#it's an obscure one relating to one of my interests not a silly line i thought of myself sorry...

[emathyst9]

Henry ref is now done, so here I give you the depressed middle aged man

Though I emphasized that a lot on here so that goes without saying

[improvapocalyps]

Stale blood caked Cleo's armor as she dragged herself through paradise. Gods below that sucked, she thought, that really sucked. They ignored the colorful birds that swooped overhead, disregarding the cloudless sky and brilliant sun that cast down gentle rays upon her green skin. What was the point of indulging in something that didn't exist?

Dust, Flesh, and Bones, by @pattonscribe

“Death!” she called, a hoarse quality to her voice, clutching tighter onto Etho’s body as their army of the dead went onwards to protect them. “You— this wasn't what I wanted!”

before we lose the sound of our own mouths calling mine, mine, mine., by @kanda-franca

In participation of MCYTblr AU Fest Summer 2024 hosted by @mcytblraufest!

I feel incredibly lucky and honored that two(2) writers decided to pick up my niche af AU pitch! They knocked it out of the park with their fics, please check them out !!

[Some behind-the-scenes ramble and close-ups under cut]

My AU's ao3 equivalent tag is "Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses", specifically drawing inspiration from Khelren's Godsend TTRPG setting (though you do not need any knowledge of the ttrpg to enjoy the fics):

In Godsend you roam the lands as the avatar of your god, cursing mere mortals and presenting gifts to the chosen ones. Your memories are numerous, made of the lives of your predecessors, your power is almost limitless. Will you use it to fulfil the will of your god? Or, as the end times draw near, will you try to save the world? 　(from the itch.io page)

I had my heart set on making Clethubs AU (to no surprise of anyone's i'm sure) so that's the main characters/ avatars settled- but who shall be the gods?

There are 6 domains in the Godsend setting: Death, Justice, Knowledge, Nature, Trickery, and War.

To me, it was obvious to put Bdouble "moss" O100 under the Nature domain, and Zombie "zombie" Cleo under Death. Then after some comtemplation Etho "free glass" sLab was slotted underneath Trickery.

What remains is to find the Hermist/ Traffic-lifers that are 1) connected to the domains 2) related to the avatars.

(fyi i drew all those feather strokes manually by hand with my lineart brush) (why? well,)

Grian came to mind immediately when I thought of "Trickery" (Though Cub, Scar, and a couple of other Hermits also fit). I wanted to build the god-avatar relationship on the Etho-Grian dynamic specifically.

Scar was chosen based on his S9 theme (wood elf) and his history with Bdubs (S7 mayor race). Baiscally the concept of King maker/ Second-in-command Bdubs was stuck in my brain. (Sorry Stress :[ )

Death was a trickier one. While it would be funny to have Grian-Scar-Mumbo to be (half of) the pantheon, Mumbo fit the Knowledge domain better. (ignoring his Peace, Love, and Plants deal for a sec; even then I think that's more Nature-aligned) so I went with the classic option of Zedeath.

Beyond this point (until "===") is me overanalysing/ blue-curtaining the black & white piece. You have been warned (/silly)

This piece's composition used a circle/three-parter as its base, witih the circle centred on the castle/city in the middle of the map. Etho was fully isolated in Grian/Trickery's third of the space, but Nature crossed over into Death's space easily the two domains are closely related imo. It was natural for things to end (death), and endings fueled the next cycle of nature life.

It seemed that all the gods are looking at the world/map, however since their pupils are obscured (non-existent in Scar's case) it was difficult to say for certain. Though you might be able to tell where their interest lie, if you look at the distance between the deities and the mortal realm and where their hands rest.

Death carefully rested his elbow on the line separating him and Nature, but his left hand was dangerously close to Bdubs. And it looked like it was ready to come down and press direcly onto the corner of the map, tilting or even flipping the chessboard over. In his right hand held the scythe, posed to swing. The edge of his scythe faced Cleo, pointing towards them like he could harvest their life whenever at his whim.

He also looked at the world from directly above (though you could say he was biased towards Cleo's point of view since he's not centered+ he was positioned behind them), meaning that he saw all lives as "equal", or have an especially detached but not uncaring view regarding the world (like a scientist looking microorganisms in his petri dish).

In contrast, Grian/Trickery leaned in close to the world, lowering his head so his eye level was almost at the ground level of the world. Like he was looking through the mortals' point of view, understanding the state of affairs through humans' moralities and values (through Etho, even, since Grian was positioned behind him).

His eyes were wide in anticipation. While he carefully kept his hands close, they were also touching the world directly; which was a thing no other god did in the piece. It was like he was waiting for the right moment to reach out and disrupt whatever that's happening on stage. As we all know, no matter how much Grian tries to restrain himself, he will press the button.

Scar is the most... detached/ distanced from the world as a whole? He reclined backwards, his visible hand resting on his knee. He might be looking at the world, or he might be looking at Grian, or was his attention on bdubs? Even with the signature :J smile on his face, he got this air of indifference. Maybe Nature believed that everything will run their fated courses without his influence.

The flowers on Scar's clothes were sunflowers (sides of his corset), roses (back of corset and forearm), and a very specific lilac brush I had to download. Flowers that were closely related to a certain series :3c

Shoutout to w4r (War for Rayuba) for the chessboard map idea. ily octs It's really funny that Bdubs, Cleo & Etho all start/ were currently standing on black tiles (<- did not count the tiles and only realised that after i started to fill in the black)

Let's talk (more) about body language and outfits and black-white ratio (I am Reaching here) (not that I wasn't in the previous part) (but I am Reaching even further)

Etho has a very clear cut B&W shading with minimal grey/cross-hatch areas. He is the least ink-blocked. He knows what his beliefs are and the lines that he will/won't cross.

He has a semi-relaxed stance, tilting back slightly. He has one hand on his hip but the other by his side remain open-palmed. He isn't not listening to new proposals, but he is considering (and judging) them carefully.

Bdubs' moss cloak and boots has a clear divide in b&w, but not his outfit (pants)/headband. Both the cloak and boots are nature-aligned: cloak is, well, made of moss; and boots to walk the earth, the only thing separating him and the dirt (though at the same time, supporting him).

Nature is clear in what it wants. While there may be bright parts mixed in shadows, and flecks of shade within the "light", Nature holds a firm stance based on layers and layers of understanding.

Bdubs is also reaching out with an open palm. He is open for dialogue, perhaps preaching/ prompting others to communicate as well.

Cleo is the darkest/ most shaded among the three. She has highlights on the edges of her armour, but overall her armour is mainly shades of grey. Unlike Etho/Bdubs whose outfits' base color is largely white/empty, the visible parts underneath her armour (gloves and pants) are solid dark. She is dressed for blood and combat. It also gives the impression that she has this fierce determination/ conviction (darker tones being more "serious").

Her posture- legs wide, slouched/ leaning forward- makes her look aggressive/ stressed. Her hands are balled up into fists, one of them holding onto the flag/banner (of Death). Even then, the way she holds the banner isn't one that says it's for morale. She holds it like a spear, like a weapon.

There's also something about fabric/ extra fabric on the characters.

Etho has the least fabric on him but he has this shawl wrapped around himself. And the shawl itself is very still/ motionless. Bdubs' outfit is very round and gives like a grounded/soft vibe while the ribbon around his head drags behind him. but Cleo has neither of those, the only fabric that waves in the air is her banner which is outside of her body/not connected to her.

=== === ===

The composition of my 2nd piece aimed to imitate the playbook's cover art (illustrated by Vash Taylor), with the slightly faded background and wispy banner. The path of the smoke meant to mimick Cleo's face stitches (as how I usually draw them), where it crawls up her right cheek, crosses her nose bridge and passes through her eye.

Shoutout to "google search: zombie hands" stock photos and silhouette images, they saved my life when I was struggling with the foreground.

If you read through all this, I thank you from the bottom of my heart and hope everything will be going splendid for you in the month of August!! Even if you didn't and just swiped past after realising there's too many words behind the read more I wish you the same :D

Once again, please check the fics if you are interested in the AU!! Dust, Flesh, and Bones is a multi-chaptered long fic and before we lose the sound of our own mouths calling mine, mine, mine. is a 9k one-shot! They are both so dear to me I hold them close to me heart,,

[muninnhuginn]

Ohh, I really like your analysis of the last skip&loafer chapter. It's not shown in the scanlation, but in the japanese version there is also a little comment at the end which reads something a long the lines of "there is nothing wrong with these feelings" and i love how it reflects the idea that there is nothing wrong with enjoying your interests, no matter how silly they may seem, but also that there is nothing wrong with feeling angry about not being treated well. Kazakami wasn't ungrateful for being upset over his possessions being thrown away, it's an understandable reaction... I am really looking forward the school festival arc and how it will expand on kazakami, takamine and kanechika trio! I wonder if we will get some shima, yasaka and kazakami parallels too

Thank you! And aww, that's so sweet with the end note. I guess it's something that's threaded throughout the series in general in terms of people enforcing roles and not needing to fit them, but there's just something nice about it being said "outright", you know?

But yeah, I think the whole thing with his hobbies being dismissed is wildly relatable. The fact that he'd still been trying his hardest to study for third year and abandoning everything else just makes it worse. Because he'd kept this one hobby for himself and he couldn't even have that. And his parents clearly didn't comprehend that his hobby *was* important to him. The bit where his mum referred to the figures as "dolls" just rubbed it in, because if you spend any time whatsoever with anyone into that side of things, you would not be mucking up on basic terminology? It's not any kind of obscure trivia like the handedness. It's super basic, but his mum couldn't be bothered to even learn that.

Same @ the final year trio. If there's going to be any kind of breakthrough with them, it pretty much has to be during the culture festival, I think. Just because timing-wise, that's the big opportunity that's left before they leave. And getting the Kazakami chapter has made me more sure of that, because now we have some solid pieces of info on all three of them. (Though ngl, I'd love a Kanechika focus chapter during/before that. We've received plenty of pieces on him breadcrumbed throughout the series (too forceful, genuinely passionate about stage not just acting, but he puts himself out there in a way none of the other characters are really able to and he has had to work to reach a semblance of "cringe is free" - it's not effortless), but I don't think we've had a chapter that full-on focuses on him in the same way as we have the other two?)

I hadn't been thinking of Yasaka but yee definitely. She has parallels with both Mitsumi (as a contrast. that line about "never having to worry about being loved" (paraphrasing) still rings in my head) and Mika and Shima (as a compare) and I'm sort of guessing her thread may appear more with the Ujie subplot. But Yasaka basically takes Shima and inverts his approach in a lot of ways (appeasing other people, not trusting in being liked for oneself, but she's more active than passive in her manipulation of social situations), so given Shima and Kazakami are now shown to be remarkably similar, it follows that Yasaka would also be an interesting comparison point.

Sorry, most of this is just rambling, but tl;dr yes to all the above. The series truly is parallels all the way down and the way that societal roles colours everything, but the series itself says you don't have to conform to that is so reassuring. I know personally, Nao-chan's worries about having missed the boat on experiencing life really hit

[addictedtostorytelling]

bit of a random/silly one but..... personally i dont see gil grissom as a guy that would ever get a tattoo?? of any kind? BUT for hypothetica sake, if he did do you think he would get A: a bug. B: something else of his interests like a molecule or a cowboy hat etc. C:.... maybe poetry? a text of some kind.

(or D: some other option u like that i have thought of!)

hi, anon!

i can't picture grissom ever actually getting a tattoo, either, but for the sake of the (fun) hypothetical, if he were to, i think he might be more inclined to get a text tattoo as opposed to a pictorial one. i also see him going toward something personally meaningful to him and maybe a bit cryptic. so maybe something like

the exact geographical coordinates of where he met sara. (which, according to my research, would most likely be 37.7848° N, 122.4091° W.)

a shakespeare quote or a line of poetry. maybe sonnet 47.

a quote from moby dick.

a quote from roy rogers.

maybe a date (like his and sara's wedding anniversary).

maybe something warrick-related, like advice warrick once gave him or warrick's birth and death dates.

a latin inscription relating to life, death, the human condition, etc.

or his beloved locard's principle written in the original french.

alternately, if he were to go for something pictorial, i could maybe see him, during his seafaring days, getting really into the traditional meanings of sailor tattoos and choosing something to commemorate an achievement, like sailing a certain number of nautical miles or crossing a border or equatorial line. probably something pretty obscure, knowing him.

maybe a vintage scientific illustration of a bug (particularly one he had studied or helped to conserve)—the anatomical accuracy being paramount.

maybe a favorite constellation.

perhaps after the events of csi: vegas episode 01x08 "pipe cleaner," both he and sara would get wedding ring tattoos, just in case either one of them ever loses theirs again.

as for where on his body he might get the ink, i think it'd definitely be someplace he would cover with his clothes but nowhere risqué. most probably a pectoral muscle or on his upper arm somewhere.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

[lightandfellowship]

Do you have any other ‘random and obscure’ headcanons? I’d love to hear them!

Honestly? Not exactly? My head has been pretty stuck in the meta/analysis side of KHDR so I haven't been thinking about fun headcanons as much. But let me see...

There's like zero canon-canon to this but I like to think that Vidar, Vala, and Heimdall all have a simultaneous crush on Hoder. Just based on dialog/behavior/what could potentially be interesting dynamic-wise. Though it can all be read platonically too, of course.

Based on Vala's line about Hoder's honor, her knowing ballroom dancing, and the fact her screen debut is in Beast's Castle, maybe Vala reads a lot of romantic stories about royalty and princesses and brave knights and kinda wants to be a knight herself? (But maybe not a reckless one, since she disagrees with the idea of going after Maleficent and disrupting the world order...so maybe less of a "knight who vanquishes every single villain and saves every single damsel in distress they come across" and more of a "knight who follows a very strict code of conduct and doesn't question the orders given to them by their superiors.") <- all of this kinda goes hand-in-hand with my "Vala has a crush on Hoder" headcanon. Maybe she views Hoder like a princess...

This one isn't new, I've seen it around a lot, but Vali using sign language to communicate like 90% of the time. I like to think that, in addition to whatever would be considered standard Scala Sign language, the upperclassmen have a unique set of signs that only their group knows the meanings of and were created specifically for/by Vali. Including inside jokes but also quick, useful signs for communicating secretly on missions. Scala Sign Language is a required course in all Scala schools, so both the upperclassmen and the underclassmen know it well.

Relating to my "Vidar was meant to be Odin's heir" headcanon, I imagine he and Odin have a close student and mentor, or vaguely dad and son, relationship. Odin shares information with Vidar that he doesn't share with any of his other students, and Vidar is more emotionally open with Odin since Vidar feels like he can't show too much weakness in front of his friends who rely on him to be their strong leader. Maybe Vidar and Odin sometimes hang out in the Scala tower drinking tea together and discussing various difficult subjects. Even though Odin was saddened by all of the deaths of his students, Vidar's definitely hit the hardest, especially since Odin knew in great detail all of the hopes and dreams Vidar had for the future that have now been forever lost.

I have this silly old post about how the KHDR cast would act during a game of laser tag

[allthemusic]

Week ending: 12th November

We're in a doo-wop mood, it seems! Plus, the arrival of two pretty cool characters, at least one of whom is going to be a returning guest star for the next few years of this blog.

What Do You Want to Make Those Eyes At Me For? - Emile Ford and the Checkmates (peaked at Number 1)

We're kind of in the golden age of "X and the Ys" band names, aren't we? We had Johnny and the Hurricanes last week, and now it's Emile's turn, with this little slice of doo-woppish pop. And it's really doo-woppish, including literally starting with backing singers - the Checkmates, I presume - going doo-wop be-dooby-dooby doo-wop, before Emile comes in with a soulful romantic complaint, as he asks his love what do you wanna make those eyes at me for / If they don't mean what they say? His love's been leading him on, he explains, with looks that make me glad, they make me sad, / They make me want a lot of things that I never had.

It's relatable stuff, though definitely skirting a line, by modern standards. One line, in particular, stands out here, about how that's alright, I'll get you alone some night / And baby you'll find you're messing with dynamite. It's very menacing, and colours the rest of the song, giving the whole situation a sort of "well she was asking for it" vibe that I'm not sure I appreciate. "Oh, but your honour, she was making eyes at me, you can hardly blame me." Fortunately, for the most part, it's delivered in such a way that you do mostly get the sense that Emile's just a frustrated man, and not an outright predator - he's all talk, but there's none of the heat behind it that suggests he's actually going to do anything, you know? This is just him venting his frustrations as he feels he's being messed with.

Making it doo-wop is a nice touch, in all this - the backing singers and soulful, wailing singing add a real pathos to it that I can appreciate. And there's a sort of silly fluffiness inherent to the style that lets you get away with things like tacking a slightly underwhelming yeah to the end without really damaging the song - a harder rocking song would have been absolutely crippled by it, but here it just comes off endearingly naff. Surprisingly, it wasn't originally a doo-wop song, though, but a rather obscure Broadway number from 1916. I have genuinely no idea how it found its way to Emile, a full 43 years later, but I find myself kind of glad it did.

In all this, I assumed that Emile Ford was American - but no, he's from Saint Lucia, then part of the British West Indies. He moved to London with his mother in the mid-1950s to study sound engineering, and picked up guitar, piano, bass, violin and drums all while studing - talk about an overachiever! He made regular appearances in London dance halls, during this time, and on TV music shows like Oh Boy! but this record was what really made his name - and made him the first black British artist to sell a million records. All with a sound that's shockingly American, to my ears. We've been hearing white British artists putting their own spin on rock and roll for a little while, but Emile's perhaps our first British doo-wopper - at least that I can remember, correct me if I'm wrong.

Interestingly, there's another name I recognised attached to the record - because it was co-produced by Emile and one Joe Meek. By my count, this makes this Joe's first appearance in this project. A sound engineer by trade, just like Emile, Joe's an interesting and somewhat tragic character who will absolutely re-appear in this project. Interested in electronics and soud recording from a very young age, he had had a brief career in the RAF as a radar technician, before getting into the music industry, hopping between various radio companies and recording studios as an audio technician, and scoring a few minor jazz and calypso hits, all while developing an interest in using the studio itself in new, experiemental ways, an impulse that would lead him to develop techniques for overdubbing, sampling and adding reverb to tracks. None of which are really on display here, but it's cool to see his first chart appearance, as one of the earliest producers to really have a distinctive style and reputation.

Put Your Head on My Shoulder - Paul Anka (7)

And then, after the surprisingly British doo-wop of Emile Ford, we've got Paul Anka, with a shot of the proper American stuff. Again, we're looking at some pretty standard doo-wop fare, here, lots of backing singers going oooooh and ba ba ba ba ba, all combined, in this case, with triplets on a piano and a steady, driving bassline and drum combination that keeps the whole thing slinking along nicely as Paul wails away over the top. It's a slightly woozy slow dance, elevated, perhaps, by the fact that the backing singers sound absolutely angelic. None of Emile's rough and tumble chorus of dooby-doo-wops here, we're in the realm of clean, sustained chords here, ethereally high and sweet.

I think, delivery-wise, Paul's also a bit more convincing than Emile - while Emile's frustration is clear in the lyrics, it's Paul who sounds properly desperate on lines imploring his love to put your head on my shoulder / Whisper in my ear, baby / Words I want to hear. Et cetera. It's all pretty basic stuff, just wanting your love to hold you and pull you close and tell you that they love you, but Paul really sells it, with a slight warble to his voice, and a little audible breath before the title line that just underscores how much he's longing for that bit of contact. Lyrics asking them to put your lips next to mine dear help, conjuring a sense of intimacy that's somehow even more intense than if he'd just asked them to kiss him.

Production-wise, this is definitely sleeker and glossier than Emile's was - Anka was a much more established name at this point, and was working with American pop money, coming off the back of several similarly big, smoothly swinging hits. And so there's a sort of shimmer to this that Emile is perhaps lacking, at least in my mind, an easy stylishness that sets the track out. And indeed, the song's been picked up by a bunch of people for cover versions, through the years, including apparently becoming the basis for a 2020 Doja Cat song - as a consequence of which, a mashup of the Doja Cat hit and the Paul Anka original apparently was briefly a thing on Tiktok. All of which puts us squarely half a century ahead, just shockingly modern. I fully did not expect to be talking about Paul Anka and Tiktok in the same entry. Wild!

I think Paul Anka probably recorded the better song here, from a technical and a perfomance standpoint. It's catchy, it's pretty, and he sings the heck out of it. Plus, it's clearly good enough to have stood the test of time, and to be sampled even sixty years later. It's great, genuinely. But if I had to pick one of the two songs I listened to for this entry? I think WDYWTMTEAMF (good song, bad acronym) has to be the winner. It just felt more interesting, fresher. Plus it's interesting to see sound technicians like Emile and Joe Meek take centre stage - they're not doing anything too wild here, sure, but it's only going to be a matter of time before they start unleashing more avant-garde sounds on the world. And I am here for it - watch this space!

Favourite song of the bunch: What Do You Want to Make Those Eyes At Me For?

[throughscreendoors]

Poetry Lessons from John Ashbery's "Street Musicians"

John Ashbery has been deified by critics, but my sense is that he's divisive among young writers and poets. He's kind of a hallmark of obscure, academic white guy poetry that once ruled the literary world but is out of vogue (in many cases for a number of good reasons)—but on the other hand, he's incredibly prolific, has a tremendous vocabulary and has a silly, cerebral voice that is entirely his own.

I read his collection Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror, which critics seem to consider his magnum opus as far as I can tell, and wasn't totally moved by it; there was interesting language and strange moments, but I found it too navel-gazey, too inward-facing and without enough footholds for readers. Unnecessarily difficult, in other words.

Even so, I picked up Houseboat Days, another collection of his, because I wanted to give him a fair shake anyway in the interest of closely reading good poets in order to improve my own writing.

With that out of the way, "Street Musicians," the first poem in the collection, actually impressed me. There are a few main things I want to take away and remember from it, which are as follows:

1. Titles, Context and "Directions" in a Poem

A common struggle for me when writing my own poems is choosing a title that speaks to what follows.

As I see it, there are different strategies you can take:

Self-consciously poetic title that speaks literally to the content (popular in older poetry, for e.g., Robert Herrick's "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" or Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken")

Self-consciously poetic title that speaks figuratively to the content in varying degrees (on the more direct end of the spectrum, "Mean Free Path" by Ben Lerner comes to mind, alluding to a particle's path in physics vs. a reader's path through his elliptical writing style vs. a person's path in love and relationships and memory through their own life)

Plainspoken phrase with poetic affect, figuratively related to the poem either directly or indirectly (Elaine Kahn runs the gamut here, particularly in her collection Romance or The End—a more direct figurative example could be "You Dream of Candy Because You Want Yourself To," which does mention dreaming of candy in the poem but only as a detail, whereas a less direct one might be "Reality Steve," a reference to a blog of reality TV spoilers on a poem that doesn't seem very related to that at all; it might be a reference to The Bachelor or might not, since the poem does mention a person on TV with nice hair, or it could be a reference to a real lover in the poem the author addresses, though it might not—the title has a feel of an inside joke, though magically still works somehow)

Title that is the "first line" of the poem (Emily Dickinson has come to be known for this in retrospect, since her poems were seemingly untitled—"I felt a Funeral, in my Brain" for example)

And so on.

One thing you usually don't do is pick a non-poetic title that is strictly nominative and literal, which Ashbery does here (ie, it's about two street musicians... and it's called "Street Musicians"). Even so, it ends up working because the title still has an interesting relationship to the rest of the poem.

The main thing it depends on is the first line that follows it:

"One died, and the soul was wrenched out/ Of the other in life..."

The jump from the plain and nominative "Street Musicians" to "One died.../ Of the other..." does a lot of work with very little. Upon first reading the title, it could mean any number of street musicians; now immediately, it means only two.

Only two evokes a lot: a deep friendship, a rivalry, almost a romantic relationship. The fact that one of them has "died" in the first line also makes the poem feel very fast paced; in a way, "Street Musicians" is doing a ton of expository work and is setting up a timeline for the whole piece almost invisibly: as we see by the end of the first stanza, 90% of the story is already over when the poem starts, and the rest takes place in the twilight of that fact.

Suddenly, a boring title is actually pretty interesting—and the jump to "One died" is both tragic and kind of darkly funny (he's almost using the "jump" from title to first line as a narrative "line break," which is probably an underused technique).

Finally, as my one-time poetry teacher Elaine Kahn always stressed, you want a title that strikes the right balance between explaining and directing and providing another opening into the poem; in my own thinking, it's like thinking of the title as either a door (the only way in) or a window (one possible way) into the poem.

Direct and literal titles tend to run the risk of over-explaining or over-directing, but Ashbery elides that trap for a couple reasons: first, the title is so plainspoken and direct that it almost becomes too vague again, leaving room for interpretation; second, the poem itself actually doesn't offer many concrete clues (!) that the poem is a literal story about two street musicians other than the title (yes, there's details that lead that way, but without the title, it would be way too easy to interpret in countless other directions).

Suddenly the title is generous: it's just enough to get you started reading and interpreting, but not much more. Good start!

2. Abstract vs. Concrete, Open vs. Closed Language and "The Rules"

Some common writing rules are "show, don't tell," "use concrete language," "be specific," "avoid excess abstraction" and so on. They apply to almost all writing, but they have some special application in poetry.

Apart from its history as CIA propaganda, "show, don't tell" is a misunderstood rule and it breaks down when it comes to poetry (more accurate might be "balance showing and telling"), and the other three rules I mentioned basically follow this one rule.

The problem is in other forms of writing, "concrete language" means specific and descriptive language when painting scenes or pictures, but typically it leans towards a realist aesthetic (ie, use language that helps readers reproduce reality in their minds). In poetry, what is or isn't "concrete language" has a different sense—it means more juicy words and fewer filler words, more words that point to richer or multivariate meanings, more arrangements of words and lines that evoke than those that don't, and so on.

In essence, poetry already has a broad license to be abstract; it is encouraged in a way that it isn't in many other forms of writing. Even so, it's a question of where the abstraction comes from in poetry. Generally speaking, if it comes from the language you've chosen itself rather, it's a counter-productive kind of abstraction.

Again, thinking on Elaine Kahn's advice I've heard in the past (and her admission of being a fan of Ashbery, which surprised me), she says the key is to be "very concrete about abstract things," and that you can "get away" with abstraction if you can make it real somehow.

Ashbery is still too abstract in general for my taste, but I have to admit that he's kind of a master of this. Consider his description of the life and times of the surviving street musician:

Wrapped in an identity like a coat, sees on and on The same corners, volumetrics, shadows Under trees.

First of all, "wrapped in an identity like a coat" is almost disarming in how basic it is. The idea animating the metaphor is basic and well-understood: identity is illusory or "false" in some way, a rationalization. But "a coat"?

But then we get the description that follows: the seeing "on and on" evoking a dread of mortality, "corners" taking on the literal meaning of street corners and the figurative meanings of being "cornered"—and then the pivotal "volumetrics," which in my estimation, basically breaks "the rules."

What exactly is a "volumetric"? The definition is "relating to the measurement of volume," which is about as un-concrete and abstract as a noun can get (it's doubly breaking a rule because "volumetric" as an adjective might be evocative, but pluralizing it into a noun makes it seem like it would be bland again). So, why is it not bland here?

The concrete words Ashbery uses here around it are so concrete that they are almost mundane: the corners, the coat, the shadows, the tree. On the one level, we get the day-in, day-out existence of the unfulfilled street musician. Then, tying all of these things together, we get volumetrics.

Where it is, the word gives a whole new dimension (pun intended) to all the other daily observations of this would-be musician—and it gives a vivid inner voice to the musician at the same time. Suddenly, "corners" is evoking math formulas and trigonometry, "shadows" is evoking physics, vectors, light, heat.

Finally, the way the line breaks leaving "under trees" alone is interesting as well. Having "corners, volumetrics, shadows" together is important for these connotations to fly, but really what the musician is remembering or thinking of are the "shadows under trees," which is actually quite a specific image: he is thinking of the specific public places in parks and street corners where he can find shade on a hot day, and how the romance of that has drained with repetition. What was once a welcome respite, a secret performance space for those in-the-know has now been reduced merely to mathematics and logistics.

From Ashbery here, maybe we have a new rule: you can make your concrete language abstract, but it depends on context; you can do it if doing so will open more avenues and interpretations than it will close, which it does here.

From this and other examples, we can see that there are rules, and then there are rules. There are rules beneath the rules, and we ought not to take them (or the world, if we are to describe it evocatively) at face value.

3. Be Proportional with Vocabulary; Evoking Over Stating

Finally, Ashbery is thought of as an extremely verbose and dense poet (and sometimes he is), but "Street Musicians" shows a lot of restraint. There are a handful of moments that make you want to reach for the dictionary:

volumetrics

chattels

declamation

And none of these are really too much of a reach for any average reader. The moments that make you really sit up in your seat actually use quite plain language, combined or deployed in an arresting way. The moments that pop out for me are:

suburban airs/ and ways

beached/ glimpses

So I cradle this average violin

In November, with the spaces among the days/ more literal, the meat more visible on the bone"

The first two use line breaks to create puns and multiple meanings. The "average violin" is so crushing in what it evokes given what precedes it, but the language is entirely plain.

The last example is maybe the most instructive for me, because it is perhaps the most abstract in its concept and in its language while still working somehow. The first part of the line for me evokes a calendar, the sense of time passing (though why does November make the spaces clearer? shorter days? longer and more visible divisions of time?).

The second part evokes a kind of hunger, but almost inversely—a sense of literal "meat more visible on the bone" makes me think of when there won't be meat on the bones, of aging and eventually dying, of the hunger we have in our youth that wanes as we get older. Neither of these "images" are particularly concrete as we usually think of it, nor are they particularly related—but he orchestrates them so that they are here.

Finally, the only thing that turned me off in the poem:

"The plush leaves the chattels in barrels/ Of an obscure family being evicted Into the way it was, and is.

For me, this is Ashbery Ashbery-ing as people usually accuse him, and I start to lose the thread. "An obscure family" doesn't do a lot for me," "into the way it was, and is" I understand but uses too many non-word words to make its point, the missing comma in the first line drives me insane, the double-s in "chattels in barrels" is frustrating for some reason and feels overly arcane.

But hey, nobody's perfect.

[mctreeleth]

Ahoy! I know this is very nosy but in my experience people like talking about things adjacent to their research, but also obviously do feel free to ignore this should you be so inclined! I just want to ask how you landed on your PhD topic, whether it was an advertised project or you had to workshop invent it yourself or A N Other route? Cheers!

That is very true, and I have a theory that we love to write about our research because it is an alternative to doing the actual writing we are meant to be doing, but guilt free, because like, we are still sort of working on our projects, but we don’t need to reference.

For me, it was 100% a “this is a real question I have that no-one has an answer for me for” type thing. I had been pretty active in the quilt community online for a few years prior to going to university in my late 20s, I lived through the increasing emphasis on placing financial value on patterns, and I had found it a wild thing to watch from the periphery of. But every time I would try to find out what was happening, I would come up blank, so I realised I would need to do it myself.

I did some preliminary stuff related to it during undergrad, and planned my honours year research to serve as a preliminary form of it, kind of a “this year I will do the research to prove that there is conflict in the community as to whether or not patterns are a product to be sold, and for PhD I will work out why” topic. But in the process of demonstrating that quilt patterns had become increasingly commodified I also accidentally stumbled on the fact that the community had pretty much been forced to do so by forced by the combo of “in hustle culture you must commodify your hobbies” and “we will not give you fair wages for quilts”

So, having found out the why in my honours thesis, I flip-flopped on if to do PhD at all, and ultimately decided that if I was doing it I wanted to focus my research on people who were resistant to the commodification of quilt patterns, primarily to see if the narratives they employed in this resistance could be applied to other resistances towards capitalism. This to me felt like an opportunity to use my PhD for something that would have applicable concrete benefits, rather than just me getting a full picture of what was happening for my own edification, which was fine when I was paying to attend uni, but felt a bit silly when I was getting a scholarship from the government to do so. That is internalised stuff that is in itself a bit problematic, but also, if I just look at the process of commodification itself, then there is always a risk that a marketing student could stumble upon my research and be like, hey, we can use this to commodify other things. (My personal money on the next field to experience it: macramé. No proof, just a vibe.)

Unfortunately, a lot of the pro-commodification quilters are online, and a lot of the resisting quilters are offline, and my method for finding to offline ones was to go to the International Quilt Museum in Nebraska for a bit, which COVID has put the kibosh on. So at the moment I can really only access online quilters, and my project has reverted to the topic of “The Commodification of Creative Knowledge: How Hustle Culture and Intellectual Property Rights have made the Quilting community suuuuuuck” rather than what I wanted it to be, which was “Resistances to Hustle Culture and Intellectual Property Rights in the Quilting Community”. For the record, I hate this, and I understand the fear of having a topic that does not mesh with your sensibilities. So much motivation comes from interest, so having a project that suits you, not only in terms of topic but also of methodology and outcome, can make all the difference.

Sadly, I don’t really have any advice for getting a topic that works for you. I came to mine by taking something I had noticed that seemingly not many other people had (there are a couple of law professors researching quilting and copyright, but more in terms of how complicated the laws are than the social underpinnings) and just talking about it with people until it moulded into a project. If you have a niche field, like quilting, people will instinctively try to relate it to their niche field, whether that is computers or art or music or gardening or knitting or whatever. Those comparisons really helped me to demonstrate that even though the field was niche, the problem was not, and it is that cross-applicability that makes a work citeable and therefore, in metric-dominated academia, valuable. I also had the advantage of building up to it, thanks to an undergrad stream consisting entirely of sociology and womens studies topics which were open-ended enough that I could do snippets of the project from all sorts of different angles to work out what directions were dead ends and what were foundations of bigger projects.

All that said, I think I have very much taken the difficult route, although that might just be how everyone feels. But talking to those of my cohort who went more along the lines of “examining x, through the lens of y” I get the impression they are having a much easier time of it, as are those in more technical fields who branched their research off of their supervisor’s projects. I don’t have a central theorist to refer to repeatedly, to tie it all together, which makes structuring it difficult. Really it would have been wonderful if someone else had already done my project exactly, but for… okay well the whole point of mine is that it is very specific to quilting, but if I was very into, say, macramé, and I got to explore the field of macramé through the lens of Sara Lastnameredacted’s work on the commodification of the quilting community. Maybe that’s my advice. Find a work that makes you want to draw little exclamation points in the margins and pick a field you love and write about it though the lens of that particular work. If they can make you do it about Marx and Weber and Foucault then why not do it about some obscure anti-commodification theorist. This all depends on if you are doing a social science I guess. But maybe it works for other fields too, I don’t know!

None of us know anything! Isn’t it wonderful!

[umbry-fic]

Beaches! And Dolphins! (And Arsonists!)

Summary:

Colette: Misella, come play at the beach with me! Misella: I appreciate the invitation, but I must decline. Misella: I have been informed that I am 'not the beach type'. Colette: What? But... the beach is so much fun!

Colette, Lloyd, Arche and Genis spend an afternoon at the beach. Shenanigans ensue.

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia, Tales of Crestoria Characters: Colette Brunel, Lloyd Irving, Arche Klein, Genis Sage, Raine Sage, Misella Relationships: Colette Brunel/Lloyd Irving, Colette Brunel & Lloyd Irving & Arche Klein & Genis Sage Rating: G Word Count: 4789 Mirror Link: AO3 Original Post Date: 20/07/2021

Notes+Warnings: A fun fic based on Colette's Crestoria summer alt. (Don't take this too seriously!) Arche and Genis are both wearing their Asteria summer alts.

Slight spoiler warning for a design change in Crestoria chapter 8. No spoilers for Lloyd's side story.

Credits to @likes-words-and-shrimp for inspiring the conversation at the start. Happy summer! ♥

~~~

“Oh god.” Arche spat out a mouthful of pineapple juice, fumbling and nearly dropping the glass she was holding, tiny umbrella and all, into the sand. She coughed into her free hand, desperately trying not to enter a wheezing fit. She had not expected to witness this today.

“Genis already warned me, but… Really, what possessed you to choose this?!” Arche asked in disbelief.

Genis and Colette, in Arche’s humble opinion, both looked adorable - Genis in swimming trunks and a pair of kitten flip-flops; Colette in a swimsuit dress, golden hair tied into a messy ponytail, and equipped with cute accessories that only added to her charm.

Then there was Lloyd. Who was wearing the loudest Hawaiin print shirt she had ever seen, paired with… shorts that were secured with a belt? These were the weirdest clothing choices she had ever seen. Who wore a belt when they were going to the beach?

Lloyd was very red and very noticeable, sticking out like a sore thumb on the beach.

At least he had made a sensible decision when it came to his footwear - he was wearing sandals. If he had chosen to wear covered shoes to the beach, Arche may have needed to bury Lloyd on the spot for his crimes.

Lloyd scowled, clearly not appreciating Arche’s gaping expression or Genis snickering behind her. His childhood friend had a hand on Arche’s shoulder, and it was the only thing keeping him from collapsing in laughter.

“It’s my favourite colour!” Lloyd protested, crossing his arms and glaring away into the distance. “Besides, how much more ridiculous is it than your silly hat, Arche?”

“Excuse me?” Arche retorted, straightening up in indignation. She adjusted the hat in question, which was not a hat at all. “This is a sun visor! Can’t you see it’s made of plastic? It’s a fashion statement. A fashion statement. And a practical one at that, because my sensitive skin needs protection! It’s miles better than your shirt!”

Arche glared back in full force, fire raging in her eyes. Despite her being a full three heads shorter than Lloyd, she appeared threatening enough to make Lloyd take a hurried step back.

“Alright, alright!” Lloyd conceded, holding his hands up in surrender. “Don’t murder me.”

“I told you this was a horrible choice yesterday, Lloyd,” Genis gasped between snickers, bending down with his hands on his knees. His sides were in pain. “Anyone would have known that this was a horrible choice. Anyone except you! You should have been there when he tried it on, Arche.”

Genis had done more than just tell Lloyd. Upon seeing Lloyd step out of the dressing room, Genis had groaned and buried his head in his hands. For an entire hour. Colette had tried to get him to raise his head with wonderful motivational quotes like “You can do it!”, but ultimately failed to knock Genis out of his stupor.

“Honestly, I’m thanking my lucky stars that I already owned mine,” Arche replied drily. And her two-piece swimsuit was cute too! A win. “I was spared seeing this disaster unfold live.”

“I think it looks nice,” Colette spoke up, butting into the conversation with a sunny smile. “Red looks good on Lloyd. It’s like… How do I explain it… His colour?”

“See? All of you just have no sense of taste!” Lloyd said triumphantly, blushing a little as he scratched the back of his head, grinning from Colette’s compliment.

“I’d say love is blind. But you’re both blind,” Arche commented, shaking her head and patting Genis on the back. “Come on, Genis, let’s go get started on a sandcastle before these two idiots derail this whole day.”

Colette stared after the retreating back of her two friends, Arche holding her drink high above her head and Genis still letting out a final few peals of laughter. She turned back to Lloyd, blinking in confusion. “Love…?”

“JUST - Think nothing of it!” Lloyd blurted out, blushing harder until his face resembled his shirt. All in all, too much red. “They don’t mean anything by it! Shall we get going too? We only have until Professor Raine picks us up to enjoy the beach.”

“Alright!”

Colette still wanted to know what was up, but chose to drop the line of questioning in favour of getting started with this day of fun. Neither she, nor Lloyd, nor Genis, had ever been to the beach. How could they, having been confined to the limits of a single village for their whole lives?

This was her chance to experience the sparkling waters and pristine sands that every child was supposed to know and experience at least once. All with shining eyes, a ton of energy, and the company of her friends! Arche had promised to act as their guide to all things beach-related, boasting about her expertise in this rather strange area.

It was going to be great, and she couldn’t wait!

Colette spotted a familiar figure in the corner of her vision, standing some distance away on the golden sands. Was that…?

“I see Misella!” Colette chirped, jumping up and down on the balls of her feet in excitement from spotting her new friend. She hoped she could get to know her better - that was a favourite pastime of hers. “I’m going to go say hi!”

“The girl you met last night at the inn? Have fun! I’ll be waiting with...” Lloyd trailed off as he realised that Colette had already taken off, leaving nothing but a cloud of fine sand in her wake. “Ah, she’s gone…” he muttered, smiling fondly. “Just like her.”

Lloyd turned, following the footprints Arche and Genis had left behind. Might as well get started on learning some beach activities! Then he could help Colette ease into them.

He wanted to make this day as amazing for her as possible.

~~~

“Misella!” Colette called out, practically lunging at the other girl’s back in excitement. Misella, rightfully startled, turned around just in time for Colette to grab onto her hands instead of sending Misella face-first into the sand.

Hm? How strange, Colette thought. Misella was still wearing gloves.

Maybe her hands were sensitive to sand…? That was the only reason Colette could think of. Or maybe it was just a fashion thing! Arche would know. She’d ask her later.

“Oh. It’s just you, Colette.” Misella blinked, releasing the tension from her hunched shoulders.

“Sorry for startling you.” Colette giggled. “I’m glad you ended up coming to the beach! You said you wouldn’t last night...”

“Ah, Kanata wanted to come. He said this was a famous beach and it would be a shame if we didn’t visit it,” Misella replied with a gentle smile, her gaze drifting to a boy with blond hair, who was wearing a plain pair of swimming trunks and was busy lugging a bucket from the direction of the waterfront. Kanata’s hand was bandaged - was he injured? Oh, Colette hoped he’d get better soon!

“And… the rest of my acquaintances,” Misella continued, tone shifting from adoring to carefully neutral as her gaze slid further right.

Acquaintances? What a strange way of putting friends!

Colette followed Misella’s gaze... And had to pause to process what she was seeing.

A man with black hair stood next to a lady with light brown hair, both slaving away with shovels in hand. The man wore a Hawaiian shirt over a pair of swimming trunks, the shirt even more eye-catching than Lloyd’s, and unbuttoned to reveal a strange symbol on his stomach. The lady wore a two-piece swimsuit, together with a sun hat made from straw and a pair of dark sunglasses that fully obscured any view of her eyes.

But what Colette was more interested in was where the two were dumping the sand they were so determined to dig up. All of it, weight and all, was going onto a third person who was so obscured by the pile of sand covering them that only their head of silver hair was visible, together with two flailing arms.

And was that screaming?

“Don’t be worried, Colette. This is an activity known as burying someone in sand. It’s a tradition at the beach, and Aegis volunteered,” Misella said in a deadpan tone. “Yuna and Vicious are just helping him.”

“I… I see.”

“Your swimsuit is very cute,” Misella commented, turning so that she blocked the concerning view behind her. She pointed out the white petals nestled securely in Colette’s hair. “And the flower is very beautiful. Is it a lily? I must admit I’m not too knowledgeable on flower species...”

“Oh, thank you so much! Lloyd picked it out for me, and it is a lily! At least, I think so,” Colette replied, any thoughts about the person in the sand already forgotten. Her happy smile only grew wider as she recalled how Lloyd had gifted the lily to her on the way to the beach.

Lloyd had been shifting from foot to foot, unable to look her in the eye as he had offered her the freshly-picked flower, the petals still wet from the morning rain. She hadn’t understood why he had been feeling so nervous, but hadn’t wanted to probe him on it. She had, however, accepted the lily in the blink of an eye, letting him place it in her hair, his fingers brushing against the tip of her ear for a brief moment and making her shiver. Her heart was filled with warm happiness from his actions. She intended to cherish the flower for as long as she could, for it was a gift from Lloyd, and all gifts from Lloyd were precious treasures.

“Like my brightblaze…” Misella muttered to herself, fingers cupping the precious flower that continued to sit in her hair, no matter her outfit or agenda for the day. It would never leave.

“Yours is really pretty as well! So is your swimsuit. It’s elegant,” Colette said eagerly, wanting to return the compliment. Misella’s two-piece swimsuit with a skirt truly fit her!

“Thank you, Colette. And did you get yours from the same place as us? This…” Misella asked, fingers reaching out and brushing the inflatable float that snugly hugged Colette’s arm. The float didn’t resemble any normal ring float - it was shaped like Lloyd, complete with his large smile, spiky hair and red Hawaiian shirt. It was adorable, and Colette absolutely loved it. She would be keeping it forever, even if she never went to the beach again! Lloyd had said much the same about his float, who looked just like her, down to the exact outfit she was wearing right now.

Besides, who said she wasn’t allowed to wear the float even outside of the beach? She wasn’t opposed to proudly wearing it every day, no matter what anyone said to her.

“I see that you have a similar float.” Colette giggled, gently poking the Kanata-shaped float on Misella’s right arm, which complemented the one she could faintly see on Kanata’s arm. “Did the friendly man at the swimwear shop offer to make you a pair as he did with me and Lloyd?”

“The short man with the accent?”

“The very same! He was so nice.”

Colette clasped her hands together, hoping she’d be able to see that friendly man with the bushy beard again. She wanted to thank him one more time for the generous gift - the pair of floats had been completely free of charge, and the details were perfectly done!

She also wanted to just spend some time with him. He seemed like an interesting person, and Lloyd seemed to like him too.

“Ah, Colette,” Misella said, breaking Colette out of her train of thought. “Kanata is calling for me.”

“Oh! Then I won’t keep you any longer.”

“Sorry for cutting our conversation short…”

“Don’t worry about it.” Colette waved Misella’s worries away. “We can always keep talking in the inn tonight. My friends and I aren't going to be leaving till tomorrow. I hope you have a good time! I’ll be joining my friends now.”

“You too, Colette! Have a fun time!” Misella waved goodbye, yelling after Colette’s retreating back.

Colette really was doing a lot of running around today.

She hoped she wouldn’t trip and ruin something…

~~~

“Sorry about the sandcastle. I lost us the competition...” Colette sighed. She crouched and dipped her hand down, letting the incoming waves wash away the granules sticking to it. That wouldn’t be enough to rid her of all the sand clinging to her from her plunge through the sandcastle, but nothing was likely to do that except a dip in the ocean.

Neither would the water wash away the frustrated frown on her face.

“Don’t worry about it,” Lloyd said, his gaze drawn to her, as it always was - watching the sea foam part around her hand; the sea flinging droplets into the air around her. “I’m just glad you’re not hurt. And what mattered was that we had a lot of fun, right?”

“Right!” Colette stood up, her frown fading away. Rivulets of water flowed down her arm and dripped from her fingertips. “I had a ton of fun!” She turned to face the azure waves, taking a step closer. Sunlight rippled on their surface, forming diamonds of pure gold that danced in merriment. “The waters here really are beautiful. They might be the most beautiful thing I’ve seen. Apart from Pasca’s clearing, that is. Thanks for suggesting we come here, Lloyd.”

Lloyd walked further out so he was standing next to Colette, feeling the waves lap at his ankles and submerge his bare feet, his sandals having been abandoned in the protection of Arche and Genis.

The sea wasn’t anywhere close to the most beautiful thing here.

“Anything to make that smile return,” he muttered.

No, that title belonged to the girl standing next to him. Her ponytail swayed in the slight breeze that teased his shoulders, her dress fluttering around her thighs, the metal around her neck glinting golden under the sunlight. Her arms were outstretched to feel the sea spray, her head tipped back in bliss. And on her face was the smile he always wanted to put there, bright and happy and content.

He couldn’t tear his gaze away.

“Lloyd? Earth to Lloyd?”

Lloyd snapped out of his daze to find Colette waving her hand in his face, a pout on her face and her hand on her waist.

“You can’t just stare at me and go silent, you know,” Colette grumbled.

“Sorry. I… I was, um...” Lloyd scrambled to return to his senses, wondering what he could even say without exposing just how deeply he had tumbled into love. Just being this close to her made his heart sing, not to mention how her current outfit turned her cuteness up to eleven and made functioning normally for him nigh impossible. All the ribbons…

He’d choked on his spit when Colette had walked out of the dressing room, hardly able to believe his eyes. Genis had spent the entirety of yesterday night reminding him of this, and Lloyd knew Genis would never let him forget.

A sudden clicking sound emanated from near their feet, interrupting his awkward attempt at an explanation. Boy, was he glad for the distraction.

“Oh!” Colette squealed in delight, crouching once again to peer at the snout that now poked out of the waters - one belonging to a grey dolphin with shining, curious eyes. “Hello there! Come to say hi?”

So the clicking sound had been the dolphin’s cry! He’d have to thank the dolphin later for saving his hide.

Colette laughed, the sound as refreshing as the sea spray, as the dolphin bumped its snout into her open palm. “You’re a playful one, aren’t you?” she whispered, patting its rubbery head. “Hm, I think I’ll name you Tim. Do you like the name?”

The dolphin proceeded to swim one rapid round, seemingly expressing its joy. It leapt into the air before diving back into the water, the slap of its tail spraying the both of them with a faceful of salt.

“I think it likes it,” Lloyd said. He couldn’t help but smile - even as he blinked seawater out of his eyes - content to watch Colette play with the dolphin. Naming the dolphins was so inherently... Colette.

That was when a second dolphin appeared, emitting equally enthusiastic cries as it joined the first. The two swam around each other happily, squeaking and clicking, with what appeared to be smiles on both of their faces that revealed rows of teeth.

“I think Tim and Robert are friends!” Colette exclaimed, clapping her hands together. She had come up with a second name on the spot. Impressive. “How sweet.”

“They’re… They’re coming back,” Lloyd noted in surprise, staring at the two rapidly approaching dolphins gliding through the ocean. The two sea creatures came to an abrupt stop before him and Colette, both clicking out an unknown message.

“I wonder what it is they want,” Colette mused, reaching out a gentle hand to stroke Robert’s fin. Only to be met with enthusiastic clicking, Tim bobbing its head up-and-down in what Lloyd interpreted as a nod.

“Huh.” This was probably going to sound dumb, but it was the only thing that came to Lloyd’s mind. “I… I think they want us to ride them?”

As if they could comprehend what Lloyd was saying, the two dolphins burst out into a cacophony of cries, shocking even Colette.

“I think you hit the nail on the head!” Colette kicked off her sandals, the two shoes landing on a haphazard pile on the sand, before grabbing his right hand in both of hers. She did it with no hesitation at all, the warmth of her hands seeping into his. He didn’t know how she did it, but he never wanted her to stop.

“Come on! This will be so much fun!” she cried, tugging him along, the bracelet around her right wrist jangling. She was the brightest thing before him, brighter even than the sun, her smile lighting up his chest with fireworks.

He would follow her anywhere. Anywhere in the whole wide world.

“Let’s not keep Tim and Robert waiting!”

~~~

“I wish you would have told us about the dolphins,” Arche grumbled, sitting up on the beach towel that formed her seat and hugging her knees to her chest. Genis was squatting next to her, continuing to work on the turtle sandcastle that had won the pair the spontaneously-held sandcastle competition. And rightfully so, considering how intricate the design was - complete with grooves on the shell and accurately shaped flippers.

Colette wondered how the turtle continued to stand on such a narrow base, however. Shouldn’t it have collapsed by now? Sand wasn’t this stable, was it? How did Genis do it?

“Sorry,” she apologised, plopping down under the shade of the umbrella that the two half-elves had commandeered. Her legs were still slightly shaky from the thrill of the past half-hour. “I was too engrossed and forgot entirely.”

It had been so much fun to navigate the seas on the back of an energetic dolphin with Lloyd by her side, catching the waves and speeding along the currents, feeling the sea breeze kiss her face. The cries of the dolphins and Lloyd’s laughter had filled her ears, his delighted smile carved into her memory. He’d even challenged her to a race, one that had ended in a draw as both Tim and Robert reached the shore at the same time. She and Lloyd had stumbled back onto the sand at that moment, her head spinning from all the tight turns they’d made. His arms had steadied her, as Lloyd always did, as she had turned and waved goodbye to the dolphins before they sped away.

“I’ll definitely tell you next time!” Colette promised. Arche and Genis should get to know the magical experience as well. And she would love to do it again.

Maybe she’d get to see Tim and Robert again! That would be great.

Genis not-so-discreetly elbowed Arche in the side, raising three fingers into the air and shaking his head.

“Ah, you’re right, Genis. Never mind, Colette, it’s alright. I’m actually somewhat glad.” Arche nodded sagely, having understood Genis’ symbolism perfectly. She flopped back down onto the towel, resting her head on her crossed arms. “I would have died so young from third-wheeling.”

“What does that even mean?” Colette asked, half-ready to place her hands on Arche’s shoulders and shake the answers out of her friend. It was bad enough that Arche and Genis seemed to be sharing an inside joke, but they also kept using these mysterious terms that Colette couldn’t wrap her head around! Even Lloyd seemed to be in on it.

“Don’t mind them!” Lloyd hurriedly interjected, slipping his feet into his sandals. Was he… blushing again?

What was happening?!!

Colette pouted. Fine. She’d drop it for now. But she’d find out one day, she swore.

“So. Shall we play a game of volleyball?” Arche asked. “Our sandcastle competition fell apart from the beginning, and…” Arche reached blindly into a backpack that the half-elf had magically procured out of somewhere, for Colette did not remember her bringing it to the beach. Arche triumphantly pulled out a colourful beach ball, all without budging from her lazy position. “...it’s the perfect use for this!”

“Sure. You’re on,” Lloyd replied, grinning. “I bet me and Colette can beat you any day.”

“And you two are automatically on the same team.” Arche finally sat up, raising one eyebrow before dropping it immediately. “Why am I even surprised? Anyway, you sure you want to make that bet?”

Genis sighed, setting down his shovel. He was not looking forward to all the physical exertion, but he knew he’d get dragged into it whether or not he agreed. Might as well indulge his friends. “Don’t try to be cocky, Arche. Lloyd may be the dumbest idiot in the world, but he is strong.”

“Oh, you’re right…”

“Yeah! See? I’d beat you - Wait, Genis!” Lloyd shouted, having finally processed that his friend had insulted him.

Colette paid no mind to the childish jabs her two childhood friends were busy exchanging. Rather, she was deep in thought about how to make the upcoming volleyball game more fun. Genis would get tired fairly quickly, and she’d rather let him rest instead of forcing himself to continue. But that would make the teams unbalanced, and who knew how long Arche and Lloyd could continue playing for?

The solution…

Ah!

“Can I invite Misella and her friends?” Colette perked up, raising her arm like she was answering one of Professor Raine’s questions. She’d come up with a brilliant idea, and she wanted to share it! “Since they’re here at the beach, they might as well join in the fun!”

“I mean… I don’t see why not?” Arche shrugged.

“The more the merrier!” Lloyd agreed.

“Okay then, I’m off!” Colette scrambled to her feet, quickly brushing down her bare legs. “I’ll bring them back here.”

Colette sprinted towards where she remembered Misella was, becoming nothing more than a blur of yellow and red that zoomed past other people. She spotted a familiar head of pink hair and adjusted her path.

Misella was standing with her back to Colette, her arms crossed across her chest. The person who had been in the process of being buried was now fully covered with a massive mound of sand, arms laying slack as if in resignation.

As Colette neared the group of five, the sound of enraged shouting reached her ears. Oh no, was there some argument going on?

All Colette could make out was the word “bazongas”. She had no clue what that meant, for she had never heard it before. Perhaps it was some mysterious creature, befitting of such a unique name. She’d just ask Professor Raine later!

What Colette did know was the chain of unfortunate events that unfolded within the next few minutes. It was such a short time, and yet it was packed to the brim with frantic activity, seeming to stretch into eternity.

Colette spotted Misella raise her arm, a bird of flame coming to life and rearing its head gloriously. She absent-mindedly registered in a small section of her mind that the phoenix was gorgeous, elegant and regal. A perfect match for someone like Misella.

The rest of her mind was focused on all-consuming worry.

Lloyd, Genis and Arche tended to get into arguments a lot. They were always playful, however, never malicious in nature. And they most certainly did not stray into full-on fights with intent to injure. At most, Genis would hit Lloyd lightly in the shoulder, while Arche hit a little harder by slapping the same spot.

Friends shouldn’t hurt one another! She staunchly believed in that! So whatever disagreement Misella and her friends had gotten into, they should resolve it peacefully. Not with red-hot flames!

“Mise - Ah!” Colette was interrupted mid-shout as her foot caught on… absolutely nothing. There was nothing in the sand - not a pebble, not a fragment of a seashell, not a handle of a stray, forgotten shovel. She had tripped over thin air.

The mystery of how Colette had fallen, while intriguing, was not the most important thing.

Rather, it was the immediate consequence of her fall, as it usually was.

Misella, too wrapped up in yelling at Vicious, didn’t hear Colette’s approach at all. The others took notice of the girl flailing her arms in warning far too late, identical expressions of alarm crossing their faces as they stepped forward in a futile attempt to stop the inevitable collision.

“Now burn - Eek!” Misella let out a surprised squeak of her own as Colette’s outstretched arms slammed into Misella’s back, sending them both careening towards the sand.

Unfortunately, this was also the moment wherein Misella released her scorching flames.

And you can guess how that ended.

~~~

“First of all. Lloyd, what are you wearing?” Raine groaned, dragging a tired hand down her face. As the responsible, and only, adult of the group, it had fallen to her to retrieve the frolicking children from the beach before the day got too late, and shepherd them back to the inn. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be leaving this town on time. Or ever.

If Raine was to be truly responsible, she should have been supervising them the entire time. After all, there was no telling what consequences Arche’s shenanigans would usher in, nor the problems that Lloyd’s stupidity could cause, nor the calamities that Colette could trip her way into. Genis, bless her little brother’s poor soul, would try his best, but he was nowhere near intimidating enough to get a handle on all three of them.

But there was no way anyone was going to convince her to spend her afternoon at the beach, passing each second petrified by terror and staring at the slowly approaching waters, waiting for the ocean to swallow her whole. She still wanted to let Lloyd, Colette and Genis experience the beach, however. Colette, especially, had been deprived of a childhood for far too long.

So Raine had happily traipsed off to the library for a few hours of quality reading, convinced that even these trio of troublemakers (and Genis tagging along) couldn’t get into that much trouble in such a short time.

And she’d come back to this mess.

“Is this really relevant, Professor? And why does everyone feel the need to bring this up?”

“Because it’s appalling! I taught you better than this!”

Genis and Arche, sitting on a nearby stone wall and observing the proceedings with identical deadpan expressions, let out a synchronised snicker. Though they quickly shut up when Raine glared at them. They did value their lives.

“That’s NOT the point, Professor! Don’t we have more pressing issues to deal with?”

"Then to get to the point… Colette," Raine forced through gritted teeth, the last word pointed. These kids were really something…

"Yes, Professor Raine?" Colette laughed in a higher pitch than usual, clasping her hands behind her back as sweat ran down her brow. Both because of nerves, and because of... Well... The situation behind her.

It was really, really hot. Not to mention the group of five arguing close-by, the boy who had finally managed to extricate himself from the sand desperately patting at his originally silver hair, which now had blackened tips. It might also have been… significantly shorter than it used to be, and certainly more jagged.

Raine sighed, brow furrowing in exasperation. She could feel the beginnings of a pounding headache.

"I left the four of you for three hours. Why is the beach on fire?"

[otonymous]

Origins (MLQC Lucien)

Description: Discover the truth about the MC (MLQC AU) Warnings: 18+:  Explicit/graphic language — reader discretion is advised.  Potential trigger warnings: mild mentions of violence, blood and gore; scientific experimentation & related unethical behaviour.  Spoilers for chapter 13. Word Count: 1647 words (~8 mins of darkness, angst, and (hopefully redemptive) fluff at the end) Author’s Notes:  

@marytheredqueen​ requested a drabble about Lucien with a s/o he created himself (like a romantic version of Victor Frankenstein).  This was an intriguing Ask that took me in a very interesting direction which, unfortunately, was more conducive to angst than lascivious thoughts (and also turned out to be much longer than a drabble)!  So apologies, dear requester!  I do hope you enjoy this story nonetheless, as I had a lot of fun writing it 😊

This piece contains some spoilers for Chapter 13 of the game, but the rest is a conglomeration of speculative AU dabbling.  The lines marked with an asterisk were taken directly from Chapter 1 of the game.

Please note the trigger warnings listed above, and happy reading! 👍🏼

All characters & Mr Love: Queen’s Choice owned by Elex

Blood splattered thick across bulletproof glass, crimson smear obscuring the view into the room, grey and bare save for a single straight back chair of brushed steel and an overturned table resting against the far wall.  

And the woman, chest heaving as she stood beneath fluorescent lights, impeccable were it not for the wayward splashes of red marring her white gown like macabre polka-dots.

“I didn’t mean to do it,” she would later tell him, head bowed and gaze on the ground before it swept up to meet his, her eyes wet with tears.  "I thought they were going to hurt me.  I was scared.  Do you believe me?  Are you disappointed?”

Panic had set in her voice when her hand, delicate and small, flew up to encircle his arm in a grip firm enough to make even the strongest of men flinch.  But Ares didn’t even bat an eye.

He could never turn away from his own creation.

“Of course I believe you, foolish girl.  Why would I be upset with you for disposing of garbage?"

He placed a gloved hand over the crown of her head to see her smile of relief, felt the warmth seep through black leather as she nuzzled into his touch.  Ignored the soft groans of the men in neon hazmat suits when they entered the room, trying their collective best to hold in stomach contents while gingerly sidestepping body parts strewn across the concrete floor.

“I hate having to clean up after his experiments.  That girl is a fuckin’ freak, tearin’ apart all these guys without even having to touch ‘em.  Scares the living shit outta me.”

“Shut your goddamn mouth or he’ll hear you.  You may have a death wish buddy, but I wanna live.”

The faintest expression of amusement crossed Ares’ face.  As if he had the time or inclination to deal with every small fry who spoke behind his back within those walls of black steel, the carbon towers of the Black Swan collective stretching high into the sky like impudent fists bucking the laws of nature herself.

Freak, they had called her, when beautiful was what she really was.  Surpassing all of Ares’ expectations even when those convened in that hall of polished obsidian murmured objections under their breath, the organization’s top brass silently gloating that finally, finally…there was something that Ares, the golden child, couldn’t do:

“I heard the project was a failure.  The subject’s too violent…”

“Out of control.  Unpredictable.  She’s a ticking time bomb.”

“Hiding in plain sight?  Ha!  The girl won’t even be able to integrate into normal society.  It's out of the question...”

Even still, the lot had gone silent when Ares swept his cool gaze in their direction, the placidity in dark eyes sinister in a way that none dared to challenge.  It wasn’t until a metal ring began to tap sharp against steel that the tension in the room was broken.

“They say the subject is unstable, Ares; that your project is unsalvageable.  Why do you persist in a futile endeavour?”  The voice projected from the shadowy dais, bouncing off expansive walls in an eerie echo.

“Oh?  And who, pray tell, is best positioned to determine whether or not an experiment has yielded usable results than the scientist himself?  Subject LUC13N is the most advanced prototype I have developed to date, and is, as it stands, our organization’s best chance at achieving its goals.  But you don’t need me to tell you that.  You’ve already witnessed first-hand what she is capable of.”

The metallic tapping ceased, an uncomfortable silence descending upon the standoff between the two men until it was finally interrupted by the one seated on the dais, speaking in a tone both amused and threatening at once:

“Proceed with your plan, Ares.  But know that I do not tolerate failure.”

The scientist rose from his seat at the glass table, the long tails of his black coat sweeping behind him as he left the others in the rumble of discontent that erupted in the wake of the proclamation.

He had no time to listen to the fallout.  There was still much to do.

“I’ll get better, train harder…try to control my abilities!  Isn’t there another way?!”  Her hysteria dies down the moment she sees the look on his face: firm, resigned.  Studying the matte, black capsule on her palm, her voice grows small.  “I don’t want to forget you, Ares.  You’re everything to me…everything I know.”

His large hand reaches out to cup her face, thumb rubbing against the softness of her cheek when he says in a voice laced with fatigue, “It’s the only way.”

She blinks, delicate eyelashes fluttering to make the breath catch in his throat.  The hitch in his movement is slight; Ares is careful to conceal it.  She mustn’t know that as she had begun to change, evolving into something greater and far more complex than his initial designs, so did the way he had come to see her.

As something more than a test subject.  A person.  The woman who carried the genes he so painstakingly extracted and recombined within the mutating cells of her beautiful body.  Tremendous power hidden in an unassuming package — soft and tender and always so pliant in his hands.

And — in what might be the most surprising discovery of all — a creature who had unwittingly breached the barriers to human emotion and learned what it was to love…teaching him how to love in the process.

Ares pulls away, reaching for the tall glass of water on her bedside table to hold it out in offering.  She takes it in a trembling hand, hesitant.

“What’s going to happen?  I swallow this and forget?  What of my mission?”  She looks again at the pill, rolling it about on her palm as if all its implications could be revealed in the contemplation of its featherlight weight.

Kneeling before her, Ares’ lab coat spreads about his legs in a bright halo on the muted concrete floor.  He brings his face level with hers, slowly sliding the glasses down the bridge of his nose before resting them on her bedside table beside a pair of paper cranes.

“You’ll forget all of this.  Forget Black Swan, forget me.  I'll give you new memories: a happy childhood, friends and family who love you.  You'll get the chance to know what it's like to live like a normal human being.  Go to work, come back to a warm place you can call your home.  Eat foods you’ve never before tasted.  Laugh and cry at the movies.  Maybe even fall in love-”

“I’m already in love with yo-”

Ares silences her with a long finger laid gently upon her lips.  He hoped she wouldn’t catch the way it trembled with the force he exerted to keep himself from losing control, holding back the painful emotions that stabbed deeply into his heart.  He couldn’t stand to hear her state what they both already knew to be true, even if they had refrained from confessing up to now:

That Ares had fallen in love with a creature of his own making.  And in an unlikely miracle, she returned his feelings.

“In exchange, the pill will bury the power inside of you until the time is ripe for you to awaken."

The girl remains motionless save for the gentle rise and fall of her chest, slowly processing the words of the man who made her.  “Awaken…and when is that?”

“That’s not for you to worry about, silly girl.  I'll be there when it happens, watching over you. Or did you think I'd leave your side?"

At this, her head snaps up, eyes darkening as pupils expand in an attempt to capture this last image of the man more important to her than life itself.

“Never leave me,” she says, pinching the pill between thumb and forefinger and lifting it to her lips.

A faint smile, beautiful and bittersweet, graces Ares' handsome face when he nods.  "I promise."

Her lips part, sealing their fates as the capsule disappears into her mouth to be swallowed whole.

“Hello, I’m looking for Professor Lucien."*

The woman approaches him on the stairwell of the research centre, eyes squinting for a moment as bright sun shone through the windows to set her face aglow in a way that took Ares’ breath away.

Finally, together again.

He schools his voice, trying to temper the euphoria that threatened to overwhelm him at their reunion.  "Lucien?  What do you want with him?"*

“I’m a producer from the Iridescent Images company.  Here’s my card.  I want to invite the professor to be our guest on the show ‘Miracle Finder.’”*

Ares looks at the delicate hand extending the business card in his direction, remembers the way it used to grip his arm whenever the girl was anxious or scared.  Sees the shy hesitation in the eyes that once looked upon him with love and affection, and is warmed by the prospect that they could have that happiness once more.

And so, it begins…

Thank you so much for reading!  Check out more of my work here! 📚

[occidentaltourist]

ive heard that the china government is now going to make the boys of the country go through an education process to make them more "Manly". i honestly kept thinking, are they serious? that's a main issue? i read an article of the voices of a few people disagreeing with the whole idea. i mean, they can't be serious and if they are, do you think it'll stick? SOrry, I know you may not do the whole political thing but I wanted to rant about this to someone.

My day job and graduate degree are in fields closely related to & influenced by politics at global and national levels, so I spend a lot of my non-tumblr time talking and thinking about these things. ;) Maybe I should revise my blog description to say ‘fandom and politics.’ 

You bring up a lot of interesting questions, and for now I’ll focus on the Disney-related ones since the China studies class I took was several years ago and I’m not familiar with everything you’ve mentioned, though the overall themes are basically unchanged. 

I think the bottom line is that the entertainment industry is extremely competitive, and the reality is that the Chinese market is massive. China’s economy is on track to overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest in the next decade or so. We see the consequences of this already playing out across the world, with a new economic imperialism already underway across Asia and Africa in particular. 

Disney’s products aren’t limited to movies or traditional media content. They have theme parks and ‘experiences’ - including in Shanghai and Hong Kong - they even own ESPN so sports is a big deal too; and merchandise of all kinds. So their relationship with China is never just about one movie, and neither is any of the other entertainment companies’. Universal or Warner Media or anyone else isn’t going to make different choices, because it may be theoretically possible, but it will be exceedingly difficult for these media companies to succeed without access to the Chinese market. That means playing by their rules. 

(I didn’t know about Black Panther not doing well there, or that promotional material featuring Black and brown characters is edited a certain way. But it doesn’t surprise me, either. Anti-Black racism is unfortunately very common in Asia - not just in China.)

Placing you full set of asks under the cut, for context. :)

P2: pro but only in a single scene by a nameless person or couple; speaking about diversity but making the China posters starring black main characters are reduced or their faces or obscured or making someone who is traditionally Tibetan white in the adaptation (The Ancient One in the MCU). Basically, Disney is all about "having their cake and eating it too". I know China's huge population means more $, but that also means doing some ridiculous rules in order to appease the govt. I know that

P3; Tibet and China have some beef (Im not sure what) but I think it's stupid to erase a character's Tibetan or Chinese lineage just because two countries have issues. I know money is important but Disney's hypocritical and greed makes them look pathetic to an extent. And, and this is a serious ?, it IS possible to make $ with very little or even without from China, right? Black Panther did poorly there but made over 1 billion dollars; also Tenet has a black hero but the film did good there

P4: Tenet made money there and they (assumingly) didn't censor him like disney. It's a humbling lesson (not that disney will listen) that they can't keep following these rather silly laws. Pandering may work at first but it always leads to trouble in the end. I will respect each and every culture different than my one but pandering is where I draw the line. That South Park ep, The China Problem, did make a good point on this issue, controversial as it was in other parts. Your thoughts?

[woozapooza]

(fifi here!) oh ok nice! as for the names, oh boy, some of their surnames are just Iconic: Fifi Clampwell - Ishmael, Trixie Shedbanger - Starbuck, Manda Snorter - Queequeg, Lolita Meadworthy - Esta (Ahab's wife), Fanny Goldenshowzer IV - Stubb, Cora Klein - Pip, Isadora Slapsaddle - Flask, and their own headmistress, Dorothy Hyman - Ahab. def smth wrong abt queequeg, pip, etc. being played by white ppl even if it is set in a british school but ah well :/ anyway the girls have funky names

p.s. not musical related but!! would love to read your ishmael thoughts. love him sm as well <3 and also not md related at all LOL but as an avid fan i have to say that that princess artwork you reblogged recently is from the movie barbie as the princess and the pauper!!! a big fave of mine -fifi

Okay so first of all I have to tell you something that happened recently. I don't know how it took me so long, but after years of listening to the soundtrack on youtube, I discovered that it's actually available to purchase from Hereward Kaye's bandcamp site! So of course I bought it, and it turns out that when you buy something from bandcamp you have the option to send a little note to the artist. I didn't think he was really going to look at whatever I wrote, so I just wrote something simple, along the lines of "I love this ridiculous show with all my heart." But the next day, I received a thank-you email from him! So I wrote back, and actually I'm just gonna copy and paste what I wrote:

Oh wow, for some reason I didn't really think you would actually see my message! But since you responded, I just want to take a second to tell you that I've been a fan of Moby Dick the Musical ever since I discovered it by chance on YouTube when I was fourteen years old. I recently rediscovered an entry in my eighth-grade diary gushing about this very weird, very silly, very obscure, VERY entertaining musical I had just discovered; twelve years later, it's still one of my perennial favorite musicals. What's more, this year, I finally did what I had been wanting to do for these twelve years: I actually read Moby Dick (keeping an eye out for connections to the musical, naturally!) which is now one of my favorite novels ever. So thank you! I'm SO glad I finally realized I could buy the soundtrack!

He didn't respond, which didn't come as a surprise, but I'm just psyched that I got to tell one of the CREATORS of this musical how much I adore it!

Anyway. WOW those are some wacky names...except for Cora Klein, which just sounds like a normal name that a normal person might have, unless there's a joke I'm missing. Huh. So I take it that in the UK version, aside from the headmistress, the cast of the show-within-the-show is made up entirely of St. Godley's students? In the US version, there are also the security guards (one of whom plays Pip), the janitor, and some boys that one of the girls snuck in.

I have so many things I want to say about Ishmael but it's hard to put them into words without it just turning into "I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM" which is an accurate expression of my feelings but doesn't make for a very interesting tumblr post. But I'm definitely going to try to actually articulate at least some of my thoughts/feelings eventually, so stay tuned!

Thank you for providing the context for that beautiful fan art! I played with barbies as a kid but never saw any of the movies aside from part of the Nutcracker one. I doubt I would have enjoyed them. My barbie games were overflowing with ANGST and PERIL and I doubt the movies reached the same dramatic heights.

[wedreamedlove]

The Importance of Vision [Xu Mo Character Study]

Reddit archived.

This is also pretty much the last of the posts I'll be bringing over. I have plans to update my Speech Quirks post and then maybe write something about Li Zeyan being in love.

So, back in my translation for Xu Mo's Archery Date I noted that Xu Mo had a lot of eye symbolism, especially with eyes being covered. At the time, I made a mental mark whenever I caught it but I didn't have any conclusive thoughts. However, I'm back now with said thoughts!!

Everyone ready for another deep dive with me?

Spoilers go up to Chapter 16 of the main story, and some dates unreleased yet in English.

THE IMPORTANCE OF VISION

First, and this will sound silly, I want to set the atmosphere for this post by pointing out that vision is an extremely important sense for animals, humans included. It helps us navigate the world.

Xu Mo brings up danger signals in [Firefly Date] and [Rainfall Date], explicitly the ones that you can see with your eyes. Here, he's giving us an example about how vision can be used to identify and avoid danger (if you so choose).

Meanwhile, like a broken record, I want to bring up again how colors (related intimately to vision) is THE romance symbol for Xu Mo and MC.

[Drowning Love SSR] and its two calls [Artist and Butterfly] and [The Only Color] imply an obsession and importance towards the one and only person who brings color to Xu Mo's life.

[Afternoon Date] has Xu Mo admitting that MC is full of colors in his eyes.

In addition to colors though, the two of them have scenes where they reflect only each other in each other's eyes. Their vision is wholly focused, consumed, and reflective of the other person in [Main Story 13-8] and [True Love Date].

So, in this case, vision is being used to give weight and importance to the bond between Xu Mo and MC. Not only can vision warn us about dangers and let us avoid them, but it can also identify important things to us (whatever that may be).

ACTUALLY, ABOUT THAT VISION...

However, in [Afternoon Date], Xu Mo actually gives an interesting lecture about Theodor Erismann and Iva Kohler's experiment on inverted vision. Interesting that Elex chose to drop their names, because the Chinese version included it...

TL;DR Kohler, when he wore the goggles that inverted his vision (up became down, and vice versa), he had a hard time doing things but his brain ended up adjusting and, by the end, he could go about their daily lives with these goggles on. Other people could even drive with them on!

Xu Mo goes on to say an intriguing line which Elex decided they wanted no part in LOL. So, in English, he goes "That's how malleable our brain is. The world you see may not be real. Perspectives can easily be changed".

In Chinese, he goes "这就是大脑的可塑性带来的效果、你看到的世界也许不是这个样子、去无存清、用进废退" which basically translates to "This is the result of our brain's plasticity. The world you see may not be as it seems. The brain eliminates anything other than what is essential and that is the law of use and disuse."

I took liberties here to get my translation to make sense, because 4 character phrases are always a headache to translate. I'm sick and tired of Elex dropping lines though!!

Anyway, the reason I bring up Xu Mo's lecture here is because it's being said that vision actually isn't so important. Like he pointed out, what we see may not even be the "real" world and it's just our interpretation of it through our senses. I'm going to stop here before we end up going to Wittgenstein's theory of experiential epistemology.

But the fact that our brain can adjust to messed up vision and still lets us go about our daily life shows how adjustable we are to our senses being deprived. Not to mention, there's lots of disabled people getting by just fine in our world too, blind people included.

VISION ISN'T ALL THAT IMPORTANT

In [Main Story 1-9] Xu Mo delivers his infamous line about how, when MC runs into danger, she is to trust in her instincts.

In [Main Story 9-22] Xu Mo talks about dreams, lucid dreams, and how there is no such thing as absolute reality, only reality begetting reality. Honestly, this is some mumbo jumbo and I'm sure there's different interpretations for what he meant here... but how I'm understanding it is that, again, he is pointing out that reality is what we experience and believe to be reality.

This is important and leads into my next example because, if reality is what you make of it then, again, vision isn't all that important and you can't rely on it.

In [Main Story 13-15] Xu Mo and MC go to the abandoned lab and see the [1 Corinthians 13:12] line on the wall "For now we see through a glass, darkly...". The meaning of this line is that we have an obscure or imperfect vision of reality.

Over and over again in Xu Mo's chapters we get these lines about how reality (and the truth) isn't something we can literally see. In my various character studies, I've tied this back to him gentling his eventual reveal as Ares to the MC, but here I'm using it to point out that it lessens the importance of vision because it's clearly a useless sense in this context.

Now, after all this emphasis on the lack of importance of vision, there's these scenes:

[Main Story 9-22] Xu Mo covers MC's eyes when they're both sharing the dream about the car accident in his past.

[Main Story 16-22] Xu Mo covers MC's eyes before he removes her from the dream world.

[Blossom Date] Xu Mo covers MC's eyes to demonstrate how her other senses heighten and lets her listen to the sounds of nature around her. This also lets MC hear all the suppressed emotions in his voice.

Again, in [Blossom Date] MC covers Xu Mo's eyes this time. His monologue shows that he's amused because he doesn't need his senses heightened, he has always heard his heart beat for her.

[CN Archery Date] MC covers his eyes to get him to sleep in the car.

In [Main Story 5-14] Xu Mo tells MC that it's not what you see that's important, but who you see it with. He's really diminishing the importance of vision and putting more weight into the experiences and feelings you get elsewhere.

MC clearly takes his words to heart because in [Hot Spring Date] she closes her eyes to avoid seeing the snow, since she wants to see the first snowfall WITH him (at the time, they were in a hot spring separated by a wooden divider).

Lastly, I mentioned this in my massive character study for Xu Mo that I actually think his actions, up to now, have disproved his obsession over the one and only color in his life (aka. importance of vision) because he hasn't tried to chain her to his side. He's let her escape, or helped her escape, in his chapters.

Then, in [Memory Palace: The Night Before], we see that Xu Mo can barely remember MC's colors and is prepared to lose it completely when they meet at the news conference. In [Main Story 16-22] MC sees moments of Xu Mo's past but it's already all in black and white.

Remember Erismann and Kohler's experiment with the inverted goggles and how the brain adapts quickly to wonky vision? Haha... Xu Mo has made the choice to abandon the color in his life (for her own good?) and now his brain will just have to adapt to a black and white world.

I say adapt but, well, he's been living in one for 26 years (except for that one time he met the MC?) and so it's more like he's returning to a familiar world. The plasticity of the brain will make it so he'll have no hindrances navigating through the world, but whether he's emotionally satisfied is another question.

THEY KNOW EACH OTHER SOUL-DEEP

BUT!! It's not all doom and gloom! Because here I'm going to say that Xu Mo and MC know each other on a soul-deep level. Not only do they play off of each other well (examples in the character study with poems and quoting each other), but there's also:

[Autumn Whisper SSR Call: Breakfast Time] MC delivers breakfast to Xu Mo's office and hides it behind a stack of books. He guesses it right on the first try and after MC asks if he has x-ray vision he answers "I don't have x-ray vision, but... you certainly don't have any secrets in my eyes, and you can't hide anything. Isn't that right?".

Meanwhile, in [CN Archery Date], MC picks out Xu Mo's bow among all the others in a line up, because she knows his personality, and this surprises him.

In the [Go See Him] sometimes Xu Mo will have a line where he says "Even with my eyes closed, I can tell its you".

[Midnight Date] and [True Love Date] make references to the red string of fate (although in a negative light because it pains Xu Mo) but the CN traditional wedding theme literally shows Xu Mo and MC bound by the red string of fate.

Those connected by the red thread are destined to be together, no matter their appearance, the place, the time, or their circumstances. They're connected to each other on the level of the soul and they'll always recognize and know each other.

CONCLUSION

So, how about it? Is vision important or not important to Xu Mo?

MC being Xu Mo's only color in the world is super important and romantic, but at the same time it's equally important and puts a twist on this romance that, hey, they don't actually need to rely on this color connection between them because they're connected on a deeper (?) level.

MC doesn't need her eyes to see and understand Xu Mo. She just has to trust in her instincts and believe in his character.

Meanwhile, Xu Mo can function without color as long as she's still here in the world although... maybe he is emotionally lacking something still LOL. There's always this hint of awe in his monologues whenever he thinks about MC and the color she brings with her.

Haha, at the time of writing this post, I didn't strongly believe in one or the other side. I just thought it'd be interesting to point this out. However, I read an amazing comment by @Edhie421 on Reddit:

And then the most famous sentence of [The Little Prince], of course, that I read when I was 7 and never forgot "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." (A very good translation from the original French, I might add.) That seems to me to reflect the other point you were making: that Lucien and MC both teach each other to look beyond the surface. While they're both obsessed with surface sight first - he with her colours, she with not wanting to notice the darkness in his behaviour - they slowly learn to see each other's value beyond. In that sense, I believe it's important that MC went through his betrayal, and that he went through being severed from her. He must learn that she means much more to him than the colours she brings, and she is learning to love him for all of the person he really is, the good and bad, and not just the lovely image that he projects at first. In that sense, it's a reflection of transition from passionate love into deep, lasting love: going beyond the surface (the iridescent shimmer) of your expectations and appreciating each other for who you are, stripped down to your bare, sometimes terrifying essence.

[lisalowefanclub]

Multiplicity and what identification and representation means to Us

Madeline: I don’t remember there being many cool, attractive, and overall desirable but not fetishized (bye yellow fever) representations of Asian people in mainstream media while I was growing up in the early 2000s. The Asian media I did consume was introduced to me by my dad, so you can imagine the kind of outdated and endearingly weird characters I was exposed to as a kid. Think blind Japanese swordsman Zatoichi or humanoid child robot Astro Boy, both of which originated in Japan around the 60s. As for celebrities, I occasionally heard people talking about Lucy Liu or Jackie Chan, but only as defined by their stereotypical Asian-ness. My point is that this kind of cultural consumption fell into one of two categories: that of obscurity, which suggests that cultural objects are created by Asians for Asians (bringing to mind labels like “Weeb” for Western people who love anime), or that of hypervisibility grounded in stereotypical exoticism. You’d be hard pressed to find a film that passes the Asian Bechdel test.I didn’t discover K-pop until coming to college when I became curious about who my white friends were fawning over all the time. Since then, it’s been really neat to see how K-pop has become popularized as one of the many facets of America’s mainstream music and celebrity culture, especially when artists write and perform songs in Korean despite the majority of their audience lacking Korean language fluency. This suggests that something about the music is able to transcend language barriers and connect people despite their differences. Today it’s not uncommon to see Korean artists topping Billboard’s hot 100 hits, being interviewed on SNL, winning American music awards, gracing the cover of Teen Vogue, or being selected as the next brand ambassador for Western makeup brands like M.A.C. If you were to ask your average high school or college student if they know Blackpink, BTS, or EXO, they would probably be familiar with one of the groups whether or not they identify as Asian.What does this mean, then, for young Asian-Americans to grow up during a time when Asian celebrities are thought to be just as desirable as people like Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, or Michael B. Jordan? What does it mean to see an Asian person named “Sexiest International Man Alive”, beating out long-time favorite European celebs? What does it mean for popularity to exist outside of the realm of the racialized minority and for it to build connections across minority cultures? Of course, fame can be toxic and horrible-- it is, at times superficial, materialistic, gendered, fetishized, and absolutely hyper-sexualized-- but I for one think it’s pretty damn cool to see people who look like me featured in mainstream American culture.I’ve found that throughout the semester, my understanding of Asian presence in America (American citizen or otherwise) has been deeply shaped by our discussions of identity politics and marginalization, another class I’m taking on intergenerational trauma, and my own identity as a Laotian-American woman. Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about the similarities between American proxy wars in Korea (The Forgotten War) and Laos (The Secret War), both of which involved US bombing of citizens in the name of halting communism. Taking this class has challenged me to reconceptualize how we make sense of mass atrocity in relation to a pan-Asian identity, especially when contending with how trauma and violence can act as a mechanism for cultural production, and I look forward to exploring this more in my thesis. 

Cyndi:  K-pop is always just the beginning. Enough in and of itself, any interest in the genre at all reinvigorates the consumer to become more engaged with the world in which it exists. Two years ago, I got into a big, but in hindsight pretty silly, argument with my mom when I started going to a Korean hair salon (because of my K-pop delulus / Jennie prints) instead of seeing Maggie, our Vietnamese hairdresser who I can usually only see twice a year on our bi-annual visits to California to visit extended family. My mom told me the Koreans don’t need our money, they are already richer than we will ever be. Who are ‘the Koreans’? Who is ‘we’?? Is every person of Korean descent doing better than every person of Vietnamese descent in America? And #why is my mom being A Hater? Surely, sharing our identity as ‘perpetual guests’ in America should create some sort of solidarity, or at least, allow for transitory economic collaboration??? I give my money to white people all the time: to McDonald’s (Cookie Totes), to Target, to Swarthmore College. 

K-pop cannot be the end. As much as I enjoy the music, the show, and the celebrities, I also know in my heart that the current international interest in K-pop will not last. As an almost perfect and perplexing exemplification of modern global capitalism, the industry will over-expand and thus wear itself out. I always see the subtle disappointment on my language teachers’ faces when they ask me how I came to take interest in Korean, and I have to answer ‘K-pop’, because that is the truth; that is not where I am at now, but it will always be how I began. It has become clear to me that this disappointment is not just a generational difference. Maybe these old people are jealous of pop stars like how I also have to question whether I am secure in myself when I see a 14 year old accomplishing things I as a 21 year old could never accomplish in my long life. I am coming to understand that part of their reaction comes from the fact that there is a fine line between cultural appreciation and cultural appropriation, that pop culture is ephemeral, but they have lived their lives as entirely theirs. Casual or even consuming interest for the parts of culture that are bright, and clean, and easy cannot ever stand in for true racial empathy, though it is where many of us start. Identity in K-pop is merely another marketing technique, but to the community of fans and lovers, it is something that is real, lived, and embodied. I find that looking at K-pop always brings forth my most salient identities in terms of gender, race, and sexuality. As much as female group members express affection and jokingly portray romantic interest toward one another, would it ever be accepted if these jokes were no longer jokes, but lived realities? Even if the K-pop industry itself did not seek to produce fan communities of this magnitude, these communities that have been founded in response to it are here to stay.  Lowe argues that “to the extent that Asian American culture dynamically expands to include both internal critical dialogues about difference and the interrogation of dominant interpellations” it can “be a site in which horizontal affiliations with other groups can be imagined and realized” (71). A recent striking example is Thai fans’ demand to hear from Lisa on the protests -- a primarily youth-led movement against the government monarchy--going on in Thailand. Although she is, of course, censored and silenced on this topic, the expectation is still there; fans are holding their idols to a standard of political responsibility. 

Jimmy: I haven’t really paid much attention to K-pop until working on this project. Sure, my cousins would do anything to go see BTS perform in person, but I didn’t care so much. Or maybe, I was just not saturated with the cultural zeitgeist. Whereas they live in the center of a cosmopolitan city which imports and exports, my hometown hums white noise. Increasingly, though, K-pop has entered into my life and the wider American cultural space. Now, K-pop tops the charts and is featured on late-night talk shows. Whether or not you are a devout follower, you have probably encountered K-pop in some form. It was not until I went to Swarthmore that I have “become” Asian American. Back home, my friends are primarily either white or Vietnamese-American. And even though I did recognize that I had an “Asian” racial identity mapped onto me, I did not consider it to be based on any politics. After engaging with and working within  Organizing to Redefine “Asian” Activism (ORAA) on campus, as well as taking this course, I have a better grasp of what it means to rally around an Asian American identity. It is a way to organize and resist. Reflecting on my political evolution, I feel comforted and alienated by the cultural weight of K-pop in America. It is amazing to see the gravity of cultural production shift away from the West. And to have global celebrities from Asia is great. Yet, K-pop is limited as a platform for Asian Americans to create identity. What are the consequences when mainstream ideas about contemporary “Asian” culture are still perpetually foreign from America? Is Asian American community just built around transnational cultural objects like K-pop and bubble tea? Does the economic and cultural capital of K-pop held by its idols obscure or erase the heterogeneity and multiplicity of Asian Americans? 

Jason: The first time I heard K-Pop was when Gangnam Style came on during a middle school social event when everyone is standing in their social circles doing their best not to be awkward when teacher chaperones are constantly staring at the back of your head seeing if any wrongdoing would occur. At that time, I could never imagine the K-Pop revolution that would occur within the American music industry.  Anytime I turn on the radio it is only a matter of time until a BTS song will start being blasted from the speakers. It is crazy to think that K-Pop has become so widespread within American popular culture that mainstream radio stations in Massachusetts are so willing to play K-Pop, even the billboards of 104.1 “Boston’s Best Variety” are plastered with BTS, because they know that is what their audience wants. Eight years ago, during that middle school social Gangnam Style was more about being able to do the dance that accompanied the song rather than the song itself. This has completely changed as more and more people are finding themselves becoming devout supporters of K-Pop. This class and project have continuously been pushing me out of my comfort zone by engaging in literature that I would never have read and discussions that I would never have imagined participating in. I have even listened to more K-Pop over the past couple of weeks than I had ever before in my life. I was impressed by myself when a song by BLACKPINK came on and the radio host said here’s some new music that I knew that the song was from their first album that came out around a month ago. I am grateful that I have been pushed out of my comfort zone and “forced (by having to actually do the homework)” to engage in the material of the class. Who knows how long this K-Pop fascination will last in American popular culture, but I am glad that I could be a part of it rather than letting it pass me by and staying within my comfortable music sphere of country, pop, and British rap.  

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2010s: 140 - 136

140. Greta Salóme & Jónsi - Never forget” Iceland 2012

Oh man, this is just tragic. Like, “l’amore è femmina”, “Never forget” could’ve been near the top of the ranking, but the stakes were even higher. A good performance of “Never forget” WINS this ranking easily. "Never forget” is not only one of my favourite ESC songs ever, it’s also the song that ignited my interest in becoming an freelance Eurovsion analyst, following the backstage, rehearsals and preselections, teaching myself how to gif, etc. It was a key entry in establishing my fandom.

My feelings on “Never forget” are as such, all over the goddamn’ place, so I will attempt to remain succinct: I was a HUGE fanboy in the day and to some degree I still am. Jónsi is probably still my single favourite Eurovision human. Effortlessly funny, disarmingly self-deprecating, overwhelmingly charismatic, constantly spewing off dorky dad humour everywhere. The only other person who can hold a candle to that is (the sadly LESS dorky) Måns Zelmerlöw. He is, simply put, perfect. Here’s a gif of him getting lost backstage.

(caption: “How unprofessional of me🤭🤔😬” 😻)

Greta is pretty amazing in her own right, as well. In addition to being a very talented songwriter who makes consistently magical music, I relate a lot to her permanently anxious, overambitious, perfectionistic self, her crippling fear of “not being good enough” permeating throughout every line she says. I mean, same girl, same. WLU *GREAT*A.

As for the song,man, how much praise can I cram into this? “Never forget” is a brilliant composition: It transcends the boundaries of music by unfolding like an animated chapter from the Edda. The Icelandic version may very well be the single best song in all of Eurovision, and is on my non-ESC playlist.

Sadly, Greta & Jónsi were ALSO struck by the Crystal Acoustics Curse. Not as badly as Compact Disco and Nina were but still, the end result was pretty disappointing. Jónsi was especially terrible which hurts my iceberg of a heart. However, I prefer to not dwell on what could’ve been. The final positioning at #140 is fair based on what “Never forget” eventually became: a solidly good entry, just not a great one. 

________________________________________________________________

139. Emmelie de Forest - “Only teardrops” Denmark 2013

On the other end of the spectrum, we now encounter another song in the “OUTSOLD!!!” category. Emmelie’s rank is limited by the quality of her song: "Only teardrops” is a boatload of nonsense, pre-packaged as pseudo-ethnic schlager <3 To put it plainly: It is a simple song for simple souls. 🤗  Fortunately, I too am a simple soul and was instantly drawn by this charming blend of floral melodies and underlying moody percussion. “Only teardrops” is, by the strict definition of the term, a basic bitch song, but it actually manages to convincingly disguise itself as quality. The presentation is elegant and even lowkey epic and Emmelie absolutely makes the most out of it. It’s not my 2013 winner, not even by a longshot, but I am nevertheless satisfied.

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138. Buryanoskiye Babushki - “Party for everybody” Russia 2012

PARTIY VAR EVRIBADIY DENZ. 

ANOTHER VICTIM OF CRYSTAL ARENA ACOU- lmfao just kidding.🤭 We knew well ahead in time the Babushki couldn’t hold a tune and if you care about *that* aspect, you’re just not watching Eurovision right. The only complaints I could’ve had would be if they won and well, look at the year. 

Also, in a year featuring Jónsi (perfect human) and Kaliopi (”I LOVE THE GREECE. I LOVE GREECE MUSIC” + off-screen showmance with Can Bonomo <3), Natalia, a living breathing inner matrjoska manages to capture my heart as one of Eurovision’s best ancillary characters. SO ADORABLE, WHERE CAN I ORDER ONE ONLINE???

All yours, Babooshka, Babooshka, Babooshka, ya ya~

I also really cherish the Babushki because their participation feels like the FINAL time Russia was genuinely without a hidden motive. They were the last Russian entry to win an NF, and they did it with antiquated shit schlager about dogs crawling on cats <3 (Like, seriously. I’m sure there is some obscure uralic legend at the base of these acidtrippy lyrics, which <3). This of course they expanded by baking cookies on the stage while cawing on in offkey Udmurt and broken English. They are genuinely disarming and I question the morality and life choices of anyone who thinks otherwise. ^_^

Oh btw, all of Russia has  now been eliminated, except for Polina. What a Good Eurovision Country. 

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137. Sunstroke Project ft. Olia Tira - “Runaway” Moldova 2010

In a bizarre fluke, “Run away” is one of the most famous Eurovision songs of all time.😂  I will not insult your intelligence by pointing out how, and I’ll instead remark that I find it lowkey hilarious. Hilarious, because at the time, the general opinion of “Run away” was a negative one: “a vocal disaster, an undeserving fringe qualifier, the epitome of bad taste & bad music, evocative of eastern-European countries voting only for each other”. Man, do those haters look silly now. 

As for my personal opinion, well, yes, I live for the mess, obviously? Always have, long before it was cool! Pseudo-orchestral trashpop beat laced with incomprehensible coalminer’s English <3 correctly-rated-as-epic sax playback <3 <3 The terrible outfits <3 the world’s least convincing violin <3 Sergei RIPPING OPEN HIS SHIRT AT THE END lmfao <3 Keep on causing rage-induced embolysms with those juror fiends, sweet trash angels. So camp, so lowbudget, so shameless, SO MOLDOVAN <3

and now for the final boot of the ~Like Zone~

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136. Uzari & Maimuna - “Time” Belarus 2015

“Time” is like Thunder Oh OH.

‘Time” is such a weird entry and I am barely able to make sense of it all. 

First of all, it’s a physical health awareness anthem aimed at the terminally ill??? Telling them to live their life to the fullest because they have such little time left (which is both endearing and hilariously inappropriate). 

Second of all, both Uzari (pronounced *YOU*zari, no really, he insists) and Maimuna are such intense weirdo’s. I wouldn’t describe their deadlocked gazes as chemistry per se, it’s more like a nonstop spaghetti western staredown.  <3 How did these two people end up working together?

Thirdly this is a pairing between a singer and a musician but it is UZARI who composed the music while MAIMUNA wrote the lyrics <3 "Time” is such a quaint, but entertaining little song, how come everyone overlooks it ::looks at the flag::... oh. 

And that concludes all the songs I ~like~. Now we move on to the second highest tier, to the [chiara] Songs That I ~LOOOOOVE~ 😻 [/chiara]

[echodrops]

Hi, i'm curious... Can you share some of your favourite fics? What kind of stuff do you like to read?

Interesting ask; since you didn’t specify a particular fandom, I’m assuming you just mean my favorite fics in general? Of all time? Or were you looking for more recent fics? Let me know if this wasn’t what you were looking for.

Hmmm…

Well, my absolutely undisputed favorite fanfic of all time is Twigcollins’ signal to noise series, particularly the short fic “Death Takes a Holiday.” I could go into a massive analysis about what makes this series stand out to me so much, but I’ll just keep it short and say that this particular story is what I think of whenever someone asks me what my writing goals are. Everything I want to capture as a writer–wit, charm, vulnerability, grace, evocative imagery, silliness, seriousness–is all encapsulated beautifully in this series and in this short fic especially.

Some other greats that come to mind from the past are:

Quillslinger’s Deceitful Above All Things

Zeff N Company’s Gunmetal

Cygna_Hime’s i don’t need you (to worry for me)

Resmiranda’s Tales From the House of the Moon

Glassamilk’s Gutters

Nuitnovember’s Sign a New Agreement With Itunes

suncityblues’ If There Is Light (but this one appears to have been deleted, RIP)

Legete’s the sirens and the thunder

And there are probably many, many others but my memory is garbage for medical reasons and I never thought to keep a list of all my very favorites across multiple fandoms, so some great fics are probably consigned to oblivion in my search history forever. If I think of more I guess I’ll come back and add them. XD

Looking back at these fics, I think I’d say that my “type” is really aesthetically oriented, atmospheric fics. I tend to prefer strong non-romance-related plots over fics that are entirely about a ship (or, if they are only about a ship, the fics need to be genre savvy and creative in their use of tropes), and I tend to prefer canon, canon divergent, or at least canon adjacent fics over entirely AU fics. I think the “emotion” of a story is almost more important to me than the pairing or even sometimes the actual beats of the plot itself–if the writing quality is high and the storytelling is compelling, I can fall in love with a fic even if I would never have read that ship or type of plot otherwise. I like stories with melancholy vibes and even sometimes tragic endings, although I feel like stories have to earn their tragedies for such endings to be worth it. In short, I like “pretty” stories with clear, strong writing voices.

There are also certain tropes I like to read a lot. In particular, I really love Outsider POV fics and stories that look at characters’ behaviors and situations from different perspectives. I love almost scientific-tinged fics where a character–perhaps one of a different species like an alien or other worldly being–makes observations about a “normal” character and is confused and amazed by the differences. Gold. I’m a huge sucker for accidental baby acquisition, especially when it’s male characters who are uniquely unsuited to parenting who get stuck with children for both the comedy and heartwarming factors… Found family is A++… Villain redemption and reorientation into normal life stories get me EVERY TIME… Crack-treated seriously is a special interest of mine. Like, fics that take absolutely bizarre or absurd plotlines and treat them realistically and with deep thought are flawlessss. Speaking of crack, I have a soft spot for well-written rare pair fics; there are so many fun interactions that never get explored by a majority of fan writers… World-building and fics with careful action to background details are so nice!! And a special guilty pleasure: while I tend to prefer canon-based stories, I do really like dragon AUs because I really like dragons in general…

On the other hand, there are some tropes that can completely turn me off a story in seconds. Probably biggest pet peeve is fics where characters drink, do drugs, or even just smoke “for the aesthetic.” Drunk fics often feel like an excuse to write OOC to me, drugs aren’t cool kids, and like… do the people who write cigarette smoking into their fics know how absolutely unsexy it is in real life? I feel like cigarettes in fics are a 50/50 toss-up between real-life smoker authors who are projecting their habits onto their characters and authors who have never smoked a cigarette in their lives and just think it looks cool/sexy/edgy. There’s an annoying correlation between villain characters and cigarette smoking in fics and I’m just like… :/// Love triangles and will-they-or-won’t-they plot lines tend to exhaust me… Gratuitous smut without a logical plot for said smut, such as two characters who have absolutely no build up to their attraction suddenly deciding they want to fuck is just like... “Sure, Jan” to me.

It takes A LOT, A LOT to convince me to read a coffee shop, floral shop, or soulmate AU. Absolutely nothing against anyone who writes them, and I know they can be done very well, but as much as I agree with that one post here on tumblr about the two cakes, I still feel like there’s a such thing as too much cake, sometimes. XD I crave diversity in AUs, like where are the “I got hired at Hooters but I’m a dude” AUs? My “I’m a bouncer… at Costco” AUs? “My family bought a snowcone truck and now I’m forced to shave ice all summer” AUs? The “I work at a pawn shop and people keep trying to sell me really weird shit” AUs? The “I mow lawns for a living and your yard looks like hot garbage but you keep insisting you don’t need my services” AU? “I got in trouble with the law and was assigned to clean up the streets near your work as community service” AUs? I feel like there’s a lot of comfort in using a tried and true AU structure, but the most memorable AUs for me tend to be those which do things totally differently from anything I’ve seen before.

All of this makes me sound like I’m really picky but the truth is that when I get free time, I just read basically everything that’s available. I’m that “goes through the AO3 tag… then goes through the AO3 tag again with lower standards” type readers. If the summary and tags look even remotely interesting to me, I’ll definitely give it at least a shot. My tolerance range, even for things like bad grammar and OOC is really pretty high, especially for rare pairs… T____T

Currently I’ve been reading mostly BNHA fics. aloneintherain’s history has its eyes on you was very nice, and I’ve recc’d juurensha’s stuff before but their ShinIida collection is charming. I recently caught up with Ohmytheon’s Reconfigure and it is the embodiment of all my special interests so I’m especially excited to see where it goes.

Uh… I hope that answers the question???

Please send me fic recs that match my obscure personal tastes; I’ll love you forever.