#mad woman and mean !!!

[rebekahgaveup]

Can someone check on Taylor please is she okay

[coatl-cuddles]

" WIP DELETE LATER 🤪🤪🤪" ok who gaf?

[scorpion-flower]

Greece's singer preteded to fall asleep.

Netherlands' singer covered himself with his coutry's flag.

Ireland's singer wrote "Ceasefire now" in old irish.

Latvia's singer said that every country deserves to be free.

I know it's not much, but I still love those subtle hints of diss agaist Israel 😂

[knuckles-bloody-for-me]

Thing is if any debut song was on folklore then yall would EAT them up

[dollypopup]

hm. idk, maybe the reason Luke Newton isn't announcing new projects or posting any Bridgerton content is because some of you demons treated him like hot trash instead of a creative that you wanted more work from and he decided fuck it, this isn't worth the stress. you know, like a lot of creatives who get mistreated do?

like this is a man who went from couch surfing in a friend's house and bartending to make ends meet, deciding that the Bridgerton audition was the last one he'd do before he quit, to suddenly being recognized on the street because that last audition propelled him to star in a global show where fans who have zero media comprehension blamed him for his character's actions and literally stalked him at any hotel he happens to stay at. he went from being a dude doing musical theatre and shopping at thrift stores and recording random songs with friends and posting silly memes on Twitter to being harassed on his only social media page and his friends insulted and his partners bullied by his supposed 'fans' and anything he posts being so microanalyzed that he can't do a damn thing without someone coming out the woodwork screaming about how he's the WORST and won't he think of the FANS!?

like damn he can't have a girlfriend without being harassed, he can't travel without being harassed, he can't like or not like social media posts without being harassed, he can't post a fucking MEME without being harassed, he can't take a vacation or cut his hair or hold someone's hand or just live his life without being blamed for some bullshit or another. but yeah, okay, 'when will Luke Newton come back?' as if it isn't your fault he's AWOL now

[class-of-classic-blog]

MY HEADCANON FOR PARENTS NAMES:

Snow White: Bianca White ( Bianca means "white" and Whites are probably one of the most obsessed families with their story, every single Snow White had a name with meaning relative to the fairy tails,)

Evil Queen: Eris Queen (I can't remember did I read a fic where she was called Eris but I think that the name of the goddess of discord really suits her)

Sleeping Beauty: Rosalin Beauty (pretty standard name)

Cinderella: Ophelia Ella ( a sweet name for a sweet girl)

Red Riding Hood: Scarlett Hood (one more standard name)

Big Bad Wolf: Aiden Wolf (close friends call him Andy :) )

Dark Fairy: Darcy Thorn ( oh the irony of being the dark fairy with dark name and yet cover yourself in light)

Candy Witch: Cinnamon Witch (I also didn't come up with this name myself. I saw someone use it for her a really long time ago but I can't remember who. If the person who came up with this name sees this, you deserve a reward, the name is perfect. But I hc that she goes by her nickname: Candy. Why? Because it's such a cute nickname)

Pinocchio: Oak Wood (I think that every family name has something to do with trees or wood. Oak sounds like a perfect name for someone sweet, young and cheerful and later as an adult calm and wise)

Goldilocks: Dolly Locks ( I just think that its a cute name and she kinda remind me of Dolly)

Huntsman: Archer Huntsman (Okay, so, Huntsmans are bad at naming their kids, like REALLY BAD. Hunter we are counting on you to break that cycle)

King Charming: Dashing Charming (I read one fanfic were he is named Dashing and i think that name suits him, i myself couldn't come up with the more fitting name)

Queen Charming: Grace Charming (I also read that one in a fanfic and i think it fits her, somehow whenever i think of Charmings Dashing and Grace are the first name that come to my mind)

Rapunzel: Cressida O'Hair (I first just like the name but then i found out the Cressida means "golden" so it goes well with Rapunzel story)

Pied Piper: Devin Piper ( It means "bard" or "poet", the perfect name for a musician. Also, Piper is really a cool name, too bad it is already his last name)

Mad Hatter: Maddox Hatter (I just like silly names for Wonderlandians, especially Mad Hatter)

Queen of Hearts: Victoria Hearts ( okeey, it's not a very Wonderlandian name but neither is Elizabeth and Vicy is a cute nikename)

Cheshire Cat: Lorelai Cheshire (I didn't want to go for the obvious one Chatrine, like, I get it, she's a cat, She literally named her daughter Kitty, or maybe Katrine Kitty for short, BUT THEN I REMEMBER THAT TOLERAI EXISTED which is literally the same name just different first latter and I already gotten attached to Lorelai, so, umm if you all could just do me the favour and pretend that these are TOTALLY different names I would be very thankful)

Alice Wonderland: Amilia Wonderland ( Also would her last name be Wonderland or Liddell? Bonus cute nickname Amy)

White Rabbit: Castor Blanc ( At first i just liked the name but don't you think that "dutiful" is a perfect for White Rabbit)

White Swan: Elenor Swan ( It means "shining light" and to be honest with that destiny she's going to need some light in her life)

Black Swan: Callisto VonBart (What would be the last name of The Black Swan? VonBart?BlackSwan? I put VonBart because I found an OC of Odille on Pinterest and her last name was VonBart. I don't know)

Frog Prince: Hanry Croakington ( i reafuse to belive that he named his son after himself. Nuh-uh. He named Hopper after his father or maybe his grandfather)

Robin Hood: Wren Hood ( Listen, Listen, maybe they just have a thing with the birds?)

Maid Marian: Pandora Charming ( I don't think that there is a destiny stricly for Maid Marian. I think thats just a princess from Charming family or from nobel family, that's why i gave her last name Chaming. Last name changed after the wedding)

Beauty: Primrose Beauty ( Ah, Beauties and their roses)

Beast: Damian Beast (like it)

Fairy Godmother: Beatrice Goodfairy ("blessed one" mmm... too bad you can't bless yourself)

Jack Beanstalk: Jasper Beanstalk (nice)

Snow Queen: Isolde Winter (perfect for ice queen)

Snow King: Nikolai Winter (took his wife's last name, couldn't think of his own that's not arleady taken)

BONUS: PRINCES CHARMING

The Good King: David Charming (i think that only the main Charming follow that logic with names where all siblings have names with the same first latter)

Cinderella's prince Charming: Louis Charming (he's a nice boy)

Snow White's prince Charming: Cassian Charming (I just like it)

Sleeping Beauty's prince Charing: Liam Charming (don't ask)

[prolibytherium]

I never touched it but I feel like i only ever hear positive things said about song of achilles.. in (rough strokes at least) what makes it dogshit to you?

Okay it's been a while since I actually read it so some of this might not be spot on accurate. Sorry if at any point I say 'the book never does xyz' and it actually does once or twice but I think my underlying criticisms are accurate

-Patroclus is made into like this soft gentle tender quivering little yaoi boy. In the source text, he's shown as compassionate and moved by the suffering of his own men (and apparently having some medical skill, tending to the wounded in the camp), but very much invested n combat and very, very good at it (pages worth of descriptions of the guys he's killing left and right). In this, the arguably more complex character from this 8th century BC text is flattened into Being A Healer, he doesn't want to go to war he just wants to help people, he only goes because Achilles has to but he doesn't want to fight he's a HEALER he's a gentle lover NOT A FIGHTER who just wants to help he just wants to help everyone around him he HEALS while Achilles is a doomed warrior who is so good at fighting and KILLING its a DICHOTOMY GUYS!!!LIKE THE BEAUTIFUL SUN AND MOON DOOMED LOVERS SO SAD patocluse HEALER . (I Think he's specifically characterized as being BAD at fighting but might be misremembering)

-I don't remember much about Achilles' characterization I think it just makes him less of a jackass while not adding anything of interest and levels out into being mad boring.

-Not getting into the literal millenias old debate whether the mythological characters Achilles and Patroclus were being characterized as some type of lover by the original oral sources of the Iliad or its Homeric writers. We will never know. We don't even know what (if any) culturally accepted conventions of male homosexuality existed in bronze age Greece (we know much more about their descendants). But there are some interesting elements of their characterization in this direction, with how unconventional their relationship is WITHIN the text itself- Patroclus is described as cooking for Achilles and his guests (very specifically a woman/wife's job), Achilles chides Patroclus like a father, but there's also scene where Achilles' mourning of him directly echoes a passage of Hector's wife mourning her husband, Patroclus is explicitly stated to Achilles' elder, and is overall treated as his equal or near-equal, closest confidant and most beloved friend (to the point that pederastic classical Greeks would debate over who was erastes (older authority figure lover) and who was eromenos (adolescent 'beloved')- many took it as a given that this text depicted their present-day cultural norms of homosexual behavior but it existed so Outside of these norms that it had to be debated who was who). Their relationship is non-standard both within the text and to the descendants of the civilization that wrote them.

Basically what I'm saying is this book had opportunities to like, explore the unconventionality of the relationship (being presented here as explicitly lovers), explore the dynamics of why Patroclus wants to do 'women's work' (besides being a tenderhearted softboy), the weird dynamics where they take on paternal roles to each other but also roles of wives, how they feel about being this way, and just kind of Doesn't. Which I guess isn't an intrinsic fault (because it omits much of what I just talked about to begin with). it's just like.... Lame. This book takes jsut abandons everything interesting about the source text in favor of flattening it into bland Doomed Yaoi.

-The conflict that sets off the core story of the Iliad is Achilles and Agamemnon fighting over Briseis, an enslaved Trojan woman taken by Achilles as a war-trophy, Achilles spends most of the story moping because he was dishonored by his 'trophy' being taken. Achilles and Patroclus and everyone else are raping their captives, all the women in the story are either captured Trojans (or in the case of the free women within the walls of Troy, soon to be enslaved, and are slave owners themselves). Slavery as an institution and extreme patriarchal conventions are innate to the text and reflective of the context in which it was developed. You cannot avoid it.

But obviously you can't have your soft yaoi boys doing this, so the author has them capturing women to Protect Them from the other men. Their slaves are UNDER THEIR PROTECTION and VERY SAFE (and they might even Like And Befriend Them but I might be misremembering that. Briseis does though). Our heroes have apparently absorbed none of the ideals of the culture they exist in and the author seems to think "they're gay and aren't sexually attracted to their captives" would translate to them being outright benevolent (also as if wartime sexual violence is just about attraction and not part of a wider spectrum of violent acts to dehumanize and brutalize an accepted 'enemy')

In the source text, Briseis mourns Patroclus as being the kindest to her of her captors, who tried to get her a slightly better outcome by getting her married to Achilles (which probably would be the Least Bad of all possible outcomes for a woman in that situation, becoming a legal wife instead of a slave), and wonders what will happen to her now that he's gone. This is a really really sad, horrible, and compelling dynamic which could be fleshed out in very interesting ways but is instead is tossed entirely aside in favor of them being Besties. Like brother and sister.

All of the above pisses me off so much. If you don't want to engage in the icky parts of ancient/bronze age Greece then don't write a retelling of a story taking place in bronze age Greece. I'm not gonna get mad at children's adaptations of Greek myths or silly fun stories loosely based on them for omitting the rape and slavery but it is SO fundamental to the Iliad. If you're not willing to handle it, either fully omit it or better yet set your Iliad inspired yaoi in an invented swords-and-sandals setting where you can have all your heartbreaking tragic doomed lovers plot beats and not have to clumsily write around the women they're brutalizing.

-The author didn't seem to know what to do with Thetis and she made her just like, Achilles bitch mother who spends most of the story trying to separate our Yaoi Boys (iirc her disguising Achilles as a girl and hiding him on Scyros is made to be more about getting him away from Patroclus than trying to save her son from his prophesied doom in the Trojan War) until she sees how much they loooove each other and I think helps Patroclus' spirit get to the afterlife or something in the end?

-This is more of a personal taste gripe but it has that writing style I loathe where the prose feels less like a story and more like an attempt to string together Deep Beautiful Hard Hitting Poetic Lines that will look great as excerpts on booktok (might predate booktok but same vibe). It's all very Pretty and Haunting and Deep but feels devoid of real substance.

I really like The Iliad and The Odyssey in of themselves. They're fascinating historical texts that give a window into how 8th century BC Greeks told their stories, saw their world, interpreted their ancestors, etc. And genuinely I think these texts have 'good' characters, there's a lot of complexity and humanity to it.

WRT the Iliad- all of the main Achaeans are pretty fascinating, the one singular part where Briseis Gets To Talk and laments her situation is great, Achilles fantasizing that all of the Trojans AND the Achaeans die so he and Patroclus alone can have the glory of conquering Troy (wild), Achilles asking to embrace Patroclus' shade and reaching out for him but it's immaterial (and the shade being sucked back underground with a 'squeak' (the squeak kinda gets me it's disturbing and sad)), Hecuba talking about wanting to tear out Achilles' liver and eat it in a (taboo, exceptioally pointed) expression of rage and grief for his mutilation of her son's corpse, just one tiny line where the enslaved women performing ritual wailing for their dead captors are described as using it as an outlet to 'grieve for their own troubles' is heartrending, etc. A lot of grappling with anger and grief and the inevitability of death, a lot of groundwork laid for characters that could be very interesting when expanded upon in the framework of a conventional novel.

And Song Of Achilles really doesn't do much with all that. I know a lot of my gripes here are kind of just "It's different from the Iliad", I would have thought of it as mostly mediocre and forgettable rather than infuriating if it wasn't a retelling (and I DEFINITELY have strong biases here). But I think the ways in which it is different are less just a product of a retelling (of course there's going to be omissions and differences) and more a complete and utter disinterest in vast majority of its own subject matter, to the book's detriment. I think a retelling has a point when it EXPANDS on the source, or provides a NEW ANGLE to the source. This book doesn't Really do either, it just shaves off the complexity of its source material, renders the characters into a really boring archetype of a gay relationship, and gives very little else. Its content boils down to a middling tragic romance that has been inserted into the hollowed out defleshed skeleton of the Iliad.

Bottom line: I definitely would not be as mad about it if I wasn't familiar with the source material but I think it's fair to expect a retelling to Engage with/expand on its source, and I also think it's weak purely on its own merits. This book was set up to disappoint Me specifically.

[on-till-morning]

Just gotta give a shout out that Stede’s very first (#1) suggestion about what to do with the guilt loot is to buy clothes, which is totally 100% for the sole benefit of his only-ever-been-in-one-outfit-and-one-outfit-only bf and def not at all about I’M A BIT OF A CLOTHESHORSE Stede and all the outfits he can buy for himself while dressing Ed up in a pretty women shopping montage

[lucabyte]

transfem loop + siffrin... you agree

i does agree.... i does in fact ... write a 7k word essay on the subject..... if you would like to perhaps click that link and read it if you were not already aware...... kisses u on the forehead......... sorry its that long but i had to cover all of my bases you know how it is with textual analysis when you're trying to draw a distinction between "headcanon" and "reading of the text" because those are different things.... to meeeeeeee.......

[moomeecore]

horrible, stupid country

[volatile-shorty]

pretty bird, pretty bird, i know youre hurting but so am i

[the-tenth-arcanum]

I can't believe trump is winning the elections...

[andichoseyou]

eras tour surprise songs parallels

4/15/23—Tampa, Florida: mad woman / Mean

[napping-sapphic]

pride month is SO funny to me like absolutely nothing dramatically changes with the way i look or act but for some reason my brain is CONVINCED that the chances of a random stranger woman just seeing me and asking me out on the spot are SO much higher when they really truly are not

[scorpiusmalfoylovesoscarwilde]

headcanon that astoria went through a rebellious phase in her teens and got a nose piercing and a tiny hidden tattoo on her hip ✨️

[the-judicial-assistants-notebook]

does anyone see what I mean by 'they look similar' yet or am i insane.