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FQL: Social Justice Edition

Lestat here. I want to answer this question from Mike Chandler: “Lestat, my question is simple. What would you do to fix the world?” —- Mike, I would not do anything because I don’t believe the world is “broken” or in need of fixing. I am aware of the age old belief of many that this is a “fallen” or “broken” world, but I’ve never accepted those ideas. At the present time, more than ever, I’m convinced the world is evolving. There never was any Golden Age or Garden of Eden. We are all evolving, physically and morally as the universe unfolds according to discernible scientific laws. And I’m fascinated by the process. As I explained earlier in another answer, I am by nature optimistic and confident, convinced that we can do much to make this world better for us and others. We vampires face essentially the same challenge as humans: how do we live with our own fallibility, our own greed, our own ruthlessness, yet co-exist with other creatures? That’s why just about every vampire story is essentially a human story. We acknowledge the same dilemma.

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FQL:

Lestat here. I want to answer Scott Hunsucker: “Lestat, I would like to know how you feel about music. You’ve been around long enough to hear some of the greats play and sing. Do you have a personal preference for a certain genre or style of music. If so, does the music move you, does it take you back or evoke memories of your past as it does with some of us mortals?” Scott, I love music. I have to be careful with it; music intoxicates me; I can become completely taken over by music, to where I don’t want to do much else but listen to it. It’s like a powerful drug. I love music of all periods, especially my own century — Mozart in particular. And some French composers who were earlier favorites at the French Royal Court. Vivaldi energizes me, as do many of the Italians. But I can be overpowered easily by Beethoven and Brahms, and 19th century opera as well. Verdi and Puccini and Saint Saens especially delight me. Of course I am enchanted by popular music of all kinds — Jim Morrison, Tina Turner, Bon Jovi, Joan Jett. I find myself highly susceptible to the most emotional and intense music. But I can be hypnotized by the gentle melodies of Eric Satie or Chopin as well. I am consumed from time to time with the desire to make music, to sneak off to some little tavern in the French Quarter of New Orleans and take to the stage with an electric guitar. I do this from time to time, actually. Though not as much as I would like. Thanks for the question. There are many more composers and performers I could name, but you get the idea. —– Now, if anyone has a new question for me, by all means post it in this thread.

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FQL:

Lestat here. I want to answer this question from Amanda Rice: Lestat, is it hard for you to watch humankind tear each other apart over social issues such as marriage equality or freedom of religion? After living so long, I am sure you realize that most of the fighting between us mortals is absurd and pointless, but I am curious to know what you make of all of it? Do you think humans will ever learn to do better?—- Amanda, you’re assuming we vampires, due to our long lives, are somehow emotionally and morally superior to humans and wiser than humans. I’m not so sure that we are. We are after all monsters with human brains and human hearts. We engage in a lot of struggle ourselves that is “absurd and pointless.” —- Actually when I witness humans struggling over social issues and religion, I marvel at their courage and stamina and determination to live meaningful, fruitful and compassionate lives. I marvel at their patience as they struggle to persuade others through reason and reasonable argument, rather than violence. And yes, over the centuries, humans, in my opinion, are certainly doing “better.” They are making great progress, particularly in the West, towards maintaining a secular humanist society in which no blood is shed over race, color, or creed. This is historically remarkable. I can understand your frustration, Amanda. But history, as I’ve lived it, supports a steady advance in human rights in the West that is not only inspiring, but beyond the wildest dreams of those born when I was born. Thanks for a marvelous question.

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Another Fan Question for Lestat answered:

Lestat here. This question is from Federica DarkMoon: “Lestat, would you be give the Dark Gift to someone is ugly, but with a powerful attitude and a brilliant brain, and who loves the same kind of music, look and art you love?” Absolutely, I would, Federica. In theory and in principle and in fact, I would. But it is a fact of the Undead world — to be respected — that vampires give the Dark Gift to those whom they feel are physically as well as mentally and spiritual attractive. But could such a person be physically ugly? Yes. Could the person be old? Yes. Could the person be plain? Yes. Could the person be disfigured? Yes. What matters more than anything is the spirit infusing the person, and for me that would and should involve the person’s curiosity, intensity, love and respect for all life, and desire for knowledge. What matters to me more than anything in selecting candidates for the Dark Gift is whether or not I love them, or think that I will grow to love them, whether or not I desperately want them to share eternity with me, and whether or not they engage me sufficiently that I can count on myself to spend the requisite time with them needed to prepare them for immortality. Of course I’m a creature of wild impulse. I made my beloved child, Claudia, into a vampire just to see what would happen, and hoping that she would help prevent my companion, Louis, from leaving me. And to be quite candid about that, I had no idea Claudia would be so exquisite once transformed or so interesting. She was after all a tiny, malnourished creature, covered in dirt and rags, and on the brink of death. —- Does this cover it? I hope so.

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FQL:

Lestat here. I want to answer a question from Areona May: “Lestat, when you laid unmoving on the chapel floor all those years, why was it only Armand who was allowed to approach you? to touch you? What was it about him that was so special to your heart? —– Areona, I’m not quite ready to discuss in depth what was happening during my ‘comatose’ years on the chapel floor in New Orleans, but I can tell you I was conscious all the while, and aware of what was happening around me. In general, I was essentially recovering from my great journey to "Heaven and Hell” with Memnoch, seeking to make sense of what had been “revealed” to me and what it meant, and whether or not any of it could be trusted. You could say I was roaming on another plane of existence. Some time in the future, I might be able to say more about it. I controlled who approached me and who didn’t. And I did allow Armand to come close for a specific reason. He had a deep anguished need to know whether Memnoch had been a truthful spirit or a lying spirit, whether my visions with Memnoch had been true glimpses of the Divine or delusion. His pain shone bright, brighter than the pain of anyone near me. And so I honored Armand’s intentions. You could say that Armand respected what happened to me with Memnoch more than any of my other immortal comrades. I love Armand deeply. My view of Armand has evolved over time. The less I fear him, the more I love him. And the more I suffer, the more I come to understand Armand’s suffering. I have never doubted Armand’s love for me. We are kith and kin, Armand and me. Areona, thanks for the question. —– I will return later to this page to answer another question and at that time, you all can leave more questions for me.

[fanart by garama]

Lestat here. I want to answer one short question from Alex Hall. Alex asks me: “Did you kill Louis’s brother?” The answer is no. I had nothing to do whatsoever with the death of Louis’ brother. For those of you who don’t or can’t know, this pertains to the story of “Interview with the Vampire.” When I encountered Louis in the 18th century in Louisiana, Louis was grieving for his dead brother. Louis felt he’d failed his brother and caused the brother to take his own life. For a variety of highly complex reasons, I found Louis profoundly emotionally and physically attractive, and I invited him to receive the Dark Gift from me. I brought him over, made him my vampire brother, friend and lover. But only after did I learn about his family, his personal losses, his grief, etc. I would never have struck down some innocent person – Louis’ brother — just to make another person ripe for the Dark Gift. Never even occurred to me. I found Louis deliciously despairing, reckless, and charming. Of course, if he had not lost his brother he might not have been so attractive to me. But again, I didn’t plan all this. There are too many likely candidates available at all times for the Dark Blood; one does not have to go to great lengths to prepare people for it. At least that is what I felt back then in those nights. —– I’ll be back later today to answer more questions.

ANOTHER Fan Question for Lestat answered.

Lestat here. This question comes from Vicki Golightly: “I have never read the books but I have heard so much about them and yes I do have a question, how were you created and do you have a soul?” — Vicki, if you mean how was I created as a vampire, the process was simple. I was kidnapped by an older vampire named Magnus, taken by force to his tower outside of Paris, and there made a vampire through an exchange of blood. Magnus drained me to the point of death and had I not drunk his powerful blood after that, I would have died. Well, I drank it. And I became a vampire like him. This is how it is done with our species; the human is drained and then infused with the maker’s blood. And yes, I most certainly do have a soul — as surely as any human being has a soul. I define soul as that invisible and conscious part of myself which may or may not survive biological death. And I am certain I have one; I am certain that all human beings have souls. And very likely some non-human beings have souls as well. But this soul question is a matter of faith. I can tell you for certain that I have a conscience, and it is a very human conscience, though I do not always listen to it by any means. —- Vicki, thanks again for your question. —- I’ll be back later today with more answers.

Another Fan Question for Lestat answered!

Lestat here. Many of you have asked me whether or not I have any regrets. At first I ignored this question, because I am constitutionally opposed to the very idea of regret. But the more I saw the question, the more I thought about the whole matter. And I think there is indeed one thing in my life that I actively regret. I regret that during the 19th century when I lived in New Orleans with my vampire companions, Louis and Claudia, I did not tell them more about our origins, and about the vampires of the old world. I thought at the time that I was protecting them from secrets that could only hurt them, sheltering them in a wilderness and paradise that belonged exclusively to the three of us. But this was all wrong. I should have known that Louis and Claudia needed to know about the origins of our kind, needed to know where we’d come from, needed to know whether or not there were others out there, and I should have anticipated and encouraged their questions rather than keeping them at a distance from myself. Of course one reason I made this awful mistake is that I did know secrets about vampires that I was bound by an oath not to reveal. But I could have told Louis and Claudia more than I did. I could have respected their need for knowledge. I truly regret that I did not. As many of you know, our little coven family came to disaster, and I think I had a hand in that disaster, by not giving my beloved fledglings more information and insight into what we were. —- I’ll be back later to answer more questions.

Another Fan Question for Lestat answered.

Lestat here. My question today is from Heather Malone: “Lestat! What are your thoughts on gender? Does it matter? Do you think you would have lived your life the same way had you been born female? Best regards, H.” Thank you, Heather. Gender matters only because it matters to biology and society. I can’t imagine how I might have lived my life as a woman, simply because society in my time and even in the present sees women so differently from the way it sees men. I would have been restricted by law and custom in ways as a woman that I was never restricted as a man. How would I personally, the irreducible Lestat, have responded to life had I been a woman? Impossible to know. But I can tell you how my mother, Gabrielle, responded once she became a vampire. She put aside women’s garments and lived as a genderless being, ignoring society entirely and taking full possession of her superior vampiric strength with genderless impunity. She discarded feminine limitations with her feminine garments. She reveled in her new invulnerability. I admire her for it. — Now when it comes to loving others, caring about them, respecting them, becoming involved with them, no, gender means nothing to me. Almost all vampires ultimately transcend gender concerns in their social and emotional relationships. —- That being said, I would say how we personally respond to gender in all our dealings remains a mystery; some individuals no matter how long they walk the earth, may have deep biases based on gender, biases developed in them during a mortal lifetime. These might be so subtle as to defy qualification or analysis. I pride myself on having none, but I’m not sure that I’m right about myself in this. I have respect for the fact that this is a mystery. — I’ve certainly lived long enough to see that society’s assumptions about gender in my time were all proven false and foolish. On the other hand, there are aspects of gender difference that never change for human beings, no matter how much we would like them to change. —- Gender, it matters and it doesn’t matter. Thank you, again, Heather.

Anne Rice’s FB. Another Fan Question for Lestat answered.