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an-absolute-travesty · 4 years

Text

Secret Santa fic!

Heya @all-eternity it was me all along! I hope you enjoy this :) very much looking foward to actually being able to follow you after this without looking sketchy lmao

Also shoutout to my lovely beta reader @keepersandqueens as if I don’t talk about Salas enough here lol

Warnings: underage drinking, drinking in general, hangover, drugs/medication mention (not abused, basic over the counter stuff dw), mentions of vomit (not described)

Pairings: Kam, background marelinh, ex titz

About: Kam coffee shop college au

Word count: 5,205

Tag list (tell me if you want to be added or removed): @cadence-talle @ruewen-and-rising @lemontarto @a-lonely-tatertot @clearlyvacksen @percabetn @sewersewersewercouch @everyonehasthoughts @imaramennoodle @enbies-and-felonies @blxckh0les42 @rainbowtay-11 @callas-starkflower-stew @impostertamsong @appalyneinstitute1 @stars-and-splendor @anna-without-an-e @mistythegenderqueermess @we-have-no-bananas-today @we-wont-dissapear @jadenightthewriter

Tam stumbled into his first 8 am class, anxiety making his heart feel like it was pounding out of his chest and stomach doing backflips.

If he could survive bouncing between foster homes, a short stint at juvie, and worst of all high school, he could survive college.

Well he thought he could until he saw a familiar person right next to the only available chair in the room.

God fucking damn it.

"Hey Bangs Boy!" Keefe waved him down, causing a scene. Tam had no option but to sit beside him, both because of the lack of chairs and the fact that everyone was now staring at him.

Not a great start.

"What a coincidence! I notice you still haven't taken my suggestions on your hair, I'm telling ya' you'd get all the girls and or guys and nonbinary pals with a man bun." Keefe looked smug at the fact he'd be able to taunt Tam for another semester, minimum. Tam was already making a mental note to check when he could swap out of classes.

"Keefe, if I knew you were going here I would've just gotten myself back in jail, oh wait, you were the one who got me in there in the first place." Tam shot him a look, praying that he'd suddenly develop superpowers and shoot lasers from his eyes.

"Hey, just because I came up with the idea...and helped with some of the execution, doesn't mean I'm responsible for you trashing your parents house. Besides, you were only in there for like 3 days max before you got out," Keefe said, shrugging as if 3 days in jail was no biggie.

"Most peaceful 3 days of my life," Tam sneered, turning back to the front of the room as the professor walked in.

"Good morning class!" the prof turned to the white board, writing his name. "I am Dr. Harding," he tapped it for emphasis.

The class was silent.

"And you say good mor..."

"Good morning Dr. Harding," The class said in unison, they all sounded tired and bored.

This wasn't going to be fun.

~*~

"Grande ice vanilla latte for...Hen-are-y?"

The man shot Keefe a look as he grabbed his coffee.

"Henry." He dropped a tip in the jar, fifty cents. How generous.

He had come in before, and never left good tips. Keefe made it a game to pronounce the names of anyone who wasn't a college student and left bad tips wrong, no matter how much they came in. It was a wonder he hadn't been fired yet.

As he turned preparing another drink, the bell at the top of the door rang. He ignored it at first until he heard a quiet, "Fuck," come from behind.

"Bangs boy!"

"Why are you here?"

"I work here obviously," Keefe walked up to the counter. "Now, what'll it be?"

Tam sighed. "Iced caramel macchiato with two extra shots of espresso."

"Size?"

"Venti."

Keefe whistled thinking about how much caffeine that was as he wrote down "Bangs Boy" on the cup.

"Alright, that'll be 5.75, may I ask why the insane amount of coffee? I believe I remember you saying caffeine makes you anxious in high school."

"Yes, but it also helps me focus, and I have a quiz tomorrow I haven't studied for."

"Fair enough," Keefe said, going to prepare the drink. "It'll be ready in five."

Tam nodded, walking off to the side and scrolling on his phone. Keefe made the drink, occasionally sneaking looks over at Tam. He didn't seem to notice, thank God.

Soon after, they finished the transaction.

"See you at class," Keefe said, he was trying to be genuine, but it came across more taunting.

Tam grimaced, muttered "Thanks for the coffee," and walked out the door.

~*~

The class fell silent as a disheveled Dr. Harding walked in, a pack of gatorade in one hand and bottle of tylenol in the other. He popped one as he sat down.

"Hello class it seems today I have the worst headache imaginable, just give me about 5 minutes of silence and we will go over your assignments."

Keefe leaned over to Tam's desk.

"Well, we know what he got into last night," he whispered. "Heard the bar on the corner of 5th was giving out two for ones for professors."

"Isn't that place run by the alumni?"

"Exactly. Gotta thank Alvar tomorrow, Fitz said it was his idea."

"Wait Fitz goes here too? Why did I not-"

"Boys!" Dr. Harding practically yelled. "I am tired of the racket." He put his face in his hands where his elbows rested on the desk, bald spot showing to the world.

"We were whispering!" Keefe made a 'what the hell' sort of gesture. Tam glared at him, hoping he could communicate 'I will kill you myself if you say another word' with just his eyes.

"Sencen, do I look like I care?"

Keefe winced a bit at the use of his last name. That was something Tam could understand.

"Look, boys," Dr. Harding stood up and turned to the chalkboard, writing something down. "If you all like talking so much, you'll love this next project."

He walked to the side, revealing the board, that read '10 page essay, due the 25th'

"With the person next to you, you'll be writing a 10 page essay on um...the importance of keeping your oil changed in your car. You'll then present it to the class. It's worth 25 points."

A student raised their hand.

"Luka?"

"Sir, I thought this was a psychology course?"

"It is. You are all excused."

With that, he left the room with his tylenol and gatorade in his arms. The students glared at Keefe and Tam as they all got up, muttering amongst themselves about the pure bullshittery of it all.

"So..." Keefe said, slowly standing. "Does the library tomorrow at 3 work? I have work until then, so it can't be any earlier."

"Yeah, sure." Tam promptly walked out of the classroom as fast as possible, he didn't know why but his anxiety was spiking. He tried to tell himself it was just because he was a useless gay that didn't know jackshit about cars, yeah, surely that was it.

Just a useless gay.

~*~

Tam waited at a table in the library, it was 3:05, Keefe was late.

He didn't know what else he expected from him, he always seemed to do stuff like this. At the same time, Tam didn't have the energy to be particularly mad at him. This was going to be the stupidest essay ever written in the history of man, might as well put it off.

The library door slammed open, and in came Keefe. He balanced a large stack of papers and books along with four drinks. He stumbled over to Tam and practically threw them down on the table.

"Sorry I'm late, I thought it would be nice to, like, get you a coffee, but I didn't know how much caffeine you wanted, so I got one decaf caramel macchiato, one normal, and one with an extra shot, and also hot chocolate for me."

He sat down in the chair by Tam, as if getting three different coffees for someone you were forced to do a project with was totally normal.

"Um...thanks, I-I can pay you back-"

"Don't worry about it." Keefe turned to him and smiled, bright and friendly. Tam was frozen. "Okay, now it's car time." Keefe turned back to the desk.

"Yeah."

They were silent for a while as they researched, Keefe going through his piles of papers and books and Tam on his laptop like any sane person would.

Tam finally worked up the nerve to talk.

"So um...this is out of nowhere, but I think you mentioned Fitz went here?"

"Oh, yeah." Keefe put down the absurdly large textbook that was set up in front of him. "He's my roommate, he uh thought it would be best not to tell you after everything, I guess."

"That's fine," Tam shrugged like he didn't care. "I'm over it."

He was, really. They only dated like 2 weeks, sure it ended with a...pretty big fight after Fitz claimed he wouldn't be able to date someone who had gone to jail and Tam reminded him it was his best friend that got him in there in the first place, but he was still over it. There was still something bothering him, nothing to do with Fitz himself but...something. He just couldn't put his finger on what.

"Alright, I'll take your word." Keefe shrugged, setting his giant book back up in front of him.

Tam felt the need to start talking again, but didn't. They were mostly silent for the next 40 minutes or so, just researching and the occasional word exchanged between them.

Keefe checked his phone.

"Shit," He got up. "Work emergency, I gotta go. Same time tomorrow?"

"Yeah that works."

"Chill, see ya' later."

"Bye."

Keefe waved (with a wide grin Tam would've called idiotic in high school) as he went out the door.

Tam found himself with a smile on his own face, he quickly stopped, hoping no one saw.

~*~

Keefe hurried into work, pulling his apron on as he saw the absurdly long line and a panicked Marella frantically making coffees behind the counter. She sighed with relief when she saw him.

"Thank God," She said as he stepped behind the counter with her. "There was a scheduling error, Forkle's useless at that stuff."

Mr. Forkle, their well-meaning but often mistaken manager, was out of town at the moment. The fate of the Starbucks rested on two college kids, what could go wrong.

And so they went, Keefe taking orders and Marella fulfilling them until there were no more to serve.

Marella, quite literally, threw in a towel she had wiped her face with. Promptly going to the back, presumably for her break. Keefe followed her.

"Alright, I think you can probably go back to whatever you were doing before this now if you'd like," said Marella, inspecting the small braids in her hair in the nearest shiny surface.

"Nah I was just doing a project with Tam for Harding's stupid class, he's probably left by now, I might as well rack up some overtime."

Marella turned back at him, clearly caught off guard at the name.

"Tam? As in my-girlfriend's-brother Tam? As in you-had-a-massive-crush-on-in-highschool Tam? As in dated-Fitz Tam? As in you-got-him-in-jail-"

"Yes! Yes! Why does everyone remind me of that, it was one time."

"When you get someone in jail, people tend to remember," Marella went silent for a second, thinking, before looking Keefe in the eye. "Wow, that must be awkward as hell, I mean seriously, if I were you I'd straight up file a restraining order just to avoid him. Maybe move to another country. I hear Estonia is lovely this time of year."

"Eh, it's not as bad as it seems. I mean it was awful at first, mostly because I tried to resume right where we left it on the taunting front, but I think it's ok now."

"Hm. Well good luck with that," Marella turned back to go to the front, but Keefe grabbed her arm to stop her.

"Uh, actually I need your advice on something. It has to do with Tam."

"Shoot."

"Well I was thinking of maybe, I don't know, asking him out or something? Look, yeah, it's an awful idea but is it 'he never wants to talk to me again' awful or 'he attempts to strangle me' awful?"

Marella looked him up and down, eyes uncomfortably cold, as usual.

"I mean, no hetero, but despite your annoying qualities you're a decent looking guy. Plus Tam's, like, super anxious according to Linh, so maybe he'll be too awkward to say no. You can probably squeeze at least one date in there."

"Wow, thanks Mare," Keefe mumbled, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Yes, I try. Also don't call me Mare."

"Alright Ella!" Keefe called as the front door's bell rang, signalling a new customer. Marella went off to take care of it, unable to respond she growled back at him.

~*~

Tap tap tap tap tap.

Tam glared from across the table.

Tap tap tap tap tap tap.

"Why do you keep doing that?"

Keefe looked up, muttered a simple "Fidgety" and went right back to it, tapping his pen against the table. Tam said nothing more.

Keefe had been quiet for this entire meeting, something highly unusual for him.

"Ok, seriously dude, what's up? I haven't seen you this quiet literally ever."

He only seemed to get more fidgety at this question, his bouncing leg shaking the library table.

"I...um..." he looked down, running a hand through his hair "I have a test I need to cram for and no one to study with and keep me accountable. Y'know, ADHD issues."

Tam didn't overthink for once in his life but the moment the sentence was out of his mouth he regretted it.

"I have a test too, maybe we could study together?"

Keefe smiled his annoyingly charming smile.

"Sounds good."

"Good."

Tam quickly looked back down at his computer, trying to look like he was still doing car research when in actuality he was processing he just actively offered to spend more time with Keefe Sencen.

If Linh found out about this he'd never live it down.

He didn't think he cared.

~*~

Dr. Harding walked through the classroom door, clearly much less hungover than his last appearance.

The students waited, would they get an apology? Any sort of remorse?

"Alright, who wants to read first?"

Apparently not.

Keefe raised his hand with too much confidence for what their essay looked like. Tam gave him a confused look. He had his scheming face on, never good.

"Mr. Sencen!" Keefe winced at the use of his last name by the doctor. "What an amazing start, it's only appropriate. One of you boys come up and present."

Tam gave Keefe a look of 'do you want me to do it?' Keefe just smiled and got up from his chair. This would either be really good or really, really bad. Tam was all too familiar with the scheme face.

"Doc, I did depart from the source material a bit here, hope you don't mind. And I use 'I' because Tam had no involvement in this, he deserves full points for his essay."

Keefe cleared his throat, the room was so silent you could hear a pin drop.

"Doctor Harding deserves to get fired: an essay. (And it's only been a week!) Paragraph one, his drinking problem-"

"Sencen! Back to your seat now. I will see you after class, or I will not see you in my next class, understand?"

Keefe gave a thumbs up as he sat back on his chair with a thud.

A few minutes later, in the middle of another student's essay, he passed Tam a note with his loopy handwriting.

"The amount of comebacks I had for 'see me after class' is absurd but if I get kicked out there's no way Elwin is helping me pay tuition a second time."

Tam tried not to smile, certainly failing, as he wrote his response.

"Yeah I think the time you talked back to Miss Cadence she wanted to expel you. Lucky Principal Alina had a thing for pseudo-dad Alden."

"Oh God I haven't talked to him in a whiiiiiile."

"?"

"You haven't heard? Yeah, he sorta found out like ALL his kids were ell gee bee tees and freaked out. Della found herself a new gf though!"

"Sounds like a lovely extra punch in the gut for a queerphobe."

"Yep. Honestly I recommend looking through his Facebook sometime. Just a million rants about how the gays destroy everything, great entertainment."

"Duly noted."

At that point it seemed like the doctor started to take notice of their note passing, and they stopped quickly. Tam wouldn't be surprised if he did the whole high school read in front of the class thing with the way he had been acting so far.

Tam was 100% sure tenure was the only thing keeping this guy's job intact. Apparently being a drunk asshole wasn't near enough to get a person out of their position. He tried to ignore the professor's annoyingly smug face for the rest of the class.

~*~

Keefe sat in his usual spot at the library, Tam sitting across from him, his brown eyes dancing across the textbook page and lips mumbling along the words. He didn't have much to do, often finding himself just staring at Tam, quickly looking away if he seemed to notice.

Eventually he sighed, sitting back.

"Ugh, this test is in a week and I have so much other crap to do, I'll never get this all memorized by Friday."

Keefe silently thanked his brain for managing to get around the having to study thing. Yay, photographic memory!

"Oh, uh, well I'm free to study more tomorrow if that would help? We could do, like, flashcards or something."

Tam seemed to repress a smile. He did that a lot. Keefe always noticed.

"That's okay, I'm sure you have better things to do. The Starbucks is always pretty packed."

"Eh, sometimes you have to get away from Marella. She's mean to me."

"Not just you, once she told me if I ever made fun of Linh's cat's name again she'd make me cut off my own bangs."

Keefe nodded sagely. "The shorter you are the closer to hell. That's why you're worse than her."

"Hey!"

Tam flicked a stray rubber band at Keefe.

"I'm at least 2 inches taller than Marella...we measured."

Keefe thought up about 12 inappropriate jokes he couldn't make before flicking the rubber band back.

"Two inches only counts in roller coasters, none of which you can ride."

Tam stuck his tongue out before returning to his studies. Unlike Tam, Keefe didn't hide his smile.

~*~

Tam strolled into the Starbucks that Friday morning, no longer surprised to see Keefe working the counter. He could barely hold still in line as he thought about the amount of cramming he'd have to do in the next few hours.

When he reached the counter, Keefe said nothing, just busily worked making a drink.

He stuck it right out at Tam.

"One venti iced caramel macchiato with 2 extra shots of espresso because you have a test today in political science and still haven't studied everything and also a muffin because you probably haven't eaten today. On the house. Good luck with the studying."

Tam froze.

"I- um- th-thaks. Y-you too...sport."

Oh, you fucking idiot.

He quickly scurried out of the Starbucks with drink and muffin in hand. Wow, he had screwed that up.

But...

Keefe...

He...

He remembered his order and that he had a test and that he forgot to eat when he was stressed holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit-

Okay, deep breaths Tam, you got this. You can totally handle a frustratingly cute guy showing care for you this is fine...

Not fine, not fine, gotta tell Linh.

He called Linh with no forewarning. Despite the fact that she was currently across the country at a different university, and it was about 3 am for her, she picked up. He barely let her get out a groggy "Hello?" before explaining everything. She only seemed to think a moment before responding.

"Hm. Well it's good to know that college is going good for you. Do you need advice or comfort?"

"Yes."

"Well, first of all, everything's gonna be okay. And I know that doesn't help much but just try to remember we're eighteen, and it's not the end of the world. Second of all, try to ask him out or something. It doesn't have to be framed as a date, like Marella and I got together on a walk in the park, seriously it can be anything."

"Thanks Linh."

"No problem, also can you hug Marella for me?"

"If she doesn't try to kill me first, yes."

"Nice. Okay go do what you gotta do, also don't wake me up at 3 am again or else I'll sic Purryfins on you, I had just gone to bed."

With that she hung up and Tam continued on his way, still trying to not completely freak out.

~*~

Keefe stared blankly as Tam walked right out of the door. Marella appeared by his arm.

"So, how'd it go?"

"Well, he called me 'sport'."

Marella inhaled through her teeth.

"Yikes. Comfort, advice, or distraction?"

"Distraction, please." Keefe replied, absent-mindedly preparing a cup for the next customer.

"Uh, well I meant to ask you what ended up happening with that ass of a teacher, but I got a bit distracted at your attempt to woo Tam-"

"Hey I said distraction not reminder. But basically I just got a slap on the wrist because, and I quote, 'Your father is Cassius Sencen! He wrote half the books we use in this class, I'm sure he can straighten you out!'"

"There's absolutely nothing papa Sencen could do to make you straight, I'm pretty sure he tried that, and it obviously didn't work."

"He actually tried a few times and it most definitely did not. Lucky he doesn't have my number anymore or else I assure you he'd keep trying."

Marella laughed.

"Well, moving on from grade A assholes, I'm supposed to tell you there's a party tonight. I'll have to send you the address later, I have it on my phone though, I am told there's gonna be booze, so I'm going."

"Eh, I'll probably go. Just to get my mind off everything."

"Thata boy." She lifted her phone. "And my shifts over in three, two, one, and I am out of here! See ya' tonight Hunkyhair."

"That's Lord Hunkyhair to you."

She just rolled her eyes and clocked out, leaving Keefe to deal with both the customers and his own thoughts.

~*~

Tam sat in his dorm room alone, constantly refreshing his grades for the possibility that his 70-year-old professor would post the test results at 1:30 am.

His roommate was gone for the weekend, actually he was gone most of the time. Tam didn't think they'd even had a full conversation before.

He jumped as his phone began to ring, a call from Keefe of all people. He hesitantly picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Tam! Tam Tam Tam Tam Tam" Keefe's slurred speech was too loud for a phone call, Tam held his phone a bit away from his ear. "...fuck wait why did I call you..."

There was a long pause, neither said anything.

"Oh yeah! I needed to tell you something...but uh I uhm I forgot what it was."

"Keefe, where are you?"

"At a paaaaaarty, well, actually just outside a party because it was hot in there, but now it's cold out here so uh yeah."

Tam sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Okay, send me the address, I'm coming to pick you up. Wait right there and don't move."

"Okie dokie."

Tam heard a thud sort of sound and the rustling of grass from the other line before Keefe hung up and soon after got a message of his location.

After 20 minutes of walking in the cold, Tam came up to what seemed to be a frat house with Keefe sitting on the lawn in criss-cross, patiently waiting in short sleeves and basketball shorts, way too little clothing for the weather. His ruddy face smiled as he saw Tam approach.

"Tam! I remembered what I was going to tell you." He stood up, face falling right after. "Oh no wait I forgot again. Ooh! You need a drink."

Keefe grabbed Tam's hand, pulling him towards the house. Tam stayed in place.

"Hey, let's get you home dude."

Keefe pouted.

"I don't wannaaaa."

He slouched down, pulling on Tam's arm like a child having a tantrum.

Tam pulled him back up to his feet.

"C'mon, if you go to your dorm without fuss I'll buy you ice cream tomorrow."

Keefe seemed much more ok with going along with Tam with the ice cream deal. He pulled off his own coat and placed it around the very drunk boy, he didn't complain.

Keefe began humming some annoying song from the early 2000s that was playing from the house earlier as they walked back in the direction of the dorms.

Suddenly, Tam remembered something.

Fitz was Keefe's roommate.

Shit.

"Hey uh do you think Fitz is at your dorm?"

Keefe nodded confidently.

"Yep! Said he was gon' study. Wouldn't come to the party because of his 'reputation' or whatever."

Around reputation he did exaggerated finger quotes, nearly knocking Tam's jacket off his shoulders.

"Hm...in that case let's go to my dorm, ok?"

Keefe shrugged, apparently willing to go along with most things in his current state. Thank goodness Linh had made Tam bring extra pillows and blankets to college, he could sleep on the floor and just hope Keefe didn't get sick on him in the night.

It was ridiculously hard to lead Keefe back to his dorm. He tried to pull down his pants halfway there and Tam almost had to carry him up the stairs but soon enough they got there. He sighed with relief as he led his inebriated friend into the room.

"Okay, you can stay here for the night. I'll sleep on the floor."

Keefe plopped himself down on Tam's bed laying flat for only a moment before sitting up with a snap and a look of realization in his eyes.

"OOH! I remember what I was gonna tell you again!"

"Oh?" Tam said playing along, expecting him to forget again.

He patted the spot next to him on the bed, Tam continued to play along, sitting next to him.

"So Marella said that I should just tell you this, and it worked for her, so I'm gonna. And uh and you have to promise to listen 'cause I'm not sayin' it again."

At this point Keefe grabbed his face with both hands, staring right in Tam's eyes and squishing his cheeks.

"You're listening right?"

Tam nodded, mostly to shake Keefe's hands off his face.

"Okay."

Keefe took in an over dramatic breath as if he was preparing to preform in the Olympics before getting another grin on his face.

"I really like you."

"You really like me?"

He nodded mumbling "mhm".

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I like you. Like, like like you."

"Like...as a friend?"

"I said I wasn't gonna repeat myself. As a booooyfriend." At this point Keefe fell back on the bed, looking at the ceiling. Tam's cheeks were burning.

"How long have you liked me like that?"

"Mmmm..." Keefe seemed to ponder for a moment, "Prolly high school."

"Oh um...good to know. You should get some rest. I'll be down here if you need me."

"Alrighty."

Tam shut off the lights and Keefe started snoring quick. Tam could only stare up in the darkness, unable to sleep.

~*~

Keefe woke up that morning in a room he didn't recognize to a killer headache and dead phone.

He turned to the side, seeing a pile of blankets and pillows with a large gatorade, bottle of tylenol, and a note next to it. Suddenly last nights memories came flooding back.

Oh, shit.

He scrambled out of bed, headache and nausea hitting him harder as he stood up.

Despite the fact his head was spinning, he picked up the note from the ground and read it.

Hey, meet me at the reservoir around 6, we need to talk -Tam

F. U. C. K.

Had he really said all that stuff last night? Surely it was a dream, right?

Oh God.

He gathered his few belongings, plus the things to help the hangover, and left the dorms as fast as possible. Only having to stop once along the way to throw up in one of the campus trash cans, hopefully no one would notice.

Keefe didn't have anything to do and he really didn't want to face Fitz so he went about his day in last nights clothing. Then again, it was a college campus. Someone walking around with rumpled clothes carrying a gatorade probably wasn't that big of a deal for most people. By 5:30 he sat impatiently in the empty park where the reservoir was located, it was colder closer to the water.

Just as promised, at 6 o'clock he saw Tam approaching on the horizon.

~*~

Tam was damn near a panic attack as he walked around the park attempting to find Keefe. Eventually he found him, sitting on a bench still in his clothes from last night, face once again ruddy from the cold. He sat next to him wordlessly.

"So," Keefe started.

"So," Tam replied, looking down at his lap.

"Tam I-" Keefe turned to face him. "I'm sorry about everything last night, I probably just made everything super awkward. Not to mention it's a giant violation of the friend code to even have a crush on your best friend's ex-"

"Yeah, about that."

"What?"

"You're gonna maybe kill me for this but uh," Tam pulled on his bangs. "I sorta talked to Fitz about it, I figured you wouldn't and apparently I was right. He said he was okay with it as long as we were ok with it."

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?"

Tam sighed, "Perhaps."

Keefe once again wore that shit-eating grin of his.

"Can I hear you say it?"

"Why don't you have to say it?"

"Already said it last night! Your turn now. Why did you take care of me while I was drunk?"

Keefe stared at Tam excitedly waiting for the answer. Tam sighed.

"Because I love you, little shit."

"Ooh you said it-"

Tam smashed his lips against Keefe's, both quickly melting into it. After only a moment they pulled away.

"Agh, you taste like gatorade and vomit."

"Well you taste like salt so really what's worse."

"Definitely the vomit."

Despite this, Tam leaned back in. This kiss was a moment longer than the last, and when Tam pulled away Keefe chased it.

"Ok, look I'm sorry but you look like shit Keefe you have to go change." Tam removed his jacket, throwing it around Keefe once again and helping him up from the bench. Keefe laughed.

"Yeah, you're right. Ooh now that we're a thing you need a new nickname!"

"I do?"

"You do, how about 'Bangs Boyf' ooh or maybe you can be my 'provoked partner' or my 'snappy spouse' my 'agitated accomplice' perhaps."

"Do you just have these ready and prepared for any situation?"

"A magician never reveals his secrets."

"You aren't Houdini, you're an 18-year-old boy that currently reeks of frat party."

"Eh that's basically the same thing. I've seen some 18-year-olds at frat parties preform tricks Houdini could never dream of."

Tam sighed dramatically. "It's a good thing you're pretty, you know."

"Hey!" Keefe jokingly shoved him.

For the first time Tam's smile wasn't repressed.

#hope you like this elliot!#kotlc #keeper of the lost cities #kam #keefe sencen #tam song #kotlc fic #scheduled to post at 9 am and ill reblog once i get back to my phone because ill be doing x-mas stuff

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onewomancitadel · 3 years

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News update! I’ve completed registering for at least the necessary classes and I’m having an appointment with my program and college counselors to confirm with them. One of my classes for the PE credit is rock climbing lol. On the other hand, I’ve just realized a huge flaw with my characters... I can’t write personalities for shit. I do not remember writing to be this hard so there’s that. How are you by the way?

Yay! It always works out in the end, one way or another. Rock climbing sounds pretty cool. If we had that at my uni I imagine people would be a lot happier. Good luck with starting your course! I want to give advice because I'm almost at the end of mine, but to be honest you should just try to enjoy yourself and make sure to do the readings for class. Lol.

I think in terms of writing advice and personalities, the thing most effective for me personally is daydreaming. The other is to sit down and collect character quotes (transcribed) and rewatch their scenes. That's more for cadence and word-choice, but it works in deconstructing their character as well. But daydreaming, I listen to music a lot and I reimagine scenarios to make them fit what I think should happen. I also think sometimes 'writing advice' can be really constraining. For instance, I had this issue with my current fic where I was like 'but reasonably, in Cinder's character she would do x and it's expected that x is morally explored' but then I realised there was absolutely zero chance she would open up about x yet, so yes, it is a genuine consideration and it is a thing that needs to be addressed narratively, but there is no chance of it happening because of her character.

Also, because the scenario of Cinder rescuing twelve children is sort of a humourous sight - or like, she keeps finding them - I would lean hard into the vaguely cracky but also emotionally sincere direction. Cinder is also sarcastic, and emotionally guarded, so it's possible to pull off. It would also be funny if her next immediate thought after trying to help them is like 'okay I need somebody RESPONSIBLE. Who's responsible? Jaune. He has sisters. Right?' Like, in that sense I'd also lean into some emotionally sincere clumsiness on her part.

You should be having fun too. I would also sit down and do some reading research. The best writing advice is to read. Or I mean, you can do that with the show itself too. I also think about each scene I write as a wheel, and the wheel has beats of tension I need to hit, and when it completes a revolution that's bit of the spokes which make up the larger engine. Yeah. So when I think about constructing a scene, I think about each character's purpose, personality, goals/motivations, what's stopping them and what's making them go, that type of thing. Obviously you have the foundation in your fic that Cinder wants to help children because they're in the situation she was in, but how does she rationalise that to herself? What's the next step after trying to help them? It makes sense she'd be desperate enough to turn to Jaune, or at least team R/WBY. Like she rescues them and tries to fob them off onto them. (Not sure what stage Cinder is at in your story re: her emotions and being evil).

So I would also structure your story according to revolutions, what beats you want to hit, and how that should interact with the romance (which is the superstructure). Also, daydreaming. Music! I keep rethinking and revisiting a scene over and over again until I get it right, and like, yeah this is fun and I do this whilst cleaning and exercising, lol.

And to answer your final question: I'm ok thank you! I've got to get a complete draft of my thesis in soon, so I'm working on that over the next week, but the hardest assessment (the presentations and essay all grouped in the same week) is over, so I'm really relieved right now. I just need to knuckle down and stay on top of stuff. Otherwise, outside of uni, constantly homesick lol, I also haven’t seen my mates in ages but I try to distract myself as best I can. Lavender is growing well. Roses won't be coming in yet for a month, but we've had two seasons of them now already and they were absolutely riotous in colour and scent.

Hope you are doing well, best of luck with college and your fic! You can do it!

#ask #user: iressent #fic writing

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jamestaylorswift · 4 years

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1 different interpretation of “the 1”

A companion piece to this.

When I first heard “the 1,” I got a rather intense musical itch. Consider this essay to be me scratching it. Enjoy, or don’t, and thanks for reading!

Note: I’ve tried my best to simplify some technical parts music theory, but my sincerest apologies in advance if the translation still seems clunky. My hope is that if this essay doesn’t make musical sense to you, it will at least make linguistic sense. The only prerequisite knowledge you need is that scales exist and a song is made from minor and major chords.

——

There are a shocking number of connections between “peace” and “the 1.” One of my favorites is a very subtle musical one. Like “peace,” I propose that “the 1” could be imagined as a conversation. The difference in perspective is again telegraphed by what the piano and bass are doing.

Here are some musical facts about ”the 1:”

This song is in the key of C major, which means that the C major chord is the sonic ‘home base.’ It is is the chord to which every other one ‘resolves,’ or quite literally returns. (In fact, this chord accounts for exactly half the chords in the song.)

The verses and prechoruses are constructed with two alternating chords, (1) either F major or D minor, and then (2) C major. This creates a kind of ‘push and pull’ effect, of harmonic tension and release. (You don’t need any musical training to feel this effect. Just focus on the first 10-ish seconds of the song.)

All of the chords in the song are made up of three notes. The F major and D minor chords share two of the same notes; both chords are thus as similar as two chords could be. Substituting one for the other is a very common trick. These chords are similar enough that Taylor wouldn’t need to sing different notes over them to sound good. Indeed, she doesn’t, and several chord substitutions in “the 1” sneak by as Taylor goes on her merry melodic way.

In “the 1,” the substitution of D minor for F major does not happen at the same point in the verses/prechoruses. The D minor to C major progression happens in the seventh and eighth lines of the first verse, but the fifth and sixth of the second. It also happens in the third and fourth lines of the first prechorus. The second prechorus is only long enough to allow the F-C progression.

Chord substitutions exist mostly to make music interesting. If they do exist, they usually follow predictable patterns. The last observation above is…itchy.

Most people are taught that chord quality is emotive: major chords are happy and minor chords are sad. Perhaps Taylor is trying to highlight that the lyrics with substituted chords are especially sad. Here are the lyrics associated with the F-C progression:

I'm doing good, I'm on some new shit

Been saying "yes" instead of "no"

I thought I saw you at the bus stop,

I didn't though

I hit the ground running each night

I hit the Sunday matinée

I guess you never know, never know

And if you wanted me, you really should've showed

I have this dream you're doing cool shit

Having adventures on your own

You meet some woman on the internet and take her home

You know the greatest loves of all time are over now

These are the lyrics with D minor instead:

You know the greatest films of all time

Were never made

And if you never bleed, you're never gonna grow

And it's alright now

We never painted by the numbers, baby

But we were making it count

These lyrics are sad, but I don’t see why these lines would be picked over others. All of the lyrics are pretty depressing. Plus, if Taylor really wanted to make the song sad with minor chords, she would have added a lot more.

Emotion doesn’t explain the different positions of the minor chords in the verses. What could?

Recall “peace.” Observations about the bass and piano in that song, especially their musical independence/interdependence with respect to lyrics, led to the conclusion that the piano represents Taylor and the bass represents Karlie. These instruments also suggest two perspectives in “the 1.”

However, “the 1” is more sonically dense than “peace.” The arrangement of “the 1” makes perspective shifting more complicated than ‘the piano plays independently here, therefore Taylor is talking.’ Instead, we discover perspective shifts when considering deviation from the harmonic ‘norm’ of the song. (This is not a real musical term, but rather an English approximation of how our brains/ears interpret the chord progressions of “the 1.”)

The chord substitution is the first example of deviation from the norm. F major and D minor function differently in harmonic progressions because the bass note changes (from F to D). The effect of substituting D minor for F major is that the release of harmonic tension, the ‘pull’ or resolution back to C major of the first chord’s ‘push,’ is less satisfying. That is, a bass note of F exhibits a stronger ‘push,’ so the ‘pull’ back to C is far more compelling to the ear. (Look no further than terminology for an explanation. F major to C major is an example of the beautiful “amen” cadence, a chord progression so nicknamed because it’s found at the end of many hymns.)

Per the lyric split above, Person One gets the F-C progression while Person Two gets the D-C progression.

The second example of deviation from the harmonic norm is the movement of the bass note in first and second halves of the chorus.

Consider the first half of the chorus. The bass note follows the chords at the beginning of this section. The first two chords are A minor and C major, so the bass plays A and C. Like in the rest of the song, the chords in the rest of this section alternate: F major, C major, D minor, C major. (The notes aren’t really that important, just the back-and-forth behavior.) This time, however, the bass note doesn’t hop around with the alternating chords. It walks down part of the C major scale: F, E, D, C. (Again, the notes matter less than the movement. This is a part of the song where the bass doesn’t do what the piano is doing.) The bass movement in the first half of the chorus is summarized as ‘hopping, then walking down.’

The second half of the chorus features a bass that just walks down the C major scale: A, G, F, E, D, C. The only difference between the halves of the chorus lies in the first two chords, A minor and C major. This time the bass plays A and G, not A and C.

This bass line appears in only the second halves of the first two choruses, but the entire bridge and last chorus.

The difference between the two halves of the chorus is simple in alphabetical terms but sneaky to the ear.

The alternating chords throughout the song make C major a strong sonic home base which the ear absolutely does not want to leave. (Pretend the ear is a person who doesn’t like to stray out of their comfort zone.) The bass has to leave C to make the music interesting at all, so it facilitates a sonic reward system. The first half of the chorus offers almost instant payoff for straying from the key’s chord: A is immediately followed by C. This placates the ear, if you will, and makes the walk down the scale more acceptable. The ear gets tricked into believing it will get to return to its comfort zone, to C, if it just waits a little while while the bass walks. So consider this first section the bass’s way of expanding the ear’s comfort zone.

The bass then can be a little more audacious. It walks down the better part of the C major scale in the second half of the chorus. Even though the chords above the bass line alternate with our home base chord of C major, the bass takes the long, long way back home to C. (Essentially, this harmonic progression is a tease because it takes its sweet time to fully resolve.) Still, this walking line isn’t as jarring as it could have been, because the bass eased the ear into accepting a long walking line during the first half of the chorus.

Remember that the walking bass line is ultimately what separates the bass from the piano. The long, meandering bass line in the second half of the chorus therefore constitutes deviation from the harmonic norm.

We apply this idea to the lyrics. The chorus is first Person One’s question:

But we were something, don't you think so?

Roaring twenties, tossing pennies in the pool

And if my wishes came true

It would've been you

And then Person Two’s answer:

In my defense, I have none

For never leaving well enough alone

But it would've been fun

If you would've been the one

In summary, the harmonic progression of “the 1,” defined more by the bass line and not the piano chords on top of it, splits the song between two speakers. The verses and prechoruses are split unevenly. The first two choruses are split in half, with Person One speaking first and Person Two following. Person Two sings the bridge and last chorus.

I’ll be the first to concede that using an observation about “peace” to prove the same thing about “the 1” might be circular logic. It’s crucial, however, to recognize that all of this musical magic is very, very sneaky and probably not accidental—especially because deviation from the harmonic norm of “the 1” does not follow a simple (i.e. localized) pattern.

Who is Person One and who is Person Two?

Perhaps Taylor is Person One because the “new shit” is the “shit” she talks with her friends in “peace.” Perhaps she’s Person Two, who “never [leaves] well enough alone” in both “the 1” and “ME!” (This depends on your interpretation of “ME!” though.) If Karlie is the bass, does that mean she’s talking when the bass is doing something normal or something different? I have my own opinion, but in the spirit of the song, I’ll leave it open for your own interpretation.

The takeaway from this exercise isn’t that the novelty of a song increases because there are multiple perspectives in it. Many of Taylor’s songs allow room for interpretations of just one perspective as well as many. (I adore “the 1” as a solo breakup song.) Nor must all songs featuring piano and bass be conversations. The bass is critical for the style of “Lover,” for example; most people, myself included, regard that song as from Taylor’s perspective. To me, “peace” and “the 1” simply highlight one interesting, beautiful way of telegraphing multiple perspectives. Taylor has introduced multiple perspectives by creating lyrical connections and collaborating with artists who trade verses with her. Just as literal voices clarify who is speaking, it seems reasonable that instrumental voices could too.

One final thing. The melody and chords of a song bounce around a scale, which establishes the key of the song. In this case, the melody and harmonies are all made of notes in the C major scale; the song is ‘in’ C major. Different combinations of notes in the scale make different chords, like F major, D minor, A minor, and of course the C major chord, home base. Each chord can be represented by the single scale note upon which it’s built (e.g. F, D, A, C). This note is called the ‘root.’ It’s usually (though not always, as we saw) what the bass plays.

Scales are ordered. Musicians like to label chords with numbers based on where the root note falls in the scale order. The chord made from the very first note of the key—in this case, the C major chord, the thing to which Taylor always returns—is literally called “the 1.”

——

Things that I think are neat but that probably only exist because the songs aren’t boring as hell:

The bass walk down in the chorus of “the 1” is the same as the bass movement in the “peace” second verse/quasi-bridge

The “amen” cadence makes an appearance for the lyrics “the devil’s in the details but you’ve got a friend in me”

The coincidence that this essay is about?? Idk man maybe I was just supposed to be content with a lifetime of itchiness

#kaylor #gaylor swift #folklore analysis #music analysis #my post

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roisinspencer · 4 years

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Research Essay on Hauntology & other concepts of memory

Question 10: The concept of hauntology (see online required reading for Week 11) was first coined by Jacques Derrida as a philosophical concept. However, it has been subsequently used to describe a style and genre of music and sound art (including vaporwave) by theorists such as Simon Reynolds and Mark Fisher. First describe the relevance of memory to the notion of hauntology both as a genre of music and as a philosophical concept, and then pick one or more sound works or music pieces that belong within the genre. How does the sound work(s) engage with the notion of memory and what could the work(s) be commenting on?

Hauntology’s inception as a philosophical concept was first conceived in the writings of Jacques Derridawhere he elucidates elements of the past as haunting the present through reconfigurations of dead ideas and figures. Derrida’s Hauntology concurs a logic that surpasses sanctioned logic, where there is a perturbed collusion between “actuality” and “ideality,” or most recently “virtuality.”[1]In Derrida’s denotation of Hauntology, virtuality largely consists of unconscious convulsions of embodied past traumas surfacing to actuality and confuting our understanding of the present. These ruptures of past subconscious repressions can be related to notionsof Freud’sInvoluntary memories which are crypted deep within us and materialise in an unmediated manner. Hauntology in the form of Involuntary memories is prevalent inGrimes’Oblivion, Blank Banshee’sTeenage Pregnancyand the Caretaker’sYou and the Nightas they each employ musicology to reconnoitre differing mnemonic theories. Constructing off Derrida’s definition of Hauntology, Mark Fisher, Simon Reynolds and other theorists have extended its meaning into modernity’s memory market. Fisher in particular ascribes the term to embody the concepts of Lost Futures and Capitalist Realism, interrogating the cyclic nature of our capitalist nostalgia and yearning for what could have been. The musical genre of Vaporwave proselytises this lust for the promises of capitalism in its most illustrious stages during the 80’s and 90’s. Grimes’Oblivion, Blank Banshee’sTeenage Pregnancyand the Caretaker’sYou and the Nighteach employ the characteristics of Vaporwave reconstruct the neo-liberalist vitality that once clad capitalist consumerism, appropriating audio techniques from the 80s/90s to invoke a thirst for past possibilities that never came to fruition.

Canadian born musician Clare Boucher (born March 17, 1988), professionally known by her stage alias Grimes[2], released pop phenomenonOblivionin 2012, alluding to Derrida’s Hauntology through distinctly layered developments and Vaporwave quintessence. Derrida portends Hauntology as a resurfacing of elements of the past which permeate into the present in an alternate, abstruse manner. The title of the song,Oblivion, denotes a state of incognizance where memory of a particular event or person has been effaced. This is conveyed in the introduction of the main riff as interjections of disjointedness via lagging and glitching project and air of inconsistency and disquietude. The song embodies a confused catharsis as the artist reinvokes the acutely traumatic experience of a past sexual assault and reconfigures it “as something really welcoming and nice.”[3]The melody bestows an anxious effervescence through major tonality and upbeat melodic mechanisms, exacerbated by the breathy, high pitched, ethereal vocals. Grimes speaks of this memory sporadically infiltrating her actuality, leaving her “terrified of men for a while.”[4]These reflexive outplays of mnemonic trauma are emblematic of Derrida’s “logic of the ghost”[5]as although the memory is an encapsulation of a past foreboding, it oscillates from virtuality to actuality and invokes physical repercussions out of fear. The bass line incessantly drives the song and is played by a heavily distorted and incredibly low synthesizer, allaying a murky yet omnipresent undercurrent of trauma. The bass line is so astonishingly low it is on the precipice of being inaudible to the human ear, suggesting just how far the depth of memory are and how deeply trauma can be imbedded within. This impetuous occurrence of memory intimates Freud’s theories on Involuntary memory and its convulsive manifestations of trauma which are often “crypted comments” which arise “with no identifiable cues.”[6]By rendering her involuntary memory “as positive”[7]Grimes has employed tenets of Freud’s Screen memory in aims of a “possibility for counter-memories to emerge”[8]in a bid to conceal tormenting truths. This convulsive delirium is evident through perpetual lyrical repetitions, most notably the phrase ‘see you on a dark night”[9](2:26) where the artist directly addresses the present physical space that remits her past trauma. The cyclic nature of this phrase portends the interminable haunting of this memory. In the bridge she accosts the resurrection of her memory by starting to ask it “To look into my eyes and tell me” (1:34) which is then abruptly interrupted by nonsensical interjections of “la la la la la”[10]as though to override and screen out the existing traumatic memory with an innocuous, unburdened one sung in a child-like, high-pitched naivety. Through evocations of the philosophical concept of Hauntology,Oblivionevinces how past trauma intermittently ruptures through to the present and the cyclic nightmare of attempted repressions along with unwanted regressions.

Patrick Driscoll, known professionally as Blank Banshee[11], (born June 28, 1987) is another Canadian artist who efficaciously employs Vaporwave tendencies in his songTeenage Pregnancy(2012)to conjure Hauntological notions of resurfaced trauma. Similarly to Grimes’Oblivion,Teenage Pregnancyalso imbues its digitised cadences with Involuntary memory by employing similar methods of repetition and recrudesce interjections. Although the two pieces share Hauntological notions of Involuntary memory, the artists execute the resolution of these ruptures in processes considered completely disparate from one another. As Grimes aspires to skew the traumatic crux of her past memory and purport it as “positive” via Screen Memory tactics, Blank Banshee aims to exploit the shared trauma of our conscripted nostalgia for origins and its circuitous fissuring into adulthood. Derrida’s writings on Hauntology partially elicit its inspiration from Freud’s theory on mourning where “one internalises or introjects the dead” assimilating them within an eternal idealisation of the “deceased.”[12]However when this mourning is not resolved, according to conventional “psychoanalytic theory, there is no true introjection,” only “an incorporation of the phantom.”[13]This concept of the phantom presents itself inTeenage Pregnancynot only in the title but also as a vocal schism which endeavours to interrogate our nostalgia for origins. The songbegins with a motif consisting of sustained, sporadically placed notes which make no sense out of the context of the future layers of sound. This relates to Derrida’s idea of the past and future being omnipresent in our understanding of present. Along with persistent crescendos and diminuendos, the drumbeat oscillates from one ear to the other destabilising the foundations of the song, allaying an insecurity in the linguistic information soon to occur. Layers of varying digitised motifs build up and establish the repetitious undulations“of traumatic and/or stressful events” that “are often poorly integrated into the life-story and identity of the person and for the same reason tend to intrude repeatedly upon consciousness.”[14]The cacophony of litanydrops out to expose the crux of the trauma, that being the disruption of childhood innocence and accosting of our romanticised mourning of childhood. In his writings about the Uncanny,Nicholas Royle, entails “another thinking of the beginning: the beginning as already haunted.”[15]This is illuminated in the recapitulation of the phrases “I’m just a kid”(1:52) and “It was only a mistake”(2:22) as the tonality of the verbiage starts at a high pitch but glissandos in glitches to a low, disturbingly distorted articulation affronting our mourning for the fictitious public memory of childhood. The timbre of the voice purports the dismay of this disarrayed experience of childhood through a cybernated vibrato, crackling in a manner that mimics the tremolo of vocals on the cusp of crying. As heard inOblivion, Blank Banshee effectively elucidates the spectral persistence of trauma associated with Derrida’s definition of Hauntology, yet strays from projecting a positive manufacturing of memory to mask the said trauma and instead aspires to exploit the negations of childhood nostalgia.

WhilstOblivionandTeenage Pregnancyanalyse humanist, embodied experiences ofHauntology, English artist/producer Leyland James Kirby (Born May 9, 1974), professionally known as The Caretaker, released the trackYou and the Night(1991) which is emblematic of notions of the Uncanny and its reconstruction of space and time from remnants the past. Convictions of the phantom in Derrida’s ideas of hauntology amalgamate with the Uncanny to permeate unease and construe a contorted understanding of time, space and our standing within this misshapen memory. The sentiment of the phantom is evoked as elements of the past present themselves in fragments rather than in their historical totality, evident in the preternatural patina that filters the obfuscated layers of music. The crackle and grainy effect that filter the vexing remnants of music tacit an antiquity, yet this nostalgia prompted for the past is later accosted by its own decay and overlay with elements of the future. “The Uncanny involves feelings of uncertainty,” in particular “what is being experienced”[16]which is explicit in underscoring this Hauntological eclipsing of time. The pieceopens with low, prodigiously distorted instruments playing a minor, perturbed melody of acute, atonal nonsense, manifesting this uncertainty of the Uncanny. The eerie instruments have been slowed down to an acute largo, lending this uncertainty to our understanding of time and its disequilibrium in the extraction of memories. The layers of ominous instruments further destabilises time as each section of the orchestra are playing at augmented 4thintervals. These augmented 4thintervals were historically classed as the devil in music and its use was periodically forbade in sacred songs.[17]As well as underscoring the inconsonance of time in memory, similarly to the Involuntary memories present inOblivionandTeenage Pregnancy, the devil in music is also remnant of the dissonant re-evocations of trauma which Freud concurs “were a manifestation of death instincts.”[18]The high pitch strings confute notions of nostalgia as all though they are recognisable to the listener’s ear yet, their esoteric distortion detaches them from recognition in our memory. The dislocation of time in memory and Uncanny trauma in Hauntology is made audible inYou and the Nightthrough The Caretaker’s utilisation of cryptic chromaticism and deep decay.

Similarly toYou and the Night, Hauntological time is deeply confounded in Grimes’Oblivionthrough predilections of the Vaporwave genre to expound the circuitous capitalist purgatory of the present. Simon Reynolds discusses Vaporwave as “a kind of aural or musical detritus” which adopts “dead media sound production from the 80s and earlier”[19]to concoct a nostalgia for the inception of capitalist fruition and also futures that never came to fruition. Vaporwave can also present itself as “a kind of memory play that is produced through representations of repressed trauma or loss” which can be “expressed through musical form as a process of catharsis.” Grimes herself proclaimed that she “took one of the most shattering experiences of my life and turned it into something I can build a career on”[20]and capitalise off. Gerhardt Richter first coined the term “Capitalist Realism” in 1963, which Mark Fisher later adopted in his writings to presage why “We remain trapped in the 20th century.”[21] Fisher denotes that due to the “reliance of current artists on styles that were established long ago” our “current moment is in the grip of a formal nostalgia.”[22]This formal nostalgia is immediately connoted inOblivionthrough the opening motif allayed by a synth sentimental of “dead media”[23]of the 80s/90s. The motif imbues a sense of nostalgia via its upbeat major melody, playing into the romanticism of the 80s when capitalism harnessed new offerings. The ethereal yet heavily digitised female vocals reverberate with efficaciousness, yet the echo also illuminates an ebb in these capitalist expiations as the words lag past their initial debut. This reminiscence for a time with fresh bearings can be heard in thesporadic piano (1:50) bridge which doesn’t abide by typical methodologies of music, alluding to a time in Capitalism where everything being produced was new and experimental. Although it contrives an air of excitement, the notes echo and envelope itself by its own ghostly refractions and further confound our capitalist nostalgia and sense of time concurrent with it.Old riff comes back into play followed by the other infinite loops, speaking not only to incessant haunting of past coming to present but also the incapacity to cultivate anything new under capitalism. The song ends on an interrupted cadence, sounding unfinished by nature and insinuating that these loops and our wistfulness for the past could continue on for an eternity.

Simon Reynolds discusses Vaporwave as a musical genre of “Retromania,” defining it as “Pop culture’s addiction to its own past,”[24]which is epitomised in Blank Banshee’sTeenage Pregnancy. As alluded to prior,Vaporwave music “plays with the idea of nostalgia for something that never happened”[25]which Mark Fisher concurs is the haunting of Lost Futures. This reworking of the past is conceived out of utopian visions of the 80s which were “co-opted by capitalism and repackaged for consumption”[26]and now haunt the present tense with past visions of the future. In consonance with Grimes’Oblivion,Teenage Pregnancymanifests the sound production of the 80s/90s, but instead of manufacturing its nostalgic utopianism, Blank Banshee appropriates a riff directly from a musical relic of 1982, beingGrand Master Flash and the Furious Five’s hit The Message.[27](0:27)The Message accosted the structured cultural divides under capitalism in the 80s and exhibits capitalism’s sedentary nature as the song aids a message about class and race that is just as culturally significant today. The sampled riff is profoundly manipulated through an increase in duration, pitch altering, lingering reverberations and interrupted cuts followed by repeated interjections of the same phrase which disallows the riff to resolve. This disseverance of the riff communicates a Lost Future desired by the original song which has been pervasively and ironically stifled and stultified by capitalism, betokeningElizabeth Guffy’sunderstanding ofRetro-Futurismas the message “remains a sensibility, rather than a plan of action.”[28]This asphyxiation of rebuttal to capitalism is furthered by the unchanging layers of hypnotic digitised motifs which add to a sense of being directionless. These invariable layers underscore how under capitalism “cultural time has folded back on itself, and the impression of linear development has given way to a strange simultaneity.”[29]This stunting of linear development is also exteriorized through the repeated phrase “I’m just a kid” which evinces capitalism’s stilted eternality in its past days of prophecy.

Both Blank Banshee’sTeenage Pregnancyand The Caretaker’sYou and the Nightutilise Vaporwave’s appropriation to incarnate the past, forming memory through the depletion and decay of their audio relics. Even though there is a subordinate amount of time between the Romanticism movement and the conception of Hauntology, there is a distinct convergence of concepts as through absence we derive definitions of past. Sophie Thomas writes of the affiliations of ruins in Romanticism and how in their “state of decay, ruins signify loss and absence”, furthermore “a visible evocation of the invisible, the appearance of disappearance.”[30]Fisher denotes the extent to which “cultural artifacts” in the form of music “can historicize the human condition”[31]as audio ruins an “absent whole.”[32]The caretaker has appropriated Eddie Higgins’ 1934 hitYou and the Nightand the Music and represented it with a patina of an embellished state of deterioration and distortion. Linking back to a Vaporwave idiosyncrasy, due to the levels of decay and dissonance each segment of the orchestra is isolated to a layer of its own presenting as a relic rather than a unified body of noise.You and the Nightdiffers from Blank Banshee as its appropriation predates the vitality of capitalism in the 80s and instead samples from the 1930’s, where the Industrial revolution and turbulent international relations were yet to meet the capitalism Francis Fukuyama called “the endpoint of history that would replace human conflict with universal peace.”[33]This notion is evident in melodramatic undulations in dynamics as the persistent adjusting between disturbed diminuendos and climactic crescendos prevails a volatility to the past before “accepting of contemporary capitalism as the only viable social structure.”[34]Apex of discomfort when the orchestra plays in a unison vivace, yet instead of playing in a congenial harmony the decaying layers play in disillusioning quartertones. The vocals are then discerningly doubled, a low voice more representational of the original track yet is still acutely diluted, the doubled voice at a higher pitch, filtered through an alienesque, digitised tremolo multiple octaves higher. This digitised doubling in an almost extraterrestrial tone depicts a duplicity to the past, acting as a fissure to an alternative future to contemporary capitalism. The Caretaker’sYou and the Nighthas employed the “technological advances and special effects”[35]of Vaporwave and the conceptual preface of Romantic ruins to recreate visions of the past and offer insight into Lost Futures.

Through imbuing connotations of Involuntary memory with Derrida’s definition of Hauntology,Grimes’Oblivion, Blank Banshee’sTeenage Pregnancyand the Caretaker’sYou and the Nightinvestigate the resurfacing and rupturing of past trauma into the present tense. Each artist conveys the spectrality of trauma and its recurrent Hauntological embodiment which pervades into the present. The three songs concurrently apply the musical genre of Vaporwave to elucidate contemporary nostalgia for the vitality of the consumerist contingencies of capitalism in the 80s/90s. The three pieces interrogate the cyclic idealisation of Capitalist Realism and the Lost Futures as a result of this societal sedentary.

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daybreak-academy-fanfic · 4 years

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Daybreak Academy: Chapter 57

The Problem With Raspberries

Summary: In which Kieran encourages Anora to ask Ephemer out. Word Count: 1,658 First | Previous | Next ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆

Anora anxiously waited by the school gates. She didn't know what to expect as she waited. A part of her feared that she wouldn't even remember what he looked like. Anora looked back down at her phone, rereading the last message he had sent to her. It was almost noon. Where was he?

The sound of a taxi honking its horn made Anora jump when she heard it. She turned her attention to the sound to see it come up Daybreak Drive and around the cul-de-sac. A part of her expected a student to come out, the other part of her knew that this was who she was waiting for.

Out of the taxi stepped a young man that looked to be in his early 30s. It was quickly apparent that he was a good head taller than she was, but his overall body mass was about the same to hers. His feathered, dark turquoise hair reached to his shoulders and was partially tied back with a small ponytail. His round, dark brown eyes surveyed the area before they fell on Anora. His smile was exactly how she remembered it being three years ago.

“Hey Razzie.” the young man greeted with a smile. Anora could feel her vision start to blur as her eyes welled with tears. Without a second guess, she wrapped her arms around his neck and held on for dear life.

“I missed you...” she mumbled into his shirt.

The young man smiled at her, holding her even closer. “I missed you too, cousin.”

Kieran, Anora's only cousin, had decided to make a surprise visit.

The two were locked in their hug for several minutes before Kieran finally pulled them away. He still kept his hands on his cousin's arms- he looked like he was admiring how much she'd grown since they last met.

“So,” he casually mused, “You've told me that there's a tourist trap of a town nearby, right? Mind showing it to me?”

Anora's face lit up before giving him a quick nod. But then a small frown appeared on her face as she said, “The taxi left...”

Kieran smiled at her. He held up a set of roller skates that he had been holding in his hand. “Race ya.”

The girl looked from her cousin, to the skates, and back again with widening eyes. With a wide grin, she signaled for her cousin to wait where he was so she could get her skates. Kieran laughed as he watched her dart back to the dorms. Some things just don't change.

. . .

“I hate boba tea.” Kieran idly noted as he stirred his straw around his boba. “It's the tapioca pearls that get me. Like, what am I supposed to do with these? Choke on them? Have them get stuck in my straw so I can't actually drink the tea? Ridiculous.”

Anora raised her eyebrow at her cousin- taking a very judgmental sip of her milkshake in doing so. Kieran was quick to pick up on it.

“Now, don't give me that look Razzie.” he admonished. “'Why would you get a boba if you don't like it?' you might say. To which I rebut, because the tea itself is still fantastic! I mean, depending on who's making it, it's not like a smoothie or anything- but it's not actual tea either. It's just the little balls of potential choking hazard that turns me off. That's it.”

With a little chuckle, Anora shook her head at her cousin before continuing to sip on her milkshake. Kieran was the face of normality after the weirdness from the summer. Just hearing her cousin's voice was enough to make her forget about Strelitzia's kiss, and seeing Ephemer react to it, and how Anora almost kissed him on his birthday, and...

“Something's eating you, cousin.” Kieran noted, snapping her out of her thoughts. He pulled his straw out of his boba, gave a disgusted little look at the tapioca pearl stuck at the end, then sucked it off before sticking the straw back in the tea. “Wanna talk about it?”

She should have seen this coming. In fact, she should have known this was coming- Kieran's visit wasn't completely out of nowhere. She had asked him to come because she really needed someone to talk to. Well, she didn't directly ask him to visit. But the subtext was written all over their last email to each other, and since Kieran knew how to take a hint, he immediately made plans to travel over to Departure County.

Shrinking a little in her seat, Anora quietly said, “Remember in our emails I mentioned a boy named Ephemer?”

“How couldn't I?” Kieran snorted. “The first time you brought him up, you composed an entire essay on the way his hair bounced when he laughed.”

Anora bashfully looked away for a moment. It hadn't had been that bad. Had it...? Was it even possible to have a silent crush on someone for that long?

“You also mentioned him in your last email too.” Kieran added, his tone a bit more somber now. “You said he saw you kiss another girl. And in seeing him react, you thought you had developed feelings for him. Like, the kind where you dream about getting together and wake up a hot mess.”

“He's always been a friend to me.” Anora quietly agreed. “But now… I don't want to be just a friend anymore. I don't know how...”

Kieran studied Anora with interest. It really was bad, huh? The way she would blush when she thought about this dude. How badly you could see that she did want to make some sort of move, but was afraid on how to do it. Kieran himself had only a small amount of previous lovers to fall back on; in all but one relationship the girl had been the one to make the first move. And if he knew his cousin well, he was more than aware that she would write off her feelings as belonging to something more circumstantial. But this? This was different. It needed to be different.

“Hey, is there a library around here? I wanna see if they have something real quick.”

Anora gave her cousin a funny look, but nodded her head. After the two finished their drinks, they started to make the short walk over the Cable Town's public library. The library was on a side road, so it was able to have a unique structure apart from the mixed-use buildings that tended to be on the main road. While matching the overall tudor aesthetic the rest of the town had, the library's exterior looked a lot more like a small castle.

Kieran led them both into the library- he made his way through as if he had been here a million times over. He went over to the kids' section and started to comb through the shelves for something in particular.

“Oh darn,” he mumbled to himself, “They don't have it. But they do have...”

Anora could barely see what book he had pulled out. He wouldn't let her see it as he then went over to a small reading area. Since it was made for younger kids, the much larger Kieran almost didn't fit as he made himself comfortable under a canopy.

“Come Razzie,” he cheekily told her, patting the spot beside him, “It's story time.”

For a moment, Anora wondered if her cousin had gone insane. But she carefully started to humor him- it was a tight fit for the both of them to be under the canopy. Anora held her legs close to her chest before carefully leaning against Kieran. Her cousin smiled at her, gave her a little peck on the head, then opened the book up.

“Once upon a time,” he started to read, “There was a princess who lived in a kingdom surrounded by raspberries. But there was one problem- the princess didn't like raspberries! So one day, an evil wizard came by and promised the princess that he could make all the raspberries go away.”

Anora cuddled her cousin a little closer as he went on with the story. She missed having him read to her; his voice went into a slower cadence and worked to pronounce each word with purpose. When she was much younger, and he'd volunteer to read her a story, she'd almost always go to sleep during. It was comforting; relaxing. She had really missed this.

When Kieran was done reading, he carefully closed the book and let out a small sigh.

“Your problems aren't going to go away if you ignore them, Anora.” Kieran told her. At the mention of her real name, Anora jumped and looked up at her cousin with wide eyes. He looked back at her thoughtfully. “While I'm no expert in love or anything,” he went on, “You should definitely talk to Ephemer. Maybe he feels the same way, but since the summer was so eventful, he can't tell if you feel that way too. I mean, if I saw a girl that I liked kiss another girl, I'd immediately assume that she wasn't into dudes. And you don't like girls like that… Do you?”

Anora flinched.

“So you're bi then.” Kieran casually deduced. “Or close enough to it- no big deal. But you do like him, right?”

For this, Anora could feel her face burn up as she looked down at the ground, nodding her head. Kieran put a comforting hand on his cousin's head.

“Tell him Razzie.” he stressed. “I'd hate to think that one of the few times we meet, and you're this upset about a guy, of all things. And don't worry, if he breaks your heart, I know how to use a shotgun.”

Anora laughed. “I love you Kieran.” she giggled.

“Love you too Razzie.” he replied before giving her another kiss on the forehead. “Now, go get him.”

#daybreak academy #chapter 57 #kingdom hearts fanfiction #Anora #Kieran #Transitions #Season 1

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goldenuwuswriting · 5 years

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Siren’s Song

A/N: Just in case you haven’t heard this man’s heavenly vocals: A video or two! Also credit to @ncttrinities for feeding into my zero self-control and helping plan this. I might be slightly wh*pped for him.

Pairing: Nakamoto Yuta x Reader

AU: Siren! and College!

Summary: Sirens don’t exist or do they?

“Sirens were originally Persephone’s three handmaidens. When Hades kidnapped Persephone to be his wife, Demeter gave the handmaidens beautiful golden wings so they could search the earth. They eventually gave up, making Demeter mad and causing her to curse them to an island.” Professor Nakamoto lectures alongside the powerpoint made by his TA, Johnny. You took this Greek Mythology 101 class for the easy A or so you thought. Professor Nakamoto grades based on how much effort you put into the assignment and how much you participate in class.

“Time’s almost up for today, so your assignment for this week is to write your own siren myth.” The professor always had assignments like that. You thought that he set the class up like that to see how much the students retained from his lectures, but little did you know that he was hiding a big secret.

Professor Yuta Nakamoto was a siren and trying to teach that sirens don’t exist. The curse was just that in his opinion. The man literally looks like a god and could have been an Idol but had decided to teach to protect his secret. Johnny, his TA, came from America and was just as handsome as Yuta. Johnny was older than Yuta, but messed around and never graduated college and was the only one in the history department who knew Yuta’s secret.

You, on the other hand, were halfway through a Master’s degree in History. You were trying to take all of the credit hours you could, just to graduate early and start your life. Midterms were a few months away, so you had to make at least an A on them to give you a little wiggle room for the finals.

Johnny, being the greatest TA bless him (bless me achoo), hosts a study group and has office hours in Professor Nakamoto’s office before and after class almost every time.

You had a question over the study guide that Johnny had handed out, so naturally you went to office hours to ask before heading to your next class. There was something magical about the voice you heard coming from Yuta’s office. It was so pretty and drew you in. Your feet kept moving towards the door, as if they weren’t controlled by your brain. You reached out for the door handle and turned it. Something compelled you to keep walking into the office, where Professor Nakamoto was sitting in his chair and singing under his breath.

Yuta was shocked. You weren’t supposed to hear his ‘true’ voice. He quickly cleared his throat and asked you what you needed. You were frozen for a minute, as all of the gears in your brain started to move again, you remembered why you were there.

“I have a question on the study guide that Johnny made. Do you know where he is?”

“I don’t know where he is, but I could probably help you since I am the professor.”

You wanted to laugh at yourself for being such an idiot. “The question asks for the differences between harpies and sirens. Is it for the modern idea of sirens or the original idea of them?”

Yuta looked at you confused, shouldn’t you be questioning him on the fact that he is a siren (the answer is yes but you are too tired to realize it). He looked at you for a moment before answering, giving you his perfect, healing smile. “Its for the modern idea of sirens, Y/N. You’re the only student who caught that.”

“Alright, thank you and see you in class.” You took off towards your next class, mind still piecing everything together. Professor Nakamoto can’t be a siren because they don’t exist, right? Your next class went on for what seemed like hours.

Yuta was freaking out. He called Johnny, hoping the sentient tree would answer the phone.

“Hello?” Johnny’s disembodied voice flowed through the phone.

“I, uh, may have done something stupid and exposed myself.”

“Nakamoto Yuta, What did you do?”

“I may or may not have been singing under my breath and Y/N got captivated with my ‘true’ voice.”

Johnny sighed and Yuta could picture the taller man rolling his eyes.

“You want me to convince them that their mind is playing tricks on them, don’t you?”

Yuta just hummed in response.

Johnny hung up on him, not before telling him that he should be more careful.

You were finally dismissed from class. Johnny had texted you and asked if you want to meet up at a café near campus. It was about a 15 minute walk from the building you were at. The only thing in your head was the sound of Yuta’s voice. The voice that mesmerized you, the one that belonged to a forbidden object, and the one you couldn’t have. The more you thought about your professor’s voice, the more it dawned on you that he might be a siren. You walked towards the café, pulling your jacket closer to your body, trying to get as warm as possible while walking into the wind. The fall weather was your favorite, but it still had its downsides. You pushed the door open and took a deep breath, taking in the scent of fresh roasted coffee beans and fresh baked goods.

Johnny waved you over to the table he was sitting at. Your TA had two cups of coffee in front of him of which he handed you one. You gladly accepted the bean juice and took a sip. The two of you exchanged greetings and talked about random topics.

“Johnny, how much do you know about Professor Nakamoto?”

“He’s like my best friend, why?” Johnny was concerned about what you were going to say and it showed.

“I want an honest answer. Is he a siren?” You whispered those sentences. Perhaps you were going crazy with all the credit hours you were taking and the disturbing amount of sleep you were losing due to it. Everything about the professor seemed to match the exact creatures he was teaching about, obviously there were small differences.

Loud Laughter broke you from your thoughts. “You honestly can’t believe that, Y/N. Sirens don’t exist and he is not one. I think you need to take a break from your course work or take a long nap.”

“I guess so, but no one should have a voice that pretty.”

Johnny helped you with a few questions on your study guide before it was time for him to go help Yuta get set up for the Introduction to ancient civilizations class. You decided to head to your dorm and sleep as Johnny suggested.

The nap was just what you needed. Your roommate woke you up and asked if you had notes from your english class that they could borrow. Your phone’s screen lit up displaying the current time and a message from your best friend, Kun. Kun is the mom friend. He brings you food and takes care of you, so it’s no surprise when he texted you asking where you were and why you weren’t in class today.

Johnny had met up with Yuta and practically clowned him for letting you catch on.

“I didn’t know that they was there.”

“Well, It would take a genius to figure out that students are going to stop in during office hours.”

“If you’re so smart, Johnny, then why aren’t you a professor?” Yuta was becoming dramatic. He picked this habit up from a few of the freshman students. The students called themselves the dream team.

You weren’t prepared for class on Monday, knowing that you had to take the chapter test. Johnny had warned you that the professor had a project planned but he was picking the partners. You asked him to put in a good word for you, so that you would hopefully get paired with Dong Sicheng, who goes by WinWin and happens to be the professor’s favorite. WinWin was a cutie and very babie so you understood why he was the favorite. A plus to working with WinWin is that he was friends with Kun as well, so study snacks would be made for you both.

The test was easy, probably because Johnny had explained everything to you when he asked you to get coffee. Yuta had waited for everyone to turn in the test before explaining the project, which was to come up with and market a product as business entrepreneurs (Johnny’s idea after writing an essay at 3 am and drinking red bull). He started to call each pair.

“Dong Sicheng and Mark Lee.” There goes your chance at a decent grade, Mark was the only other student who wasn’t a freshman and had a great work ethic. “Y/L/N Y/N and Huang Renjun.” You have heard that Renjun was a responsible boy who loved art from Kun constantly talking about him and Sicheng. Kun also said that Renjun and his three other friends referred to themselves as the dream team and they did everything together.

The said boy came up to you and introduced himself and gave you his number. When class ended, you marched up to Johnny.

“I thought I asked you to make sure I was partnered with Sicheng.”

“I tried. Professor said no multiple times.” Johnny was trying not to smile at the memory of teasing Yuta.

“What would he say if I ask him? I really don’t want to work with a member of the self-proclaimed ‘dream team’.”

“He would most likely say no and to get over it, but you can try. He’s in his office.”

Johnny was sending you to war with a dangerous (read: Soft) enemy. Johnny immediately texted Yuta a heads up after you stormed out of the classroom. Yuta had anticipated someone was going to be upset at the partner choices, he just didn’t think that it was going to be you.

You furiously rapped on the door to Yuta’s office and waited for him to tell you to enter.

“Y/N, what can I do for you?” The male had asked in a sing- song tone. The cadence of his voice quickly quelled your anger.

“I wanted to know if I could switch Renjun for either Mark or Sicheng.” You smiled at him, silently praying to whatever gods or goddesses existed that he says yes.

“I’m sorry, but partner pairings are final unless one partner is doing more work than the other.”

You exited the office in a slightly better mood than before, which Johnny noticed when he passed you in the hall.

“Yuta, was Y/N just here?”

He nodded.

“They were furious after you assigned partners and then is suddenly in a better mood after talking to you. What happened?”

“We had a great conversation, that’s all.”

Johnny shot him a look that conveyed his thoughts. Yuta was slightly annoyed that the elder could read him that well.

“I just charmed them a little. Y/N might be short but They’re kind of scary.”

“I know, but we’ve had this discussion. What happens when they figure out that you are in fact a siren. Y/n already asked me if you were.”

Yuta knew that Johnny was right. He should probably stop while he was ahead. You were too pretty to die and he really didn’t want to move again.

You messaged Renjun and asked him to meet you at Kun’s after okaying it with him. Kun was already working on snacks for the three of you. Three hours later and Renjun never showed up, Kun tried calling him but the boy never answered and Kun knew the boy didn’t have class until tomorrow. You already texted Johnny and told him what happened and that Renjun hasn’t shown up. You made sure to ask where the professor was, hoping that this would get you a new partner. Your favorite and only teaching assistant informed you that the was hour left in Yuta’s office hours. The walk from Kun’s dorm to the office to you about thirty minutes compared to the usual hour. The anger boiling in your system at the freshman kept you warm and was what caused you to practically slam the office door open.

The Japanese man had heard angry footsteps coming down the hall, so he started to sing in order to calm the anger. It worked after a while and you could feel the anger melt away as waves of relief washed over you. The song continued and something about it compelled you to start walking towards your professor. You closed the distance between your lips and Yuta’s. The kisses were filled with passion and need.

“Get a room!”

That phrase startled you. Yuta grabbed your waist, not ready to let you leave, and looked at the source of the interruption. Johnny was standing at the door, rolling his eyes. You didn’t even notice the glare that Yuta shot him.

“Get Out, Johnny. Office hours are over.” (WiNk WoNk)

#nct yuta nakamoto #NCT #nct 127 au #nct 127 imagines #NCT 127 #yuta x reader #yuta nakamoto x reader #nctau #nct fanfic #nct fluff #nct imagines #nct scenarios #kpop fanfic #kpop au #kpop imagines #kpop scenarios

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rtcessays · 7 years

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Essay 1

I heard you killed your only friend last year Disarm The fog won’t lift in your town

Q’s for Lise

What inspired you to sit down and write, what it sounds like you assumed would be a one shot, or at the least the start of a very short and sweet ‘verse?

I definitely initially thought it would be a one-shot, and honestly as I wrote it I didn’t even know that I was going to publish it. I can’t exactly remember what I was thinking - pretty early on after watching The Avengers for the first time my girlfriend started me thinking about Steve and Loki, though initially not necessarily as a pairing - just as a pair that might have interesting interactions. The plot mostly came from needing an excuse for them to interact and having a deep, abiding love of whump.

Basically, “how do I put Steve and Loki in a place together and get them to have a conversation? Oh, I know, I’ll just beat Loki up.”

Was there a clear point where you said something like, ‘Hey, there might be more to this than I originally thought?’ through this first series of installments?

Yes.

Disarm mostly happened because I felt like I’d left some hanging threads, and started imagining what the next meeting between Steve and Loki - on more equal footing - might look like. So I wrote that one, mostly thinking “well, I’ll just see what happens here”, hit the end of it, and went “wait, there’s definitely more here that I want to write.”

It seems like pretty early that I knew I started shipping them - already Disarm is marked as pre-slash. But I don’t think I started out with what became sort of the goal of this first segment of fics: getting them to a point where they were really in a relationship. I think it wasn’t really until I was midway through the third fic that I realized where this all was going and started to think I might have tripped into something.

a/n for the essay from ‘I heard you killed your only friend last year’:

I am still hilariously new to all things this fandom and sincerely apologize for any inaccuracies.

Where were you at when you first started? Had you been reading comics your whole life, or was this your introduction to these characters?

The only comics I’d read at the time I started writing RTC were a few scattered Batman comics, Sandman, Lucifer, and some fables. I hadn’t opened a single Marvel comic in my life, and while I watched Thor in 2011 nothing really came of it. I don’t remember watching any of the other movies when they came out, though I might have and just not really left an impression.

Then I went to The Avengers in May of 2012 and just got - slammed. Suddenly I had all these feelings about characters, especially Loki, with a whole new amount of intensity. I started writing fic for the MCU almost immediately after I got out of the theater, of which I heard you killed your only friend was a very early one. At the time, I had no idea what I was doing. I mean, I went back and watched everything over again, and began my deep dive into comics fandom (starting with Black Widow), but...May 2012 was really where my MCU pit started. --

Remember This Cold has humble beginnings in I heard you killed your only friend last year. What eventually becomes a richly filled ‘verse begins almost as a writer’s exercise. How does character A respond to character B, and vice versa. It is a laboratory environment, poking and prodding at the two in order to determine...well, we’re not sure exactly, at first. And that is for the best, as we have the pleasure of unfolding this particular mystery as the author does.

The back and forth of Steve and Loki’s interactions, sizing one another up through the fic, is reflective of the author feeling out the belief that Loki and Steve are viable as a pairing, and investigating how their beliefs, morals, and cadences fit together. Lise has come to be synonymous with Loki, but her voice for Steve is dead on accurate, right from the start. Also, her understanding that Steve is layered, and has a depth that goes overlooked in the source material (remember this was written post Avengers).

There’s a magnetism to this iteration of Loki that the reader feels through Steve. Steve Rogers is an upstanding gentleman through and through, known for doing the right thing. There’s no grappling with this for him, as he quietly insists on taking care of someone who just leveled Manhattan. But is there more to it?

“Just something to think about,” Steve said, after a moment. “If you get tired of running.”

Its a nice set up for further exploration, which follows in Disarm, wherein we begin Loki’s penchant for showing up unannounced. For those of us waiting for the romantic elements to be included, the rapid slow burn is tantalizing from the first scene. Steve is playing ethics with Loki, to a degree, and Loki...well, Loki is kind of slippery. Being from Steve’s perspective, Loki’s machinations are secret and therefore, more captivating.

For new readers, its almost a requirement to travel back in time in order to picture this Loki. Deliberately made out as a menacing villain, it is a largely flat characterization. The beauty of fanfiction, of course, is we can breathe life and breadth into a character. Making room for an eventual romantic focus is secondary to making room for a more rounded out individual who might be capable of such a thing. We just begin to see it in how Steve’s tempered treatment seems to get under Loki’s skin.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder, they say. Steve’s thoughts may be preoccupied with Loki, but upon being confronted by them, the reader imagines he might feel like a mouse being batted around by a cat. Loki’s speech is a rabbit warren of clues and suggestions, none of which Steve has the conversational skills to navigate. But, that doesn’t do anything to assuage his patience or curiosity. The questions of ‘how can Steve stand by and allow this to go on’ may start to come up. Is it unfair that he treat Loki with some kind of deference? Maybe it is. Maybe, just maybe, Steve Rogers has a flaw or two. Alternatively, its possible there’s more to Loki than meets the eye, and Steve’s instincts are serving him well.

Almost too literally, Steve gets a peek at Loki’s true state and when he pushes, he only gets Loki’s verbose command of language. That all changes when Loki shows his underbelly, and Steve sees what being dogged by (presumably) Thanos or the Chitauri has cost him. Loki views Steve as a safe place, that much is obvious, but the reader is left to wonder why. Is it because Steve would do the right thing and Loki knows it? Is it a sign of something more? Hmm.

The notion that this is a thought exercise is expunged by the time we reach the fog won’t lift in your town. It’s subtle, but the potential transition to something altogether not platonic is illustrated in this first sign of attraction:

He [Loki] glanced down at the pear and took another bite of it, eyes drifting closed in what looked like blissful delight. “Mmm,” he said, head tilted slightly back, and Steve felt the inexplicable urge to look away.

Its a brief interlude, perhaps almost a foreshadowing. The m/m reader is sitting up straight, now; the author has our attention as themes might begin to shift.

“You would not. You will find, Captain, that believing a thing, no matter how passionately, does not make it so.”

Loki says this, and it is a moment where you can see past his dramatic airs to find a truth of his. And it’s of course as cynical as Steve is optimistic. These little morsels we get in the back and forth that’s flavored the series so far are gems that keep you hooked, and allow you to truly begin to fall for a character.

The stakes are raised when their conversation, as it sometimes does, turns into a concern over who’s allowed to do what. Steve can’t turn his back to Loki, Loki can play the puppet master and toy with Steve. Expressly forbidding it, Steve makes to leave and Loki’s having none of it. Though, once Steve does in fact stay, we get another one of those morsels when Loki admits it is easiest for him to be cruel.

Then, he’s more or less threatening the Avengers should Steve not keep his repeated presence a secret, and we’ve snapped back to the persona Loki has been favoring. Steve, as ever, doesn’t care. He presses on, and claims his debt in the form of Loki doing a good deed. Sometimes it's hard to determine if Steve is deluded, or if Loki is the one who doesn’t truly know himself.

Good deed or no, one has to wonder why Loki chose to text Steve. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but Loki is adding another way to communicate with Steve, only to show up in person once Steve has seen the news coverage. Its another subtle nod to what’s to come.

A noted marker of more of the same is the epithet of ‘my Captain’. Without Loki’s perspective, we can only guess at where he’s coming from...which in itself is a quagmire. We’re best left to trust the author and continue enjoying the ride.

Take a risk, he [Steve] told himself, and tried to ignore the little voice that said he was taking too many.

This in response to Loki bringing up Steve’s potential melancholy for things that were, it is notable in that Steve is becoming maybe a little conscious of how he is compromising himself. Let us not forget that that is, contrary to some belief, not entirely out of character for him. Taking risks got him to where he is, in countless variations on a theme. His willingness to be vulnerable pays off, as Loki admits simply that there are, in fact, things he misses about Asgard.

As we continue, Steve grows more bold and Loki somewhat more callus. He brings up Bucky Barnes, and though initially not by name, it’s obvious who he’s referring to. It is here that Steve tries drawing a line in the sand.

“Don’t try to tell me that,” Steve interrupted. “You don’t like something I say, say so. Don’t just – don’t just take off and then come back determined to have some kind of revenge. You can’t – go around hurting people just because they hurt you.”

“Why not,” Loki said, his voice lofty, but there was something low and vicious underneath. “That is the world, is it not? Give and take. Action and reaction. Strike and retaliation.”

And here we have two opposing sets of beliefs. Steve proceeds to shut down the conversation, and that is how the scene ends, before opening up into a new scene, a slow revelation that something happened and Steve has been hurt. Loki is there when he wakes, which is maddening! How long has he been there with him, one wants to know, and do the other Avengers know? Loki is clearly distressed. Here we have some explicit emotional whump, as Loki insists he’s simply not trustworthy. Steve might be tired, hurt, and out of it perhaps, but it bears out more of his emotion.

“No, and I was wrong.” He needed to salvage this, and wasn’t sure why it was so important, only that it was.

It’s important because Loki has become part of his life, and Loki needed to understand Steve saw things in him Loki probably refused to believe he could ever possess. Our final segment concludes on a very good recap:

Still. He couldn’t help but feel a little twinge of something like hope. Maybe just a little. Four steps forward, three steps back.

Even if he still didn’t know where they were going, or if, or why. It was still something.

#rtcessays #essay 1 #remember this cold #stoki #frostshield #veliseraptor #buffyscribbles #fanwork

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bkrsszlrd · 7 years

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We Don’t Talk Like This - Dialogue in Fiction

Steven Erikson - Author

December 1 at 6:00pm

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For the writer, dialogue is carrying more than one character forward, and accordingly, the writer needs to know each one intimately. Sometimes, with very minor or one-off character appearances, the writer needs only the minimal knowledge for that character: specifically, attitude and stance on the chosen subject. You might think it doesn’t need to be there and strictly speaking, you’re right, it doesn’t. But giving that little bit of extra thought for that throw-away character can make the narrative zing. An example? Okay.

Nimble Thumbsuck led his party of adventurers into the tavern. He looked around, trying to pierce the gloom. As his eyes adjusted, he saw a mysterious hooded figure sitting at the very back, near the dying hearth. On the battered table before this figure rested a long sword, its oily blade glistening as if sheathed in sweat. Nimble turned to his companions. “Find us a table. I need to ask some questions.” As they meekly headed off, Nimble strode up to the counter and positioned himself opposite the barkeep. “Ale, if you please.” The barkeep quickly poured a tankard and set it before the wily thief (what, you didn’t guess he was a thief? For crying out loud!). Nimble gestured the old man closer. “Hey, friend, what can you tell me about that hooded stranger at the back with the sword on the table?” “Oh,” said the barkeep, “that’s Valorous Verdant, who secretly works for the somewhat dim Wizard of Virtue, Alf Gullible. He’s been here the past four nights. Must be, uh, waiting for someone!” Smiling, Nimble collected up his tankard and ambled over to the hooded man. Taking a seat opposite with the bared blade between them, the thief smiled and said, “I hear you’re waiting for someone.” Valorous Verdant said nothing for a long moment, and then he leaned forward, planting his elbows on the table (and inadvertently slicing open one of those elbows on the sword’s razor-sharp edge, but that’s the price of Ominous Gestures, so he bore it with nary a twitch). “That’s right,” he said. “I require the services of a thief and oh, five adventurous companions just like those ones sitting over there. The Eye of Zircon needs to be stolen from the skull of, uh, Zircon. Needless to say, he might notice that. Aye, ‘tis perilous, but the very existence of the world depends on it – and on you too, my friend!”

Okay, now let’s try it again, hunting for something (anything!) to elevate this trope-laden purgative of a scene.

Nimble Thumbsuck led his party of adventurers into the tavern. He looked around, trying to pierce the gloom. As his eyes adjusted, he saw a mysterious hooded figure sitting at the very back, near the dying hearth. On the battered table before this figure rested a long sword, its oily blade glistening as if sheathed in sweat. Nimble turned to his companions. “Find us a table. I need to ask some questions.” As they meekly headed off, Nimble strode up to the counter and positioned himself opposite the barkeep. “Ale, if you please.” The barkeep, a frighteningly hirsute man apparently devoid of any habits of hygiene, continued polishing a tankard. At Nimble’s request he blinked sleepily and then said, “See what I’m doing?” Startled, Nimble frowned. “Excuse me?” “Said ‘see what I’m doing?’” “Uh, well –” “I’m polishing this tankard. And it’s like this. You start something, you finish it. My old man taught me that, the night he bailed on all of us. And I gone and taught it to my brats – assuming they’re even mine and I ain’t making no claims here either way, and maybe I seen you around out back five years ago when my wife was hanging laundry and her latest whelp’s got the same red hair as you, but maybe I ain’t seen anything like that at all. Point is, what do you think I’m gonna do with this here tankard?” “Uh … finish polishing it?” The barkeep’s grin was as green and brown as the rag he was using on the tankard. “Smart man. And when I’m done, why, then I’ll pour some ale in it for ya. How’s that for service?” Recovering at last, Nimble smiled. “Sounds perfect. Now, one other thing…” “What? Can’t you see I ain’t finished here yet?” “I know. Still, that hooded man at the back there…” “What about him?” “Well, who is he?” “Fucked if I know.” The tankard was finally polished to the barkeep’s high standards. He filled it with ale from a cask and plunked the vessel down in front of Nimble. “If you’re thinking of taking this over to that table back there, you’re paying first.” “Right. Sure. Of course.” Nimble set a coin down on the counter. Then, collecting up his tankard, he made his way over to the hooded man’s table and sat down in the chair opposite, the bared blade between them. “Good evening, good sir,” he said with a smile. The hooded man said nothing. Nimble tried again. “Looks like you’re waiting –” “Get the fuck out of my face.”

A few things should be evident when comparing these two examples. In the first version, everybody our intrepid hero questions offers up reams of information. The barkeep’s nobody, really. Just an expository robot. Then, when we get to the hooded man, again the guy just spews out all kinds of expository shit and comes across like a, well, like a fucking moron. With heroes like this, Lord Zircon’s got nothing to worry about.

The other detail you might have noticed is that the second version uses minor characters as blocks and foils to knowledge. Why? Because they’re more real as people: they are not enslaved by the narrator as functions of explication. These blocks and foils are both more realistic and serve to complicate the hero’s quest for knowledge. In other words, the second sample tells you far less than the first sample and guess what, THAT’S A GOOD THING.

The third point has to do with character-based diction. The first sample, in employing each character as props, ultimately flattens the diction, because the two minor characters aren’t fully realised by the author. They have no voice of their own, no attitude (beyond the effusive) and no stance and accordingly, nothing at stake. And if you think an old barkeep has nothing worthwhile to take a stance on, you don’t know jack. No matter how small the turf, it will be defended. Also, bear in mind that Nimble is the seventh thief looking to talk to the hooded man that night. Okay, not true, but as far as the barkeep’s concerned, it could be.

In the second sample, the barkeep’s diction comes to life, acquires its own cadence, and all of it decided by the writer’s choice to give him his moment on the stage, to acknowledge his right to exist and to have a full life. If the writer dismisses the lowly barkeep, what does that say about the writer’s attitude toward his characters, and indeed, the entire story? Maybe nothing. But maybe a lot.

A bit-part does not mean a bit-life. What is the other effect of enlivening your minor characters? It deepens the world. It occupies that world with genuine people. It adds authenticity and reminds us, the reader, that the world (any world) is NOT a straight-forward narrative dictating every appearance, no matter how incidental, in the story. Sure, of course it is. But we don’t want it to be so obvious. Instead, we want to create the illusion of that world’s verisimilitude.

Recall my mention of how people don’t talk to each other, but past each other? Well, a deeper discussion of what I mean by that will be forthcoming in Part Two of this essay. Stay tuned!

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smashpanda · 3 years

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Ani-Me #13: Groovin’ To That COWBOY BEBOP (Ep. 1-13)

Welcome to Ani-Me! The Series Where You Make Me Watch Anime! To be clear, you aren’t making me do anything because I have enjoyed every bit of this so far.

And surprise, nerds! Look what I’m doing! Haha, I actually had this whole fun plan to do the anime poll and then Ozymandias-style be like “I already WATCHED THE WHOLE SHOW!!!” But it would take too long to finish watching all of it (it’s been a busy as hell month). Besides, I got half way through the show and decided that was definitely enough space to really dig into how I was feeling about the start. So without further ado, it’s time for…

Today’s Entry: COWBOY BEBOP (1998-1999)

So, I’m doing this because I felt like I needed to have reckoning with this show.

That’s because I actually tried watching it once before. This was about 10 years ago. An old friend thought it was positively insane that I had never seen it before. He wasn’t the first to sing its praises either. Even at the time I was open to the idea and gave it the old college try for a bunch of episodes, but… it didn’t take. I think I was mostly crashing up against the proverbial rocks of all those tangible details I was not prepared for. Which were really just the kinds of things that had kept me out of anime for so long. Like the facial contortions being so different from western animation. Or the way this particular story seemed to fixate on cool posturing in a way that likely would have more appealed to me during my teenage years. Heck, I was even wondering why there was a romantic, emotional pop song at the end (again, I had REALLY not seen a lot of anime). Then there was that very complicated issue of “fan service,” because I was watching with someone who was like WHY ARE HER BOOBS ALL OVER THE FUCKING PLACE!?!?! Simply put: they were really not having it. Plus the fact that we were watching the dubbed version, which felt like it played into a number of sexist tropes. So much of this was the problem with my initial experience.

But I imagine anime fans are so fucking tired of these kinds of complaints from outsiders, no? Hell, even just a year into this column series, I’m tired of them, too. But here’s the thing: these complaints are the common obstacles for outsiders and some are not without merit. And as much the casual dismissal from outsiders about anime can rankle, it’s also important to remember how it is for the outsiders - to realize how much of that anime-fan tiredness manifests online in the forms of equally-casual dismissals (mostly from toxic white dudes) for “not getting fan service,” etc. Point is, misunderstanding and excuse-making can go in a lot of directions. And honestly it was all part of the system of why I think I stayed away from anime for so long?

Thankfully, everything’s about timing.

So much of this column series has been about throwing myself in the deep end, getting used to the cinematic language, knowing the filmmakers, and growing comfortable with the cadence of a particular form. But honestly, I think so much of it has to do with just being much older, too. Basically, I calmed the fuck down. The previous things that bothered me are still there, but it just feels like so much less of a big deal. Even “the rules” of what I tend to believe about storytelling are so much more expansive. As they say, finally “I’m not young enough to think I know everything.” Along with that, there’s the popular online joke that something “hits different,” but coming back to Cowboy Bebop after a decade… it hits different. Like I said, timing is everything. Which brings us to another reason I really wanted to do this now…

So John Cho goes to my grocery store a lot.

A little while ago I saw him in full Spike hair and it was rad as hell.

So I’ve also been thinking a lot (read: too much) about how to cover Anime TV. Ideally, I like the idea of doing one giant essay about a series, but sometimes 1) overall thoughts don’t take on essay-like form the way they did with, say, Evangelion. And 2) that sometimes takes out the fun of talking about little things in each episode. But at the same time, I don’t want to feel the need to do the FULL RECAP thing with every episode, which sometimes bogs down the more important thoughts / gets repetitive (I felt like I ended up doing that with a lot of Korra recaps). So really, it’s going to be a case by case basis. And for Cowboy Bebop, I decided on a sort of “fly casual” approach with no plot recapping - just the evolution of my thoughts along with some other random passing ones. And it will all likely crest into big overall thoughts that will come with the end of the series.

Cool? Cool.

1. ASTEROID BLUES

“Oh, this is good, isn’t it?”

I said this to myself while watching and I simply cannot explain the difference the subs make for me personally when it comes to this show. Like I know the dub has a lot of fans and history, but everything about hearing the show in Japanese just plays stronger to me. The rhythm, the cadence, and most of all the timing of jokes. There’s just this way each of their voices better line up with the droll affectation of the show. Combine that with me finally being used to a lot of anime’s particularly cinematic language? The show just plays so FUNNY now. Like I’m laughing out loud four times an episode. But that’s not the only thing that’s changed.

When I tried watching a decade ago, there was also this funny thing where I was having a very different relationship to the cinematic affectations of the late 90’s. Like how much of this episode reflects the El Mariachi / Desperado machismo that defined a certain kind of posturing coolness. Back then I worried a lot about that specific brand of indulgence. But now it all feels so silly and playful (as if, at the time, I wasn’t so much reacting to the worry of that coolness as how much the me of TWO decades would have eaten it up). Like I was the perfect age when this show came out the first time.

But I think that’s the real thing that hits me now with the episode: how playful it all feels. Like the absurd shot of the woman leaning on the counter to drink beer, the cat drinking all the crap on the ground, the sole motive of wanting beef, and Spike fitting a whole sandwich in his mouth. It takes none of these things seriously - except when it takes them seriously, of course. The episode’s structure is really built around the two bait and switches. The first is the fun fake pregnancy where it turns out that’s where she keeps the vials. And the second - tragic, with her death. Fast. Brutal. Forlorn. From minute one it’s sort of spelling out the tonal nature of this show: the fast loose hijinks > serious comeuppance > the Sisyphean process of bounty hunting without success… But hey, at least they got that beef.

It’s an apt metaphor.

2. STRAY DOG STRUT

In my original go round, I remember this being the episode liking this enough to stick with it longer. But now it plays even better. It’s kind of a classic fun and games episode, with the great set-up for the dog reveal - and the classic “lose but kinda win” ending a la Santa’s Little Helper (along with the dramatic irony that the dog is worth millions). I think I actually referenced this two columns ago, but there’s this kind of “kafka-esque’’ funny edge to the show. That “there is hope, but not for us” sentiment that populates a show of lovable losers trying and failing to navigate life’s absurdity.

But what I also like is that it’s not from a complete lack of competence. The gag where they both look up from the aquarium and Spike’s already got the gun drawn? That’s perfect stuff. Same goes with Spike absent-mindedly missing Abdul because he has shit on his foot. Both help establish this incredibly enduring character that thrives on both confidence and a genuine lack of awareness (which is often how he is able to pull a fast one on the audience, too).

The episode also helps clarify the show’s setting of an American Cultural Diaspora, filtered through the lens of Japanese culture. Could the Abdul stuff read as problematic? Oh absolutely, but the Game of Death / Way of the Dragon reference is also so singular to Kareem Abdul Jabbar’s influence that I’m not sure how much intention exists from the creators outside of it. And for an episode that delivers hijinks like Spike stealing the “just married” car and the incredible sound cue / animation of the corgi slapping onto the hood of his ship… I can’t help but smile.

3. HONKY TONK WOMAN

Ahhhhhh Faye Valentine. It’s funny, I wont say that I’m “used” to fan service at this point, nor really have any interest in excusing its extreme nature… I’m just sort of not letting it stop me from engaging everything around it? Does that make sense? But once again, I can’t explain just how much original language helps her character specifically. Megumi Hayashibara has this kind of wonderfully bored, disinterested tone that fits the characterization better.

The other thing that really hit with this episode was the James Bond-ness of the series (I mean in this gambling-centric episode drrr). But it’s the riff on the silhouettes in the opening titles, the pastiche of cool, and again, I keep coming back to that late 90’s disaffection that falls in line with Bond’s unruffled ethos. To wit, there’s a reason young men like disaffected characters, of course. In that it’s just as much of a power fantasy as so many other things are. They have all these budding, confused emotions and life feels so uncontrollable, so it becomes easy to grasp onto characters who play it cool, who show suaveness and are unbothered by the ups and downs going around them. Of course they want to be like that.

Which would normally be a possible “indulgence problem” if this show wasn’t also so keen on taking the piss out of Spike and company. That’s the thing: it’s just so damn playful at the same time. Unlike something Bond-esque, it’s always looking to make Spike the punchline. And the twisty, confusion-laden plots of chip-swapping and rubes and one one-ups-man-ship? I cackled constantly. And I have to say the fight in this one is so, so good. And the last line?

“Bye” … chef’s kiss… is… is that thing the kids still say?

insert grandpa face

4. GATEWAY SHUFFLE

It’s probably weird that THIS is the thing that most stands out to me, but it’s weird how much Twinkle reminds me of “Mom” from Futurama, right down to her large adult sons. I also like how much the episode plays with the dramatic irony of Spike and company being totally oblivious idiots (which will be a running gag), especially them on the verge of killing themselves with the virus. Also also, it establishes the sheer volume of problems that Spike fixes with sleight of hand. Also also also, there’s the fact that this episode is where Faye joins the team for good, thus setting up the fun larger team dynamics.

Is it weird that I don’t have much more to say about this one? It sort of reflects the way some Bebop episodes just feel slight in a way, which isn’t to say they aren’t fun or don’t have good gags. It’s just sort of the nature of this show, sometimes. Cause you’ll get an episode like this and then the next time you’ll get… Well, you’ll get an episode like…

5. BALLAD OF FALLEN ANGELS

“Who is this Sephriroth mother fucker?!?!?”

Such is the way I noted the entrance of Vicious. Given the overlapping timeline, I’m guessing there was something about long gray haired evil dudes with big swords in the water? Either way, the far more obvious influence on this one is John Woo. There’s the gunplay. The cathedral. The operatic posturing. It all brings me back to a place and time so vividly. That place and time being a teenager in the 90’s with a camcorder, boy, I can’t tell you how often we ran around with toy pistols diving off to the side and putting it in slow motion (we could never seem to find doves, but were always on the hunt for a group of pigeons to run through). This instinct also highlights the potential problems with these tropes. It would be SO easy for this to be nothing more than juvenile posturing / copying an en vogue aesthetic, but - as I’m learning is common for this show - Cowboy Bebop kind of hits this different note entirely…

Mostly thanks to the score. Because it all comes back to that ending with the haunting chorus of Green Bird, which gives me an array of complex feelings (along with it being a song I’ve had in my head for weeks now). On a pure aesthetic level, the scene is perfect. The pure combination of image, sound, and symbolism to hit an emotional response so squarely. A decade ago I felt this moment was more about hiding the story in a way - as if teasing backstory instead of even showing it - which isn’t entirely wrong, but now it feels more economical than anything, merely touching a lot I can have patience that will be dealt with . And more important than the specifics is understanding what it means to Spike emotionally - how much Vicious is part of his life and lost love and injury and pain, the cycles of opera and birth death rebirth death that all fit the same lyrics to the song…

“Spring has come

Worms are showing their faces

Little birds are eating them

Spring has come

Children are going to school

Farm dogs are giving birth to puppies

Spring has come

Women are looking in mirrors

Egg pies are baking”

In short, I understand why it’s a classic.

6. SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL

It’s here I realize that writing about Cowboy Bebop is a bit counter to my general instincts. For I’m someone who likes digging into problems because it helps me understand things. With Korra or Falcon and The Winter Solider or something, I can stop, dig into the structural problems of a given episode, talk about approach, and feel like everyone was coming out the other side with a bigger understanding. I get that sense of purpose. But what’s odd about this show is everything is incredibly sound on the writing front. Every weekly “session” gives us a contained, thoughtful, playful little story with little differing nuances (it actually reminds me a lot of the Lone Wolf and Cub story structure, which yes, I’ve read all of by the way). And it’s no different with this episode (which also reminded me a bit of the ventriloquist dummy episode of Buffy?). There’s even so many really great things that stand out. Like this is the first episode where Faye really clicked for me (the gag where she casually eats the dog food is an all-timer). I also loved the kid getting Last Crusade-ed at the end.

But the “what makes us care” is a whole other ball of wax. Because this was the last episode I watched in my initial trial a decade ago. There wasn’t any big reason I stopped, just that simple lack of interest. And I think it speaks to the trouble of telling stories about disaffected characters. The whole idea is that they’re often hiding pain or interest or backstory or whatever else. Then the idea is you’re slowly supposed to peer in (and I’m far enough into the show to know how they do that). But if you’re not really all in on a character’s emotional journey from those critical starts? Sometimes it’s hard to work up that investment. If I was watching this as a teenager in the 90’s? I would likely have a whole different feeling because I’m watching in more of an aspirational sense. But watching an episode like this, from where I am now? I understand why it’s easy to feel a lack of connection, even when the boy is giving all the tears about the release of death… It feels like an emotion on display, a thing I’m looking at, but kept a distance from - and thus a harder thing to certainly feel.

7. HEAVY METAL QUEEN

For shits and giggles I watched this one with dub. It’s interesting because it instantly reminded me that part of the reason I like subs so much is it needs your undivided attention. With the dub? Suddenly my eyes could wander, sometimes to twitter sometimes and then I’d realize I missed something and rewind a second. In that capacity the subs are actually allowing for more distraction? Which is why 1) I worry that most shows seem designed to be watched with someone half paying attention and 2) I tend to watch things sans phone as much as possible. Look, it’s not that this multitasking activity is “bad” inherently. I love listening to podcasts as I cook or clean. It’s just with cinema it’s so easy to do and miss out on what I really want to be doing. Which is being enveloped in a story.

Anyway, I’m more or less good with this episode. I wish I had more to say than that. But once again I feel like I’m coming out of an episode with an “okay, that was solid” feeling. Perhaps because also plays into 90’s dated-ness in a way where all the things that should feel modern feel just so… heteronormative? I dunno. It’s like VT feels like a character I should be adoring, but with 20 years she feels like a half-measure. And even at the time, it’s really hard to get past the dude in the sombrero ogling the waitress who looks like lady liberty. Like, the gross metaphor is utterly clear, and not in a way where it’s countering it on any level. But there’s always those moments of elation, like Spike firing his space gun to better direct himself back - that make the show still feel special.

8. WALTZ FOR VENUS

So this is the first episode I unequivocally loved.

Perhaps it’s just because it does some of my absolute favorite writing things. Like, hurray! They finally got paid! But true to understanding their ethos, it happens almost immediately in the opening, thus setting up proper expectations for what is to follow. And then it does my absolutely favorite thing, which is make you absolutely care for a character you hate without realizing that’s what it’s doing. Roco at first comes off as annoying, jealous, brash, etc. But with time and perspective, the eagerness ends up being motivated. And the way it all crests into him using the “like water” teachings of Spike’s supernatural reflexes? Perfect moment!

And then he gets fucking shot.

I literally screamed NO in my living room. But that’s what good writing does, it takes you through journeys subtlety then knocks you on your ass with whiplashing emotion (I also realized this entire beat, right down to the thumbs up in the middle, happens in Mad Max: Fury Road). And what’s more is that even on death’s door stop, all his eagerness and wonder could be summed up in that youthful question: “Hey, if I knew you earlier, would we have been friends?” Gah, it’s just gutting. And so absolutely perfect in its dramatic articulation.

With this kind of competent writing on the “fun / plot” level, it’s also funny how much I remember the little details that the show is so good at. Like the use of the Hagia Sophia on Venus. Or the way the rich guy shouts to save himself and then gets his toupee knocked off.

… And then there’s those super gay panic 90’s details like shoving the gun in gay man’s throat that make my skin fucking crawl. As good as things can be, those ugly shadows loom large.

9. JAMMING WITH EDWARD

I love that they finally get around to explaining why earth sucks and everyone is in space in episode 9! This is also one of those episodes where the cyberpunky-ness of a rogue A.I. would play more fresh back in the late 90’s? By now it’s just hard to grab onto, given how many times we’ve seen this plot done again and again. But thankfully, the show has the complete dignity to continue its tradition of being playful instead of serious, in that MPU is a little freaking weirdo whom I am glad escapes.

I sort of don’t know what to make of Ed yet? I like certain affectations and weirdness, but I’m hoping it crests into something interesting. Otherwise, most of my notes cater around very specific reactions to moments. Like how Nazca lines were just in my trivia league! Or how the episode had huge Android: Netrunner vibes! Also a Summer Wars-like internet world! And great quotes like “there’s nothing made on earth that’s good” and paying it off with the cheap missile firing a dud.

But I also just want to mention lines like, “I hear that that hacker is gay hahaha” which I want to come back to because I don’t think is just a “Japanese culture” thing. That’s a “90’s gay panic” thing. And what’s important to talk about with these moments is that I don’t handwave them now as being dated and in the past. Because they weren’t “the past” for me. They were what I lived in. And revisiting it all from where I am now makes me FURIOUS. That’s because they were all part of a gay panic culture of the 90’s than gave me so many internal complexes and fears about being bisexual (I didn’t understand that’s what I was, really, I was mostly terrified I was gay and thought it would literally get me killed) and bunch of other stuff. It was just brutal. And I spent that entire decade around all this kind of media being like “hahahhahaha no big deal, right guys?” and I didn’t realize inside it was just tearing me apart - in the worst sense of making me deeply afraid in myself. It wasn’t the past, it was hell.

Anyway!

10. GANYMEDE ELEGY

I was wondering when we’d get to a Jet episode. So far he’s been the kind of character I don’t know much to make of. He mostly exists to be a no-nonsense foil to Spike’s irreverence. But even in this episode, a lot of his gruffness comes off as harmless, but then there’s the “be strong for her” ggRrrRRrrr pRoTeCt wOmAn philosophy just rubs me the wrong way. Though I think there’s a lot of valid reasons people gravitate toward characters like Jet? Even if I hesitate to get all pop-psych with it, I think characters like this remind a lot of people of their dads? I dunno, more curious what others think.

But Jet’s backstory completely fits it with what I’m now calling the C.B.M.O. (Cowboy Bebop Modus Operandi) in that it presents a forlorn, almost classical noir backstory - doesn’t go too deep with it, leans heavy on the pastiche, but at least has the dignity to be fun in the process. And by the time we get to the ending, the final confrontation with Alisa and Rhint still plays emotionally valid, which I think is all you need in this show (including strong thematic gestures of literally throwing the watch AKA your past into the ocean).

But also once again, what’s more burned into my mind is little moments and decisions. It’s trying to light the lighter with the bad memory cooked up in your head. It’s underlining the dramatic irony of tragedy with cutting lines like “this must be because i have good karma.” Also that end song totally sounded a lot like Seal’s “Kiss From A Rose.” Also we got gem lines like…

“I live and wander with a group of weirdos now”

I do, too… I do, too.

11. TOYS IN THE ATTIC

Let’s get right to the plum gag: bahahahahahhahahah the alien being an advanced form of leaving lobster in the fridge is just SO AMAZING. I was cackling like mad.

And honestly, I think the lead up with the entire episode was pretty damn great. It just has a completely different energy, not just in regards to playing with the sci-fi / horror tropes (which it’s not laying it on thick or anything), it’s just this fun verve. You feel it in the energy of how everyone hangs out. Like Faye completely taking Jet for all he’s worth in the strip poker game and his “honorable” reaction (this side of Jet’s gruffness I like a lot more). Which all just serves as the perfect dramatic irony of the encroaching, otherworldly horror. It also sideswipes these great little lines about how humans “quickly forgot the lessons they just learned.” And once again we get an episode where all the highs are in the little details, like the little beat where the alien good wiggles again before it’s fully melted. Even the episode’s overlaid vignette structure about lessons (which could be trite when applied in gauche fashion) instead only exists as a distracting bit of artifice that is only really leading to a sublime gag: “You shouldn’t leave things in the fridge… that is the lesson.”

Five stars. Would rent again.

12.-13. JUPITER JAZZ - PART 1 AND PART 2

I feel like it makes sense to write about these two episodes as a single entity.

First off, I have to say how much I like the pacing of them. Most of the sessions of Cowboy Bebop are lean, mean, and economical, which is all part of the fun. But even though the show has its moments of rest / down time,” it’s often rushing through conflict and rarely milking the drama in a way that lets you sit with the tension. Which just means I rarely feel like we ever have a real chance to just dig into a longer story pace. Which is of course what we finally get in this mid-point two part epic that brings us back to Vicious. Which, of course, we all suspected would happen (I say this like we’re all watching the show live for the first time, haha). But now that we’re finally getting into the story itself…

I’m not sure how crazy I am about it? Like, it’s all coming back to that problem of “how much do I really care about all these characters?” I like them and stuff. Really, I do. And it’s really nice to get moments of genuine emotion, like when Spike gets legitimately angry at being called Vicious. But there’s just this thing where I can’t get the emotional investment in the show to really drive that constant want of engagement. There’s fallibility, but so little genuine vulnerability. So it’s not really the kind of show you “lean into.” Which is all part of the ongoing cool disaffection. But hey, isn’t that just how noir operates?

The thing most people don’t understand about noir is that all that disaffection and hidden emotion always bubbles up by the story’s end, often in the spectacular ways of coming undone. Like, the vulnerability explodes by the end. But with a TV show slowly dolling that out like four times across 26 hours? Yeah, that’s not what the noir structure was built for so it just makes it harder to engage. Particularly when characters like Vicious still feel like cyphers in a way. Same goes for the way Julia feels like that haunting ghost. Like we learned “more” about them, but I don’t feel “closer” if that makes sense.

And it also doesn’t help matters that these episodes do some of my least favorite story tropes. Like when a female character is like, “I’m a girl who can take care of myself!” which seems to position them as not being the damsel, but then the male character saves them anyway, which just makes them EXTRA good at rescuing the kind of super-capable women who think they’re above damsel-ing! The fact it does so on the sly that feels even ickier than that. Same goes for yet more homophobia in the episode. And speaking of LGBT+ treatment…

I have NO idea what the heck to think of Gren? Like did they really say that Gren just got a hormonal imbalance from insomnia from going to prison??? Wut??? I don’t want to google things until I’m done with the show but needless to say I’ll be reading from trans / non-binary writers on the subject because I’m having huge flashbacks to The Crying Game discourse that so radically shaped more 90’s-ness when it comes to this stuff. Speaking of which, of course the character dies. And it’s amazing how many people don’t even recognize the problems of this trope, or even that it IS a trope. The reason the “kill your gays” trope exists is because it’s always written by straight people trying to grab other straight people’s sympathy (look, see now you care about this character because they died and that’s sad!) Meanwhile it only teaches LBGT+ people that they are doomed and should be afraid and that their “sacrifice” only exists to teach the straights lessons or whatever. Again, we’re just back in 90’s tropes that I internalized and have come to resent in much more meaningful fashion.

And yet, despite all the things that stick in my craw, this show always has these little things that seep right into my brain and stay there. Like that moment where Lin dies and Vicious clarifies, “he protected the rules,” which is just a forehead-slapper of a perfect line. And then the last little variation on the end title that really hits you: “Do you have a comrade?” Oof. These little things are what makes me ultimately care about the show. It’s not the drama. It’s the little ingenious moments that stick in there and keep rattling around in my brain.

Speaking of brain rattles, this also finally brings us to why I also felt comfortable stopping halfway through the show to write all this down… The other night I felt inclined to start listening to the soundtrack and it was all just there in my brain already, set in stone.

Point being, I’m in.

<3HULK

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channelnewswire-blog · 6 years

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When will New Zealand fiction overcome itself?

An essay by author Kirsty Gunn on the insistence of New Zealand fiction to keep harping on about problems of nationwide identity, 'embeded in a rictus of recognized figures and tropes'.

A long time ago now, I wrote an unique about a kid growing up, who likes the sea, enjoys to browse, and who has a day in the middle of summer season when the sea appears to wish to show something to him. That story was soaked in the New Zealand of my past-- with memories of a specific beach, one specific summer season-- it was pure fiction, pure made up stuff of sand and salt and shadows.The novel won

a prize in Scotland-- and, it's real, there were parts of Scotland in the book. My children were little women at the time it was composed and we spent many weekends at a beach about an hour's drive out of Edinburgh where we were based then. I also understood of the surfing scene up in the far north where my sister lives, where the kids browse in wetsuits all year round such is the permeating cold of the cold north sea. So Scotland, yes, remained in the story, for sure, it makes up a huge part of my imagination always.In basic

, however, it was the Wairarapa beaches of Castlepoint and Riversdale that constituted the landscape of that book-- so that it was New Zealand, most likely, that rose clear off its pages to many readers. At the end of the prize event-- I 'd made my speech, I 'd thanked the judges, the celebration was about to begin-- a woman came up to me and stated, "What's an unique like your's doing winning Scottish Book of the Year?"

She was standing actually close, smiling, however not smiling. "It's not a Scottish book at all," she went on. "I do not know what it is, however it's not Scottish."

At the exact same reward ceremony, the late Gavin Wallace, the literature director of Creative Scotland (for Scotland had followed New Zealand's lead by the early 21st century and was no longer The Scottish Arts Council but Creative Scotland-- with all the comparable entailments those modifications brought to both financing bodies) had actually spoken about an "International Scottish Literature", a means of considering how the culture of a nation might be specified as much by all that it gives it, all that is beyond its coasts, as it speaks of its own indigenous colours and tastes and histories.Gavin Wallace was

a motivating and erudite spokesman for such a literature. His unfortunate death in 2013 seemed then, and today, to mark a change in the way Scotland views her novels and narratives and plays. It was Gavin Wallace who introduced a funding stream that would enable books to be translated out of and into the nation-- an intelligent, generous reciprocity of interests that might only broaden and deepen our understanding of Scottish letters. That stream has actually been dammed and now is dry. The literature bursaries that he helped establish are gone-- literature must now take on film and the music company as far as financing by means of Creative Scotland is concerned-- and any books or plays or poems that are made it possible for by grants and awards must be shown to have "advantage", as is specified in the manifesto produced by Creative Scotland in line with ever brand-new directives coming out of The Scottish National Celebration with its targeted, politicised interest in Scottish culture and ideas.Everything needs to be Scottish, for Scotland, about Scotland, and with everyone in Scotland in mind. Noise familiar? It's familiar to me.Familiar due to the fact that

when I think about growing up in New Zealand in the 1970s it was for these type of factors precisely that I wished to leave. Reasons that were to do more with politics, as I saw it, than literature. All those unrelentingly New Zealand very male type of men writing about the land of livestock farms and slaughter, of willing ladies and flagons of beer ... All those endless tales about what it was to be a New Zealander, about how we spoke or might speak, and how we ought to speak if we were to be real to ourselves, if we were to discover our way ... It had to do with nation-building, to my mind, this type of activity, not the imagination; it was pushing away, to state the least.At my girls'school we checked out Mansfield and Janet Frame and Fleur Adcock and Marilynne Duckworth by method of a remedy-- however the flavour of the country was strong. Frank Sargeson and Dan Davin and all who followed had actually developed its tone. Sam Hunt was on the increase in his singlet and with his bottle of red; the tones of Barry Crump had well and genuinely eclipsed the figure and work of his advanced, London domiciled ex-wife-- she barely counted as a New Zealand writer, as I seem to bear in mind; there was the shape of her absence in discussions and media of the time. Even studying American poetry with the urbane Bill Manhire could not rather make me think there was a place for anyone who didn't have the kind of named-town, idiolectic particularity, an "authenticity"( the speech marks are my own but the word was everyone's) that was being put about by method of genuine writing, the honest to goodness New Zealand stuff that would get released. I would send out off my little brief stories to the Listener and Landfall and the rejection notes would return telling me that what I 'd sent wasn't what they were after at all. I even have among them somewhere: A handwritten message on that thrilling Landfall stationery they had at that time stating" It's good, this, but it's not actually a New Zealand story, is it?"

By the time I pertained to the politics and feminism of Fiona Kidman and the gnarly indigenous poetics of Patricia Grace, by the time I had been introduced, by the late Frank MacKay, to the subtle classical and European inflected locales of Vincent O'Sullivan's work, that had actually followed in turn that very same teacher's modernist parsing of James K Baxter (who till then I had foolishly, shamefully, put among those other "blokes") it was too late. I 'd fled. I wished to live somewhere where I might compose whatever I desired in the design I wanted about anything I wanted.The truth that New

Zealand lakes and rivers and watercourses go through my pages, and have done since I initially made my fiction, doesn't change that concept. I could not stay somewhere which felt so willfully detached from other places, so constantly ... nationalist, really, is how it felt, in its top priorities, so fixed on a voice that needs to be permanently talking about what it was to live here, what that signified, and how it might look, identity-- as a sentence on the page-- and how those sentences might include up and sound.To me, all

that was exhausting. For New Zealand to be set on a job to specify itself to the world, as a nation that may exist quite apart from Britain ... On a mission to create itself as an independent area of letters and culture that could drift in glorious isolation in the Pacific sea, not responsing to anybody ... To my mind then-- though I might comprehend it now-- that sort of engagement might only be restricting, to the creativity, imaginative volition, and to the free-and-easy passage of believed itself. When I contemplate the nation that is Scotland in 2018, determining its own form of detachment from a royal Britain, the activities and sensibility follow almost to the letter the state of affairs disputed in New Zealand all those years ago: the literary program simulating the exact same figuring of identity politics, stating itself as an intellectual and cultural endeavour and finding benefit for that in public acknowledgment and award and financial support.I have actually expected

something in both Scotland and New Zealand that felt more like a synthesis, of attempted and tested methods with new techniques, an amalgamation of old tropes with bold, unexpected concepts that come from artists and thinkers and risk takers and that have nothing to do with past requirements that literature may be so responsible for clothes the country in its culture. For it seems to me that the writing I have actually followed from New Zealand since my own leaving, for the many part, from what I have actually seen, has not shifted much from those concerns established at that time when I was a girl.I myself have actually shifted; now on visits back to Unity Books purchasing up whatever I can that has about it the whiff of the pohutukawa tree, the tang of wool, that rings and clatters with the sounds, those cadences of house. My viewpoint has opened that method. On a recent visit to the UK Fiona Kidman gave me Lauris Edmonds' In White Ink, a selection of her life's work, and I read it through in one rapt session, sitting as I remained in my mind in a house above Asian Bay in Wellington with the wind rumbling through the macrocarpas, and the harbour water listed below me dark and large. I can't get enough of Dan Davin and Frank Sargeson now.Yet an evaluation of Vincent O'Sullivan's most current book, All This By Chance, in this year's winter season issue of New Zealand Books is proof of the fact that though I have actually changed, literary politics in New Zealand have not. I'm promoting books, instead of making a case for the poetry of, state, the worldwide phenomena that has actually flown into view by way of young women like Hera Lindsay Bird. Novels are what I understand. And from those I read, and in the publications whose evaluations I follow, and the discussions I have with authors and scholars and critics and literature enthusiasts in New Zealand, it appears all too clear to me that old practices die hard.The chap

may no longer be ranging through the pages of the stories everyone is talking about now (although he is an existence, I do note) however the old cultural identity problem is still out there-- in Polynesian and Māori garb, or in feminist and gender ethics clobber, possibly-- writ large. In a recent review of The Migrant Misconception: New Zealand Writers and the Colonial World by Helen Bones, Simon Hay discussed the need to resolve power structures within New Zealand that would reduce particular sort of social groups, sensibilities, in any introduction of the literature. "If Bones were to swap 'New Zealand culture' for 'bourgeois, white inhabitant New Zealand culture'... I think I would basically concur with her," he wrote. He's referring to a specific period in New Zealand letters, however the belief is up to date. Keep coming to grips with those problems to do with identity and self and for goodness' sake, both book and review are stating: Get the identity right!

Frank Sargeson, Dan Davin, Barry Crump, Sam Hunt

It's the kind of sensibility that is expressed in the evaluation of O'Sullivan's novel, that, in one sweeping, dismissive reading marked down an universe that had actually been carefully put together. Here was a New Zealand that existed as a location both in the imagination of a North London chemist, all sunlight and beaches, and the reality for a family who find themselves split apart and darkened by the atrocities of a past that can barely be articulated. "Yet the words 'Jew' or 'Holocaust' are almost absolutely missing," composed reviewer Ann Beagehole, as though all imaginative product, and ethical and social and moral and spiritual, need to show itself plainly on the tin. What kind of New Zealand story is this, her review appears to recommend, to describe a history that attempts not speak its name?Casting my eyes over the latest wave of modern books-- on both sides of the hemisphere, mind you-- this sort of thinking appears to prevail. The hesitancies of art have been silenced in favour of promoting sure results. Where are the spaces, the occlusions? The locations for reticence, for suggestion? Where is the poetry and poetics in the kind of story that must emerge on the printed page as a 100 %variation of this method of believing or that? The novels that aren't set in a rictus of known figures and tropes? I'm barely stating that Scottish and New Zealand authors are lacking in verve and colour. Only that those down-at-heel outsiders that were once so fresh in the novels of James Kelman have actually now staled into numerous replicas regarding render the story of marginalised metropolitan lives redundant. In the same way that the inheritors of New Zealand's own kind of dirty realism have actually hardened their art into self mindful tales of people like us, like us, like us, over and over, set on limitless repeat.O'Sullivan is one of numerous writers in the country who has constantly withstood such simple compartmentalising, naturally, to the advantage of all who like books and think in literature's power to alter and enlarge our lives. However arts agendas all over the world are simply that-- programs-- and they are powerful. My own thinking has taken me just recently towards research being undertaken at Oxford around the concern of literary credibility-- how a lot of our so-called works of imagination and/or textual and linguistic originality are in fact-- consisting of for a lot of the reasons I have actually detailed here-- variations of a state sponsored programme of letters.It leaves the imagination gasping for air, all this. For in ticking the boxes and showing ourselves to be taking part in what are considered the important arguments of the day we lose raw idea. Trait. Special, and monstrosity.

We lose the lovely wastes of exploration and tentativeness and the topics and figures that may take their location within it, feral and numerous and new.Not everything has to do with the familiar. Unusual animals walk, and are books. We need to keep in mind that culture is protean as much as it is an expression of some set status quo. Let the other locations sound, and silence, sometimes, resonate. Let creativity reveal us what to write, open to fictions that may be as sweet and unforeseen as those revealed by my Wairarapa kid finding himself cleaned up in a marquee at the Edinburgh festival. Worldwide we're occupying now, scarier than ever, to keep repeating what we already understand does not appear to be moving us forward, so may we not instead permit ourselves to be released into a sea of the mind?As the movie writer and public intellectual Michael Wood composed recently, resolving the type of art that is the opposite of certainty, that confuses us and makes us alert, "forms talk to our bewilderment, to everything we can not master. They may recommend too that mastery is not precisely what we need."The Spinoff Review of Books is happily given you by Unity Books.

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dicojib · 7 years

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SILENT TRAILS

by Marcelo de Gracia Concepcion

Silent Trails Silent are the trails of Benguet hills, When the mist veils the sun – Even the wind stirs the ferns And the bamboo brakes sing Their echoed murmurs. And the laden Benguet women pass, Beating their pakkongs* In cadenced monotones. Even so, These trails are lonely And deep are the ravines. And higher still the skies

a Literary interpretation of Alec John Bandivas

Let’s begin with the word silent. The author wants to convey the adjective word silent manifesting its definition, which is not expressed aloud. The word silent may be wrongly perceived in here that the subject is not making or accompanied by any sound ,or that it is in the state of being unable to speak or being mute. This adjective word then linked to the noun trails. Trails may have lot of interpretation. In a strict sense a trail is not a place but rather something that connects places, but we also need to know that it also marks the boundaries of a certain place. The word trail also has a connotation of one's course through life that he/she is following as well as the urge for exploration. Here we could say that ‘silent trails’ would literally mean something that is incapable of connecting or unable to draw a borderline. In a deeper sense, this could be related to a person not capable of expressing himself/herself or make himself/herself guided by the knowledge where or when to stop. Silent trails were also used to express deprivation of living one’s own life and become enlightened of things and of oneself. The author put into picture the state of the person who perform these actions through the word hills. Hills usually depicts our ups and downs in life. During these days we ought to make ourselves isolated in which there were lot of thoughts and feelings inside of us that we used to leave unspoken. In this state, we might have an extreme decision making - let’s say when we are very happy or very sad - that we tend to become misguided, and live other people’s lives.

To veil is not ordinarily being perceived in here the same as to hide and protect what is behind it. It became a different story since it was acquainted with the word mist. Mist is a slow drizzle that blurs, and distorts, our vision and perception. It prevents us from seeing clearly. Mist is that discomforting confusion that we must wade through just prior to experiencing clarity. It is the feeling that what we are looking for is not yet ready for us to understand. Metaphorically: Mist creates a blurred vision of something real and true that is not meant to be completely understood by our rational mind; or, at least not meant to be understood by us at that moment. What is becoming blurry or uncomprehending because of the mist? The sun. The sun symbolically represents life, influence and strength. It also symbolizes energy, will, being clear and self. When we are misguided and we live other people’s lives then these words that symbolizes the sun will become blurry. Life will be hard, we will not understand ourselves truly, we will be unable to unleash our strength. We will not be able to know ourselves, we lack our own identity.

Wind symbolizes the act of change or the bringing in the new and sweeping out the old. The wind symbolizes different things depending on the topic, religion and culture. Religiously, wind is a sign of spiritual discovery or truth.We are then inspired by changing oneself as the wind awakens our sincerity towards others, which is the symbolical meaning of the fern. Bamboo is a symbol of virtue. It reflects soul and emotion. It breaks the silence, it wanted to speak. It expresses dissatisfaction or annoyance about a person’s state. It is a song that whatever one do to disregard, will still surface and repeatedly declared. It is a form of inner rebellion wherein one cannot withstand being suppressed.

And then the place is filled with women. Significantly, each of these stereotypes aligns woman closely with nature. Such images reinforce the idea that woman, imprisoned within her biology - as the innocent vessel of the life-bearing force or as bearer of uncontrollable and instinctive sexual desire - is incapable of transcending her bodily functions and desires. Also it was said that the women were from Benguet, a native of the place, which made me think that these women are members of Igorot tribe. These facts moved me to study deeper about this. So, I made a research and found an interesting article that might help us understand the sentiments of the author. “Beyond the extraordinary, emerges that which is flawless. The igorot woman is a product of an extraordinary background. Imagine her early beginnings - raised to be man’s shadow in what others may view as the most primitive of environments,” according to Maria Cristina Apolinar-Abeya in her essay entitled The Role of Women Among Igorots. The igorot women are bounded to do things the way they were supposed to, no any question. They live the life what the elders established how the women are expected to live. And then these women would beat their pakkongs. Pakkong is a native instrument that is used to make music. Music is so much part of the culture and lives of the igorot tribe, we could say that it denotes their core-being. It was observed that it was in a sequence of single note. This strengthen the way of life of the women among the igorot tribe, a life that follows the tempo of a single song, the voice of the majority which sets the standard of the society.

Together as I try to interpret the last part of the poem, would also be the conclusion of this analysis. The author said nevertheless, taking this path is lonely. Like the deep ravines, one mistake would mean death, take the wrong path and one shall experience pain. In present times, defying the norms of the society would be easier than how it was before, however it would really still be hard for those people who do, as it would also mean letting themselves become vulnerable to wrong judgment of other people. How can we say that we are now free from this most primitive actions? These people are not capable of expressing themselves due to the standards of the society they feel they are deprived of living their own life because of their fear. They are deprive of exploring himself/herself, they are forced to blend not to stand out. And higher still the skies denotes their aspirations. They are wanting to break this chains around their necks. They are dreaming to hear the silent trails they want to take.

#literature

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ricardosousalemos · 8 years

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Thelonious Monk: Monk's Music

The summer of 1957 would seem to mark the redemption of Thelonious Monk, the summer he made Monk’s Music in one night.

He was then a 39-year-old New York jazz pianist of great repute who hadn’t been able to work at most jazz clubs in New York for the past six years. His cabaret card, a relic of New York law enforcement since prohibition, had been revoked in 1951 after a spurious narcotics charge. And so he hadn’t been easy to see, which means he might have seemed elusive. He was introverted and sometimes guarded; such behavior has never been unusual in jazz. In fact he lived with bipolar disorder—undiagnosed at the time, though we know about it now, especially through the work of the scholar Robin D.G. Kelley, whose book Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original is the principal source of much biographical information here.

At the end of 1955, Monk’s mother, Barbara, had died. In early 1956, an electrical fire destroyed his New York apartment on West 63rd Street, totaling his piano and resulting in his family of five, basically destitute, having to stay for months with friends—15 people in a three-room apartment. At the beginning of 1957, Monk spent three weeks in Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital, taken there by a policeman he'd been unresponsive to after a car accident. (What else was going on in his bloodline? Kelley’s book, at this period, contains a chilling sentence: “Thelonious did not know that his own father had been living in a mental asylum for the past fifteen years.”) In May, his wife Nellie developed an illness which resulted in a thyroidectomy, leaving her frail and depressed, which had a relay effect on Monk. Also during this time, Monk got himself a manager, began a close musical relationship with John Coltrane, made several albums for Riverside records including Monk’s Music, regained his cabaret card, and started a six-month job at the Five Spot Café—a gig which would re-establish his performing career, serve as Coltrane’s finishing school, and be described thereafter as a high point in New York jazz culture.

This is all a relatively easy story to tell. There is a reversal of fortune; Monk makes a great album; he wins. Like any cliche, it only applies badly to Monk.

As a pianist, Monk, who would have turned 100 this year, was not a dazzler-virtuoso like Art Tatum or Oscar Peterson. He phrased in a wide circumference around the beat, leaving a lot of silence in an improvisation, enough for you to notice. He made polytonal clonks on the keyboard by playing the desired note as well as the key adjacent to it. The assumption, often, was that either he didn’t have much technique, or was withholding it because he didn’t want to be understood or known too quickly, and why would someone do that?

A common initial reaction to Monk was skepticism. The pianist Randy Weston, then 18, first saw Monk playing in Coleman Hawkins’ band. “Who is this cat on piano?” Weston remembers thinking, in his memoir African Rhythms. “I can play more piano than this guy!” In other words: it’s unclear what this person knows. Another reaction was humility. The drummer Art Blakey described in a 1973 interview how Monk had been his sympathetic guide through what Blakey called the “cliques” in New York jazz when Blakey first arrived from Pittsburgh in the early ’40s. Blakey watched Monk defend his own music and insist on the right way to play it. “He was very outspoken,” he said. “He knew what he wanted to do, and he did it.” In other words: this person knows a lot.

Much of the talk around jazz, and around Monk, turns on ideas of knowing and not-knowing. (I keep the hyphen, as for related reasons did Donald Barthelme in his essay of that name as well as various Buddhists and psychotherapists, because by “not-knowing” I mean flexibility, working without a fixed outcome, trusting oneself to find a new vocabulary, as opposed to what I would mean without the hyphen: ignorance, lack of awareness, incuriosity.) By one understanding, jazz is a consensual language of rhythm, harmony, and form, and a consensual repertoire accumulated over the last hundred years. That’s about knowing. If you want to work in jazz, you have to get the basic songs under your fingers. Those songs—including, say, “All the Things You Are,” “Donna Lee,” “Footprints,” and about ten by Thelonious Monk—are a part of what holds the tradition together.

The larger part is the fact that jazz is essentially African-American in musical vocabulary and disposition. Jazz is cultural memory. For many African-American musicians, to know is also to be aware of the values and dangers; to know is not to forget. Monk’s music suggested the cumulative past as a wider present: something older from within jazz—boogie-woogie or early Ellington—along with other vernacular traditions adjacent to it: rumba, gospel, or rhythm and blues.

Jazz is further defined by the discipline of improvising, which some say is an express-lane to thinking through time progressively and allowing possibility, the greater idea of not-knowing.

From the first seconds of “Well, You Needn’t,” the second track on Monk’s Music and the record’s greatest eleven minutes, much control is in evidence. You hear Monk, with only the bassist Wilbur Ware thrumming in the back, working upward from the C below middle C over an F pedal in half-steps: C, Db, D, Eb, E. Monk is playing in an implied three-beat rhythm, and punching out his notes a little roughly, as you might imagine yourself punching an elevator button. But he is doing it in between the beats, with style and purpose. He climbs his five notes twice, each time bringing you one step away from resolution in a perfect cadence; he is building tension and expectation in a classical and idiomatic way, alerting you that something is going to take place here, and it’s going to be an event. Then it arrives: the song’s hard opening, with John Coltrane, Coleman Hawkins and the rest of the septet piling in, Art Blakey’s drumming shoving it forward.

The band plays the theme together and Blakey crashes on its last beat. Now it’s Monk’s turn. He doesn’t start until the cymbal quiets down, and so for the first measure and a half there is silence. His solo begins as a restatement of the song’s melody, according to convention, but picks it up like a sentence started in the middle. He speeds up and slows down, experimenting, stamping his foot a little, testing the strength of the rhythm and his own relationship to it. Three times he brings his hand down on a strange five-note chord: a stack of fourths, all black notes. Each time he lets it ring for six beats. “Well, You Needn’t” was not a particularly famous song in 1957—Monk had recorded it ten years before for Blue Note, also with Blakey—but it sounds colossal here.

Monk wasn’t an album artist per se. Monk’s Music—produced by Orrin Keepnews, recorded at Reeves Sound Studios on East 44th Street, released on Riverside Records—is contradictory: strident, reassuring, fractured, centered. It isn’t perfect, whatever perfect means. Here and there it sounds like a rehearsal or a jam session. Some solos wander, particularly on “Epistrophy,” and the trumpeter Ray Copeland and alto saxophonist Gigi Gryce are comparatively weak links. But Monk’s Music also sounds loose and deep and urgent. At its best it suggests a party in a specific room; you come to know the room. After Monk finishes his solo in “Well, You Needn’t,” he shouts “Coltrane! Coltrane!” to signal who’s up next. Ravi Coltrane, John’s son, told me that when he first heard Monk’s Music he was 21, listening in a university library with headphones on. At Monk’s shout, he startled, thinking someone was looking for him.

The band includes the saxophonist John Coltrane, Monk’s new student, who sounds dry, driven, searching; the saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, Monk’s old mentor, with a gallant and knowing affect that he puts to special use on Monk’s ballad “Ruby, My Dear”; and Blakey, a kind of younger brother, pro-active, explosive, rendering the dance impulse in super-titles. Monk himself does nothing strange by his own standards. He is brusque and vatic and intimate, moving through funny, orderly, supremely affective songs. The first track is the exception in several ways: it is only a melody, played in straight rhythm by the horns alone; it is a hymn called “Abide With Me,” also known as “Eventide,” composed in the middle of the 19th century by the English composer William Henry Monk. Destiny’s Child liked to put their gospel songs at the end of their records; Monk put his at the beginning.

Monk’s Music includes the first renderings of a harmonically rich song that would become one of Monk’s standards, “Crepuscule With Nellie,” written for his wife at a fragile time. Monk plays it unnervingly slowly, and bids the band to do the same with him. (One of his drummers at the time, Frankie Dunlop, in an interview from 1984 extraordinary for the secret knowledge about rhythm it reveals, as well as for Dunlop’s imitation of Monk’s speaking voice, called Monk’s approach to tempo “a different musical category altogether.”) Really, it’s a radical slow dance. During the Five Spot gig, while others soloed, Monk began the practice of dancing on stage: a soft lurch, turning in a circle, imitating the greater circle around the beat.

A lot came together for Monk in 1957. Shortly thereafter, starting in the 1960s, he shifted up to touring theaters with a steady band. His records became elegantly repetitive and often staid. He appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1964; from then on, till his withdrawal from playing in the 1970s and his death in 1982, he was “known.”

You can make fun of jazz writers from the distant past all day, but some of their early published ideas about Monk in the ’40s, especially in Down Beat and Metronome, were only as naïve as Weston’s. If they liked him, they were describing a European-style avant-garde hero, desiring to cut loose from the known. If they didn’t like him, they were describing music they found incomplete or antisocial. They described him as “too too,” “for the super hip alone,” “neurotic,” and—worst of all—“bad, though interesting.” All these reactions imply Monk’s fecklessness or lack of control. They are the reactions of people encountering a critical intelligence and not knowing what to do with it.

Monk’s story is a story of relationships. Born in Rocky Mount, NC, he grew up among Southern and Antillean families at 234 West 63rd Street in Manhattan, on a block now called Thelonious Monk Circle. A couple doors down, No. 224, was the Columbus Hill Neighborhood Center, his social hub and the site of his early gigs. His engagement in the jazz culture of Harlem through the ’40s, alongside Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, and Kenny Clarke, created several new languages in jazz, collectively and roughly described as bebop. All his interviews, all the anecdotes, illustrate that Monk, to a great degree, knew his own value and had no interest in being strange on purpose. (“I don’t like the word ‘weird,’ anyway,” he told Nat Hentoff.) He knew who he was, and that knowledge allowed him the freedom of not-knowing.

One of the best lines in Kelley’s book comes in a secondhand story told by the poet Ted Joans. Be skeptical, but here it is. At some point in the second half of 1957, during a set at the Five Spot, Monk wandered off stage as the band continued to play, out the doors of the club, and walked for a few blocks. One of the club owners chased him down and found him looking at the sky. He asked Monk if he was lost. “No, I ain’t lost. I’m here,” Monk is said to have responded. “The Five Spot’s lost.”

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