#bc she was told the final year literature test would be on it

[malachitezmeyka]

I found my literature notebook from two years ago and as I was flipping through it, I found a creative writing assignment that was basically “Come up with characters that could plausibly exist in this universe and write a short snippet about them”

And I got this feeling that I knew exactly what 14yo me did with that assignment

So I quickly scanned through the text and yep, I put Suiren and Midori into it. Because of course I did. This was May 2021. Red Lotus week. Peak obsession hours. I was cringe but I was free.

[thehobbem]

Jane Eyre

(Um. SPOILERS for Jane Eyre, I guess.)

So. I put off reading Jane Eyre for many years, bc

1) I read a chapter at college and didn't like the style (so I chose to read Great Expectations for that class, instead), and

2) pop culture spoiled the story for me long, long ago, so it killed any sense of urgency. Like, Rochester having his wife in the attic (technically, "secluded room in the abandoned 3rd floor") is the "Darth Vader is Luke's father" of English literature -- it should come as a shock, but at this point, everyone who cares already knows.

But I finally picked it up last week, and reader, I'm having a blast. And I realize now that no one had told me the actual two main attractions of this particular show: that Jane is absolutely hilarious, and that Rochester is WILD. I expected him to be wild, bc, well, he's got his wife locked in the attic, but he's entirely RIDICULOUS?????

So far, these exchanges have happened:

Mr. Brocklehurst: "What should you do to avoid hell?" Jane: "Not die" (GIRL XDD)

Rochester: goes on and on about temptation and redemption and regret, in the most abstract of manners Jane, getting up: "I'm not following anymore, so I'm gonna go. (This man??? Met this 18-year-old girl who has seen nothing of the outside world and???? decided to just???? tell her his entire life story???? including his sob story about a French mistress???? Didn't tell her about the wife in the attic, ofc.)

Rochester, who's way too cool about having been almost roasted alive in his own bed like a suckling pig: "Thank you, Jane, now go." Jane: starts to leave Rochester: pikachu_face.jpg "Are you leaving???" Jane: "You told me to??" Rochester: holds her hand, thanks her profusely for saving his life, calls her his 'cherished preserver', Jane: "No problem! Night." Rochester: "Are you really going?!" Jane: "I'm cold, sir." LSAJFLASKDF

Servants: talk in code about the wife in the attic Me: EVERYONE KNOWS, EXCEPT JANE???? HE'S NOT EVEN KEEPING IT A SECRET????

Rochester DRESSED UP AS A FORTUNE TELLER???? TO TEST JANE???? I GUESS???? He implies she's about to be super happy in life, but also that he's gonna marry Miss Ingram, and then???? Jane realizes it's him??? Jane: "Take this costume off, sir" Rochester: "...I can't, the string is knotted" SKJDJLDAKVK

Rochester keeps telling her he's gonna marry Miss Ingram, and that he'll send Jane away???? And then proposes to Jane???? Saying he TESTED MISS INGRAM, AND SHE FAILED???? So... So what, had Miss Ingram proved to be a nice person who cares about him and not his money, would he then... have married her instead???? WHAT'S HAPPENING HERE

And all the while I'm like "Sir, stop playing dress up and stop proposing to other women, YOU HAVE A WIFE LOCKED IN YOUR ATTIC" (same intonation of "a horse loose in a hospital"). Can't wait for the next fire, is all I'm gonna say.

Rochester is preposterous. He makes Fitzwilliam "You're beneath me, your family is ridiculous, I don't know why I like you but I do, you have fine eyes. Marry me?" Darcy seem like the MOST sensible man in the world. Hell, he makes Frank Churchill seem sensible.

Meanwhile, she has an uncle in Madeira (me, reading it: "oh she has an uncle in my country, how exciting!" XD) who has money and wants to adopt her???? GIRL, RUN TO YOUR UNCLE, BE ADOPTED, ENJOY THE COMFORTS YOU'VE NEVER HAD ACCESS TO

I'm loving every second of this. Reading this knowing about the wife in the attic is great.

Part II, because why not

[writingfortoomanyfandoms]

Shyer Than Me

Pairing: Gwilym Lee!Brian May x Reader

Summary: The band want to meet Brian’s girlfriend - Brian reflects on his time with her

Requested: No but I love Brian so fucking much and haven’t written for him properly before

Warnings: Swearing, lots of references to English literature (whoops), italics mean it’s set in the past!

A/N: so this is my first full-length Brian fic! Please remember to let me know what you think - I love hearing from you guys!! Reading your comments, reblogs and asks really make my day and inspire me to write more and I also kinda love the way this turned out so please let me know if you want me to write more for Brian (bc I totally want to write more for him :))

“We’re just saying, Bri, you guys have been dating for how long now?” Roger asked the university student as he tuned his guitar.

“A year and three months,” the soft-spoken man said, not looking up at the drummer as he answered his question, though there was a smile on his face, a smile that was always present whenever Y/N was brought into the conversation.

“Right, you guys have been dating a year and three months now, you’ve told her you love her, she loves you, she’s met your family and yet we can’t meet her?” Brian raised his mop of curly hair just in time to see Roger gesturing between himself and the other two band members.

“You’d scare her off,” Brian shrugged and Freddie scoffed.

“Please, darling, if she’s stuck around this long I hardly think meeting the rest of us will scare her,” Brian rolled his eyes, setting his guitar to the side, finally finished with tuning. He stood and stretched, feeling the satisfying click of his muscles as they stretched out.

“We don’t know anything about her other than you love her, Brian, and that one photo in your wallet,” John said, putting it more gently than the other two. Brian raised his eyebrows at his friends.

“How do you know about the photo of her in my wallet?”

“None of us wanted to pay for the food when we went out a few months and you had left you wallet unattended,” Roger waved him off.

“It was Roger’s idea if you couldn’t tell,” John added, laughing at Roger’s nonchalant response.

“She’s hot though,” Roger added helpfully. Brian’s smile widened and he nodded.

“She’s beautiful,” he agreed.

“So we can meet her?” Brian shook his head, a laugh escaping his lips at his best friend’s persistence.

“Nope!”

“Then at least tell us about her!” Freddie demanded. Brian rolled his eyes, becoming well aware of the fact that, for once, the men weren’t going to back down on the subject of his girlfriend.

“We need to prepare for the show,” he tried but the men shook their heads, each of them taking a seat. Freddie pulled Mary onto his lap and they all looked at him expectantly.

“We have hours to go before the show, we’re fine,”

“We just want to hear about your girlfriend!” Roger groaned, throwing his head back. Brian let out a long sigh before giving a slow nod, taking a seat on his amp.

“What do you want to know?” The boys eyes lit up at the question.

“How did you meet?” A smile crossed his face as he remembered meeting Y/N for the first time.

“Are you okay?” Brian asked, approaching the girl. She was stood on her tiptoes, desperately reaching for a book at the top of the shelf in the bookstore. She turned to Brian and immediately looked away, ducking down to hide her face.

“I’m fine, thank you,” she whispered and Brian noticed the adorable way in which she played with her fingers, clearly shy and embarrassed. 

“Do you want me to get that down for you?” He offered gently, not wanting to scare off the woman but at the same time not wanting to stop talking to her - she was gorgeous, there was no doubt about that. And this was probably the longest conversation he had successfully held with an attractive woman in over a month.

“I don’t want to be a bother,” she denied quickly, twisting her fingers together as she risked a look at Brian under her lashes. He gave her a reassuring smile and shook his head easily.

“No bother at all, love, don’t worry. For once my height may actually come in handy,” he joked and a sense of accomplishment and pride filled his chest at the sound of her quiet laughter filling his ears.

“Then if you don’t mind,” she agreed shyly. Brian shook his head and reached his hand up.

“Which one?”

“Keats, please,” the pretty woman asked, holding her hands out for Brian to place the large book of poetry into.

“You read a lot of poetry?” He asked, not wanting to stop talking to her. 

“I study English Literature at the university,” she explained, a quiet smile on her face.

“That’s cool! I study Astrophysics there,” Brian said. The woman bit her lip and looked at Brian through her lashes.

“I have some other books to pick up,” she whispered and Brian nodded, feeling disheartened that the woman didn’t appear to want to spend more time with her. “Would you um...” she trailed off, looking away as she tried to collect herself. Brian’s heart picked up a little at how adorably confused she seemed.

“It’s okay, love,” Brian chuckled.

“Would you like to come with me?” She offered, closing her eyes as though preparing herself for rejection. 

“I’d love to,” Brian agreed. “I’m Brian, by the way, your own personal step ladder,” she giggled at his words and shifted the book of poetry to rest in just one of her arms so that she could shake his hand.

“Y/N,”

“That’s... kind of really sweet,” Roger said uncomfortably, clearly not used to enjoying hearing romantic stories of his friends.

Roger never was the romantic type.

Brian looked down, shifting awkwardly.

“Yeah, well...” he trailed off, clearly unsure of how to finish his sentence.

“So you two just hit it off from there?” Mary asked, clearly invested in the story. Brian shrugged, smiling a little at the memory.

“Pretty much,” he agreed.

“Did she stop being shy and awkward?” Roger asked and John elbowed him, causing both of them to start laughing. Brian shook his head at them rolling his eyes but smiling nonetheless.

“On our first date she was still pretty shy at first but opened up a little more as it went on,”

Brian bounced on the balls of his feet, biting his lip as he stared down at his watch. He was stood outside of her home - it was a house that she shared with her roommates from university, Y/N had mentioned over the phone that there were six of them including herself living there.

It must be a completely different dynamic to that between him and Roger living together.

He didn’t want to be too early for there date - not wanting to come across as too eager or anything that may scare her off after she had agreed to it, which had taken a lot of convincing in itself.

It was safe to say that Y/N was probably the shyest person Brian had ever met.

It was fine, though. If anything he found it cute. Her shyness made him want to be more confident, to look after her.

“Are you Brian?” His head snapped up towards the door. A man stood in the doorway, eyebrows raised as he looked at the guitarrist.

“Uh - yeah,”

“Here for Y/N then?”

“Yeah,” the man stepped back, offering him entrance to the house.

“Come inside - it’s cold out,” Brian nodded and walked up to the door, entering into the hallway. “I’m James - one of her roommates,”

“It’s nice to meet you,”

“You too - Y/N/N hasn’t stopped talking about you,” James laughed before walking to the stairs. “Y/N/N! Your date’s here!” He shouted loudly and turned back to Brian. “Cat’s just helping her finish getting ready,” he informed the musician. Brian nodded, swallowing and wiping his sweaty palms on his jeans.

“Well I’m quite early,”

“It’s fine - good, actually. Put Y/N’s mind at rest,” he laughed, shaking his head and then seemed to pick up on Brian’s confused expression. “She was fairly sure you were going to cancel on her or something,” Brian chuckled and shook his head quickly.

“Definitely not - I’ve been looking forward to this for the past two days - just ask my roommate, he’s sick to death of hearing about it,” James threw back his head and laughed just as there were light footsteps on the staircase.

“Hey Brian,” she said quietly. Brian struggled to keep his mouth closed as he stared at her in wonder.

She was dressed simply in a cute sundress, her hair done up properly and her make-up done to perfection and yet Brian had never been quite so awestruck by a woman before.

“I wasn’t sure how smart or casual you meant by smart-casual,” Y/N admitted, a shy smile on her face as she awaited Brian’s response. The curly-haired man cleared his throat and grinned at her.

“You look amazing,” Y/N giggled a little at his words and took his outstretched hand, grabbing her bag from the side as the two of them passed the table on their way out of her home. “Do you like Italian food?”

“I love it,” she grinned, squeezing his hand, sending Brian’s heart into a frenzy of out of time beats.

Every time that he looked at her Brian felt an overwhelming urge to kiss her. When she laughed at his jokes, when she was telling anecdotes about her roommates, when she started speaking so passionately about English Literature and poetry. Everything she did made him want to kiss her.

But he didn’t.

He wasn’t about to mess this up.

“You didn’t kiss her?” John asked, eyes widening slightly. Brian shrugged and shook his head.

“It wasn’t the right time,” Brian explained. Roger scoffed.

“It’s always the right time,”

“And that, Roger, is why you have yet to be in a serious relationship,” Mary added, the comment taking all of them by surprise, the group of them busting up into laughter.

“I don’t know how you like this shit,” Y/N laughed, closing Brian’s heavy textbook and tossing it to the side, turning instead to face him. He pouted.

“You were meant to be testing me,”

“You know it all,” Y/N waved him off, the smile on her face wide and genuine, a far cry from the shy one that had seemed a near-permanent fixture on her face for the first two weeks of their relationship.

“Is that so?” Brian asked, rolling over on her bed so that he was hovering above her, eyes crinkled as he smiled down at her.

Y/N reached up and gently tucked one of his unruly curls behind his ear, out of his face and ran her hand tenderly down his jaw, her face softening.

“Definitely,” she agreed. 

“Yeah?”

“You’re the smartest person I know, Bri - you’re going to ace the test,” she promised. Brian chuckle a little, his heart swelling with adoration and he ducked down to press his lips to one cheek, then the other.

Before he could pull away again, Y/N caught his face in her small hands, her palms resting on his cheeks.

“Kiss me?” She asked, her original shyness coming back as she spoke her words, though Brian grinned and nodded.

“I’d love to,”

The kiss was soft and innocent, a brushing of lips and a bumping of noses but it left the two of them grinning insanely widely as they stared at one another.

Finally Y/N moved her arms to wrap around his shoulders, tangling in his long curly hair and pulling him back down into a kiss.

“You guys are so cute,” Mary sighed, smiling at the stories as she relaxed back into Freddie’s arms.

“You guys study together?” John asked, raising his brows at him.

“Yeah, used to get quite a lot done,” Brian agreed. He picked up his guitar, just for something to do and moved his fingers back to the tuning pegs, despite knowing it was already tuned.

“You know nothing about English Literature,” Roger pointed out and Brian shrugged.

“I try to learn about it though - it doesn’t matter, she tests me on Astrophysics and she has no idea what half the words even mean,”

“How did your parents react when they met her,”

It was one of the few weekends that Y/N was spending at Brian’s home. 

The couple rarely spent time at Brian’s apartment on account of Roger always being there.

Not that Y/N had anything against Roger, it was just that she wasn’t ready to meet all of Brian’s friends, particularly the most outgoing ones such as Roger and Freddie.

But this was one of the few weekends that Roger had gone back to his family to spend time there.

And Brian saw it as a good opportunity to invite his parents down to meet his girlfriend. By this point they had been dating for five months and had even managed to exchange “I love you”’s with one another and it was needless to say that Brian had talked his parents ears off about Y/N.

“Are you sure they’ll like me?” Y/N asked nervously as she bustled around the kitchen, preparing the meal for them to eat. Brian laughed, coming up behind her and kissing her cheek gently.

“Of course they will, love - they’re going to love you,” he promised. Y/N sighed and turned to face him properly.

“I’ve never really met my boyfriend’s parents before,” she admitted, playing with the necklace resting on his chest. Brian gave her an affectionate smile and shook his head.

“You’re going to do amazingly, my love. They already love you anyway,”

“Oh yeah?”

“I love you and that’s enough for them,” Brian promised, kissing her tenderly for a moment before breaking away. “Come on, I’ll set the table,”

When Brian’s parents did arrive, they were swift to pull Y/N into hugs, introducing themselves with their first names and complimenting her on both her appearance and how the food smelt delicious.

Brian held Y/N’s hand under the table all through the meal, squeezing it tightly whenever he could sense her nerves, though they seemed to quickly dissipitate once her and his father got onto the conversation of their favourite Shakespeare plays - arguing over who the best villain was (Harold thought Don John whereas Y/N insisted that Richard III was far more complex and misunderstood and was therefore a better villain as a result of his complex reasonings and lack of any other personality traits) and seeing her getting along so well with his family made his heart beat out of his chest.

When they left that night, Brian’s mum invited Y/N to come stay with them in a couple of weeks time when Brian was coming up, insisting that they had to get to know each other better.

“I told you they’d love you,” Y/N let out a sigh of relief and allowed herself to fall back into Brian’s embrace.

“That was the most stressful dinner of my entire adult life,” she informed him.

“Excuse me, Brian? There’s someone here who says they know you?” Brian frowned at the man and stood up, walking over to the door. “A Y/H/C woman, she was quite shy and said that she was your girlfriend?” Brian completely lit up at that and nodded enthusiastically.

“Yeah, yeah of course! I’ll be right there!” Brian grinned, before turning back to his band mates. “I’ll be ready to play I promise,” was all he said before moving out into the main area of the pub.

It didn’t take him long to locate Y/N because, a soon as he exited the backstage area, Y/N flew towards him and hugged him as tight as she could. Brian gave a laugh of delight and returned the affection, nestling his face in her hair and breathing deeply.

“You came!”

“Of course I did, Bri,” Y/N laughed quietly, looking up at him and then moving to connect their lips together.

“I love you so much,”

“I love you too,” Y/N giggled. Brian looked behind him towards the door through which he had just arrived and bit his lip unsurely before turning back to Y/N.

“Do you want to meet some people?”

[ethospathoslogan]

okay so this is definitely me self-projecting but i haven’t been able to stop thinking about roman and logan as “””competing””” english teachers. like, i know it’s common to have logan as a science teacher and roman as the drama/choir teacher!!! which i love!!! but i also think the two would make great english teachers

they both teach 9th grade english, roman also teaches 10th grade english, and logan teaches 12th grade ap english literature

logan’s favorite books in his curriculum are the great gatsby and the lord of the flies. honestly, though, he gets frustrated teaching them because the curriculum and ap test make him hammer out “the green light is symbolic for what” and “who does simon represent” so much that his students can’t have fun with the books. so, after the ap exam, he hosts a game of “survivor” amongst his 12th graders where they all compete in teams and take on various challenges (scavenger hunt/jeopardy/riddles/etc) and, as students are “eliminated,” the final surviving student wins five points to their overall average and also logan buys them a lunch of their choosing

(my old high school did that but we didn’t do it in ap lit and im still sad abt that)

roman’s favorite thing to teach is anything shakespeare. he’s a sucker for romeo & juliet but he also loves twelfth night to no end. he casts his students as the characters and does his best to get them involved and interested in what they’re reading. when students are nervous about being seen as weird or dumb for getting into the plays, he’s like, “so what! have fun! who cares what others think!” also, at the completion of the plays, he shows the ‘90s r&j (yeah the one with leo) and she’s the man (im reading twelfth night now for college and i was amazed to find out that she’s the man is deadass twelfth night)

their classrooms are next to each other and every student of theirs Knows that shit is gonna go down each class period

like when both of their freshman classes were doing romeo & juliet and roman’s mercutio was absent the day he was supposed to do the queen mab monologue??? roman took over and. oh boy. logan had to shut his door bc “dammit roman you’re being too loud and my students are only on scene two of act one, you’re spoiling everything”

when roman teaches catcher in the rye to his 10th graders, roman makes so many slights at logan. “oh yeah, mr. sanders, what a phony, amiright, kids? don’t worry, i won’t tell him you agreed”

this makes his students think that he hates logan. when a student finally steps up and asks roman, roman’s like, “wait what? mr. sanders is my best friend. my ride or die. he bought me coffee this morning.”

during his seniors’ free periods, they typically come to logan’s class to have him proofread their college essays and other papers. roman typically waltses in (because, i must repeat, their classes are next to each other) and gets all nostalgic because he had a lot of logan’s seniors as former students.

“oh, valerie, terrence, leo! i had all of you and it felt like so long ago and-” “mr. prince, please, i am trying to read their essays.”

everyone expects logan to be the hard-ass and roman to be the super easy going teacher. this results in a lot of students being, at first, terrified of logan and ready to take advantage of roman.

and then they learn that logan is the teacher most likely to throw random bagel/pizza parties (he believes that it’s positive reinforcement) and roman is notorious for pop quizzes when his students don’t read (most of them end up not being counted, he just needs to put his foot down occasionally)

both of them are well respected teachers and their students typically come to both of them to talk about things. students like logan’s honesty and how he tries to realisitically assist his students in things going on in their lives. with roman, they like his optimism and how he encourages all his students to pursue their dreams.

(true story based on something that happened to my old english teacher) bet you thought that, because roman is an english teacher, he has no connection to theater, right? well, you thought wrong!!! roman is also the director of the school’s plays and musicals. during musical season, roman rallies some of his leads and ensemble members and crashes logan’s freshmen class with a performance. logan is shooting daggers at roman from his desk. the freshmen are entertained and also slightly terrified. roman is having the time of his life. the musical opens the next night.

to get revenge, logan sticky-notes roman’s entire classroom. roman’s desk, students’ desks, the bookcases, even the walls. every single thing in and on roman’s desk has been sticky-noted. no one ever finds out how logan had the time to do it in one night, nor where he got all the sticky notes from.

when roman found his classroom, he actually dropped his coffee. he waited in line at starbucks for ten minutes. he is going to kill logan.

anyone who has logan as a teacher is told that they need to try to get roman, and vice versa. students of both teachers can never choose a favorite.

they both go to graduation, even though roman hasn’t had many of those students for years. they both are extremely emotional.

logan is definitely the type of teacher to be like “in this classroom, we’re professional. you cannot have my twitter or my instagram or anything because i am your teacher and you are my student. and- oh, wait, you’re graduating right? oh shit then here take my number, here’s my snapchat and my twitter handle, retweet my pinned tweet.”

it is through this that logan’s graduating seniors discover that roman and logan have been engaged for eight months.

(patton, the 12th grade ap calculus and 9th grade geometry teacher, is logan’s best man. virgil who is either the art teacher or a history teacher i haven’t decided yet is roman’s.)