#literature as metaphor

[justaravingwritingdesk]

orv sidestories hitting real hard with the lit metaphors, callbacks and reveals...

like that one line about extras being extras because their stories are unwritten... how they do their roles as extras best in the blanks between the ink... how they stop being “true” extras when their story comes to light... how characters who get even a little of od!kdj's attention get elevated to side character...

when the realization that ysa and lgy and jhw were never actually extras but hidden characters finally hits... that maybe he crossed paths with all of them because they were all-important to the story... that their meetings could possibly be coincidences turned to fate...

and the hidden stories of 41 regressions of yjh who never met disaster of floods... the instrumentally hidden stories that mirror world of zero in many ways... with an incomplete kim dokja pulling strings in the background... even “small fry” cheon inho's previously unexplored potential for ultimate antagonism...

that only 51% of kdj is oldest dream... that od!kdj is a kdj who acknowledges himself... that 49!kdj doesn't want to be kdj but plays along anyway... the metaphorical and literal denial of self... 51!kdj's theme of fictional reality... 49!kdj's theme of lies and impersonation... 49!kdj's ultimate abstract denial by considering “kdj” a mask of identity... the twisted contrast to 51!kdj thinking himself the “real” or “better” kdj...

[chillandnormalrambles]

i’m still not sober but here’s some sketches of the famous last words music video

[deviumflumenmaga]

is somebody gonna match my freak

[macaulaytwins]

[parlapina]

[bonefall]

This AU is basically the Dungeon Meshi of Warrior Cats. This is a high compliment.

It's so funny, I get that a lot and I totally see it + appreciate it, but BB actually predates me being a fan of Dungeon Meshi! I've been getting that compliment since even before the anime dropped.

It makes perfect sense though. Dungeon Meshi uses food as a metaphor for communication across individuals, class, and most relevantly culture. It's something that brings people together, even when that's being addressed as a sinister thing when.......

Ah. No spoilers. You should go and read the manga to find out what I'm teasing ;)

I do something with a lot of overlap in BB. Food is an extension of the culture of the five Clans. I use it to characterize individuals too and as a metaphor for things at times (like Darkstripe's growth or cultural friction in Heartstar's Rise), but most of all, I try to emphasize the food as the product of the society that makes it. The biome, the diet, the behaviors of its chefs... so Dungeon Meshi and BB are naturally going to draw some interesting similarities.

Plus, Dungeon Meshi's a good ass series man, it's downright awe-inspiring. I hope I can make a narrative as satisfying as Ryoko Kui can, lmao. I love how much that girlie loves food

[queeringclassiclit]

Victor Frankenstein & Henry Clerval

from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

[withthewindinherfootsteps]

I AM NOW THE PROUD OWNER OF A 400-PAGE LONG BOOK OF ACADEMIC ANALYSIS ABOUT MDZS (both the novel and CQL, as well as the wider danmei sphere, internet authorship, fan reactions in both CN and non-CN spheres, and so many more interesting things – there are photos of the contents list below) >:DDDD

I only got it this afternoon so have only read the (quite long?) excerpt available online and pages I came across while flipping through, but everything I've read so far is really interesting and well-written. If you're interested, it's promoted on the blog of @pumpkinpaix, where there are also chapter spotlights with comments from authors of each paper/chapter about them and about MDZS in general (which is how I found out about it, one came up in tumblr's 'based on this tag you follow...' recommendation), as well as FAQs (including where to buy it, though I did link that at the start). Alternatively, all posts about it are in the tag #catching chen qing ling!

I really recommend it, especially if content about MDZS interests you! and I promise I haven't been told to advertise this it's just something so so cool... a collection of academic work about MY FAVOURITE BOOK... and I know people do follow me for meta/analysis so this might be the sort of thing people looking at this blog will be interested in..?

[devilhoney]

to love like a dog.

faithful to the last, briton riviere // moon song, phoebe bridgers // laika, sarah doyle // hannibal // unknown // i'm your man, mitski // el perro, francisco goya // isle of dogs // cop car, mitski // i bet on losing dogs, mitski // bite the hand, boygenius // dante and virgil, william alphonse - bouguereau // i'd hate me too, susannah joffe // dog days, ethel cain

[metamorphesque]

food as a metaphor for existence, food as a love language, food as just food (poetry recommendations)

September Tomatoes by Karina Borowicz

Ode to Tomatoes by Pablo Neruda

I Ask My Grandmother If We Can Make Lahmajoun by Gregory Djanikian

Here, There Are Blueberries by Mary Szybist

The Orange by Wendy Cope

Oranges by Gary Soto

From Blossoms by Li-Young Lee

Persimmons by Li-Young Lee

Eating Together by Li-Young Lee

Self-Portrait as So Much Potential by Chen Chen

Chasing Utopia by Nikki Giovanni

In the Kitchen by Chen Jun

Food by Brenda Hillman

Miss you. Would like to grab that chilled tofu we love. by Gabrielle Calvocoressi

I love you. I want us both to eat well by Christopher Citro

Baked Goods by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Bread by W. S. Merwin

buy me a coffee

[soulsunpoets]

(I've never known a love so tempest like)

[wronghands1]

[redconsumerism]

TO CONSUME IS (not) TO LOVE

cannibalism in romance novels

Cannibalism is like a parallax. For once it exists as a ‘philia’, characterized by the desire of eating another. And we find that it exists in the opposite spectrum, in the form of a ‘phobia’, which speaks of the fear of being eaten or partaking unknowingly or forcefully in the act of eating another. To vore is adjacent to love in most cases, both feared and desired. Because to love someone is (apparently) to want to consume them. 

Though cannibalism might seem like a barbaric and horrific concept, it is said to be one of the most intense demostrations of love that exist in both classic and contemporary literature. The gruesome gesture reminds the lecturer of the intensity of love and its lunacy. As Mercedes Abad stated in spanish newsletter ‘el tiempo’ on May 21st, 1995 ‘There is no doubt that love and sex are feasts where, to a greater or lesser extent, we all become anthropophagi who would surely find it quite difficult to answer the question of whether there is greater pleasure in phagocytosing the other or in being phagocytosed.’ Because Cannibalism as a metaphor for love in romance novels, as it is in our day to day, is more about the blind consumerism of it rather than the pureness of it. One example of blind consumerism of love would be in Salvador Dali's Autobiography, where it is mentioned how Gala cooked their pet rabbit because of how much they loved it, in front of the woman’s refusal to the idea of leaving the rabbit with the maids.

To love is to consume, but to consume is to devour and transform in reusable energy. Like a vampire would when consuming someone’s blood, so they can continue living at the other’s cause. You live off the love you take, but if you devour that love, the other cannot live. The truth is cannibalism has a double connotation, and consuming the other’s otherness is three dimensional. Which means it isn’t always about love, or the lack thereof, but more so about the act of possessing. Cannibalism isn’t only one of the greatest manifestations of tenderness (for many), but also the irrevocably selfishness of an individual blinded by desire - in front of the morbid contemplation of the lover giving themselves so the other can survive -. The amorous-sexual instincts that resurface from a deep sense of infatuation together with those of hunger - a basic instinct - that create an irrational longing, unite in cannibalism as an analogy for that which we wish to become one with. It leaves you to question if the love narrated is but an act of survival for starved people.

‘Love is only a prologue to two cannibals struggling to take a bite of each other.’ - La Oscuridad, Ignacio Ferrando Perez (2014.) Cannibalism is, then, the imposture of love, and the obscure craving of something bigger than yourself without any understanding of it. 

[freudapologist]

There’s something terrifying about the realisation that I can mold myself over and over again and yet still be so undeserving of the radiance of the setting sun. 

[lux-brumalis444]

Red.

Your lips.

Your hands.

My chest.

You are my angel of destruction.

So breathtakingly covered in blood.

And while you devoure my heart,

I am on my knees in front of you.

Looking up to you and praying for your love.

Let me be a part of you.

Let me be yours for eternity.

And so I shall die a thousand times as long as it's your hands that take my life.

As long as it’s your arms that hold me while I take one painfully last breath.

[jellysshitpoems]

my Body, my Blood - Poem by me (jellysshitpoems)