luteddecoction

[luteddecoction]

The Counterfeit Marquise

A literary fairy tale published in 1697, presumably by Charles Perrault and François-Timoléon De Choisy (who spent a considerable amount of his life in drag, just like the protagonists of this story).

Translated by Ranjit Bolt, featured in Warner’s Wonder tales: six stories of enchantment (1996).

Cw: gender disphoria.

Keep reading

[luteddecoction]

Genderqueer Folktales

About two years ago a kind anon asked me for folklore around transness and I only had one fairy tale to share. Since then I’ve done a lot of reading, and now I’ve gathered some proper gender nonconforming fairy tales to share with you all.

I specifically chose stories with happy endings and positive characters, but please keep in mind these are all translated products of their time. Usually I don’t shy away from retelling stories a bit, but in this case I think it’s worth leaving them untouched for history’s sake.

I’ll try putting some modern-day labels on these stories to make them easier to choose from:

The Unicorn, Spanish, collected in 1947. AFAB, bisexual protagonist who physically transitions to male through magic while he is already married to a fully supportive wife. [Cw: murder, attempt at being outed.]

The Counterfeit Marquise, French, literary fairy tale written in 1697 by (allegedly) Charles Perrault. AMAB protagonist (noble) is raised and identifies as a woman, she falls in love with a handsome nobleman who turns out to be in the same situation but AFAB, they marry happily and have a child. [Cw: gender dysphoria]

Florinda, Chilean, collected in 1962. AFAB protagonist who physically transitions to male through divine intervention while he is already married to a fully supportive wife. [Cw: attempt at incest, attempt at being outed.]

The Abbot of Druimenaig, Irish, collected or written 1484-87. A young abbot finds himself transformed into a woman, lives as a wife and mother for seven years, is then transformed back and goes back to his wife, but divides parental responsibility with his husband. [Cw: initial unhappiness at both transformations, mixed-feelings ending.]

Ileana Simziana, Romanian, collected 1870s. AFAB protagonist (royal) who physically transitions to male while completing impossible tasks because of a “curse” that suits him very well. [Cw: attempt at being outed]

The Girl Who Was a Boy, based on the previous tale, but “gently adapted into the 21st century” by Paul B. Sturtevant. (In other words: minus some “product of its time” issues.)

The Princess and the Dív who exchanged sexes, Persian, collected in the 12th century. AFAB protagonist (royal) who was raised as a man strikes a deal with an AMAB spirit to briefly exchange sexes so that he can marry his betrothed, the exchange is made permanent because they are both happier for it. [Cw: threat of parental abuse.]

If you are interested in this topic, I heartily recommend the thesis “She was really the man she pretended to be”: Change of Sex in Folk Narratives by Psyche Z. Ready (2016).

[luteddecoction]

my headcanon I believe in so hard I forget it's not canon is that Charles didn't actually look like how his memories show he did when he died

what the Night Nurse is seeing and subsequently what the audience is seeing when she looks into Charles' memories is how Charles viewed that night. it's his memories, and memories are biased

when we see the memories in the attic, even when Charles is curled up under a blanket literally about to die, he just looks gaunt, tired, and a little woozy (btw this is NOT an attack on makeup artists what they do is amazing and I'm just building on that)

but we are told over and over that he died of hypothermia and internal bleeding. and I doubt that the rocks that were thrown at him did all that much damage- have you ever thrown something into water? it sinks slowly as soon as it hits the surface. those rocks weren't doing any damage to Charles anywhere that was under the water. so yeah, his 'friends' probably beat the shit out of him first and that's what caused the internal bleeding

but internal bleeding is typically from organs or brain damage and is often visible as mass, dark bruising. but you're telling me Charles had no bruising on him whatsoever?? he was bleeding internally enough that it's listed as his cause of death - not just a side note - it's part of the reason that he died. but no bruises on the face, none on the arms, no bleeding from the head or anything (we don't see his torso until after he dies so I have nothing about that)

Charles definitely felt fucking freezing so of course that's shown in his memories, of course he's gaunt and tired and cold - but the pain can just be passed off as the cold and he had something much more interesting to pay attention to: Edwin

I fully believe that we see those memories with Charles looking the way he does because his focus on that night looking back on it isn't that he was slowly bleeding and freezing to death; but that it was the first time he met his best friend, (and why would he want to remember all the gory details) and that's why he looks the way he does in his memories

[luteddecoction]

Hello tumblr. Take some charles rowland. Goodbye.

[luteddecoction]

I find Crystal and Charles' relationship super interesting (relationship in general, I'm not really talking about shipping here).

Because on one hand-- she IS noticing things Edwin let go unspoken, and Charles DOES have some deep seated anger and grief.

But on the other hand, she is ABSOLUTELY projecting her own issues and traumas with violent men onto Charles. Like, he has some anger he hasn't dealt with, for sure, but he doesn't have Anger Issues in the way she claims. We never once see him him angrier than a situation calls for, in my opinion.

In the Devlin house, he's seeing a man brutally murder a woman and children. I ALSO would have tried to intervene.

With the Night Nurse, she had just mentally tortured both Charles and Crystal, and was threatening to essentially send Edwin back to Hell. Again, I for sure would have murdered her.

Charles is a generally fairly emotional guy, and extremely protective. But I truly don't think he has severe rage issues the way Crystal consistently insinuates, I think he has some unresolved issues and they trigger HER issues and she ends up projecting a lot.

Their friendship is fascinating to me because she's in this weird place of being both right and wrong when it comes to him, and giving a weird mixture of helpful and unhelpful advice.

And HE'S in this weird place of pinning a lot of his unresolved issues with being dead so young onto HER. As much as his death is better than his life was in many ways, as much as he's happy with Edwin and wouldn't change it-- he still died way too young and struggles with that in a way Edwin doesn't (Hell has a way of granting perspective, I think). And here's this living girl who can see him and can remind him what it's like to be alive and have a taste of what he might've done-- flirt and date and have a girlfriend.

So here are these two people who are genuinely friends, genuinely care about each other, and are partially right about each other-- while also being kind of hilariously wrong and projecting their own issues without realising.

Idk I don't think this makes a lot of sense I've just been thinking while bored at work and now I'm word-vomiting

[luteddecoction]

Niko: Is Edwin always like this when they lose?

Charles: Oh, yes. You should've been there for the Great Jenga Tantrum of 2015.

Edwin: You bumped that table and you know it!

[luteddecoction]

"The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness." ~John Muir

Starlit Wilderness Breeze @BreezeChai

[luteddecoction]

Edwin and Charles have an ongoing beef with a pair of paranormal investigators, let's call them Evan and Caleb

it lasts years, and the investigators are always super late to the scene, but they stubbornly, and infuriatingly, follow our boys' trail

Charles finds them amusing, likes to keep up with their blog about them, is even willing to move an object or two when they're in the room, and when Edwin isn't looking

because Edwin finds them endlessly irritating - they interfere with their work, are loud and annoying and, worst of all, come to absolutely outlandish conclusions

for example, one of Evan's and Calen's theories is that they're searching for not only a couple of ghosts, but a ghost couple (they just fully think Edwin is a female ghost, they even have sketches of what they think their married ghostly couple looks like and "Eve" is a tall girl with big feet and a ribbon in her hair)

when Edwin and Charles finally get together, Charles takes the liberty of moving the bow from "Eve's" hair to her neck and only then does it finally click for the willful and overeager pair of investigators

"Caleb, what if... they've actually always been two boys?!"

"Holy shit, Evan, you may be right! so they're not actually married, maybe just best mates??"

Edwin continues to hate them

[luteddecoction]

HEAVYJAN day 4.

[luteddecoction]

ye olde trans rights 💙🌸🤍

[luteddecoction]

My train was late. AGAIN.

[luteddecoction]

i will try to live my life in peace and then i remeber HBO is speding millions to produce ANOTHER Harry Potter adaptation nobody wants while new, amazing, queer, ORIGINAL stories wont get a chance to continue (dead boy detectives i am thinking of you!!)

and i get so PISSED

[luteddecoction]

Most of the surviving works from Aristotle are on Ethics and Politics. We don’t care about those. When it comes to esoteric history, we are far more concerned with pseudo-Aristotle. 

When Alexander the Great died, legends about his life sprang up like weeds. Aristotle, being a major character in his life, was given a legendary role. He was no longer the sober, empirical, tutor to a great military mind. He was cast as Alexander’s court wizard, a font of occult insight who taught cosmic secrets to a legendary hero. Plus, if you wrote something, and you wanted it to have some real clout, you could just lie and say Aristotle wrote it. This trick would be pulled for several hundred years. Thus, pseudo-Aristotle became equally as influential as the actual historical Aristotle. 

Ancient Greek Philosophy and the birth of Western Esotericism, today on patreon.

[luteddecoction]

Seven-Eleven (not 7 elevens: 11-11-11-11-11-11-11) Inc. is an American convenience store headquartered in Texas. They no longer serve their famous slurpees in Mexico as far as I found out at 11 (not seven) years of age. It started as an ice house storefront in 1927 and when the chain expanded between the years of 1927 and 1946, each of their stores were referred to as Totem Stores (no idea why). Anywhys, the stores used to operate from 7am to 11pm and that's where it got its name from

I miss the world before AI image generation

Secondly, I also miss the world where AI image generation was just incoherent blobs and obvious fakes

Thirdly, I miss when I had a spark in my eye

[luteddecoction]

[luteddecoction]

-

Patreon | Ko-Fi

[luteddecoction]

qweustion. why dont chefs ever prescramble eggs by shaking an umcracked egg like a maraca before cracking it into the pan.?