#There’s even a “Queen James Translation”

[fanartlover1234]

FALLING IN LOVE

Okey guys bear with me, i recently watched Descensants 4 and im obsessed with James fucking Hook, like have you seen tne man and i had an idea where Y/n is Bridgets older sister forced to take up the duty as a future queen even though she doesnt want it and thay includes arranged marrage but she over the time falls for Hook

He really didnt mean to dump bleach all over her in their first year at Merlin academy but somehow as he is a VK it was supposed that he meant to do it.

And ever since that it was war.

And no matter how many times the girl shood him away he only seemed to translate it in his head to ' please annoy me everyday and never let me have peace'

She knew the pirate wasnt the smartest but this was something.

The girl exited her class as she placed the notebook in her bag as she heard a whistle before an all too familiar voice caught her attention from the shadows.

"Oy, princess" he said as he looked at her but she only rolled her eyes and kept walking " we are going somewhere?" He asked trailing behind her.

And thats how most days went, he annoyed her to guts to get a reaction out of her but those few days she was left alone she found herself missing him.

Few days pass and Y/n is in her room, her dark red silk night dress barely reaching above her mid upper thigh reflects in the mirror and she starts thinking it looks like Hooks jacket but quickly shakes the though from her head when she hears a knock on her door.

She goes to open it to find no other then Hook leaning on her door frame before he pushed his way in looking around her room.

It was different from what he expected.

It wasnt all pink and happy and stuffed like bridgets room.

"Sure, come in" the girl said annoyed as she closed her door leaninh against it as she watched Hook turn to her.

Her hair neatly combed amd falling along her back and framing her face, he looked down at her pj and raised used brows.

Y/n shifted to stand straight, it was clear he was at least a head taller then her without her heels.

"What do you want?" She asked crosing her arms over her chest.

"A smile for starters and then maybe" he pulled stalking over her brushing her jaw line with his hook "ill know what i want next"

Y/n pushed his hook away before looking back at the door and pointing " wait how did you, you VKs are not allowed in the part of dorms" she said as she looled back at Hook who smirked steping forward making her step back.

"Well darlin' y'know" her back hit the wal and he placed a hand next to her head and leaning down to meet her eyes " forbbiden is what makes it fun " he said before he held up his hook, her nacklace hanging there.

She had lost it two weeks ago and it was one of crown yules of Wonderland.

Y/n reached for it but hook pulled his hand away, walking to her bed and sitting down.

"Give it to me" she said walking over to him but before she could react he was up and his good hand was around her waist pulling her to her chest as his lips brushed her ear.

"Meet me outside by the big oak tree across headmasters study at this timw tomorrow, then its all yours" he said before kissing her cheeks and leaving her room.

The next day seemed to pass quickly, a bit too quickly for her liking and she found herself sitting on the bed looking in the mirror at her outfit.

Her pink her up in half up do with a black clip, black skirt brushed her upper mid thigh and the oversized t-shirt tugged into the skirt in one corner looked pretty good on her. The black high heels boots finished the look as she decided against her better judgement and sneaked out making her way to the big oak tree.

When she got there Hook was already there leaning against the tree, his signature smirk forming on his lips when he saw her make her way to him.

He pushed off from the tree and went to her.

"Follow me" he said walking past her and into the forest.

She followed him for a while untill she was met with a clear field as she stomped to Hook who sat down in the middle.

The girl squated down annoyed to ask what this was but before ahe could get words over her lips he moved hed head upward.

She looked up, her lips parted when she saw the metior shower above her like she has never seen before, she sat down in shock her eyes never leaving the sky.

"Wow" she mumbled.

"Yeah, wow" Hook spoke as he looked at the girls face, glowing as the stars raced in the sky.

Walking back they had a half pleasant talk as she had Hooks jacket coat on.

They reached her dorm and she was about to take off the jackef but he told her to keep it and left after wishinh her a good night.

She entered as he placed a hand in one of the pockets of the coat and was met with a small cold metal chain brushing her fingers.

She pulled out and her lips turned into a smile as she looked at her necklace while she walked over to her bed.

Hey babes, i was thinking of making this a small story but, have no fear there will be part two for this, but please, repost, comment and like it really helps and feel free to leave requests.

[shadysadie]

Hot take: the Wittebanes were not Puritans

So since Hollow Mind came out there have been a lot of jokes about how the Belos is a crusty old Puritan. And while he is certainly crusty and old, I don’t think he was a Puritan.

I understand why everyone jumps there, when we think of Witch Hunts in Colonial America the very first thing that comes to mind is the Salem Witchcraft Trials. However, the Salem Witchcraft Trials began in 1692, that is 80 years after Masha says the Wittebros showed up in Gravesfield, and 30 years after the events of Elsewhere and Elsewhen.

If Masha’s information is correct, (which it might not be but we’ll get to that) then Caleb and Philip arrived in Gravesfield in 1613, which is closer in time to the settlement of Jamestown (1607) than the Salem Witchcraft Trials. 

The Pilgrims didn’t even land at pride rock until 1620, seven years after the Wittebros arrived in Gravesfield. The Mayflower Pilgrims were really the group responsible for creating the idea of religious charters. They specifically wanted to leave England to create their own religious society. Many other groups followed, (notably the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which later became the home of the aforementioned Salem Witchcraft Trials) but the Mayflower Pilgrims were the first group of religious extremists who came to America looking for their Zion. 

Prior to that, the motivation to settle the “New World” was mainly financial. Ships were chartered through the Virginia Company. Which as we all remember from our favorite wildly inaccurate and problematic 90s Disney movie, the Virginia Company was in it for the money. The New World had resources and Britian wanted them, damnit, Glory, God, and Gold and the Virginia Company.

That meant, if Caleb and Philip really did arrive in Gravesfield in 1613, their family likely made the trip for financial gain, not religion. If that’s the case they were less likely a member of an obscure group of religious extremists, and more likely to be either Protestant like King James and Queen Elizabeth. (They could have also been Roman Catholic, evidence for that comes later).

“But”, you say, “weren’t Puritans the ones persecuting witches at the time?”

Yes and no. 

In the Americas, Witch Hunts will forever be linked to Puritans, but in Witch Hunting long outdates the Puritans. King James himself, was a witch hunting fanatic, he personally oversaw hundreds of witchtrials. He wrote books about finding witches, and it was specifically the King James endorse translation of the Bible that features the infamous “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (in many prior translations the word witch is something more along the line of “sinner” or “evil doer”). By many estimates, upwards of 1500 people were executed for witchcraft as a result of his reign. If we are going with Masha’s 1613 timeline, the brothers would have left England smack dab in the middle of his reign, right after the King James Bible was published.

(^this GIF has nothing to do with the Owl House, I just love sassy Gay King James in his bird mask, look at this cocky ass bastard, you know him and Belos would have been genocide buddies)

However, I can’t pretend to be focused on some semblance of historical accuracy and take Masha’s information at face value, even in the context of the show it wouldn’t add up because according to the sign we see in Yesterday’s Lie, Gravesfield was established in 1635. 

(Granted there is a difference between a settlement and a town, it is possible that 1635 was when Gravesfield was officially acknowledged as a town and the boys just lived there pre-establishment). 

However, in the name of historical accuracy, I have to assume Masha got the date wrong, because the English didn’t even settle in Conneticut until the 1630s. The Conneticut Witch Trials began in the 1640s. By this timeline and demographic, the likelihood of Caleb and Philip being Puritans goes up by a lot. 

However, if we look at Philip’s clothes an his goals, there are still signs that don’t point to Puritanism. First look at the clothes Caleb and Philip wear as children:

Philip’s pants are red and Calebs are green. While it is a myth that Puritans could only wear black, the colors that they were allowed to incorporate into their wardrobe were typically still neutrals (dark yellows and beiges). Green would be pushing it, and red would be unbelievably bold.

Additionally, the ruffles on Philip’s shirt in the journal and Jacob’s book, would have been seen as incredibly vain.

 The blue/black coat that Caleb wore in the puppet show, and Philip later wears in Elsewhere and Elsewhen and King’s Tide has gold buttons and gold embroidery. Gold and Silver accessories of any kind would have been considered incredibly sinful and conceited. 

Which would also make it really weird for a Puritan to choose gold to represent himself. Infact his whole emperor authentic is much more reminiscent of the Catholic Pope. His own role as the messenger of the Titan’s will is also very papal in nature.

Finally there is the term he uses, “Witch Hunter General” is an illusion to “Witch Finder General” which was a rank made up and used by Protestant Matthew Hopkins and not really used by any Puritans. Such a title would also probably have seemed pretty vain.

Now you might say, “It’s a fictional story, why does any of this matter?”

The answer is: It does not, but I am high and have ADHD and this was the rabbit hole I fell down.

[curlyhairedbooklover]

What is the gender spilt of the murders in NBC Hannibal?

This is the third of three posts though this one works as a standalone, the first two are about the characters saying each other’s names and can be found here and here (I promise they are much more interesting than that summary makes them sound….) I decided to make this post because of this quote from Bryan Fuller; “And we are very conscious in the writer’s room; ‘Okay we just killed a woman, we have to kill a guy now.’” (47:20) And I always wondered how well they actually managed to do that…. thus I went out and collected the data and here it is!!

Adding a quick disclaimer that I did this for fun so I haven’t double checked it meaning there may be some mistakes!

As you can see from the data it turns out that they did kill less women than men during the show!!!! The total known kills in the show are 200 with 98 of them being men, 65 women and 37 were unknown!! I also kept track of who did the murder and those categories are: Hannibal, killer of the week, Will, and other.

To preface, I am only using “women” and “men” for my categories in this data as the show does not depict any trans or nb people (explicitly at least, there are a couple metaphorical/subtextual ones…) and if I could not tell the person’s gender or I simply did not see a body I categorised them as “unknown” 

You will be pleased to know that Hannibal killed 39.5 people (the 0.5 is Dolarhyde which I split between Will and Hannibal as it was a joint kill 😌)  over the show on screen and that 26.5 of them were men, 9 were women and only 4 were unknown! All I can say is that Hannibal is a feminist queen! That or women are significantly less rude in the Hannibal universe… although Freddie seems to defy that theory…. He does kill the most in s1 at 21 times! That essentially halves in s2 to only 12 times and again to 6.5 times in s3.. although it’s worth noting that I was unable to count his kills at Muskrat Farm as we don’t see any bodies on screen (though the script implies it was at least 7) and I only counted the Il Mostro kills that we saw evidence of instead of including the amount killed by the actual Il Mostro killer(s).. Not to mention that he spent half the season in prison! So all that said he did okay! Also I personally believe that his kill count across his lifetime is easily in the high hundreds, he has to meal plan if nothing else so let's put some respect on his name as Hannibal THEE Cannibal!

Unsurprisingly the killers of the week did make up most of the kills in the show, and killed 62 men, 56 women and 33 of unknown gender altogether. The killer of the week who did the most murder is James Grey at a whopping 50 but he did have a mural to create so that takes a lot of bodies! Second place goes to Lawrence Wells who murdered 17 people over his lifetime to create his totem pole, while Clark Ingram sneaks in at 3rd with 16 murders, although he only killed women and is the main reason why the women’s s2 kill count is higher than the men’s, boooooo! Poor Dolarhyde had to pick up all the slack in s3 as the only killer of the week but he did at least get 15 kills in! Sadly he was bound by the orders of the moon and could not do the suitable legwork 😔

Now Will DID get his own section of the table as is his right as the main character 😤 even if he only killed 3 people (which translates to 2.5 on the table as a result of having to share the dragon with Hannibal…). But they were all monumental kills, I mean Garret Jacob Hobbs haunted the rest of the show, Randall was turned into a magnificent tableau, and Francis was the culmination of his becoming and gave us That Ending!! It’s also not like he didn’t successfully manipulate multiple people into killing (or almost killing) people so I think he deserves extra points for those if only in our hearts!! Despite his low kill count he is the character we see commit murder the most on the show! He fantasises/imagines/hallucinates murdering 32 people across the show!! As the show moved away from the procedural nature he imagined killing less people; with s1 standing at 16, s2 moving down to 9 and then only 7 in s3! Just because most of the time he’s empathising with killers to recreate their kills doesn’t make the scenes any less sexy or iconic!!

The 7 other kills actually all come from women!! Another feminism win!! 3.3 is when Chiyoh killed her prisoner after being manipulated into it by Will. 3.7 sees Chiyoh kill again, this time’s it’s the 2 guys who were going to kill Jack and the 2 guards at Muskrat Farm, where we also we get Mason’s murder from Alana and Margot!! Then in 3.10 we get the flashback to Bedelia killing her patient! Go Girls!! Whooo!! 

In conclusion no one is surprised that there is a lot of murder in this show and Bryan Fuller while not exactly alternating each week in killing off each gender did not kill more women than men so arguably achieved his goal!

(part 1) (part 2) (part 3)

[forestdeath1]

Lily and James — the alchemical Queen and King. Lily is the main symbol of the entire saga.

In Harry Potter, there are two levels - the mundane and the symbolic. On the mundane level, Lily is a character with her own strengths and weaknesses. On the symbolic level, Lily is the main symbol of the entire saga. Perhaps that's why there's so little talk about her because symbolically Lily is what everyone strives for, everyone searches for but cannot find. Harry learns more about Lily only before the final battle, and there's a reason for that.

It's no secret that HP books are heavily laden with alchemical and Christian symbolism. I'm not religious, and to me, all these symbols are just cultural codes that have had a significant influence on almost all classic literature and art.

Philipp Otto Runge, Chagall, Goethe — they're all alchemical codes

Firstly, alchemy is not about literally turning lead into gold, it's a path of spiritual development, a path of transformation, a "hero's journey," the journey of the Son returning to the Father. Alchemical transformation is described in the text "The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz." This is the third manifesto of the Rosicrucian Brotherhood.

So, lilies are a very ancient symbol.

According to Jewish legends, the lily grew in Eden just at the time of Eve's temptation by the devil and could be defiled by him, but even amid temptation, it remained as pure as it was, and no dirty hand dared to touch it. In early medieval depictions, Christ was placed against a backdrop of lilies or in the lily flower, seen as a symbol of the Virgin Mary. The orange lily often symbolizes the blood of Christ.

Symbolically, Lily is the love of God, a divine spark, and the blood of Christ itself, which was shed in the name of redemption and salvation to atone for the sins of all humanity. And what is the blood of Christ? In Christian tradition, the blood of Jesus Christ is a symbol of the life-giving and saving spirit of God.

By the way, lilies and roses were often confused in translations, and symbolically they are the same. Many suspected that the Rosicrucians' rose is a stylized version of the Egyptian and Indian flowering lotus, and the lotus has often been considered a water lily (they are different, but symbolically they merged). But calling the main character Rose would be too dull and obvious a reference.

Lily - symbolically, she is both the mother of Christ and the Spirit of God herself, the bearer of divine love, to which all seekers are drawn. This is not the only meaning, but for now, it's enough.

God is love, says John the Apostle. (Remus John Lupin, hehe. It was absolutely unnecessary to know his middle name. It's intentionally inserted because each of the marauders, except Sirius, by name signifies one of the disciples closest to Christ. Sirius is a separate story, he signifies something completely different.)

And who is drawn? Well, primarily we see two - James and Snape.

One of the most important things we learn about James is that he's a deer. The deer is a well-known symbol. In myths and folk beliefs, the deer was associated with the soul's aspiration to heaven and purification.

"As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God" Ps. 42: 1

In the Alexandrian "Physiologus," there's an ancient enmity between the stag and the serpent. The serpent hides from the foe in the clefts of the earth, but the stag, with the help of water, draws out the serpent and defeats it. (Water has always been a symbol of the serpent, even in Slytherin's element water, but the stag fights the serpent not with ordinary water but with the water of baptism. The snake has another important meaning for alchemy, but more on that later.)

Snape belongs to the Serpent, to secret knowledge, occult knowledge, "philosophical" reason, dark magic, which has always been contrary to the divine nature in Christian understanding and originated from the devil. James belongs to the Lion and the Deer.

The Lion is a typical alchemical symbol. Also, the Red Lion is Christ. Gryffindor embodies the soul's aspiration towards light and transformation, towards salvation. By the way, St. Godric (the hermit) also had his own pet deer, which he saved.

The deer seeks love, the spirit of God, the divine spark, God Himself, and in this persistent pursuit is shown James's path, as a seeker and as an alchemist. The Potters — if not alchemists themselves, then at least from the lineage of alchemists — the Peverells (The symbol of the Deathly Hallows is an alchemical-masonic symbol). And this means that the Potters are at least seekers; in their souls, there is a desire to find the divine and undergo transformation. The Potters have a strong hatred for the 'serpentine essence' of evil, and this is what needs to be transformed. (By the way, the graveyard is located near St. Jerome's Church. Besides translating the Bible into Latin, Jerome also healed and tamed a lion).

Masonic-alchemical symbol. Symbol of the philosopher's stone. Symbol of the Deathly Hallows. Solve et coagula is a principle of alchemy meaning "dissolve and coagulate".

An alchemist is a gardener, and this is another interesting reference to James and Lily. The way James tries to find an approach to Lily is an alchemical process. The alchemist tends to the Garden. In Vrisvik's Great Work (the Magnum Opus), it appears as the Garden of the Wise. The Gates to the Garden of the Wise for the Chosen become the process of dissolving "our Substance." James manages to approach Lily only when he dissolves his Ego. The Ego is the main enemy on the path to transformation.

The tradition of "hermetic gardening," that is, "cultivating the flowers of Wisdom in one's garden," becomes a leading line in alchemical symbolism. James cultivates wisdom.

While Snape cultivates "dark knowledge," although his soul also strives for light and love. But Snape is still too captured by his Ego, too captivated by base emotions, a thirst for revenge, recognition, or power, a craving for "secret knowledge." He cannot resist it, no matter how much he may strive for Lily, for the divine transformation of his spirit, and James, still dwelling in his Ego, instead of showing mercy to Snape, pushes him further away. The stag fights the serpent, but God is love. Ultimately, Snape temporarily closes off the paths of alchemical transformation for himself.

The Rebis is the end product of the alchemical magnum opus or great work. The lion must dissolve the serpent. Hermetic gardening. The alchemical wedding: the Queen and the King.

But besides all this, the deer is also a symbol of eternal renewal and victory over death ("The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death" 1 Corinthians 15:26 ). A symbol of Christ. His constantly renewing antlers represent eternal life.

In the original Greek of the New Testament, the names Jacob and James are variants of the same root—Yaaqob. James is an active force, a seeker, an investigator, a supplanter. James the Great was of a rather impulsive character, but everyone was also amazed by his courage, he was the only one who acknowledged Christ as the Messiah. And he is the only apostle whose death is described in the New Testament. He dies at the hands of King Herod, a cynical and evil king who was willing to murder babies for his purpose. James also dies at the hands of Voldemort, who is willing to kill a baby for his purpose.

Moreover, it was Saint James who was considered the heavenly patron of alchemists. His tomb was located in Santiago de Compostela, which was the oldest center of adepts. It was there, in 1378, after twenty years of unsuccessful attempts to decipher the Book of Hieroglyphic Figures, that Nicolas Flamel, the most famous alchemist of the Middle Ages, went. By the way, Shell Cottage... the scallop shell is a symbol of the apostle James and the "trademark" of the Way of St. James. Shell Cottage is also alchemical. It is there that Harry sees the symbol of the Deathly Hallows around Lovegood's neck.

James is a seeker. Lily is a symbol of the divine spirit, sparks, transformation. That to which all must ultimately come, that which must change in our world in the image of God. But for now, our world is seized by evil, by the antichrist. To defeat death means to defeat the antichrist in one's soul.

James finds Lily. The Soul finds the Spirit. The Spirit descends into the Soul. The King and Queen marry—and a new life is born, another hero capable of defeating the evil that has engulfed the world, capable of cleansing the world of evil. The connection between Harry and Christ is no secret to anyone.

The power of love conquers death. A rune appears on Harry's forehead—Sowilo rune—the victory rune, the sun rune, the irreversible rune. It symbolically serves as the key to the world of Alfheim—the world of the light elves, that is, the bright ideas, the prototypes of the buddhial plane, the ideality in this world.

The key to God. Harry becomes marked. His scar is a reminder to him that he came into this world not just by chance, but to destroy evil. And coming into this world, materializing, a person invariably receives a particle of the antichrist within himself. That's how this world works. Evil is in the soul of each of us, and through the Great Work, a person must purify himself.

And none can live while the other survives, because they mutually exclude each other by their very nature. Christ and antichrist.

But Harry has a difficult path ahead, the path of the Great Work before he can achieve victory. And that will be the theme of all 7 books, 7 years — exactly 7 days is the duration of The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz for the transformation oh his soul, for victory over death.

[uwmspeccoll]

Classic Profiles

This is a 1676 edition of The Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans, compared together by the 1st-century BCE Greek philosopher and historian Plutarch of Chaeronea, printed by the printer to the University of Cambridge John Hayes for the bookseller George Sawbridge. Originally written in Greek, Plutarch's Lives appeared in print for the first time as a Latin translation in 1470, and this English translation by Sir Thomas North was first published in 1579 from a French translation by James Amiot (Jacques Amyot). The text is a collection biographies of famous Greeks and Romans, including Alexander the Great, Pericles, Tiberius Gracchus, and Cicero. These figures left an indelible mark on history, their lives and achievements shaping the world as we know it.

Sir Thomas North (1535 – c. 1604) was an English translator and lawyer significantly contributing to English literature. His translation of Plutarch's Lives served as the primary source text for William Shakespeare's Roman plays, a testament to his work's enduring influence. This translation is regarded as one of the earliest examples of exceptional English prose. It was followed by another edition in 1595, which included updated biographies. A third edition of North's Plutarch was published in 1603, including even more translated Parallel Lives and a supplement of other biographies.

Jacques Amyot (1513-1593), a French scholar, writer, and translator, made substantial contributions to the field of translation and literature. His work on the translation of Plutarch's Lives (1559-1565) was instrumental in shaping the literary landscape of his time and laid the foundation for future translations and interpretations of Plutarch's work.

The first edition of this book was dedicated to Queen Elizabeth I. This dedication reflects the book's significance and provides a glimpse into the political and cultural landscape of the time, adding another layer of depth to the reader's understanding. Plutarch’s Lives helped shape the understanding of the classical Greek democracies and oligarchies of the Roman Republic and the role attributed to their founders—among them the legendary Lycurgus of Sparta and the Athenian lawgiver Solon.

-Melissa, Special Collections Classics Intern

View other Classics posts

[violetwhisperswolfstar]

The Evolution Of A Wolfstar Girlie

(with my fic recommendations)me aged 10-23: there will never be a book I like more than Harry Potter. I love books and read all the time but Harry Potter is above anything. Reread HP everytime I am feeling down.

me aged 24-30: I lost the ability to read for pleasure. Just read to my kids and A LOT for work.

me at 31: *after a random tiktok video* Sirius and Remus were TOGETHER together?! Never even crossed my mind!!!

But... I get it.

But like... JKR didn't write it. Fanfic is just amateurs writing, right? I have enough of reading as is, I have to read for my job (I'm a translator).

But... They promised it's a HP experience. And I do have an eReader... It costs nothing to try it.

But... What the hell is ao3? What is smut??? Fluff??? HEA? MCD??? Cannon?? AU? Excuse me, is this English?!

The following then happend over 2 months time:

📖 Reading All the Young Dudes

OK, this is really very much like HP. I am getting hooked. This is ACTUALLY what happend, right? Like this is amazingly written. How is this not a real book? (What IS a real book and how do I not know this being a book translator?!) Are Sirius and Remus getting together in this one?

Oh my!

Actually, I've not been this obsessed with a book in like 10+ years.

Reading all through the night (with three kids, mind you, so a very stupid idea)

🎶Love this music!!! Have always loved rock, Queen, Beatles, Bowie, led Zeppelin… You name it. But this makes it better!!!

Finishing ATYD: OMG! OMG! I AM OBSESSED. They need to be together forever. I need to re-read it.

A SEX SCENE in Harry Potter?! EXCUSE YOU! Like… Didn't know I needed that. Thank you.

Of course they had teenage sex at that school. Yes to a giant snake killing people with its sight and no to some friendly petting? Yeah, sure, JKR! Be for real! Never thought about it like that before. And of course they had parties. And smoked (weed) and did drugs. Like… It's a boarding school for heaven's sake! this is much more realistic. Finally know what smut is and I am here for it.

I want a cigarette SO BAD right now (haven't smoked for YEARS)

googling specifics of gay sex because I never thought about it (and I live in a very conservative country) (and like I had QUESTIONS, excuse you, like can you just do butt stuff without prep?!)

finding 📖 explicit one-shots from ATYD

📖 Reading ATYD sirius's POV:

This is ALSO good. So... fanfics on the internet can just... be amazing, right? How has this existed for years and I did not know about it?? Sirius is obsessed LOL. He fell first and he fell harder, the poor boy.

My husband is SO MUCH like Remus. (personality-wise). Guess I know my type, lol.

These fanfics are written better than majority of books I've read. I'm utterly amazed.

📖 Reading Out of the Blue and Bootleg Tapes:

OK, I needed some healing. Happy for Grant and all. But I need wolfstar more.

📖 We could be heroes (finding out what a "fix-it fic" is)

Yes! Wolfstar endgame! A happy ending! Yes!!

Intrusive thoughts: Is ATYD wolfstar like… toxic?

Are they ever happy?

Don't go there, brain!!

Trying to heal with 📖Manacled, then DMATMOOBIL.

Like Dramione. But wolfstar is far superior.

Also have to note that Draco is amazing in bed.

Not a sentence I've ever thought I utter or think. Ever.

Finding 📖 Cadence Of Part-time Poets

sceptical.

How can muggle AU be good? Don't I like all this because of the magic?

Reading it, re-reading it.

Buying an e-cigarette (cause I have to DEAL ffuck's sake and they smoke in like every second scene and ecigarrete is the least of all evil)

Obsessing.

Cannot get enough.

Best. Thing. Ever. Written.

Somehow more magic than magic U.

DOES REGULUS LIKE JAMES?

Seeing the possibilities of Jegulus (is everyone gay in the end? Excuse me, Am I GAY at this point ?)

THE MUSIC OMG THE MUSIC IS MUSICING!!! I am in love with the music! How are Marauders not a band in cannon?! Like that's obviously what they were always supposed to be! Lottie, Simon, Tonya, Tomny… They ARE cannon for me lol. They were there and you cannot convince me otherwise.

Cannot read more, afraid I will lose this Cadence feeling. Just re-reading the best scenes over and over. Stalking motswolo's tumblr. Consuming all there is about Cadence out there. Trying to talk to people about it but noone reads fanfics here!

Can we like start a gofund me for them to get therapy??? I want to see them diagnosed, aware of their traumas and forever together.

Also, why is Remadora a thing? Thank god it wasn't in Cadence (yet) but sometimes i remember it exists and like… vomit internally. Gosh, I rly hate JKR. She just did it to discourage Wolfstar.

getting to read 📖 Black Mass Over Highway 90:

Very sceptical at first.

It's American… and Marauders are essentially English. Remus somewhere in Texas… of all places? Afraid this won't be my cup of tea... Cowboy Remus?! wtf

OMG.

OMG.

This scene basically porn… right? Why do I LOVE THIS?!

Remus is DADDY! Officer Moons!!! He can get it. Like omg. Cowboy Lupin FTW!!

THIS IS the SMUT, RIGHT?! Like do I even want to watch porn at this point? How am I - a cis female in a hetero relationship of 14 years with 3 kids - finding this SO HOT?!

📖 Reading Blends

Also very sceptical.

But... it's so sweet! Is this fluff? Am I discovering fluffy fics? Now, this is comfort reading! Coffe-shop AU? Like, this is where I want to die, my friends! This is so sweet, so incredibly sweet, and I DO NOT miss Voldy and his stupid war one bit, like to hell with him, he can order an Americano and Remus will decaf him at this point!

I am in LOVE!

📖 Reading Names (Blends sequel) because can you do anything else at this point?

Now this is... a whole other thing. It is fluffy, yes. But it goes deeper. And... wider somehow?

It's the first WIP I give a chance.

Cluster headaches are an AMAZING parallel to lycantrophy.

HOW exactly are people this talented just out there publishing fanfics?!

And this "slice of life" thing IS doing it for me. Like really.

📖 Reading Crimson Rivers

Is there anything else besides angst in this?

Wait, James likes... Regulus?!

discovering Jegulus -

wow. I am utterly amazed... cannot put this down at any point of the day. Reading while breastfeeding, reading all through the night. Reading all through the day. Learning how to read and braid my hair at the same time.

I keep thinking - why DO I love gay man/boys stories? How did it come to this? How is this FREE? How do I GIVE BACK to these AMAZING authors that are just doing incredible things for me? Like this is everything I've ever wanted from a book... and they're not even getting paid for this?!

📖 Reading a bunch of short fics inbetween (honorable mentions: Like Real People Do, That's the Art of Getting by, Led by Light of a Star Sweetly Gleaming, Pages of You - discovering Drarry, thinking Drarry is less angst because there's less homophobia in the 90s,

📖 Reading Only the Brave

OK, it's Jegulus, let's give it a chance...

OMG

OMG

OMG

I feel like ever since getting into this fandom, I'm just falling and falling and falling. Falling... In love.

This is so good, you guys. I love JEGULUS!

But as long as WOLFSTAR are together, I can deal (took them half a fic to get together, so please don't do anything stupid!)

I. CANNOT. STOP. READING. WOLFSTAR.

In every universe.

Wolfstar & fanfic taught me not to have any prejudice. And I also discovered that I was quite prejudiced without being aware of it!

I can read anything with those two... just don't break my heart and just let them be together.

Wolfstar made me read again and actually enjoy it. It's been several thousands of pages in a couple of months and I don't regret the lack of sleep…

They are soulmates. In every universe. I don't know what this fetish is called but I need them to be together, see them together, read them together. Love them both. Just need them to be happy.

I am completely amazed at the sheer power the internet has, that an online community has. This is my new obsession and I am utterly devoted to it. It taught me and gave me SO MUCH. I will forever be learning how to give anything back.

Thank you.

[shootingstarwritings]

"Hey bro, how does a crew battle work...?"

Hey, it's me again! The name's James. Last time we checked up like this, I hopped my roommate's body so he'd get better at fighting games. His name's Korrin, but he prefers Kor.

I gotta admit, these powers were a pretty sweet deal. He suddenly had a brand new genre to enjoy and I got to play with his body every once in a while. Seemed like a win-win, right?

Well, we got caught up talking just a bit too much shit during one of the weeklies. Think I ended up messing with my roommate's personality a bit too much while I was jerking off as him. He was far cockier than before I started taking over.

"Yeah, that's right. $500 crew battle," said Kor, flexing his muscles through the tight t-shirt I had mind-fucked him into preferring to wear. "Me and James could beat the shit outta everyone in this venue. Easy."

I wrapped an arm around his shoulder, saying, "Chill the hell out before you spend all our rent money," through clenched teeth. In response, he leaned over and gave me a deep kiss before talking more shit.

We didn't have to play everyone in the venue, but now we were stuck in a 4v4 crew battle; and Kor had successfully pissed off just about everyone who was a regular. We had two weeks to find two other guys to fill out our team or we'd be going hungry for the next month.

The ride home was quiet, although Kor didn’t seem to mind. He stared straight ahead, one hand on the steering wheel while another was on my thigh. Occasionally, he would squeeze while smiling at me. The way his eyes lit up whenever we were together dazzled me. I couldn’t stay mad at him, especially when it was my fault he was the way he was.

"Aww, don’tcha worry," said Kor as he massaged my shoulders, another trait I had bestowed him. My bed was a bit small for the two of us, and Kor had often wondered out loud if we could fit a queen sized bed in my room. “I’m sure we’ll find some guys. Even if they’re dead weight, you and me can wipe the floor with everyone there.” Before I could say anything, he leaned over and kiss my neck. I shivered, toes curling as he greedily licked one of my more sensitive spots.

After I let out a few… unbecoming moans, Kor pulled away and tittered. “Love making you cry out like that,” he said in a sensual tone. “Well, good night. Gotta get to the gym early tomorrow.”

As the door to his room shut close, I stared up at the ceiling and sighed. I had a few other friends that liked games, but they had no interested in fighting games like me. Of course, that had never stopped me before…

Two weeks should be enough time to make two pros, right?

The first guy on my list was Jason. He was a buddy of mine that I met in college. Smart, kind, and eager to show off the gains he'd made at the gym. "I spent three years to get this bod," he had bragged to me, showing off his toned and sweaty torso. Even so, he still enjoyed playing games, particularly RPGs. He was always throwing one my way or another--with tons of fan translations and cryptic guides as well.

I'd have to play one of them to completion one of these days to thank him for the service he was about to provide.

The night after Kor made his bet, I made my move. I locked my door and focused on flying. My body slowly lost its weight, density, and then mass in general. Skin peeled away and disappeared into dust, waiting for the chance to reform once my mission was complete. Organs twisted into neat little knots that blinked out of existence. My bones ground up against each other before vanishing.

It was only during those few precious moments that my soul was free. I sailed through the sky, unable to feel the wind on my face yet elated all the same. The moon was so close to my fingertips that it felt unfair that I couldn't grasp it. However, I knew exactly what I could grip instead.

I phased through Jason's apartment with little issue and found himself soon afterward. He was playing a battle simulator without a shirt on. "It's about a 73% to one-hit KO," he muttered to himself as he clicked through an innumerable amount of tabs. I knew for a fact some of them were months old and untouched for just as long.

Probably another habit I’d have to kick, but it was hard to focus on that when I kept focusing on that tight body he had. I would’ve licked my lips of I had any in that form. Not wanting to waste any more time, I hopped into him.

“Hnng…! Ahhh…hah…!” Jason let out a moan, tongue sticking out involuntarily as a shiver of pleasure ran all throughout his body. “Wh-what the fuck—is happening—“ Jason moaned as he turned around and began to hump his seat cushions. “AH! NRGH AAAAAHHHH!” Any words Jason would’ve tried to cry out were soon overpowered by panicked pants of pleasure. His hands, which would’ve normally reached for his phone to call for help, could only play with his chest and sensitive nipples.

My will overpowered his own, but Jason didn’t seem to mind. He kicked off his shoes, socked toes curling up in pleasure, and rubbed his trembling body all over the coach. “I-I…! K-Keep go—OOAHH—Keep going!” He said, panting and laughing the whole time. His back arched once more as he let out a strangled scream while his erect cock spewed semen all over his shorts. Jason, mind drowning in a hurricane of euphoria curtesy of me, collapsed covered in a sweaty, semen-covered mess.

Eventually, I opened my new eyes and felt my chiseled body. “Mmm, oh Jason. Let’s get your hand-eye coordination to my level.” As I began to strip so I could play in the nude, I saw angry DMs from Jason’s opponent.

Smirking, I walked over to the laptop and messaged him back. “Sorry bro, too busy playing games and fucking bussy to play with a pussy like you. GG you win, loser.”

I laughed as I got another stream of profanities from Jason’s old opponent, but I didn’t care. I was covered in sweat, smelling like a real man, while I was playing my favorite game.

Once Jason was done and truly mind-fucked, I had one more person I needed to visit.

[international-writing]

Intelligence agencies 101: MI6

Dashing spies and deadly agents, from James Bond to Alex Rider and George Smiley. We have all heard of British Intelligence, but just how much do you know about MI6?

1.- It is the oldest secret service in the world.

If we want to get technical, spies have been working for the British crown since 1569, thanks to Queen Elizabeth I and her Secretary of State, Sir Francis Walsingham. But for now, we'll focus on the contemporary Secret Service.

Hear me out, back in 1909 in the midst of what we call the "armed peace", things were getting anything but peaceful. Countries developed and accumulated weapons like it was a sport, and most of them were unsatisfied with the territories they owned. Germany was going all Queen and screaming "I Want It All", which made the rest of the European countries slightly concerned by its imperialistic ambitions.

Britain was the first to grow paranoid and so Prime Minister Asquith decided to have the Committee of Imperial Defence, create a Secret Service Bureau.

However, it is worth mentioning that the existence of the agency wasn't formally acknowledged until 1994, under the Intelligence Services Act, and even though everyone had known about it for ages.

2.- They have very... diverse tasks

Officially, MI6 is tasked with the collection, analysis, and adequate distribution of foreign intelligence (it is a common misconception that MI6 also handles national affairs, that's what its counterpart MI5 is for).

Now, note that I said "officially", and that is because unofficially (it is kind of very illegal), MI6 has been known to carry out espionage activity overseas. But you already knew that, didn't you? Otherwise, why would you be here?

3.- Roles

As described by the SIS itself, there are several roles within the organisation:

Intelligence officers: Must be UK nationals of at least 18, with no drug use and pass a very intrusive security clearance. The jobs are divided into the following subcategories:

Operational Managers: planning and managing intelligence collection operations.

Targeters: turning information (data) into human intelligence operations.

Officers: link to Whitehall (government) as well as validating and testing intelligence.

Case Officers: managing and building relationships with agents.

Operational Data Analysts: Must be UK nationals of at least 18, with no drug use and pass a very intrusive security clearance. Tech abilities are a must. Training course lasts 2 years.

Tech Network Area: Must be UK nationals of at least 18, with no drug use and pass a very intrusive security clearance. Skills in: GoLang, gRPC, Protobuf, Kubernetes & Docker Python, Java, C#, C, C++, and React (+Redux).

Language Specialists: Must be UK nationals of at least 18, with no drug use and pass a very intrusive security clearance. Russian, Arabic and Mandarin linguists are the most solicited, followed by translators.

4.- Their alphabet is a bit jumbled up

Anyone that has ever seen or read any 007 material knows that M is the head of MI6, whether that be Judy Dench, Bernard Lee or Ralph Fiennes.

But what if I told you that the head of MI6 is actually a certain C?

Back when the Secret Service Bureau was created, a 50-year-old Royal Navy officer called Mansfield Cumming (and dubbed "C") was chosen to head the Foreign Section.

5.- MI6 or SIS?

Officially, the agency's current name (adopted in 1920) is Secret Intelligence Service, hence the acronym SIS, but it wasn't always that. We've established that it started its days as the Secret Service Bureau, and during WWI, the agency joined forces with Military Intelligence, even going as far as to adopt the cover name "MI1(c)".

The agency continued to acquire several names throughout the years, such as "Foreign Intelligence Service", "Secret Service", "Special Intelligence Service" and even "C's organisation". It wasn't until WWII started, that the name MI6 was adopted, in reference to the agency being "section six" of Military Intelligence.

And I truly do hate to be the bearer of bad news but... the name MI6, as cool as it sounds, is no longer in use. Writers and journalists still use that name, but those within the organisation just call it SIS nowadays.

6.- They are fond of their traditions

Remember our dear Commander Mansfield? Well, turns out he started a thing. The man used to sign his letters in green ink and always with the letter "C" a tradition that proved to be sticky enough to be passed down to every single Chief afterwards. Another tradition worth mentioning, is that of calling intelligence reports "CX reports", which... you guessed it, is still done to this day.

7.- Special friends

On 1949, the SIS began a formal collaboration with the CIA, even though the agency had already helped to train their predecessor's personnel, the U.S. Office of Strategic Services.

Even the CIA has admitted that the MI6 has provided them with some of the most valuable information of all time, including information that helped during the Cuban Missile Crisis and key elements to the capture of Osama Bin Laden.

I hope this will be of some use to your future writings and do feel free to submit an ask if you happen to have a specific question regarding British intelligence, or any other International Relations subject!

Yours truly,

–The Internationalist

[tarotenvelhecida]

pick a card– which book speaks to your soul?

You read something which you thought only happened to you, and you discover that it happened 100 years ago to Dostoyevsky. This is a very great liberation for the suffering, struggling person, who always thinks that he is alone. This is why art is important.

—Conversations with James Baldwin.

this is my love letter to all the bookworms in the tarot community— pick a pile & i'll give you a list of genres + book suggestions carrying important messages to you.

I. THE FIRST

To the daydreamers and the escapists; to the ones that need to rest before following what you need follow.

RELEVANT GENRES & CONCEPTS– fiction in general; romance; fantasy; fairytale; poetry; ‘happy ever after’ endings; hopeful endings; fantasy; magic; dreamy.

AUTHORS – Ursula K. Le Guin; Louise Gluck; Mary Oliver; Jane Austen.

BOOKS FOR YOU–

‘The Paper Garden: An Artist Begins Her Life’s Work at 72 – Molly Peacock'

‘Good Bones – Maggie Smith’

‘If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho – Translation by Anne Carson’

‘Owls and Other Fantasies – Mary Oliver’

‘Dog Songs – Mary Oliver’

‘Emma – Jane Austen’

‘Howl’s Moving Castle – Diana Wynne Jones’

‘The Little Prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’

‘Death Comes for the Archbishop – Willa Cather’

‘Sonnets from the Portuguese – Elizabeth Barrett Browning’

‘The Hawk and the Dove – Penelope Wilcock’

‘The Secret Life of the Lonely Doll: The Search for Dare Wright’

‘The Ink Dark Moon – Ono no Komachi & Izumi Shikibu’

‘Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll’

‘The Letters of Vita Sackville-West and Virginia Woolf’

‘Little Women – Louisa May Alcott’

‘Anne of Green Gables – L.M. Montgomery’

‘Kissing the Witch: Old Tales in New Skins – Emma Donoghue’

II. THE SECOND

For the ones that carry the ache to learn and know everything; to the ones bored with life's commodities & seriousness. For the ones that question everything around them – as they should do.

You do not need to fit in. Don't change yourself for other people. If they want to see you this way, then become the proud witch in the edge of the woods.

RELEVANT GENRES & CONCEPTS– books on 'niche' knowledge; science; philosophy; true crime; drama; scandalous romances; adventure, magical realism; YA thriller & horror; comedy & sardonic comedy; ‘controversial’/'weird' books.

AUTHORS– Carmen Maria Machado, Kate Moore, Grady Hendrix.

BOOKS FOR YOU–

‘My Sister, The Serial Killer – Oyinkan Braithwaite'

‘The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales – Oliver Sacks'

‘St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves – Karen Russell'

‘Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife – Mary Roach’

‘The Hitchhiker Guide to Galaxy – Douglas Adams'

‘Inferno – Dante Alighieri'

'Magic for Beginners – Kelly Link'

‘Lace Bone Beast: Poems & Other Fairytales for Wicked Girls – N.L. Shompole'

‘Severed: A History of Heads Lost and Heads Found – Frances Larson’

'The Woman They Could Not Silence – Kate Moore'

‘The Dictionary of Lost Words – Pip Williams'

‘She Kills Me: The True Stories of History’s Deadliest Women – Jennifer Wright’

‘Anatomy: A Love Story – Dana Schwartz'

‘Pretty Dead Queens – Alexa Donne'

‘I’m Glad My Mom Died – Jennette McCurdy'

'Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus – Bill Wasik'

‘Chilling Adventures of Sabrina – Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’

III. THE THIRD

You need to put your sadness somewhere. If you can't, remember that someone has done it before – and transformed it into a story. Let the words you'll read be the resting place for whatever you're feeling right now; let yourself remember that not even your pain is lonely in this world.

RELEVANT GENRES AND CONCEPTS— poetry; gothic horror; thrillers; murder mysteries; tragedies; cathartic stories; biographies.

AUTHORS– Shirley Jackson, Osamu Dazai, Clarice Lispector, Sylvia Plath.

BOOKS FOR YOU—

'The Year of Magical Thinking – Joan Didion'

‘The Dead – James Joyce'

‘What The Living Do – Marie Howe'

‘The Hour of the Star – Clarice Lispector'

‘Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector’

‘Some of Us Did Not Die – June Jordan'

Somewhere Towards the End – Diana Athill'

‘We Have Always Lived in The Castle – Shirley Jackson'

'Heaven: A Novel – Mieko Kawakami'

'Journal of a Solitude – May Sarton'

'Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte'

'Grief is the Thing with Feathers – Max Porter'

‘Carrie – Stephen King'

'Of Dogs and Walls – Yuko Tsushima'

'Frankenstein – Mary Shelley'

'The Stepping Off Place – Cameron Kelly'

'Letters to Milena – Franz Kafka'

‘Beloved – Toni Morrison'

[incorrect-koh-posts]

Other than leper king and his heirs which book would you recommend for research on Baldwin iv of Jerusalem?

All right then, buckle up for some nerdery! 😁

I will preface this by saying that I am not a total expert on Baldwin and haven't done a colossal amount of research specifically on him. I could chew your ear off prattling on about the general world of the crusader kingdoms, their politics, and about Raymond III of Tripoli and Sibylla of Jerusalem in particular, but Baldwin isn't my main interest here. Also, as far as I know, Hamilton's study is the only longer academic work centred solely around Baldwin. Hence, in order to learn more about your fav and the world he lived in, I'd recommend reading a little more broadly. Being a king, he is featured (at least in some capacity) in most publications that deal with the Latin kingdoms in the latter half of the 12th century.

That said, have a list:

Piers D. Mitchell: "Leprosy and the Case of King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem: Microbacterial Disease in the Crusader States of the 12th and 13th Centuries", International Journal of Leprosy, vol. 61, no. 2, 1993, pp. 283-91. Pretty self-explanatory. You can find this article on the internet; Mitchell also has a few other publications that deal with medicine in the crusader states, so you might find some additional Baldwin stuff there as well.

Elma Brenner: "Recent Perspectives on Leprosy in Medieval Western Europe", History Compass, vol. 8, no. 5, 2010, pp. 388-406. Has a little bit on Baldwin, might be useful if you want to find out more about how the disease was regarded by his contemporaries.

Helen J. Nicholson: Sybil, Queen of Jerusalem, 1186-1190. Routledge, 2022. This is a really good and really recent one that I was lucky enough to find in my uni library. Of course Sibylla-centred, but gives a good overview of the politics in Outremer and of course has passages about Baldwin in it. Also look into some of Nicholson's other publications if you're interested in the role of women in the context of crusading.

Kevin James Lewis: The Counts of Tripoli and Lebanon in the Twelfth Century: Sons of Saint Gilles. Routledge, 2017. Obviously mostly a Raymond-centric source, but it is also relatively recent and has a good chunk on Baldwin in the chapter where Lewis talks about Raymond's time as Baldwin's regent.

Joshua Prawer: Crusader Institutions. Oxford University Press, 1980. More politics to be found here, but very well put together. Prawer was an extremely prolific scholar where the history of the Latin East and the crusades was concerned, so - once again: if you're interested, look up his other works.

Jonathan Riley-Smith: The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades, Oxford University Press, 1997. Good overview that goes into detail about the mentality among crusaders and aspects of daily life. Again, Riley-Smith is one of the authorities in the field, so looking into his bibliography might be worth a shot.

If you're into military history, the works of Benjamin Z. Kedar, John France - or, if you want something more dated, R.C. Smail - might be of interest to you. They mostly cover general points of Frankish and Muslim warfare or the Battle of Hattin in particular (other than in Hamilton or in some of the primary sources from the crusader period, I've never come across an article on the Battle of Montgisard), but might be helpful if you want to get a feel for what life was like at the time.

Hans-Eberhard Mayer is also definitely worth a look as a scholar, even though his works are a bit older now. However, I'm not sure how much of his stuff you can find in translation - I've only read him in German.

For the physical setting of crusader-period Jerusalem and the material culture, I very heartily recommend two works written or edited by Adrian J. Boas: Jerusalem in the Time of the Crusades: Society, Landscape and Art in the Holy City under Frankish Rule (Routledge, 2001) and The Crusader World (Routledge, 2016). I consult both of these frequently for world-building in my fic writing.

If you want something on the general concept of the knight / chivalry, Maurice Keen's Chivalry (Yale University Press, 2005) might be a good start. For a detailed analysis of medieval courtly culture, I recommend Joachim Bumke's Courtly Culture: Literature and Society in the High Middle Ages (2000, English translation by Thomas Dunlap). That thing was invaluable when I was writing my BA thesis. And if you'd like to know more about the literary life of the crusaders, there is a recent publication called Literature of the Crusades (Cambridge University Press, 2019) edited by Simon Parsons and Linda M. Paterson that I also found rather good.

For fashion: The various Osprey Military History books are a good choice if you want visual representations of knightly dress. There's also a collection of essays called Encountering Medieval Textiles and Dress: Objects, Texts, Images (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002) edited by Désirée Koslin and Janet Snyder, which is one of the better ones I've found, as most books about medieval fashion focus mostly on later centuries. This one might be a bit hard to get through, though, if you don't have some kind of background knowledge about medieval texts or architecture.

If you want something less strictly academic and more in the vein of popular history, you might want to try James Reston's Warriors of God (2002) or the much more dated but rather fanboy-ish The Crusades: A History (also sometimes titled The Dream and The Tomb) by Robert Payne, which is very pro-Baldwin.

Other than that, I'll link you an older post about fictional depictions of Baldwin and other assorted good bois and girls from KoH. I hope this will scratch the Baldwin itch for you!

And: If anyone has more suggestions, of course do feel free to add them!

[hussyknee]

Somewhat put off by the spoilers I've read about Mary and George. There's no doubt nearly all relationships in the British court were some level of sordid, but King James, to all intents and purposes, had genuine feelings for his three male favourites, most especially George Villiers. He was no Henry VIII. I don't know why they wanted to reduce the most famous and open homosexual relationship in European royal history to a comedy between a "cock-struck" old lech and a conniving courtier that led him by the nose and then betrayed and murdered him.

All evidence points to George at least being loyal to James (if you discount his love letters as simply sucking up to his benefactor) and even had a fond relationship with his Queen and his son Charles. He was in fact in France when James died, and reportedly cried when he heard the news.

It's even a little heartbreaking because this is right after Nicholas Galitzine played the closeted gay Prince Henry in Red, White and Royal Blue, who in the book is proud of the open and unashamed love between his ancestor and his lover, and the way even James's son Charles I honoured Villiers for accompanying him to the Spanish Court to ask for the hand of the Infanta.

“Actually . . . you remember how I told you about the gay king, James I?”

“The one with the dumb jock boyfriend?”

“Yes, that one. Well, his most beloved favorite was a man named George Villiers. ‘The handsomest-bodied man in all of England,’ they called him. James was completely besotted. Everyone knew. This French poet, de Viau, wrote a poem about it.” He clears his throat and starts to recite: ‘One man fucks Monsieur le Grand, another fucks the Comte de Tonnerre , and it is well known that the King of England, fucks the Duke of Buckingham.’” Alex must be staring, because he adds, “Well, it rhymes in French. Anyway. Did you know the reason the King James translation of the Bible exists is because the Church of England was so displeased with James for flaunting his relationship with Villiers that he had the translation commissioned to appease them?”

“You’re kidding.”

“He stood in front of the Privy Council and said, ‘Christ had John, and I have George.’’

“Jesus.”

“Precisely.” Henry’s still looking up at the statue, but Alex can’t stop looking at him and the sly smile on his face, lost in his own thoughts. “And James’s son, Charles I, is the reason we have dear Samson. It’s the only Giambologna that ever left Florence. He was a gift to Charles from the King of Spain, and Charles gave it, this massive, absolutely priceless masterpiece of a sculpture, to Villiers. And a few centuries later, here he is. One of the most beautiful pieces we own, and we didn’t even steal it. We only needed Villiers and his trolloping ways with the queer monarchs. To me, if there were a registry of national gay landmarks in Britain, Samson would be on it.”

Henry’s beaming like a proud parent, like Samson is his, and Alex is hit with a wave of pride in kind.

He takes his phone out and lines up a shot, Henry standing there all soft and rumpled and smiling next to one of the most exquisite works of art in the world.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m taking a picture of a national gay landmark,” Alex tells him. “And also a statue.”

Like all white liberals, Casey McQuiston tends to romanticise the crime against humanity that is royalty and also that house built by bunch of slave owners that has since housed a progression of genocidal war criminals. There's very little to like about any British monarch. But the relationship between James and Villiers is a significant part of gay history and there's no need to smear it even more than it's already been smeared the last four hundred years, contrary to the actual known facts.

Idk man. I'm sensitive to this stuff Ig. Maybe I'd be a little more positive about it if I watched it, but the trailer gave me "tee hee they're gay" vibes so Idk if I want to.

Edit: so it seems the trailer is misleading and the story is more complex than a "tee hee gay" comedy. I might watch it after all, even if the starkly visible age difference makes me a bit queasy. How tf is Galitzine nearly thirty and a babyface with those razor cheekbones?? Perfect to show how uncomfortable it looks for a middle aged man to get with a kid of twenty.

[rambite6]

ARDRA AND REVATI: STAR-CROSS LOVERS?

Ardra, the 6th nakshatra within the 27 nakshatras, resides in Gemini, co-ruled by Rahu. It's also known as the "moist one," referring to its association with moisture in the air, which leads to the formation of clouds and eventually rain. The symbol of Ardra is either a diamond or a teardrop, reflecting its connection to moisture and wetness. This teardrop symbolism encompasses various forms of sorrow, as well as the clarity that often follows a cry. Twilight is set in Forks, Washington, a town known for its very rainy climate. It’s where Bella, a native born under the Revati sun, encounters Edward, who is a native born under the Ardra moon.

Kristen Stewart revati ☉ x Robert Pattinson Ardra ☽ in twilight

Revati, the 27th nakshatra, resides in Pisces, co-ruled by Mercury. Its name translates simply to "wealthy," but alternatively signifies "to transcend," aligning with its position as the final nakshatra. With its focus on duality, Revati symbol of a fish swimming in the sea. This symbol, representing the soul's journey through the universe's waters, has ancient roots. As the last nakshatra, Revati holds significance for Moksha and ultimate enlightenment. It symbolizes the point in time where both material and astral realms merge into the causal realm, eventually transcending into the supreme eternal void. It’s also important to note that Venus exalted in the revati Nakshatra, The energy of Pisces is enhancing Venus's spiritual dimensions of love, beauty, and harmony, allowing for unconditional love and the use of love and art as agents of healing. In my opinion, this is what an Ardra craves: unconditional love.

Olivia Hussey revati Asc x Leonard Whiting Ardra ☉

There are parallels between Romeo and Juliet and Edward and Bella, especially in the second installment of the Twilight saga: New Moon. The book and the 1968 version of Romeo and Juliet are even referenced in the film. Like Romeo and Juliet, Bella and Edward are star-crossed lovers, feeling as if they can't live without each other. There are outside forces that disrupt their romance (rival families or vampirism), yet they still long to be with each other, even if it means in death.

Ardra individuals, due to their deity Rudra, can embody the destructive and transformative essence of Shiva, characterized by chaos and disorder. Under Rudra's influence, they exhibit rapid shifts from joy to sorrow. When fixated on desires like romantic relationships, Ardra natives may harm themselves internally, converting longing into self-inflicted pain. The 12th house symbolizes the "end" and is linked to the subconscious, dreams, and sleep, resembling a temporary state of death. Pisces itself is sacrificial, especially when they love or care for others.

Here are some more revati x Ardra pairings

Alex Lawther Ardra ☽ x Jessica Barden revati ☽ in End of the fucking world

The series follows the journey of two troubled teenagers, James and Alyssa, as they set out on a road trip to find Alyssa's estranged father. James, who considers himself a psychopath and desires to kill someone, views Alyssa as his ideal target. Meanwhile, Alyssa seeks escape from her troubled home life, where conflicts with her mother and step-father prompt her to leave. However, as they navigate through various unexpected and dangerous situations, their perceptions of themselves and each other are challenged. Along the way, they develop a complex and intense relationship, moments of introspection, and unexpected tenderness.

Harrison Dickinson Ardra ☉ + sleeping beauty Elle Fanning revati ☉ in Maleficent 2

Harris plays Prince Phillip, and Elle portrays Princess Aurora in "Maleficent 2." When Aurora agrees to marry Prince Phillip, Maleficent voices her disapproval. Queen Ingrith, Phillip's mother, emerges as an opponent to Maleficent, devising a wicked plan to permanently separate humans and fairies. This creates tension between the two groups. Princess Aurora, who embodies characteristics associated with the Revati nakshatra, will be further examined in a future post.

Sources: The Book of Nakshatras by Prash Trivedi

[andydrysdalerogers]

The Type You Save ~ S E V E N T E E N

James "Bucky" Barnes and OFC Alexandra "Alex" Richards

Detective James Barnes hasn't seen the love of his life in three years. Since the night she was almost caught stealing a painting. He knows it was her and she disappeared leaving him confused and heart broken.

Alexandra Richards never expected to be pulled back into her old life two years after she left it. She had found love and a home and was happy. Until a note blackmailed her to take one last job. Three years later she walked into the last person she expected to see in San Francisco. Because he lived in New York right?

They always put family before everything. And he would do anything to get his family back. Because she's the type you save.

TW: mob, death, smut, rape intentions, angst, guns, family abandonment, dub-con, manipulation

A/N: because of the Valentine one shot I'm posting tomorrow, I'm posting the final chapter of The Type You Save today. It has been fun writing a different hero this time.

I do NOT give permission for my work to be translated or reposted on here or any other site, even if you give me credit. DO NOT REPOST MY FICS. Reblogs, comments, likes, and feedback ALWAYS appreciated

Divider by @firefly-graphics

Previous: S I X T E E N

Series Masterlist ~ Main Masterlist

Alex stood on the grass in San Francisco, her black dress swaying in the cold wind, a storm coming in.  She sighed as she watched the casket being lowered into the ground. She tightens her grip on James’s hand as he held Drew on his other side.  

“I’m glad I was able to do this for him.”  

“Me too doll.  You ok?” 

“Its just hard.  I thought…” 

“I know Allie. But its closure.”  

She could barely listen to the prayer, her mind whirling from everything that had happened.  After everything had settle, Zemo sang like a bird.  He explained how he got involved with Grey, the threat Grey had on his family.  Grey made it seem like all he wanted was to take Alex, not explaining that he was going to kidnap Drew a week or so after his plan to break her.  

The police found Grey’s will and a letter for Alex.  Alex took a moment a couple of days after her rescue to read it.  

Alexandra,   If you are reading this, it means that I have die, probably at your hand.  That’s hard to write, considering the amount of love I have for you.   If you haven’t discovered yet, let me explain some truths.   When I first saw you, you were the most beautiful creature I had ever seen.  I wanted you from that moment on.  But your brother refused. I tried to persuade Simon, reason with him. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out.  We buried him close to the house in Boston. I hope that brings you a little peace.   As for your parents, they threaten to harm you as they blamed you for your brother’s disappearance.  I had them change their will to leave me as their benefactor before they were killed.  I wanted to keep your inheritance safe.   I left everything to you, my pet, my queen. My hope is that this letter is unnecessary, but I wanted to be sure you were taken care of, should anything happen.   I love you so much Alexandra.    Yours,   Christian.   

Alex sobbed at the letter with James holding her as she wept.  Her entire adult life before James was built on a web of lies.  When she got confirmation of his location, she had her brother reburied.  The toll of the bell snapped Alex back to the present.  

The father completed his blessing over the casket.  “We celebrate your life Simon Richards, a lost soul that has been found and now taken to the Lord. Amen.”  

They all murmured a reply and then came to give Alex their condolences. After everyone left, Alex turned to James.  “I want to see him, Jamie.”  

James sighed, “Allie, I…” 

“I need to see him.  He did this for me.  It’s the least I can do.”  

James adjusted a sleeping Drew on his arm.  “Ok, ok.  Let me make a few calls.”  

A couple of hours later, Allie sat beside a hospital bed.  Its occupant was asleep.  She took his hand and his eyes fluttered open.  

“Hey Allie Cat.”   

Nate’s face was still pale and his movements slow but there he was three weeks after being shot.  

She reached over to press a kiss to his forehead.  “Hey Nate.  How are you feeling?”  

“Tired.”   

“Getting shot will do that.” She gave him a soft smile. “What have the doctors said?” 

“Recovery is going well. Docs say I just have to be patient to get stronger.”  

“That’s good.” She rubbed her thumb over his knuckles.  “We had the funeral today.”  

Nate could see the pain in her eyes.  “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there. I’m just glad I was able to give you that.  I’m sorry I hadn’t told you sooner.”  

“Its ok. I probably wouldn’t have believed you then.”  She looked away to blink her tears away.  “How is your case looking?” 

He chuckled.  “Since I help saved two cops and a witness, its looking like I’ll be able to plea to a lesser charge. Maybe a year.”  

“That’s good. Steve, James and I are ready to testify for you.”  

“Thanks Alex.  I should rest. I have physical therapy in a couple of hours.”  

“Ok.  I’ll be back again now that I can get to see you.”  She hugged him gently and went to the door.  “Open on bay 7.”  There was a buzz and a click before the door slid open.  She glanced back at Nate with a smile and went through the door.  

James was sitting in the visitor’s lounge, checking his email when Alex walked in.  “Hey Allie.  How is he?” 

“He’s good.  Still kinda pale and slow but he says he feels stronger.”  She popped a shoulder.  “Ready?” She held out her hand.  

He took and tugged her to him, her back to his front, hugging her, breathing her in. Something he doesn’t take for granted anymore. “Ready, doll.  Steve called and said Drew asked if they could go to the park.  I said ok. Wanted some time with my doll.”  He placed a kiss on her neck.  

“Jamie, we are in the hospital,” she moaned quietly as he continued with his gentle assault.  

“I’ve missed you, Allie.  My perfect little doll.”  

She melted right there. “Ok, ok, get me outta here Detective.”  

“Its Sargent and you know it.”  

“You’ll always be my Detective.” She spun in his arms and looked into his stormy blues. “Take me to bed Jamie.”  

“Oh Allie,” James moaned. He kissed her hard before releasing her, taking her hand and guiding her out of the hospital.  The drive was laced with anticipation, the air heavy with lust from the couple.  They hadn’t been intimate, since before, with Alex dealing with the emotions of her past coming to light and Drew being attached to his parents in fear of never seeing them again.  James held onto Alex’s hand, his thumb moving over her knuckles, the sensation like bolts of lightening to her core.  

“Lightening touches,” she whispered.  

“What was that?” 

“Lightening touches,” she said a little louder.  “Before all of this, your touch always gave me the feeling like lightening through my skin.”  

James smiled.  “I remember. I believe it was the same night we conceived Drew.”  His smile grew wider. “That was a great night.”  

“It was.” Alex brought his knuckled to kiss. “I’m sorry I’ve been distant.”  

“Don’t be doll. I understand.  We’ve all been through a lot.” They made it back to their apartment.  It was eerily still.  Alex looked around as James pulled her to their bedroom.  “Tell me what you need baby.”  He sat on the edge of the bed as Alex settle between his legs.  

“I need you,” she whispered.  

“You have me, doll.” James began to kiss around the hem of her blouse.  He motioned for it to be taken off and Alex swiftly pulled it off.  “So beautiful.  My Allie,” he whispered in between kisses.  

She ran her hand through his hair.  “My Jamie.  I love you.”  

“I love you too, doll.” He stood up and lifted her into his arms.  She wrapped her legs around him as he flipped them around and he laid her on the bed. “Let’s make a baby.”  

“Now?” 

“Now.  No more threats, no more secrets.  Its just us now doll. James and Alexandra. Bucky and Alex, Jamie and Allie.”  

“Never called you Bucky. But Bucky and Alex works.  Just like mommy and daddy.” She ran her fingertips over his chin. “I love you.”  

“Oh doll.  I love you.” Soon all their clothes were gone and James was hovering over his wife. He stared deep into her eyes as he rubbed his tip through her folds.  “So wet doll.  Almost as if you were excited to make me a daddy again.”  

“Jamie, don’t tease,” Alex whined.  “I need you.”  

He grinned as he sank into her, stretching her slow.  He watched as her head tilted back and her eyes rolled back. “Feel good?” 

“So good baby but you have to move,” she moaned.  James started on a steady pace, not really using force, just letting her feel good. “Oh god, Jamie,” she cried.  

“Yeah Allie.” James flipped them so she was on top.  She swiveled her hips and he groaned.  “Just like that doll.”  She bounced on him, feeling all of him. He could feel her starting to tighten.  “You close baby?” 

“So close.  You feel so good inside me.” He grasped her hips tighter, pulling her down harder onto him. “Gonna cum.”  

“Do it, love.  All over me Allie.” James grunted at the force, wanting to be closer to her.  He flipped them again and moved his hips hard. She gave a silent scream as she tightened around him.  “Ah fuck!” He let go as well, moving slower, working them through.  

They laid there a moment, the cloud of bliss still over them. The memories of lost love, love found, and love made flooded them.  James held his girl, thankful that she wasn’t lost.  She was saved.  

F I V E  Y E A R S  L A T E R 

“Andrew! Delilah! Its dinner time!” Alex called out to her children. She felt something around her ankles and looked down to see their white kitten, Alpine, twisting herself around her.  “Yes, Al, dinner for you too.”  Her children raced in, their German shepherd, Brooklyn, racing after them.  “Wash your hands!” She turned back out the door.  “Bucky! Steve! Dinner!” 

James and Steve trudged in, still arguing on the best way to fix the bike.  “I’m telling you it’s the exhaust,” Steve argued.  

“Whatever punk, the pop noises are from the clutch, guaranteed.” James wiped his hands off and went to Alex.  “Hey momma, how are you?” 

“Tired but good.” His hand rested on the small bump on her belly, and she placed her hand over his. “Still too early to feel them, love.”  

“Can’t wait to meet them love.  Its everything we ever dreamed of.”  

“It’s more Jamie.  It’s so much more.”  

James and Alexandra. Bucky and Alex. Jamie and Allie.  

Family over everything.  

*~* The End *~* 

@patzammit

@texmexdarling

@slutforchrisjamalevans

@firephotogrl74

@tinkerbelle67

@before-we-get-started

@bunnyforhim

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[scotianostra]

On April 4th 1617 John Napier, the mathematician, died.

I hated maths with a vengeance at school, I'm not talking about counting, I can hold my own with that, but real maths. algebra, geometry, topology and worst of all logarithms, which we have Robert Napier to "thank" for, he introduced them in the early 17th century as a means to simplify calculations, aye right!

If John Napier had been born a common man he would maybe have been burnt at the stake, nothing to do with him and his maths nonsense but because he dabbled in the occult at a time when we were routinely setting such people on fire!

James VI was on the throne and his obsession with devilry consigned hundreds of unfortunates to the flames. Unless you were born of a noble family of course. A wee bit background on the Napier's his father was Sir Archibald Napier of Merchiston Castle, and his mother was Janet Bothwell, daughter of the politician and judge Francis Bothwell, Lord of Session, and a sister of Adam Bothwell who became the Bishop of Orkney. Archibald Napier was 16 years old when John Napier was born. John, as was the common practice for members of the nobility at that time, he was privately tutored and did not have formal education until he was 13, when he was sent to St Salvator's College, St Andrews. He dropped out of Uni and toured Europe for a time before returning to Scotland aged 21.

Back to his links with sorcery, several members of John Napier’s family – respected and wealthy participants of Edinburgh society - were commonly known to be wizards or sorcerers. Their necromantic power was feared by nobles as well as peasants from far and wide.

The family wizardry started with Napier's father, Sir Archibald, seventh Laird of Merchiston, who successfully predicted when Mary, then the former Queen of Scotland, would leave Lochleven Castle, where she was imprisoned. The story goes: "Claude Nan, the Queen's secretary, wrote that 'the Laird of Markyston (Sir Archibald), who had the reputation of being a great wizard, made bets with several persons to the amount of five hundred crowns, that by the 5th of May Her Majesty would be out of Lochleven." Mary escaped on 2 May 1568 – and the senior Napier was presumably wealthier for his prediction.

Sir Archibald married Janet Bothwell, sister of Adam, Bishop of Orkney, who the paper said was "a notorious necromancer", so that their son, the future mathematician, inherited "a double inclination towards the magic arts". This might explain some of John's odd behaviour. A necromancer is a wizard or magician by the way, I had to google it!

Tenants who lived on the vast Merchiston estate south-west of Edinburgh thought John to be a bit mysterious at times, Napier would be seen many evenings wearing a long gown, pacing outside his tower chamber, a private work area where he often would pass many long hours alone.

Many people thought that his pet black cockerel was a familiar – a supernatural being which assisted witches and wizards in their magical practice. However, the Napier family held the hereditary role of King’s Poulterer and Napier may have kept the cockerel on a whim but I have read he travelled not only with the bird but also with a black spider in a small box, not normal behaviour.

The Scottish writer and translator Sir Thomas Urquhart, who, told of a demonstration of devastating artillery Napier devised against the threat of invasion by Spain.

"He gave proof upon a large plaine in Scotland to the destruction of a great many herds of cattel and flocks of sheep, whereof some were distant from other half a mile on all sides and some a whole mile,"

A well as being a wizard and mathematician Napier was also a fervent Protestant, much of his writing is vehemently anti-Catholic even by the standards of the time. He was a man of contradictions though, as he is said to have had friends who were Catholic, including Alexander Seton, the Earl of Dunfermline, although the vast majority Catholics back then had to hide their faith.

The last interesting, and worrying, fact I found out about John Napier is that his cause of death according to wiki he died "from the effects of gout" at home in Merchiston tower, now I suffer from gout and it is bloody painful but I didn't know it could kill you!

[cherrylng]

Matthew Bellamy Interview - Muse [CROSSBEAT (November 2009)]

The Resistance Goes On MUSE First cover story! In-depth look at the new album and its trajectory!

"I think this album represents the way the MP3 generation listens to music, because it's so fickle and inconsistent."

When you think of Muse, there's bound to be a 'Muse verse' that rings in everyone's head. What's great about them is that they never betray that 'Muse verse', but constantly update it with fresh and innovative ideas. There is always a Muse that you like and expect in each new album, but there is also a Muse that surpasses it. That is their greatest strength. With "Black Holes and Revelations" in 2006 and "HAARP", which is a condensed version of their appeal, they are finally showing signs of a big breakthrough here in Japan, and with their new album "The Resistance", which is also self-produced, their appeal is like a fireworks display. This issue of the magazine is the fastest in Japan to feature Muse on the cover, and will thoroughly dissect their appeal with interviews and articles on their material! And for the first time ever, the supplement "MUSE BOOK" provides a comprehensive look at all the interviews from the past! Muse, the eye of the typhoon in the scene in the second half of 2009, will be pushed all the way!

Text: Hidefumi Harima / Interview: James Nicholas Joyce / Translation: Sumi Imai © James Nicholas Joyce/IFA

Muse were, after all, a tremendous band. On their new album "The Resistance", the most anticipated album in the band's history, they have delivered an unmistakable "Muse-esque" sound with intensely emotional melodies, a sound that swings from static to dynamic, lyrics that present grandiose images, and Matthew Bellamy's full-bodied vocals that carry them through. The band has successfully sublimated to the next level of "Muse-ness" by maintaining the "Muse-ness" while challenging various new things so that it does not end up sounding the same as it has in the past. In fact, when I first heard the album, I felt like it didn't have any killer tunes like "Plug in Baby", "Stockholm Syndrome", or "Knights of Cydonia". But I realised on the second listen that it was just the lack of strong, fast guitar riffs, but the melodies, hooks, sounds, and beats were all full of elements that grabbed the listener firmly. There were so many elements that were firmly etched in my memory, even though it was only the second time I'd heard it. And yet, every time I listened to it, it felt fresh. This is an album that will definitely satisfy previous Muse fans, and will definitely blow away new listeners.

Take the grandly titled "United States of Eurasia". The song opens with a graceful piano, followed by Matthew's restrained tone, and then a thick chorus straight from Queen ("legendary champion"!) cuts in, and before you know it, the Arabic phrases are flowing. Immediately after the climactic big part, Chopin's "Nocturne" is played over a background of children's voices, jet fighter engines, and what sounds like communication with the ground, bringing the song to an end, before the next moving and beautiful part of the song, "Guiding Light", is played. The band's ability to combine so many elements into a single song with a natural flow is something no half-baked band could ever hope to achieve.

The whole structure of the album consists of an opening with a fun, thumping rhythm, leading up to a synth-heavy section of "Undisclosed Desires", the big song "United States of Eurasia" and its continuation "Guiding Light" (reminiscent of Presley's "I Can’t Stop Loving You"), the solid, fast rock number "Unnatural Selection" that could only come from Muse, followed by "MK Ultra", a bluesy/classical duality that calms down and leads into the final chapter. The trilogy of "Exogenesis Symphony", which boldly incorporates orchestral elements, carries on in a perfect flow with a significant change in musicality.

After all this, there was no moment when I personally felt astonished or bewildered when I first heard the album. Rather, I must have listened to it with a grin on my face, thinking "Oh my God, they're doing whatever they want". And sometimes I even laughed out loud. (It was a trial listening session where everyone listened with headphones, so I was lucky that no one noticed……). In other words, Muse's openness has been there for a long time, and it is not at all surprising that Muse would do a symphony, slap bass, and use a pipe organ or clarinet. I'm sure they did this because they were self-produced and, in a sense, 'unstoppable' (in a good way), which means they put everything they had into it in a total package.

Where will they go next after this? With their unchanging core and sincere inquisitiveness for music, Muse can always continue to grow, shedding their skin while still remaining being Muse. There is no doubt about that. Still, where is the snare sound that Dom (Dominic Howard: Dr) was seen in the pre-released teaser video, strumming while listening to the clicks on his mobile phone (probably) with a flock of sheep in the background in a wide meadow? (laughs). I'd like to examine that carefully from now on. And of course, I can't wait to see what kind of show I'll be able to see next time.

"Thom Yorke once said something like this: 'We're run like the United Nations. But my position in that is the US.' I can relate to it a lot."

When interviewing Muse, journalists always interview all three members separately, rather than meeting and talking to just one of them, which is a unique approach, isn't it? How did this happen? 「When the three of us were being interviewed together, they [the journalists] would often direct questions to me personally. And I'm pretty quick at answering. And Chris (Wolstenholme: B) would get left behind, and he'd be like, "What the hell am I doing here?" But then I thought it would be better to communicate the idea of the band as a whole, rather than just me doing the promotion on my own. When it comes to the sound-making process and the arrangement of the songs, it's actually very democratic. Songwriting is undemocratic. Thom Yorke of Radiohead once said: 'We (Radiohead) are run like the United Nations. But my position in it is the US. It's an interesting analogy. I can relate to it a lot. Our other two members are not as confident as I am when it comes to songwriting. They're very shy [when it comes to songwriting]. But I'm always encouraging them to write songs and I want to open up new avenues. Chris gives me all sorts of ideas that he has and asks me to finish them. But I'd rather he finish them himself. That way he can feel more like it's his own song. So I'd say we're a very democratic band, but at the moment we're quite dictatorial when it comes to songwriting (laughs). But I rely on both of them to help me sift through all the ideas. Because sometimes I come up with ideas that don't really fit with Muse or aren't very cool. And they help me sift through all those ideas and they end up being just right.」

Can you give us some examples of "not so cool ideas" that you've come up with? 「When we were working on the last album, I wrote a song called 'Soaked', which sounds like an Elton John song. It's like an 80s number, like 'Nikita' or something like that. Our publisher says it's Adam Lambert-esque. He's a male singer who was runner-up on American Idol (an audition programme aired on US television), which means it was that kind of music. I want to write songs in a variety of genres, whether it's classical or pop. But there's a clear line in Muse that I'm not allowed to cross, and as a songwriter I sometimes step over it. So, with Chris and Dom's help, I can clarify those boundaries. The last three songs on The Resistance are the ones I've been trying to push for the last two years. But it wasn't until I added bass and drums that they really started to sound like a real band, and I'd say they're songs worthy of Muse. Dom and Chris have helped me tremendously in that respect. They added beats and rearranged things that had been more freeform in terms of speed, and it became a Muse song. There are always different genres of music around me. It can be more abstract or classical. When I'm working on Muse, it's not just the goofy songwriting that I try to keep aside.」

"The first part of this album is about 'political unrest', which is a bit influenced by the opposition protests that have been happening in the UK recently."

Black Holes and Revelations was influenced in part by the Neapolitan folk songs you were listening to at the time of recording. But there's a curious lack of that influence in 'The Resistance'. Why did that kind of music drop out during the process? 「I think if there's something you're exposed to in your day-to-day life in the months before you start making an album, whatever it is, people naturally absorb it. Originally we wanted to start working on this album earlier. It ended up being delayed until now. We first started thinking about actually recording something last January. But then we got a couple of offers to tour. One was in South America. Then we did a couple of shows in Dubai [United Arab Emirates] and South Africa, and a couple of shows in England. We ended up staying in Dubai for four or five days. I remember listening to all sorts of things, especially the music on the radio in the taxi. You can hear those influences in the middle section of "United States of Eurasia". I think people absorb different things as they go through different stages in their lives. It means that it sparks an interest in something different from what they were used to. In addition to that, the MP3 generation is very used to listening to a wide variety of music from different genres, eras and styles, in no particular order, in the same row. I think our album represents that way of listening to music. It's very fickle and inconsistent. Another key thing was that we recorded part of the last album in a studio in Milan. There I met a string arranger called Mauro Pagani. He was the one who introduced me to the music of southern Italy. This time I didn't get to meet him, because I'm arranging the strings myself. So maybe that made me less influenced by those things. But this time I made a conscious effort to reintroduce some classical sounds, and I also wanted to experiment a bit with electronica. Well, it only ended up settling in the song "Undisclosed Desires". There was a time when "Uprising" was going to be more electronic. But in the end, we ended up with a more live, glam, guitar-oriented version. I thought it sounded a bit more modern that way.」

Of all the current British bands, Muse in particular seem to be the closest to continental Europe, both melodically and aesthetically. You are based in Italy, and have built a studio in Como (A city in northern Italy, famous for its scenic Lake Como). Where does this affinity for the European continent come from? 「Ah, that's a good question, because it's difficult to answer. It probably has something to do with the history of music. Most classical music was born in Europe. Russia, Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, and Poland, all these countries have produced many great composers in their history. So I think my appreciation of European music came from my interest in classical music. But also, interestingly enough, a lot of the music that we were into as boys was by bands from Belgium and the Netherlands. Deus, for example, or Evil Superstars. Or, if we're talking about younger bands, like Millionaire. I personally always thought that European bands had a more creative and futuristic approach to rock. There's great stuff in American music, but what we were aiming for was something different and individual, and we found more of that individuality in European music.」

Regarding classical music, "Exogenesis" is placed at the end of the album. Would the three-movement symphony have worked better if you had divided it into three parts and placed them separately throughout the album, instead of putting them together at the end of the album? 「Maybe in concerts we'll get creative and incorporate things into the set. For example, you could play part one first, then part two in the middle of the show, and part three towards the end of the show. If you listen to them all at once, you'll probably get a bit full. But for the recording, I wanted to record the orchestral part all at once, for 13 minutes straight. Because we wanted to capture the whole sound in there, including the in-between sounds, the 'sound' of a lot of people not doing anything. We wanted that kind of continuity. The feeling of a breather before moving from one thing to the next.」

On a completely different note, the beginning of the album develops a George Orwellian theme. That's not reflected in 'Exogenesis', though. 「Musically, lyrically and conceptually, that part is certainly quite different from the rest of the album. At one point we were even talking about not including that part on the album and releasing it as a separate, independent EP. The first part of the album stands on its own as a separate thing and is about 'political unrest'. It's a bit influenced by the recent protests in the UK. I've also been influenced by the G20 summit, the parliamentary scandals, the economic crisis and of course the anti-war protests that have been going on for years now. My flat in London is very close to the US Embassy, so almost every weekend I look out the window and see demonstrations going on. That's what really struck me. So the first part of the album is like a love story that emerged from the current political unrest. There are quite a lot of similarities with '1984' (George Orwell's futuristic novel about the inhumanity of a totalitarian state under a one-party dictatorship). Before I started working on the album, I went back and read '1984'. So I put the love story between Winston (Smith: the protagonist of 1984) and Julia (Winston's girlfriend) at the centre. When I was in doubt about the lyrics, I used '1984' as a reference. Not all of the songs are about that, but the song "Resistance" is. There are terms like 'Thought Police' (the police force in '1984') and things like that.」

Muse are not generally regarded as a political band, are they? For your part, are you okay with being perceived as such? Or can those labels be a burden? 「I don't care how other people perceive us or what they think, and I'm happy for them to say whatever they want, really. There's no point in me worrying about it. It's impossible to control the aftermath of what I do. So it's more important to just concentrate on what you're doing. At the same time, I don't think politics is an influential factor in the direction of the band. Well, maybe it's a factor that's slowly being brought up. I mean, there may be things that go in that direction in the future, but… I think as I've gotten older, I've developed certain views and certain opinions and I've started to incorporate them into the songs. But I wouldn't say the whole album is political. Of course, there are some very direct love songs on the album that don't have any political commentary in them at all.」

Perhaps a more accurate description would be that Muse is a band of twists and turns. Up until now, the companies Muse has fought against to prevent the use of their songs and names without permission have been large companies and big names, such as Nestlé or Celine Dion, for example (see column under p. 27). 「I think that's true. I think people of my generation, and the younger generation who are now becoming adults, have a very strong rejection of the commercial corporate structures that have been there since they were born. If the parliament is run on a proportional representation system, the MPs are supposed to represent the views of the majority of the people, but in reality they are influenced by people like lobbyists from large corporations. With the internet, there is no longer any reason to stifle the expansion of pure democracy. Decisions on major issues, such as whether or not to enter the war or to enact new laws, should not be made by a very limited class of people who spend more time in London than in their own constituencies. There should always be a referendum, in which the general public can participate. The internet has given people access to an awful lot of information. There are far more sources of information now than there were 30 years ago, when there were only a few newspapers and a few TV channels and it was easy to control public opinion. Thirty years ago, if the BBC said something, everyone believed it. But now with the internet, it's much more possible for people to have a genuine free opinion.」

And people are also willing to make an effort to collect information and increase their knowledge, because it's now seen as cool to gather information. 「I agree. I think we should move in that direction, and I'm definitely in favour of that happening. Apart from the demo, the album's opener 'Uprising' is an overview, so to speak, about being fed up with someone else making decisions about us. That's a political view that's coming up in my mind at the moment, and it's something I hope to express more and more in the Muse album.」

Going back to the music, can you tell us anything about the advantages and constraints of being a three-piece band? 「With our first three albums, we felt constrained by our line-up quite early on. So we were trying to cram all these other ideas into our playing as a three-piece. There's a certain simplicity in the three-piece framework that I don't want to lose. But at the same time, I think we've opened up the possibility of playing live synth and sample parts by having a fourth musician on stage when we play live. But in the case of this album, the last three songs are impossible to play live without making some dramatic changes. The whole thing has to be played on synths. An orchestra is impossible. But we think the majority of the album should be played live with a fourth musician. For us, there's always a fine line between 'we want to be a three-piece' and 'we want to be more than a three-piece'. It's a bit contradictory, but we like both. We like the simplicity and roughness of the straight rock that only a three-piece can give off. Three people can actually sound more powerful than a five-piece, because you can clearly hear the three distinct instrumental parts. At the same time, we're very much into more carefully crafted, complex music. Music with more depth. And unfortunately, three-piece bands are very good at straight-ahead rock stuff. Like the Jimi Hendrix Experience or the Police, for example, they had a lot of energy. But of course we're influenced by other music as well. So we try to do both. I don't really know which is our essence. We're not sure if we should get more musicians involved or not, and we've been wondering for a long time now.」

Earlier in the interview, we asked you about the division of roles when it comes to promoting Muse, and it's interesting to hear that you've adopted a democratic approach when it comes to the music aspect as well. Just earlier you were talking about instruments with clearly assigned roles. 「Maybe with 'Exogenesis' we broke that rule for the first time. But I'd like to think that the three instruments we're each responsible for are the most important axis on which the song depends. The bass riff is usually as important as the guitar riff, and the drums are usually the first signal. In terms of playing, I think we're a genuine, really democratic band. Chris probably plays as many lido riffs that get the crowd going as much as I do. And Muse are not a guitar hero band.」

"Words like 'over-the-top' and 'too much' that were used as insults in the early days are now used as compliments in a positive way."

Aside from the added flourishes added by the arrangements, some of the songs on The Resistance seem more curvaceous and graceful than on previous albums. Is this related to the fact that Muse have started playing live at arena venues in recent years? In other words, were you influenced by the fact that you learned what works well and what doesn't in such large-scale venues? 「That's an interesting perspective. When I started the band, it was definitely to play shows. I didn't form the band to make recordings. I started the band because I wanted to get on stage and tour the world with my friends. It's like being a teenager who dreams of touring. I see playing live shows as the end result of what we're doing. Most of the time, I'm making this kind of music to play live in some way. But as the venues get bigger and bigger, I've noticed a phenomenon happening. In the bigger venues, there are grandiose, flashy parts that get things going. Those parts didn't work in the smaller venues. In the early days, the reviews about us used to swear by words like 'over-the-top' and 'too much'. But when we started playing bigger venues, those same words are now used as compliments in a positive way. They say it's great because it's 'over the top' and 'flashy'. It's like that part of the band has been capitalised on and we've been able to get the audience more involved. If you listen to songs like 'Uprising', you can hear that we want the audience to sing along with us. We want to feel at one with the big audience. I want the people at the back of the room to sing along, not as me, but as each of us singing about ourselves, in a chorus. I use the pronoun "we" a lot, like at the end of "Knights of Cydonia". I think the fact that we're playing bigger venues has definitely had an effect on the way we use the word 'we' a lot.」

But apart from that choice of words, would you say that your music has not been 'adapted' to larger venues, but that you have found the right size venue for you? 「Sometimes you suddenly realise that there are things you've always wanted to do that are better suited to a bigger venue. We've always had this idea in our heads that we've always wanted to push the boundaries, but when you're playing a bigger venue you can be a bit more open than you normally would be. I'm not worried about doing that at all anymore. The third album['s song], 'Blackout', is one of my favourites, but it didn't work out so well back then when we were mainly playing hall-sized venues. I was a bit disappointed that people didn't like these graceful songs as much as I did. So for a long time I left it out of the set. But when we played it at Wembley Stadium, it went down a storm and everyone said it was one of the best songs at the concert that day. I was really moved by that. So, I thought, maybe I have to make it over the top? Otherwise, I won't be able to show my best qualities. When we used to play in smaller clubs, when we played this song, people would go and buy beer or look at their watches and wonder when we were going to play a rock song next. But in the big arena venues, when we play this song, people are holding up lighter fires and shaking to it. People listen to it more intently now. I don't know how it works, but there's definitely a key to it.」

Translator's Note: In case some of you are too lazy to click on that link that I put there, here's the video of Dom playing a snare drum in a sheep field while listening to his phone. You're welcome.

[drowninginthoughts27]

8/9 Colorful Word Count: 685

@jegulus-microfic

“James! We are not getting light up signs to put in our home!” Regulus whisper-yells.

James looks at him with pitiful puppy eyes, pouting out his bottom lip, but reluctantly sets down the light up neon sign.

“We still need the basics, a couch, a bed frame, some tables and chairs etc.,” Regulus continues, now guiding James away from the obnoxiously colorful decorations (that he’s not quite sure how James managed to find so efficiently) and towards the furniture section of the store.

James and Regulus had just bought a flat together after James had gotten his business degree. Regulus only has one more year left in school but he has in-person classes so infrequently that he’s practically never on campus anymore.

The apartment they got is small, only one bedroom, one bathroom, an office, kitchen, and a living room. But it’s perfect for them.

Close enough to Regulus’ College that he can commute. But far enough away that they plan on living there after he finishes school.

The one thing Regulus didn’t account for was how stressful furniture shopping would be. When they had lived apart their spaces were so drastically different. Regulus’ was darker, covered in fairy lights and deeper lighting, books crammed in almost every free square inch of space. Whereas James was big on natural lights, small knick knacks and colorful everything. Neither were messy or aesthetically unappealing by any means but they were definitely polar opposites of one another and it showed. Which is how he finds himself in a home improvement store with James wandering off at every possible opportunity.

Pulling out the list of things on his phone he starts to read off of it.

“We need a couch and an area rug. A queen size bed frame, night stands, and a dresser. A coffee table and two lamps. And a dining table, chairs, and bar stools. Oh and one or two bookshelves and a desk.” He lists off.

“Okay couch first.” James concludes, browse tightly knit in adorable concentration.

“Look at this one love,” Regulus says whilst guiding James over to a plush, emerald green, velvet couch.

“But what about this leather one?” James points out nodding over to a brown couch.

This goes on for a while.

There’s the table and chairs: A choice between a round or square table. Paired with either wooden or fabric chairs.

The bed frame: A Bronze metal frame or wooden pallets.

And the dresser. Natural wood or painted wood.

And the pattern continues.

But at the end of the day, all challenges aside, they’ve managed to make it out of the store with everything they intended on purchasing and more.

———

They had invited most their friends over to help move everything in. Providing pizza as an incentive.

It was quite the struggle getting the larger things up a flight of stairs rather tight stairs. (A true demonstration of Sirius, Barty, and Marlene’s lack of spacing awareness) Assembling things was also a very real struggle as the instructions were very clearly not in a language anyone there spoke. (Remus had ended up very wisely opening google translate to put Peter, Mary, and Evan out of their misery.) Pandora, Regulus, Lily, and Dorcas unleashing their inner interior designers. Making sure everything looked just right. Miraculously they were set up in their new flat after only one all nighter.

After everyone left James and Regulus walk around the apartment, side by side, admiring all of their hard work.

The green couch, with a deep wooden coffee table with a glass top, and thick rug in the living room. Wooden pallets act as a bed frame. And a black and brown dining room table with green chairs that match the couch flawlessly.

James’ posters hang in frames around the house. Books and plants filling open surfaces. With natural light flooding through each and every window. In the end James even got his light up sign- a sun with stars around it to hang- in the living room.

The house is a bit chaotic and colorful but they wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s exactly what both James and Regulus had envisioned. It’s perfect.