#modern shakespeare ch

[sunnydaleherald]

The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter, Wednesday, August 9th, and Thursday, August 10th

Buffy: I mean, maybe after this thing with Spike and the assassins is over, I could say, 'Kendra, you slay, I'm going to Disneyland.'

~~What's My Line?~~

The Sunnydale Herald is looking for at least one new editor. Contributing to the Herald is a great way to get your Buffy on! Find out more here.

[Drabbles & Short Fiction]

Feeling About in the Dark by madeingold (Angel/Spike, Explicit)

Bed Buddies by veronyxk84 (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Like Sting by anonymous author (Buffy/Spike, T)

Broken Strings by TooCaughtUp (Willow/Oz, T)

her impossible paramour by The_Eclectic_Bookworm (Giles/Jenny, M)

Enjoying the view by Julikobold (Buffy/Spike, OC, G)

Enjoying the view by Julikobold (Buffy/Spike, OC, G)

Watch the World Burn by Blackmysteria (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Spike vs The Frying Pan by disco-tea (Buffy/Spike, Dawn, PG-13)

[Chaptered Fiction]

There Should Be Groveling, Ch. 20 (COMPLETE!) by slaymesoftly (Buffy/Spike, NSFW, rated NC-17 on other sites)

Howl - Chapter 1 by Bregan_Daerthe_Agent (Xander, Oz, "Supernatural" crossover, M)

What's Meant to Be Will Always Find A Way - Chapter 1 by charmed4lifekaren (Angel/Spike, T)

Seven, Ch. 51 by Holly (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Unforeseeable Paths, Ch. 12 by Axell (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

do you wanna dance? Ch. 5 by sunshine-of-my-lifetime (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

There Should Be Groveling, Ch. 20 (COMPLETE!) by slaymesoftly (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

More Found Family Ties, Ch. 9 by Julikobold (Buffy/Spike, G)

The Plunge, Ch. 11 by Harlow Turner (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

The Plunge, Ch. 12 by Harlow Turner (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Sweet Childe of Mine, Ch. 4 by Chopper01 (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

Along Came Two, Ch. 1 by LilithSwan (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Postcards and Snapshots, Ch. 24 by TheSunnySlayer (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

There Should Be Groveling, Ch. 20 (COMPLETE!) by Slaymesoftly (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

More Found Family Ties, Ch. 9 by Julikobold (Buffy/Spike, G)

The Alphabet of Spuffy, Ch. 17 by VeroNyxK84 (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Dream, Ch. 25-32 by Dusty (Buffy/Spike, R)

Creative Solutions, Ch. 8 by Harlow Turner (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Part of the Family, Ch. 10 by Harlow Turner (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Part of the Family, Ch. 8-10 by Harlow Turner (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

College Is Awesome! Ch. 8-9 by Grief Counseling (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

College Is Awesome! Ch. 9 by Grief Counseling (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Vanilla and Spice, Ch. 40-77 (COMPLETE!) by MaggieLaFey (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

Other Side, Ch. 10 by myrabeth (Buffy/Spike, M)

[Images, Audio & Video]

Mario Bros crossover art by lennymcdragons (Pauline/Buffy, everyone's clothed but possibly nsfw anyway)

A text post meme (captioned screenshots) ft. Spike and Giles by teatimewithgiles ()

[Reviews & Recaps]

I think that Ted is a good episode .... But. by coraniaid

Cleverest Episode Titles by Alofkri

What is a writing decision in the series that will never stop impressing you? by emperor-spriggan

Angel S3E16: Sleep Tight | Booze & Buffy

Episode 35: Beauty and the Beasts by Gym Was Cancelled: A Buffy Podcast

Pop Culture Role Call: Sebstein - Angel S05E04 - Hell-Bound

[Fandom Discussions]

i find it very lgbtq+ that when the first tried to make faith turn... by buffyjackets

faith lehane's queerness is so interesting to me by buffyjackets

[Giles and Cordelia in season 1] by jvstheworld

Best Spike Friendship by spangelmybeloved

[Accidental foreshadowing in Teacher's Pet] by the-elusive-soleil

The writers forgot Gunn came up with multiple solutions in Season 2 by The810kid

If Buffy was made in modern times… by AhDunWantIt

Why Giles should've left by LiviaDruzilla

Angel Season 4: Trying to Make a Better World by Andrew Heard

[Articles, Interviews, and Other News]

« On... on peut se reposer maintenant ? » Foucault et les multiples subjectivités discursives de Spike by Andrew F. Hermann (in French)

Just Another Angry Woman: Adaptations of Female Rage through Euripides, Shakespeare, and Whedon (ft. Willow) by Melissa Pistone

Variety within Bigotry: From Individual to Systemic Monsterism in Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Mona Rocha and James Rocha

Buffy: Do You Know Each Popular Characters' 90s Grunge Vibe? - mag.remarkist.com

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[krenenbaker]

And so it begins...

I'm only 2 chapters in, and I've already cried, so this will be GREAT! (/gen)

also, it's weird seeing Shakespeare here... because he's speaking Late Modern English - what we speak now - rather than Early Modern English, like he spoke in his route?? So... that's a surprise.

(ch 1/2 screenshots below)

SO

THIS IS WHAT MADE ME CRY

EVEN NOW, LOOKING AT IT AGAIN

I'M CRYING

(there are a few more lines in-between here, but those are what made me ache)

There's already such tangible... loneliness. It's heartbreaking, and it's beautiful.

AND THEN OH MY GODS

DAMN. Playing Vlad's route right after Shakespeare's was a good choice, methinks!

[cleolinda]

Weekend links, March 18 2023

My posts:

Varney ch 2 recap

Varney ch 3 recap

Poll: What does "old lady perfume" mean to you? (some intriguing answers so far)

What is "amber" in modern perfumery (including the search for terms to replace "oriental")?

Lesbian flowers

Reblogs of interest:

Shakespeare in a Southern accent and the Ides of March in general

A really lovely quiz about magical familiars of North America

Your Florida Man birthday headline

Porridge season is over and Hozier has returned

Are You Scared of the Man in the Crowd?

Reminder that Evil Supply Co is now the Netherworld Post Office

A Windows XP/98 boss theme

500 TTRPGs for $5 for trans rights in Florida

As always, Pallas cats

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Adding Context (for some of these, as requested)

fool - An endearment recorded in the 16th and early 17th centuries, usually accompanied by a supporting adjective, such as poor, young, heavenly, and sweet. The other, much more dominant sense of fool probably crushed its tenderness potential.

bully - At first either men or women could be addressed as bully, meaning ‘sweetheart’, but by Shakespeare’s time it was men only. The innkeeper in The Merry Wives of Windsor (1597) calls all the men bully, both with an accompanying noun (‘bully Sir John’, ‘bully doctor’) and as a single vocative (‘Mockwater, in our English tongue, is valour, bully’).

pussy - This use of a cat’s call-name as an endearment is found in a ballad as early as the 16th century (‘Adieu, my pretty pussy . . . ’), but there is a significant gap before OED citations resume in the 19th century. The reason is probably to do with the way puss developed negative associations in the interim (such as spitefulness and slyness). When Samuel Pepys writes in his diary (6 August 1663), ‘His wife, an ugly puss . . . ’, this is a long way from endearment. But when Doctor Jeddler calls his daughter puss (in Charles Dickens’s novella The Battle of Life, 1846, ch. 1), we see a very different usage. The change seems to have taken place during the 18th century, and heralded later adaptations of the pussy motif (e.g., pussums).

ding-ding - A playful adaptation, probably of darling, with OED citations into the early 17th century. Ding-dong and ding-a-dings took it a stage further.

pug - Most of the meanings of pug are to do with ‘small size’ – a dwarf animal, an imp, a nose, a doll – so presumably this endearment was used for people of small stature. OED citations are found throughout the 17th century. There was usually an accompanying adjective: the alliterative pretty pug was popular.

bawcock - This is a man-to-man endearment, ‘fine fellow, my good man’, from French (beau coq ‘fine cock’). It was often used sarcastically, as when Sir Toby Belch teases Malvolio, calling him ‘my bawcock’ (Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, c.1602, 3.4.112).

nutting - The modern use of nut (‘crazy person’) makes it difficult to appreciate the way this word was earlier (17th century) used to mean ‘source of delight’, especially in the phrase for nuts (‘for fun’). A single OED citation from the play Wily Beguiled shows the unusual (to modern eyes) association: Will Cricket addresses ‘sweet Pegge’ with an extravagance of endearments: ‘my nutting, my sweeting, my love, my dove, my honey, my bonny, my duck, my dear, and my darling’.

bagpudding - The word does indeed mean ‘a pudding boiled in bag’, and might seem out of place in this list. But the context of its single recorded use, in playwright John Day’s Humour out of Breath, suggests a jocular sense of ‘clown’ or ‘buffoon’.

cabbage - One of relatively few vegetables that have become endearments, often in the form my (little) cabbage. The usage shows the influence of the equivalent expression in French, mon (petit) chou.

prawn - The dominant human application of prawn was unflattering, but there is a single OED citation suggesting that, for some people at least, the noun could be an endearment. ‘I expect you’re a saucy young prawn, Emma’, says a character in William Pett Ridge’s Minor Dialogues (1895).

pussums - The source is ultimately baby-talk, where diddums (did ’em = ‘did they’) as an expression of commiseration is known from the late 19th century. The -ums ending then had a limited productivity in jocular pet-name vocabulary between playful adults. Pussums came to be used in talking to both people and cats; snookums (1919) for people and lap-dogs. Most recently, we find people and dogs addressed as pookums (probably from pooch), though sociolinguistic lexicography has yet to establish who is responsible.

lamb-chop - A woman in Ellis Lucia’s memoir, Klondike Kate (1962, ch. 2) is described as ‘quite a lamb chop’.

Source ⚜ Notes & References ⚜ Historical Thesaurus

50 Terms of Endearment

This selection of words used as terms of endearment over the past thousand years shows several items that have stood the test of time, notably darling and dear, and some recurring motifs, such as those from the semantic fields of taste and the animal kingdom. But several belong to their own time: bawcock and bully, for example, are encountered in Shakespeare.

darling (c. 888) ⚜ dear (c. 1230) ⚜ sweetheart (c. 1290)

heart (c. 1305) ⚜ honey (c. 1375) ⚜ dove (c. 1386)

cinnamon; love (c. 1405) ⚜ mulling (c. 1475) ⚜ daisy (c. 1485)

mouse (c. 1520) ⚜ whiting (c. 1529) ⚜ fool (c. 1530) ⚜ beautiful (1535)

soul (c. 1538) ⚜ bully (1548) ⚜ lamb (c. 1556) ⚜ pussy (c. 1557)

ding-ding (1564) ⚜ lover (1573) ⚜ pug (1580) ⚜ mopsy (1582)

bun (1587) ⚜ wanton (1589) ⚜ ladybird (1597) ⚜ chuck (1598)

sweetkin (1599) ⚜ duck; joy (1600) ⚜ sparrow (c. 1600)

bawcock (c. 1601) ⚜ nutting (1606) ⚜ tickling (1607)

bagpudding (1608) ⚜ dainty (1611) ⚜ flitter-mouse (1612)

pretty (1616) ⚜ old thing (c. 1625) ⚜ duckling (1630) ⚜ sweetling (1648)

pet (1767) ⚜ sweetie (1778) ⚜ cabbage (1840) ⚜ prawn (1895)

so-and-so (1897) ⚜ pumpkin (1900) ⚜ pussums (1912)

treasure (1920) ⚜ sugar (1930) ⚜ lamb-chop (1962)

Source ⚜ More: Word Lists ⚜ Notes: On Love ⚜ Love Advice ⚜ "I love you" Word Lists: Love Pt. 1 Pt. 2 ⚜ Physiology of Love ⚜ Synonyms ⚜ Kinds of Love

[thelarkophelia]

Modern Shakespeare Characters 13/? 

Oliver de Bois from “As You Like It” 

 “Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?”

[isabelpsaroslunnen]

A friend of the family in Canada sent us a box of Nanaimo bar mixes, which turned out gloriously. Still, I did find this label pretty funny, despite being very familiar with the overlap between the English and French lexicons.

All we need now is King Lear the baking show and Edmund shouting “Why brand they us with base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?” as he waves a spatula.

[weloveperioddrama]

Which is Beatrice? I answer to that name. What is your will?

(requested by anonymous)

[operabooknerd68]

Favorite version of this play

Much Ado About Nothing (1993) dir. Kenneth Branagh

[starslung]

“I said the exam is NEXT Thursday. Don’t scare people.” / from eva since i'm definitely adding her soon :*

PROFESSORS ARE WEIRD !

      “oh, c’mon, we could all use the extra studying. might as well light some fires under a few asses.” personally, he knows he won’t be looking at his notes until the period before, but just because finn’s study habits were abysmal didn’t mean everyone else’s had to be. “they’ll thank me next week when they can recite portia’s the quality of mercy is not strained monologue by heart.”

[hamletthedane]

When Shakespeare wrote in Early Modern English, the suffix -ture was not pronounced with a modern “ch” sound. Instead, it was pronounced as a flat “ter.”

I am, therefore, delighted to inform you that Shakespeare would have called small furry animals “critters.”

[maeglinyedi]

I was already in awe of the insane word count & fantastic quality of your work, but finding out that English isn’t your first language? Holy shit, my respect just went up so high it’s in geosynchronous orbit! Do you have beta readers or Brit pickers? Or does everything go up as is? I only ask b/c when I went back to read the rest of Beyond Thought after ch 14 I noticed a few things, like the Dutch spelling for Genghis Khan, and Gild when modern English uses guild or gilde (Shakespeare’s era).

I'm Dutch, yeah, but I've been writing fanfiction in English for over 20 years now. I used to have a bunch of amazing beta readers, but I'm doing it all alone now and I'm fine with that. I do appreciate people pointing out typos and such in the comments.

And I use gild because it's as old-fashioned as the wizarding world, lol.

[procrastinatorproject]

BeoWorf - The Restored Klingon Edition

I have a class at uni this year that’s all about conlangs, i.e. constructed languages. We’ve had some presentations on Tengwar, the writing system developed by JRR Tolkien for his Elvish languages, on the dialects and historical development of Valyrian from the Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones universe, and much more. For a final paper, we were told we can write on pretty much anything: the syntax of Sindarin, how language is used in GoT to unite and other characters from each other and the audience, was Esperanto doomed to fail?, we could even invent a writing system or grammar for a made-up language of our own.

I was really unsure what I wanted to do for a long time. I love Tolkien’s languages and can still read the writing fluently, but it’s been a few years since I was really obsessed. I wasn’t sure if I could find any aspect I could focus on enough to devote a whole term paper to. And then one day, inspiration struck me while I was taking a shower (minutes after reading about why it is that inspiration so often strikes us when we are on walks or in the shower):

I can translate a small section of Beowulf into Klingon and write about the process of that! And thus, the idea for BeoWorf was born! (Pun courtesy of the inimitable @regionalpancake)

Now, fan translations of classic works into Klingon have a storied history. In Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Chancellor Gorkon says that “you have never experienced Shakespeare until you have read him in the original Klingon.” Going off of that, the Klingon Language Institute has created “restored versions” of e.g. the original Tragedy of Khamlet, Son of the Emperor of Qo'nos by famous Klingon playwright Wil'yam Shex'pir.

I’m not nearly this ambitious, of course! My knowledge of Klingon is severely limited and the professor teaching the class couldn’t remember whether Klingon belonged into Star Wars or Star Trek. So, the actual academic work won’t be in the translation itself, but in documenting the process leading up to it.

I expect the Klingon text I come up with in the end won’t meet the standards of the dedicated translators who have devoted a lot of time and passion to this fictional language. But the point of this exercise isn’t to create a flawless translation of (a very small part of) Beowulf. The point is to have a term paper topic so thoroughly entertaining (and close to fandom shitposting) that I will actually sit myself down and write it. And to have fun. I feel like after the year+ we’ve all had, there is a lot of value in making the things you have to do as fun as possible.

So, without further ado: An Outline For A Possible Term Paper!

BeoWorf - It’s better in the Original Klingon

Introduction "You've not experienced Shakespeare until you have read it in the original Klingon." (Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country)

Ch 1: Klingon - A History

who are the Klingons in Star Trek?

origins of the Klingon language

fandom engagement with the language and fannish translation projects

Ch 2: Klingon - Grammar and Challenges

an overview of remarkable features of the Klingon language

including a brief note on how they innovate or fail to innovate on standard conlang fair

Ch 3: Klingon Poetics

Are there rules for writing poetry in Klingon?

How do e.g. the writers of the Klingon Shakespeare projects handle it?

What approach do I want to take, considering my translation is a representation of ancient epic poetry as opposed to not-quite-as-ancient theatre?

Ch 4: Klingon Warriors and Monsters

most translation projects of Klingon don't just translate, they localize (i.e. adapt the text to a target culture), following the premise that they’re recreating a Klingon original text

Klingon was created for a science-fiction warrior culture, therefore Beoworf and his companions travel on spaceships to the head of a neighbouring house and fight the monsters plaguing him with bat'leths and phasers.

depending on how much space I have: go into more or less detail of how aspects of Beowulf (from surface level practicalities to concepts of retainership and loyalty) would map onto the fictional Klingon culture

Ch 5: Beoworf, An Annotated Translation

translation of a very limited section of Beowulf into Klingon-localized modern English, and translation of that into Klingon

detailed annotation of interesting grammatical aspects

(Yes, whatever I end up with will go on AO3, but only after I have handed in the paper and it has been run through the department’s plagiarism check. I’m not 100% certain how those things work and what they would or wouldn’t catch, but I’m not going to run the risk of having to explain to half a dozen people at my university why my term paper (or even parts of my term paper) are posted online next to angsty starship drabbles, rousing tales of maniacal space roombas, and something called “IKEA Intergalactic” XD)

(And now I shall stop procrastinating by making tumblr posts about this thing. Because I need to give a presentation on it this week. And so far, I have nothing 🙈😅)

[we-are-inevitable]

modern art // javid (ch. 1)

A/N: hi !! so some of you may remember an old songfic i did in march of last year, titled ‘modern art’ after the song “IDK You Yet” by Alexander 23. well, i’ve always thought that that one shot would work great as a stand alone fic, and here we are! i have ch. 1 edited and SO MUCH of it as changed- like, for example, the fic is a chapter fic now !! regardless, i hope you guys like this !!

WARNINGS: depression, anxiety, self-deprecation, past addiction, mentions of addiction, just general Bad Times- pls be mindful when reading !! it’s just very Not Happy rn ADDITIONAL INFO: all characters are in their mid-twenties in the fic. oh also this is probably important but it’s a soulmate au !!

Read On AO3!

tag list: @bound-for-santa-fe @wannabecowboypunk @shippingcannons @yahfancyclamwiththepurlinside @smallsies @deliciouspeachpirate @newsies-is-my-erster 

Jack doesn't know what’s going on with himself, but he knows that he could really use his soulmate right about now.

They’ve communicated before. Never verbally, and never enough to reveal who they were. Perhaps they are both just... dealing with some unspoken fears, dealing with the worry of rejection sitting heavy in their chests. Perhaps they both like this mystery- the uncertainty that came with the notes scrawled across their bodies in a handwriting that isn’t their own.

Or perhaps they just aren’t ready to take the plunge. To grow up and face the harsh fact that, as soon as they meet, wherever and whenever that may be, a new chapter of their life will unfold. Consume them. Change anything and everything they’ve ever known or held dear.

They had been braver when they were children, that much was true. Jack remembers staying up late often, writing notes on his skin and watching in awe as the replies appeared. He remembers the giddy rush of trying to quickly wash off the ink on his wrist when they ran out of space to talk, and, oh, how they talked. There were school days when Jack would go to class exhausted, feeling like he’d been walking through quicksand for miles on end, but all of it had been worth it. The exhaustion he felt had been worth being able to talk to them until two, three, four in the morning. Sometimes he regretted it, of course, but only because it was harder for him to focus in class. Never because he was upset at them.

He could never be upset with them.

Even now, Jack remembers a lot about his soulmate. They liked music. They knew how to play the piano. They were into a few video games, even some that Jack had never played, and said that they always tried carrying a book with them wherever they went. Jack remembers that, as a younger kid, they liked Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, but also liked analyzing Shakespeare and Edgar Allen Poe and a bunch of other fancy authors that Jack had never even heard of. They were intimidatingly smart, and sometimes, would carefully correct Jack’s grammar whenever he misspelled a word or something- but they were never mean about it, they were just… there. A steady presence that he could count on.

Fifteen year old Jack dreamed of finding them one day. But now, twenty-five year old Jack is losing hope.

He can’t exactly help it. For starters, he and his soulmate haven’t communicated in… well, shit, it had to be nearly a year. Maybe nine months or so, but there’s no way to tell for sure, and even then, their conversations since reaching adulthood have been dull, for lack of a better word. A few positive comments here, a ‘have a good day’ there- it’s all so mundane, and neither of them can be blamed for it. They both have busy lives- or, well, Jack does, at least. His job as a graphic designer is hard enough on its own, but the added pressure of doing freelance work and commissions on the side has been eating away at him for weeks, coupled with debilitating self-doubt and lack of motivation for… anything.

Saying that he’s overwhelmed is the understatement of the century.

There is always another design, another client, another meeting, another deadline, another sleepless night as he stares at a blank canvas and prays for a spark of inspiration from whatever God is listening. Usually his inspiration comes from the world around him- his friends, city life, even the quiet confines of his apartment, but right now... Jack is stuck. He had holed himself up in his room days ago, trying and failing to get out of bed every morning when the time came to work- and thank God that the majority of his work could be done from home. His boss was understanding, too, to an extent.

Still, though, there’s a constant heavy weight on his chest that prevents him from moving most days, and he’s lucky if he even gets up long enough to shower or eat or do literally anything aside from lie in silence and count the cracks in his ceiling.

Nothing had happened to him recently to bring this on, from what he can tell. Jack has always been the happy-go-lucky leader, the man with a plan, the guy who always knew just what to say to motivate others into doing the best thing for themselves, but when that responsibility is reflected back onto himself, Jack feels helpless. There are words waiting to be said, sketches waiting to be drawn, designs waiting to be sent to clients… yet Jack lies there, motionless in his room for three days before he even has the energy, the willpower, to pull back his curtains and allow the sunlight to shine through. There is so much he wants to do, so much he needs to do, but he can't bring himself to do any of it.

In all twenty-five years of his life, through all of the things he’s been through, the ups and downs and foster homes and graduations and birthdays and funerals and therapists and rehab facilities and whatever the fuck else life decided to throw at him, Jack has never felt so worthless, so… lonely. His closest friends are all moving on with their lives. Many have already found their soulmate, have settled down and hidden their rowdy, rambunctious pasts behind skeletons in a closet. They’d all gotten their adventures done and over with in high school and college, and most are moving onto bigger and better things in life. They have careers. Families. Some have children, others have pets, a few have an insane amount of plants to care for.

All have seemingly left Jack behind in the dust.

No one told him when to flip the switch.

No one told him when he had aged out of adventure.

Now, they would never say it, but Jack knows. He knows. Saturday hangouts and trips to the bar had been replaced by Sunday church services and playdates for the kids. Rather than hearing yelling from his living room after his friends had all been teetering just on the edge between tipsy and fucked up, Jack hears the news, and documentaries, and podcasts, and the ghosts of a past life that he still seemed to be desperately clinging on to.

Katherine had been the one to tell him that he needed to grow up, though she didn’t put it in such a blunt manner. No, she’s just.... gently urging him to find a bigger apartment, or buy matching furniture from a place that is not a thrift store, or purchase dishes that weren’t of the plastic Walmart brand. She says it was because she wants to see him in a more professional, "adulty" lifestyle, but he knows it’s really because she can see that he’s a mess.

Deep down, Jack knows she’s right. She’s always right.

He just can’t help but feel cemented in place, dreaming of the past while dreading the new future ahead of him.

Jack never asked to feel so broken for no reason. All of the hope and optimism he had felt as a teenager was gone, lost in a sea of uncertain plans and shitty jobs and bill extensions and canvases dropped onto the floor with no rhyme or reason. And, yes, maybe Jack would look dramatic to someone who didn’t know his situation, but Jack knows what dramatic feels like. Dramatic feels like watching his best friend, Charlie, belt onstage in front of a backdrop that he helped create for the school play. Dramatic feels like laughing at the top of his lungs while walking through a random gas station at two in the morning, joined by Race and Al, all while higher than a kite. Dramatic feels like driving to the outskirts of the city with Katherine, climbing onto the roof of an old building and screaming about all of their stress, their anxiety, their insecurities, just to have some form of emotional release.

Dramatic doesn’t feel like sadness. It’s not supposed to.

Not for Jack.

He had been so… so happy, as a teenager. Proud and defiant and carefree. He was the kind of guy to skate and smoke weed in Central Park until midnight and take a math test at eight in the morning the next day. He was the kid who stood on a table in the cafeteria and came out as bisexual to everyone around him, just because of a dumbass bet that he didn’t even get paid for. He was the boy who wasn’t at all good in an academic sense, but who always knew how to talk himself out of trouble, who always came up with the most ridiculous- or most believable- lies to cover his ass when he needed it, who was always the class favorite, the teacher’s pet without meaning to be.

Jack had felt on top of the world back then, but now he’s struggling to even get off of the ground. The longer time goes on, the more lost Jack feels inside his own life. He feels like something was missing, something big. Something bigger than himself.

When his mother was alive, which now felt like lifetimes ago, she would often echo this old wives’ tale about how it’s best to find your soulmate while you’re younger, just to save them- and yourself- the pain of being alone for a long time. Jack had always kind of believed her; logically, he knew it was true, but he had always told himself that it wouldn’t happen to him. That he would be fine alone, though it wouldn’t be ideal, and that he would have plenty of time for soulmates after he got out and made a name for himself.

He’s starting to think, though, that maybe she was right. Maybe Jack had waited too long to make a move, to make contact again, because now, he just feels nauseous even thinking about it.

Don’t get him wrong, he knows the negative effects of self deprecation and not taking his own mental health seriously, he’s been to rehab before, blah, blah, blah, but, fuck, how could he put his soulmate through something like this? This fucked up state of mind he has now. Jack can’t even imagine talking to Katherine about this, and Katherine had been his best friend for over a decade. He can’t just meet his soulmate now- it’s been too long, he’s too messed up, they won’t like him, they’ll hate him for not trying hard enough, and Jack will just end up alone again, wasting away in his bedroom because no one fucking cares. No one cares. He has nobody.

That’s not true. He has Medda, his mom, his savior, his impulse control, but the thought of telling her that everything is acting up again makes him want to scream. He has Tony, but Tony has Al, and Tony and Al have a kid- a sweet little five year old girl who calls Jack ‘Uncle Jackie’ and takes no shit from anyone. He has Katherine, but Katherine has her soulmate- this dude named Darcy, who Jack doesn’t have much of an opinion on because they just met, like, a month ago, and Jack hasn’t exactly been emotionally ready for a hangout session between the three of them. He also has Charlie, and Charlie has certainly seen him in worse times- like when Jack was kind of hooked on pills for the entirety their freshman year of college- but Charlie has grad school to worry about and Charlie would hate him if he bothered him with this.

Still, there are other people who would listen, probably. He could easily talk to Elmer, or Romeo, or Specs, or Jojo or Finch or Sean or a fucking therapist but that’s just it, isn’t it? If he talks, he burdens, and Jack Francisco Kelly would rather run himself into the ground than be a burden anyone.

So, he makes a vow.

He makes eye contact with his reflection in the bathroom mirror. He’s gripping onto the sink, holding on for dear life, as he stares into his own sunken eyes. He takes in his appearance. Damp, messy hair, falling down to cover his forehead. Pale skin, which isn’t normal at all. Dark circles have taken their place around his eyes, and his smile- one of his favorite things about himself- is… nonexistent.

Distantly, Jack registers himself dumping a full bottle of ibuprofen into the sink. And then, he does the same thing with the bottle of melatonin from his medicine cabinet. The valium follows. He lets the water run for a long time. It's not that he doesn't trust himself- he'd done so, so good in rehab, and he doesn't even feel urges that often anymore- but it's better safe than sorry, especially since he's like... this.

This is not the Jack Kelly he’s used to anymore. This is not the Jack Kelly he wants to be.

But this Jack Kelly is the one who vows not to reach out. The one who vows to only answer when his soulmate is ready, and maybe not even then.

He doesn’t have to wait long, though.

Not when a heart appears on the back of his hand the next morning.

It’s there when Jack wakes up, and, honestly, it almost brings Jack to tears- but not necessarily for happy reasons. Sure, Jack wants to be happy. Who wouldn’t be happy after seeing something like this? A lopsided heart drawn in red ink, right on the back of his left hand- it was the definition of a symbol, of a romantic gesture, and Jack wants so badly to write back, to strike up conversation, to draw a goddamn heart, but… he can’t.

He can’t, and that’s horrible of him, and he knows it.

Right now, though… Jack can’t even work up the courage, the energy, to call his mom.

His soulmate, whoever they are, is going to have to wait.

[passmeabook]

Servamp: Macbeth & Macduff, Kuro & Mahiru

I was writing, and am still working on, an Ophelia MBTI analysis, and then I got an idea for an Ophelia tragic heroine meta, and from that came this. Ophelia and the Greed Arc have a lot of Shakespeare references and influences, and I found some interesting things while rereading through the arc. While Ophelia and Lawless have strong influences of Hamlet I would argue that Kuro and Mahiru have strong influences of Macbeth.

In this meta I’m going to be pointing out the similarities Kuro and Mahiru have to Macbeth and Macduff from Macbeth and how this might influence the future of the story.

Hypothesis: Tanaka has used parts of Macbeth and Macduff respectively to write Kuro and Mahiru. Can we use these two Shakespeare characters and perhaps infer what Tanaka intends to do with Kuro and Mahiru as the manga continues further along?

Kuro as Macbeth

In Ch. 24 “Tears” Lawless says this line to Kuro “Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from your hand? No, this your hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine. Making the green one red.” Intriguingly this line is said while the both of them are fighting on a stage. Plays have traditionally been played on stages, so I wondered if this was deliberate. Especially since in Hyde’s flashback story to Ophelia the memory is literally played out in his mindscape on a stage, and when the memory is over the curtains close.

When Lawless is fighting Kuro on the stage he says this in reference to Kuro directly as he uses the word “you” instead of “my” when referring to the hand covered in blood. We even get Lawless stabbing Kuro in the hand with his rapier followed by a close up of Kuro’s pierced hand in the panel following the Macbeth line. Hyde by saying this to Kuro and using the word “you” instead of “my” is placing Kuro in the role of Macbeth. 

Lawless changes the words in the line a bit, but the sentence comes from Shakespeare’s Macbeth Act 2 Scene 2 after Macbeth has murdered King Duncan in his sleep. The original sentence is Macbeth speaking about himself and he says “Whence is that knocking? How is ‘t with me when every noise appals me? What hands are here? Ha! They pluck mine eyes. Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood from my hand? No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red.” (Sparknotes Editors) In modern English this text reads as: “Where is that knocking coming from? What’s happening to me, that I’m frightened of every noise? Whose hands are these? Ha! They’re plucking out my eyes. Will all the water in the ocean wash this blood from my hands? No, instead my hands will stain the seas scarlet, turning the green waters red.” (Sparknotes Editors)

In Macbeth after Macbeth murders King Duncan he experiences great guilt that plagues him throughout the rest of the play. When Macbeth says that not all of the ocean could wash away the blood he is saying that the regret of committing this crime will stay with him forever; he will never be rid of the sin of the act of murder. The reason Macbeth murdered King Duncan is because he visited three witches and received three prophecies: 1. Macbeth will be Thane of Glamis (which he already is at the start of the play), 2. Macbeth will be Thane of Cawdor, and 3. Macbeth will be king (which is what drives him to murder King Duncan). Ironically Macbeth at the beginning of the play is presented as a hero. He is noble, courageous, and loyal to his cousin King Duncan. He is renowned throughout the Kingdom of Scotland as the greatest warrior in the entire country. Which is why his betrayal of Duncan is so poignant. That a noble and loyal warrior would murder his defenseless slumbering king was unimaginable treachery.

Similarities between Kuro and Macbeth become highlighted once you see the connection. As far as we the readers know Kuro had a close relationship with The Creator, and yet he was the one who murdered him. We know that The Creator and Kuro had a conversation before his death, and The Creator is shown to be sitting down and seems to be relaxed around Kuro. Kuro essentially murders The Creator when he is defenseless just as Macbeth murders King Duncan when he is defenseless. Another similarity is the guilt Kuro and Macbeth hold over the murder they have committed. Macbeth’s guilt follows him to his death, and Kuro’s follows him for several centuries. Macbeth’s line of “Methought I heard a voice cry, “Sleep no more! Macbeth does murder sleep”—the innocent sleep, Sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care, The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath, Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, Chief nourisher in life’s feast.” (Sparknotes Editors) refers to Macbeth’s inability to truly rest and be at ease now that he has committed the murder of King Duncan. Macbeth’s conscience will not allow him to sleep because the guilt will not leave his mind. Which parallels Kuro and his inability to move on from his regret of The Creator’s death. 

I also thought that the three witches in Macbeth were interesting because you can parallel them with C3. As of Ch. 99 we’ve found out that C3 was originally CCC which stands for “Conjurer Control Convention”, and the fact that there are three C’s as well as three witches, and that these are the entities that deliver the information that results in a murder is thought provoking. We the readers don’t know the contents of C3’s letter beyond the fact that it held information about The Creator and that it asked the Servamps to kill The Creator. For all we know there could have been more included.

A great callback connection to Kuro’s hand wound by Hyde and the metaphorical blood on his hands from the murder of the Creator is in Ch. 31 “I’m Not Wrong”. Mahiru has entered Kuro’s mind and Kuro is saying how he never wants to make another decision ever again if he’s just going to regret it, and that he’ll only do things another person tells him to do. When Mahiru tells Kuro that accepting a decision a person makes is wrong takes courage, we have the speech bubble in the same panel that shows Kuro’s right hand, the hand Hyde stabbed in Ch. 24 “Tears”, covered in blood. This is deliberate because it is the only time in this sequence of dialogue that it is shown bloody. The rest of the time the hand is clean. 

Also in Ch. 24 “Tears” we have Kuro’s shadow while fighting Hyde appear to have only four fingers, and in the above photo Kuro’s thumb is slightly obscured and seems to blend into his palm. Making it seem as though at first glance if you don’t look hard enough that he has only four fingers. With real lions they have five fingers on their front paws, but what we’d consider the thumb is much higher up their paw almost in their wrist area, so it sometimes looks as though they only have four fingers. Kuro’s claws are also made up of four appendages. In Ch. 2 “Tsubaki” after he has slashed Belkia his hands show two long claws and in between them are two shorter claws.

The similarities between Kuro and Macbeth end at their guilt. In the play Macbeth continues to murder, and Kuro has decided he will never make another decision on his own ever again becoming passive. Kuro has also faced his guilt and acknowledged he was wrong, and through the series has tried slowly, but surely, to change and become a different, better person than he was before.

Mahiru as Macduff

What truly stands out to me as Mahiru sharing similarities with Macduff is that in Macbeth Macduff is a foil to Macbeth, and his overall good character and noble qualities are supposed to contrast against Macbeth’s ambition and pride. Mahiru and Kuro are definitely opposites with Mahiru’s All Work vs Kuro’s All Play, but there are more subtle instances where Mahiru parallels Macduff. In the play Macduff is suspicious of King Duncan’s death and suspects Macbeth. Mahiru while not knowing about The Creator still wonders in Ch. 25 “SOS.” ‘What happened with you in the past? Just who did you kill? Or did you not kill anyone? What did you do with the majority vote? Did you approve of the-’, so there is a small parallel of Mahiru being curious of Kuro’s actions that may have resulted in a death in the past just as Macduff is suspicious of Macbeth’s involvement in King Duncan’s death.

Another parallel I found between Mahiru and Macduff is knocking. In Macbeth Macduff knocks on the door of Macbeth’s estate, where King Duncan had been staying. Macduff’s duty is to wake the king, and when he goes to wake King Duncan he finds him dead. Macduff’s knocking has been thought to represent Macbeth’s conscience knocking on his moral door. It’s also been thought to foreshadow that Macbeth’s opponent in the play is Macduff who’s knocking startles Macbeth after he has murdered King Duncan. Macbeth even has the line “Wake Duncan with your knocking. I would thou couldst.” which means “Wake Duncan with your knocking. I wish you could.” (Sparknotes Editors) to emphasize the regret he feels over killing Duncan.

In Ch. 31 “I’m Not Wrong” Mahiru is shown to say that he doesn't need a weapon to be let into Kuro’s black box. Only a knock. Just as Macduff can represent Macbeth’s conscience with his knocking, so can Mahiru represent Kuro’s with his. Only Mahiru and Kuro have much happier results than Macbeth and Macduff do with Mahiru guiding Kuro to confront his regret and telling him he was wrong to make the decision he did.

With Mahiru seeming to parallel Macduff in some ways it makes me wonder if there are more similar points between the two. In Macbeth Macduff was born by a cesarean section, and since Mahiru’s birth is mysterious and the circumstances around it haven’t yet been revealed to us it makes me wonder if Mahiru also was born via c-section. Along with what other secrets Uncle Toru hasn’t told us about Mahiru’s birth.

Conclusion

After analyzing Kuro and Mahiru’s similarities to Macbeth and Macduff I don’t think Tanaka will use references from Macbeth anymore, not so prominently at the very least. The Greed Arc is over, but the story still continues on. The best idea I can gather from this is that Mahiru may have a birth story similar to Macduff, or share the circumstances that their births are outside of the norm. Macbeth’s influence seems to have run its course in the series. Still, the way it was used in the Greed Arc for Kuro and Mahiru was incredibly well done and subtle.

I do find it hilarious that when Hyde uses the Macbeth line on Kuro in Ch. 24 “Tears” he’s just telling Kuro that blood from murder is on his hand. He doesn't realize that Kuro feels immense regret for killing The Creator, just as Macbeth feels immense regret for killing King Duncan.

I apologize for any spelling or grammar mistakes. Thank you for reading this far.

Sources:

SparkNotes Editors. “No Fear Shakespeare.” SparkNotes.com, SparkNotes LLC, 2005, www.sparknotes.com/nofear/shakespeare/shakespeare/ 

Pictures:

Ch. 24 @pastenaga

Ch. 31 @lichtjekyll​

[thelarkophelia]

Modern Shakespeare Characters 12/?

Celia from “As You Like It” 

“Do not seek to take your charge upon you, To bear your griefs yourself, and leave me out; For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale, Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.”

[blarrghe]

Hello! 10,18 and 20 for the meta writer asks? :))

10. How would you describe your writing process? hmm. mildly chaotic. 18. Do any of your stories have alternative versions? (plotlines that you abandoned, AUs of your own work, different characterisations?) Tell us about them. There are some bits and thoughts that get cut for time, or altered to fit better as the story develops. Usually just a scene or two that gets scrapped more than a whole different version. also currently trying on a few different options for how some relationships pan out in one of my fics, so some plotlines get abandoned while in wip stages I guess.

20. Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?) ashjasjfhjash ok so in Twelve Nights I’ve been having fun using a lot of callbacks to lines and being generally tropey. Eg. Dorian says “I hate you” Taren says “I don’t believe you,” as a running riff turning into Dorian saying “I care about you,” after fucking up royally and Taren saying “I don’t fucking believe you” with an entirely different tone, that one made me happy... I’ve tried to make lots of little hints to future scenes in there too. There’s background protest organization and clues to the main conflict going on in almost every chapter. The scene with Cole at the end of Ch. 6 is an obvious Shakespeare reference but that’s also kind of a reference to the fact that Cole frequently references modern media, including It’s A Wonderful Life, in Inquisition, and this is a fic that already references a bunch of christmas movie things, so that felt like it fit... Lots and lots of character building that I give far to much thought to, too.

The Merrill Sessions is nothing but me trying to analyze characters and highlight parallels lol.