For the bingo game: The Delegate (looove this fic)
Awww nonnie <33 I love that fic so much too. I honestly don't understand now how I managed to work on it so focused (probably bc it was during the summer holidays here?) but I'm so happy I did. I still haven't managed to read it again after writing it because the editing process was SO long (thank you @bubbebruja for ALL the help, ideas and discussion), but knowing you love it means a lot and actually makes me want to read it again. Now let's see for the delegate:
No bingo again :((
I’m going to add a “keep reading” bc this is too long
Okay, so, what can I say about this fic... first, it was also inspired by a great song sent by my partner :) Vanderlyle crybaby geeks by the national. The fic was originally going to be about the french revolution, with Remus-the-revolutionary helping Sirius-the-aristocrat- but-lover escape his home (bc c'mon, the lyrics start about leaving your past life, but also have obscure lines about swans and a chandelier, and a line that goes "eat your cake" that made me think so much of Mary Antoinette), but I honestly didn't want to dedicate so much time to study again the french revolution, because I'm kind of tired of the centring of the global north in history, and although French Sirius and Remus sound cool, I really wanted to bring something I knew better: the history of my own country. So yep, it felt like something I could write, and wanted to write, and not many people would probably be able to write about, and I really, really wanted to read a south american/latinx Remus who wasn't second or third generation, bc, well, I'm a first-generation migrant so yup. Projection reasons, but also to fill a void in fandom, I guess.
The story is inspired in history and some of my own experiences BUT it also has a lot of hijo de ladrón, a book by Manuel Rojas which would be translated as "son of a thief" or as "born guilty" (interesting choice English translators), if you wanna check it. The book is a masterpiece in terms of style, mixing the modern novel style of stream of consciousness with stylistic class and political markers, and it's SO well crafted. It follows a young man who suddenly finds himself without his family and home and no life project or skills, so he roams from Argentina to Chile, missing ships and jumping into trains and sleeping in the streets, until he finds himself in the middle of some riots in Valparaíso. The book is painfully straight though, having just two references to queer people that are... NOT good, so there's where the "what if they were gay" comes from.
Finally, I think this story is more patent on the "to see if I can" because I usually don't write non-magical AUs. When I read them (I usually don't either) they are usually historical AUs. So I really wanted to try my hand at this, and see how to "translate" things that are important to me about the characters to their versions in the AU . For me, The Delegate's Remus needed to showcase the disability part that I read in lycanthropy, the trauma of the lost years that his older version has, and his queerness bc. Well, I read him from that lens. For Sirius, I wanted to work with his privilege, which in this case is a class privilege but also a north/south privilege, his ideological development, and his care for others, his painful empathy that makes him get stuck sometimes and lash out bc of *toxic masculinity* and lack of emotional regulation (again, these are my reads of him, nothing wrong with all the other headcanons). It ended up being super fun to see what stuck and what didn't from my reads of the characters into this universe.
Woof, sorry for the length! it turns out I still love this fic too.
You can send me the title of one of my fics and I’ll answer my reasons to write it with this card! let’s see if I make bingo with any!
13: What music did you listen to, if any, to get in the mood for writing this story? Or if you didn’t listen to anything, what do you think readers should listen to accompany us while reading?
In a big ridiculous turn of events, The Delegate, a South American fic, was written with US white men music on repeat: Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks by the Nationals was the original inspo. Then I moved to La Joya del Pacífico, a song about Valparaíso by Joe Vasconcellos, to work on the descriptions.
Eventually, I made a playlist called anarchism and the sea that is honestly a BIG MESS, 100% do not recommend. It has a mix of US protest music, tangos, boleros, and what's known as "La Nueva Canción Chilena," which was a renewal of folklore with socialist imaginaries in the 60s onwards (Víctor Jara, Quilapayún, Inti Illimani, Congreso, Los Jaivas...).
I would recommend listening to La Cantata de Santa María de Iquique for the fic, particularly. La Cantata tells the story of the killings in the hands of the State of 3,600* saltpetre miners and their families in 1907 after they walked from the desert and gathered in a school to demand the end of deplorable working conditions. Fun story, the fic was going to end with R/S moving to the north to participate in these protests. Good thing the dates for the presence of the Wobblies in Chile didn't fit with these processes. Now, if you wanna know why I picked the Wobblies in particular, that would be for another ask ;)
* The number is more of a narrative device/a social memory representation of all the killings in the hands of the State without a real body count. We do not know the real number of victims bc - why would the State really count the deaths of poor people?
You can send me a fic title plus a number from this list for me to talk about my stories!
I hope you feel better soon! As a distraction, I'd love to hear you talking about The Delegate! You can talk about any parts of it, but here are some questions about it if you want prompts :) (Also no pressure to answer ofc)
How do you think Sirius's aristocratic/rich upbringing may affect things? His relationship with Remo? His politics? How other characters view him?
I feel like this is a really basic and predictable question, but do you have any particular ideas as to what might have happened after the ending? Do you think Remo might have changed his stances on anarchism etc?
I always love answering this question for my own fics, so I was wondering, do you have any comments on the structure of The Delegate? Why did you decide to tell the story in the way you did? How did you choose the period of time over which the story took place?
Most enjoyable part of the research process? Ie favourite topics/articles/etc?
What about The Delegate are you most proud of?
Tell us about the side characters! Did you put any particular effort into developing the side characters, or was your focus more specifically on Remo and Sirius?
No pressure to answer any of these, just giving you an opportunity to talk as a distraction <3 I'm sorry to hear that you're in pain and I hope things get better soon!
Raeeeee omg this is. Just the best ask ever. Omg. I've been taking my time bc I want to have half a brain but no, no, I really wanna answer this (and full disclosure I been thinking of sending you an ask about your fic so wait until I feel better bc you'll be attacked with love for it).
Here's the link for the delegate! Idk how to add a cut here on mobile, might do so when I manage to sit and open desktop, but yeah. What follows has spoilers.
- how Sirius' upbringing affects him and his relationship with others: I love this question bc this is an important topic through the fic, and with the north/south tension accounts for most of the communication conflicts in the fic. In one level (the romantic, sweet level) it doesn't affect that much, since Sirius has been living as a working class person for years when the fic takes place, but in a sort of protected place by masculinity and the hero fantasy. Anarchists (at least in Chile) didn't have a class theory/division as strong as other movements, since a big base for them were students in universities and intellectuals, so I think it's also why he finds a place there. Having said that, when I mention the communication conflicts, I think Sirius and Remo have a great challenge ahead of them when it comes to Sirius prioritising a self-centred (as in, centred in the individual trajectory, desires and liberation, not as in 'egotistical') narrative that clashes with Remo's solidarity/collective identity narrative. This has to do with core values (formed in their class-shaped youth) and it can be tricky, especially considering the power dynamics between them. But I think Remo and other people would likely attribute that more to Sirius' nationality/the cultural aspects than class, and that would make it easier to navigate.
- I have some ideas for what happens next (luckily the timeframe didn't fit bc I was going to have them going north at the end, to the nitre mines where anarchist were also involved in protest that ended with massacres, in the 1910s), but for once, yes, I do think Remo changes his stances mostly about politics and how much to get involved. The IWW in particular was short lived in Chile, so I see both of them taking a shift towards other movements (the next workers' union was mostly lead by socialists, but there were also anarchists so I'm not sure in that area what I would do for them). There is a lot of social conflict to come in Chile in that era - towards the end of the 20s, a civil war, and then in the 30s a dictatorship that included anti-communist laws and the prosecution of gay men. Most anarchist went to the country side in the south to hide (the criticized city of Osorno in the fic lol where there's only cows and landlords and therefore no one suspected anarchist hiding in holes in the ground and workers bringing them food) so there's that for them, considering they'd be double-targeted on the terror campaign of Ibañez.
- Oh fuck, this is hard. Why did I pick the 20s? I wanted to do this class-difference story, that was my first idea (like, French revolution), and because of the inspo in a book (son of a thief, by Manuel Rojas) it slowly took shape to be in the 20s. I don't actually remember how the particular period came to be - I think it was highly shaped by the podcasts and history time frame (before the civil war, after the independence period where some organisations were already working. I love stories that show the everyday life and not just the crisis/history heroes). Other element that influenced the story is that I needed to have a reason for it to be told in English and I wanted to reflect on the power of other countries on Chile (Sirius was going to be a Brit at first), so having a character pov that had a reason to be there, but who didn't speak that much Spanish, was important, and that shaped US/IWW!Sirius and interpret!Remo. It was very important for me that they were peers - neither of their political awakenings happen bc of the other, but their particular perspectives do change in the encounter. The final element that shaped the structure was the journey frame - I wanted the story to be self-contained, so having an arrival and departure date shaped the way I told the relationship changes (with Remo, and with Valparaíso). I still wanted some tropes/canon elements to be reflected in the story (Peter's treason, James becoming the close friend, Remus' lycanthropy parallels, Sirius' disinheritance) but I ultimately wanted a story about finding someone while being out of place, with tones of vindication of autonomy and solidarity, if that makes sense (I wanna leave a * in this response and maybe come back at it later bc it's too good and I'm not sure I'm answering it)
- Oh, the whole research was amazing. It was great to re-read 'Son of a thief.' It was great to look at pictures of the era and research the IWW. Most of the research was based though in listening to a Chilean history podcast, which had two episodes on the history of anarchism, an episode on the social issue and one in women's magazines that really shaped The Delegate. I loved particularly looking for pictures and newspapers about queer people, since I couldn't properly find a book in queer history that I could read here in Australia, and I read the biography of a gay poet from the elite. I listened a podcast of queer stories in Chile that had one (1) episode on queer history, but it mostly skip the early 1900s since there isn't much material. I also watched and skimmed over 'Tengo miedo, torero', a story that takes place in the 80s but that has 'old queens' that talk about the past. Oh, and I was very lucky to have @bubbebruja as alpha reader, who thought me a bit on the US side of the history of the Wobblies!
- I'm really proud of some descriptions, the atmosphere achieved through the fic, and the balance between romance and period history/political reflection. I felt at some points it was a too complacent story, but I think I like that. It's ultimately a fluffy piece about falling in love with someone you share values and dreams. And those values and dreams are about social justice.
- I tend to hyperfocus on R/S for my fics. James, Peter and Lily are the only other characters with research (Minnie and Poppy are my wishful thinking self-insert lol and the anarchist leaders are based in historical leaders) . Out of the three, my favourite was Lily's research. Finding anything on women at the time was hard, but the whole women magazines podcast episode really shaped her - her story is still told through Remo, but it's hers. She owns a cocinería (working class restaurant), which makes her a powerful women at the time, has an open relationship with James, and her dreams are of a feminist revolution, and therefore just as Remo, she stays in the margins of a workers' movement that tends to overlook her and other women. She's in the margins also because her more meaningful relationships are with other women and the fight for political representation, so she doesn't gravitate around James or even Remo, even when they are friends. A potential follow up of this story would focus on her and James, tbh.
Here's some more progress drawings of Dulcie! She goes by Cassia Ivanov in this disguise. All the makeup she wearing can't hide her blood colour when she shows her eyes. Which is why she wears tinted glasses (That have mysteriously disappeared in this drawing XD). I haven't had a ton of inspiration lately, so I'm extremely pleased with how this came out! :D
So, I managed to draw something today... that wasn't on my list of things to draw. *unintelligible grumbles* Thanks hand for not drawing the crest I needed for Naoki. Dulcie and her alter ego, Isolde.
The rest of what I've been drawing. The Delegate, my own creation (look at how cute she is! Big puffy hair :3), and The Grand Highblood. I like looking at progress drawings. Even if some of them are my own. Which is why speedpaints are so much fun.
