#books i read in 2021

[freshbaked-bread]

i fear that after 3 and a half years i am once again back on my gravity falls bullshit

[rotomicity]

TGCF art from 2021 which were very experimental and very much something out of my comfort zone but am still so satisfied with

(gonna ramble more under the cut 👉 )

My main inspiration for these were definitely classic storybook illustration styles and the watercolor-like illustrations included inside the tgcf books which depict hualian's daily slice of life routines as seen below

I wanted to capture that feeling of warmth i got from reading but i also went with the storybook look because their relationship (and by extension broad strokes of the entire plot) really did feel like something out of actual myth or legend; i'm chinese indonesian and was raised surrounded by chinese culture + values so tgcf felt VERY familiar to me, it threw me back to my childhood reading or listening to tales about chinese deities, i'd say the storybook image definitely came into my mind pretty quickly bc of this

I find this style somewhat hard to replicate now but if i could or have the time to, i really want to continue the 'companion pieces to chapter titles ' concept i did with the last 2 pieces (which are of the same chapter title but i was just indecisive 😭😭), i even had 3 more planned based on my favorite titles before burning out back then

[chiropteracupola]

A very fine captain, and a finer friend.

[roseworth]

i love this one. btw. if you even care.

[estebunny]

bernie collins recalled the scene of esteban ocon's first win in hungary 2021

via her book How to Win a Grand Prix

[wynntermelon]

I really admire the scum villain fandom for surviving this long through sheer willpower and delusion alone

[butchlifeguard]

swimming <3

just add water, katie ledecky / tumblr / me / "how swimming helped an ocd writer quieten their mind," oprah daily / "how does swimming help shape my body?" plunge san diego / "simone manuel has already won," the ringer / pinterest / tumblr / aristotle and dante discver the secrets of the universe, benjamin alire sáenz / instagram / the swimmer, john cheever / me

[tigerbears]

[bleachbleachbleach]

I was taking a book recommendation quiz and now the only thing I can think about is the Seireitei Communications putting one out for shinigami (Hisagi's attempt to get buy-in for mass importation of books and movies and music and such from the Living World).

Like, how do you not read this question and think about comedic master Kuchiki Byakuya bemoaning the inability to choose more than one option:

I mean, like:

[wordvomit555]

As an autistic person with a very high hatred for injustice and a tendency for seeing the world in black & white, I had a very hard time with aftg at the beginning.

I still sometimes catch myself at trying to completely justify the actions of my faves instead of accepting them as human beings, who just make mistakes.

But that is why aftg is so beautiful and important. It taught me to look at things at a wider angle and even if the hyper fixation will fade at some point, I will forever hold those books close to my heart.

[schwirrymartz]

goth twins (from different universes)

[hazellevessque]

You’re joking.

[lucapizzelles]

There were some mistakes in the original post which @sixteenthtryry pointed out, so I've edited this a bit! (a lot of the analysis was based on a small grammar thing that i misheard so :,,,D but still fun to me)

(Okay I spent like half an hour trying to find a specific post because brunosaderogatory made a post about how the Italian subs for Luca are different from the Italian dub, and also that the Italian subs are done by AI while the dub is actual human translators, but I can't find it. So jsyk that's the inspo for why-)

I've been transcribing the Italian dub for Luca and I noticed some really silly things already, but one in particular made me laugh/eyebrow raise/"jesus christ, Daniela."

In the lunch scene at the beginning of the movie Daniela says (parentheses are direct-ish translations (hence why it may seem a bit choppy). Disclaimer Italian is not my native language + I'm not super good at it, but I have some Spanish background + a friend who IS good at Italian that helped me translate):

English: Nope, nope! The end! Shut it down! [...] Well, the curious fish gets caught! We do not think, discuss, contemplate, or go anywhere near the surface. Got it?

Sub: No! No! Fine! Dacci un taglio! [...] Beh il pesce curioso viene pescato! Qui non si nomia, invoca, contempla, o sfiora mai e superficie. Intensi?

(No! No! The end! Give it a rest! [...] Well, the curious fish gets caught. We do not name, invoke, contemplate, or ever graze the surface. Understood?)

Dub: No! No! Fine! Dacci un taglio! [...] Sì, pesciolino curioso, finisce** in padella! Qui nessuno nomina, brama, invoca, contempla, o sfiora mai e superficie. Intesi? 

(No! No! The end! Give it a rest! [...] Yes, the curious fish finish in the pan! We do not name, invoke, yearn, contemplate, or ever graze the surface. Understood?)

under the cut for a crazy syntax analysis

**(said small grammar thing that I misheard, under the cut is analysis of if she had said "finisci" instead of "finisce," where it would have translated to a more direct "you" instead of being more general.)

A couple things I want to point out:

The sub is obviously a much more direct translation from English. Which is why the dub is important, there's certain nuances that non English speaking Italian readers of the sub wouldn't catch. And vice versa with a non Italian speaker reading English subs of the Italian dub. Namely, and you probably already saw it:

Daniela straight up tells Luca, directly speaking to and about him, that he, the curious fish, will be put into a pan if he goes near the surface. lmfao.

English has what's called a "generic you," which you're probably implicitly aware of, just maybe didn't there's a term for it. English speakers like to replace saying "one" (as a pronoun) with "you." I asked my friend Alex about this, if Italian has a way to distinguish this "generic you," and they do and it's the normal way of saying it:

my friend (shoutout): "The 'understood' you is called the 'impassive si' in Italian. ie: 'you (understood/generic) don't eat eggs with ketchup' -> 'non si mangia le uova con ketchup.' The Italian translates DIRECTLY to 'one does not eat eggs with ketchup.' The way it's formed is by just putting 'si' in front of the lui/lei conjugation of whatever the verb is. (me: so they have a way of distinguishing it? what's more common?) The 'you' thing is a translation thing specifically for English people. When talking specifically to someone you use 2nd person conjugations. When talking about everyone or the "understood/generic someone" you use 'si' + 3rd person singular. The way we say 'one' in English, which seems too formal/isn't used often, is the exact opposite in Italian, essentially."

TLDR: Italian has a specific way of saying the "generic you," like how English has the pronoun "one," which is primarily used above saying "you (generic)."

In an informal setting like at a family lunch, Daniela would not be using a "generic you." There is a specific way to say "one will finish in the pan" and she doesn't say that. As my friend put it:

The use of "finisci" is specifically saying "YOU finish." It's the present, 2nd person tense of finire (to finish). In English, she just generally talks about any fish that is curious being "caught." The curious fish is implied to be Luca, but she doesn't really say it is.* The audience, understanding context, just picks that up, but if you (one) were a robot, one might not. In Italian she uses 'curious fish' as a title for Luca specifically, she is talking to him directly, the curious fish is EXPLICITLY him. Even a robot, lacking contextual skills, would get that, given the nature of the language and syntax used.

This whole thing is super instinctual, and we don't necessarily think about it when speaking or comprehending language. BUT it is a very fun thing from a syntax analysis/language localization perspective.

* also, it's a play on the proverb "curiosity killed the cat." Italian doesn't have this saying afaik, and if it has a similar one, then the translators chose not to use it. (unless the pan thing IS the Italian version, but iunnow, I doubt it, considering context)

And finally, a PAN?? Instead of just a generic "caught," she straight up tells him they'll eat him. damn.

She also specifically adds "yearns" when listing the things they don't do about the surface, something not present in neither the English version NOR the subs (of course). I just found that cool and silly and funny.

Sorry if I drilled in the finisci thing too much it's just like. HA that is so brutal. I love it.

[3am-thoughts-of-achilles]

i should be sleeping i just spent the last hour crying over patrochilles they loved each other so much it drives me insane

[nonasbirthday]

a couple years ago i had zero attention span, and i hadn't properly read a book in forever. the pandemic absolutely did not help, on account of i was working long hours & also dead inside. but in early 2021 i picked up TLT and it reignited my love of reading. and over this past year i finished 22 books :')

forever grateful to the lesbian space juggalos for resurrecting the ghost of my 12-year-old self, a nerd who had to be banned from reading books while walking between classes. (she wouldn't be very impressed by my 2023 book count, but she also had zero responsibilities and limited internet access, so. who cares.)

here's to a continued love of reading for all of us in 2024, and maybe some ATN teasers!

[fictionadventurer]

Elizabeth Gaskell has the kind of brilliance that makes you forget how brilliant she is until you come back to her work after reading inferior authors. Her type of talent is understated skill that does everything so well that it looks easy.

She has prose that's descriptive without being flowery. Plots that take their time but also keep pulling you along. She writes about everyday life in a way that makes it enthralling without over-romanticizing it. She can take what would be stock characters in the hands of other writers and explore their upbringing and history so thoroughly that they become real, nuanced individuals. And she does it all so simply that you barely even notice how much talent it takes to write like that.