A Certain Slant of Light

This week I have been extremely lax about “doing things that I actually need to do so I don’t fail,” and have instead been reading a book called Albion’s Seed which is about the way that different British regional folk traditions were transplanted to different regions of the American colonies.

It’s actually really interesting – it sounds like it ought to be dull but I just kept reading and reading and reading…my favorites were the Quakers, with the Puritans a close second, and damn there’s something wrong with those cavaliers who settled Virginia. Occasionally they throw out a hero, but generally speaking…seriously, man, leave your poor slave girls alone. Also the bearbaiting? You really need to lay off the bearbaiting.

Anyway, it got me thinking on a fantasy story I’ve been working on for oh my goodness let’s not even discuss how long, which I periodically open up, fiddle with, and put aside again. I have five files of stuff for this book. Altogether it must add up to fifty thousand words. If those words were coherent or connected the book would be done.

But anyway, the story is about a girl whose brother has been sold into slavery because of suspected involvement with a political faction that fell out of favor. Because of complicated political maneuvering that we don’t really care about, he’s been pardoned, so she’s gone to find him and bring him back home.

Every few months I have yet another epiphany about Why This Story Isn’t Working. My newest epiphany is - this is the kind of culture she comes from; forget that namby-pamby naive life! liberty! and the pursuit of happiness! idealism, she’s a cavalier. Headstrong, passionate (but self-controlled!), with a sense of entitlement and social snobbery the size of a small country.

That thing where fantasy princes say "Oh please call me Bob, I hate titles"? Oh no, she is absolutely not going to stand for that. The family honor has suffered enough already. (How dare those vulgar common soldiers think they had the right to sell her brother into slavery! A member of the gentry!) She's going to get that honor back, at sword's point if the polite option fails.

For obvious reasons, this doesn’t play well with people who have different cultural assumptions. (Including hypothetical readers. But challenges are fun, right?)

Now I just need a working cultural model for the island of sugar plantations where the brother has been sold, and this might actually become a real story…

I have a problem with Shakespeare's comedies.

I really like Shakespeare's history plays: I think we've already covered How Much I Love Julius Caesar, and I'm reading Richard III and enjoying it a great deal. And although his tragedies usually leave me cold, I don't dislike them. (Except Romeo and Juliet. All-consuming love is silly whether it's Shakespeare writing it or Stephanie Meyer.)

But I don't like his comedies, and in particular I don't like As You Like It. I do not think Rosalind and Orlando make a cute couple. I don't think they make an interesting couple even when Rosalind is pretending to be a boy called Ganymede and Orlando is pretending that Ganymede is Rosalind and fake-courting him/her, which by all rights ought to be entertaining - but no. It's mostly an excuse for Rosalind disguised as Ganymede to have interminable discussions with Orlando about how awful women are.

I'm sure Elizabethans found this hilarious, and as a historical artifact I'm sure the play is fascinating. But I hate it. I hate Rosalind (no one else in the play develops enough individuality to be worth hating). I hate the LOL!misogyny. And I hate the play.

I am so, so tired of seeing people describe something they don't like as "Victorian." Now, there are things that could with fairness be derogatorily described as Victorian - sweatshops leap to mind - but no one ever does.

No, if someone is appending the word Victorian to something it's probably to do with women's rights; the word prudery will probably mentioned; somewhere, a mention of piano legs decked in little skirts will probably be slipped in. "Putting women on a pedestal is just as sexist as believing women are the worms of the earth," the commentator will intone, gleeful that he's finally found a reasonable excuse for his belief that all women are bitches and whores (and he definitely means that in a derogatory sense) and should be treated as such.

( And now I will ride into battle, sword flailing, to defend the Victorians' honor. )

Back from Edinburgh!



( Cut because I have a couple more pictures )

Off to Edinburgh for the next two days. Hoping very much that I don't freeze.

Also, I finished my paper about The Symbolism of Food in the Middle Ages! Very exciting stuff.

Hobnobs are on sale at the campus grocery. And not just hobnobs, but - dark chocolate hobnobs. Two great tastes that taste great together!

Dear reader, when you dip the dark chocolate hobnobs in tea, the chocolate melts. I had to restrain myself from eating the entire package.

Food I Will Miss When I Leave England:
1. Hobnobs. Especially dark chocolate ones.
2. Clotted cream. Cream teas generally, but clotted cream in particular, because I could reproduce the rest of it at home.
3. Cheap fish & chips.
4. Pain au chocolate. (It's available at home, but only at Starbucks, and Starbucks somehow makes the croissant part tough. Also, expensive.)
5. Sausage rolls.

I think this list probably explains why my stomach has been in knots for the last three days. I have been eating nothing healthy. Also, stress. (Is it bad that I didn't notice I was stressed till I got a psychosomatic gut punch?) Eat more fruit, woman!

...As soon as I finish the package of hobnobs. :)

Sherlock Holmes!

The Sign of Four is IIRC the second Sherlock Holmes novel published; I wanted to read the first, A Study in Scarlet, first, but the library only had copies with endnotes, and I hate and despise novels with editorially imposed endnotes. (Terry Pratchett’s footnotes are something else. They’re meant to be there.)

First, Holmes takes cocaine. I have nothing witty to say about this, I just thought you should know.

It’s fluffy fun; if I can find any other un-endnoted Sherlock Holmes stories in the library I may pick them up for bedtime reading. Other than that I don’t have much to say. Conan Doyle’s treatment of characters of color is appalling, as one might expect from a book written in the 1880s; his treatment of women is better but still marked with the stigmata of his times.

On the other hand, the plot is cracking, Holmes’ voice is delightful, and Watson’s narration is just the right mixture of fascinated and exasperated. (I can’t imagine there’s anyone in the world who doesn’t sometimes want to throttle Holmes.) So take from it what you will.

***

Also, this new icon of mine comes from semyaza, who has a journal full of great icons based on book illustrations, illuminated manuscripts, old maps, political cartoons from the 18th century...it's pretty fantastic.

Dear Yuletide Author:

First, thank you so much! I'm really excited about Yuletide - your story, my story, everybody else's stories, all the hot chocolate I can drink while angsting about what to write...I'm sure I'll love whatever you come up with, so try not to stress out too much.

Second, sorry for not writing this a bit sooner. Mea culpa.

( On to the letter! )

I hope this helps! Happy Yuletide, and good luck!

The University of York campus is infested with ducks.

Now, I am fond of ducks. Ever since I was a tiny child I’ve liked to feed ducks, and added to that now is the peculiar pleasure of knowing that duck’s feet slap against the pavement with a sound like flip-flops when they’re out wandering.

However, there is trouble in paradise. Along with ducks, the University of York campus is infested with coots.

( The Trouble with Coots )

About fifteen years ago – my goodness, I’ve gotten old – I saw the Wishbone version of George Eliot’s Silas Marner, and it left me such a lasting impression that I spent most of the time reading the book murmuring, “Okay, when is insert next plot twist here going to happen?”

So that probably colored my reading of the book somewhat.

It’s a nicely written book, but I can’t love George Eliot the way I love Jane Austen or Charlotte Bronte. She’s too sentimental, which is funny given that her novels deal with serious, ugly issues (infanticide, opium addiction, anti-Semitism…) which Austen ignores and Bronte rather skims over, but there it is. In Austen and Bronte, you have to work for your happy ending. In Eliot, it comes to you.

Quite literally, in the case of Silas Marner.

And that makes for less than satisfying reading.

I went to Betty's for lunch/tea today - Betty's is a famous teahouse/restaurant in the center of York, which has been there since 1937, which is not quite as impressive as Sally Lunn's in Bath which has been there since 1680...but Betty's has better food.

I had rarebit! Which was delicious! And jasmine tea! Which was...interesting. I prefer my tea with milk, I think. But it was a lovely golden color. And hot chocolate spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg with cinnamon sugar sprinkled on top! (I've been meaning to write a post about the Comparative Hot Chocolates of York. I should do that. Tomorrow.) And a pear and almond frangipane tart with ice cream and chocolate sauce!

The chocolate sauce was TO DIE FOR. Mind, the tart was completely excellent too, but I would walk over a pit of burning coals to get to the chocolate sauce.

Also, my lunch companion was a Shakespeare nut from my medieval history class, who didn't think it was at all strange when I got histrionic about Brutus from Julius Caesar (because he's got so much integrity and courage and he's so idealistic and Cassius takes such cruel advantage of his ideals and it's SO TRAGIC), and even lent me her copy of As You Like It. (I haven't read any of the comedies, except Midsummer Night's Dream, because my school for some reason thought high schoolers would obviously prefer the tragedies. Or something.) So I can add Shakespeare to my British Classics project!

I'm having way too much fun with that project. I think I should do an American classics project when I get back to the States. I've always meant to read more F. Scott Fitzgerald...and finally get through a Mark Twain book. I feel bad about it, but I've never been able to read Mark Twain. I don't know why, because everyone else thinks he's so funny, but I find him boring. :( Maybe I've grown into him by now, though?

Anyway, it was an excellent day.

Title: Lonesome Dove
Author: osprey_archer
Beta: visualthinker11
Fandoms: Wonderfalls and Pushing Daisies
Pairings: Jaye/Eric, with a splash of Olive/Randy and a touch of Ned/Chuck
Rating: PG, for cussing
Summary: Jaye, in an uncharacteristic burst of fellow-feeling, agreed to go on a road trip with Eric. Partway through, her habitual misanthropy firmly back in place, they end up at the Pie Hole - where Olive is trying to figure out is Randy has a hidden criminal life. What could possibly go wrong?

( Lonesome Dove )

I can't say that I've learned to like tea; I still think it tastes rather like boiled grass clippings. And I find the process of tea rather intimidating: it comes out in two pots, and I can't figure out how they're meant to be used. Am I supposed to pour from the hot water pot into the teapot, so that I will have a continual supply of steeped tea? Or am I supposed to use the hot water to water down the tea if I think it steeped too long? Assuming I knew if it was steeped too long. It's way too alchemical for me to judge.

And let's not even get into tea lists. One girl vs. fifty varieties of tea...is it any wonder I'm intimidated?

But at the same time...tea comes with biscuits. I'm particularly fond of ginger. Or scones with clotted cream! Why did no one tell me such a wonderful thing existed in the world? (The Jane Austen Center in Bath has a particularly lovely cream tea. I was running out of time so I had to pick between their tour and their Regency Tea Room. I think I made the right choice.)

And...while the two pots are intimidating...still. Two whole pots, plus my own tiny pitcher of milk. I could sit there and read and write all afternoon with such provisions! And it's cheaper than hot chocolate. And better for my health!

It's still a pity about the grass clippings bit. But maybe I've just been drinking the wrong varieties; eenie meanie minie mo will do that for you. What are your favorite types of tea?

Before I went to England, I was informed by a number of sources that people in England are much, much more liberal than Americans (in the left-leaning sense, not the British classical liberal = libertarian sense). This is quite true, in the sense that the English love their healthcare system excessively and feel the need to proselytize it to every passing American. Repeatedly. At great length. Have you accepted the NHS as your lord and savior yet? Yes! Yes! Uncle!

(I like the NHS. It would be nice to have a healthcare system that didn't charge a thousand bucks for an ambulance. It just gets tiresome hearing about it after a while; it's not like I can fly home and go Rambo on Congress until they cry uncle and import the NHS wholesale.)

The funny thing, though, is that after the NHS and the merits of various types of baked goods, probably the topic that's come up most often is Political Correctness. And how it is Ruining Britain. Because the political correctness police are marching through the streets with billy clubs ready to thrash anyone who uses naughty language (by which I of course mean ethnic/ablist/misogynistic/etc slurs, not cuss words)!

I haven't met any members of the political correctness police (even leaving out the billy clubs). I'm inclined to think that they're kind of like proselytizing vegetarians, who surely exist somewhere, but not in nearly sufficient numbers to adequately explain the way many people cringe when they meet a vegetarian. "You aren't one of....those kinds of vegetarians, are you? The kind that really truly believes that meat is murder and isn't just going to stand back and let me murder my way right down the deli line at the dining hall?"

Apparently humans dislike even the wisp of an idea that someone, somewhere might disapprove of the way we do things.

Anyway. The point is certainly not that Americans are secretly more liberal than the British; I've heard people moot the same political correctness argument at home, too. It's that a generally left-leaning political spectrum doesn't endow individual people with liberality of spirit. It just means that they express their lack thereof in a less distressing way. Disdain for political correctness never killed anyone; not being able to afford an ambulance does.

I watched the BBC adaptation of Noel Streatfeild’s Ballet Shoes earlier this year, and just this weekend finished the book. I liked the movie rather better than the book.

( Ballet Shoes etc., minor spoilers )

Back from Bath! Sadly my camera batteries gave out just before the art gallery so I can't regale you all with my Grand Theory about Victorian paintings of Spain and orientalism, but as I wasn't supposed to take photos in the gallery anyway I suppose it's just as well.

I did get some pictures in the Roman Baths, which I loved - walking where the Romans would have walked, and seeing artifacts they would have touched, and not just cracked shards of them but whole jars and ivory hairpins and an almost-complete mosaic.

( Merhorse mosaic )

The bath itself one is not allowed to touch, because it's full of algae and also wicked hot. The hot spring was sacred to the early Britons and then to the Romans, who built a temple there as well as a bath complex; people would carve curses onto sheets of pewter and pitch them in the water, hoping the goddess would help them recover their stolen coins or their gloves or their lovers.

Nowadays the only thing left of this custom is a wishing pool, which is the old frigidarium - the round cold pool where Romans cooled off after their paths. Toss in a coin and make a wish; the coins go to the excavations, and the wishes into the ether in the hope that they'll land lucky side up.

( The light on the wishing pool. )

Off to Bath tomorrow! Back Saturday! Don't forget to feed the miniature horse while I'm gone!

You may not steal my children
nor yet my neighbour's children
not even when my neighbour's children jump at six AM.
You may have unearthly beauty,
but you may not steal hearts, souls, or nursemaids,
nor sacrifice my friends to hell.

The rest of the poem is here, and it just gets better as it goes.

And! As a bonus! In the comments to that post, there is another poem about elves which is even BETTER!

If you lose your elf, we will replace it
or provide a pot of gold of equivalent value
up to the mean Rainbow Standard
adjusted for inflation.

Okay, the excerpt of the beginning makes it sound like nothing more than a parody, but it builds to a brilliant crescendo.

Finished Jane Eyre! It's a lovely book - the prose is graceful and fluid, and the story engaging even when it meanders, as it does for the first hundred pages or so. Charlotte Bronte could probably give a discourse on dust bunnies narrative pull.

I really enjoyed it, and I would recommend it unreservedly to pretty much everyone - especially anyone who is fond of older books, because the narrative style is somewhat antiquated. (I don't mean that in a pejorative sense; I mean it in the sense that every era has its own narrative conventions, and getting used to another eras' can be difficult.)

( Spoilers for, like, everything )

A poem - about night, because that seemed appropriate for Halloween.

Incidentally, I went for a walk this evening - because it's Halloween, and the moon is so close to full. My path led through the woods, and I didn't have a flashlight; but the moon was bright enough that I could see my shadow wash across the ground.

The Night of the Full Moon
By Lloyd Frankeburg

O come with me into this moonlight world.
The trees are large and soft tonight,
With blossoms loaded soft and white,
A cloud of whiteness furling and unfurled.

The houses give their sounds upon the air
In muted tones and secrecies,
Their lights like laughter through the trees.
The evening breathes its vows into our hair.

The evening puts its lips to throat and brow
And swears what it has sworn before
To others and will swear to more.
The evening has its arms around us now.