Reading questions and materials for April 13th

[잔다르크]

The novel for this month is " The Devil wears Prada." by Lauren Weiwhsberger in 2003.

And it also filmed in 2006 starring Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway.

Because it is one of the most read novel as well as the most watched movie, the discussion is sure for going vigorously.

Please read followings and don't forget to bring interesting stories and articles as well.

I'm really anticipating to meet you tomorrow.

1. What do you think the most cruel manner Miranda did on her subordinates is? If you don't remember any, please tell us your own "Boss from Hell" story you've met in your life.  

2. Among those characters did you find someone similar to you?  Then because of what aspect do you think so?

3.  If you had a chance to meet one of these fictional characters and asked a question, who would you pick and what question would you ask?  For example, I want to meet Eduardo and ask him why did he alwalys act like that? I felt so irritable about his mischievous behaviors to Andrea when she is already unfortunate enough.

4. "Runway wouldn't be Runway - hell, it wouldn't be much of anything at all- without Miranda Priestly. I knew it so did everyone else."  If you fill another word (A)  instead of "Runway" and  fill another name(B) instead of Miranda Priestly, what would they be?

 For example,  (A)슬램덩크  (B)서태웅 

5. " It's a job a million girls would die for, of course."  What was the most adorable job on your school days? 

6. "The Closet wasn't really the closet at all. It was more like a small auditorium. Along the perimeter were walls of shoes in every size and color and style, a virtual Willy Wonka's factory for fasionistas, with dozens of sling backs, stiletoss, ballet flats, high-heeled boots, open toe sandals, beaded heels. Stacked drawers hel every imaginable configurations of stockings, socks, ... the accessesories shelves and drawers took up the farther two walls, and the sheer amount of merchantdise-not to mention its value-was staggering.. " These descriptions for the "closet" go through 2 pages.

 Q. Have you dreamed of your own closet or garage filled with innumerous precious things ? In my case, it was Baby house with 2 strories. Baby has her own room and own a closet filled with all kinds of clothes including party dresses. What was yours?

7. "The expression‎ on her face was one of passive disgust, the way the desensitized Law & Order detectives appear when faced with yet another beaten and bloodied corpse. I did quick review of myself and wondered what exactly had triggered the reaction. "

 Q. This is one of some descriptions where Andy felt Miranda's gaze on herself. 

 Have you experienced that kind of situation in front of someboby possibly hating you? Or vice versa? 

8. Andy finally decided to return to her normal. Do you think if the story goes on reality? Going back or going ahead continuously, which way is more real?

9. Here are ending and sequel.

 -Ending-

 In the last chapter Andrea learns that her tiff with Miranda made her a minor celebrity . Afraid she has been blacklisted from publishing for good, she moves back with her parents and works on short fiction, financing her unemployment with the profits from reselling the designer clothing she had been provided with for her trip.  At the novel's end, she is returning to the Elias-Clark building to discuss a position at one of the company's other magazines. She sees a girl who she realizes is in fact, Miranda's new junior assistant, who looks as harried and put-upon as she once did.

-Sequel-

" The story is set eight years after the events of the first novel. Andy is now herself a magazine editor-in-chief, at hot bridal magazine The Plunge, with Emily as her assistant. She is planning her own wedding, to a former boss, but remains haunted by her experience with Miranda, whom she eventually encounters again."

 Q. How are you satisfied with the ending and the sequel?  Why don't we make them different?

 Here is one example of criticism. One fan of the original reacted with disappointment to this. At MSN.com, Kate Erbland called the story "disconcerting" since Andy had apparently turned her back on the world of magazine publishing to concentrate on writing fiction at the end of The Devil Wears Prada. " Readers who have warm and fuzzy memories of indefatigable Andy might not be so inclined to pick it up," she warned. " So Andy got back into a side of publishing she didn't like so much, is still afraid of Miranda, and will likely have some relationship issues thanks to her work?  Nice maturation there."

10. Do you remember any memorable lines in the novel or scenes in the movie? If any, please share them.

<Materials for The Devil wears Prada>

1. Plot summary

Andrea Sachs, a recent graduate of Brown with a degree in English moves to New York City hoping to find a job into the publishing. She travels with her best-friend Lily, a graduate student at Columbia, and blankets the city with her résumé, hoping for a foot in the door of the magazine industry to further her dream of working for The New Yorker. She gets a surprise interview at the Elias-Clark Group and is hired as the junior assistant of Miranda Priestly, editor-in-chief of the fashion magazine "Runway". Although she knows little of the fashion world, she is told repeatedly that "a million girls would die for [her] job". Andrea is told that if she manages to work for Miranda for a year, she can have her pick of jobs within the magazine industry.

At a celebrity party Andrea meets Christian Collinsworth, a charismatic Yale graduate who has been identified as the hot, up-and-coming writer of their generation. They become attracted to each other, complicating her relationship with her boyfriend, Alex.

Andrea's relationships become complicated because of her new job. Lily increasingly turns to alcohol and picking up dubious men to relieve the pressures of graduate school. Alex, struggling with his own demanding job as an inner-city schoolteacher, grows frustrated with Andrea's long hours and constant stress. Andrea's relationship with her family also suffers. Matters finally come to a head when her coworker Emily gets mononucleosis and Andrea must travel to Paris with Miranda in her stead. Andrea agrees, although this will mean canceling a long-awaited trip with Alex.

In Paris, she has a surprise encounter with Christian. Later that night, Miranda finally lets down her guard and asks Andrea what she has learned, and where she would like to work afterwards. She promises to place phone calls to people she knows at The New Yorker on Andrea's behalf once her year is up and suggests that she take on some small writing assignments at Runway.

Back at the hotel, Andrea gets urgent calls from Alex and her parents asking her to call them. She does so and learns that Lily is comatose after driving drunk and wrecking a car. Though Andrea is pressured by her family and Alex to return home, she tells Miranda she will honor her commitment to Runway. Miranda is pleased, and tells her that her future in magazine publishing is bright. At the Paris fashion show for Christian Dior, however, Miranda phones her with yet another impossible demand. Andrea finally realizes that her family and friends are more important than her job, and realizes to her horror that she is becoming more and more like Miranda. She refuses to comply with Miranda's latest outrageous request, and when Miranda scolds her publicly, Andrea replies, "Fuck you, Miranda. Fuck you". She is fired on the spot, and returns home to reconnect with her friends and family. Her romantic relationship with Alex is beyond repair, but they remain friends. Lily recovers and fares well in court for her DUI charge, receiving only community service.

In the last chapter Andrea learns that her tiff with Miranda made her a minor celebrity when the incident made 'Page Six'. Afraid she has been blacklisted from publishing for good, she moves back with her parents and works on short fiction, financing her unemployment with the profits from reselling the designer clothing she had been provided with for her trip. Seventeen buys one of her stories. At the novel's end, she is returning to the Elias-Clark building to discuss a position at one of the company's other magazines. She sees a girl who she realizes is in fact, Miranda's new junior assistant, who looks as harried and put-upon as she once did.

2. Characters

• Andrea "Andy" Sachs, a recent Brown University, graduate, who works as a junior personal assistant to a powerful and tyrannical fashion magazine editor.
• Miranda Priestly, the British-born (as Miriam Princhek) editor-in-chief of Runway, an influential fashion magazine published by the Elias-Clark company. She is known for wearing a white Hermès scarf somewhere on her person every day and treating her subordinates in a manner that borders on emotional and psychological abuse.
• Emily Charlton, Miranda's former junior assistant now her senior assistant. She and Andrea have a conflicted relationship.
• Alex Fineman, Andrea's boyfriend, who teaches at an elementary school in the South Bronx through Teach for America.
• Lily Goodwin, a free-spirited graduate student in Russian literature at Columbia with curly black hair, who rooms with Andrea, her longtime friend.
• Nigel, a very tall British gay man who in addition to serving as Runway 's creative director, frequently appears on television as a fashion consultant and is thus one of the few stars of the magazine Andrea knows prior to working there. He always speaks loudly. He has an outrageous sense of style and is the only person who can get away with critiquing Miranda's personal wardrobe choices.
• James, another gay man at Runway who works at the beauty department who befriends Andrea. He jokes about "calling in fat" on days when he feels unattractive.
• Jeffy, who oversees Runway 's famous "Closet," stocked with all sorts of clothing nominally on loan from the designers for use in shoots, but rarely returned and often "borrowed" by the magazine's staff. He is responsible for transforming Andrea's wardrobe so she can fit in in the fashionable hallways of the Runway offices.
• Hunter Tomlinson, a prominent New York tax attorney who is Miranda's current husband (she is divorced from the father of her two daughters, a well-known British rock star). As nice to Andrea and Emily as his wife is cruel, he is referred to by them and other close associates of Miranda's as "B-DAD" behind his back, for Blind Deaf and Dumb—the only way they could imagine anyone being able to live with her.
• Eduardo, a security guard at the Elias-Clark building, who often playfully makes Andrea or anyone else unfortunate enough to work as one of Miranda's personal assistants sing or otherwise put on some sort of act before he lets them enter the building.
• Christian Collinsworth, a handsome young writer whom Andrea meets at a party, where they develop a mutual attraction.
• Caroline and Cassidy, the twin daughters Miranda dotes on.
• Cara, the girls' nanny, who saves Andrea's skin more than once but is eventually fired by Miranda after she gives the twins a timeout in their bedroom for a bad attitude.
• Jill, Andrea's older sister, who is married and lives in Houston, where she has begun to affect a Southern accent, much to Andrea's displeasure.
• The Clackers, the magazine's many female editorial staffers, mainly Allison (former senior assistant, now beauty editor), Lucia (fashion department), Jocelyn (editorial), and Stef (accessories). Andrea gives them their nickname for the sound made by the stiletto heels they wear as they walk up and down the marble floors of the Elias-Clark building.
• Benjamin, referred to as Benji. He is Lily's ex-boyfriend, but it seems that he and Lily has stayed in touch even though they had broken up. He is mentioned in the book only briefly, but he was involved in the car accident with Lily.

< Appendix - Movie Reviews >

“Never raising her creamy voice, Meryl Streep is scarily sensational as magazine editor Miranda Priestly, the tyrannical, all-powerful arbiter of New York fashion. When the satire stays focused on Streep or her snooty Brit assistant (Emily Blunt), ‘Prada’ is malicious fun. But the central story about how smart, idealistic Anne Hathaway, as Miranda's drably dressed new assistant, loses her soul (and boyfriend Adrian Grenier) in pursuit of success and great shoes is dramatically anorexic.” --DAVID ANSEN, Newsweek

“What makes the film more than fairly good fluff is Streep's performance. It would have been easy for her to portray Miranda as a raging caricature, but instead she plays it for truth. The cadenced purr of her voice has steel in it - she's a lot scarier than a shouter would be. The manicured and Manolo'd Miranda with her rock-solid coif is a woman who values control above all things. When she lets her guard down near the end and talks to Andy about the breakup of her own marriage, the fissures in her armor show and for a moment she becomes bracingly(기쁘게도) human. Is there anything this actress cannot do?” PETER RAINER, The Christian Science Monitor

“Miranda is played by Meryl Streep, an actress who carries nuance in her every pore, and who endows even her lighthearted comic roles with a rich implication of inner life. With her silver hair and pale skin, her whispery diction as perfect as her posture, Ms. Streep's Miranda inspires both terror and a measure of awe...she is a vision of aristocratic, purposeful and surprisingly human grace. And the movie, while noting that she can be sadistic, inconsiderate(인정미없는) and manipulative(손끝으로 다루는), is unmistakably on Miranda's side.” --A. O. SCOTT, The New York Times

[andrea]

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