#ill-made knight is literally one of my favorite stories it punches me in the gut

[glorious-catastrophe]

hi. i'm currently reading the ill-made knight and feeling insane, so naturally i looked it up on tumblr to find the other sickos and saw your tags on some random "have you read this book" poll about queer lancelot and i just have to ask. is there, like, more of it? i honestly know pretty much nothing about arthurian legend in general, i just found out about this specific series and started reading it, but now i'm kinda hooked. on lancelot especially. what a guy. are there other interpretations of lancelot as being queer?? it's just so interesting to me if he's not just the guy who's fucking king Arthur's wife but is also in love with him too.

hi anon!

first off: i’m so excited that you’re getting into arthurian legends!! it’s a really cool field with some really cool stories :) i wish i could go back and re-learn everything over again

ill-made knight is the most well known arthurian retelling with overtly queer themes, so you’re off to a good start. if you’re looking for similar vibes, i would recommend the sword stone table edited by swapna krishna and jenn northington—it’s an anothology, so it’s got a bunch of queer retellings of arthurian legends (but it might be a little difficult to track all of the characters if you’re unfamiliar with the source material) i know there’s queer lancelot in the story flat white, which is in that anthology

coming out later this year, you have tristan and lancelot: a tale of two knights! i obv haven’t read it yet but it seems like a good introduction to the knights of the round table at large and morgan la fey!

if you’re looking for something other than books, try the album high noon over camelot by the mechanisms (i usually listen on spotify!) if you’re into the magnus archives, the guy who voices jon is in the band—hnoc is a mix of a radio drama and musical retelling of arthurian legends set in space. and they’re cowboys. honestly what more could you want

if you’re interested in learning more about the source material, i would recommend le morte d’arthur as a starting point! it’s like THE arthurian book for people who aren’t insane about the middle ages and cant translate old english and old french. some serious academics are weird abt le morte for various reasons but it is a REALLY good starter text (and lancelot is a bit of a tragic figure and it makes me weep)

if you’re more interested in source material/lancelot stories, start with knight of the cart! there are some good translations (and bad ones) out there—i would recommend a poetry translation over a prose (so it’s written in poem format) because i’m a translation purist but it’s really down to taste

if you’re looking for more source material with more of a queer leaning/playing with gender i would recommend marie de france’s lanval—it’s short and sweet and has some really interesting moments, but, unforch, no lancelot

i do have to put a disclaimer here and say that 1) i have unfortunately been involved more on the academic side of queer lancelot (and queer and trans medieval studies) to know what’s really popping off in the arthurian legends fandom these days and 2) i am one of those people who is insane about medieval literature and have done a research about medieval lit as a whole and so some of the recommendations here are not… fun in a traditional sense. but nevertheless!

OH ALSO if you’re interested in a story about a trans medieval knight, i would recommend yde et olive—it’s a french chanson de geste (if i remember correctly) and from the same literary tradition as most lancelot stories

if you have any questions about arthurian legends in general, feel free to shoot me another ask! i love talking about it and i would love to be a help! and if i think of any more recommendations to send your way, i will reblog this post and add them! happy reading!

[peablesart]

Diluc and Kaeya: A Character Study

One of my favorite things to do is analyze the true anti-parallel nature of Diluc and Kaeya’s lives. In my eye, they are so similar but exist as inverted images of each other. 

DISCLAIMER : I see Diluc and Kaeya as siblings and this will not change, so anything I post about them is purely familial and platonic. If you ship kaeluc please do NOT interact with this post.

So I since I started Genshin for Kaeya, and then pulled Diluc and fell in love with him, it’s really only natural that they are two of my favorite characters in the game so far (and probably for the rest of it too). Kaeya’s story has alaways been fascinating to me, and this was just exemplified by the Dainsleif quests that revealed more about Khaneri’ah and the Abyss. When I started getting more invested in Genshin, I started reading the manga, and around the same time I got Diluc and started friendship farming like I never had before. I literally devoured his character stories and enjoy fitting his canon with the stories of others.

But yes, as my favorite characters who actually have canon connections (in surplus in fact), I often think about how similar their stories are, but that they run in opposite directions to each other. I see this so clearly in how they are in canon and what I think they were like in childhood.

On one hand, we have Diluc, the only child of one of Mondstadt’s beloved noble families. He comes from a line of highly respected individuals, the descendent of one of the leaders who freed Mondstadt from the tyranny of Decarabian. Although his mother died young, he grew up in a nurturing and loving family with his father. From the manga, we can tell that his personality was somewhere along the lines of Amber and Klee when he was younger, and I think he was probably a brash and jovial kid who caused problems but was earnest in everything he did.

On the other hand we have Kaeya. Here is where a lot of my headcanons come into play, because there’s very little on his family. I strongly believe in Kaeya as Khaneri’ahn royalty (a descendent at the very least), and that he belongs to the Eclipse Dynasty bloodline. It’s unclear the type of rule of the dynasty, but my thoughts are that it was not cruel but definitely cold. Kaeya likely did not grow up with much affection, respected but not loved. He entered the story with the destiny of a kingdom on his shoulders, and was left to fulfill it on his own. As such, I see him as a guarded, probably extremely introverted kid, especially when he’s first taken in by the Ragnvindrs.

Obviously, this contrasts with their in-game personalities. I still think Kaeya is a true introvert but acts extraverted to come off as more open and trustworthy in order to get what he wants. This is clear in how almost every quest or event interaction with him has some sort of “ulterior” motive. His story quest was him testing the waters with the traveler to see how trustworthy they were, the Windblume Festival was very likely an easter egg conversation for a later quest, and he definitely lied abut the reason for coming to the Golden Apple Archipelago. In short, all these interactions are only half-truths at best.

I similarly think the opposite happened to Diluc, his grief and vengeance stifling the unbridled joy from his youth. I wouldn’t say he’s still a people-person, but his voice-lines make it so clear how affectionate and warm he is to everyone; he worries about Jean and the Traveller, openly admires Lisa’s skills, etc. His 18th birthday and his four-year journey exposed him to the world at its rawest, away from the tinted lens of the Knights, and he likely saw and dealt out more death than he thought he’d ever have to.

After Crepus’ death, the brothers reconciled with the events by changing their nature - at least, how they presented themselves to others. While not mirrors, they definitely took on parts of the other’s childhood self, with Kaeya becoming more verbal and Diluc becoming more skeptical. 

As much as I want it to happen, I don’t think we’ll get a reconciliation of the brothers until one of their last moments. Mihoyo has made it clear they don’t intend to shy away from major character deaths, dropping red flags in abundance for multiple characters. Kaeya is definitely one of them, and my thinking is that he’ll die by Diluc’s hands in an effort to save Mondstadt. Either that, or they’ll be on the cusp of progress before plummeting into the worst-case scenario.

And be- cause I’m a sucker not just for angst but for sucker punch and then a stab to the gut - I’ll put this here as well: although they clearly aren’t exactly on the best terms right now, I truly believe they have both forgiven each other but don’t believe the other has forgiven them yet. Their voice-lines about each other don’t seem honest, and their easy banter at the Golden Apple Archipelago shows so much familiarity. Their relationship is still uneasy, clearly seen in Venti’s story quest, but it is entirely salvageable. Kaeya is ready to atone for abandoning DIluc to his grief and compounding it with a secret too large to stay hidden forever. Diluc is ready to repent for driving Kaeya to death and casting him out form a place he’d felt was the closest to home he could let himself be.

(Would love for a happy ending too, but I don’t trust Mihoyo to give me happy Diluc and happy Kaeya for any lasting duration rip.)

It’s clear that the two are meant to be foils to each other. I could go on and on about smaller things, like Kaeya feeling inadequate filling Diluc’s prodigious shoes, Diluc finding his first true friend in Kaeya, the both of them defending each other behind their backs. I could also go into how other characters perceive their relationship, especially Jean since she’s known them since childhood as well. But at the end of the day, they are simply two men with a broken past that cannot be restored, but can be fixed. Them making up would ease so much off both of their shoulders, and they could fight side by side like I’m certain they did when they were younger.

TL;DR, I love both Diluc and Kaeya with my whole heart and want them both to find happiness. There’s more steps to be done before they can call each other “brother” with sincerity again (and I tend to ill those steps with various ships ik ik) but it’s a start towards healing.