#genuinely love how articulate he is when he speaks and the clarity of his ideas

[houseofborgia]

╰┈➤ David Oakes discusses Juan's role in the Borgia family.

[vietzuko]

if we used to share a discord server, this post is for you!

hello! i am going to try to do this as anonymously and non-confrontationally as possible. i do not want this to be a spectacle or call out post, but i will say that i am quite disturbed by the way situations have transpired on the server. 

in case you didn’t notice, i left! when i left, i wrote a little goodbye post in #general, which has since been deleted. either the mods deleted my goodbye or they banned me from the server (which automatically would delete my message). in case you didn’t see it, here was my goodbye message:

hi everyone, i’m leaving the server. if you’re a POC who is interested in joining an ATLA server where POC can talk about ATLA and critically discuss race, feel free to PM me for a link! otherwise, this is goodbye. see you all around.

i won’t rehash everything that happened in the events leading to this, nor will i name names in this post. if you were on the server, you probably saw what happened publicly or you can message me personally, either here or on discord. if we know each other through the server and you want some clarity over names/events in this post, please PM me. 

if you are a POC in the ATLA fandom who is concerned by the events of this post and you would like me to clarify which server i’m talking about, please PM me.

i just wanted to share the very long message that i sent to the mods (on their prompting!) because i feel that it shows my perspective on what transpired.  unfortunately, this message did not result in any meaningful change, except for me getting banned/my messages removed from the server. i suppose that’s a type of meaning! haha. 

anyway. here’s the message. cw for racism, yellowface

hi MOD 1 (and presumably the other mods who will read this message)! thanks for reaching out. i’ve had some time to dwell on the situation and discuss it with other people in the server who witnessed it and reached out to me personally. this is going to be an unbelievably long message, so i apologize in advance and thank you for your time in reading it.

i think the first thing i’d like to do is give some context for the incident and to give my perspective on why i said the things i said.

i have PMed a mod about a racist incident in the server exactly once. it was when i first joined, and i saw a picture of a white person in yellowface in the cosplay channel. i didn’t know any of you personally yet (and this was before some of you even joined on as mods). i have since told SERVER MEMBER 1 about this incident and i’m pretty sure they mentioned it to you because i noticed you’ve changed the yellowface rule. but i think that the context of me pinging a mod about a racist incident and then witnessing another (although less egregious) instance of racism by the mods might explain why i am, in general, hesitant about talking to mods about racism on the server. i am just trying to live my life and experience as few micro-aggressions as possible.

i also think the fact that i regularly educate and push back against white people’s racially harmful messages in the server is also important context. i realize none of you likely know this, but about every two weeks i receive an unsolicited PM from a different white person apologizing/asking for forgiveness/asking for reassurance/asking further questions about their racism on the server. i’m glad people are learning from me, but this is a huge amount of emotional labor that i put into the server and its members because of course i have to reply and explain things and tell them not to worry and thank them for apologizing, etc. i know that these messages aren’t your fault, nor am i asking you to do anything about this. but it feels important that you know the price that i (and perhaps other poc in the server, although i can’t speak to that) pay in order to share space with you.

MOD 2 has even messaged me personally to thank me for educating people in the server and responding to racist messages, saying: “really appreciate how much effort you put in and everything, i was trying to type something up but floundering badly.” it was a nice message, and i appreciated it a lot! it also led me to believe that the mods would prefer if i engage with racist messages myself, rather than ping them, because it felt like i was just going to be more able/willing to articulate a response anyway.

so when SERVER MEMBER 2 messaged the zukka channel “thought that lives in my head rent free: Sokka's hairstyle in canon is just a warrior's hairstyle and has meaning because of that. Sokka wearing the same hairstyle in a modern AU is undisputably queer-coded” and nobody replied for a while, i assumed that it was because they had seen what i had seen-- a racially insensitive message that totally ignores sokka’s indigenous heritage and the history behind indigenous hair-- so i decided to step in with what i thought was a balanced response. 

SERVER MEMBER 2 then replied with a cheery “Fair enough! I will defer to your greater knowledge,” which i couldn’t tell was sarcastic or not, but i decided to be generous and to believe they were genuinely thankful for my reply, so i responded with a “you too can have great knowledge. i only know things because i read things. anyone can read things and learn,” which is something i firmly believe and also a way to divert the conversation away from SERVER MEMBER 2’s mistake, which i felt was the most dignified solution for them. i suppose this message could be read as aggressive because i didn’t use exclamation marks? but that feels unfair and ungenerous because i genuinely did not mean this message in a harsh way.

then SERVER MEMBER 3 jumped in and asked a few questions, which i read as a request for clarification, so i tried to continue to explain my point. it felt like SERVER MEMBER 3 wasn’t understanding what i was trying to explain, or at least i wasn’t able to articulate myself well enough, which was making me a little tired and stressy (and i was also thinking about my own race and queerness in stressful and triggering ways), so i decided to tap out of the conversation. 

me: dude i love u and i respect u and i truly believe that u are trying very hard to understand, but this conversation is making me kinda heated

SERVER MEMBER 3: I’m gonna step back from it because it’s not my conversation to insert myself into, which is what I did initially and apologize for

me: i think it's so important to engage + ask questions & i appreciate that u respect my opinions on these things, but i think i'm just. i have said what i need to say and now must sleep. much love to all.

to me, this felt like me expressing that i was feeling tired and upset and leaving the conversation, while still attempting to reassure SERVER MEMBER 3 that i still admired him as a friend. i felt like the conversation had ended peacefully!

i hope this helps explain why MOD 3’s message came as such a surprise. 

“the escalation to defensiveness and accusation regarding the original (relatively benign) statement was unnecessary and exaggerated. There’s an atmosphere of purity policing that’s been growing, which is why I took away the squick channel, as I assumed that a space that encouraged no repercussions was facilitating irresponsibility aggressive arguments. “

i truly didn’t believe i was being defensive. i was very careful not to accuse anyone of anything. in fact, i tried as far as i could to coat my language in “i” statements-- “i would personally not choose…”, “i would just. stay away from…” in order to avoid “accusations.” i was also trying very hard not to be aggressive, and i (and other poc that i have spoken to about this) believe that the idea that my messages were aggressive is racialized. just because a poc is upset about racism, it doesn’t mean they’re attacking you personally! 

i feel so hurt that my messages were wilfully interpreted in this way, instead of being read generously and from a more compassionate perspective, especially since i voiced my own upset and discomfort during the conversation. it distresses me to think that me expressing negative emotions is seen as aggressive, rather than a cause for empathy or care, and i do believe that this is because of my race.

if a mod had asked me to take the messages to the DMs or to squick or even just let me know that someone was interpreting my messages as aggressive, i would have changed my behavior. (like i said earlier, i spend a HUGE amount of energy coddling white people on this server. i am very used to it.) 

instead, i got the shock of 45 minutes after the fact, being publicly chastised and labeled as aggressive and being told that my conversation was “something nasty or unwanted.” 

the idea that SERVER MEMBER 3 was de-escalating a “clearly escalating situation” feels untrue to me. i was ready to move on after i sent my message to SERVER MEMBER 2, but he kept engaging me on the subject! (no hate to SERVER MEMBER 3 on this.)

i think one of the most painful parts of this whole situation is the implication that i was attempting to “purity police,” as though i am a person who picks fights just because i want to feel good about picking fights?? or to act holier-than-thou???? i do not do this. if you have witnessed ANY interaction i’ve had with a racially insensitive white person on the server, you will know this. 

i am simply a person of color trying to live my life. i do not want to fight about racism. i want to chill out and watch my cartoons. unfortunately, sometimes, someone will say something that i consider racially insensitive and i will do my best to engage and explain why i find this insensitive. that is all. (it is important to note that most of the time, when i see racially insensitive things on the server, i do not say anything because i am tired and it is a lot of effort to engage. i truly only engaged this time because nobody had replied to the message and i was just like, oh, fine, i guess i’ll educate, since no one else has!)

this whole incident has honestly made me really hurt and disrespected. i have enjoyed my time on the server and i have made some good friends there. however, it feels clearer and clearer to me that the server is a space where white feelings of safety (not being criticized for their racist content) are prioritized over poc’s feelings of safety (not having to witness and experience racist content). i sincerely considered myself to be an active and enthusiastic member of the server, maybe even friends with some of you, but it feels to me that all of our previous positive interactions have been displaced by this idea of me as an aggressive, overzealous purity cop who calls things racist for fun. 

i don’t even know how to repair my relationship with the server after this because i really do feel horrible and sick about the whole thing. i have spoken to other poc who also expressed their concerns about the way the mods handled the situation, even if these other poc weren’t directly involved, and some of us are considering leaving the server, if we haven’t already. (i would also like to note that these people reached out to me, unprompted, to make sure i was doing okay after what they and i interpreted as a micro-aggression by the mods. like, we independently read the situation in this way.)

(also, not sure if this matters, but i talked to SERVER MEMBER 3 the morning after the incident because i wanted to make sure he was okay, and we both ended up apologizing to each other and having a really good and productive talk.)

thanks again for reading this. i hope that you’ll be able to better understand my perspective on what occurred. i truly appreciate the work that you put into the server (especially as someone who also puts work into the server lol), and i know it’s difficult to mod a large server (i also mod an atla server!), but i continue to feel hurt about this. i know it’s hard to read tone over server messages, but i really wish that my (and SERVER MEMBER 4′s and SERVER MEMBER 5′s ) server messages had been read with greater compassion. 

...

and that’s all folks! i’m going to be remaking my blog soon, partially because this whole experience has exhausted me and partially because i have been meaning to anonymize my internet presence for some time.

[apprenticeofcups]

If youre still taking astrology compatibility can I get one for my MC Vera, a Leo, and Asra?

you certainly can!! (i’m a gemini, too, so i’m excited to self-drag)

Vera: ♌ (7/23 - 8/22) - Fixed, FireRuled by: Sun

Asra: ♊ (5/21 - 6/20) - Mutable, AirRuled by: Mercury

Air and fire couples have a lot of energy. Leo’s warmth provides affection Gemini didn’t know he needed, and Gemini’s mind works just fast enough to keep impulsive Leo out of trouble…usually.

sex & intimacy - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Leo’s creativity inspires Gemini’s factory of ideas - these two love to experiment. Neither one of them has much shame, and they’ll find their partner very receptive to new locations, positions, and implements. Gemini can be overly casual about physical intimacy, avoiding a deeper emotional connection, but as a fixed sign, Leo’s passion is contagious, and having a more stable partner boosts Gemini’s confidence in asserting their feelings. Leo doesn’t need much emotional validation or commitment as long as Gemini is enthusiastic and communicative - which he will be, every time.

trust - ⭐⭐⭐⭕⭕Both signs like to talk more than they like to listen. Mercury-ruled Gemini is so involved in his own mind he often forgets to check in with his partner, and Leo is great at asserting their own needs, but bad at satisfying their partner’s. They really won’t question each other in the beginning, and they both play close to their chest, so their relationship can progress without much trust for a while before either one notices. Leo is known for their loyalty, and Gemini isn’t unfaithful, just easily-distracted, so once they learn to hear one another, they’ll prioritize each other’s needs just as highly as their own.  

communication - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐These two will talk about everything but their feelings. Leo’s curiosity and Gemini’s didactic nature work in perfect tandem - Gemini loves to explain, and Leo loves to learn. Leo does have a tendency to bulldoze, but Gemini’s way with words can easily redirect them if he feels he’s about to get crushed. Their communication is a great way to build trust - Leo rarely thinks before they speak, and Gemini’s constant running commentary is nothing if not honest. Leo admires their partner’s intellectualism, and Gemini’s respect for his partner’s strength of character comes through in their words to one another.

emotions - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Luckily, these two are usually on the same page emotionally, because they both struggle to acknowledge and articulate their emotions. Their self-awareness is their saving grace: Gemini knows he’s not emotionally-adept, and will ask for correction, and Leo knows they have a tendency to be hot-headed, and will give him plenty of warning. Fixed Leo can (and will) be frustrated by inconsistent, mutable Gemini, but they’re patient enough to wait for his emotions to surface, and when they do, they’re genuine. Gemini will be surprised by how appreciated and supported he feels in sun-ruled Leo’s warmth, and Leo finds comfort in his naïveté and charm.

values - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Smart is sexy to this couple. They both place value on intelligence, clarity, and openness. Both Leo and Gemini are rational and unabashed about what they want. Gemini values his and his partner’s independence, which is a relief for sun-ruled Leo, who needs freedom. Likewise, Leo encourages Gemini’s idiosyncracies and inner child. They not only understand that he needs to be a little odd to be happy - it’s one of the things they love about him.

interests - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭕Gemini wants to go everywhere and do everything, and Leo’s one of the few signs that can keep up with him. They might even leave him in the dust. Leo does need to be lazy on occasion; Gemini is always on the move, but Leo understands the importance of a do-nothing day. These two are comfortable in their independence, though, so Leo won’t mind Gemini running off without them, and he won’t try to drag them off the couch when they want to treat themself.

Overall ⭐ 4.5This couple is exciting and adventurous, built on solid communication and mutual respect. They understand each other rationally and implicitly, and share a desire to understand and explore the world around them. Once Leo understands Gemini’s flakiness doesn’t make him untrustworthy, and Gemini realizes his partner is holding him together, rather than tying him down, these two will be a long-lasting, fun-loving pair with lots of laughter. ♌♊💖

(send me your apprentice’s sign + an LI for a love reading! ☕)

disclaimer: compatibility doesn’t mean “they’ll definitely get together” or “they’ll never get together” - it just gives a little starry insight into what the relationship is like!

[sleemo]

Adam Driver: ‘Compared with the military, acting isn't that difficult’

The Star Wars actor on leaving the Marines, filming nude scenes with Lena Dunham and getting in touch with his dark side — The Guardian | Dec 9, 2017

Adam Driver has a reputation for being a serious young man, which is partly a matter of attitude and partly, I suspect, to do with some aspect of his physiognomy: he has a large head and outsize features that somehow combine to give an impression of gravity. 

Before the photoshoot, he let it be known that he finds it uncomfortable to have a journalist (me) in his sightline on set, the kind of specification one might expect of a particularly precious Hollywood star. But this turns out to be misleading. Driver’s discomfort is with the entire celebrity aspect of his job, which makes talking about his role in the latest Star Wars trilogy somewhat tricky. I don’t even know where to start with The Last Jedi, I say, as we settle down after the shoot, and Driver grins, then looks gloomy. “Me, neither,” he says.

We are in downtown Manhattan, a few miles from Driver’s Brooklyn Heights neighbourhood (Lena Dunham lives there, too) and a more upscale part of Brooklyn than the grungy Greenpoint location of Girls. That show, the sixth and final season of which ran on HBO earlier this year, was watched by relatively modest numbers, but has had an outsized influence on the culture. Barely a day goes by without Dunham being mentioned in a blogpost somewhere, and it gave Driver, who played her on-off boyfriend, the kind of career launch twenty-something actors can only dream of. 

At 34, not only does he have his second go as Kylo Ren in the latest Star Wars movie, but he has just shot The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, directed by Terry Gilliam, was in the Steven Soderbergh film Logan Lucky and played the title role in the Jim Jarmusch movie Paterson. Pretty good, I’d say, although I assume the two Star Wars films – The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi – are the real life-changer.

“No,” Driver says, looking genuinely baffled.

But to be part of a juggernaut that size – wasn’t he warned it would change his life? “I don’t think anyone said that, and I wouldn’t have listened to them, anyway. As a person, I’m the same. The problems I had before Force Awakens, it didn’t solve any of them.” He laughs. “For me, the only noticeable difference is your visibility as a person. Loss of anonymity is a big thing. I didn’t realise how I would see that in a billion little ways.”

The fame he had before Star Wars was somewhat localised. As Driver says drily, “In my neighbourhood, a lot of people watch HBO.” Star Wars is different: “Seven-year-olds to 70-year-olds.” It is global and almost impossible to escape. Driver is 6ft 3in and distinctive-looking, like a child’s drawing of a man brought to life. He’s even recognisable when travelling at speed. “I thought, I’ll ride my bike around the city,” he says, “and within two seconds I got pulled over by the cops, who said, ‘Hey, can we take a picture?’”

Really? “Yeah. I mean, I also ran a red light, so it was fair.”

Driver has been in New York since his early 20s, and part of his appeal as an actor has to do with his background. Before attending drama school at Juilliard, he was in the Marines. He was discharged after two years of training, and before his unit got shipped to Iraq, following an injury brought on while he was out mountain biking, a terrible blow at the time.

It is this – the combination of the classical theatre training and the military experience – that gives Driver an unusual ruggedness. As with most things that come up during our conversation, he is mildly amused and emphatically deflating about the role of the military in his appeal as an actor. He already knew he wanted to perform when he joined the Marines in his late teens, a move partly inspired by 9/11 and partly by youthful lack of direction. Driver’s application to Juilliard had been rejected; he had no other plans and was listlessly living in his mother and stepfather’s house in Indiana when 9/11 happened, filling him with what he described in a recent TED talk as “an overwhelming sense of duty”. He was also feeling “generally pissed off” and underconfident, and for some reason – he agrees, looking back, that it was in many ways an odd move – signing up seemed to be the answer.

At high school, Driver wasn’t particularly macho. “I didn’t do organised sports, not because I didn’t like them, but because I wasn’t very good at them. Except basketball. But I was never, like: let’s play football.”

He mainly hung out with the high school drama nerds. “I wasn’t someone who was into groups of guys – we’re men! We’re going to eat meat!” He looks momentarily wry. “I don’t know what guys do. Anyway, I would never have talked to those people before the military. Now you’re stuck in the epitome of alpha-male territory.”

To everyone’s surprise, he loved it. One can almost see why: there is an earnestness to Driver that relished the purity of military life and the more he talks about it, the more he makes it sound like a combat version of Buddhism. “There’s something about going into the military and having all of your identity and possessions stripped away: that whole clarity of purpose thing. It becomes very clear to you, when you get your freedom back, that there’s stuff you want to do.”

The bonds Driver made with his fellow Marines were startling to him, given how different many of them were in terms of background. (In his own family, his mother is a paralegal, his stepfather a Baptist preacher and his father works “at the copy counter at Office Depot”.) In the military, Driver says, none of that mattered. “You’re in this high-stakes environment where who you are as a person is constantly tested. And, in my experience, a lot of the people I was closest to in the military were very self-sacrificing. For me, it speaks volumes, more than how well they were able to articulate, or whatever front they were putting on. You get to see them at their most vulnerable and they’re literally going to back you up. All pretences dissolve.”

Being discharged on medical grounds before deployment was devastating for Driver; but the experience of having been in the military also made rehabilitation easier. Nothing, he believed at the time, could be as hard again, and after a period of working in a warehouse back in Indiana, he found that he still wanted to act and reapplied to Juilliard. It was different this time. “Whereas at 17 I just wanted to be liked, and to be funny, and accepted, later I had a bit more life experience.” He was accepted and moved to New York.

He has worked almost constantly since then, to the extent that he took four months off recently just to hang out at home with his wife Joanne Tucker. (They met at Juilliard and she is also an actor.) Most of his early roles – he was in Frances Ha, the excellent Noah Baumbach movie, and in the Coen brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis – were very good, but relatively small scale and indie. Even Girls, his breakthrough role, didn’t look like much when it first came on screen. The Force Awakens, on the other hand, became the fastest film to take $1bn (£740m) at the global box office. I try again: surely this does something to Driver’s basic levels of self-confidence?

“No, because that’s not what I was after when I started to be an actor,” he insists. “It would if that was my goal. I know people think that if you’re an actor, it’s your goal to be famous and wealthy. Surely you want to be famous and wealthy! And there are great things about that part of it – it frees you up to do other things. But part of my job is being anonymous and I think being able to live, to observe more than to be observed, is important. [Being famous] seems counterintuitive to my job. It’s a weird dynamic when you walk into a room and there’s an image people project on to you.” He interrupts himself to say, conscientiously, “My problems compared with global issues, or anybody else’s, are very small. Even that I have time in my day to think about the existential.”

This is how it goes with Driver: he is assiduously mindful of broader sensitivities and somewhat embarrassed to air his own. “What it means to lose anonymity is a bougie problem in and of itself. And I won’t garner sympathy, nor am I asking for it. The image of us on our red carpet wearing expensive suits, where people naturally assume your life is, is not what I was after when I started this job. Believe it or not.”

I do believe it, I say. One has only to look at him, twisting this way and that in his chair. (“I’m not doing it on purpose to get away from you,” he says.)

So he doesn’t take any credit for, or validation from, the success of Star Wars? “You mean, am I, like, yes!” He gives a little satirical air punch. “I’m excited that people liked it, but do I think that I got it right? No. If I had directed it, maybe. But I didn’t write it, direct it, pick out the costumes. All these decisions – about the lightsaber, that it’s unfinished and unpolished – none of those were mine. I know enough about this job not to take credit.” He looks pained. “That would be an illusion.”

Driver’s family have no roots in acting, although his stepfather’s job as a minister might be said to have some performance aspect to it. Driver sang in the church choir well into his teens, which, he says, gives you an idea of how left-field his decision to enlist was. When he joined the school theatre, it was because his friends were doing it and it looked fun. “They auditioned for Oklahoma!, so I did. And I got a part in the chorus. I remember being backstage and it seemed like a community that was a bunch of weirdos, and I liked that part of it. I also felt that I was kind of OK at it. I tend to get frustrated with things that I don’t pick up right away.”

When people in the US think of Indiana, he says, they think of somewhere “boring and flat”. It is also deep into Trump country, such that Driver and his family are careful to avoid talking about politics when he goes home for the holidays.

Occasionally, his worlds collide. A few years after being demobbed, Driver set up a nonprofit organisation called Arts In The Armed Forces, which puts on theatre performances for personnel at military bases. His burgeoning celebrity has made it easier to recruit other well-known actors to the cause, but it is testament to his management skills that from the outset, the company has been smartly and seriously run. His aim, he says, was to broaden the range of entertainment put on for the troops. When Driver was stationed at Camp Pendleton, in California, the troop entertainment was, “‘The Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders are going to come and dance for you.’ Which is great, but there wasn’t anything like theatre or performance art brought to us.”

Unlike Bryan Doerries’ excellent stage project Theatre Of War, in which Greek drama is performed before military audiences as a public health initiative, there is no therapeutic element to Driver’s nonprofit. Still, it can have an interesting impact. “In one of our first performances, Laura Linney did a monologue from this Scott Organ play called China, about a female employer reprimanding a female employee for not wearing a bra. It’s really funny, that’s why I picked it – not really thinking it through. It was one of a series of monologues, and the male Marines were coming out and saying, we really liked it, but we thought [that particular one] was an indirect attack on how we do things in the military.”

When Driver asked why, they replied, “Because there’s a uniformity and structure and a reason in the military, and we thought that’s what you were trying to criticise. I said, OK, that’s interesting. And then the female Marines were coming out and saying, I liked the whole thing, especially that monologue, because I know what it’s like to be a female in a very male-dominated environment. That’s the best response we could’ve asked for. Hopefully they like it and it’s entertaining. But it also confronts them, and they bring something to it that a civilian audience wouldn’t think of.”

It can take a little persuasion on Driver’s part to get officers to allow him on to the base, and if he is adept at overcoming the military’s initial scepticism towards theatre, it is thanks to the experience of having overcome similar prejudice in himself. Theatre school seemed insane after the Marines, he says. “It is a very egocentric four years, just sitting around and focusing on what does the back of my tongue sound like when I make this sound? What is a Scottish dialect?”

Failure didn’t particularly worry him; he was still in his early 20s and brimming with the confidence of youth and the machismo of two years of hard training. “In the military, you are put in hard circumstances, so I’m thinking, I’ll move to New York and be an actor, and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll just live in Central Park. You know, compared with the military, it can’t be that difficult. I’ll dumpster dive. I’ll survive. Civilian problems compared with the military are small; that was my thinking at the time. That’s not right. But at the time, that’s what I thought.”

It wasn’t just the contrast between the two worlds that gave Driver confidence. There is something almost fanatical about his belief in the right and wrong way to do things. When he was still at school and decided to be an actor, the only place he applied to was Juilliard; nowhere else, no backup. He had heard it was the best place in the US to train, so that’s where he wanted to go.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, he isn’t on social media. Those kinds of exchanges don’t interest him. As a result, he missed out on a lot of the hype around Girls, although even he couldn’t fail to recognise that the show was a hit. (Driver won three consecutive Emmy nominations for his role as Adam Sackler.) It was a strange thing, he says, to sign up for what felt like a relatively obscure show – “Something that felt like it was made in the basement of a friend’s house” – and watch it rise, while he and his friends rose with it. (We speak before the controversy over Lena Dunham��s defence of a Girls writer against an accusation of rape.)

It did not escape Driver’s notice that his own nudity on the show was less remarked upon and criticised than that of Lena Dunham, even though Dunham wrote, produced and directed the show. “Of course there’s a double standard for men and women. I don’t think that’s a controversial thing for me to say. It’s so obvious, and one of the things that she was fighting against, which I understood right away, is that it wasn’t gratuitous. There was always a point behind it, it was always still storytelling. It just seemed very natural. We talked just as much about being naked, and what was the story and the sex scenes, as we did about scenes where there’s dialogue.”

It wasn’t uncomfortable to film? “If it’s for no purpose whatsoever, that would be very uncomfortable. But part of the storytelling is about our bodies and how they look, and if there’s something that’s not flattering about it, that was probably what we were going for. That’s my job, to tell the story.”

What did he learn from Dunham?

“Um. I mean, Lena is a great writer. She’s a good thief, also: she’s very aware of her environment and is very good about processing her experience of something immediately. I feel like I need more time to get distance on it, so I can look back and have an opinion. She is forming opinions as she does things. Which I think is a rare ability.”

Driver sometimes wonders if he’ll ever come to firm conclusions about anything. “I never figure anything out,” he says, winningly. “I do my job. That’s my goal, to be as economical as possible. Basically, the only thing I try to do is know my lines.”

His ego is contained, too. “Usually, the mood of the set is what I adapt to, as opposed to having a set way of working and imposing it on everybody else. If you need private time, usually people give you space for that. But getting set into one way of doing something seems like closing yourself off from being wrong.” On the other hand, “interesting things can come out of being wrong”. He smiles. “Sometimes.”

Can he let things go?

“No. I don’t think so. Maybe after a while. I keep replaying scenes in my mind. That’s why I don’t like to watch anything I’m in – it’s not my responsibility.” It’s a Zen attitude Driver has worked hard to perfect and he frowns with the effort of maintaining it. To be a small part of the machine is where he has always felt comfortable. “It’s not about me,” he says .

— The Guardian

[abloodymess]

Tobe Hooper made the best horror movie, he also made the best horror movie sequel (with all due respect to Don Coscarelli and the great Phantasm sequels), and he also made the best made for TV horror movie. Not only that but he made a ton of great idiosyncratic horror movies through his career, some better than others, but all certainly interesting and could not have been made by anyone else (can you believe Lifeforce was made at all!? Who makes a movie like that!?). A true oddball, with a unique vision, that changed the landscape of cinema, not just horror cinema, all cinema with the release of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. So with Tobe passing I thought I would share my favorite bit of writing on that particular film in its entirety. 

Anecdotal: the concept of one’s own death loiters in the brain of a middle-aged man a lot more frequently than that of his twenty-something counterparts. Once you hit 40 there are, statistically speaking, more days behind you than in front of you, and as much as you try to run in the opposite direction, your mind will always eventually face front to dwell on the non-negotiable black nothingness of oblivion waiting for you at the end.

Not surprisingly, this mindset changes the way one watches the beloved horror classics of one’s youth. Moments of cinematic carnage take on a gravitas that the 18-year-old you couldn’t possibly have absorbed. When we’re young, death is scary but abstract; a dark unknown. In our 40s, death is a fact. It has by now reached out from the shadows and taken a few of our group. It surrounds us, moving toward us as we move toward it. In middle age, we’re always painfully aware that death is waiting, that it’s the one true certainty in life.

Death's inevitability is sitting right there in the title of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. There's no ambiguous "nightmare" or “legend” or "night of terror" in that title. Right there on your admission ticket, it’s printed in black and white: Death is coming. En masse. With that one title, you’ve been told the what, the where and the how. (An opening dateline provides the when; you will never get the why.) The film that follows is not an escapist, spooky funhouse ride. It’s a funeral dirge. And no one gets more existentially fucked up by a funeral than the middle-aged.

That’s an interesting wrinkle, as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is, through and through, a young people’s movie about death. It stars and was made by people mostly under 30, and was ingested primarily by a young audience who, in 1974, recognized it as the primal fairy tale it was. “What happened to them was all the more tragic in that they were young,” John Larroquette's voice tells us in the opening narration, and a young, draft-age audience nodded in agreement. Certainly that was my take on my first viewing, at age 12. In the VHS heyday of the early ‘80s, I found The Texas Chain Saw Massacre to be unnerving in its visual and aural assault, altogether different from the other movies in my rental pile. Of the many films that sparked an early interest in the craft of filmmaking, Tobe Hooper’s 1974 masterpiece was likely in my top three, though I struggled to articulate what was so special about it. It wasn’t exactly fun, or heightened, or overly stylized with the kind of polish that telegraphed “film production” to the viewer. It felt like you were seeing genuine homicidal insanity onscreen. There were no safe, cathartic thrills to be found. It made me feel small and helpless. That’s probably why it wasn’t on rotation in my VCR the way, say, the Friday the 13th movies were.

As the power (and appeal) of certain slasher franchises faded with my adolescence, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre continued to cast a spell. Time did not render any of its moments cheesy or hokey for me; the film’s unblinking lack of sentiment served it well in that regard. When more advanced moviemaking technology started to throw the rough edges of my other horror favorites into sharp relief, here was a film that never stopped feeling real. With each new video transfer, its deceptively primitive visual style was revealed to be more detailed and sophisticated than we realized, VHS “purists” be damned. Its soundscape never became dated because it is singular in the history of the genre; nothing has sounded like it before or since. The sound design is near-flawless, impregnating even the quiet moments with a droning sense of doom. It’s the heavy silence of a funeral director’s office, or an oncologist’s waiting room. It’s the noisy silence of blood pounding in your ears during a panic attack.

It's the one film that never became "just a movie" to me, but not for my lack of trying. I’ve attended multiple Q&As with the makers of the film. I’ve watched at least three documentaries, and read at least two books on its making. I’ve digested all the outtakes, and I’ve met every living principal cast member. I even once drove an hour to the relocated farmhouse, ate a meal in its dining room and wandered both floors. Despite my many attempts at demystification, its hold on me remains. In my 40s I now find the film resonates most powerfully in the moments leading up to the characters’ deaths. Pondering your own end, that terrible awareness that you’re rushing toward a point in the future where you will no longer exist. Unease, quiet dread, guilt, confusion, panic, abject terror: The Texas Chain Saw Massacre has become, for me, a mosaic of the feelings the idea of oblivion stirs within me. These days, those feelings are where I experience true horror, and I find that the film still delivers on that front.

Make no mistake: the movie still offers plenty of straight-up terror for all age groups. Unpredictable, unknowable chaos reigns in Hooper’s film, a marked contrast from the subgenre it helped birth. Later slasher films would evolve into a rigid set of rules by which characters would live or die; abstinence was rewarded, vice and promiscuity were punished. In a way the slashers came to really epitomize the ‘80s mindset, nearly right-wing in their code of conformity. They reassure a status quo; they're downright comforting in their predictability. This is not the case with The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. There are no ground rules as per Wes Craven’s Scream; no one is safe. Our heroes don’t fit the stereotypes of slasher victims, and aside from Franklin’s wheelchair-bound whining, the characters are fairly nondescript. But beyond that well-trod observation, even more unsettling is that these are good kids. They’ve heard reports of grave-robbing in the area, and they’ve gone out of their way to make sure their grandpa’s remains are undisturbed. They are checking on their dead grandpa. It’s a sweet, human, honorable goal. The film does not care. 84 minutes later, they’re all fodder for a saw that’s still swinging when the screen cuts to black.

This is a horrifying notion in more ways than one. These characters - good, bad, indifferent, pretty, fat, annoying, carefree - are all going into the sausage grinder. WE’RE all going into the sausage grinder. Like dumb cattle, oblivious to the signs all around us, one by one we willingly march toward our own screaming, bloody ends, slaughtered without ever understanding what’s happening to us. But part of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s enduring power is the horrible glimpse of omniscience it gives us, and in that clarity is revealed a universe prodding us down the cattle chute from day one. Right from the opening frames, the protagonists’ deaths have been set in motion. The Hitchhiker (Ed Neal) rattles those bones and displays that skeleton, and it’s a beacon. Relatives from miles away descend on the graveyard to check on their loved ones’ remains (who knows how many of these well-meaning people ended up as furniture in that house, their cars piled up under that tarp in the backyard). With his cemetery folk art, the Hitchhiker has summoned Sally (Marilyn Burns) and her friends to their doom, with neither side even aware of it. Later, Franklin (Paul Partain) tells the group that his and Sally’s grandpa sold cattle to the slaughterhouse where Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) and his family worked, and eventually we come to find out that the two families were essentially next door neighbors.

On recent viewings, that last detail chills me the most. The film is rife with omens - the astrology readings, the ramblings of the graveyard drunk, the radio station that broadcasts literally nothing but reports of carnage and mayhem. But more than anything I can't shake the weird angle of these characters dying horribly simply because of where their grandfather happened to live (and die). That vanload of victims had been tied to their cannibalistic murderers for decades before August 18, 1973. Whatever it is that’s gonna kill you, the film reminds us, has probably happened already, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You were always going to end up on that meat hook.

Movies, we like to tell ourselves, are a kind of immortality. Films last forever, and sequels and reboots keep things alive long after the end credits. In the world of cinema, we're seldom asked to confront the actual end of anything. But discarding all the sequels, the remakes, the sequels to remakes and remakes of sequels, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre remains one of the most confrontational films about death ever made. Forty years on, the film offers no comfort in its bleak message: you might live or die at any given moment, and when you finally take the dirt nap it will likely be an unsentimental, arbitrary bit of happenstance. But sooner or later you will end. Once you are dead you will no longer matter to the world at large, and odds are most people on Earth will never know about your experiences. Moreover, time will eventually claim not only you and everyone you love, but the entire planet. The whole of human existence will be nothing but an imperceptible blip on the universe’s radar as our tiny planet of cruelty and chaos is one day swallowed by the angry sun we see erupting in the film’s opening credits.

@PhilNobileJr

[thebandcampdiaries]

God Moore the Elixir - Passport: Ego Sum Qui Sum

God Moore the Elixir is more than just your average hip-hop artist. Unlike so many modern rappers who just chase trends and copy the lyrical styles of the most trending artists at any given time, he developed a thoughtful and personal sound. His rap flow is deeply tied to the art of parablism, that is,  verbally projecting thoughts or ideas to the listener. He managed to accomplish that by exploring a vast array of topics, and concepts that have the power to really connect with the audience.

Recently, the artist released a brand new album titled “Passport: Ego Sum Qui Sum.” This record denotes a really special approach to production, with a sound that feels clear and sophisticated, yet warm and organic.

This astonishing release features 9 studio tracks, each blurring the lines between different sonic aesthetics and creative directions. The first song on the set list is titled “Chess Move.” Much like it requires some thought to come up with the perfect chess move to win a game, this track is filled with clever lyrics and searing topics, igniting the listener with a witty spark of intelligent songwriting. “WYFW (Catch Me On The Way Back)” is a great song, which combines its unapologetic lyricism with a really dense and organic background track. “So Kosher 1.0” combines a sharp lyrical flow with a beat that has a nice old-school vibe, making for a gritty, yet melodic approach. This song has a modern and polished production, which really allows the mix to stand out for its clarity and depth. On the next track, “GNLFY”, there is even room for a stellar collaboration with Glance Conway, who helped shape this song into something that truly stands out. The 5th track on this release is a song named “Focus 1.0 (Without The Blind Eyes)” and it stands out for its golden age flair. I love the combination of cross-cultural references and classic hip-hop grooves! In addition to that, “Facade (P.B.S)” is yet another lyrically strong track, which actually ties right into the concept of the next song, “So Racist.” The subject of this release speaks for itself, and this song really stands out as a strong title, a very unapologetic look at some of the world’s most controversial issues in this day and age. The next song, “Passport 1.0 (Krill & Steak)” is one of the best tracks on the album, with its catchy melodies and intelligent composition. On this one, the low end is really fat and punchy, while the mid-range is warm, but never harsh. In addition to that, the top end has a nice, silky tone that really contributes to a smooth sounding mix that puts the vocals at the forefront. Last, but definitely not least, “From Predecess To Tha Predeceed” serves as a perfect curtain closer, reiterating what this album is really supposed to be all about! This song in particular showcases the artist’s personal philosophy and spiritual beliefs, from a truly interesting point of view. It’s a deeper reflection on faith, identity, and more. 

One of the most interesting and striking features of this release is definitely its remarkable consistency. Not many artists can easily pull off a project that features such a wide variety of elements and influences. The most obvious risk is that the material can end up sounding quite disconnected and loose - but this is definitely not the case.  

God Moore the Elixir is a master at creating organic, cohesive and consistent vibes, which really flow well throughout the span of this release. The performances are loaded with passion and integrity, while the production aesthetics are also excellent. The mixing quality is indeed absolutely world-class, with some amazing definition in the top end and lots of punch in the low-end and midrange. The results sound warm and present, yet never harsh or fatiguing, which is quite an amazing achievement, particularly in this genre! With this release, the artist really made a point to set the bar higher, not only for himself, but also for his listeners, genuinely delivering something that’s catchy and direct, yet forward-thinking and challenging in the best possible way.

Ultimately, this is an album for pioneers. For the forward-thinkers who like honest and meaningful music that’s more art than entertainment!

Find out more about God Moore the Elixir and listen to this release:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_k5ghJQF0RUxdt--KT_aD-sZ9seUs9giOc

We also had the chance to catch up with this talented artist. Keep reading for a full interview!

I love how you manage to render your tracks so personal and organic. Does the melody come first, or do you focus on the beat the most?

My appreciations and thank you for the review you constructed of my album.  You’re truly exceptional at what you do.

You know, you're the first to ask me that in an interview....there are times when other artists make fair and welcomed attempts to extract an idea by asking how I structure my lyrics or what gave me the idea for a track.   Quite frankly, there are times in which I let the beat tell me a story and I correspond with one similar, but verbally....that approach is literally no different from indulging in a cordial conversation with someone who shares a similar view.   That's a conversation that'll take you off schedule and make you a few minutes late to your intended destination.   Other times, the rhythm of life brings forth that which is within the subconscious.   An example would be when you arrive at that destination and don't recall the duration of the drive itself because of mental activity; the time within the drive granted the mind the perfect opportunity to reflect, explore, and bestow the findings to the conscious....I hope that answer is fitting enough.

Do you perform live? If so, do you feel more comfortable on a stage or within the walls of the recording studio?

Yes, but not as often as my peers and others think I should.  I'm quite comfortable in both.  It's been a while since I actually performed on stage.  Like over 10 years.  I took a well-deserved hiatus to work on separating the mentality I developed while deployed as a contractor overseas.   I won't go into the content of my service, but once I returned, I had to really look at what I had become.  Returning to the things I left during the first deployment wasn't a difficult transition because my time there was like a vacation....but the others were a little different....there was a change that I didn't want to be a constant within my identity....so it takes time to truly analyze yourself and be blatantly honest with yourself about yourself....10 years may sound a bit extensive to some, but it was necessary.  And even with that passage of time, the stage is nothing foreign nor are the sound-proof walls of a studio.

If you could only pick one song to make a “first impression” on a new listener, which song would you pick and why?

It would, hands down, have to be From Predecess To Tha Predeceed and quite frankly, it's not difficult to understand why if who I am is attributed wisely.  FPTTP is an accurate portrayal of identity greater than my observation of an individual, individuals, or an event for inspirational purposes, writing from the position of someone else and projecting what my primitive reaction would be upon aligning with the lesser of choices, or me just having a moment of raw grit because a memory ensued for whatever reason (which is normally to maintain a healthy balance of personal cohesiveness)....FPTTP is what I Am from a point of what I can accurately articulate....some things (thoughts, feelings, emotions, aspects of self, experiences, etc.) can't be explained because there are no words to explain or fully describe them.  The articulation of such findings remain sacred until another is met who are operating on or within a similar frequency....and the connection is apparent but nonverbal.  All other attempts to express may provide some degree of minute reference. Nonetheless, they will always fall short of exactness.

What does it take to be “innovative” in music?

Innovation - as well as the opportunity to be innovative - is always in existence.   From the standpoint of creating music, the opportunities are just as apparent.  Being alert of your direct atmosphere/environment (what's happening around you) and staying aware of what your mind is manifesting (what's happening within you) at all times indefinitely, like, really being in tune with what is being imparted to you from your higher faculties and recognizing at that very moment that this is God Mode (a moment of creation), is ideal.  Honestly, innovation is inward and dormant until the perfect circumstances occur to awaken it.  So all it takes are the tools to pinpoint it for further crafting and the desire to allow it to manifest for universal utilization.  And the amazing truth about these tools is that they are already within you.

Any upcoming release or tour your way?

Yes to the releases, and not at current on the tour front.  But to all my supporters, globally, I will be looking forward to making the Passport Tour official soon, so don't fret.  I want to take time to be fair to this venture I have finally accepted as ordained.  Let those that listen and support me and my art have adequate time to “see with their ears” before the visual entertainment aspect is approached.  That's out of respect and love for my supporters and exercising patience so every box is checked and no stones are skipped on my behalf. Pebbles are perfect for skipping, but if you skip a stone in life, you'll only get so far before you'll have to return to it, so if I'm going to do it, I'm going to make certain it's done right.  I’m not going anywhere; we’ll have a lifetime to connect.

As for upcoming releases, I recognize from projections that the bulk of my fan base and supporters (quite naturally) have been women.  So Kosher 2.0 will be liberated this fall along with J.C.L (Just Can't Leave).  Both were completed (the rough mixes) in 2015 so I have an archive of content.  To expound a bit on what I consider my archive, I've been writing quality lyrics since 1997 and there hasn't been a year that I haven't written at least 8 songs.  Some years begat upwards of 20, but never have I fallen below 8.  Now, as for performing, I had to extract myself from it and it's not like I was well known during that time, but life took its course and some things were put on hold.  Writing was never one of them.  I share this to inform my supporters that I have a lot of content to put out that will be somewhat toxic if released "as is"; it is who I was at whatever time period I created it....I didn't become The Elixir overnight.  But those experiences I was blessed to fulfill equates to the God Moore I am at current.

Anywhere online where curious fans can listen to your music and find out more about you?

Indeed, I'm on every major music and streaming platform globally for those who wish to listen to my art which can be found on Spotify, Tidal, Pandora, Deezer, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, iTunes, Apple Music, you name it, I'm there. Hopefully, we can provide a few quick links for convenience after the interview is concluded.

Also, if you are a supporter, you are considered a member of the New Freedom Guild.  Don’t be hesitant in connecting with me.  I’m not on all social platforms, so the connections will be more personal.  Link with me anytime and when I’m able and time is ample enough, I’ll respond whether it be directly or live.  God Moore is more than a name....it's a movement for positive growth and universal evolution.  My ulterior motives extend well beyond the realm of music….when you’re given the mental capacity to upgrade and change the world for the betterment of mankind, and you’re provided a platform and a supportive following, you may tend to cater to obedience.  Within the facets extending from forward-thinking to technological advancements, my impressions will manifest.  In time, the revelation of this claim will be appreciated.  Love you all.  I humbly do this for ALL.

Health, Peace, and Prosperity.

Want to listen to God Moore the Elixir:

Spotify

https://open.spotify.com/album/7ckAcuHwFfiOfV8pCOZ4bh

Tidal

https://tidal.com/artist/15657257

YouTube Music

https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lDAkCqc4uZiNcQki6Drqwv8HNPpOe-IJc

YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_k5ghJQF0RUxdt--KT_aD-sZ9seUs9giOc

Amazon Music

https://music.amazon.com/artists/B07R7XXTSV?ref=dm_sh_QbwmIjh3QlD0EM7fC8YPoXJnc

iTunes/Apple Music

https://music.apple.com/us/album/passport-ego-sum-qui-sum/1462118607

Twitter

@MooreElixir

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/in/god-moore-the-elixir-009882188

To generously support The Parsec Council and The New Freedom Guild in our mission of forward advancing our world.  I do shout outs on LinkedIn, Twitter, and on YouTube Live:

CashApp

$GodMooreTheElixir

GooglePay

godmooretheelixir@gmail.com

PayPal

https://www.paypal.me/GodMooreTheElixir

YouTube Live Channel

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU2GiMFC1WTuBXJlh-MfHuw

[dawnfelagund]

On Writing Aman, or the Balance between the Mythic and the Real

This essay was written for Back to Middle-earth Month 2017 for the orange/nonfiction path and the prompt “Worldbuilding.” It can also be read on the B2MeM community and the Silmarllion Writers’ Guild.

"In Valinor, all the days are beautiful."

This was the very first line I wrote in my very first serious Silmarillion fan fiction, Another Man's Cage . But I don't believe it. (Which is okay--those were Celegorm's words, not mine.) In fact, the twelve years of writing Silmarillion-based fiction could be seen as an exercise in proving Celegorm's sentiment here wrong.

Early feedback on the first draft of AMC largely focused on this point. A comment by JunoMagic (now SatisMagic) sums this up nicely:

What I think is most difficult about stories that are primarily concerned with Elves and Elves in Aman at that, is how to keep their inherent elvishness alive and present throughout the story, a feeling that this is not a story about another kind of men, but about a different kind of beings, however closely related they might be. (emphasis mine)

The challenge of writing not-wholly-human beings is hardly new to the fantasy genre. Ursula LeGuin's essay “From Elfland to Poughkeepsie” addresses it. "But the point about Elfland," she writes, "is that you are not at home there. It's not Poughkeepsie. It's different" (145). Most of LeGuin's essay focuses on style and the precarious process of achieving a style that sounds otherworldly without being distancing. But she takes jabs as well at fantasists who veer to close to the human and the our-worldly in their work:

The Lords of Elfland are true lords, the only true lords, the kind that do not exist on this earth: their lordship is the outward sign or symbol of real inward greatness. And greatness of soul shows when a man speaks. At least, it does in books. In life we expect lapses. In naturalistic fiction, too, we expect lapses, and laugh at an "overheroic" hero. But in fantasy, which, instead of imitating the perceived confusion and complexity of existence, tries to hint at an order and clarity underlying existence--in fantasy, we need not compromise. (148, emphasis mine)

So while LeGuin's essay is ostensibly about style, she also argues for characters of a "kind that do not exist on this earth," which is a profoundly different thing. This gets back to the early criticism of AMC: readers' unease with elements of the story that felt too "human" or "not Aman enough," like weapons and predators and Elves who pee. I think this unease is far less common now than it was ten years ago; I like to think that my generation of Silmfic writers had something to do with that, as did the shift away from Tolkien fan fiction as largely a practice by fans already deeply committed to the books (and the orthodoxy of mainstream Tolkien fandom) and toward participation by fans who came to the fandom through one of the film trilogies (as indeed I did). These fans bring practices common to Fanworks as a Whole but not necessarily the Tolkien fanworks community as it existed in its original online form, practices which seem to allow for an easier break with fanon and orthodox interpretive approaches to the texts. But the issue still remains: How does one worldbuild a place like Aman?

Juno's comment on AMC hints at this: The Elves of Aman are different and more difficult to write than Elves in general (who also pose their difficulties). Or: Aman is more of the rarefied, not-of-this-earth Elfland that LeGuin places at the heart of a successful fantasy story. I don't want to say that this is wrong--I admire both women as writers and thoughtful critics of fiction--but I also see this view as posing difficulties that LeGuin does not acknowledge in her essay. (Juno does, in her discussion with me back when.)

Successful fiction, for most people, requires a connection to something real, something they can relate to. (I know some people would disagree with this. But for most of us, reading a story that carries no connection to anything recognizable to us is not a pleasurable experience.) Tolkien recognized this. In his essay On Fairy-stories, he spoke of the necessity of an "inner consistency of reality" and noted, "The keener and clearer the reason, the better fantasy will it make," i.e., one must understand the rules of the world before remaking them (section "Fantasy"). The best of authors are, in many ways, the builders of bridges: They take recognizable human experiences or components of our familiar world and use them to bear us unwittingly across the chasm to an unfamiliar world or existence. Suddenly, sometimes without knowing how we arrived there, we look up to find ourselves existing (fictionally) as a person we detest or inhabiting an experience we knew nothing about--or living in a world not our own: an alien planet, an underworld, an Elfland.

The risk comes when that bridge is so tenuous, so frail that the crossing becomes difficult or even impossible, and we stand on the other side, looking into a world or existence as a character that we cannot really connect to. It isn't quite believable or real. Some might argue that is part of the point--LeGuin makes the case for escapism in her essay, which was a major component of Tolkien's theory of fantasy as well1--but escapism is far from the sole reason for reading or writing fantasy. In fact one could--and I would--make the claim that fantasy functions just as easily as a test environment for ideas that would perhaps stretch the bounds of belief if grounded in our world. Fantasy as a genre, after all, is defined primarily by the author's ability to bend the rules "just because." That allows for the stereotypical sorcery and dragons, of course, but it also allows authors to add gender equality or benevolent monarchs or immortality, or to explore the darker elements of what it means to be human--genocide, colonialism, and slavery are all present in The Silmarillion, for example--without exploiting or misrepresenting the experiences of actual victims of those things in our real world. Adding such elements provokes interesting questions about what it means to be human in our world without becoming so entangled in the complexities of real-world history and modern society and the emotions these things incite.

Which brings me back to the question of Aman and how best to write stories set in this otherworldly place. A good deal of it depends on your purpose for writing about Aman: Is it an escape? Or are you situating a recognizable human experience inside an otherworldly setting to see what comes of it?

For me, it is the latter, and not just because I find this the most meaningful type of fiction to write but because the material Tolkien gave me to work with suggests this approach. Earlier, I emphasized LeGuin's quote that "[t]he Lords of Elfland are true lords, the only true lords, the kind that do not exist on this earth: their lordship is the outward sign or symbol of real inward greatness" (148). If the magic of Elfland comes from language and style, then LeGuin is correct to hold up Tolkien as a master of "the genuine Elfland accent," but what she says here is a whole 'nuther animal, and had LeGuin had access to The Silmarillion--she wrote "From Elfland to Poughkeepsie" in 1973--then she might have been less confident in this assertion about the "true lords" of Elfland (148).

As a nascent Tolkien fan, I fell in love first with The Lord of the Rings and, when I reread it now, love it anew for reasons I need articulate to no fan of Tolkien. But what seized my heart and transported me fully to Middle-earth was The Silmarillion. I've spent thirteen years now writing stories about The Silmarillion, motivated largely by a desire to understand the flawed world and characters it presents. Most of my stories are set in Aman. This possibly seems contradictory: If I love flaws, then why would I set most of my work in "Elfland," in a place described as "blessed, for the Deathless dwelt there, and there naught faded nor withered, neither was there any stain upon flower or leaf in that land, nor any corruption or sickness in anything that lived; for the very stones and waters were hallowed" (Silmarillion, "Of the Beginning of Days")?

One doesn't have to look far to realize that this description is idealized. There is first of all Míriel Serindë, who not only sickened but died, right there in Valinor, in the most exalted of acts: giving birth to her child. Ungoliant dwelled "there in Avathar, secret and unknown," where "beneath the sheer walls of the mountains and the cold dark sea, the shadows were deepest and thickest in the world," in sight of Valmar and the Two Trees (Silmarillion, "Of the Darkening of Valinor"). Of course, Melkor lived there for many ages; the Silmarils, also described as "hallowed" ("Of the Silmarils"), burned his hand when he touched them, but he could abide the also (supposedly) "hallowed" Aman?

Aman isn't a flawless realm but a realm that carries a convincing veneer of flawlessness. This has been essential in my worldbuilding within the bounds of Aman. Over the years, I have given Aman universities, hunger, seaside resorts, a redlight district, and most recently, democracy. One of my favorite Tolkien resources of all time is Darth Fingon's “Twenty-Two Words You Never Thought Tolkien Would Provide” because it gives us a look beneath the veneer of Aman.

I believe this veneer takes strength to maintain that is not possible to sustain over the long term, even for the Ainur. We see this again and again in Tolkien's world--Doriath, Gondolin, Nargothrond, Númenor, Imladris, Lothlórien, all isolated and protected places that eventually fall or wither with time--but Aman is rarely included as such a place. We assume Aman had genuine sublimity--not least of all because many of the realms on the list above imitate Aman; not least of all because it is the creation of the divine and eternal Ainur--but I'm not sure that the land that harbored Ungoliant can be labeled as ideal. The illusion is tattered, and reality is bound to enter in.

In my stories, the effort to keep up the veneer of perfection means that the further one is from Valinor proper--from the part of the realm most carefully constructed and maintained by the Valar--the more ordinary the realm appears. This is based in the fact that Ungoliant's unnoticed occupancy of Avathar--which including weaving vast, black, light-sucking webs among the mountains there--seems at least partially predicated on the fact that it is "far south of great Taniquetil" where the "Valar were not vigilant" (Silmarillion, "Of the Darkening of Valinor"). However, in the same passage, both Melkor and Ungoliant are described as able to descry the Light of the Trees and other features of Valinor; they don't seem to be that far away. The power of the Valar may be more limited than the idealist description of Valinor in the text would suppose and doesn't seem to extend across the extent of Aman. I have used this same idea in my stories about Aman: As one journeys further from the epicenter, the veneer of perfection thins and then disappears altogether. Formenos in the north, in my stories, is set in a part of the land with seasons, including winter, and predators that residents warn their children against. These elements of my depiction of Aman were among those questioned by early readers of my work.

Likewise, some of the residents of Aman were born in Middle-earth and their personalities shaped in the crucible of the early conflicts with Melkor. Aman, therefore, could hardly guarantee an edenic existence for the Eldar, innocent of the knowledge of grief, violence, and death; rather, the Elves who came to Aman doubtlessly brought with them both survival skills and trauma from their tenure in darkened Middle-earth. This is an idea that is frequently explored by Silmarillion writers (including me) in the context of sexuality: Before the laws of the Valar were imposed upon them, the Elves would have had a more naturalistic and lenient view of sex. Without delving beyond its title, Laws and Customs among the Eldar is just that: among the Eldar, and this choice of wording from the semantically fastidious Tolkien feels deliberate and laden with potential meaning. But the presence of Elves from Middle-earth--including all of the leaders of the Eldar in Aman--presents significance beyond sex. Weapons are an issue I wrote about as early as AMC--proposing, somewhat in defiance of canon, that Elves in Aman possessed swords as historical artifacts and also for athletic pursuits--that drew criticism then, at least in part because what use have the people of Aman for weapons? I say that allowing swords to certain groups of Eldar in Aman is "somewhat" in defiance of canon because Tolkien himself waffled on this issue, seeing the question of weapons as a potential plot hole.2 He concluded that it was unreasonable to expect that they didn't possess weapons on the Great Journey. Consider this implications of this. Into the so-called Deathless Realm came Elves experienced in making and using weapons, whose minds most likely devised of instruments of death and violence on their own, possibly among their first creative acts. How is such a culture shaped by the of reality life in Middle-earth, illuminated only by the stars and under duress of an enemy too strong and cunning even for the Valar? How is that effect amplified when those who endured such an experience do not die, leaving their descendents to progress into a more pacific existence without them, but retain that formative mindset, those skills and those traumas, into the ages?

But trauma does not end with those born outside of Aman. Events within Aman wreak havoc upon those likewise born within its borders: In fact, that they occur in Aman seems an inescapable component of the trauma.

Perhaps the most salient example of this is Fëanor. Fëanor lost his mother and watched the Valar bend the rules to allow his father to remarry, ensuring in the process that Míriel could never be reborn. These events alone would have been potentially traumatic. But consider how their occurrence in Aman of all places compounds that trauma, adding a sort of insult to injury, as Fëanor doubtlessly progressed through his life hearing how fortunate the Elves were to live in the safety of the "deathless realm." His own experience would have been very different, and it must have been painful or galling to hear Aman celebrated while understanding that ideal was only a veneer--a concept doubtlessly controversial, if not impossible, to articulate.

Likewise, the conflict in the House of Finwë is worsened by its happening in Aman. When Fëanor draws his sword on Fingolfin, he is accused primarily of having "broken the peace of Valinor and drawn his sword upon his kinsman"; almost as an afterthought, Námo Mandos adds that the "deed was unlawful, whether in Aman or not in Aman," but it is hard to imagine Fëanor would have received a penalty so severe anywhere else (Silmarillion, "Of the Silmarils"). The primary transgression seems to be manifesting an emotion--expressed through the powerful symbolism of the drawn sword--that belies the illusion of a land without corruption. The cauldron of circumstances that produced this rash act are not examined in any meaningful way; instead, the rash actor is hidden away in the name of restoring peace--or at least the illusion of it.

Taken together, I believe that worldbuilding Aman as an "Elfland" as LeGuin understands it is a fundamental flaw. The lords of Aman are the very ones we see on earth: They are idealistic to the point of naïveté (the Valar); they want what they don't have (Finwë); they are jealous, vulnerable, angry, in pain (Fëanor). One can extrapolate outward from these supposedly greatest of the residents of Aman to assume that the land is not as impeccable as the rhapsodizing of the narrator of The Silmarillion would have us believe. To look no further than the dust of diamonds upon one's shoes in walking there, to never glimpse the faces of those who dwell there and what hides behind their eyes, is to be so dazzled by a beautiful illusion as to miss what matters.

Notes

1. On escapism as a motive for fantasy see Tolkien's essay On Fairy-stories, in the section "Recovery, Escape, Consolation":

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which "Escape" is now so often used … Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if, when he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?

2. On the question of weapons in Aman, see The History of Middle-earth, Vol. X: Morgoth's Ring, The Annals of Aman, note on §97 (page 106 in the hardcover edition). Tolkien originally stated that "Melkor spoke to the Eldar concerning weapons, which they had not before possessed or known," then emphatically argued with himself in a marginal note: "No! They must have had weapons on the Great Journey," concluding that they had "weapons of the chase, spears and bows and arrows." Swords may be a step too far for some people--although Tolkien's own inconclusiveness on this issue leaves me feeling it is far from carved in stone--but weapons in Aman certainly were not.