#things i've read

[jojotier]

wait so you're telling me that the only helmet described in the illiad is Odysseus's boar tooth helmet and that in the Odyssey when he eventually comes home he's discovered by his nanny because she sees the scar on his leg that he got from a boar as a boy (a scar emblematic of the masculine ideal of the time), thus by hiding the scar he hides the evidence of his valor and masculinity, effectively emasculating himself in the presence of the suitors until he's ready to strike, and yet the boar scar isn't how Penelope recognizes him- it's by the fact that he knows about their marital bed, lovingly carved within the roots of an olive tree? that while everyone recognizes Odysseus at war his wife is the one to recognize him at peace?

[fauna-a]

Things I've (actually re)read in 2023: The Cemetery of Forgotten Books by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Every book, every volume you see here, has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it. Every time a book changes hands, every time someone runs his eyes down its pages, its spirit grows and strengthens.

[fgcz]

I threw myself into a discussion some AnK fans were having to voice some of my own opinions. I just copy pasted them here, and now I'm going to attempt to edit it into some sort of out of context coherence.

I don't have any deeper thoughts regarding how Guy behaved towards Riki, but I did kind of get the sense that Riki loved Guy because he was safe, and familiar. It was love, but not love.

Meanwhile I'm not certain if his feelings for Iason were actually love, or if it was really some effect of getting traumatised by Iason.

If it was truly love with Guy at one point, it might have been that overwhelming love that teenagers have, that you then as an adult wonder "What the heck was I doing??"

It might have been true love for Guy

Or maybe because Guy never got to leave Ceres and experience more of life outside of the district he might still be stuck in that safe, teenaged love.

I think Guy was also so deadset in his knowledge of who he knew Riki was that when Riki had suddenly started changing, making choices that didn't involve Guy anymore, he refused to understand and adapt to a new Riki who had learned things and grown in ways that Guy had no idea about.

So when Riki finally just outright told him he was choosing Iason, Guy absolutely knew Riki must be brainwashed or controlled, because the Riki that's in Guy's head would never say such a thing

The whole thing feels a little bit like a horror story telling with the subtext of psychologically breaking out of terrible situations and dealing with people who are worse (tanagura), and the people who are still stuck in it (ceres)

So basically an allegory for breaking away from abuse.

There will be the awful, manipulative people who want to keep you the way you were, under control, "weakened", which is Tanagura.

And the people who haven't managed to break away yet and are still stuck in the mindset and how you see them after your own situation and outlook improves, which is then Ceres.

[brawlingdiscontent]

My Favourite Books I’ve Read This Year

I’ve been doing some year-end reflection. This year I finally got back to reading for pleasure, after many soulless grad school years with little time for non-academic reading! In the spirit of my goal to do even more reading for pleasure this year, I am listing my top 5 books of the year (in no particular order). I recommend all of them!

1. The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami - historical fiction, fictionalized account of a (real) early Black explorer of the Americas, it explores in a really interesting way how colonialism operates as a mode of thinking and being.

2. The Emperor’s Babe by Bernadine Evaristo - historical fiction meets poetry that is startlingly crisp and fresh (and a bit brutal), set in 2nd-3rd century Roman Britain

3. Empress Dowager Cixi by Jung Chang - the only non-fiction book on the list, a fantastic biography not just of Cixi but of this period of Chinese history in general (though somewhat partisan - the writer has clear opinions and makes judgments that she doesn’t necessarily foreground as such)

4. She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan - historical fiction (have you noticed a theme?) meets fantasy - gripping, fun, and queer-feminist imagining of early Chinese history

5. Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones - despite having seen the movie, I’d never actually read the book! I found it surprising and very instructive, looking at how the author constructs the narrative.

(Also just noticed that there are no cis male authors on this list, just women and non-binary folks - which is perhaps not that surprising given what I tend to go for, but still lovely - not that there’s anything wrong with cis male authors, but nice to be reading a lot of work by underrepresented writers).

[existentialbisis]

I didn't even know my favorite manwha called Distant Sky got updated a couple months ago and a whole season was right there for me to read??? After 6 years of NOTHING. I read all 26 chapters in 1 sitting lmao

[i-was-crashing-into-you]

one of the reasons I love working in a used book store is that when you open boxes of donated books you get to see what that person was going through.

the first box I opened today had 15 books on psychics and past lives and 5 books on feminism and women's history.

[devocao]

Queering the Work of Jane Austen Is Nothing New

The first known Mr. Darcy to take the stage, in 1899, was a woman.

“In some ways, women playing Austen’s men in this era is predictable. Casting women in men’s parts gained traction in the United States and Europe by the early 20th century; in a turnabout from Shakespeare’s day, when men played women’s parts, fin de siècle Hamlet was often a woman. In this period of fashionable male impersonation, then, an all-female Pride and Prejudice cast may have seemed par for the course. But a signal difference is that these other plays were not romantic comedies with repeated marriage proposals, showcasing both failed and successful love scenes. The unconventionally cast Austen adaptations were thematically suited to heightening queer readings of  the novelist’s work.

MacKaye’s Pride and Prejudice offers up a Darcy who is bombastically, stereotypically manly. He swears (‘Damn!’) and once cracks a whip in front of Elizabeth. He threatens the absent Lady Catherine with the line, ‘She shall be set right, I assure you!’ It’s an aggressive scene that must have played far differently with a female Darcy, whose violent behavior would have come across as mock-manly, and perhaps even playful, rather than as hyper-masculine intimidation. It seems ripe for reading as a comic subversion of male expectations of female obedience. (The forceful physicality of the scene is fascinating regardless.)

There were touching moments in MacKaye’s Pride and Prejudice, too. In one scene, Elizabeth reaches for Darcy’s hand and pleads, ‘Take me home, Mr. Darcy! Take me home!’ The play ends with Darcy’s rushing toward Elizabeth and folding her in his arms.”

“Still, many young women at this time would have memorized Austen-inspired lines of dialogue in order to deliver them looking deeply into the eyes of other women. The number of audience members who watched female actors locked in such gazes likely numbered in the thousands. Darcy, filtered as he’s beenthrough the rom-com-industrial-complex, may seem to readers today as an obvious sex object for straight women. But his being played in drag a century ago suggests the potential for other kinds of desire, on stage and in the audience.”

[zabiniblaisee]

-excerpt from 'The Princess Saves Herself In This One' by Amanda Lovelace