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NON-freaks dni. This is a freaks only zone

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Jane Eyre: I'm a good pale white English woman with a heart and a spine unlike those slavish submissive brainless Eastern Orientals

white women for the next 200 years: wow 😍😍 I love this book 😍😍 I'm such a Jane 😍😍

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Everyone is always talking about how Rochester is problematic and how Jane shouldn't have married him but that is not even the most objectionable part of the novel, not by a long shot. No. The real problem in Jane Eyre is both Rochester and Jane's treatment and prejudices towards Adèle.

Adèle is the eight-year-old, half-French child of Rochester (maybe), who is already predisposed to be a harlot either because she's French or because of eugenics (daughter of Rochester's mistress, let's not mention the double whammy since her father was in fact sleeping with that mistress because of course the man has nothing to do with it rolls eyes). Her being excited to get a present of a dress from Rochester must mean she's already well on the way to being a slattern, it's not the normal reaction of a child to a present (it totally is). And then Jane can't care for Adèle because she has a half-blind and crippled husband, BUT DON'T WORRY! Good English education drove all that slutty Frenchness right out of her:

As she grew up, a sound English education corrected in a great measure her French defects; and when she left school, I found in her a pleasing and obliging companion: docile, good-tempered, and well-principled.

It's not even her mother mentioned here, just the fact that she's French. She must be saved from the Frenchness! And I can't even laugh at how stupid this all is, because this is still a common negative stereotype about the French.

So yeah, it's worse than the marriage at the end, that's all I'm saying.

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they need to invent an emoji of a guy in a hole that resembles the grave but isnt

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being deconstructed probably feels good as fuck for a genre

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Hiya

23. fics you wanted to write but didn’t

24. favorite fic you read this year

25. a fic you read this year you would recommend everyone read

xx

23. fics you wanted to write but didn’t

Forced-marriage-due-to-compromise-by-way-of-snowstorm was actually the first fic I was jotting down notes and snippets of conversation for—but then my mind was attacked with the conversation in chapter 3 of Promise. Once I finished Promise, I was going to get started on it again (or else my Elizabeth-has-a-London-season idea), but the premise of Town and Country (which I had been intending to save for later) compelled me so powerfully that I just gave in and started writing it.

24. favorite fic you read this year

Probably hele's Not Every Gentleman. It was the kind of reading experience where I got more upset the closer I got to the end, because soon I wouldn't have any left to read. It's such a fascinating idea, and so well-executed.

25. a fic you read this year you would recommend everyone read

@linmeiwei's Betrothed to Mr. Darcy is really well-written, subtle, well-characterised, and touching.

Also @rusakkowrites "Playing their Cards Right" for something quick--"A Knightly Rescue" for something a little bit longer. The latter story in particular is really clever in how it plays with canon.

[fanfic end of the year asks]

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"It is absolutely useless and absurd to tell a man that he must not joke about sacred subjects. It is useless and absurd for a simple reason; because there are no subjects that are not sacred subjects. Every instant of human life is awful. Every step, every stirring of a finger, is full of an importance so huge and even so horrible that a man might go mad if he thought of it. If it is wrong to joke about one's death-bed it is wrong to joke about the veal and ham pie which, if pursued with too much devotion, may very likely have a great deal to do with bringing one to that death-bed. If it is wrong to joke about a dying man it is wrong to joke about any man. For every man is a dying man; a man dying slow or fast. In short, if we say that we must not jest about solemn subjects, what we really mean or ought to mean is that we must not jest at all [...]

I think we may jest on any subject. But I do not think that we may jest on any occasion. It is really irreverent to speak frivolously at those particular moments at which the seriousness of the matter is being specially and fiercely felt. We joke about death-beds, but not at death-beds [...] Life is serious all the time; but living cannot be serious all the time.

[In] anything that does cover the whole of your life--in your philosophy and your religion--you must have mirth. If you do not have mirth you will certainly have madness."

-- G.K. Chesterton: The Daily News, 1 September 1906

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fanfic end of the year asks

since it’s december, i thought i’d make a little end of the year ask meme for fanfic writers and readers! reblog and ask away

favorite fic you wrote this year

least favorite fic you wrote this year

favorite line/scene you wrote this year

total number of words you wrote this year

most popular fic this year

least popular fic this year

longest completed fic you wrote this year

shortest completed fic you wrote this year

longest wip of the year

shortest wip of the year

fandom you enjoyed writing for the most this year

favorite character to write about this year

favorite writing song/artist/album of this year

a fic you didn’t expect to write

something you learned this year

fic(s) you completed this year

fics you’ll continue next year

current number of wips

any new fics to start next year

number of comments you haven’t read

most memorable comment/review

events you participated in this year

fics you wanted to write but didn’t

favorite fic you read this year

a fic you read this year you would recommend everyone read

number of favorites/bookmarks you made this year

favorite fanfic author of the year

longest fic you read this year

shortest fic you read this year

favorite fandom to read fic from this year

*feel free to specify fandoms or a fic depending on the question.

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Writing character-driven porn

that is still ✨porn✨

(totally not asking about Scenes of Dissipation)

What can I say... I try to give the people (myself) what they want

[anonymously tell me what my specialty as a fanfiction writer is]

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oh no my pornography is turning into an angst-filled character study

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Jane Eyre: I'm a good pale white English woman with a heart and a spine unlike those slavish submissive brainless Eastern Orientals

white women for the next 200 years: wow 😍😍 I love this book 😍😍 I'm such a Jane 😍😍

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Not only that, but the entire novel is basically the Arab Men Are Evil Misogynist Despots and Arab Women Are Submissive Sexpots book. The image of "The Arab" is used to represent sexual despotism and bad, evil gender dynamics very explicitly and repeatedly.

There's a reason that Blanche Ingram is described as having dark colouring ("the raven ringlets, the oriental eye") and also being submissive and flattering towards Mr. Rochester; there's a reason that she's specifically "attired in oriental fashion" during their game of charades ("her cast of form and feature, her complexion and her general air, suggested the idea of some Israelitish princess of the patriarchal days"); there's a reason that Rochester says "I would not exchange this one little English girl for the Grand Turk’s whole seraglio," and Jane thinks that "The Eastern allusion bit me again."

There's a reason that the whiteness of Jane's skin is emphasised. When Rochester says his Grand Turk thing, Jane replies:

“I’ll not stand you an inch in the stead of a seraglio,” I said; “so don’t consider me an equivalent for one. If you have a fancy for anything in that line, away with you, sir, to the bazaars of Stamboul without delay, and lay out in extensive slave-purchases some of that spare cash you seem at a loss to spend satisfactorily here.” “And what will you do, Janet, while I am bargaining for so many tons of flesh and such an assortment of black eyes?” “I’ll be preparing myself to go out as a missionary to preach liberty to them that are enslaved—your harem inmates amongst the rest. I’ll get admitted there, and I’ll stir up mutiny; and you, three-tailed bashaw as you are, sir, shall in a trice find yourself fettered amongst our hands: nor will I, for one, consent to cut your bonds till you have signed a charter, the most liberal that despot ever yet conferred.”

English = white skin = liberty, liberality, freedom, determination, feminism &c. Being "Eastern" or "Oriental" or having an "olive" complexion = slavery, misogyny, sexual licentiousness, &c.

It really is impossible to overstate how repeatedly or explicitly this equivalence is made in this novel. It kind of drives me crazy that no one seems to remember or care about this whole motif.

Everyone is always talking about how Rochester is problematic and how Jane shouldn't have married him but that is not even the most objectionable part of the novel, not by a long shot. No. The real problem in Jane Eyre is both Rochester and Jane's treatment and prejudices towards Adèle.

Adèle is the eight-year-old, half-French child of Rochester (maybe), who is already predisposed to be a harlot either because she's French or because of eugenics (daughter of Rochester's mistress, let's not mention the double whammy since her father was in fact sleeping with that mistress because of course the man has nothing to do with it rolls eyes). Her being excited to get a present of a dress from Rochester must mean she's already well on the way to being a slattern, it's not the normal reaction of a child to a present (it totally is). And then Jane can't care for Adèle because she has a half-blind and crippled husband, BUT DON'T WORRY! Good English education drove all that slutty Frenchness right out of her:

As she grew up, a sound English education corrected in a great measure her French defects; and when she left school, I found in her a pleasing and obliging companion: docile, good-tempered, and well-principled.

It's not even her mother mentioned here, just the fact that she's French. She must be saved from the Frenchness! And I can't even laugh at how stupid this all is, because this is still a common negative stereotype about the French.

So yeah, it's worse than the marriage at the end, that's all I'm saying.

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Your specialty: Subverting tropes and encouraging readers to question them!

:0 thank you!! that's definitely a lot of what I'm going for.

[anonymously tell me what my specialty as a fanfiction writer is]

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Kickass period-accurate and style-accurate Austen fanfic!

📜🪶 thank you!!

[anonymously tell me what my specialty as a fanfiction writer is]

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anonymously tell me what my specialty as a fanfiction writer is

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Muslins (cotton fabrics) made in India for the European market in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

Fabrics designed to be sold and made up in Europe featured a relatively subdued colour palette, distinct from those intended for sale locally, or in Thailand or Indonesia. They were mostly naturalistic florals on white or cream grounds. The designs were block-printed or hand-painted; sometimes, some elements were painted and others embroidered (as in images five and eight).

Block printing uses hand-carved wooden blocks, which are then painted and pressed onto a length of fabric repeatedly to form a design. Each colour and design element requires a separate block.

Printing block of carved wood, India, 19th century

Beverly Lemire, a scholar who writes a lot about textiles and the production of consumer tastes and markets in Europe in this period, writes:

Textiles played a crucial role in defining gender, rank, and race in British imperial expansion during the long eighteenth century. This period saw an emphasis on whiteness in skin and cloth, symbolizing social status and racial hierarchy, with laundering, largely performed by low-ranked and racialized women, maintaining pristine garments representing social “whiteness.�� Everyday clothing, its care, and the opulent societal lifestyle of the elite, characterized by events such as masquerade balls, upheld the imperial ethos of race and reinforced social hierarchies. A critical history of empire must examine fabrics and their use, as well as the motivations behind material whiteness. [Empire and the Fashioning of Whiteness: Im/Material Culture in the British Atlantic World, c. 1660–1820]

[Source and more information on fabric # one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight]

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and so…they were both afflicted with really deep-seated & complex culturally determined neuroses about the meaning of penetrative sex