#no editing or revising we die like men

[fantasyfantasygames]

Angria and Gondal

The Tale of Angria and Gondal in the Glass Town Confederacy, Exhumation Games, republished in 2004

Dungeons and Dragons is the first widely published tabletop roleplaying game... but not the first one written, nor even the first one to be distributed. So far as game historians can tell, that honor goes to The Tale, the name of a game invented and played by the Brontë sisters: Emily, Anne, Charlotte and Branwell. The game started development in or around 1826, and revolved around the fictional locales of Angria and Gondal and their inhabitants. From the Brontés' Blackwoods Young Men's Magazine (edited by "The Genius") to Far Beyond This Place, the play-by-mail game between Virginia Woolf, Sylvie Underwood, and Georgette Heyer, there was what we might now think of as a thriving underground RPG scene for nearly a hundred years.

Exhumation Games is a wife-and-wife team dedicated to the unearthing and reproduction of these earliest of game 'zines. They scan originals, track down rare reproductions, create PDFs, and place them on the Internet Archive. You can also find the two of them at conventions, selling them in booklet form at what must be very little profit if any.

The rules of The Tale are written in what we might now think of as a "Miss Manners" or FAQ kind of way. Things are a lot closer to online forum roleplaying than, say, Fate or Apocalypse World, but there are some distinguishing features that mark them as roleplaying games rather than freeform shared storytelling. Some of the rules from the Second Volume (edition) include things like:

When Telling The Tale, begin and end with a pinkie promise, so that all may know when this act has started and ended.

Good and kind Tale-Tellers do not make one another cry or shout.

When Writing The Tale, what is written cannot be unwritten, save by the agreement of all players that an error has occurred. Write with forethought.

Do not send a letter until you have received one, except to report an unexpected turn of events, after which, wait to receive two. Out-of-character missives may be sent at any time.

One cannot demand that another's character follow the events given them by history.

Mock not the words of the Genius!

The Genius shall adjudicate the greatest and most momentous of events by a means agreeable to all, or, should but one author disagree, then agreeable to all save one.

Quoits shall not be used as a method for adjudication.

Anything not described in the rules is entirely fair game. The examples of play included in The Tale show the players inventing unexpected twists, recovering memories from amnesiac characters, and even revealing that a character has returned from the dead! Players have a fair amount of authority over the world, and are expected to contribute to it.

The Genius, their GM equivalent, mostly handles disputes and compiles the new versions of the rules. Sometimes the resolution mechanics involved the skill of the players, sometimes the perceived or established skill of the characters, and sometimes pure a flip of a coin or toss of a die.

Early on, characters were described and established more or less at the whims of the sisters. As things went on, things became more formalized, so that by the 4th Official Revision each character was expected to have a biography of "not less than 75 words nor more than 150" that described their past and personality, in which key phrases were underlined in a manner very similar to HeroQuest. I really appreciate Exhumation Games publishing multiple editions of the game - it's fascinating to see how it evolved over time.

The art is entirely pen sketches, mostly of men, sometimes women, with the occasional map. The maps are sometimes even painted in with watercolors.

All in all, The Tale is a fantastic piece of RPG history. I'll see if I can review some of the later games in its lineage some day. Some games from the early days of modern RPGs don't really hold up today, but The Tale's later editions could still be played and enjoyed 200 years after they were written.

[mychemicalnations]

Six Sentence Sunday

Idea from @vcaudley, you can find the original post here!

I want to try and post more about my writing, so I'm going to be doing this weekly in theory.

To start it off, here's a little blurb from Blorbo Pandemic WIP V.4(?), not revised or edited we die like men:

My family never was “traditional,” and that needed to be established for anything else to make any sense. To start with my parents, there were four of them - technically, I had two biological parents and two stepparents, but I had lived with all four, all four had raised me from birth, and all four were married to each other. As such, I called all of them my parents, plain and simple. That said, I didn’t have a mother; I had three fathers. So, naturally, we needed a way of determining which father we were talking about, so we called Ilya “Dad,” Dave “Papa,” and Malvern was simply “Da.” The fourth parent, Valdemar, we called Atma, the affectionate form of “parent” in our ancestral language - one of our ancestral languages, really. Having four parents really lends itself to multiculturalism.

[riverdamien]

The Brave Never Die!

"Sloughing Toward Galilee!

"The Brave Never Die!"

"The brave die never, though they sleep in the dust, their courage nerves a thousand men and women!" Minot J. Savage.

"Never Allow Yourself to Be Made A  Victim, Accept  No One's Definition Of Your Life; define yourself." Harvey Fierstein.

"It is Revolutionary for any trans person to choose to be seen and visible in a world that tells us we should not exist."  Laverne Cox

---------------------------------------------------------

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition:

Mark 10: 17-27

The Rich Man

17 As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18 Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. 19 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not defraud. Honor your father and mother.’ ” 20 He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” 21 Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money[a] to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” 22 When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

23 Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” 24 And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is[b] to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” 26 They were greatly astounded and said to one another,[c] “Then who can be saved?” 27 Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

================================

Twenty years ago I was an interim pastor of a local church, and wanted to lead a new Bible study on non-violence; a parishioner, who had served in Vietnam sat down and opened the book that was chosen, and began screaming at me, really screaming and upset, for he had been wounded in Vietnam, this study was questioning who he was and what he did in his life.

Inadvertently my brainstorm of sharing a different approach to the Bible had violated this gentleman to his very core; the one thing a pastor never intentionally does. I asked his forgiveness, put the Bible study away, and never used it publicly again.

In the same manner, several years later I attended a meeting wearing clericals, and a woman minister started screaming and crying because the black clericals represented patriarchy and sexual abuse; since I have worn clericals and only colored ones.

In the months and years to come I would serve young and old homeless veterans as the one on Haight in the photo above; be in a Veterans PTSD group struggling with my issues, and assure each one of my thankfulness for their service. I remember a cousin and uncle who were veterans of World War II and Vietnam, both suffered silently from depression, and I would suggest PTSD through the years.

I do not believe in war, I do not believe in violence, but we live in a broken world, and like Mark Twain:  "Patriotism Is Supporting Your Country All the Time, And Only Your Government When It Deserves It! Mark Twain. We live in a "dirty rotten system", and my support is through caring for people who are disabled, homeless, and severely crippled.

There was a time early in my ministry when I was going through the process of being a military chaplain, but came to my senses when I admitted my being queer to myself. I could not stay in the closet! And we in our country are still struggling with letting queers in the military, especially transgenders!

In our election campaign season and on Memorial and Veteran's Day our politicians promise to eliminate homelessness among veterans on the street, and yet year after year I see the same people living in tents, unable to get their foot in the door. Several are disabled in wheelchairs, and all struggle with PTSD and other forms of mental illness, and yet they are homeless.

June is Pride Month! LGTBTQ'S celebrate they're being a presence in the world! But beneath the celebratory mood, real fear exists in parts of our country and the world. Homophobia is still alive and well in our religious institutions, government and social institutions, and our population! You should hear the comments I receive on my blog and through my email, most are telling me what a sinner I am, and what the Holy Scripture says about my way of life! My sister, a fundamentalist, will not talk to me, and canceled a meeting with me when I was back in Southeast Missouri to "clean the church," rather than to hang out with this sinner!

And so on this Memorial Day, we celebrate living veterans, queer veterans, and the deceased giving their lives for us, we celebrate their sacrifice and dedication. This Memorial Day I will take out the veterans on Polk and Haight for a meal, give them thanks for their service, and end the day by walking through the Presidio cemetery in prayer and thanksgiving!

This  June we celebrate "Pride Month", and are declaring to all who want to condemn and dehumanize LGBTQ individuals we are proud to be who we are, children of God!

We can talk about political parties, and

politicians, in their harm or no harm to individuals, but in reality, change comes only through each one of us looking at ourselves, and seeing every human being simply as a child of God, deserving of love and care without regard to sexual orientation, race, creed, and color. Change begins with you and me, and I invite you to join me in donating to the Wounded Warrier Project:

Wounded Warrior Project, P.O. Box 758516, Topeka, Kansas 66675-8516

 Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

============================

Dr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

Post Office Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

www.temenos.org

paypal.com

415-305-2124

Dr. River Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.

Director

Certificate in Drug and Alcohol Addiction

Certificate in Spiritual Direction

Certificate In Religious Trauma

(30th Anniversary Celebration!)

October 5, 2024

5:00 p.m.

Victor's Pizza

(Where Bought Youth First Pizza!)

Prayer of St. Brendan!

"Help me to journey beyond the familiar

and into the unknown.

Give me the faith to leave old ways and break fresh ground with You. Christ of the mysteries I trust in You to be stronger than each storm within me.

I will trust in the darkness and know that my times, even now, are in Your hands.

Tune my spirit to the music of heaven,

and somehow, make my obedience count for You"

------------------------------------------------

(Temenos and Dr. River seek to remain accessible to everyone. We do not endorse particular causes, political parties, or candidates, or take part in public controversies, whether religious, political or social--Our pastoral ministry is to everyone!

[z-h-i-e]

New Year Fanfic Asks (3/5)

11. Would you like to try any new fanfic genres or tropes this year?

It will be difficult to find something I haven’t done. However, there are many things I have written in the key of two Imladris Advisers, that I have not tried out with the Bling Kings, so perhaps that.

12. Will you change anything about the way you edit or rewrite this year?

Nope, I’ll still be a chaotic buttercup who posts in the middle of the night and sometimes has someone look over my shoulder and make suggestions while I’m writing, but unless there’s a ‘use a beta’ notation, these stories get posted as they are, we die like Men of Gondor, and then like fifteen years later I’ll do a revision and correct the additional typos then.

13. Aside from fanfic, are there any other fan works you’d like to try creating? Fanart, or fanvids, gifsets, or podfic? 

I’ve done fanart, will probably do more. (As of last year, I have publicly displayed artwork with one of those fancy engraved nameplates and the description of the work attached to the wall next to it, so I think more art will happen in more than one way.) Videos, unsure. I unearthed some old animations I did for the fandom a long while ago; if you’re in a discord with me you may have seen those shares. Unlikely on gifsets. Podfic – I’m working through logistics.  I do a fair amount of live reading, and I have a good microphone (with pretty colors) now, so I really should. I need people to poke me about those. 

14. Have you ever lost large chunks of your work in the past, due to not backing up your work? Will you change your methods this year?

The year was…well, it had to be either 2002 or 2003. I’m working part time, and I carry my disks with me (yes disks) that have fanfics on them. And I’ve got a few of them, including the one with the original Little Balrog with me at work.  And a student worker picked them up from the desk and set them onto the desensitiser unit–the one that demagnetizes things.  And I immediately said, ‘Well, you just ruined all of my disks,’ and we had a lesson on why one does not move things that are not theirs, and why they absolutely put nothing but books on the desensitizer (we had a different unit for the VHS tapes, because it could mess those up, too).  So I did rewrite Little Balrog, and it turned out a little different, there’s a whole part in the beginning with Elrond, Erestor, and Glorfindel having a long discussion that I just skipped rewriting.  However, that means I have been a backup the backup of the backup person since then – I have so many flash drives of everything, and paper copies, and copies in the cloud, and I don’t trust technology since then, so it’s been a good 20 year run of tech not failing.  Now, whether I can FIND the flashdrive, the disk, the CD… >.> They’re around here somewhere… I also did a fair amount of sending fics to Yahoo!Groups and then not archiving them, so that is what I’m working on, is getting things archived on AO3. 

15. Do you foresee any personal or professional obstacles this year, that would keep you from creating fanworks? 

Yeah, I’m currently trying to make a huge decision between staying in the librarian & professor camp or shifting into management. Pros and cons to both.  I have about 11 years left in my plans of how long I anticipate working before retirement (I have been in the workforce since 1995; 40 years of working seems like a fair amount in my opinion). I waffle on this on a daily basis, whether I want to continue what I’m doing for the duration, or to try one more adventure. Strangely enough, I think the latter would actually mean more free time, because what I do now is work a full time job plus a part time job, and that can be 60 or more hours a week, especially during midterms and finals.

[sage-advisor-of-gms]

Oh boy! Banter! I’m so here for this!

Arguable. The Ranger, as released at the beginning of 5e borders on unplayable, and is definitely not very fun to play. It's the only class they had to patch (twice!), which they eventually achieved by bringing the Ranger closer to how it was designed in 4e.

That’s weird. When I played a ranger for a mini arc, I had a great time with my raptor sidekick without having to consolidate the revisions. Nevertheless, to criticize the ranger class for receiving patches still leaves 9 classes on the board with a subclass total of 38, and that’s if you lump all the circles of land together and solely consult the PHB. Also, are we allowed to start talking about the edition that was so bad that we collectively chose to treat it like fight club?

Not to mention, 5e flattened several choices and took away others. You cannot make a martial healer, or a knight distinguishable from both Paladin and Fighter, or a purely psionic caster. All of those options were available in previous editions.

True story: one of the players in a group that has became regular’s at my table ask if we could do an all-monk one shot. I wait for the two players to veto it only to hear them jump on board. One played the way of the elements, one played Tasha’s healing monk, and one played Xanathar’s sun soul. The issue arose when they had too much fun knocking my fools around that they turn my one shot into a two shot. Same group made a band of bards for another supposed one shot, all from different colleges. We all had too much fun and my one shot turn into a short campaign.

And please don't say "just flavor it differently" or "just homebrew it", I see an attitude like that as a major problem. It lets WotC off the hook for designing a shallow game experience.

Got it. We’re not going to glorify Bethesda’s current business model. You and me are on the same page. I will adhere to your taboo rule and will not utter those phrases. Instead I will refer to any instance of those concepts with the video game terminology of ‘Mods’.

The Mystic didn't work, in my opinion, because they tried to cram every single D&D idea of psionics into a single class. MCDM Productions has since approached the idea and created The Talent, which works pretty well for what it's supposed to do.

Wait, I thought we just agreed on no mods. Why does this hyperlink take me to a supplement store with a 14.99 price tag? Is this comic from Marvel or DC? Are you an affiliate marketer? What the return policy in the event that my DM won’t allow me to roll my mystical man and begs me to just go with one of Tasha’s Psionics classes?

I honestly don't see what the problem with that is. Aren't subclasses supposed to add unique mechanics and aesthetics? The aforementioned MCDM Productions was able to do that not once but three times (yes they made two more classes, which are also very well designed). I won't even mention how many well-balanced, interesting classes are available on Dungeon Master's Guild.

I’ll provide an example. So hypothetically, you have hired me on to create a new D&D 5e class to solve the issue of only one class edition. I’m going to save the Kineticist for the final point and say that I’m building this class so that I can finally my SpiderDrow. Now I need three subclasses.

…

Well this is quite the conundrum that I’ve written myself into. Technically I should have one subclass down because it the Spider-Man that I want to play. But do I then make two additional arachnids sub-classes so that players can choose a crab or scorpion route? Or do I base the subclasses off of the spider mens of the multiverse?

This all has to be addressed before I get to question like: What hit die do I use? How do I convey web slinging and web swinging? If they got bit by a magical spider, would that just make them sorcerers? If they built their gear, doesn’t that make them artificer?

May I interest you in the Kineticist in these trying times?

“You can certainly try.” -Matthew Mercer

Pathfinder 2E is in general a pretty decent counterpoint, too: they've been releasing new classes pretty often. Two more are in the playtest as we speak!

Seriously, I looked over the link provided. However, the sudden shift of language due to the presentation of different mechanics hinder me from really enjoying the possibility of playing a Kineticist. And since mods are not allowed in our scenario, the solution to playing a class not found in D&D 5e becomes switching over to Pathfinder 2e.

So, I logged in to my Roll 20 account and decided to search for a Pathfinder 2e game to play on the a free slot that I had on Saturday. That specific search brought up 0 games. I decided to just run the broadest search for Pathfinder 2e on Roll 20 just to ensure that the site wasn’t malfunctioning. I found 4 games that were playing Pathfinder 2e. For comparison, when I put in a basic search for D&D 5e, I received 8 full pages of open games plus a ninth page that contained the overflow of games.

If we’re holding TTRPGs systems in a similar standard as the console wars, I’ll admit that there are some things that Pathfinder 2e does better than Dungeons and Dragons 5e. In terms of mechanics, pathfinder has a much more complex system that allows for more diverse options. However, that same complexity could also be serving as its low audience engagement. The majority of people tend to believe that the D&D 5e system is easier to understand. Adding the influential factor that D&D recieves as a named brand (Stranger Things, Critical Roll, Gravity Falls, Community), D&D gains an audience base that outnumbers Pathfinder. In my opinion, Pathfinder 2e ‘longer official class list’ falls to the sunk fallacy cost when an individual has to invest more time learning an advanced system only to find out that hardly anyone else is playing the system.

Now that D&D 5.5 is drawing nearer... Could we perhaps admit that it's pretty weird there was only one base class released outside of the Player's Handbook throughout the entire lifespan of 5e?

[obeysme]

NSFW and sfw headcannons for a relationship with Simeon and diavlo? Boys a adorable but I feel like they arent someone to mess with 😅😅 Your writing is legendary btw♡♡

relationship headcanons for simeon are here.

i adore diavolo to bits, it’s a travesty that i haven’t written anything for him. at least i have now! warning for explicit sexual content under the read more; if you’re a minor, do not interact with this post or you’ll be blocked.

* SFW.

being in a relationship with the future king of hell has its benefits; diavolo showers you in lavish gifts and trips, taking you to the best establishments in the devildom and showing you around

he’s a romantic and has you swooning without even meaning to; he compliments you often, practically waxing poetic about how wonderful you are and how happy he is that you’re his and vice versa

likes to surprise you often; if it’s your birthday, for instance, you can bet that he’ll throw you a surprise party at his castle. even if there’s no occasion, he’ll reserve a table at ristorante six without your prior knowledge, in the hopes of seeing you light up when he takes you there

the kind of sap who stares at you from across the room, especially when you don’t know it, and smiles softly to himself at how lovely his partner is

not at all the jealous type; he’s confident in himself, as well as your relationship

that said, he can be a little possessive in the sense that he enjoys seeing you in clothes he bought for you or having you on his arm at parties, so everyone knows that you’re with him

doesn’t mind public displays of affection, quite the opposite in fact; he likes linking arms with you or wrapping an arm around your waist, kissing you briefly on the cheek or mouth, and giving you the occasional hug

when tired or stressed, he wants nothing more than to rest his hand in your lap and close his eyes for a little while; his tense shoulders relax the moment you run your fingers through his hair

he’s curious about you and what your life is like in the human world, listening to whatever you’re willing to tell him about yourself with rapt attention. he recalls everything you’ve told him perfectly, from your favourite colour to the name and breed of your pet

* NSFW.

has a fairly high libido, so expect multiple orgasms in one night

if you didn’t have a praise kink before, you just might have one now; praise drips from diavolo’s tongue like honey—he’ll tell you how wonderful you look spread out beneath him, how good you’re making him feel, how he’d been thinking about this for some time now

makes eye contact with you whenever possible, looking at you adoringly; he doesn’t want it to feel cold and impersonal, he wants to know he’s doing this with you and ensure you remember that too

loves to hoist you onto his lap and thrust up into you; he enjoys hearing you whine so close to his ear, leaning back to see your face twitch and twist in pleasure

prone to mischief and teasing; don’t be surprised if he suddenly takes your arm and guides you away from his own party to have his way with you in a nearby room

quite talented with his mouth, he’ll go down on you for as long as you like

would love to christen his throne with you (because come on, the king of hell has to have a throne), whether by having you service him on your knees or seating you on his lap

very adventurous in bed and always up to try anything at least once; he’s open to what you like or want to try out, and he’ll let you know the same with no hesitation or shame

[cosmicallyavg]

okay besties as an ace person i never would have thought in a million years that i would be capable of wanting to write a ✨ mature ✨ fic, let alone actually Writing said fic. but i am fr so close to publishing one and im very proud of myself bc this shit is so good even though it took me like 4 months to write (bc im So awkward about this stuff that i had to take lots of breaks or else i would have combusted) like its certainly not Explicit but it is Mature i would say.. like when i tag it on ao3 i think i can do mature and be okay. just know that i am so proud of myself for doing this and im so excited to post it very soon 

[lowestechelonabomination]

9, 12 and 13 specifically for gin and akutagawa

i cant put it knto words just. them helping akutagawa through a panic attack (based on dazai abusing him).......hnbnmbjhnbshbng

I'm going to go with just 9 because I'm deeply lazy and also don't know how to accurately write panic attacks due to me being, well, me. I mean I can write the panic attacks I've had, but they're far from normal and also not very interesting. anyway yeah, here you go. instead of a panic attack you're getting uh...fatigue? depression? I don't know, just take it. somehow every time I try writing fluff it turns into angst instead. also I haven't actually written anything in literal months and am too lazy to properly edit this, so this will be far from masterpiece quality or anything, but whatever. enjoy I guess

It was one of those days.

He realized it the moment he woke up to nothing. His eyes dragged open, slowly, and even that seemingly simple action drained whatever little of him was left. The hollow heaviness in his chest weighed him down far more than usual, and as he blankly stared upward through the semi-darkness at his grayish and barren ceiling, he found that an overbearing force was pulling the rest of him down as well, pressing him into his bedsheets with an even, crushing pressure focused in that one spot in his chest. His breathing came slowly, and with it came a spreading, bone-deep cold and a heavy fog within his skull.

It was one of those days, where he looked inside himself and found a yawning emptiness instead, an abyss that drained him until he found himself unable--no, unwilling--to do anything. One of those days where not a single force, not even antigravity, could stop him from sinking slowly downwards. Eventually he'd hit the bottom, from where he could push himself back up, but the weight on every atom of his being was insurmountable in limbo.

Distantly, he registered the door quietly sliding open, followed by soft, nearly imperceptible footsteps he never would have noticed had he not been raised to do so.

He didn't turn his head--couldn't, really, not when everything was as agonizingly, numbingly heavy as it was--not even when the footsteps paused to the left of him. He vaguely felt their presence looming over them, their image but a blur in the shadow of the night.

"You're awake."

And so were they.

He slowly, slowly dragged his unfocused gaze over to where they stood, the motion only causing the heaviness to push him further into its murky depths.

A slow sigh--not his.

"It's one of those days, isn't it?"

He didn't respond. He didn't need to.

"I--" They broke off. The pause rang out in the silence, interspersed by the sound of them shifting around. They sighed again, something he wished he could do, past the weight in his chest. "Do...do you want to talk about it?"

He let his head drop to the side.

"...yeah, I should have known." The sentence carried more meaning than it seemed.

Another long pause stretched out between them. He stared past them at an invisible spot in the shrouded distance. Faintly, he realized he was shaking.

"You're cold. I'll get you a blanket. The weighted one."

He looked up at them and tried to find his voice beneath where it was buried, but to no avail. He let his eyes drop down again. As they slipped out of the room, more silently than how they'd entered, he found that the cold had buried itself deeper within him than before, and that the fog in his head had begun pressing against his skull from the inside. He realized he wanted to curl into himself, but couldn't find it in him to move a single limb.

They soon returned, and with them came a new, warmer weight that was draped over him in the dark.

"Please get some sleep. You've slept for less than three hours in the past three days, and..." They sighed. "Just go to sleep this time around. Remember that I can hear your breathing change." He heard them turn to leave. "I'll be out here if you need me."

As they softly padded toward the door, he found just enough in him to open his mouth. "Gin..." he said, and trailed off, not having the energy for anything else nor knowing what to do with the weight of the words or the weight of the world on his shoulders.

"I know," they gently replied in the shadowed distance. "I know."

The door quietly slid closed.

Before he could register it happening, his eyelids slowly shut, and he fell into a dreamless sleep.

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

tonight's editing vibes: it's super cool what you can do with Very Few Words ngl

[gillockhart]

fresh meat

“... If all else fails darling, I’ll move into your guest house and become your badly behaved pool boy.” @sofiazabini

All else had failed, or so it had felt, and like a perfect storm of designer luggage and a magnum bottle of Moët, Gilderoy had appeared on the doorstep of Zabini Manor with a tale of woe, cow-eyes that even little Gerald’s farmer father might have marvelled at and the inherent understanding that neither of those things were at all necessary, for Sofia would never have dreamt of turning him away.

Never had turned him away, as was the case.

Two years later, and it had never even been a question.

Work trips were a mere page break in their accepted status quo, an occasional foray out of town that always ended with him returning as per usual, designer luggage and absurdly expensive gifts in tow to impress upon his best girl. Except, of course, that his usual sweeping grand entrance, a bag packed full of Lapis Lazuli and garnets and pearls and emeralds and his head full of grand stories of the skies and the sand and a bay of stars, were met with decidedly less fanfare than usual.

Insomuch as there was precisely none at all.

Gilderoy paused in the empty entryway, setting his bag down at his side and tipping his sunglasses atop his head to glance bewilderedly around the silent corners and to the House Elf staring at him with adoring eyes from beside the door. “Helena, sweetling,” her eyes glittered in the dim afternoon light, “What is going on?”

He didn’t have to voice the question that read so clearly upon his bewildered face; Why is nobody paying attention to me?

“Mr. Lockhart! Madame Zabini is entertaining her male suitor,” Helena whispered in barely more than a squeak, her large eyes wide and shining with adoration for him and Heavens had he taught her well, she was a most efficient little gossip. “They’re in the mast—”

Wednesday. It was Wednesday.

Well.

“Thank you Helena darling,” he assured her cheerfully, easing his jacket off his shoulders and tossing it to her directly before stooping to press a kiss to the top of her forehead, “I don’t know what I’d do without you. How many times must I ask you to call me Gilderoy?”

Helena fussed and twisted her little house elf dress, stammering, “I couldn’t possibly”s up at him and Gilderoy beamed, squaring his shoulders and eyeing the staircase ahead. Flirting with Sofia’s staff could wait.

He had a scene to make.

Taking the stairs two steps at a time he sailed through the upper floor, gracefully navigating the familiar halls that had become his home and pushing unceremoniously through the elegant double doors of the Master Suite. “Honey,” he announced himself grandly, delighting in the way that the couple entwined in the bed so quickly uncoupled at the unceremonious interruption and cheerfully sweeping across the room to throw himself into the middle of the bed, bouncing cheerfully in place before wiggling up towards the headboard, sending Sofia’s new and untested beau scrambling towards the outer edges, “I’m home.”

Sofia’s head emerged first, caught between exasperation and delight before veering towards the latter, meeting his eyes for a solid moment to debate silently with the mirth brimming in his eyes. He could see how badly she wanted to scold him, but her lips were already twitching vigorously against her attempts to hold back her laughter. At the outer edges of her monstress king bed, the damned soul she’d lured into her bed for the price of a glittering ring had the bad luck of gasping, “Who is that?”

Gilderoy’s head turned and a predatory gaze settled upon the man in question, assessing his bedhead and flushed face and objectively beautiful bone structure (Sofia would never settle for anything less than exquisite) before turning back to Sofia, pointedly ignoring the question as he clucked his tongue softly, “Oh, no, he won’t do at all, darling.”

“He’ll be a Duke,” she replied, a challenging arch of her eyebrows entirely swallowed by the wicked smile thrown his way as he wedged his way purposefully between the two lovebirds, crossing his legs elegantly at the ankles and ignoring the panicked way her beau was teetering near the edge of the bed now.

“That hairline,” he sighed.

“His Gringotts Vault holds a King’s ransom,” she contended, blatantly ignoring the protest that rose from the other side of the bed.

“Timid,” Gilderoy replied with a cutting glance sidewards, watching for a moment as this Duke scrambled with the sheets to cover himself, “It’s like watching a newly born deer try to find it’s feet. I can’t imagine any of that is at all satisfying.”

“I’m not a—” the man protested, burning with embarrassment, but was loudly hushed before Gilderoy’s eyes turned back to Sofia, amused.

She gave him a pointed look.

“I missed you, darling,” he offered cheerfully, leaning over to smack a kiss against her cheek before turning to repeat the process to her bewildered and decidedly mortified new groom. “I must insist on no more shotgun weddings whilst I’m away on business, you know how much I love to give a toast.”

With a wink he rolled off the bed, sauntering happily back towards the doors now that he’d established his dominance with a delighted, “Carry on. I’ll see the both of you at dinner,” he hesitated only a moment at the door, sticking his head back inside to add, “Don’t forget to warn him about the orgies, darling,” before happily swanning away to the charming peals of her laughter.

Fresh meat was always the most satisfying.

[peypeycookie]

“It’s Slommi.” She spits blood at the man’s feet as more flows from her nose, down her chin. “Slommi Farraway, Captain of The Fortune. And I’m going to fucking kill you.”

He examines the blood. The toe of his shoe kicks the ground to shake off some spittle that splattered the clean white. The obvious moment of hesitation– consideration, almost-- grew the salty air heavier. To kill the Captain, finish off the Farraway bloodline once and for all, with no worries as far as the seas stretched the landscape; or allow the slightest opening of possibility, chance, for this girl to grow stronger, as worthy competition. The deflation of killing the fameless. He sucks his cheek in, golden eyes finding the ravenous girl once more before crouching in front of her. A hand, unexpectedly soft to the touch, grips her chin. He looks at her.

“Yeah… yeah, you definitely have my temper.”

Slommi slaps his hand away. Her chest heaves heavy breaths. Her vision blurs.

He stands up, steps back, looks at her once more, and grins.

“Cassius Ironglade. Captain of The Devil’s Nightmare. Remember the name. Though for your sake, I’m sure you won’t forget it.”

I’m going to fucking kill you.

[billiewena]

since I never made a post for these, here are all of MY ideal endings for sam (and how I would do them) that I spite-wrote after a coworker told me about how perfect his finale was <3

HUNTER NETWORK ENDING: Sam establishes an official network for the American hunters, leading a new generation of hunters as the antithesis of John Winchester. One of the final shots is a montage of all the hunters working and saving people all across the country, proving the Winchesters are no longer alone in the world.

SAMWITCH ENDING: Sam becomes a full-fledged witch thanks to all the magic supplies he inherited from Rowena and blends hunting/witch shenanigans. He can still be powerful but now he gets to choose where that power comes from. Okay this is basically Goldenrod Revisions, leave me alone.

SEPARATE WAYS ENDING: Sam and Dean both alive but living / hunting apart, going their separate ways like a parent and child who is finally leaving the nest. Sam gets the independence he always wanted while also getting to keep his brother in his life, because this is the ultimate proof that Dean trusts him. For the first time, they can move on without the reason being the other is dead. They no longer doubt they will always be there for each other even if they’re not living under the same roof anymore. The episode ends with Sam breaking into Dean’s [insert post-finale residence of choice here] in a callback to the pilot, saying he was in the area for a hunt. The last lines are Sam asking if he wanted to reunite for the hunt for old’s time sake and Dean saying “looks we got work to do.”

PODCASTER ENDING: Sam starts a podcast about the supernatural discussing urban American legends, myths, and mysteries that also helps viewers know what to look for and maybe even teaches them to defend themselves. Some take it as fiction, some use what he tells them to save their lives. It hits the top of the paranormal/mystery charts. The Ghostfacers, whose attempt to get into podcasting failed, ARE livid.

THEY BOTH DIE AT THE END: Sam and Dean both die in a blaze of glory, sacrificing themselves to defeat Chuck and bring back the rest of the world. They both get a moment to say an emotional goodbye to Jack and to each other. The two get a massive hunter’s funeral where all the past hunters come to mourn them and talk about their impact. Jody’s speech probably makes us cry. They get to Heaven at the same time, where they are greeted by all their past friends and family at the Roadhouse. On Earth, they live on forever as urban legends and heroes.

SAM & ROWENA ENDING: Sam says #FuckHeaven and spends his afterlife in hell as the consort to Queen Rowena, drinking margaritas all day, living his best life and stopping any demon uprisings in their tracks. Anytime they give him a hard time, he reminds them that he was Azazel’s boyking and they’re just Random Demon #489. What are THEY doing with their life.

SAM & EILEEN ENDING #1 - MARRIED HUNTER LIFE EDITION: Sam and Dean both survive and continue to hunt / live together, except now Eileen and Castiel are around and live in the bunker with them too after Cas was saved in [insert Empty rescue scenario of your choice.] Sam has some deja vu to the vision he had of all four of them living together in 15x09. He realizes that this is actually real and not a vision; that they are actually together, at peace and beat Chuck. The episode ends with them going to have the movie night that they never got to have in the vision. As Eileen takes his hand to go to the movie room, you see two engagement rings on their hands. Sam realizes that his journey may have started with losing Jessica but he found love again, and that while once upon a time all he and Eileen wanted was revenge, they’ve finally both found peace.

SAFE HOUSE ENDING: Sam starts a trauma center/safe house situation for hunters and ex-monsters to recover and heal, dedicating his life to proving that no one is beyond saving and everyone can redeem themselves and defy fate like he had. Mia Vallens, the shapeshifting grief counselor, is on payroll.

SAM IS THE AUTHOR NOW ENDING: Sam narrates the finale the same way Chuck did for the original series finale "Swan Song", further proving that they are now in control in their story. We get Sam's POV as he tells us what happened to all the other hunters and side characters, as well as him and his brother, with flashbacks from all fifteen seasons and young Sam & Dean growing up together. The episode ends with the reveal that Sam actually finishing the journal entries for the Winchester family's edition of the Men of Letters Bestiary, putting the finishing touches on some monster entries and his own personal anecodotes. He treats the Bestiary like a journal, in a callback to After-School Special where Sam almost became a writer and wrote about his and his family's hunting stories.

BABY JACK ENDING: Sam raises Baby!Jack after he is de-aged and “falls” to Earth in the same fashion the angel Anna once did. Baby!Jack wears overalls that don’t say his name in giant letters because Sam is a good parent who would never do that to his child. The two have a happy life as an adopted father/son duo who defied everything Lucifer and Heaven wanted them to be.

SAM & EILEEN ENDING #2 - EUROTRIP EDITION: Sam going on a year-long vacation around the world now that he has a cool Irish girlfriend who is not afraid of planes, leading to a fun exploration of the supernatural in foreign countries. Who is Dean.

DOG SHELTER OWNER: Sam owns a dog shelter and gets to walk at least ten dogs a day. Jack helps out and Miracle is the HBIC. Life is good.

CHUCK WINS ENDING: Sam lives and Dean dies, Sam throws a funeral for him that no one attends but him and a dog, and moves to the suburbs to live a generic white picket fence life with an unidentifiable wife. As a montage of Sam’s life plays, the camera pans away what looks like a computer and Chuck’s old office. A string of quotes can be heard in the background (“we’re just hamsters running around in a cage” “what would you rather have: peace or freedom?” “I can do anything...I’m a writer” “We will never give you the ending that you want / We’ll see”). The final shot is Jack, dressed in Chuck’s clothes and glasses and using his mannerisms, typing away at a typewriter. He writes “The End” but punctuates it with a question mark instead of a period. His computer screen and our TV screen both go black.

[runawaymarbles]

7, 15, and 18 for the ask meme?

Weird Writing Ask Meme

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

It's hard to narrow it down, but one of my favorite parts-- that's a genuine pure favorite and never makes me want to bang my head against a wall-- is when I find unexpected ways to bring things I'm interested in together. When I realize that a weirdly niche rabbit hole I went down a few years ago could suddenly be plot relevant, or some analogy lines up to something else I'm doing. (Getting to bring Caravaggio's Artichoke Toss into a GO fic or when I was binging Myths and Legends's Arthuria episodes and realizing it worked perfectly with an x-men fic I was struggling with, etc.)

15. Do you write in the margins of your books? Dog-ear your pages? Read in the bath? Why or why not? Do you judge people who do these things? Can we still be friends?

It depends on the book. I don't dog-ear pages, and I don't write in hardbacks, but I've been known to underline paperbacks. I will read hardbacks in the bath if they're not too long. If I saw someone writing in an old book or a fist edition or something I might have a moment of "aaaahhh!" but I don't hold mass market books as inherently precious

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.

“Our traditional design ties together the partners’ initials with the blue line of Life and the deer of Death... For where Life goes, Death always follows; and where Death goes, Life continues. Theirs is the most profound of bonds, and one we try to emulate with each marriage.”

(From The Mixtape, Or: Six Things You Learn in Thursday School)

I spent a lot of time revising the bits of "scripture" in this fic, because I was trying to walk the line between what I could imagine someone treating as sacred text-- looking for meanings, lessons, comfort, etc-- and what would be funny for the reader who knows the actual plot of Supernatural. (Especially for those reading it during the pandemic: I still think that the Council of Nicea equivalent being the "Teleconference of Lawrence" is funny. That's also why settlements are called "pods" in this fic.)

Originally, this passage was explaining how Castiel was the Angel of Death-- the joke being that he doesn't cause people to die, but that he is in the more literal sense Dean's angel. But I figured he'd need a job or purpose to be of ritual significance. And since one of his main functions in the canonical narrative was to angel ex machina Sam and Dean out of trouble and/or back to life and be a celestial badaid, the Life/healing connection seemed natural-- but I also didn't want to make it seem like he and Death were at odds, each racing to see who got to someone first. So instead they're following each other around (as they did in canon) in the ciiiiiiircle of life. Of course, something that's overlooked by the characters who came up with the wedding rituals is that if they're constantly following each other they are never actually connecting (as they didn't in canon.) .....I'm now realizing that I could have worked in a joke about Schroedinger's box: the only place Life and Death can successfully stop and rest. Alas. I tried to keep the Angel of Death as one of Life's alternate names but between the conflation of Dean/Death/Hell/Heaven/Purgatory and Cas/Life and merging John-Chuck and Sam-Jack another name was going to make me lose track of what's going on, much less the poor suckers reading this.

Anyway it's all very Deep and Symbolic except that they think Dean's impala is a literal deer, they've forgotten what neckties are, and they used the phrase "profound bond" in conversation. Also the irony that Dean and Cas's frankly deranged, unstable, and occasionally toxic friendship rife with communication issues has been warped in the historical record as something that should be emulated in a stable marriage.

This whole fic was really an exercise in what jokes I could imagine a specific priest I know saying with gravitas and full sincerity.

[riverdamien]

Let's Dance!

Lets Dance!

Luke 16:19-31

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

The Rich Man and Lazarus

19 “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. 20 And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21 who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. 22 The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham.[a] The rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades, where he was being tormented, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side.[b] 24 He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in agony in these flames.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things and Lazarus in like manner evil things, but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. 26 Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’ 27 He said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— 28 for I have five brothers—that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ 30 He said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ 31 He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”

---------------------------------------------

"Richsplaining is when a person who hasn't experienced poverty gives you patronizing advice on how to get out of poverty."

------------------------------

People who love are never strangers to each other. We discover this whenever  we are thrown together with generous souls in a crisis, for we dance together as equals in the dance of life.

        Today as I walked down Van Ness, and came back to Polk Street my heart grieved as I saw the pain of people sleeping in tents, in blankets or nothing,wearing dirty clothes all along both streets.

    One woman sitting in a tent shared with me her recent diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, and was told she would be able to go to San Francisco General in her last weeks. Her response was she simply wanted pain killing drugs and she wanted to die on the street, she did not want to be treated as an object.

    People who  are homeless, and the very poor are richsplained, patronized by people who have not experienced poverty, and who simply tell them how and where they should live or what they should do.

    When I found myself on the streets in the midst of poverty, violence, being raped, beat up, and treated like nothing by the police and everyone else because I was a "sex worker", a queer and homeless, my eyes were opened to "Richsplaining"!

    Until we have walked in the same "moccasins" as others, we truly do not understand.

I have come to understand that when I expect people who are housed and have money to change I too am "Richsplaining".

To dance the dance of life, we must look at ourselves, and break through that which separates  Lazarus and the rich man. It is hard, difficult because we have to let go of our thinking and opinions and dance the dance of love, walking in the moccasins of the other.

Gloria Steinem once said: "The first problem of all of us men and women, is not to learn but to unlearn."

And a part of unlearning is to remind ourselves  that until you go through the struggles of being queer, black, poor and homeless, than hold back, be our friend. Never think you truly understand! Be our allies!

When we walk by homeless on the street, not pay attention, and not seeing their suffering, one is "Richsplaining". To ignore the suffering is "Richsplaining!

When we think we know the answers to people of color, queer people, and are white and straight we are "Richsplaining".

When we quote the Bible, or tell people they are wrong in their belief and that other religions are not right, for "my" religion is the only one, we are "Richsplaining".

When we are not a professional in a chosen field and from simply reading about a subject and diagnose and give a professional opinion on others we are "Richsplaining".

Jesus was clear in the central tenet of  his faith: "Love on another."

We can continue on our path of being the "rich man", or we can struggle and fight and try to walk in the shoes of Lazarus.

The Gospel is clear, we can "Love one another," we can "try" and we can change ever so slowly. I have placed my life upon on the power of Jesus, in my life to walk in the path of love, and to seek to treat people equally, I fail time and again. I bear the scars in my journey, I was recently hurt, and my PTSD has flared but I believe with all of my heart that love, the love of God, the God of many faces, is the only way in this life and the next.

Come with me in "unlearning" become as a child, and walk equally with all. Eckhart Tolle says "Life is the dancer and you are the dance", so be the dance of love! Join me in "trying"! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Commoners_Communion

Strahan Coleman

Coronavirus rates are rising again! Wear your masts in crowds, and public transportation!

While for many the virus may simply be like a cold, but the death rate is rising, I recently held the hand of a young  person dying, so know that we each have a responsibility to one another!

---------------------

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

punkpriest1@gmail.com

www.temenos.org

.

[cto10121]

Does R&J Play With Gender Stereotypes?

So I came across this piece of meta by @hamliet that rather intrigued me:

There’s also another layer here: the imagery Romeo uses for Juliet (the sun) and that Juliet uses for Romeo (the moon) is the inverse of how imagery was typically presented in those days. The moon was feminine; the sun, masculine. Even if we look at Romeo and Juliet’s respective character traits, Romeo is the flighty, impulsive, love-struck one who cries all the time, while Juliet is the decisive, bold, and loyal one. That’s the first thing Juliet declares to Romeo in the balcony scene: that she will always be loyal, and she shows this in every choice she makes in the story.

Let’s break this down.

“the imagery Romeo uses for Juliet (the sun) and that Juliet uses for Romeo (the moon) is the inverse of how imagery was typically presented in those days. The moon was feminine; the sun, masculine.”

Romeo does indeed call Juliet the sun, but Juliet never calls Romeo the moon—or likens him with anything symbolically feminine, come to think of it. The closest she or the play gets is a small but clear association with night: Romeo has “night’s cloak to hide me from their eyes” and Juliet implores “loving, black-browed” night to give her her Romeo. Even then it is so that he can “make the face of heaven so fine / That all the world will be in love with night / And pay no worship to the garish sun.”

Instead, Juliet consistently uses the same love language of authority as Romeo does with her, calling him her lord, husband, knight, “day-in-night,” “mansion of a love,” “god of my idolatry,” and, (my particular favorite), “tassel-gentle” or “falcon.” “Pilgrim” is the lowest social rank she uses, but of course she is following Romeo’s pilgrim-and-saints flirtation and its wink-wink bilingual allusion to his name. Romeo’s use of “sun,” then, could be viewed in the context of both lovers conferring cosmic/earthly authority, beauty, ownership, and sovereignty to each other—the Elizabethan equivalent of calling each other wife/husband. And of course they begin doing that immediately after they marry.

Even if we look at Romeo and Juliet’s respective character traits, Romeo is the flighty, impulsive, love-struck one who cries all the time, while Juliet is the decisive, bold, and loyal one.

Definitely not. Romeo is plenty decisive and bold—making the first move in wooing Juliet, climbing the orchard wall, showing himself to Juliet, immediately agreeing to marry her, nearly killing himself when he thinks Juliet might not take him back and, er, actually killing himself for her. I wouldn’t say he is impulsive, either—though he makes decisions fairly quickly, it is almost always with some deliberation beforehand (“Can I go forward when my heart is here?” “Shall I hear more or shall I speak at this?” and his monologue after Mercutio’s exit) and of course there are instances in which he restrains himself (“I am too bold” and his monologue after Mercutio’s death). The most accurate description of Romeo is that he is a risk taker—at least when he is well and truly motivated. And even then it does not rob his deliberation or even his wits.

He is also not flighty. In fact, he proves just as loyal as Juliet—as soon as he meets her, he forgets about Rosaline and leaves her clear behind. He doesn’t once waver in his conviction that Juliet is for him and makes plans to die with her (and does!). His love for Rosaline is clearly framed by the narrative as shallow, performative, and passive, and the verse bears this out. He was never in any kind of relationship with Rosaline—his love was an unrequited crush that he was at perfectly liberty to have ditched, frankly. After that, it’s Juliet, Juliet, Juliet until he dies.

Also, once more, Romeo is no crybaby. He explicitly cries a total of two times—one even before the events of the play, when he pines over Rosaline under a grove of sycamore, and another when he’s 1) seen Mercutio get mortally wounded, 2) killed Tybalt, 3) learned that he is banished from the city, and 4) mistakenly believed that Juliet no longer wants him (the Nurse’s reply is vague enough to be misinterpreted); at the very least he is devastated to have been the cause of her pain. Anyone would break down in those circumstances. Juliet herself breaks down on hearing the news and arguably is more verbally vehement than Romeo—namely, that even the words “Romeo is banishèd” are worse than if herself, Romeo, her parents, and Tybalt were dead. She ends that monologue with a passive suicide threat: “And Death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!” How anyone can argue Juliet isn’t as lovestruck as Romeo is beyond me.

What Shakespeare was most likely aiming for was showing the mutuality of R&J’s love with parallel scenes and even language. Both have chances to act strong, decisive, and bold, both show vulnerability and great emotion and passion, both are lovestruck. Both demonstrate so-called “masculine” and “feminine” traits, which is almost always culturally-and time-based, anyway. There are only a few key differences between the two—almost all of the above traits, however, they both share. It’s almost as if…Shakespeare understood that no man or woman had all masculine or all feminine traits.

Moving on to the conclusion:

In other words, Shakespeare was deliberately playing with gender and its stereotypes in the play, which gains an even more interesting layer to it when you consider that Shakespeare was himself almost certainly bisexual (his sonnets are preeeetty explicit). It’s not a patriarchal narrative; it can well be seen as a queer narrative in a patriarchal society. And it shouldn’t take two kids having to kill themselves to get society to realize how effed up it is. It isn’t an out-of-touch play, but instead one extremely relevant to our society 500+ years later. 

In other words, Shakespeare was deliberately playing with gender and its stereotypes in the play, which gains an even more interesting layer to it when you consider that Shakespeare was himself almost certainly bisexual (his sonnets are preeeetty explicit).

You just opened up 200+ years of fandom wank, OP. I’ll just do a quick sum-up.

The Sonnets are a complete mess. They are contradictory as hell, there is clearly more than one persona speaking, there is evidence that Shakespeare edited and revised them, evidence they were published with his permission, quite a few sonnets are based on pre-existing sources, and, most damnably of all, none of the most likely candidates for the so-called Fair Youth and Dark Lady fit the narrative of the Sonnets perfectly or even satisfactorily—if there is even a clear narrative to these things to begin with. Sonnets were artificial works whose clichés and conventions were heavily satirized in Shakespeare’s own works—Berowne’s own rant-y sonnet swearing he would never believe in love sonnets comes most readily to mind. They were usually not meant to denote an actual real-life relationship, although there was a kind of “game” in trying to figure out which parts are true and which ones fiction. At least one sonnet sequence had a completely fictional addressee (Fulke Greville, I think).

Shakespeare’s sonnets do break a lot of these rules and conventions, and radically, and as they seem to have been compiled over many years, they lend themselves to autobiographical speculation. But, as a bit of a poet myself, I feel this: No one writes 154 sonnets—plus a whole narrative poem!—to one lover or even multiple lovers. Poetry is much less personal than laypeople think. Outside the sonnets, Shakespeare is not linked to any man romantically, and, besides his wife, only to two women (unnamed citizen’s wife and Jane Devanant).

Even if we assume Shakespeare’s bi, though, that doesn’t mean R&J is a queer narrative, which brings us to…

It’s not a patriarchal narrative; it can well be seen as a queer narrative in a patriarchal society.

A queer narrative that has its lovers express their love through the language of heterosexual marriage (husband, lord, wife, lady, pilgrim/saint), and commit suicide by a chalice-and-blade symbolism that mimics heterosexual sex (Romeo drinking a “cup” of poison and Juliet stabbing herself with Romeo’s dagger. Freud couldn’t have done it better). If Shakespeare was thinking “gay allegory!!!” he would have had to at least change or erase the symbolism (straight coding?) of the double suicide, or have Juliet attribute to Romeo explicitly feminine imagery. He would have to have done some major plot rejiggering. He would have had to, in short, change the whole story.

(Unless by “queer narrative” you mean “anything that has an emotionally constipated male lead who doesn’t growl sexily and a female lead who doesn’t cry/faint at the drop of a hat.” That’d be most every narrative, lol.)

Also, I’m hard-pressed to think of love romances that are 100% patriarchal narratives, and those that do (Casablanca, maybe?) are not really true ones, anyway. Patriarchy inherently opposes all romances of love and sex, including heterosexual. It demands that men be raised as soldiers to kill enemies, slaughtered, and discarded, and women as chattel and land to be bought and sold. Marriage was that transferral of property. Having children is necessary, not out of love and care for them, but to propagate the species and create even more future warriors and womb incubators. It grudgingly accepts only (mostly straight and like maybe 1 or 2 gay) love narratives that can be subsumed into this narrow paradigm, but the tension of interpretation is always present. Ideally, it prefers to ignore, diminish, scorn and mock, or even suppress them. I suspect most people’s problems and discomfort with R&J stem from this pathology, this deep-seated unease over anything that touches on human experience patriarchy can’t quite control or subsume.

Shakespeare was obviously no lover of patriarchy (in his personal life, though…well, it’s debatable). His plays resist it greatly to various degrees, and R&J is no exception. R&J hews much closer to the reality of heterosexual love and love in general, which are informed by, though are not inherently tied to, patriarchy (as are gay relationships, sadly). Shakespeare is just being a good writer in throwing most of that rotten apple away; it doesn’t apply to what he was trying to do, anyway. R&J’s challenge to patriarchy, though, is heterosexual in nature.

And it shouldn’t take two kids having to kill themselves to get society to realize how effed up it is. It isn’t an out-of-touch play, but instead one extremely relevant to our society 500+ years later. 

True dat.

[lastsonlost]

All this over the Japanese liking a game they don't like...

Ghost of Tsushima opens with a grand wide shot of samurai, adorned with impressively detailed suits of armor, sitting atop their horses. There we find Jin, the protagonist, ruminating on how he will die for his country. As he traverses Tsushima, our hero fights back the invading Mongolian army to protect his people, and wrestles with the tenets of the Bushido code. Standoffs take advantage of perspective and a wide field of view to frame both the samurai and his opponent in something that, more often than not, feels truly cinematic. The artists behind the game have an equally impeccable reference point for the visuals: the works of legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa

“We really wanted to pay respect to the fact that this game is so totally inspired by the work of this master,” director Nate Fox said in a recent interview with IndieWire. At Entertainment Weekly, Fox explained how his team at Sucker Punch Productions suggested that the influence ran broadly, including the playable black-and-white “Kurosawa Mode” and even in picking a title. More specifically, he noted that Seven Samurai, one of Kurosawa’s most well-known works, defined Fox’s “concept of what a samurai is.” All of this work went toward the hope that players would “experience the game in a way as close to the source material as possible.”

But in embracing “Kurosawa” as an eponymous style for samurai adventures, the creatives behind Ghost of Tsushima enter into an arena of identity and cultural understanding that they never grapple with. The conversation surrounding samurai did not begin or end with Kurosawa’s films, as Japan’s current political forces continue to reinterpret history for their own benefit.

Kurosawa earned a reputation for samurai films as he worked steadily from 1943 to 1993. Opinions of the director in Japan are largely mixed; criticism ranges from the discussion of his family background coming from generations of samurai to accusations of pandering to Western audiences. Whether intentional or not, Kurosawa became the face of Japanese film in the critical circles of the 1950s. But he wasn’t just a samurai stylist: Many of the director’s films frame themselves around a central conflict of personal ideology in the face of violence that often goes without answer — and not always through the lives of samurai. In works like Drunken Angel, The Quiet Duel, or his 1944 propaganda film The Most Beautiful, Kurosawa tackles the interpersonal struggles of characters dealing with sickness, alcoholism, and other challenges.

His films endure today, and not just through critical preservation; since breaking through to the West, his visual ideas and themes have become fodder for reinterpretation. You can see this keenly in Western cinema through films like The Magnificent Seven, whose narrative was largely inspired by Seven Samurai. Or even A Fistful of Dollars, a Western epic that cleaved so closely to Kurosawa’s Yojimbo that director Sergio Leone ended up in a lawsuit with Toho Productions over rights issues. George Lucas turned to Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress in preparation for Star Wars; he’d eventually repay Kurosawa by helping to produce his surreal drama Dreams.

Ghost of Tsushima is part of that lineage, packing in action and drama to echo Kurosawa’s legacy. “We will face death and defend our home,” Shimura, the Lord of Tsushima, says within the first few minutes of the game. “Tradition. Courage. Honor. These are what make us.” He rallies his men with this reminder of what comprises the belief of the samurai: They will die for their country, they will die for their people, but doing so will bring them honor. And honor, tradition, and courage, above all else, are what make the samurai.

Except that wasn’t always the belief, it wasn’t what Kurosawa bought whole cloth, and none of the message can be untangled from how center- and alt-right politicians in modern Japan talk about “the code” today.

The “modern” Bushido code — or rather, the interpretation of the Bushido code coined in the 1900s by Inazō Nitobe — was utilized in, and thus deeply ingrained into, Japanese military culture. An easy example of how the code influenced Imperial Japan’s military would be the kamikaze pilots, officially known as the Tokubetsu Kōgekitai. While these extremes (loyalty and honor until death, or capture) aren’t as present in the myth of the samurai that has ingrained itself into modern ultranationalist circles, they manifest in different yet still insidious ways.

In 2019, to celebrate the ushering in of the Reiwa Era, the conservative Liberal Democratic Party commissioned Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano to depict Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as a samurai. Though described as being center-right, various members of the LDP have engaged in or have been in full support of historical revisionism, including the editing of textbooks to either soften or completely omit the language surrounding war crimes committed by Imperial Japan. Abe himself has been linked to supporting xenophobic curriculums, with his wife donating $9,000 to set up an ultranationalist school that pushed anti-Korean and anti-Chinese rhetoric. The prime minister is also a member of Japan’s ultraconservative Nippon Kaigi, which a U.S. congressional report on Japan-U.S. relations cited as one of several organizations that believe that “Japan should be applauded for liberating much of East Asia from Western colonial powers, that the 1946-1948 Tokyo War Crimes tribunals were illegitimate, and that the killings by Imperial Japanese troops during the 1937 ‘Nanjing massacre’ were exaggerated or fabricated.” The Nippon Kaigi, like Abe, have also pushed for the revision of Japan’s constitution — specifically, Article 9 — to allow Japan to reinstate its standing military.

This has been a major goal for Abe as his time as prime minister comes to a definite close in 2021. And from 2013 onward, the politician has made yearly trips to the Yasukuni shrine to honor the memory of war criminals, a status of which his own grandfather was accused, that died with the ethos of the modern Bushido code. Abe’s exoneration of these ideals has continued to spark reactionary nationalist sentiment, as illustrated with the Nippon Kaigi and their ultranationalist ideology. These traditionalist values have encouraged xenophobic sentiment in Japan, which was seen in the 2020 Tokyo elections with 178,784 votes going to Makoto Sakurai, leader of the Japan First Party, another ultranationalist group. Sakurai has participated in numerous hate speech demonstrations in Tokyo, often targeting Korean diaspora groups.

The preservation of the Bushido code that was highly popularized and utilized by Imperial Japan lives on through promotion by history revisionists, who elevate samurai to a status similar to that of the chivalric knight seen in Western media. They are portrayed as an honor-bound and noble group of people that cared deeply for the peasantry, when that was often not the case.

The samurai as a concept, versus who the samurai actually were, has become so deeply intertwined with Japanese imperialist beliefs that it has become difficult to separate the two. This is where cultural and historical understanding are important when approaching the mythology of the samurai as replicated in the West. Kurosawa’s later body of work — like the color-saturated Ran, which was a Japanese adaptation of King Lear, and Kagemusha, the story of a lower-class criminal impersonating a feudal lord — deeply criticized the samurai and the class system they enforced. While some films were inspired by Western plays, specifically Shakespeare, these works were critical of the samurai and their role in the Sengoku Period. They dismantled the notion of samurai by showing that they were a group of people capable of the same failings as the lower class, and were not bound to arbitrary notions of honor and chivalry.

Unlike Kurosawa’s blockbusters, his late-career critical message didn’t cross over with as much ease. In Western films like 2003’s The Last Samurai, the audience is presented with the picture of a venerable and noble samurai lord who cares only for his people and wants to preserve traditionalist values and ways of living. The portrait was, again, a highly romanticized and incorrect image of who these people were in feudal Japanese society. Other such works inspired by Kurosawa’s samurai in modern pop culture include Adult Swim’s animated production Samurai Jack and reinterpretations of his work like Seven Samurai 20XX developed by Dimps and Polygon Magic, which had also received the Kurosawa Estate’s blessing but resulted in a massive failure. The narratives of the lone ronin and the sharpshooter in American Westerns, for example, almost run in parallel.

Then there’s Ghost of Tsushima. Kurosawa’s work is littered with close-ups focused on capturing the emotionality of every individual actor’s performance, and panoramic shots showcasing sprawling environments or small feudal villages. Fox and his team recreate that. But after playing through the story of Jin, Ghost of Tsushima is as much of an homage to an Akira Kurosawa film as any general black-and-white film could be. The Kurosawa Mode in the game doesn’t necessarily reflect the director’s signatures, as the narrative hook and tropes found in Kurosawa’s work — and through much of the samurai film genre — are equally as important as the framing of specific shots.

“I don’t think a lot of white Western academics have the context to talk about Japanese national identity,” Tori Huynh, a Vietnamese woman and art director in Los Angeles, said about the Western discussion of Kurosawa’s aesthetic. “Their context for Japanese nationalism will be very different from Japanese and other Asian people. My experience with Orientalism in film itself is, that there is a really weird fascination with Japanese suffering and guilt, which is focused on in academic circles … I don’t think there is anything wrong with referencing his aesthetic. But that’s a very different conversation when referencing his ideology.”

Ghost of Tsushima features beautifully framed shots before duels that illustrate the tension between Jin and whomever he’s about to face off against, usually in areas populated by floating lanterns or vibrant and colorful flowers. The shots clearly draw inspiration from Kurosawa films, but these moments are usually preceded by a misunderstanding on Jin’s part — stumbling into a situation he’d otherwise have no business participating in if it weren’t for laid-out side quests to get mythical sword techniques or armor. Issues like this undermine the visual flair; the duels are repeated over and over in tedium as more of a set-piece than something that should have a component of storytelling and add tension to the narrative.

Fox and Sucker Punch’s game lacks a script that can see the samurai as Japanese society’s violent landlords. Instead of examining the samurai’s role, Ghost of Tsushima lionizes their existence as the true protectors of feudal Japan. Jin must protect and reclaim Tsushima from the foreign invaders. He must defend the peasantry from errant bandits taking advantage of the turmoil currently engulfing the island. Even if that means that the samurai in question must discard his sense of honor, or moral righteousness, to stoop to the level of the invading forces he must defeat.

Jin’s honor and the cost of the lives he must protect are in constant battle, until this struggle no longer becomes important to the story, and his tale whittles down to an inevitable and morally murky end. To what lengths will he go to preserve his own honor, as well as that of those around him? Ghost of Tsushima asks these questions without a truly introspective look at what that entails in relation to the very concept of the samurai and their Bushido code. This manifests in flashbacks to Jin’s uncle, Shimura, reprimanding him for taking the coward’s path when doing his first assassination outside of forced stealth segments. Or in story beats where the Khan of the opposing Mongol force informs Shimura that Jin has been stabbing enemies in the back. Even if you could avoid participating in these systems, the narrative is fixated on Jin’s struggle with maintaining his honor while ultimately trying to serve his people.

I do not believe Ghost of Tsushima was designed to empower a nationalist fantasy. At a glance, and through my time playing the game, however, it feels like it was made by outsiders looking into an otherwise complex culture through the flattening lens of an old black-and-white film. The gameplay is slick and the hero moments are grand, but the game lacks the nuance and understanding of what it ultimately tries to reference. As it stands, being a cool pseudo-historical drama is, indeed, what Ghost of Tsushima’s creators seemingly aimed to accomplish. In an interview with Famitsu, Chris Zimmerman of Sucker Punch said that “if Japanese players think the game is cool, or like a historical drama, then that’s a compliment.” And if there is one thing Ghost of Tsushima did succeed in, it was creating a “cool” aesthetic — encompassed by one-on-one showdowns with a lot of cinematic framing.

In an interview with The Verge, Fox said that “our game is inspired by history, but we’re not strictly historically accurate.” That’s keenly felt throughout the story and in its portrayal of the samurai. The imagery and iconography of the samurai carry a burden that Sucker Punch perhaps did not reckon with during the creation of Ghost of Tsushima. While the game doesn’t have to remain true to the events that transpired in Tsushima, the symbol of the samurai propagates a nationalist message by presenting a glossed-over retelling of that same history. Were, at any point, Ghost of Tsushima to wrestle with the internal conflict between the various class systems that existed in Japan at the time, it might have been truer to the films that it draws deep inspiration from. However, Ghost of Tsushima is what it set out to be: a “cool” period piece that doesn’t dwell on the reasonings or intricacies of the existing period pieces it references.

A game that so heavily carries itself on the laurels of one of the most prolific Japanese filmmakers should investigate and reflect on his work in the same way that the audience engages with other pieces of media like film and literature. What is the intent of the creator versus the work’s broader meaning in relation to current events, or the history of the culture that is ultimately serving as a backdrop to yet another open-world romp? And how do these things intertwine and create something that can flirt on an edge of misunderstanding? Ghost of Tsushima is a surface-level reflection of these questions and quandaries, sporting a lens through which to experience Kurosawa, but not to understand his work. It ultimately doesn’t deal with the politics of the country it uses as a backdrop. For the makers of the game, recreating Kurosawa is just black and white.