elegantqueenpirate-blog

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Let's talk about the wedding.

This guy on the top. Major Sholto, right?

He is quite clearly meant to be Sherlock's parody in this episode. A, Mary says 'oh Sherlock, neither of us were the first', implying that Sholto is similar to him in some (many?) ways. B, it's even stated by Sholto himself;

'Mr. Holmes, you and I are similar, I think.'

Major Sholto literally has a knife in his side this episode, and I think it's quite clear where I'm trying to go with this. Sherlock also feels like he's dying yada yada.

Something I didn't manage to pick up the first time, however, was the name of the photographer.

The photographer that stabbed Sholto.

This guy is Jonathan Small.

You know what we say about coincidences? The universe is rarely so lazy- and I'd wager that the writers are rarely so lazy either.

Jon -> John

Small -> Short

Photographer -> Blogger

The first time I watched this episode through, I hated Mary because she was the reason Sherlock was so sad. But the writers clearly think John was more to blame here. Do I agree? I don't know, but it's definitely interesting to me.

This is by no means a new observation in the fandom, but I'm new and I'm proud that I understood this considering my concering competence in English Lit. classes, so I wanted to throw in my 2 cents.

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the whole "Cynthia Ozick (and other Commentary adjacent writers) confront Queer Edwardians" . . . fascinating to me for years and years now. Tempted to present my thoughts on it. Though such a writing would be

about an episode in the history of 20th century Jewish American intellectuals, a huge topic, esp for a gentile (me)

a interpretation of an interpretation (a commentary on a commentary if you will), something I gravitate to but try to reel myself in from as it doesn't appeal to everyone

Actually I think Jeet Heer at the Nation could write this. He writes very well about American Judaism and Christianity as well as British high culture. I believe he's from a Canadian Sikh family and to me it gives him an interesting and novel perspective, more so than my own.

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reading this literature reminds me why people might want to go on dates!!

Herman Melville, Moby Dick (1851)

Walt Whitman, "When I Heard at the Close of the Day" (1867)

Edward Prime-Stevenson, Imre: A Memorandum (1906)

Bram Stoker, Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving (1906)

E.M. Forster, Maurice (1913)

Romantic Friendship and the Birth of Gay Identity

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h. gaunt and s. ellwood, 1912, preparations for a ball

(save their poor hearts)

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as a 23 year old girl I mostly felt zero control over my sexuality and less than great control over my life. the only control I felt over my sexuality was Not Partaking. I know I'm extreme and troubled but . . . these guys are such idiots.

also yeah-- if you truly want to you can transition, but that's generally not what these posts are about. they are about reactionary nostalgia, men being so overwhelmed by femininity (both its erotic and reproductive aspects) that they long to control it.

i’ve been a 23 year old girl and i can tell you it does not

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Oh hello there! Asking on behalf of Fredbensonenthusiast, I saw your post on The Inheritor by EF Benson and unfortunately I haven't read it (there is so much to get through 🤣) but looking at the synopsis it looks very intriguing with plenty of Fred's favourite obsessions! I would love to know more about it and what you thought of it! Don't worry about spoilers......

Omg absolutely! So I loved it and highly recommend it. I'll expand on what I wrote in my goodreads review - apologies if this jumps around! Not relevant to the plot but fun fact: Benson threw in a David Blaize reference (a cameo of a character named Dr. Blaize)!

The Inheritor starts out in Cambridge with a witty cast of characters very reminiscent of David of King's and slowly devolves into a claustrophobic, otherworldly novel that takes place in Cornwall (with lots of pagan/faerie influence). And there are layers and layers of queer imagery and queer subtext at play.

Relevant character list:

Steven: a 20 year old student at Cambridge, due to inherit a large fortune and, potentially, his family curse

Maurice: a 25 year old don at Cambridge, studies culture in ancient Greece, falls in love with Steven

The Child: a childhood friend of Steven's who is absolutely devoted to Steven (nicknamed The Child because he is 6'4" with a baby face)

Tim: a Pan-like illegitimate relation to Steven who nearly identical in appearance to him; he acts half mad.

Betty: Steven's wife

Mrs. Crofts - Steven's mother; may or may not be a witch We follow Steven Crofts as his closest relationships come under intense strain as he falls deeper and deeper into a family curse that pulls him away from reality and closer to the mystical world that he feels a part of. Of the characters mentioned above, the only relationship that persists is Steven's relationship with Tim. The references to paganism, interestingly, seem to be a representation for both heterosexuality and homosexuality in this novel. In a literal sense, Maurice and Steven lose themselves and their social confines to follow their nature feels pretty obvious as far as symbolism goes. Steven goes as far as recognising something in Maurice's nature that reflects his own and next thing you know, they're quoting Walt Whitman together. But when Steven rejects Maurice and loses his humanity altogether and perpetuates the family curse (involving Betty and their first born), the paganism has now shifted to represent the unnaturalness of a heterosexual relationship/heterosexual coupling. The abundant themes and references to paganism and ancient Greek culture aside (you bet we get comparisons to the Platonic ideal), Steven and Maurice form a passionate friendship that is so overtly romantic that a few sentences needed to be dedicated for Benson to assure the reader that their relationship was sexless. If you took these statements at face value, you probably wouldn't read into the fact that Steven is disappointed when his wife loses her boyish appearance when she's pregnant and he's repulsed by her touch...even though he has had very physical relationships with his male close friends. (Of course there is a lot of bathing together.) The homoeroticism between Steven/The Child, Steven/Maurice, and even Steven/Tim is fairly obvious. (Even if Steven and Tim are blood-related, Tim's place beside Steven usurps Maurice's in exactly the way Maurice usurped The Child.) This plot is entirely character-driven and the books sustains itself on the atmosphere it creates. Maurice/Steven are absolutely the heart of the novel - they have a dynamic that is absolutely captivating. And after finishing the novel, I can't quite tell how much was a decent into madness, if Steven really was cursed, and/or how much of the ancient magic was real. 

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“I did go on to the gay scene for a couple of months and I thought, it’s just not for me.” Why not? “I didn’t like the sexual venality and the narcissism. I can’t live like that. If that’s the way other people want to do it, that’s fine. And it’s something I’ve not regretted. I do know several gay couples who’ve been together a long time, and they love each other, and that’s lovely to see.”

It seems to me that Terrence Davies, who wrote the script for Benediction as well as directing it, projected his attitude to the "gay scene" onto Sassoon. Sassoon may have eventually exited the "scene" but he really was part of it for many years.

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would EM Forster approve of the slash community? eh maybe not because he would see it as women encroaching on gay male territory.

would this be fair of him? no because A Room with A View and especially Howard's End are so in the tradition of Austen and female British authors writing m/f but also exploring relationships among women. So he basically moves as a novelist in an originally feminine space.

Did I just make up this attitude toward slash of a dead author in my head and then get mad at him?

yes

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Different taboo topics between English and Chinese fandoms

Because of course there is, different cultural context, different things people find abhorrent, and so one must take extra care not to go all “if you don’t also find the things I find disgusting, then you are being disgusting” when one is entering into a fandom that was not of your culture. *nudge* *nudge*

Case in point: Chinese fandom, does not really care if you ship incest, or underage. They really don’t give a shit. Yeah the shippers wouldn’t do it in real life, but if someone does an incest side-pairing in a fantasy webnovel the readers wouldn’t bat an eye. Like, Thor/Loki is still one of the biggest ships in Chinese pop culture today, while Thor is Patron God of Lesbians in the West with no prominent ship of his own. MCU!Peter Parker/Tony Stark is also pretty huge there, while in the West those two are kept strictly familial. And that’s not counting the literal thousands of Chinese webnovels with the specific trope of “old and wise master raises poor but cute disciple, disciple grows to want to top his master.”

Even when Jin Guangyao’s various crimes were revealed, the fact he accidentally married his biological half-sister had the smallest splash. His stans didn’t really care and proceeded to make a lot “Qin Su: I am his First and Proper Wife until my death! And you! Lan Xichen! Will forver remain his side piece!” crack fanfics. His antis mostly focused on his murders. No one really dragged him for that? It won him a lot of pity points actually? Whereas here there were a lot of Horrifed Gasping when that plot was revealed.

(Sidenote: incest ships depends also depends on the chemistry of the characters, like you would with any other ship. Jiang Cheng/Wei Wuxian is decently big in China, in the West not so much. But no one anywhere really pairs Jiang Yanli and Wei Wuxian together, or her and Jiang Cheng. The latter two ships is way too familial and filial to even be conceivably turned romantic.)

On the other hand, Chinese fandom does not take to polyamory or polygamy or even “I had previous relationships before I entered this one where the plot things started happening.” They do not like it. The ship must be exclusive and monogamous. One of them can have some previous relationships but the audience will hold that as a black mark against their soul forever onwards. Seriously. To the point where a character who had several previous romances is often used as a narrative shorthand to show how horrible a person they are.

Again: platonic 3zun, decently popular in China. Romantic polyamorous 3zun, does not exist, a blasphemy to even suggest it. You are either a Nieyao or a Xiyao or a Nielan. You are either Stony or Stucky or WinterIron, you pick a lane and you stick to it. No Chinese fan will ever suggest “just do a threesome.” Absolutely not. Inconceivable. They will send you puking emojis and “I’ll book a psychologist appointment for you” gifsets.

(Sidenote: legit. I watched this C-Drama called Love is Sweet in October and the love triangle follows this phenomenon almost exactly. There were solid foundations for the main girl to go with either the male lead or the second male lead or for the two men to come together. Good basis for a poly ship right? Well. I’ve found exactly one fanfiction that had those three be in a poly romance, and it’s on Ao3 and in English. Everywhere in Chinese? Three different monogamous ships producing their own fan edits and fanfictions, ignoring the other two completely. Seeing this unfold in real life is extremely trippy tbh.)

And I honestly have no idea how to dissect this. The closest explanation (read: bullshiting) I have is that fanworks and fandom activities and shipping are largely driven by women, and whom, unconsciously or otherwise, chose to back away from the deeply ingrained cultural harm their fandom taboos has historically wrought upon them.

Historically, in the West, it was socially acceptable or even encouraged for close cousins to marry (hello Hapsburg family, honestly all the European nobility. Also Darwin, he did that too). While in Ancient China it was never socially or even legally acceptable (you can’t marry your cousin if they are related to you in three generations. So if you share the same great-grandparent, no can do. And they would know. One does not mess with Ancient Chinese record keeping.)

Whereas in the West, Europe and North America, monogamy was largely the norm for marriage. The nuclear family is the staple. Husband and wife and not legally recognized mistress on the side if the husband is a bit of an asshole. In China, polygamy was the norm. Men could have as many concubines as they could afford, Qianlong Emperor had close to forty. There are also inheritance laws and ceremonial regulations and all manner of legal rules giving them legal status. And the wife would have to tough it out and bear it and be nice to them, or else they are labeled as “jealous” and “not a good wife” and that is enough grounds for a divorce.

And as the modern fandom is often a place where anti-culture scenarios and relationships are imagined and interrogated, it can be argued that fandoms from different cultures have different taboos because they grew as backlash to different historically oppressive cultural practices.

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lol

I love cooking things and then not sharing them with people. For me, cooking is really an act of disconnection and hatred.

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I'm been dramatically complaining about being tired all my life, but then again (without self-doxxing) the source of my tiredness has been there too.

been reading some of Pat Barker's series on WWI. I appreciate the working class perspectives and the feeling of the how overwhelming it was to mount any kind of resistance against the war. There's a working class, barely literate feminist character who comes across as pretty authentic, not sentimental. I appreciate any and all portrayals of feminine exhaustion.

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been reading some of Pat Barker's series on WWI. I appreciate the working class perspectives and the feeling of the how overwhelming it was to mount any kind of resistance against the war. There's a working class, barely literate feminist character who comes across as pretty authentic, not sentimental. I appreciate any and all portrayals of feminine exhaustion.

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shoutout to stephen tennant, gotta be one of my favourite genders

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i liked this actor as the MC though

The Rings of Power Cast Watchlist ➤ Theme: 📜 Period/Historical 📜 Benediction (2021) directed by Terence Davies Jack Lowden as Siegfried Sassoon

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It's funny how few people seem to like, watch the X-Files through the lens of it being ostensibly a Sherlock Holmes adaptation bc I thought that one was kind of obvious. I'M not really a well-versed Sherlock Holmes guy but my brother is and has read all the stories and he thinks the parallels are clear. You have Mulder, a genius outside-the-box thinker who often swings into barely functional shut-in territory and whose "eccentricities" are both what fuel his successes and his failures, and you have Scully, a more traditional, by-the-books analyst with a medical degree who, while she might not always see everything Mulder sees due to her skepticism, is a vital part of their success as a team because she actually knows how to relate to people. The reason the X-Files is interesting (and the reason it starts to get REAL boring later on) is because of this dynamic. You really get the sense neither Mulder nor Scully would be able to accomplish very much on their own, and though they're very often at odds with each other they end up balancing each other out enough to succeed. Idk I just think that if House counts then the X-Files should count too

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I am FIFTY-SIX years old. C'mon body, surprise pimples? STOP THAT.

Remember, peeps: perimenopause and actual menopause sends your body into a state of rebellion and it SUCKS.

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oh yeah anti tjlc for life

i will say, the worst thing that happened in fandom was when shipping just became “i ship this bc it’s gonna be real” and not just “i ship this bc i think it’s a fun dynamic to explore idc what the writers are doing that’s not my business”