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a-wandering-ghoulette · 6 years ago

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Ghost: Tobias finally revealed himself! From MyRock n°57; March/April issue; a FR->EN translation.

Enjoy a 2 page exclusiv interview fully translated from french to english; 3 full-page pics by Amanda Demme and a bitter live report of Zénith de Paris ritual (under the cut at the end of the post)! Note that I’m not perfectly bilingual so any of you who have a better english lvl than me are free to correct any mistake I could have done!

Tobias, master of the Forge

(Translation Note: Yes, we are french and we like dumb puns. So yass, he leads this band, thx)

Few hours before his appearance at Zénith de Paris, Tobias Forge has opened his lodge’s door to us. Decontracted and unmasked, the autoproclamed Ghost’s spokesperson frankly discuss about the band news and about his sudden notoriety.

Interview by Thomas Mafrouche; photos by Amanda Demme.

“In the colllective mind, doing metal is wearing black and shouting in a mic. People believe it’s easy when it’s a music requiring a lot of work and precision.” Tobias Forge

The last time we saw you at Zénith de Paris it was for Slayer and Mastodon’s opening. Tonight, you are the headline and your show is full. You must feel very proud! Tobias Forge: Oh I’m fulfilled! It’s fantastic! I’m very happy with what is happening. Not for the success, but because it allows me to finally have the means to do shows of the scope I always wanted. I always wished Ghost to be big, that our concerts dazzle! There’s nothing which annoyed me more than when you look small on a stage. It’s the case during some opening, or festivals prestations, when we have to play during day time... Ghost isn’t a band built for small stages. It’s a full experience, the spectator must imperatively get what’s coming! But, it’s a monstrous organisation, with a lot of logistical problems to solve beforehand. The more people there are involved in this adventure, the more risks there are for the machine to derailed. But, well, it’s the challenge to achieve when you bring a choir of 40 nuns on stage (laugh). In the end, what matter is that the spectator enjoy it, that they spend a good and phenomenous evening with us.

It is said that you are scrupulous about each detail, even the lights. Is that true? T.F.: Yes... I’m a “control freak”, I must admit it. (laughs) But this hunger for perfection, it’s also what brought me here tonight. This thirst for controling everything, it also came from the fact I’ve often been right by the past, but I was often dismissed... I have long tried to fight against this facet and to let people speak. And in these cases, it often narrowly avoided a catastrophe. So now I assume it. It pisses me off to have become a control maniac, but I’m used to it now, because it’s what’s best for Ghost, and thus, for the public...

Influenced by Candlemass & Metallica

To open your concerts for this tour, you have chosen your fellow countrymen from Candlemass. You’re fan, we guess? T.F.: I’ve been listening to them since I’m eight! They are my heroes! Their album Tales of Creation is one of my cult record! A decade ago, I had the chance to meet them and today we became very good friends. We are often seeing each others, our wifes and children are getting along pretty well too. Candlemass, it’s family! Their music had a direct impact on my way to compose. Plus, there’s all the imagery! I’m not talking about costumes, but the typography and the biblical visuals which always had greatly influenced me. I’ll even confess you something: The first album of Ghost, Opus Eponymous, was written for Messiah Marcolin’s voice [2nd singer of Candlemass, Redaction Note]. At the time, I didn’t wanted to be the singer of Ghost. Then I asked him to join us, but he had declined the invitation, saying he was busy with another project. So, when time has come to sing, I did it with his head voice. Last year, musicians from Candlemass also supported me on stage during Polar Music Prize’s ceremony [Swedish equivalent of Victoires de la Musique, but with guitars, RN (T.N: ouch, it’s a nice shot in our national music award ceremony face, since they never reward rock/metal artists... So yeah, national sized Grammy’s ceremony)]. We covered “Enter Sandman” by Metallica, in front of Sweden’s King and Queen. Robert Trujillo an Lars Ulrich were there as well. It’s an unforgatable memory! My wife and I, we even had dinner with one of Sweden’s princesses, after the ceremony.

Would the princess of Sweden be a metalhead?! T.F.: I won’t go this far, no (laughs). But she was very sociable, we even toasted. It was exquisite!

“Now, I will represent Ghost unmasked. Tobias Forge will be the official interlocutor, the same way George Lucas was the unique spokesman of Star Wars.” Tobias Forge

Speaking of Metallica, you’ll open for them at Stade de France, on May 12th. There, as well, it’s consecration! T.F.: It’s crazy! I’m going to tell you a funny anecdote. I’m not passionate about football, but it turns out that I was in Paris in 1998, during the World Cup. I wasn’t at Stade de France, but I saw pictures in the city, on big screens. And, at this moment, when I saw the final, that you amazingly won, I told myself that one day, I will play in Stade de France as well. It took me 21 years, but this day finally has come! this is proof that you have to believe in your dreams!

Metallica, it’s an institution for many people. For you as well? T.F.: There isn’t a superlativ strong enough to say how much I love these guys! Especially since they became friends. It’s an honour to have been chosen to support them on stage. Notably because they’re one of the reasons which pushed me to do music.

Which is your favorite album? T.F.: Ouch, that’s not easy! From a strictly personnal point of view, I would say Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets. But from a professional one, as a composer, musician and producer, it’s clearly the Black Album. It’s their best record, the most complete. Reaching this level of perfection, it’s any musician’s dream. Everything is here, the writing is bold, with a lot of character, and the producing is impeccable. I know it’s a record which make polemic amongst purists, but objectively, it’s one of these albums which had contributed to forge the metal we know today. In the colllective mind, doing metal is wearing black and shouting in a mic. People believe it’s easy, when it’s a music requiring a lot of work and precision. The Black Album, it’s the result of a huge amount of work, it’s months and months of work!

Papa Emeritus vs Darth Vader

The Black Album is also the record of notoriety, the one which propulsed Metallica with the general/mainstream public. This exposure, it’s something you’re living since the release of Prequelle. Recently, your appearance in the TV show Quotidien created a conflict amongst fans. To have a guitar solo cut during a live stream, is it the price to pay when a metal band enter the great mediatical circus? T.F.: Of course, it’s a sacrifice to do. Let’s say that, with Ghost, our relations with medias hasn’t always been good. I long refused to play their game. For a long time, these mainstream televisions had asked for interviewing Papa Emeritus. I always opposed them a categorical no. You can’t interview Papa Emeritus, the same way you can’t interview Darth Vader. You can meet James Earl Jones, who borrow him his voice, or the actor David Prowse. But Darth Vader, nobody can speak to him. It’s the same for Papa Emeritus. Today, in order to reach the next level, it’s time to play the game, but in our way. Since I can’t relate on Papa Emeritus to do the job, I accepted to do this interview unmasked. The problem is that journalists hadn’t the necessary keys in hands to understand Ghost. Of course, I’m not talking about you, because rock press know very well what we are and who we are. You tell me about Candlemass, about Metallica... It’s something else. You, you know your subject. Mainstream medias, them, what’s interesting them is to make the buzz, it’s to have a bone to gnaw. Sometimes, I wonder why I accepted to do such mediatical things... It’s not like I needed them, moreover my concerts are full! But, well, I decided that now, I will represent Ghost unmasked. Tobias Forge will be the official interlocutor, the same way George Lucas was the unique spokesman of Star Wars. The person you have in front of you today, it’s kind of Ghost’s director.

Otherwise, what are the future projects for Ghost? T.F.: There will be a release before the end of the year, but it will not be an EP of covers like we often did so far. It will be something else, but it’s not done and I can’t tell you about it yet. But I recorded some things... The rest of the year, I will spend it on the road, it will be very long, with, notably, dates in South America. I scheduled to go in studio early next year, to realease an album in 2020. You have to strike while the iron is hot!

(Under the cut you’ll find a semi-bitter live report. Take this line as a trigger warning maybe...?)

Tobias Forge at Zénith?

It took 4 albums, 2 EP and a lawsuit before Tobias Forge, Ghost’s mastermind, offer to the french public an indoor show worthy of the name. The rendez vous is written down for early february, at Zénith de Paris.

Live report by: Roseline Artal.

6 000 persons

Concert: 3/5

Public: 3/5

We was told the show in the capital is full of capacity, but some stands are inaccessible and guarded by vigils. It’s certainly to allow everybody to be dazzled that the band decided to not fill the venue at its maximum capacity, but it’s a shame for those who would have liked to be part of the lucky ones. After a Cigale and an Olympia much comparable to festivals prestations, Ghost decided to put every efforts here. Finally! Candlemass, coming from Sweden, open the ball, remaining on the very front of the stage. Songs flow, some blunders can be heard, notably when the singer Johan Längqvist mix up “A Sorcerer’s Pledge” and “Solitude”, but the crowd seems to appreciate. They rise their fists up in the air when needed, some heads are banging here and there, and we notice a semblance of circle pit down in the front right. However, it’s hard to remain enthusiastic very long in front of the relatively flat performance. Musicians are playing the game and are having fun, which is something at least.

A cathedral stage It’s almost 9 p.m when lights turn off and the black curtains disappear, reaveling the magnificent stained glasses awning over imposing stairs. Such ornated, the Zénith stage is standing out! It’s with “Ashes”, perfect for an appetizer, Ghost offert themselves to their audience, but it’s “Ritual” which receive all suffrages on this show begining. As for “Devil Church”, it end on a duel between guitarists. When “Miasma” first notes resonnate, one question is on everybody lips: “Will Papa Nihil show himself?”. And the answer is yes, for our greatest pleasure. “Jigolo Har Megiddo” is beautifully interpreted acoustically, allowing us to rest down our ears for a short time. Indeed, the sound is unbearable, at least without appropriated protections. Fortunatelly, the view isn’t unpleasant, thanks to a Tobias Forge of many personnalities as funny as worrying.

Papa Emeritus as a mafiosi (well, it’s obviously a confusion between Papa and Cardinal from the reporter here, I’ll correct it for the rest of this paragraphe, T.N) It’s well and truly the last album which is highlighted tonight, which is appreciated by fans. They are indeed ready to sing in unison and turn on there phone on “Life Eternal”, while Cardinal Copia play the romantic mafiosi, all in white dressed, thus marking an end to the first act. 15 minutes of break are offered, without a reason being given. Indeed, when the entract ends, the setting hadn’t change and musicians are wearing the same costumes. What if Tobias Forge became the new Axl Rose with his manic to leave the stage for ages with no valid reason? We’re picky, but these minutes could have been used to play other titles, such as the amazing “Elizabeth” which has disapeared from the setlist for years now... Nothing better than “Year Zero” sing by everyone and the cover of Rocky Erikson’s “If You Have Ghost” in order to put us in a good mood. However, the band found a way to ruin it all by dragging the members presentation out for long minutes. What a shame. “Dance Macabre” and “Square Hammer”, which we all keep loving during live, reconcil us with the swedes, then, without surprise, we’re leaving on “Monstrance Clock”, an ode to femal pleasure. When the lights turn back on, we can’t help but thinking this show was both a success and a disappointment notably due to useless dead calm.

#the band ghost #tobias forge #interview #cardinal copia #Nameless Ghouls #a pale tour named death #prequelle #MyRock #translation #scan

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vroenis · 4 years ago

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The 2019 Charlie’s Angels Reboot Was A Good Project & Deserved More Respect From Hollywood

We’ve just finished watching the film and there was a lot both J and I really enjoyed about it. We’re critical of media and art in different ways and I certainly don’t speak for them, as for me, oddly I’m lenient in ways that they probably aren’t when it comes to production and culture. I don’t have to dive too deeply into the cultural response to this picture to know how it went down, I’ve come into contact with just enough of it to have a clear understanding of the popular digest. The response is not at all unexpected, it’s just uninformed.

I feel that the 2019 (year of publishing) Charlie’s Angels reboot was a good project with a wonderful spirit. Elizabeth Banks’ aims were clearly evident in the final product, however it may have been shaped along the way, and that it was under-served in the production process likely from the very beginning.

This casting is fantastic.

I do wish there were better cast-ensemble promos for me to lift from the internet and wonder whether that’s another telltale sign of production or whether the heat has just faded since release and they’ve just dropped out of the archives but I struggled to find well composed images.

The first short sizzle-teaser I ever saw for the film, I thought was quite good. Neckbeards and mouthbreathers won’t have paused for a second thought before launching hate for the project - anything in the most vague proximity of feminism or empowerment of women, or even simply just not being centred around men - will be enough to bring snide internet snark by the truckload. It remains interesting that men continue to struggle to live in a world where there can be things that also exist that are not for them, they cannot simply let these other things also exist without contributing in some way. As it were, the project looked good. Sharp, clever, playful, and a timely reboot reclaimed in the most contemporary way. When I looked up the production details and found out Banks was championing it herself, I really took an interest in it. As the first full trailers released, the casting looked great - genuinely diverse and with real chemistry, I hoped it would find the audience it was looking for.

J and I have had a lot going on in our lives over the last two years and still do. We’ve gone to theatres I think twice in that whole time, maybe three times and I think two of those were gift certificates generously paid for by family. So tonight we finally got around to watching Charlie’s Angels. If we’d seen this in theatres, I’d have still be satisfied and had the same evaluation.

A production budget of $55 million is low-balling a project of this scope;

There seems to have been a bit of pre-production shuffling and Banks did a lot of wrangling herself early on.

The whole shoot front to back was just over two months and I assume three countries, US/or studio inclusive.

CGI is noticeably subpar but not exactly cheap either, so it still would have cost a significant portion of that prod. budget. When I say subpar, the CG in this film isn’t bad, please don’t take that criticism as overly negative of the CG artists’ work - remember that people do the best they can with the time and money they’re afforded. If you want to understand what that’s all about, I encourage you to watch Corridor Crew’s channel on YouTube.

Combat choreography with principle actors isn’t great, there’s far too much editing but again, I’m betting there wasn’t a whole lot of money and thus time for training and rehearsing for them, so combat is noticeably slow.

2nd Unit photography looked very good because this kind of thing is very old-school Hollywood in that it contributes to what makes an action/spy movie look like one. Unfortunately, that means it was also expensive. We’re really running out of money here...

There is a lot of licensed music in this feature which isn’t cheap at all. Again this feels super old-school Hollywood and definitely demographic targeting, but it firmly timestamps the feature - any film, really - and unless your film is about capturing the essence of the time IT WAS THE 80′s! or FOLK FESTIVALS JUST BEFORE COVID BROKE OUT as an example of not necessarily wanting to capture the past, I really think trying to nail down pop songs of the hot present ultimately does your film a disservice.

And I’ll address that one first because I feel like it may have been one of the easiest changes to make to lift the overall quality of the picture. Instead of burning thru an immense amount of budget on a pile of pop licenses, I think a calculated risk could have been taken in getting a young contemporary musician to create a slick electronic score in its entirety to back it along side the generic orchestral action fare, no disrespect to Brian Tyler. To be honest, Tyler probably could have done it all himself but was also probably just writing to spec. BUT HEY... WHY NOT SCOUT FOR ANY NUMBER OF AMAZING WOMEN OUT THERE WHO ARE PHENOMENAL ELECTRONIC MUSICIANS AND PRODUCERS what am I talking about it’s Hollywood...

This is what I mean by the project deserving more respect and being under-served. Hollywood doesn’t believe in projects like this, they don’t realise what the project is and why it needs frontier, sincere, good faith hiring and instead under-funds but funds it nevertheless SEE? WE FUNDED IT, WE DID THE GOOD THING, SEE US SUPPORTING THE WIMMINS? WE’RE NOT SEXISTS YOU CAN’T SAY WE’RE SEXISTS YOU CAN HAVE YOUR FILM oh it didn’t do very well except we didn’t let you make it the way you wanted to make it, we still shackled you to

THE SAME TERRIBLE HOLLYWOOD TRADITIONS THAT, BY THE WAY, ARE FAILING OUR MANLY MAN MOVIES FULL OF MEN HOLY SHIT THE DEBT-RECOVERY CYCLE IS REALLY DOING A NUMBER ON OUR INVESTORS I SURE HOPE WE DON’T HAVE TOO MANY CONSECUTIVE FAILURES OR, SAY, SOME KIND OF GLOBAL CATASTROPHIC AND/OR ECONOMIC EVENT HAND-WRINGING

ahem where was I

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross provided the entire soundtrack for The Social Network and it’s both fantastic and timeless. OK oranges and refrigerators, but the principle still stands - I get the intent of Charlie’s Angels was a summer blockbuster but it would have still been elevated by being all the more slick having its own identity in music, having its own sound. You want that soundtrack by that amazing young woman because it sounds fucken awesome.

Charlie’s Angels still needed a few passes by a dialogue editor. I say that a lot. I know my standards are high and it’s a Hollywood film. There’s no problem at all with the vernacular, idioms and the casual language, that was all fine. It’s always just the little details - again, it’s always time and money which - really is just money. A good dialogue editor or script supervisor might have been able to just elevate this whole thing to that super-smooth level of flowing just right. Or perhaps if the actors had spent more time in training and combat rehearsal together, they’d have riffed better and improvised more. They still have good on-screen chemistry but again, more time - more money for time - and things improve.

If you don’t know my taste in film, you could see if you recognise anything in the Film Notes page of this journal, but it’s totally OK if you don’t. Basically most of them are long and boring, with super long takes of people not saying or doing much. I still love Hollywood films tho - I love all cinema and I’ll repeat like a broken record, I should either add a section to Film Notes of my favourite blockbusters or create a page for them. Anyway - Charlie’s Angels still has too much editing mostly due to the aforementioned combat, but also because of that good old Hollywood formulaic style-guide. It’s easy to look up the production credits and pluck out names but on a project like this, it’s difficult to pin the end result on the roles themselves. In these cases, personnel like editors are more like daily jobs rather than creative contributors which again is an immense shame. I catch myself before saying “It doesn’t have to be a Malick/Shortland/Lynch project...” but why not? Why can’t a summer blockbuster have its own fantastic identity? General audiences can identify Michael Bay and Christopher Nolan - sure, one or perhaps both of these people take themselves far too seriously, but why not let a project have its own identity?

We run back into the conversation of protecting investments and style guides.

The easy answer to Bay and Nolan is they’re men, but they’ve also had time to prove their worth over time with previous work and track record. Because they’ve had the privilege to do so. Because they’re men. And most of the people making decisions and letting them experiment and sometimes fail to recover investment on their projects and hey, don’t worry, just try again, are men - and they were permitted to try again because they were themselves men.

Whether individual men do or don’t deserve whatever they did or didn’t get, I’m not here to discuss. Many of them definitely didn’t and I can’t change it.

What we should be changing is how we finance, how we empower and how we hand over autonomy of projects to women in cinema, in the arts - in professional life, in any industry.

YOU DON’T KNOW THE DETAILS OF THIS PROJECT

So. Fucking. What.

I can make educated guesses and I can support as much as possible as fair and equitable an arts industry wherever I engage with it.

I really liked Charlie’s Angels. It had a lot of heart. It had a wonderful sense of play and sass and smarts. Yes, a few too many “why didn’t they just shoot the bad guy” moments etc. - again - script reviews, better writers, more time...

More money.

More respect from an industry that doesn’t respect women and women’s autonomy; social, professional, in all aspects.

I hope Elizabeth Banks wants to make another one, can raise the finances for it and has even more control of the next project. More power to her.

#2020 #chrono #writing about film #cinema #Charlie's Angels #Charlie's Angels 2019 #Elizabeth Banks

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my-lady-knight · 5 years ago

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Favorite Reads of 2019

As seems to be my usual, I’m posting this at what feels like the last second.

Writing this year’s post was hard. I’ve been complaining offline all year that it feels like I read far fewer books I really, truly enjoyed. Even the books I did enjoy, they didn’t stick around long in my head for me to remember details. On the other hand, this list ended up being thirteen items long, so it can’t have been that bad. And having to go back to the books in order to write this list did make me remember how and why I loved them, so there is that.

Presented in chronological order of when I read them:

The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay

The first book I read in 2019, and I knew would end up on this list as soon as I finished. It’s also the first book of Guy Gavriel Kay’s where I finally understood what the fuss was about - when he commits to writing three-dimensional characters with compelling interpersonal and socio-political relationships, he commits. The cultural/social details of this secondary-world version of medieval Spain set at the beginning of the end of the Caliphate and the rise of the Reconquista are evocative, and the scope deftly alternates between being vast without tripping over itself and touchingly personal. Most importantly, this book gave me an OT3 I wasn’t even expecting in the form of Amman ibn Khairan, famed soldier, poet, and advisor now outcast from the city-state of Cartada, Rodrigo Belmonte, beloved cavalry captain with a complicated loyalty to the rulers he serves, and Jehane bet Ishak, an esteemed physician whose path intersects with them both. Together they represent the connections and tensions between their respective, secondary-world Muslim, Christian, and Jewish communities, cities, and leaders in this secondary-world Spain and form a triangle of everything the country has, is, and can be. A year later I still love this book.

How to Write an Autobiographical Novel: Essays by Alexander Chee

This book is difficult to write about, because I remember loving it as I was reading it, but I can’t remember any of the essays very well several months after the fact (see above). What I do remember is that they were difficult, and complicated, and messy, and they did the thing I love when essays do where the fact that the things Alexander Chee was writing about are super-specific to him made them somehow feel all the more relatable. All the essays were nicely crafted stories and emotional journeys, withAlexander Chee tracing all the various aspects of his life through his writing, as an Asian man, a gay man, an aspiring writer, a professional writer, a resident of NYC, and a survivor of sexual assault, using prose that was both artistic and clear as water.

The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie

Amal El-Mohtar wrote in her NYT review that this book was akin to “Hamlet”, “if [the play] were told from the point of view of Elsinore Castle addressing itself to a Horatio who mostly couldn’t hear it,” to which my response was “huh?” Then I read the book and it a) made so much more sense and b) ended up being an astute, apropos explanation of the kind of book The Raven Tower is. It’s the story of a soldier and companion to the heir of a country investigating the disappearance of its ruler and the ascendency of another in his place. It’s also the story of a calm, patient god in the form of a stone who predates all of history and narrates the changing existence of gods, their power, and their relationship to humans and their civilizations. It’s an understated yet powerful book, full of Ann Leckie’s brilliant and clever writing, world-building, storytelling, and otherworldliness. It’s Ann Leckie. She knows what she’s doing. And it fucking works.

Sal & Gabi Break the Universe by Carlos Hernandez

This book - is bonkers. It is insane. It is one thousand percent over the top. I kept asking myself “why am I not irritated???” Instead I loved it. Sal is the new kid, a practicing magician with as showman’s flair for the dramatic and boundless energy, and he can open up portals into other universes. Gabi is the sharp-eyed, bossy class president and editor of the school newspaper who just knows something’s up with Sal and his shenanigans. Together, they become friends! And open up more portals into other universes. This book is warm and empathetic and funny and kind-hearted. It’s too-muchness quality somehow worked. The whole thing felt like the literary equivalent of a hug.

The Parting Glass by Gina Marie Guadagnino

This wasn’t a Deep book, but I could not stop thinking about it, nor could I stop recommending it to people. It’s a zippy historical fiction novel set in 1830s NYC prior to the Potato Famine. Mary (or Maire) and her brother Seanin are Irish immigrants working in the same wealthy family’s house, she as lady’s maid to the marriageable daughter named Charlotte, he as a groomsman. Mary is half in love with her Charlotte; unfortunately so is Seanin, and the two of them are carrying on an affair, the aftermath of which leaves Mary in a bind about where her loyalties lie. I love that this book has a queer take on a love triangle that I’ve never seen before, and I loved Mary’s anger and resentment, her unashamed attitude towards her desire for Charlotte as well as other women, and her selfishness as well as her loyalty. I also loved the upstairs-downstairs nature of the book and the clash of Anglo-American and Irish immigrant ethnic and class mores and the larger social and political setting of the city and time period.

The Bird King by G. Willow Wilson

I don’t even know how to begin describing this book. It’s a story about maps and boundaries and borders. It’s an epic of daring escape and adventure about a mapmaker named Hassan with a magical gift and a concubine named Fatima, two friends fleeing the Inquisition after the surrender of Granada, in search of a mythical island ruled by the King of Birds. It’s a story of faith and trust and bonds forged from disparate people, and transformation, transformation of yourself and the world around you because you will it to be so. It’s a beautiful, beautifully written book.

(As a side note, I’m intrigued by the fact that two of my favorite books on here are set during the Reconquista.)

On the Come Up by Angie Thomas

In some ways I liked this even better than The Hate U Give. I loved the complexity that arose out of Bri rapping about the injustices she’s experienced, with people drawing completely different meanings out of her words, people wanting her to use her rapping and her voice for differing reasons, and Bri herself working to figure out the power she has with her rapping and how she wants to use her talents, when it comes to financially supporting her family, standing up for herself, and being herself when so many around her are creating all these false images of her based solely off her words. I loved Bri’s anger, the way she kept speaking before thinking, her loving, sometimes complicated relationships with her family and friends...Angie Thomas’s writing and storytelling is phenomenal.

Kindred by Octavia Butler

I’m not even sure what to say about this book that hasn’t been said but, um, yeah, it’s Octavia Butler, it’s a classic, and really my favorite aspect of the book is how it so effectively bridges the gap between history and present and demonstrates how the two aren’t so far apart, and effectively blends them such that for Dana, the present becomes the past and the past is her present and suddenly she isn’t visiting history at a somewhat removed vantage point, she is part of history, her own history, her ancestors’ history, in all its horror, caught in a catch-22 of needing to repeatedly save the life of her white, slave-owning ancestor who over time grows more and more violent towards her, in order to ensure the chronological security of her own life.

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

This was a harrowing read. Set in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia during the 1969 Malay-Chinese race riots, sixteen-year-old Melati has OCD, or what she understands as a djinn living inside her that forces her to obsessively count in order to keep her mom alive, a secret she tries to hide so people don’t think she’s possessed. When the race riots break out across the city, Melati has to make her way through the violence in the streets in order to find her mom, all while battling the djinn as its power increases in the chaos. I repeat, this book was brutal. The descriptions of Melati’s OCD alone make it a tense, taxing read - combine it with the violence and unpredictability of the race riots and all the threats to Melati’s safety and her ever-growing fear for her mom and it’s a lot. Even so (perhaps because) I could not put this book down. The recreation of this part of history (which I had no clue of before and knew nothing about) was both immersive and informative, the story was deftly plotted, and I loved how Melati’s characterization and her relationship/the depiction of her OCD and how it specifically affects her in her particular circumstances.

Jade War by Fonda Lee

CLEAN BLADE CLEAN BLADE CLEAN BLADE

*ahem*

The second book of the Green Bone Saga was even better than the first. It took the story of the Kaul family and the No Peak clan and the worldbuilding of Jade City and turned everything up to eleven, expanding the story beyond Kekon into the global theater, particularly Espenia, bringing into the picture Kekonse immigration, diaspora, assimilation, and cultural heritage - what it means to be Kekonese, to be a Green Bone and carry jade and follow aisho outside of Kekon. The gang warfare between the No Peak clan and the Mountain clan spills over the domestic sphere into the international. Espenia grows more aggressive in its moves to gain control over jade at Kekon’s expense. It’s family loyalties and betrayals, it’s gang politics and warfare, it’s community, municipal, national, and international politics and culture clashes, and the changing world of being a Green Bone and wearing jade in a post-colonial world. Anyone who’s followed me this year because of Peaky Blinders - READ JADE CITY AND JADE WAR. YOU WILL LIKE THESE BOOKS I PROMISE.

Hexarchate Stories by Yoon Ha Lee

With this short story collection, Yoon Ha Lee has not only successfully published fan fiction of his own work in the Hexarchate universe and is getting paid for it, he’s published good fanfiction. The cute Cheris and Jedao backstory pieces of flash fiction he first published on his website are drabbles. One of the original pieces in this collection is straight-up PWP. (How the hell Solaris agreed to it I have no idea, there is literally no plot.) The very last story (also original) is fix-it fic for Revenant Gun that left me kicking and screaming over the CLIFFHANGER that Yoon Ha Lee ended it on HOW DARE YOU I DEMAND TO KNOW WHAT CHERIS AND JEDAO ARE GOING TO DO NEXT YOU BETTER BE WRITING MORE STORIES SET IN THIS AU TIMELINE. In sum, Yoon Ha Lee is a delight, I love him, and I loved this collection.

The Deep by Rivers Solomon

A novella about the weight of history, especially painful, traumatic history, and the necessity and yearning for it when you don’t have it. To be forced to bear the burden of history alone is to be crushed and subsumed by it. To lose or become detached from it is to lose connection to the people you’re from. Either way, it is difficult to impossible to maintain a people’s history alone. Rivers Solomon is such a poetic writer with her prose, painting beautiful images with just the right collection and arrangement of words, all while packing an astutely aimed punch in 160 pages.

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

I had some issues with how convenient some of the magic/magical artifacts felt, and the various threads of the murder plot didn’t tie up as nicely as I wanted, but oh, Alex Stern is a marvel - a survivor in every sense of the word who embraces that part of herself over and over, even as what being a survivor means changes for Alex over the course of the book. A dark/contemporary urban fantasy set at Yale where the university’s elite student societies are also magical societies— Alex is a dropout who got into drugs as a teenager in order to shield herself from the ghosts she can’t stop seeing, recruited to act as overseer of the societies’ magical rituals, and who takes it upon herself to investigate the murder of a young woman not too different than herself. The centrality of power and its abuse in this book is delicious, the read is gripping, and Alex is worth the price of admission. Yes, I will be reading the second book when it comes out.

(Also, this is literally the second book I’ve ever read that makes any mention or inclusion of Ladino (both Alex and Leigh Bardugo are Sephardi.))

Honorable Mentions

Finding Baba Yaga by Jane Yolen

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo

How Long ‘til Black Future Month? by N. K. Jemisin

Our Year of Maybe by Rachel Lynn Solomon

Dragon Pearl by Yoon Ha Lee

The Boneless Mercies by April Genevieve Tucholke

The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2018 edited by N. K. Jemisin and John Joseph Adams

The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal

Amnesty by Lara Elena Donnelly

Storm of Locusts by Rebecca Roanhorse

Let Me Hear a Rhyme by Tiffany D. Jackson

The Monster of Elendhaven by Jennifer Giesbrecht

Pet by Akwaeke Emezi

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

It’s also been my practice over the past few years when making these posts to crunch the numbers regarding the number of books I’ve read by PoC authors. This year I read a total of 30 books, which is the exact same number as last year, but since I read fewer books this year, they accounted for 47 percent of my reading, compared to last year’s 43 percent. My goal since I started has been to get to 50-50 parity between PoC and white authors, and this year’s the second-closest I got (I reached 48 percent in 2017.) The goal for next year is once again 50-50.

#long post #book recs

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obsessedwithbbandsuju · 5 years ago

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Growing Pains | Part 1

It never got any better.

Pairing: Lee Hyukjae (Eunhyuk)/Son Taeyeon

Warnings: Boring-ass cliches, probably

___

sshi: a Korean honorific used when the speaker is relatively unfamiliar with the object of their words, usually regardless of age

seonsaengnim: literally translates to teacher, but can be used to refer to someone considerably older than the speaker who has his/her respect or works in the same industry

sunbaenim: a word used by a junior to refer to a senior in the industry

oppa: a term used by a female to refer to a male, older than her, that she is close to

___

It never got any better.

Before her, Hyukjae had always believed that you could recover from breakups, no matter how painful they were. No matter how much you loved a person, he’d believed that it was possible to get over them, one day. You just had to try, and that belief of his had only been reinforced by experience. He’d had a few girlfriends, he’d loved all of them, and things had ended eventually with all of them. It hurt at first, of course. It hurt badly, the constant and stark realization that she was no longer a part of his life, that he could no longer talk to her again, hold her hand again, kiss her again. Sometimes he sat in numb silence, staring at the wall in a dazed stupor. Sometimes he cried; full, trembling sobs, burying his face in his hands and ruing the times he hadn’t treated her in the way she deserved to be treated. Sometimes he found himself smiling without mirth, thinking of the fond times they had shared with a bitter taste in his mind and tears stinging at his eyes.

But he always recovered eventually. Some recoveries took longer than others, but by the end, he was always back to himself as he was before his previous girlfriend, except with more cherished memories in his heart that he might muse over one day when he was old and stiff. It was a painful cycle, but not a pointless one, and Hyukjae never came out regretting that he’d dated any of them. They’d all done things for him in their own way, made him grow in one fashion or another, and in the end, he was always better off for it.

Hyukjae thought this time would be the same, too. He fought through the hollowness over and over, reminding himself over and over that it would fade someday, like it always did. He wiped his eyes off after the crying again and again, repeating that the pain was temporary. He gritted his teeth and endured every single of the emptying pangs in his chest at the jarring thought that he would never be able to hold her again. Even when the pain didn’t dissipate, several months later, Hyukjae had dismissed his worries. Son Taeyeon had been the woman he was probably the most serious about so far, after all. He had proposed to her, and she’d accepted; they had been engaged for over a year, before things started … crumbling. She had been such a precious, major part of his life for so long that he thought, of course, of course, it would be this difficult to get over her. But he would. Eventually.

But months became a year, then a year and a half, and still, the longing didn’t lessen in the slightest. Hyukjae still woke up sometimes, groggy and disoriented, reaching over next to him on the mattress to pull Taeyeon against him. Then the realization that she wasn’t there, that they had broken up long ago, would crash over him and he would be cruelly jolted to full consciousness, feeling unfilled and vacant. He still found his mind drifting to her and wondering where she was, how she was doing now. He saw her on TV, of course, but it wasn’t the same, nowhere even close. She was out of his reach, and more than that, she looked lively and confident as she always had.

Did she even remember their times together? Did she even care anymore? Everything he saw, everything he heard, everything he read, seemed to be indicating that she didn’t. That she had moved on. Hyukjae knew it was unhealthy, he knew it shouldn’t be like this, but the thought, the possibility, that she had really gotten over him, it shook him. It made him feel betrayed, no matter how ridiculous and irrational and practically hypocritical his emotions were. How could she just … be okay after the way they had broken up? How could she simply go on with her life after everything that had passed between them? Everything they had been to each other? Hyukjae knew, he really did, that he had no right to say anything, since he was constantly trying to get over her, reminding himself that she was part of a past he needed to erase, but still. Still.

He couldn’t forget her. It didn’t get any better. It was like there was a hole in his life where Taeyeon had been, a hole that was refusing to close. No matter how hard Hyukjae tried, no matter what he did to cheer himself up or help himself get over her, he couldn’t do it. He – his thoughts, his emotions, his life, it seemed – always came back to her.

And then an idea seized him.

It was an idiotic idea, frankly. It made him look like a complete bumbling, clueless fool, so cliché and overdone and ridiculous that it wasn’t even something that some people might consider romantic anymore. But in his state, Hyukjae thought … well, he didn’t think, really. He still wasn’t even sure what exactly his idea was when he realized this particular day was free of schedules, bought a bouquet of larkspur flowers (Taeyeon’s favorite), drove to her apartment complex, and now found himself pacing in front of the gates of the two buildings, wondering if she was home and just how he was going to convince her to come out to see him, her ex, even if she was.

Taeyeon lived in Hanwha Galleria Foret (had moved after their breakup, according to Heechul-hyung), and if not for the circumstances under which he was here, Hyukjae would have marveled at the sheer scope of the twin complexes rising into the sky. It had obviously been built to show off the wealth it required to own an apartment here, but more importantly, Hyukjae knew it was a high-security building, for the number of top celebrities that lived in it (G-Dragon-sshi, Kim Soohyun-sshi, even Lee Sooman-seonsaengnim, to name a few). Thanks to that, he didn’t have any worries about anyone spotting him and creating rumors, but now he was here after an hour-long drive with no idea what to do next. It wasn’t like he could simply walk in.

Only then did his stupidity catch up to him. What was he doing here? With flowers? Trying to win Taeyeon back? Trying to get her to take pity on him? Trying to express that he still missed her and loved her? What was the point of all this? And how was he even going to see her if he turned up so abruptly? Taeyeon was a busy person, and there was a high likelihood that she wasn’t home – in which case, he’d just wasted car gas and a good portion of his free day.

But what if Taeyeon was home? What if he somehow could talk to her face-to-face? What was he even going to do?

The thought almost made Hyukjae turn on his heel and run back to his car to drive home – almost. But when he thought of his apartment, dreary and empty and full of only more past memories of his time with Taeyeon, he didn’t want to go back. Home – home offered him nothing good, and rather than just giving up here with nothing accomplished, nothing even attempted, he wanted to do something, even if it all turned out pointless in the end. Then maybe, he thought, just maybe, it would feel better, if only because he tried. If he didn’t even do that, he would never know what might have been if he did.

If he backed out now, Hyukjae was sure he would regret it forever.

And so, he continued to linger aimlessly in front of the apartments, adjusting the mask on his face from time to time so he could breathe more properly. He took a seat on the bench near the gate, his legs bouncing up and down from nerves and impatience. Then he got back up, paced for a few minutes, clutching the bouquet in his hands. And then he sat back down, carefully placing the flowers on the bench next to him and staring up at the sky, trying to calm himself down. It was chilly, but Hyukjae realized he was sweating. He continuously took out his phone and put it away again, wondering if he should try to contact Taeyeon. It would be sensible, since at least then he had a chance at knowing if she was even home. But what if she’d deleted his number? Or blocked it? It wouldn’t be unusual after the way they’d broken up …

“Eunhyuk-sunbaenim …? Excuse me, aren’t you Eunhyuk-sunbaenim?”

Startled at the sound of his stage name, and even more caught off guard by the title sunbaenim, Hyukjae looked up from his spot on the bench, where he’d been staring ponderously at his phone. The face staring down at him in surprise was one that took him barely a second to recognize, even though it was his first time seeing it completely bare. It was hard for anyone in Korea, and especially for someone in the entertainment industry, to not recognize G-Dragon, after all.

But Hyukjae blinked. Despite knowing who was in front of him, it was a bit of a surreal experience. He’d seen GD here and there, of course; music broadcasts, performances, variety shows, and on television, but he’d never spoken to Bigbang’s leader one-on-one in person. Especially not in such a casual setting. GD looked nothing more than normal, his face free of cosmetics, his hair tucked into a cap, dressed in a winter coat, baggy jeans, and boots.

Somehow, the unreal feeling of seeing such a popular star looking so casual wasn’t completely unfamiliar. Hyukjae struggled for a second, trying to remember why he’d experienced it before.

Then he realized it was because he’d felt it often when he was dating Taeyeon, at least in the earlier weeks of their relationship. She was a phenomenally successful star, too, but off-camera, she hardly ever wore makeup, and her sense of fashion was simple and casual, similar to GD at the moment.

Hyukjae fought a grimace at the pang in his stomach, incited by the unintentional memory of his early relationship with Taeyeon. It had been nice then, he thought with what should have been fondness, but had soured to bitterness given their circumstances.

Awkward, but still nice. He’d been nervous, terrified of messing up and upsetting her, awestruck at the prospect that he was dating her in itself, but the butterflies in his stomach and the thumping of his heart had been strangely pleasant.

It dawned on him that GD was still staring at him expectantly, waiting for an answer. Slightly embarrassed, Hyukjae nodded. “Yes,” he muttered, painfully conscious of how strange he must look to the other idol, pacing in front of the gate of the apartment complex in this chilly weather with a bunch of flowers in his hand. “Yes, that’s me.”

GD hesitated, the puzzlement in his eyes plain to see. I can’t blame him, Hyukjae reflected bitterly. I probably look ridiculous.

“This might be none of my business, but … what are you doing here, sunbaenim?”

Hyukjae looked at the ground, wondering how he was going to answer that. As he fished for words trying to explain his senseless actions and situation, a revelation struck him like a lightning bolt. His eyes widened, and he let out an almost inaudible gasp. If he could convince GD to cooperate …

Which likely wouldn’t be easy, Hyukjae realized, scoffing at himself for letting himself get the impression otherwise. He didn’t know GD personally, but Taeyeon talked fondly about Bigbang’s leader, and it was no secret how close they were to each other. It wasn’t hard to see why: they met when they were young, they were in the same agency, they were both leaders of their respective groups, a position that came with considerable burdens. And from what he’d seen of GD on television, his affection for Taeyeon was obvious as well, from the way he looked at her to his comfortable attitude around her to their understated and touchy interactions on camera.

They seemed just like siblings, and Hyukjae knew that if he had a younger sister, he wouldn’t be happy with a person that broke up with her the way he broke up with Taeyeon. GD was being polite now, but if he was aware of Hyukjae’s history with Taeyeon (and there was no way he couldn’t be, not when they were so close), Hyukjae wouldn’t fault the other idol for wanting to punch him.

There was no way he could convince GD to cooperate. None at all. And yet … Hyukjae had to try. He had to.

“Jiyong-sshi?”

“Yes, sunbaenim?” Jiyong looked surprised at the question in response to his question, and Hyukjae felt a tad apologetic. But really, he was too swept up in his mounting desperation to voice his feeling sorry.

“If it’s not too much trouble, can you ask Taeyeon if she can meet me?”

Now the other idol looked outright startled, and frankly, Hyukjae couldn’t find it in himself to be the least bit surprised. Jiyong, no doubt, was shocked at his implied admission of wanting to see Taeyeon after the hurtful way that they went on their separate paths. And Hyukjae didn’t blame him. He didn’t blame Jiyong, not even when he saw anger flickering to life in his eyes.

“I can’t do that, sunbaenim.”

Nor could Hyukjae fault that reaction. In fact, he might have thanked Jiyong for being as calm with his refusal as he was, because Hyukjae was sure if it were him, he would have punched the offending male right in the nose.

Jiyong’s gaze flickered to the bouquet in Hyukjae’s lap, clearly putting two and two together in a flash. He was an intelligent man, Hyukjae knew – Taeyeon wouldn’t be so close to him if he wasn’t. And his suspicion was confirmed when the other idol’s eyes traveled up and down his body once, as if contemplating what to do with him. Jiyong wasn’t pleased with his request; Hyukjae could tell. In fact, he was sure that it was only thanks to the other idol’s naturally calm temperament that he wasn’t beginning to raise his voice.

But he couldn’t give up. He wouldn’t. Not even if the other man (understandably) really punched him.

“Please,” he begged, knowing how desperate he sounded, not caring at all. “Please, I need to see her. I need to talk to her.”

Jiyong took a deep breath and looked away, but Hyukjae could clearly see that it wasn’t because he was wavering. It was a look away that was a blatant attempt to calm himself down, to stop himself from exploding at the source of his frustration – which happened to be Hyukjae himself.

Again, he couldn’t find it in himself to fault Jiyong in the slightest.

“Sunbaenim,” Jiyong said, his voice tight. “Are you asking me to help you meet Taeyeon, knowing what you did to her?”

His junior’s straightforward question caught Hyukjae slightly off guard. What he had done? He … he did know – of course he did. He was more than aware of what he did to Taeyeon. He’d pushed her away, treated her coldly, shunned her without reason. She was always a calm person by nature, rarely one to let her emotions get the better of her and add to the volatility of the situation. They had argued during their time dating, of course, like any normal couple, but he could barely recall any instance that she had become riled up enough to raise her voice. He remembered her getting upset, naturally, but she would always handle her frustration with remarkable tact and calm. It was something Hyukjae admired about her, her self-control. Her self-control that remained almost unwavering, even after their relationship began to fall apart. Even after he… began to ruin everything.

Hyukjae had always felt like she treated him too well, had always marveled at how lucky he was to have her, when he had had her, but now, in hindsight, he couldn’t deny that he was outright ashamed of how good she had been to him. And how unfairly he had repaid her for her patience and devotion with him.

Of course he knew what he did to Taeyeon. And yet here he was, begging her close friend to help him meet her again. This is so laughable.

“Yeah,” he muttered, hanging his head and unable to look Jiyong in the eye. “I am.”

The other idol stood silent for about thirty seconds, and it took those thirty seconds for Hyukjae to gather the nerve to look up at him. When he did, the frustrated hatred simmering in Jiyong’s gaze startled him. He expected Bigbang’s leader to dislike him, even hate him, but why did he look like he was restraining himself, trying to stop something from escaping his mouth?

“I won’t help you, sunbaenim.” The leader of Bigbang’s voice was tense with displeasure. “With all due respect, please leave Taeyeon be. You’ve done enough to her.”

The harshness of the reply caught Hyukjae off guard again; Jiyong had always seemed to be a rather shy person, not at all like the almost larger-than-life G-Dragon that was his stage persona. But of course, he knew, he was probably pushing the limits of the other idol’s patience.

He couldn’t say he hadn’t expected as much. Jiyong sounded firm, sure, confident, and on top of that, Hyukjae could tell as clear as day that the other idol was angry with him. He had a right to be. And Hyukjae – he had never counted himself as the stubborn type, and neither had the people around him – but this time, just this once, he couldn’t budge. No matter how impossible it felt like it would be to convince Jiyong.

“Jiyong-sshi, please. Just this once. Please.” Hyukjae was prepared to get on his knees and beg if he had to. “I need to see her. I’ll regret it forever if I don’t.” It would have been humiliating, pleading with someone he didn’t know like this when said someone was so clearly unwilling to listen, but Hyukjae was past caring at this point. He had to do this.

One more chance. Just one more.

“Oppa, who are you talking to?”

Jiyong spun around at the sound of the very familiar voice, and Hyukjae’s eyes flickered to its source as well. His heart skipped a beat – or more accurately, about ten, and he stiffened, caught off guard by the sudden turn of events.

Because Son Taeyeon was making her way down the sidewalk. She looked as beautiful as Hyukjae remembered her, large brown eyes glinting in the bright light, pink lips smooth and stark against her alabaster skin, black hair tied into a hasty ponytail, a few strands escaping to flutter about her face by the slight wind caused by her momentum. She was bundled up in a black winter coat that sleekly outlined her slender figure, blue jeans, and a pair of brown winter boots.

“Taeyeon,” Jiyong sounded a tad bit frantic, no doubt not happy that his friend had walked across her ex-boyfriend. At the same time, though, he didn’t try to block her or usher her away, and for that, Hyukjae was grateful. Even when Taeyeon’s eyes landed on him and she stopped in her tracks, a blank expression settling on her face, stifling any hint of emotion.

A few seconds of awkward silence passed, and Hyukjae swore that Taeyeon did it on purpose to unnerve him. Jiyong didn’t say anything, just stepped away from the bench and watched Taeyeon resignedly, like he was unsure about the situation but deciding to leave it up to his friend to decide what to do.

“What are you doing here?” Taeyeon’s entire demeanor was calm, which was both surprising and unsurprising at the same time. Surprising because the way that they split hadn’t been pretty, and Taeyeon had walked out the door of their shared apartment, slamming it behind her. Unsurprising because that was the one time he’d ever seen her lose her temper like that, and usually when arguments struck, she talked curtly and mildly, voicing her displeasure with her words but not with her volume.

“I…” Despite having badgered Jiyong so insistently to help him see Taeyeon, when actually faced with his ex-girlfriend, Hyukjae found that he was somewhat at a loss for words. “I needed to see you.”

Next to the bench, Jiyong-sshi let out a frustrated breath through his nose, but he remained silent and kept his eyes on Taeyeon, who kept her eyes on Hyukjae. He couldn’t get a hint of what she was thinking – her face remained carefully neutral and she studied him as if deciding he was worth her time. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling to be appraised like that, but Hyukjae knew better than anyone that he deserved it. The fact that Taeyeon was even bothering to look his way again was more than he could have dared hope for. This was nothing – just as long as he could talk to her, this was nothing. “Please,” he added softly.

She inspected him for a moment longer before turning to Jiyong. “Jiyong-oppa,” she said, “I’m really sorry, but can we delay for a little bit?”

Bigbang’s leader glanced back at Hyukjae, the misgivings on his mind obvious, and Hyukjae, for the millionth time, found himself unable to hold it against the other idol. “Are you sure?” Bigbang’s leader asked, his voice laced with protective concern.

“I’m not,” Taeyeon replied, never taking her eyes off of Hyukjae. “But I’ll give you a chance. Come on.”

#super junior #super junior scenarios #eunhyuk #lee hyukjae #eunhyuk scenarios #my writing

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humtraveltrek-blog · 6 years ago

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How I swiped perfect to find 'somebody' for the Winter Kareri Lake Trek

It was one exciting night. I consumed the most bit of my night turning and bending, squirming on a very basic level, endeavouring to find the most open to napping position. I endeavoured to think about sunshine and the warm sandy shoreline. Pina Coladas maybe. The infection was making me fantasize.

Here I was, cased into my horrendously restrictive outdoors bed, on a bed of dry grass tangled uninhibitedly on the floor of a natural hollow. For sure, a CAVE! It was the most recent multi-day stretch of December in Himachal Pradesh. I looked fresh snow outside. It was so dazzling. It was then that my thought was angry with a racket that sounded something like a wheeze. Adjacent to me was this individual who I had met on Tinder sometime earlier and this was our first trek together.

If this was a Bollywood movie, we would have been singing a wistful tune and moving around the open-air fire in our sinkhole, in small pieces of clothing likely. Nevertheless, the reality of the situation was IT.WAS.JUST.TOO.COLD. Too cold to even consider evening think about doing anything. While he was peppy, agreeable and resting in his climbing bed, I was in a loathsome state.

His profile on Tinder said something like, "lawful instructor by calling, pahadi by heart… et cetera."

We had met and spoken two or on various occasions. In any case, city dialogues hold ones thought just until the accompanying cautioning. He had all the earmarks of being a mountain kid. A trekker. A pooch sweetheart. Nature sweetheart. An all-out outdoorsy child. *Absolutely my type*. I saw one picture of him, where his shades, top and buff verified the most bit of his face anyway I swiped a benefit at any rate.

No issues as of not long ago.

I am a firm follower of the maxim that if you have to know someone, travel with them or by a wide margin prevalent, climb a mountain with them. If you are not pushed off the feign or if you don't drive the person off, and by somehow make sense of how to return alive and sound, maybe, conceivably, it infers something.

Days after the game evolving swipe, here I was, on a lesser-acknowledged winter trek to Kareri lake. While most trekking fans head to either Kuari pass or Har Ki Doon in December, we expected to contribute some vitality alone. Nature and us.

It was December. In the night and the midst of my squirming, I kept an eye out of the natural hollow, at the sky. The snow was sparkling and cotton of fogs were inaccurately disseminated in the indefinite quality blue sky. This was the primary bit of leeway of staying in a cave, you don't need to get out to get the stunning point of view. It was there straightforwardly before you, for example, seeing a film on a huge projector screen! Regardless, I won't lie, it was troublesome.

Photo of How I swiped suitable to find 'somebody' for the Winter Kareri Lake Trek 2/18 by Nerdy Adventuress

For me, this was taking the "getting away from your standard scope of nature" to an ENTIRELY NEW LEVEL! This was essentially too much rough. I would have favoured somebody warmth anyway settling with the Tinder child was outlandish. Regardless, he looked so warm that for a split evil second I imagined myself as Leonardo Di Caprio in Revenant. *you know where he moves inside a steed dead body, to keep himself warm during a snow storm.* Oh well. I was fantasizing.

If you ask me, Kareri is a perfect date trek. Not exceptionally long. Not extremely short. Adequately long to wind up familiar with each other yet short enough in case you have had enough of each other.

The fundamental day of our trek was exceptionally smooth, we had vivaciously hopped crossed the fascinating little Kareri town, drifted through green fields, waved out at the lovely town society and stopped at some unbelievably clear pools.

Once into the timberland and for the accompanying 3 days, we saw no one or met no one. Not a shepherd, not an inhabitant. With no accessibility and no contact with the outside world, we were exclusively in the lap of nature.

At knowing the past, this directly sounds to some degree disturbing, yet invigorating!

We were extremely autonomous. We had our outdoors beds, tent, mats and sustenance. Essentially everything that we expected to make due for an accompanying couple of days in solitude. I was so familiar with a trek in a dealt with the way where someone would pass on and set up your compact haven and keep the sustenance arranged. This was an exceptional experience. Here we could stop when we required and where we required. If we loved a spot, we could just set up our versatile safe house and contribute vitality there. No request, no dialogue, no standards.

That night we ceased at the natural hollows close Liyoti. These caves are usually used by the shepherds anyway during this time, it laid surrendered.

We experienced the night exploring the domain, gathering wood and setting things for the long crisp night in the natural hollow.

I persevere through that night.

The next day, I had strangely puffy eyes and my standard morning contempt. Such a distinction to the child's perky pink face. I was believing that he wouldn't see me thusly anyway that was entirely inevitable. I think trekking or being out in the wild draws out one's authentic face. Nature draws out the individual you truly are. No concealer or joke. I mulled over inside, if he can like me in this state, and not go covert post this trek, he is undeniably not one of those shallow youngsters.

That day we changed our courses of action, instead of outside at Kareri lake, we made it everyday journey and camp at some spot in travel our drop. He proposed we drop off our packs at the cave and trek upwards. My first reaction was, "Think about how conceivable it is that someone takes our stuff?" He just smiled and expressed, "In case someone has moved beyond what many would consider possible up here to take, he undoubtedly has the privilege to keep our stuff more than us.

I don't have the foggiest thought if it was his certain tone or his calm outside or possibly his humorous tendency, my by and large hyper-focused on the untrusting soul was ensured.

We started our trek for the day. I walked around him as we moved higher towards the lake. It was compromising for me. This individual had viably completed unquestionably the most problematic treks in India like Stok Kangri and Pin Parvati, etc and on size of Triund to Pin Parvati, I was Roopkund. Sort of a novice.

I huffed and puffed and made a not too bad endeavour to cover my exhaustion while making a respectable endeavour to remain mindful of him. In any case, he would reliably walk around, paying little mind to how direct I was or how frequently I stopped to take incredibly sporadic photographs, especially of my boots! Once in a while, he would in like manner rotate and give me something to nibble on. By and by this may seem, by all accounts, to be piddling anyway when you have sweat hardening midway, your members stuck and are completely exhausted, these easily overlooked details will as a rule intensify. *Guys, I believe you are taking notes.*

In travel, we ended to recuperate, drank from the undeniable stream contiguous, ate chocolate, sat on self-assertive shakes and checked out the sound of the winged animals. Someplace near exchanging our development stories, I think, I was beginning to like him.

No issues as of recently!

Finally following 4 hours of ascension, we landed at the lake.

I had seen photographs of the lake which was taken in the pre-summer months. A green-blue lake with glades fixed with sheep. Regardless, what I saw directly was so phenomenal. It was hardened and astonishing!

At around 10, 000 feet ASL, Kareri Lake (generally called Kumarwah Lake) is high tallness, shallow, freshwater lake south of the Dhauladhar run.

From Kareri town we had trekked about 13km over the latest 2 days. A huge part of this trail was along the Nylund stream right up to the lake. Regardless of the way that this trail is straightforward in the pre-summer months, caution ought to be taken while trekking it in winters since explicit fragments are steep, snow verified and the atmosphere, whimsical.

Kareri lake is in like manner the base camp for Minikani and Baleni pass treks, yet we turned out inadequately or camp at the lake. Or maybe we offered a quick appeal at the haven near the lake, retained the wonderfulness and the warm sun and progressed back.

When we had done this trek alone in the winter months, about everyone uncovered to us it was shocking. However, a portion of the time, a little while ago and once more, you should take those 'decided perils'. Chances are they will be supported, in spite of all the inconvenience!

That day we made a long drop and stayed outside in the forested areas.

Over the glimmer of the open-air fire, some warm soup, discourses and not so much lopsided quiets, we advanced toward getting to be sidekicks.

We are not on Tinder any more but instead offer thanks toward it with everything that is in us for helping us interface, which by and large would have been hard for asocial animals like us!

A year back has been overflowing with trips and treks. Additionally, a multi-week from now we are going on another winter trek!

Up until this point, *sigh* soooo extraordinary….

*Disclaimer-All characters and events in this story are veritable. Any similarity to any person in any condition is deliberate. :)

The course of the trek:

Dharamshala/Mcleodganj to Kareri town by methods for Ghera (there is a motorable road to Kareri town now), Ghera to Liyoti, Liyoti to Kareri lake and back to Liyoti (we dove further and stayed outside at the forested areas above Kareri town).

#travel #staycation #vacation sunsout resortwear tourist travelbug solotravel honeymoon

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buzzedbabe · 7 years ago

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@thewolfdragon @richard-madden @maddennfl86 @thenorthremembersalways @thefashionprofessor @robbstarkmademedoit @what-would-wonderwoman-do

story below for those that can’t read it

How much time are you spending thinking about Bodyguard? A lot, I bet. The new BBC thriller, about the relationship between an ambitious and unknowable home secretary and her PTSD-addled protection officer, was written by Jed Mercurio of Line of Duty fame, and was cynically and artfully designed to hook, obsess and fixate an audience into appointment viewing.

Bodyguard is made to steal us away from all newly acquired suit-yourself, binge-watch and content-stream habits, with charismatic heroes who might actually be despicable antiheroes and a succession of frenzied plot twists that simply must be consumed on the night lest someone catch you out with a spoiler on social media. Even if that doesn’t happen, even if your viewing isn’t partly ruined by a stray Facebook comment, watch an episode even a little late and find yourself locked out of all the best conversations, the most detailed post mortems, most frenetic speculations. Bodyguard is, in essence, a middle-aged Love Island, a reason to gather excitedly round the screen at the prescribed hour in a way that hasn’t really happened since the late Nineties.

Bloody hell, it’s good, I tell its star Richard Madden. The 32-year-old Glaswegian actor made his name as Robb Stark in Game of Thrones and consolidated it as Prince Charming in 2015’s Kenneth Branagh-directed Cinderella. Now, after playing Mellors in Mercurio’s 2015 Lady Chatterley’s Lover for the BBC, he trembles on the verge of Poldarking himself into borderline indecent, heavily fetishised glory as Bodyguard’s David Budd, the protection officer at the heart of the story.

“Oh, right,” he says. His accent is broad, non-posh Scottish; unexpected to those who remember it as generically Yorkshire in Game of Thrones. His eyes are intense. He’s arch and funny; he’d probably qualify as dangerously charming if there weren’t also something watchful and cautious about him. “Thanks very much! I enjoyed playing something a bit more adult, less boyish. I’m keen to play more grown-up roles, without actually growing up myself. Pretending to be adult. I’m done playing princes. Princes and royalty and lords. Also, it’s nice not to do an accent.” David Budd is – conveniently – Scottish. “One less thing to think about. Shall we get a drink? It is a Tuesday night, after all.”

It’s a Monday, I point out, but all the same we order a beer and wine from the front desk of the photographic studio in which we sit.

This is not the first time Madden and I have met. Three years ago, he bowled up to me at a friend’s party and demanded to know why I hadn’t featured him in Grazia magazine’s Chart of Lust recently. A placing in the list (which I compile weekly, and does exactly as its title suggests – rates the most fanciable people of that moment’s news), is deeply coveted among those who present themselves as above that kind of vanity, but definitely aren’t. Newscasters, Hollywood A-listers, national treasures, disruptive artists (Grayson Perry once told me he’d pinned his mention up on the wall in his studio), award-winning novelists … I’ve been lobbied by spads chasing mentions for their political charges on more than one occasion. But this was the first time a candidate had ever approached me in the flesh. I was both impressed and amused by his front.

“It does my frail ego good,” he’d elaborated, which, I’d thought, demonstrated a surprising amount of self-awareness in a young actor.

I remind him of our first meeting.

“Oh, God. Great start,” he says. Then, “I’m just trying to work my way up [the chart].”

Well, let’s see how this goes, shall we.

One of the reasons I think Bodyguard resonates so hard with its viewers is that it’s dealing with themes of safety – and so are we all. Terrorist attacks, suicide bombers and rooftop snipers recur from episode to episode; our current nightmares, and most catastrophising daytime fantasies, the ones that flicker through our minds every time we board a plane, go to a concert venue or swipe into a subway system, are played out in high definition on our small screens. Madden’s David Budd thwarts and buffers and foresees and repels; a hero with a fantastically of-the-moment brief. If Poldark is our ultimate historical TV pin-up – manly, tortured, good with his shirt off – then Budd is our ultimate Threat Level: Severe pin-up – manly, tortured, good in a bulletproof vest (“An actual bulletproof vest,” he’ll tell me, “which is so comfortable, for five months”).

I run this theory past Madden. How nervy is he in London right now?

“I don’t feel unsafe. I used to be more panicky, but I’m just less uptight. A few years ago, I’d get off at Tube stations because I’d have a sense of something.”

How much of David Budd’s wariness did Madden inherit through the course of filming?

“You get to a point where you clock everything. That’s what I’m doing for 12 hours a day, so …”

Walk into a room, scope it out for the nearest exit?

“I did that anyway. My dad’s a fireman, so that’s built in. Check into a hotel, first thing I do, find the fire exit.”

Richard Madden was born just outside of Glasgow, an only boy among older and younger sisters. His mother, Pat, is a classroom assistant. There were no other performers in his close family – no pub-singer uncles, no sisters at dance school.

You’re, like, a rogue luvvie.

“Yup!” he says.

How does that happen?

“I don’t know. I was fat. And shy. Crushingly shy, going to what was a fairly tough high school. Aggressive. Masculine. So I thought the best thing to do would be to go and be an actor. Ha ha! Not go and play football. Or get good at boxing. I’ll go and be an actor. They’ll love that.”

Aged 11, Madden joined Paisley Art Centre’s youth theatre programme. “And of course, they did not love that. But then I managed to dodge a couple of years of school, because …”

Because he was good enough to be cast, as a young teenager, in professional roles: in the film adaptation of Iain Banks’ Complicity, and in a kids’ TV show called Barmy Aunt Boomerang.

“So I was like, ‘I’m going to be acting, and not go to school.’ And get paid.”

Did you realise you were good? “I don’t think you ever feel good at it.”

He gave up acting in his mid-teens – “Life got a bit shit, when you’re on telly, among your peers, and you’re 14 years old”. He returned to it when he was 17, “because you have a bunch of teachers going, ‘Right, now you must decide what to do with the rest of your life,’ and 17 is of course the best time to choose.”

In 2004, he began studying at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. “I wasn’t allowed to apply for drama school unless I applied for a ‘real’ course as well, which was computing science. I didn’t even know what it was. Had no interest. And then, luckily, the day before my first exams, I received a letter saying you’ve got into drama school, so I went to my exams and just wrote my name.”

At 22, barely out of the RSAMD, he was cast as Robb Stark in HBO’s epic, fantastically successful Game of Thrones. Stark is the noble, brave, integrity-hampered son of Sean Bean’s Ned Stark; a character with a genuine and credible claim on the kingdom’s iron throne, all of which condemned him to a phenomenally gruesome death in an episode entitled The Rains of Castamere, only fans of the show (among whom I count myself, unashamedly) call it “The Red Wedding”, on account of the blood-drenched ceremony during which Madden, his pregnant wife and his mother all die.

Madden says he thinks that early, formative brush with a TV career was both “a head-f***” and, “I was so thankful for it, because, going into the world of Game of Thrones, I’d already learnt so much from doing it as a kid, of feeling isolated, or getting arrogant because you’re on a TV show. I’d kind of done all that. I could deal with it a lot better.”

A lot better than whom, among your co-stars?

He cackles. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

Yes! Can I guess? “No.”

Madden went into Game of Thrones knowing he would die within three series – the books on which the shows are based spelled out Robb Stark’s demise long before Madden was cast – which he thinks is a good thing, professionally speaking. “I didn’t just want to be known as that guy from Game of Thrones.” It also meant that his celebrity has, until this point at least, been tinged with pity, partly for the grotesque manner of his fictional death, partly because he was booted out of that juggernaut of a TV sensation early.

That might be about to change with Bodyguard. I am reasonably confident Madden’s fame is about to be tinged with something rather more lecherous. David Budd is in no sense a straightforward romantic hero – physically and emotionally scarred, with an undivorced wife and kids squirrelled away in a safe house – but heavens, he does brooding intensity well. His love affair with Keeley Hawes’ home secretary, Julia Montague, is as intensely sexy as it is quietly subversive, for making no reference to Hawes’ Montague being ten years older than Madden’s Budd. The whole thing is designed to charm the pants off us, and I wonder how prepared Madden is to receive the unbridled lust of thousands of women on social media.

If Twitter erupts with lechery …

“I won’t look.”

Why?

“Because if I do, and if I believe someone going, ‘Oh God, he’s hot,’ then I’ll also have to believe the person that goes, ‘He’s got pumpkin teeth.’ Do you know what I mean?”

Yes, but, you are widely considered handsome, so …

“I don’t see it.”

Truly not?

“Truly not.”

It is form for beautiful young actors to deny their looks, in the interest of seeming more humble and likeable than they really are, but I think, in Madden’s case, he could mean it. He tells me fame has made him feel less attractive, not more. “You chat to a girl at a bar, have a couple of drinks, and shy Richard is slowly going. This is going well. And then it’s, ‘My boyfriend’s a really big fan. Can I get a picture?’ And you go, ‘F***.’ You think they think you’re hot, but it’s because you’re on telly.”

I ask Madden if he thinks he’s irredeemably defined by the chubby, shy child he used to be.

“I feel like I should lie down on that sofa and give you a hundred quid.”

Were you really so scarringly fat?

“Thirty-eight inch waist when I was 12. I didn’t wear denim until I was 19, because denim is really hard to take up. My mum couldn’t take my jeans up.”

Would you say you have body issues?

“Absolutely, yeah.”

Despite all of which, Richard Madden does OK with women. When I originally met him, he’d been in the final stages of a long-term relationship with the actor Jenna Coleman, who stars as Victoria in the ITV show, and who is now in a relationship with her onscreen Albert, Tom Hughes. Since then, Madden has been gossip-column-linked to a succession of beautiful women – model Suki Waterhouse and TV presenter Laura Whitmore among them – none of whom seem notably put off by his pumpkin teeth.

“I think in the last year I was, as far as the tabloids went, dating seven different people. And when you receive a text saying, ‘Are you sleeping with blah blah,’ and you go, ‘No,’ that’s a bit weird.”

Who are you sleeping with?

“I’m not saying.”

But you are sleeping with someone?

“I am sleeping with someone. I am very happy with someone. There are pictures of it on the internet.”

If it’s the one everyone thinks you’re dating, I say – by which I mean the 21-year-old Ellie Bamber, with whom he was pictured most recently at the Serpentine Gallery summer party – then she’s another actor. Is it really a good idea to go out with other actors?

“Yes and no. Yes, because you understand what each other’s going through. No, because, there’s a certain level of self-focus you need, in order to do the job you’re doing. That’s hard on all relationships, because what am I going to talk to you about? I walk up and down for 12 hours a day, dealing with this character’s shit. That’s all I’ve done, every day, for the past three months … I really haven’t got anything to offer you as a friend.”

We return, briefly, to Bodyguard. He says he got on brilliantly with Keeley Hawes. “Love her, love her to pieces. She saved my arse, because it’s not a fun job. It’s not a comedy. But then Keeley and me, me and her, off screen, were just like two kids.”

Were you paid the same?

“No idea. I imagine she earned more. I care less about how much other people are paid, and more what it takes for me to shut up and go and do my job. The equality thing needs to be addressed hugely between male and female co-stars; I know that from friends of mine. But there’s only so much I can do for myself. Agents and lawyers, they do all that stuff. I just kind of deal with what I need to, so I don’t look a producer in the eye and f***ing hate them when they’re talking about their villas, and you’re thinking, shit, I’m getting the bus at the weekend, because I don’t have the money for a cab, you know?”

How rich are you?

“Not very. People think I am, because of Game of Thrones, but you know, when I signed up for that I was 22, with f*** all on my CV, so I was paid f*** all.”

Then, somehow, we end up talking about his body again.

“In between filming, I eat pizza, drink, don’t work out, get fat, then it’s six weeks till you have to be naked again. It’s always six weeks. Actually, that’s if you’re lucky. I have ten days till I take my clothes off again this time.”

What’s the occasion?

“I’m filming Rocketman, the Elton John film, and I play John Reid, his first boyfriend, his manager for 28 years.”

A straight man in a gay role; casting that has become contentious after Disney named comedian Jack Whitehall, who is straight, as the voice of its first openly gay hero.

“Yeah, and Taron Egerton [who is playing Elton John] is a straight man in a gay role,” says Madden, “and I think we’re all f***ed if we start going down the route of you can only play a gay part if you’re a gay actor. Diversity, equality and pay – of course we need to make sure of all that, but at the same time … I read reports that so and so’s pulled out of this role because they’re not transgender, and you go, yeah, but they’re a f***ing actor, and they’re probably really f***ing good in the part, and maybe that is part of the reason why that film’s getting made …”

We wind up with him telling me he isn’t bothered about an Oscar. “Because, who won best actress last year? Best actor? Best supporting actor? What won best musical?”

No idea.

“So what does it matter?” he says.

After which, he is beautifully mocking (off the record) about a very famous actor’s latest endeavour, before hugging me goodbye and pretending – well – he hopes to see me again soon, socially. Richard Madden made it to No 2 in the current issue of Grazia’s Chart of Lust Bodyguard continues tomorrow at 9pm on BBC One. Episodes 1 and 2 are on BBC iPlayer

#richard madden #bodyguardbbc #robb stark

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bharathshan · 3 years ago

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lindsay36ho · 5 years ago

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An Uncancelled Beethoven Celebration – Interview with Konstantin Scherbakov, part 1

2020 is not only a fascinating year for the musical world and the worldwide celebrations of Ludwig van Beethoven, but also gives us a chance to get closer to noteworthy performers in order to share their ideas and experiences of the grand master of western classical music. In this interview with Konstantin Scherbakov the phenomenal performer shares his experiences derived from a lifelong relationship with the composer, on stage, in the recording studio and as an influential tutor. In this first part of the interview we get to learn about Scherbakov’s year of celebration and complete sonatas recording project.

Patrick Jovell: Konstantin, we know you through your large discography and your broad interest in different kinds of repertoire but this interview will focus on your relation to Beethoven. How did it all start?

Konstantin Scherbakov: The Beethoven Year 2020 rounds up an important circle in my biography. It is not only Beethoven’s 250 Birthday. It also happens that I play piano since 50 years. And it is absolutely no coincidence that I celebrate this double anniversary by playing only Beethoven’s music: I associate my personal Beethoven story with my life in music in general. It began when I, six years old, played his “Marmotte”, and continued through the next fifty years when I played in concerts almost everything Beethoven has written for the piano, and beyond – his solo piano works, all the Concertos and all the Symphonies. I also recorded quite a bit of this – initially for the Soviet Radio, then for Naxos (Diabelli-Variations), Two Pianists label (Eroica-Variations, Sonatas), the largest and most significant project being to-date the Complete Symphonies in Liszt’s transcription. The 2019/20 concert season was exclusively dedicated to Beethoven: the Complete Sonatas and Symphonies cycles in various countries and at some important festivals, of which the most notable was, of course, the Beethovenfest in Bonn. Besides the solo repertoire, I was also to perform Beethoven’s concerti. Towards Beethoven’s supposed birthday at the end of 2020 the release of the Complete Sonatas CD-box (which I am currently recording and will continue recording during the next months for the Steinway label) is scheduled with the release of the set of nine CDs in October – November 2020.

PJ: How has Covid-19 affected your concert and recording schedule?

KS: Yes, it was an unexpected turn of events, (for everyone everywhere!) which cost me, as any other artist, lots of engagements, concerts and which ruined all plans. You realize this especially painfully when it’s a cycle of concerts which is spread through the whole season, when your work is precisely scheduled every month at different venues: these sonatas in January, this set in February etc. Indeed it is very misfortunate when you schedule your work years in advance and everything is lost at once. Except recordings, however: in spite of the Corona crisis, the Steinway label is working strictly in accordance with the schedule we made up one year ago. Every month there has been a release of yet another set of Sonatas.

Here the pandemic situation turns out to be a life elixir! When in the past thirty years did I have the time to enjoy working – in peace – on one program for one whole month? The experience which mixes playing late Beethoven’s music all day long, endless walks in various Swiss regions, and reading Proust, is nothing short of a revelation! In the absence of any disturbing factors like traveling, getting hurried or distracted by other things, you realize this is nothing but sensational, unheard of, and for that reason extremely precious and wonderful time. That is what I am through right at this moment. However dreadful the situation is for the world I am grateful for the opportunity to experience something I was never able to experience before. Many things in life will look different from now on…

PJ: It is said that Beethoven – after composing 15 sonatas – told his editor Breitkopf & Härtel that he was planning to compose sonatas in a totally new way. How do you as an interpreter and recording artist schedule your Beethoven recitals in terms of coupling sonatas? Is there a chronological factor working in this sense?

KS: Of course everyone planning to perform or record the complete Beethoven Sonatas inevitably thinks about how to program them in concert or on CD. So did I. I had done my homework but decided to research how others did theirs before me. I consulted recording catalogues and googled for concert cycles featuring Beethoven’s Sonatas. Strangely enough, I found more programs where the sonatas were distributed in some ways, different from a simple chronological order. Among them there would not be two similar programming ideas. And every idea seemed to me strange and suspicious, highly questionable and subjective. Why this or that choice of sonatas in one concert? What stands behind this particular combination? How would such a program sound in a concert? I did not have any answers as it all seemed too personal, too speculative and thus difficult to understand or agree. My research however proved to be very helpful. The conclusion to program my Beethoven Sonatas cycle in chronological order was reinforced and my opinion about such a decision strengthened. Indeed, what can bring a more satisfying experience than a journey with Beethoven through his life, every period of which left a significant trace in his piano sonatas, from beginning to the end? Moreover: from such a perspective, 32 sonatas appear much more as a cycle with its obvious concept and well structured content.

PJ: Brahms’ opening of his first Sonata – paraphrasing Beethoven’s ”Hammerklavier” – is such a striking example of the latter’s enormous impact as a role model for the sonata form, for composers and pianists to come. There are endless attempts to explain Beethoven’s Sonatas in form and psychological contents. Can you tell me why the 32 have become a bible among pianists?

KS: There are many reasons. To name them all one would need to write a book. I’ll just try to focus on the most obvious ones, from my perspective. One of them was the fact that Beethoven’s titanic and tragic figure was the icon that represented the spirit of the time. After all, the living legend Beethoven, was the most well-known personality of the time next only to Napoleon… It is no surprise therefore that Beethoven was regarded as a symbol of the epoch also by those who composed music. Of course Beethoven’s prodigious gifts were apparent anywhere, in all forms and genres. However, his genius needed the sonata form to develop and bring to realization the whole wealth of his abilities. It is primarily due to sonatas, quartets, and the symphonies that we know Beethoven. The historical development of the sonata form has reached its peak in Beethoven’s compositions. Deriving from examples of earlier sonata forms in the works of C. P. E. Bach, Haydn and Mozart, Beethoven brought the genre to totally new heights and established a new model which ought to serve as a pattern to follow and as a catalogue of rules, methods and ideas. It was the sonata form that explains the attracting power and strong influence of Beethoven.

PJ: Clearly Beethoven displays both willingness and boldness when it comes to experimenting with contents and its construction. Can you elaborate on that?

KS: Beethoven’s method of composition at first sight seems to be uncomplicated, straightforward, simple and easy: one takes a microscopically small musical pattern and grows huge constructions using its semantic potential. This universal method is indeed like in biological life where anything grows from a single cell. However, such a method requires a genius spirit, melodical gift, perfect sense for formal balance and logic, sophistication and precision of a mathematician’s thinking. Without any of these qualities any attempt to copy or even just follow the method would fail. Many composers didn’t escape the attraction of Beethoven’s method and tried it with various success: the names of Brahms, Bruckner, Schumann and Schubert spring to mind, Mahler would not be possible; many representatives of national schools couldn’t avoid the influence either, such as the Russian Tchaikovsky, Finnish Sibelius or Czech Dvorak. The perfect blend of counterpoint and melody, the use of plain harmony patterns, rhythmical urgency, logic in the development, an enormous scope of artistic ideas and subjects and the ability to say much using few words – that all made Beethoven’s scores an example to study, worship, marvel, and to follow.

PJ: Which values – or challenges for that sake – arise for you as pianist and interpreter while working with this incredibly rich material?

KS: Also from the pianist’s perspective there are a few reasons why Beethoven’s music is so attractive. The first indeed is the fact that this is undoubtedly the best music ever written. There are thirty-two wonderful piano pieces; each of them makes any concert program attractive for audiences. Due to their different musical nature, they can be integrated in any programming context. It also happened that Beethoven was the first composer to write music for the grandfather of the modern piano which we know and play today. Finally, it was in the sonata form where he not only formally completed the development of the genre but opened the new era of pianism with new rules, principles, new basics and unheard-of means. In order to serve the new music ideas which Beethoven introduced in yet another sonata, the piano technique had to be revolutionized; the modern understanding of articulation was introduced (Legato, before all), the use of dynamic range of ever changing and growing instrumental possibilities, the use of pedal(s) etc.

However, for a thinking, reflecting pianist, playing a Beethoven Sonata remains, above all, the challenge of highest artistic criteria; it is kind of a maturity test, because in a Beethoven’s Sonata one’s musicianship becomes apparent. Why so? The answer is in the nature of Beethoven’s language in general as the language of one of the greatest humanists in arts history. It looks to me the following way: in his music, Beethoven sums up the experience of the humanity, forms it in a particular musical idea, encrypts it in a pattern (motif, theme) consisting of a few notes and speaks by its means to humans, in his own name or in the name of God (“Seid umschlungen Millionen!”). His genius makes possible an easy and clear recognition of the meaning of such a motif by everyone. Its expressive power and obvious message is underlined by its shortness. The famous “Fate motif” from the 5th Symphony is a perfect illustration of this thesis. Thus, the task of a performer is to catch, identify, decode and bring the message over. Here the interpretation (pronunciation) has ideally to have the equal expressive power; any failure in properly formulating the idea would be recognized and cause dissatisfaction. In the ideal case, we get two kindred musical spirits acting in harmony – the composer’s and the performer’s. In the worst scenario, we simply experience the dutiful text reading. To illustrate these words I ask you to think about this: how many times were the expectations that always arise in anticipation of a concert featuring, say, the Sonata Op. 111, justified by the actual experience? That is what makes pianists attempt to climb those peaks of piano literature: on one side, the challenge which in case of success would be gratified by recognition, on the other – the urge to prove to oneself where one stands as of now. And above all – the ultimate beauty of the music which is matched only by its depth.

About Konstantin Sherbakov

A world wide performer, Scherbakov had a career that took him to play with 70 orchestras and to record some 40 albums, including the complete piano works by Shostakovich, Godowsky, and the nine symphonies by Beethoven in Liszt’s transcription. Over the course of his career, Scherbakov has performed all of Beethoven’s piano concertos around the globe and is perhaps the only pianist in the world that has an active repertoire featuring all of Beethoven’s piano sonatas, all piano concertos and the Liszt-Beethoven symphonic transcriptions (the latter on five discs 1998-2004, Naxos). The recordings were met with enthusiasm: “Scherbakov is in many ways the artist whom these works have been waiting for,” International Piano wrote. Stereoplay echoed: “This CD should be prescribed at least 50 conductors for educational purposes! Since 1998 Scherbakov functions as Professor at the Zürich University of Arts and many of his students received prizes at international piano competitions, most notably Yulianna Avdeeva; the winner of the 2010 Chopin Competition in Warsaw. Scherbakov has also been nominated by the International Classical Music Awards (ICMA) for his Liszt/Lyapunov Transcendental Studies CD (Steinway label, 2019).

Scherbakov Sonatas Project 2020

FREE SAMPLE: Beethoven Complete Sonatas Vol. 6 (Steinway and Sons label)

from Piano Street’s Classical Piano News https://www.pianostreet.com/blog/articles/an-uncancelled-beethoven-celebration-interview-with-konstantin-scherbakov-part-1-10696/

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feynites · 7 years ago

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I'm so thirsty for a Gen Lavellan x Fen'Sulahn AU...

Ireth’s death is a calamity that reminds Lavellan of the endof the world.

It is not the same scope, of course. One person, one clan,versus an unfathomable number? The scales could never compare. But then, shehad never really been able to process the loss in a way befitting the scope ofit anyhow. People, she had learned, generally are not built to fathom thatscale of tragedy. So, she had mourned it in the sense of losing everyone andeverything she knew.

And now she has lost nearly as much all over again.

Most of their clan is dead. Killed by Ireth herself, in thethroes of her madness. Those others who have survived, have largely scattered.Haninan has vanished into the mountains, grief-stricken and unwilling to befound, and given all that has happened, Lavellan cannot blame him. She thinksthat the two of them, herself and June, could probably find him. That he wouldlet them, if they came. But June refuses to go looking. He is convinced thattheir father must hate him, for killing Ireth.

Killing their mother.

Lavellan finds herself marvelling at her brother, when shecan spare the thought for it. He loved their mother, as surely as she did. Assurely as Haninan did, too. She has no doubts on that front. But she andHaninan, they could not have done it. She had helped to contain and even tofight Ireth, but in the end, it had been Solas all over again, for her part init. Even knowing that she needed tostop her mother, she could not bring herself to end it.

But June had.

Lavellan is not sure what kind of strength that is. Juneseems to fear that is something which makes him a worse person, but after allshe has seen and done, she cannot think so herself. And she tries her best totell him that, in the wake of their grief.

It is… hard. It has been a long time since she has had tonavigate the world without a Mother and Keeper to guide her. Without Haninan,or the clan. There is a lot of mourning to do. A lot of faces and voices tomiss, but it is even harder for June, who has never before seen people astemporary. Who cannot think to himself theylived for hundreds of years, they were happy, they had good lives. Becausein June’s world, there is nothing else to compare it to.

They bury Ireth together. Plant seedlings over the turnedearth, and weep against one another. The absence of their mother feels as grandand impossible as Ireth herself had been.

The fight had taken place in a valley, near to the campsitesof some of the Allied Elves. Those of the burgeoning empire, who march underthe banners of Elgar’nan and Mythal. Lavellan is unsure what to make of them,truth be told. They are Olwyn’s parents. They are first reference she has forhow truly far back Olwyn managed to send her spinning through time; Lavellan isolder than Mythal, which takes her aback when she realizes it. Older than Olwyn’sancient mother. And now this woman and her twin-soul husband build cities andestablish fortresses, and war with other clans, and appoint their children asleaders of their armies.

The elves who come to them in the wake of Ireth’s death arefriendly, though. They exclaim of June’s phenomenal transformation, and becomeeven more excited when he confirms that he is Waking-born. The son of a Keeper,true, but it is almost unheard of for even Keepers’ children to becomefull-blown dragons.

Lavellan does not mention what she suspects – that, havingdone it under the circumstances which he did, June will never manage thattransformation again, either.

Her brother seems at least somewhat mollified by having theaccomplishment celebrated. They both are welcomed into the settlement, and forlack of other recourse, they accept. The elves there talk of The Great Empire.The vision of Mythal and Elgar’nan; a uniting of all good and peaceful clans ofthe various ranges, to build a place where wickedness is routed, and the Peoplemight come together to share knowledge and to live in harmony. It is a prettypicture. But it does not exactly match the reality of armies and fortresses andobvious conquest which Lavellan sees around them.

She has seen empires before, and has never been given areason to laud the concept. The Imperium, and Orlais, and even the Qun and theChantry had been empires of a sort. In her grief, she could not help but despairinglythink that perhaps it was inevitable. Perhaps no place could truly avoid thecrushing wheels of expansionist visions; the bloody swath which the powerfulalways seemed intent upon cutting through everyone else. The settlement elvesseem genuinely relieved that Ireth’s rampage was halted before their lives wereforfeited to it, and willing to explain what they know of the madness of theKeepers. They think it is a weapon, that some of the clans of the far southhave devised in an effort to get peaceful clans to strike at the expandingempire. It only seems to affect Keepers, as well – those who can become dragonsby other means have, so far, not been susceptible to it.

It matches somewhat with the things Haninan had deduced, asthey had attempted to heal Ireth. That the madness was coming to her through theDreaming. That it was a deliberate, malicious thing. June shares theirknowledge in return, and the settlement elves seem genuinely excited to havesomething more to go off of.

They seem… just like regular people, really. People with avision and a hope for the future, who offer sincere remorse for their loss, andrelief at their own survival.

Whatever is really going on, Lavellan does not think theyhave answers to it. And, she thinks, perhaps all that is really going on isprecisely what seems to be going on.The world is still young, even if she has begun to feel very old in it. Thereis no weight of past empires to weigh it down, no long history of suffering andoppression to learn from. In that light, perhaps an empire does seem like anhonest, promising vision. Perhaps unity seems plausible. Perhaps the dream ofElvhenan began in much the same manner as the stories she had heard, growing upfor the first time – so long ago, now.

Olwyn had told her that it had all been good, once. Thatcorruption and poison, arrogance and greed, and the failings of herself and herbrothers, had sundered Elvhenan into chaos and despair.

Lavellan is not naïve enough to be convinced. But… Olwyn sent her back for a reason. Olwyn believedthat there was something she might be able to save.

And perhaps, if she cannot save it – perhaps June can helpher learn how to kill it, before all is lost again.

After a few months of recovery, the settlement comes underattack again. Lavellan recognizes the assailants; Hazard Clan. Scavengers andshrine-defilers, slave-takers and torturers. They like to target clans andwanderers who have lost their Keepers. June suspects them of being at leastpartly responsible for Ireth’s condition; their own Keeper is gifted in allmanner of strange magic, poisons of the mind and body among them, and they are distastefulenough to make for easy enemies. The settlement’s warriors repel them, but Lavellanand June take up arms to help as well.

If June kills his foes with uncommon viciousness, she doesnot see fit to comment on it. They die quickly, at least.

“They will have a camp, somewhere nearby,” Lavellanconcludes, when they are examining the corpses, afterwards. Ten elves.Well-equipped, and a few had been formidable enough to give them trouble. By mostclan standards that is a typical raiding party, but given the fortified natureof the settlement, a laughably undermanned group for a serious assault. Thefighting had begun when one of the settlement guards spotted signs of tamperingwith the outer wards, though, and ran into the party – not an intentional assault,then, but more likely a scouting group.

Which means there are more, somewhere, and that the plan from Hazard’s people was likely tolaunch a proper attack, once they’d weakened the outer defenses some.

June nudges one of the bodies with the toe of his boot, andscowls down at it. He has no weapons; try as she might to get him to at leasttake up a staff, June has always preferred to fight with magic alone.

“We will go after them,” he decides.

She raises an eyebrow at him.

“What, just the two of us?” she counters, and then nods backtowards the settlement guards – who are busy making their own assessments. “Wedo not command them, after all.”

June lets out an impatient breath. He runs a hand over hisbraids, and for a moment, he looks so much like their parents – Mother’scolouring, Father’s body language – that she aches. His gaze follows her to the settlement guards.

“It would be a risk,” he concedes.

Lavellan nods.

They are formidable, but they have no idea who is in therest of Hazard Clan’s party. If Hazard himself is there, then they will bebiting off more than they can reasonably chew.

Still…

She watches as one of the attackers’ corpses bleeds itslast. Unconscious, but apparently the elf had not been quite dead. Their bodyshifts from that of a massive boar, and into a more elven figure. Cold indeath.

She wonders what they had hoped to gain from all this.

And what does shehope to gain, now?

What can she gain?

June will join theevanuris. The thought is an unwelcome one. Her brother is… he is not whatshe would picture, for a God of Crafts, or for a great leader of the people.June is June. She loves him, but he has never been happy with himself. Neverbeen what he wants to be, and never been willing to relinquish the concept ofwhat he should be, either, in orderto make some kind of peace with himself. He is not a very good leader.

And in at least one timeline, she thinks, it was probablyhis undoing.

I cannot lose you,too.

“I suppose it is theirsettlement – it is up to them. We should tell them,” she decides, wondering howshe can fight this tide. “And then we should leave.”

June is taken aback by that.

“Leave?” he asks. “And go where?”

The bitterness in his voice is undisguised.

“We should find Father,” she says.

It is a mistake, and she knows it as soon as the words areout of her mouth. June’s jaw clenches and his posture goes rigid, the uneasearound him palpable until he manages to contain it. Bitterness cresting into arush of resentment so potent, she can taste it at the back of her own throat.

And beneath that, fear.

“Father does not want to be found, least of all by us,” her brother spits.

“He does not hate us, June,” she insists. “He does not hate you. He is grieving, just like we are.Mother would want us to mourn her together. She would want us to find him, notleave him alone out there, suffering by himself.”

“Mother would havenever thought that I…”

June’s mouth snaps shut before he can finish. Eyes brighterthan they should be, as he clenches a tight fist.

After a tense moment, Lavellan lets out a long breath.

“She wouldn’t have,” she concedes. Venturing a hand out tograsp her brother’s shoulder. A muscle in his jaw clenches tighter – but hedoes not shrug her off. Again, she sighs. “But only because none of us knewwhat was coming. She would not blame you, not for any of this.”

The bitterness sinks into her own voice, then. All thethings she can see coming. But of course, this never made it into the historybooks. Nor any of Olwyn’s accounts of the past.

“I do not want to go mourn in some ditch with Father,” Junefinally says, in a sharp tone of voice. And he does shrug her off, then. “Ifthe likes of Hazard’s Clan did this to Mother, did this to our clan, then I want their blood. This new group, they arefighting this battle. We should fight with them. Build with them. Make this –this vision of theirs into a reality,and get revenge in the meanwhile.”

She closes her eyes for a moment.

“We do not even know who is really responsible,” she pointsout.

“We can kill enough of them to make certain that whoever itis gets caught in the blast,” June counters, stubborn and hard, and wreathed inhis grief again. Like an impenetrable shell. Lavellan tries, but, that is theend of that conversation, it seems.

They head back to the settlement in stony silence.

The settlement elves are obviously displeased at the attack,but they invite Lavellan and June to confer with them on the matter – they havea fair number of able bodies among their ranks, but no lauded warriors inparticular, and no one with the experience of actually going toe to toe with aKeeper. June’s reputation seems to be growing, and Lavellan appears caught init as a matter of courtesy more than anything. But June has never reallydefended fortified ground before. He does not know the advantages ofstrongholds, or armies, or their disadvantages,either.

Ostensibly, neither does Lavellan. But she still remembersSkyhold. However long ago it may be – those memories are burned into her, assurely as anything. The firmament of her being. Gently eased, across theseyears, by the balm of a home that has now been shattered; and maybe there is atleast some use in that. Maybe she had grown complacent… no, she knows she grew complacent.

She takes over much of the discussions, until another voicefrom the past comes to rattle her.

“The scouts say that General Fen’Sulahn’s forces are thenearest,” one of the settlement leaders muses, in the midst of some debate overthe next move to take. “Iluthen can wing out to them and carry a message. Theyare quick enough to do the job, and Fen’Sulahn has units big enough that wecould simply trample these rogues once and for all.”

Lavellan freezes.

General Fen’Sulahn.

…Olwyn.

“No,” one of the other settlement leaders says, as shefights to keep her reeling internal. “Fen’Sulahn is moving somewhere inparticular. I doubt the army can afford to divert from their goal. Lord Elgar’nankeeps a force at Fort Sunbreak, by the old Broadfields campgrounds. They wouldnot be as many nor as swift, but they could probably spare more people. Weshould send Iluthen to them…”

The arguments carry on, and the name Fen’Sulahn is notmentioned again. But Lavellan finds herself struggling to fall into the flow ofstrategy and conversation once more. She lets June take his spotlight instead, onlyspeaking up when something seems particularly egregious to her; and when thesettlement leaders finally decide to call for Elgar’nan’s aid, she retreats tothe small guest room that she and her brother have been granted, and sinks intoone of the chairs there.

Olwyn.

Fen’Sulahn.

She is out there, right now. The Dread Wolf of legend. Thelover she could not save… and could not kill. A young general, now, leadingarmies and helping to build an empire of legend. The same empire that will seethe downfall of the elvhen peoples – the raising of the Veil, the creation ofmortality itself, the staging grounds for the world that would eventually beruled by so many other empires. The world savaged by Blights, sundered from itsspirits.

Home, give or take.

Lavellan closes her eyes and remembers. Soft hands. Warmlaughter. Sweet lips. Sad eyes.

She can taste ash on her tongue, by the time June comes andfinds her.

At least, under the circumstances, he does not see fit toquestion the grief that keeps spilling away from her. But she is not surprisedwhen he retreats from it, too. His own too fresh and sharp and easily called upto the surface.

He hesitates, at the doorway.

“When you were small, and you would cry… I always feltuseless,” he admits. Not looking at her. One hand resting by the door, his hairstill done in tidy, shining box braids. “If you want to go and find Father, Iwill not stop you.”

Haninan.

She does want togo and find him.

But Haninan is not the one who is falling into the hands ofElvhenan. Not right now, anyway.

“I will not go without you,” she tells her brother.

He bows his head, and lingers for a moment more. Beforeleaving, awkwardly, and without another word said.

She wishes…

…She wishes she was better at this.

Olwyn, she thinks.Why did you send me here?

She wonders if she will ever be able to stop asking thatquestion. But as always, her thoughts cannot provide much in the way ofanswers. Just more memories, etched in grief, and clouded by time.

Elves come to the settlement. They carry banners with thesigil of a burning tree upon them; the symbol of Mythal and Elgar’nan’s armies.But their armour is marked with flames only, for they explain that they arefollowers of Elgar’nan’s. That the ‘unified’ empire is already being split intodisparate and easily-managed segments. They do not have vallaslin – yet. Butthose who choose to wear clan markings all sport the same, eerily familiarpattern.

It is like being in a dream, in many ways. In dream ofarmies and elves with familiar markings on their faces, and a picture of thepast that is coming together in frustrating, foggy pieces. It makes her missHaninan even more dearly. Makes her wish she had his talent for puttingpictures together, for seeing the way in which things connect. Wandering clans,and ancient-new gods, and names of figures she has honestly never even beengranted the luxury of thinking sheknew well. Even living through history does not seem to make it any morecomprehensible.

Some part of her cannot help but simply despair.

Even so, she and June go with the soldiers who set out tofind Hazard Clan’s camp. The subsequent fighting is harsh and dirty, the kindthat comes from cornered desperation, but the Keeper himself is not with thisband. In the aftermath, though, she and June seem to earn even more acclaim;and the leaders from Elgar’nan’s contingent look at June with a great deal ofinterest. And though they do not project it, no small amount of wariness,either. A kind of cautious distance. After all, she and June may have aidedthem, but they have not pledged themselves to their cause.

Though more and more, June seems to be convinced that theyshould.

It is for her sake that he holds out. She knows that. Junehas never been alone before, never been without a community around him, andthese elves are not like their clan, nor their cousin clans. They do not knowJune as the child of Ireth and Haninan; they know him as a figure of might, andit leaves him desperate to keep hold of the respect he seems to have earned.

Desperate to please, but in a way that does not seem likedesperate pleasing.

Lavellan finds herself wondering how her brother can be soold and so young at the same time.

But when Elgar’nan’s people return to their outpost, she andJune consent to go with them. They listen to yet more talk of a glorious visionof an empire. Behind closed doors, they argue, because June wants to believeit, and because Lavellan cannot bring herself to. And because her brother iswaiting for her to leave, waiting for her to scream at him that he is a killerwho murdered their mother, and because Lavellan has no interest in levellingthat blame at him. But he cannot believe it, and so they linger, stuck in anodd mess of wounds and suspicion and shadowy, persistent dread.

More than once, she thinks of telling June.

Haninan knows.

Ireth… knew.

But June, she fears, would just see it as some new attempton her part to best him. Some new thing to come and lord over him. His motherwas a Keeper, his father is a genius, and Lavellan is a time traveller who hasalready lived through one world turning to ash.

And truth be told, she cannot stomach the thought of himrejecting her, in turn. Of him sending her away, and walking into this mess onhis own.

The confession goes stale, unspoken, lingering as a hollowknot in her throat.

The invitation to the outpost becomes an invitation to the outpost. To the fortress. To the verdant campgrounds which once housed one ofthe few real temples left in the territories, where once a tree of legend grew.A place that has now been claimed as permanent base camp by the elves of the empire.

Arlathan.

They go to Arlathan, at the request of Mythal.

The city is not yet so sprawling as Val Royeaux, or Denerim,but the obvious intent is there. There are walls, and fortifications, andfields they clear a vast line of sight for the armed patrols that walk thestreets, wearing banners of fire and trees, hares and flowers, masks and owlsand… and wolves. More faces painted than not, and here she finds the rankingelves do wear vallaslin. The properkind.

It is not so reassuring as it might have been. She remembersthe markings that had been on her own face. The wolf’s marks – fitting forsomeone who had so often felt apart from the groups she belonged to. Rememberssoft fingers, and remorseful eyes, and a whispered apology that she had notunderstand the true gravity of until much later. When she had found herself infront of a broken eluvian, short an arm and clutching at straws.

But Arlathan isbeautiful. There are gardens. There are paved roads. There is a palace, andthere are fountains, and archways grown over with shimmering blue roses. Thepetals fall and land on their shoulders, as she and June walk beneath them, andare met with an unexpected heroes’ welcome.

But all Lavellan can think of is Tevinter and Orlais.

And beneath her feet, the ground feels like a wound that hasbeen covered over. As if the streets have been paved to hide the crackedtexture of a thousand broken bones.

Mythal is as beautiful and as dangerous as her city.

Her youngest daughter seems much the same.

But June looks at Sylaise, at her strange, bereft beauty,and something clicks for him. She cansee it happen, even if she cannot quite understand it. June has had loversbefore. On and off, many flings, particularly whenever the clan chanced to meetanother. He would always make a point of trying to find someone to bed. Andonce there was… oh, what was their name? Jubilance, or something like it. Thathad lasted for quite a long while, though, before dissolving in one drunkenevening, when June had admitted that he mainly liked Jubilance because theywere, in his words, ‘a dizzy idiot, easy to please’.

They had not been dizzy or idiotic enough to let that slide, as it happened.

Sylaise, on the other hand, is sharp as she is shining, andwhile it is supposedly Dirthamen who wears the masks, his younger sister seemsto have made one out of her own face. She looks like her mother, in a carefullycultivated way that makes Lavellan think that she probably does not, actually,resemble her that well, when she is being less concerted about her appearance.

She finds June’s attention flattering.

June finds something about her enthralling.

Lavellan drinks a little more than she probably should, andwatches her brother entrench himself into things that she wishes she couldsimply pull him back out of. There are more arguments. And the more argumentsthere are, the more each of the digs their heels in; the more convinced Junebecomes that this is where they should be, and what they should be doing. Andmore Lavellan feels as if they have walked into the mouth of a beast, and willnot be able to walk back out against without bloodshed.

And then, Fen’Sulahn comes back from her battlefields.

The city holds a parade. Lavellan considers fleeing over thewalls. Something in her just… she wants to run, and find her parents. She wantsto ask for help. She feels as if she looks at Olwyn again, after so long, it might somehow break her.

But Ireth is dead and Haninan is who knows where, and Juneescorts General Sylaise to her sister’s welcome feast; and so Lavellan goes, onher brother’s opposite side. Making small talk with Olwyn’s sister, and feelingrigid and brittle, prepared for the disaster of setting eyes on Fen’Sulahn. Thesun is out and shining, as summer drags the evenings into long hours. Lavellanwears polished armour, and June wears a suit gifted to him by Mythal. Red andcopper and well-suited to him. It makes him look something like a statue, inher estimations, but Sylaise seems pleased by the results.

Fen’Sulahn wears red too, as it happens.

Red and gold, as she enters the party with her own brother.Falon’Din is still afield, but Dirthamen had returned with far less fanfare afew weeks ago himself. The siblings are an exercise in contrasts, as Dirthamenwears silver and dark blue, but Lavellan finds she can scarcely take note ofthat. Fen’Sulahn’s gown flows around her. She has matched her brother’s maskwith one of her own – this one shaped like the face of a wolf. Golden bangleshang from her ears, and ball-shaped pins dot her hair. Bracelets trail up herarms. Her freckles have been covered, with some spell or powder. Lavellancannot tell. For a moment, it is almost enough to hold the wrenchingfamiliarity at bay.

But then she laughs. Then she moves to embrace Sylaise, andthe scent of her is the same.

Lavellan does not shatter into a thousand pieces.

Her heart aches, and yet, for a moment, it almost feels asif some deep hurt has been soothed. That is the surprise. The rush of softnessthat comes over her. The sense, unexpected, that something long lost hasmanaged to return. To ease an incurable ache. Oh, it is Olwyn.

Olwyn – some version of her, some younger, freer self thathas not and may not ever suffer or do what she once did – is here. Alive.Breathing and moving, and introducing herself to June.

“…And this is my sister, Lavellan,” June says, motioningtowards her.

Olwyn offers her a smile.

“It is always a pleasure to meet those who are consideringjoining our campaign,” she says. Polite, and unfamiliar, but warm and genuinelywelcoming. Lavellan stares into her eyes for a moment, before she recollectshow to steady herself, and speak.

“Thank you. The city has been most hospitable. Though Iconfess, I had not understood much of its appeal until I saw you just now. Youare easily the most wonderful sight I have laid eyes upon here.”

She drops into a bow, as Olwyn’s lips part briefly insurprise, and her cheeks darken a little bit.

Sylaise raises her eyebrows, while June stares at her as ifshe has just grown another head. And Dirthamen seems mostly inscrutable behindhis mask – though he does tilt, just slightly, as if he has noticed somethinginteresting somewhere past her left shoulder.

Olwyn recovers first.

“Are you always such a charmer?” she asks.

“No,” Juneasserts, and shakes himself out of his surprise.

“I am pleased you found it charming,” Lavellan admits, asshe straightens back up. She cannot help it, though. It is true – in ways shecould not possibly explain. Some, not even to herself. But perhaps the simpleanswer is that it has been a long time. And all the bitter, twisting feelingsin her have never been so strong as the love she felt for Olwyn.

Still feels, it would seem.

This is not the sameperson, she reminds herself. And that is true enough. But she has noexpectations, she realizes. Her goals is still the same – to find some way tostop the world from falling into ruination. And so, all that is left, is toappreciate that one thing she would want seems to have come about. Olwyn isalive, and has a second chance. And she is beautiful, and Lavellan can scarcelytear her eyes away.

So she smiles, instead. Warmly as she can, and there, in thenext faint darkening of Olwyn’s cheeks, she sees the telltale hint of frecklesattempting to resurface.

“Gracious,” Sylaise says, breaking the moment. She taps ahand against June’s arm. “What a shame the warm approaches do not appear to bea family trait.”

June scowls, but then laughs when Sylaise does.

“Only a joke!” she insists.

Olwyn clears her throat, and draws her own brother a stepback.

“Yes, well – it was very nice to meet you,” she says. “Andthank you for the compliments, Miss Lavellan. I hope you enjoy the rest of thecelebrations.”

“Then I will do my best to,” she promises. Watching as Olwynretreats into the other gatherings of guests. Turning back, to find that Junelooks annoyed, and Sylaise looks calculating.

“I feel I should warn you. My eldest sister has an unluckystreak in love,” she says, pulling them into different currents of thegathering. Over to where drinks are being served, and balls of dancing lightcast shadow shapes and performances across the ceiling. Her shoes tap acrossthe floor; while Lavellan and June’s bare feet are silent.

“Unlucky?” June asks, unable to keep his lingering annoyanceout of his tone. He feels upstaged.

Lavellan resists the urge to roll her eyes at him.

“All of her lovers have died, so far as I know,” Sylaiseexplains.

That… gives her pause. Though, not for the reasons Sylaiselikely expects.

“How many?” she wonders.

“I count three,” Sylaise explains. “One was before my time,but our mother explained the delicate nature of that situation to me. The othertwo died in battle. There might be others, I suppose, but, none she hasmentioned. My sister does not have the family skill for keeping hold of what sheloves.”

Three loves lost. Oh, Olwyn. And our own story did not end so well either, did it?

Perhaps there had been something even more, then, to thefervency with which Olwyn had thrown her into this world. Perhaps…unexpectedly, there was some answer to an old and wearying question in that.

Why did you save me?

Her eyes drift, throughout the night. Always finding theiranchor in Olwyn. Always glancing over at the sound of her laugh, or the glimpseof her curls. Flashes of a red dress, until finally, when the sky is black andthe starlight is pooling in the gardens around the party grounds, and June andSylaise have disappeared off somewhere together, she sees Olwyn dancing. Alone.Moving with the flow of the music, and the whirling of the firelights. Lavellanwatches, and thinks of how Ireth loved to dance. Of how Olwyn had looked atHalamshiral, in the dress she had fought tooth and nail to wear, with her hairup and her lips painted, and her hands warm atop her shoulders.

She moves, and follows the music herself, until those hands areresting atop her shoulders again. Olwyn smiles, politeness but perhaps just a bit of flirtation in the quirk of herlips.

Lavellan lifts her and turns her, and they take up the stepstogether. A few errant spirits winging around them, as Olwyn’s eyes crinkle,warm behind her mask. She ups the pace, and smiles when Lavellan matches it.The shape of her mask gives her an air of mischief.

“You are a good dancer,” she declares.

“My mother taught me,” Lavellan replies.

Olwyn hums, and smiles through the next lift.

“Is your mother here? We could fill the floor. Sylaise lovesto dance, too.”

She hesitates. Grip slipping, for a moment, making the nextmove less graceful before she corrects it, and sets Olwyn gently onto her feetagain.

“My mother is gone,” she admits.

Olwyn’s expression falls.

“Oh,” she says. “I… I did not know, I am so sorry. I cannotimagine…”

Cannot imagine losing a mother? Lavellan thinks of Mythal,then. Strange, beautiful, calculating Mythal; who is building this empire. Who,in one time, did build it. And whatan empire it became – slave-owning tyrants and magical calamities and enoughdisasters to send the world spinning. Mythal, who could become Flemeth, whoraised at least one daughter who never had a kind word for her mothering. ButOlwyn looks as if the very thought of losing her would be as heartbreaking asIreth’s absence.

She closes her eyes, for a moment.

What do I do?

“All’s forgiven,” she says, quietly. Words that mean farmore than they would seem to. But, really, this Olwyn has not done anythingyet. “You did not know.”

Olwyn opens her mouth, expression far more hesitant now. Itmakes her look young in a way that Lavellan cannot really recollect seeing herbefore. But then someone calls for Fen’Sulahn, and she half-turns; and Lavellantakes the opening to bow, and duck away from the dance floor again. Hearthammering, and throat closing, and far too much catching up with her at once.

She retreats into the gardens, and wanders alone until dawn.Just hoping that the sun might bring some clarity, because she still has noidea what to do.

#general fen'sulahn au #quench the thirst #i finally got it done!!!#Anonymous

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rexjamesburgdorfer-blog · 6 years ago

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Santa Clara County Succeeds in Securing the Future of Endangered Local Hospitals

http://www.juniperadvisory.com/santa-clara-county-succeeds-in-securing-the-future-of-endangered-local-hospitals/

The County of Santa Clara (Calif.) assumed responsibility for the operation of O’Connor Hospital in San José, St. Louise Regional Hospital in Gilroy, and De Paul Health Center in Morgan Hill on March 1, 2019. This transaction advances the County Board of Supervisors’ strategic goal to grow the size and scope of the County’s public healthcare delivery system. Juniper Advisory advised Santa Clara County on this transaction.

The two hospitals and health center were acquired from Verity Health, a health system that filed for Chapter 11 protection in late August 2018, triggering the potential sale of all six of its hospitals and other related assets in California. The County purchased the three Verity Health facilities located in Santa Clara County for $235 million.

“We are excited to bring these community hospitals into our health system as we expand and enhance the high-quality care that so many Santa Clara County residents have come to rely on,” said County Executive Jeffrey V. Smith, M.D., J.D. “Our new partners share our mission, values, and passion to serve. We expect O’Connor and Saint Louise hospitals and De Paul Health Center to continue the phenomenal work they have already been doing in their communities.” Research studies often lead to such bountiful results and also enchance the quality of work they can provide to the customers. Hence, to help in the proliferation of such medical centres in areas which need the most attention, are companies like PharmaSeek.com, who shift the burden of these research companies onto themselves by taking up all the administrative tasks.

The County of Santa Clara will invest in new technology and infrastructure at the newly acquired facilities, expand and augment current medical and hospital services, and be better positioned to offer the County’s extensive and integrated health services to all residents of Santa Clara County.

“This acquisition is truly a win-win for the community. It prevents the closure of two critically important hospitals and ensures continued access to medical services for those who need it, regardless of ability to pay,” said Supervisor Joe Simitian, President of the County of Santa Clara Board of Supervisors.

Per the agreement with Verity for the purchase of the 358-bed O’Connor Hospital, the 93-bed Saint Louise Regional Hospital, and the De Paul Health Center, the County has made assurances to continue operating the facilities with a focus on providing high-quality care and services, as well as improving the health of the community. The County will also institute its financial assistance programs at the new facilities to ensure that the most underserved in the community have greater access to high-quality care.

The hospitals, their staff and physicians all share the County’s mission to provide high-quality, compassionate and accessible healthcare. As a public hospital system, the County provides care to all people living in Santa Clara County, and this acquisition will support the County’s ability to serve even more residents in the community.

“We have worked hard over the past few months to lay the foundation for transitioning these new facilities into the County family of health care resources,” said Santa Clara Valley Medical Center Chief Executive Officer Paul Lorenz, who is leading the integration of the community hospitals into the County’s Health System. “While even positive change can be challenging, we are fully invested in supporting this integration to make sure it is as smooth as possible for patients and staff.”

“The acquisition of two more hospitals and a clinic in Santa Clara County is a tremendous win for thousands of patients who need our services, often in emergency situations, and the highly trained doctors, nurses and others who provide them,” said Supervisor Cindy Chavez.

“We did it! Thanks to the extraordinary effort of County staff and thousands of county residents, we were able to purchase O’Connor and St. Louise Hospitals – hugely important to everyone, especially the 100,000 people in South County who have no other alternative,” said Supervisor Mike Wasserman.

“I am proud of this County’s ability to lead on all things that matter most to the quality of life of the residents of this Valley; in this case access to quality healthcare,” said Supervisor Susan Ellenberg. “The expansion of the County’s hospital system through these purchases translates into a more robust safety net for our most vulnerable families, children and seniors. And that’s something worth celebrating.”

“I am relieved that the sale has been completed and we are eager to move forward with integrating our health care system,” said Supervisor Dave Cortese. “The two hospitals and the clinic are essential to the lives of the residents who would have been left without nearby emergency care.”

“The completion of the sale means that these important institutions will continue providing local communities with the high quality care they need and deserve,” said Rich Adcock, CEO of Verity Health Systems in a statement to the San José Mercury News.

Juniper Advisory is the only independent investment banking firm working exclusively with hospitals and health systems. Based in Chicago, the firm offers a wide array of strategic and financial services for healthcare organizations. Rex Burgdorfer and James Burgdorfer)

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#rex burgdorfer #James Burgdorer #rex james burgdorfer #news #breaking news #latest news #news healthcare news #healthcare merger news #healthcare #healthcare finance #healthcare m&a #Evanston #Illinois #chicago

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blackfeline-wastaken · 6 years ago

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Android vs iOS App Security

Is the iPhone actually more secure than Android? Is Android's "adequate" way to deal with security great enough? Imagine a scenario in which, in spite of victories, the two stages are flopping in significant ways.

Android Security

For quite a while, Google made the contention that it was sufficiently secure. No, it didn't get each and every pernicious application transferred into Google Play. Indeed, there have been a few noteworthy vulnerabilities in the working framework found by analysts. Truly, the receptiveness of Android and an introduced base cracked into a few distinct forms of the Android OS has put clients in danger. In any case, Google agents would call attention to that of the billion or so clients, just a minor part—something like 1%—could ever really experience something vindictive. So, even only 1% of a billion is a great deal. After all, that’s a staggering 10 million.

Surprisingly, Google has changed its tune. Updates to the Android working framework have put more prominent restrictions on what data applications can assemble. The organization has jettisoned its win big or bust consents model for an Apple-seasoned methodology, under which clients can consent to let an application get to their camera yet not their contacts list. Google has additionally moved to an a lot quicker rhythm for its security refreshes, pushing more fixes to more gadgets.

The greatest change from Google has really been very unpretentious. Google has moved its security endeavors profound inside Android, into Google Play Services, which Google can refresh paying little mind to what rendition of the working framework clients are running. That takes into consideration programs like Safety Net, which gives Google a chance to look for malware on gadgets, even malware that was sideloaded from outside the Google Play store.

iOS Security

Apple is typically touted as the reasonable champ regarding portable security. To be honest, it's difficult to contend with that appraisal on its essence. Apple's phenomenal control of the iPhone and iOS experience has implied that the vast majority get and introduce programming updates and security fixes. That is basic, and it's a noteworthy differentiator from Android.

Apple has figured out how to keep a tight hold over its equipment inventory network and furthermore, through the App Store reviewing process, kept control of applications from autonomous designers. It's additionally a disputable procedure, with applications being rejected for apparently discretionary reasons, yet one that has kept the App Store generally malware free.

With regards to security, Apple appears to utilize a "whatever it takes" approach. An incredible model is its Messages (some time ago iMessage) stage. This may very well appear as though instant messages shared among telephones and PCs, however a Black Hat introduction from a couple of years back clarified that wasn't the situation. Apple structured the stage starting from the earliest stage to be start to finish encoded and as alter safe as could be expected under the circumstances. Servers for messages, for instance, need equipment keys to be spun up. When the servers are operational, those keys are demolished, avoiding anybody—even Apple—from keeping an eye on clients or messing with the framework. It's immensely mind boggling, however it works.

What Each OS Gets Wrong

While the genuine number of malware contaminations is low, that one percent of Android clients who experienced something noxious was never equally dispersed over all Android clients. As indicated by 2015 details, it was overwhelmingly among individuals utilizing ease gadgets, frequently in creating nations. This has truly stuck in my gizzard since the day I heard it. The danger of these gadgets was excessively pushed to those with minimal intends to climate a trick or assault.

In spite of pushes made by Google to tidy up Android and Android Apps, the model requires a considerable lot of engineer purchase in. Google needs to persuade designers to do things another way, and utilize the new, more secure apparatuses the organization gives. Google has acquainted a few sticks and carrots with get engineers ready, yet with blended achievement. This is additionally aggravated by the broken idea of Android, with three unmistakable forms each having in excess of 20 percent of the introduced base, and significantly smaller fragments of different renditions. That implies there is a sizeable crowd that still doesn't get the most recent OS upgrades, and designers can keep on focusing on them with applications.

Nor has Apple's procedure been without results that have harmed clients. Its gradual way to deal with security enhancements implies that it will presumably be some time before an iPhone can be utilized as a 2FA FIDO2 authenticator, on the off chance that it occurs by any means. I can't utilize my current YubiKey 5 NFC with an iPhone in light of the fact that it doesn't yet bolster FIDO2 over NFC.

Apple has likewise been moderate to receive secret phrase administrator coordination, making increasingly troublesome the best thing individuals can do to keep their data secure.

Apple's most prominent security sin, in any case, is that its "whatever it takes" methodology comes at a high handset cost. The most reasonable telephone still accessible from Apple is the iPhone 7, which costs $449, in spite of the fact that exchange limits can be connected, as can an installment plan of $18.99 every month. New, great quality Android telephones, then again, can be bought for as meager as $220. The high cost of an Apple gadget sends a quite clear message: in case you're not rich enough, you don't get the opportunity to have Apple security. On the off chance that iOS is outside the value scope of numerous shoppers, Apple isn't securing them.

None of this even addresses the way that the greatest dangers to the two iOS and Android clients are spam, phishing, and extortion. These can come through malvertising, SMS tricks, and phishing messages. The two stages have found a way to handle the test, however we have to recall that while spam and phishing aren't as attractive as government-made malware, it is the genuine danger to buyers.

Both Android and iOS Can Do Better

In addition to the fact that I think it's hacky composition to state that one stage is superior to the next, I really believe that there is an enormous hole between how Apple and Google way to deal with portable security. The organizations have various objectives and plans of action, and have tended to security worries through those focal points.

The messy truth is that both Apple and Google are prevailing at security—in the event that you see it through the perspective of their separate plans of action. Google needs to keep up a gigantic, uneasy coalition of equipment and programming designers, so as to keep running the most well known OS on earth. It can get a couple of things wrong, gave each one of those connections stay solid.

Apple then again, realizes that its notoriety is everything. Since individuals feel safe on iPhones, they feel safe to burn through cash both on iPhones and (progressively significant) with iPhones. The organization moves in all respects gradually and purposely so it can take care of business the first run through, which now and again makes them moderate to receive new advancements.

Rather than picking a victor, how about we consider both of these tech goliaths responsible for their inadequacies. Toward the day's end, chances are you have a gadget with the majority of your own data on it from one of these two organizations, so neither can bear to be happy with past achievements or ongoing enhancements. For more insights on mobile apps, you can take a quick look at this website.

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drteeths · 8 years ago

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How to Find the Best Dentist in Your Area

Question: I moved around seven months prior to another range, and I've been importance to see a dental practitioner for a customary checkup. The issue is that I have no chance to get of assessing who is a decent or awful dental practitioner! My insurance agency just gives me a rundown of names. How would I decide the nature of a dental specialist with no criteria?

Reply: Finding another dental specialist can be an extremely overwhelming undertaking. I've seen that when I meet another patient, I discover that the dental practitioner is typically the exact opposite thing that is picked when individuals move to another town.

That is after the laundry, kids' school, family specialist and significantly barkeep!

Correct, envision that, being keep going on the rundown!

Who you pick as a dental specialist will enormously affect your wellbeing — positive or negative.

It's a critical choice that has implications past your first visit. So take as much time as necessary, and pick carefully. All things considered, it's anything but difficult to flame your barkeep!

Some of this is presence of mind, some is not all that self-evident, and some is inside learning…

Is the dental practitioner intrigued by entire body wellbeing?

The correct dental practitioner is concerned not simply with the teeth themselves, but rather the association of oral wellbeing to whatever is left of the body.

Your dental specialist ought to be getting some information about your wellbeing history and teaching you about how your oral wellbeing impacts the wellbeing all through your body.

In the event that the dental specialist has a state of mind of, "there's a gap in the tooth, how about we fill the gap" — then that is not a cutting edge dental practitioner and you can improve. Issues in the mouth can expand your odds of coronary illness, dementia, and diabetes to give some examples, and the correct dental specialist is contemplating the wellbeing of the mouth regarding the strength of whatever is left of the body and additionally how to square your life bend.

Inquire as to whether he knows somebody who achived your new goal.

Commonly she will know somebody that they went to class with or know about somebody that is a phenomenal dental practitioner. Request the same number of names your dental practitioner can give.

Inquire as to whether he is an individual from an expert association.

I'm an individual from an examination club that meets each month to perform clinical work with a coach introduce.

This investigation club has individuals from everywhere throughout the world that are altogether held to a similar standard, which implies I can essentially open my participation booklet and allude my patient to another dental specialist in any piece of the world with finish certainty.

Dental practitioners in these investigation clubs work to refine their hands-on clinical aptitudes past what they realized in school.

This ought to be separated from proceeding with training courses that are address construct and don't include hands-in light of expertise refinement.

Inquire as to whether you have an out of system alternative.

You may have a rundown of dental practitioners that your insurance agency expects you to see. Ask your insurance agency instantly if there is an out of system alternative as you will be extremely restricted to a specific kind of dental specialist if picking just from that rundown.

Request a proposal from companions, family, or work mates.

Just take the proposal on the off chance that they've had work other than cleanings done, similar to a crown or scaffold. You may end up with a decent hygienist who's honing with a clumsy dental practitioner which is a possible situation.

Google the dental specialist.

Try not to give your fingers a chance to do the strolling (avoid the business catalog), rather, set them to take a shot at the web.

Your companions on the web will have something to state. Be that as it may, not all audits are made equivalent.

Take a gander at surveys that by and by relate a story. The standard kind of audit that alludes to all parts of the training and doesn't dive into insights about systems ought to be viewed as suspect.

Make a request to meet the dental practitioner and staff.

The response alone to this demand will be telling.

On the off chance that you are moving out of the nation (or notwithstanding taking some time off), check in immediately with the closest US department and ask who the consular general and his family see. Odds are he's a US prepared dental specialist.

Try not to hold up until the point when you have a crisis as you will be helpless before a more noteworthy scope of dental specialists when in an outside nation. For my assessment on dentistry in nations outside the US, click here.

The subsequent stage: Go into the workplace.

After your first visit, put forth these inquiries and leave in the event that you don't care for the appropriate responses.

Was everything disclosed to me and was there support for each strategy?

My decide is that we don't continue until the point that the patient comprehends and has talked through the greater part of the alternatives.

Was the dental specialist wearing loupes (surgical telescopes)?

No dental specialist ought to be honing without them.

It has nothing to do with weak vision, it's the amplification factor that gives you a chance to see more than you could with 20/20 vision.

In the event that you can't see it, you cannot treat it!

Inquire as to whether he utilizes 2.5x or 4.4x power on her loupes. The higher the better! A Drove focus on the brow is stunningly better.

Did I feel great?

Believe you gut senses.

Affirm, so how would I pay for this extraordinary dental specialist?

Finding a decent, however shoddy dental specialist might be troublesome. The familiar saying "you get what you pay for" is never more genuine in dentistry.

Finding a shabby, low quality dental specialist will cost you route more over the long haul (and even in the here and now and again) than finding a quality dental specialist at higher costs.

The overhead in dentistry is high, regularly 60 to 70 percent, so there's almost no space for markdown, unless the dental specialist takes alternate ways in various parts in the conveyance of administration.

Ensure you are paying a honest expense for quality dentistry, and you will have obtained the best arrangement and spared bunches of cash throughout the years.

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How to make sense of what's reasonable? Think about the expenses of four noteworthy administrations among four or five dental specialists in your general vicinity. The administrations to analyze are a cleaning, a crown, root waterway, and a review exam.

That coupon that comes via the post office for $400 worth of dentistry for $39.95 will spare you some cash in advance, however could prompt fiasco later on.

Presently, I need to know: how could you discover your dental practitioner?

#how to find teh best dentist #find a dentist #dentists

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