FEELING HER PAIN
The pain expressed by Fiona Apple touched my heart (“What a Drag It Is Being Young,” by Robert Hilburn, Oct. 5).
We “older” adults try to gloss over young people like her in order to dodge our own personal discomfort with the themes her music addresses. We also have a persistent naive belief that youth is synonymous with joy. Those who are in their teens and early 20s are experiencing a range of situations--and the pains that may come with them--for the first time. Hence, their reactions are unbridled and primal; they have not yet developed the protective defenses we baby boomers have built up to get ourselves through our emotional turmoils.
Fiona, you are on the right path. Your edginess does us all good--as a means of expression for your own generation, and as a reminder to those of us who are battle weary and would rather forget the fight.
VALARIE COOK CASCADDEN
Burbank
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I wish to thank you on behalf of teenage girls throughout the Greater Los Angeles area for publishing the fact that 5-foot-2 Fiona Apple, an example of “sheer beauty,” tips the scales at a whopping 102 pounds. Your contribution to the distorted body images suffered by many young women will not go unnoticed by Apple’s many impressionable adolescent fans, I am certain.
What is significant about the artist is her art--not her height, weight or, God forbid, the teensy-weensy salad she had for lunch at the site of the interview. Tell us about her childhood, her plans to save the world, and yes, even her rape at age 12. But the size and shape of her body really is insignificant in relation to her ability to move an audience with her voice and her songwriting skills.
MARIELLE SMITH
Los Angeles
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Calendar reached new levels of vacuity with its cover text: “Fiona Apple sings of sex, loss and alienation. Why so worldly at 20?”
Can it really be that the editors of Calendar don’t know that sex, loss and alienation are the only things that 20-year-olds think about? Now, if the cover had read: “Fiona Apple sings of foreign policy, economics and how to make a truly great martini. . . .”
PETER OSBALDESTON
Los Angeles
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Huzzah for Fiona Apple! At her age, I complained bitterly that more and more of my contemporaries were becoming homogenous: shopping the same stores, eating the same food, watching the same shows and reading the same material. Her comment “Go with yourself” was an attempt to encourage young people to express their own uniqueness from within and was right on the mark.
It’s unfortunate that her “backers” in the industry use terms such as “naive,” “young” and “loose cannon.” Please allow me to use some terms regarding them: “ignorant,” “compassionless” and “backstabbing.”
GREG MEINHARDT
Manhattan Beach
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I don’t buy into the idea that Fiona Apple connects with an anguished generation. While her childhood experience was tragic, and she expresses her inner turmoil in a way that appeals to the music-buying public (I’m a fan too), today’s adolescents are enjoying the longest and deepest period of economic growth and worldwide cooperation ever.
Yes, growing up is tough, but today’s outlook is far better and less “anguished” than during the Great Depression, both world wars, the Vietnam era and the last recession.
Give me a break.
ANDREW MALTZ
Sherman Oaks
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Isn’t it ironic (apologies to Alanis Morissette) that some people should appreciate Fiona Apple’s music while telling her to lighten up. These critics are missing the point. If Fiona were more lighthearted there would be no music. Her music cannot be separated from her personality. She is a serious, introspective artist with a remarkable gift for communicating her feelings.
At a time when her male rock counterparts seem to have run out of things to say, we should all be thankful that Fiona has the talent and guts to write and speak about things that matter.
ROB FOWLER
Saugus