Phantom, by Susan Kay

Raphael wrote:

ya-chai 2 wrote:
It's my opinion that Kay's interpretation of some of the characters is a complete 180 from Leroux's version. That's really all right though because I don't see this as a companion piece to Leroux. What I see in Kay's version is a story that stands on its own.

That's why I said she respected the story and kept pretty close to the plot (i.e. the major events). Is Christine vastly different than Leroux's? Absolutely. But Kay's primary focus was Erik and her vision of the character. Anything that was skewed was because of that mindset..

I'm not disagreeing with your assessment. All I'm saying is that this is a completely different story, even the major events were changed to fit Kay's vision.  

ya-chai 2 wrote:
I often wonder why Erik would deliberately sleep with Christine to begin with. While he is practiced in the healing arts, his knowledge of his own disfigurement would be extremely limited. He wouldn't know if it was something that could be passed on to any of his children.

Raphael wrote:
It was my interpretation that Erik wasn't in a position health-wise to have much of a say in the matter.

He had some say so in the matter, he agreed to marry Christine. But that wasn't my point. Early in the story Dr.
Barye makes some observations about Erik's disfigurement, stating it's not a simple case of disfigurement, but something else. This was a fascinating piece of information to me, and I would have liked to have seen Kay elaborate on it. I believe Erik's deformity was in a way responsible for him becoming a practiced healer.

Raphael wrote:But again, look at it from Kay's point of view. She definitely had affection for Erik and has sympathy for him. Giving him a child is her way of giving the character a happy ending while still having him die at the end of the story. These choices all have to be seen through the eyes of the writer if you want to understand why she made the changes she did.

This is the first time I've ever heard someone term the ending of this story as a happy one, but I think it's more of Kay giving herself a happy ending. It's an interesting stand alone story, I just believe she should have ended it with Erik getting the thing he wanted most; Christine.