists do!

tata…. hypomania dopey going to have dinner!

latest bad news: i’m a bit allergic to brinjal! oh y oh y, oh god, y must you deprive me of my fave veggie?!?!?!

Genre: horror, literature, “classic”
Rating: 4 out of 5 fangs, made on same level of comparison as Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

‘The Historian’ is an absorbing piece of work about the legend of Vlad the Impaler, or more popularly known as ‘Drakulya’ of Wallachia. The story is beautifully told from the perspectives of mainly 3 persons - Prof Rossi, Prof James (Rossi’s tutor) and the daughter of Prof Rossi. It begins with the disappearance of Prof Rossi, leaving behind a mysterior hand-printed books with a wooden cut-out of a dragon and a mysterious letter which begins with ‘To my dearest and most unfortunate successor…’

The protagonist sets out to search for her father, as well as to uncover the mysterious source of the huge envelope of letters, the nature of which was similar to Jonathan Harker’s diary (if you’ve read ‘Dracula’ you’ll understand what I mean). Unknowingly, she also discovers her birthright, and the secrets of her mother, something her father had always kept from her. From the UK, she journeys to the States, to France, Turkey, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania… following a trail of historical evidence. She is also pursued by the evil ‘forces’ (for lack of a better word) of Dracula. There is a sense of urgency throughout the novel, a pervading feeling of chilliness, and yet, also a captivating sense of discovery as Dracula’s mysteries are revealed in layers.

Certain sections of the book might be a tad too daunting for those who are unable to withstand in-depth discussions of a country’s history. It’s still ok to skim through those few pages, but it might dampen your understanding of the entire story. What might have been best was if Kostova summarised these lengthy discussions into more easily digestible paragraphs. Nevertheless, for the consummate Dracula fans, these discussions might be very exciting and illuminating indeed!

Although this is Kostova’s debut novel, she already shows much power with words, being able to generate such a chilling atmosphere which affects even the most ‘fearless’ readers of horror fiction. It is evident from the detailed descriptions and historical evidence that she had done a tremendous amount of research even before embarking on the novel. As a result, she is able to magically blend fact with fantasy. I hail this book as a remarkable literary achievement, second only to ‘Dracula’.