#its canon for Shiv clearly

[stillswearing]

One of the things I will also miss about Succession is that the three Roys are all clearly not straight. I don't really care to know what their specific sexualities are. And I'm kinda happy the show doesn't care either - as if saying it's the least interesting thing about them given their family situation.

But they are all clearly 🌈, y'know?

[tomwambsmilk]

“Does Shiv love Tom” is such a tired question but on the same kind of topic, how attracted to Tom do we think Shiv is?

Well that's the hundred-million-dollar question, isn't it? Even more so than "does shiv love tom", which is sort of interesting in the sense that it forces you to consider different experiences and expressions of love, and then stops being interesting as soon as you encounter the people who answer it with a definitive and misguided 'no' (or worse - 'she's an emotional abuser').

Obviously I have to acknowledge the lesbian shiv truthers out there. I'm not one of them, and we'll get to why in a second, but I absolutely understand that school of thought and I think it's very valid; while I don't think it's the intended interpretation I think there's enough in canon to make it plausible. And if you're part of the 'repressed lesbian shiv' school of thought, then the obvious answer is 'no, but this doesn't mean she doesn't love him'.

Personally, I think Shiv was intentionally written as being attracted to men, mainly because I think there's a pretty clear attraction between her and Nate. At the beginning of season 1, Shiv and Tom aren't regularly having sex (hence why he tells her pussy that he misses it - aside from being a peak cringe moment that's actually giving us some critical information about the state of the relationship). Obviously, a lot of things could be responsible for this - they could just be too busy (which looks like it's partially true), or Shiv could just have a low sex drive.

However - there is obvious chemistry between her and Nate that doesn't seem to exist between her and Tom. I'm saying this as someone who loathes Nate with every fibre of my being. I do not like him. I do not ship shivn*te. In fact, it's maybe the only succession ship that actively makes my skin crawl. But. Both 1.06 and 1.07 actively juxtapose Shiv's interactions with Tom and Nate against each other, and I think those juxtapositions make it clear that Shiv has a lot more sexual desire for Nate than she does for Tom.

I think this is especially highlighted in the fact that all of the scenes where she and Tom start to have sex are either a) moments of very intense emotion (like the wedding night) or b) Shiv has upset Tom in some way and this is how she's trying to reach out to him and fix it. We don't see her initiating sex just for the sake of it, and we do see her do that with Nate. Sure, it could theoretically be happening offscreen, but I think its absence is pretty intentional.

(There's also the actor she sleeps with in 1.03, who I'd probably put somewhere between Nate and Tom on the scale of "how sexually attracted is Shiv to him". She doesn't have the same level of chemistry she does with Nate, but there is chemistry, and I think more attraction than she has with Tom.)

On the other hand, she clearly doesn't feel safe with Nate in the same way she does with Tom. (Which is probably a good call on her part). And I think this highlights the fundamental dichotomy in how Shiv relates to men: the men that she is attracted to are not the ones she feels safe with, and vice versa. (I'm saying men specifically because I don't think she has the same problem with women, although the show hasn't explored Shiv's possible attraction to women enough for that to be definitive.)

And I think this is largely Logan's fault. Beyond just the general insecurity and lack of trust resulting from his emotional abuse - I think Shiv is attracted to men who are like Logan in some way, but she absolutely doesn't feel safe with them, much like she doesn't feel safe with Logan. Logan's right when he points out that she's with Tom because she's afraid of being betrayed; what he misses is that he's the one who's instilled that fear in her. Sure, it's probably been reinforced by other relationships, but that's only because (I would bet) she's been dating people who are vaguely logan-esque.

Part of the irony of her relationship with Tom is that I do think there are logan-like qualities to him, but they're largely suppressed during the first two seasons of the show. And while this might not be entirely conscious on Tom's part, I think it's at least somewhat intentional; he does sometimes repress the kinds of tendencies that would make Logan respect him because he's aware of the fact that those tendencies are going to harm his relationship with Shiv. I don't think he's fully thought through why, I think he just knows that certain things trigger bad reactions, or create distance. I think Tom does have the potential to be the kind of man Shiv would be attracted to, but has opted instead (in the first two seasons) to be someone she would feel safe with.

Which highlights one of the tragic and somewhat infuriating aspects of her relationship with Logan - he's not going to respect anyone who loves Shiv enough to prioritize her over their own ambitions or, more to the point, him. The kind of 'killer'-type personality he would respect would also be willing to throw Shiv under the bus if need be. This is fundamentally why Tom isn't able to please both Shiv and Logan, although he doesn't realize how extreme that dichotomy is until... well, honestly I don't think he fully realizes it until the end of season 3. But my broader point is that it isn't a coincidence that by becoming someone Shiv can't feel safe with he's also become someone Logan can respect.

[finitevariety]

i'm rereading bold and forth on (amazing btw, just as good if not better a second time) and i was wondering if you Intentionally coded tom as autistic? i'm autistic myself and i really relate to the way you describe the way he thinks about social structure and social interaction lol. what made me send this ask in particular is the reveal that he had a post-it note flow chart for talking to shiv when he lived in the hong kong flat bc that is completely something i would do. anyway thank you for you amazing writing and i can't wait to read some of your other work!

ahhh thank you! Yes, I did.

As horrible as it is to admit relating to Tom, I really do--and so while writing bold and forth on I ended up put a lot of myself into him (there's one moment where I have a kid version of him feel sorry for all the other toys in the store: that was a direct pull from my own life). I am also autistic, and I think it's not even too much of a reach to read or portray Tom as the same given how much, canonically, he obsesses over the 'right' thing to do--and how often he's perceived to fail despite that level of effort.

I remember as a kid I was constantly sure that there was some cheat code or manual I was missing that would just make life work the way it was supposed to. Tom has pretty clearly, imo, spent a long time searching for the same. It's partly why I wrote the initial Tomshiv romance as being partly about her showing him 'how to be rich', the same way he later offers to do for Greg. There's something about that which, as gently mocking as Shiv is, or can be, feels to Tom like being held--because he hasn't had clear guidance like that before. With the rules laid out like that, maybe this feels to him like a game he and Shiv can win.

Tom talks about the nudie turtles and the hardening you have to submit yourself to in order to make it in the corporate city, but he chose to move into that world. I think he thought somewhere that was transparent about its cruelty would at least be easier to handle than a world where everyone was (or seemed) cruel in a more coded, hidden way. At the very least it might elevate him above people he felt rejected by or angry about or whatever. I think that impulse is clear in the fact he tries to use Greg as a punchbag and keeps failing to be adequately mean enough. He thinks it will make him feel better to be an asshole to someone because everyone shits on him, and then he's not even any good at that! He keeps sliding into empathy!

I'm really drawn to the side characters in Succession because they're not born into it. They ran away to the cruelest circus on earth and signed up to ride a little unicycle and get eggs thrown at them because they thought the rewards--status and power and cash--were worth it. What makes someone run toward that? Yes, he genuinely fell in love with Shiv, but he also fell in love with what she represented--a fucking meal ticket, and an escape (and she knew it, too! He ended up being coded about the true nature of their romance in order to try to preserve it, and it bit them both).

[kelsosefuealaguerra]

so, i have thoughts about how the writers have been addressing whatevers going on with roman + sex, and the hints theyve dropped during the whole show. (TW for sexual abuse / harassment, incest mention?)

lets look at succession as a whole so far regarding romans sexuality. The things we know are: 1) He only got into relationships with women he thought his dad would date. 2) Based on his conversation with Tabitha when they were trying to have sex, he seems to only be able to get off if he can pretend theres something "wrong" about it. 3) At this point, i think we can say his bisexuality is canon, based on his little thing with his personal trainer. Which is intriguing because if he really jerked roman off after sessions, that sounds like, the most intimate hes ever been with someone during the course of the show? And the fact that its a guy maybe enhances the Wrong aspect that he likes- i mean, remember gerris dirty talk in season 2: "what would your family think? theyd be ashamed of you. and rightly so". id say maybe dudes are easier for him because of the inherent feeling of "wrongness" his internal homophobia brings out.

And yeah, the whole thing with gerri has an air of wrongness too, because of the whole ~humiliation sex talk roleplay she did obviously, and because he knew his dad would be against it. which probably makes roman be even more into her- besides the fact that shes smoking hot, of course, but tabs is also hot as fuck and he still couldnt get into her (Ha), so we know hotness alone doesnt do the trick for him.

Then theres the incest/sexual abuse jokes, which... theres a lot to unpack there. the whole bit about him getting assaulted by connor as a child. "im touched" / "me too". what he said to rhea in dundee ("look at you, fitting right in, like a camp counselor in my butt when I was 12"??? terrible). Roman clearly doesnt know why he cant have sex, and theres the theory going around that its related to some kind of trauma like that in his past. (Last ep when shiv got mad at him for the gross sexy secretary joke and asked what was wrong with him, he said 'i dont know. were working on it, its an ongoing process', and we also know hes doing therapy 'my guy's surprised i got through at all'). so if it is sexual abuse, he probably buried it so deep inside his mind he cant actually remember, and it comes out occasionally with disturbing humor.

then theres that one time in 2x09 when he asked logan if he had someone to talk to and logan said smt like, "you want me to talk to a shrink? you know, you may want to screw your mother, but I am okay in that department, thank you". that scene is really important because like, correct me if im wrong, but i think that was one of the first times someone in his family talked openly about his issues. And it was just to make fun of them, and of roman for needing & going to therapy. Roman was really upset about it, kinda seemed like he thought there was a line in the things they taunted each other about and logan really went there anyway.

...which leads us to S3. Weve seen the family press the matter about roman and sex this season in ways that they never really did before, which was maybe one of the things that triggered the boiling point of his dysfunction: him being so careless about it he goes against gerris boundaries, possibly ruining the most healthy relationship he has right now with a person he clearly has feelings for. and in turn, becomes his fall from grace.

Ep 1, logan getting mad at roman for worrying about him and asking him if he wants to suck his dick. romans clearly not okay with it, even though a couple of scenes later he mimicks a blowjob when gerri was talking on the phone about the president respecting logan. thats basically how it worked this season: he got upset when sex shit was brought up, then he shrugged it off with innapropiate jokes. Cause we have Ep 2, where shiv tells him "you cant hide under the covers with mommy", and "someday youre actually going to have to fuck something". which bothered roman so much he had to leave the room. to my knowledge, thats the first time his siblings mentioned his issues with sex so directly. "that was low." "its not my fault he has a sex thing, that was an overreaction. was i too harsh?" "are you kidding? he loves it. hell be jerking off wearing my ex wifes panties." it was shocking to learn they know about it because, how?? rumours going around? tabitha explicitly outing roman as her eunuch bestie??? idk, but it surprised roman too and that was the moment where that boundary of his sex life being a secret from his family was completely broken, imo. for the audience and also, for himself, probably.

then there was the football team finger-bang joke, logan calling him the F slur, shivs comment about him wanting to blow logan and fuck his mom, asking about his intimacy with tabitha, kendall telling him he could take the giant replica of carolines vagina home with him SKDHSKD The curious thing though is that he went from being upset and storming out, to learning how to own the jokes and even going along with them until they got to be Too much. like. To me, the worst one so far was definitely this interaction:

and then he mimicked blowing logan... christ bro. like, how did we go from his normal response to logans innapropriate comment to him in episode one to THAT. its like season 3 was a journey of roman being desensitized about his issues because theyre joked about in every episode and not really a secret anymore, and hes kind of been going off the rails because of it. He cant tell where the lines are, doesnt undestand when hes going too far. That, coupled with his dad almost dying in episode 4, was probably what caused his undoing this season. Going hardcore with everything logan wants, allowing himself to be manipulated into severing his connection with kendall and shiv because of him. its insane bro. hes definitely losing his sense of reality a little bit ("youre not real. youre not a real person" / "no real person involved" cross my mind every now and then).

i dont know, i just thought it was important, how it all came down to last episode, where logan, shiv and gerri finally confronted him in all seriousness about his problem (though logan did it for the wrong reasons, as he usually does). Which is huge, because there were no jokes this time from shiv and logans part. and gerri had talked about him "being a sick fuck" and "having a revolting problem in his head" as dirty talk before, but there wasnt anything ~sexy about the way she called him out in italy. in all three cases, roman couldnt hide behind his usual humor or flirting, so all thats left is to come to terms with it. Even though he still has a hard time figuring out what his problem is, so... will he get better or worse? im not sure- i just think losing gerri could be his breaking point.

its really interesting to me that the writers took it there, and i wanna see where theyre gonna go with it. if its ever gonna get properly addressed, or if theyll never really explain what happened to him. knowing this show, anything could happen, tbh.

[naazaif327]

I feel like Geraskier and Yennefer could do tomgreg and shiv from Succession, like Geralt's a simp for Yennefer and they're a hot couple with chemistry but she's clearly chasing something else for fulfillment and its not him and also he and Jaskier have like a weird thing going on that's not actually canonically romantic/sexual but it is weird and definitely not healthy and Geralt has almost all the power, although he sometimes ends up doing good for Jaskier but its still overall kind of toxic

[joelmillerthirstqz]

marlene, ma’am, i am trying to look respectfully and you are making it difficult. 

Ideal

Extrinsic from all my Joel content but hey, the other Miller is just a different type of pretty and could respectfully get it. Canon leaves Firefly-Tommy pretty open, so I'm electing to believe his idealism saw Marlene's idealism and they mutually went oh, no, they're hot.

-----

Tommy hisses as he lies back against the heap of clothing, cradling a sleeve stiff with the dried blood injured arm beneath.

Marlene paces, hands on her hips in her particular way, the way that said she would be more at ease with her hand on her gun.

Tommy laughs, initially a low chuckle that blooms into a lopsided grin.

“Fucking what, Tommy?” Marlene snaps, irritable and on edge from the night they’d had so far.

Tommy gestures infuriatingly at her whole person, like it explains it, smile not fading. Marlene narrows her eyes to a squint, sizing him up like she’s going to shiv him if he so much as giggles.

“This is a bad situation. We are in a bad situation, because it is snowing, this place is fucking freezing, and you’re laughing,” Marlene lists, gesturing to his splayed legs like they’d particularly offended her.

He adopts a serious face.

“Yes ma’am.”

Marlene gives him an inscrutable look, seeming to take each of his features in one at a time before registering his whole expression.

“C’mon. We’ll be able to get out in the morning. Sure as shit no infected busying themselves with all this,” Tommy encourages, always optimistic. Always a calm different than the edge of control Joel seemed to hold. When Tommy wanted to be at ease, he could still summon it in little bursts. Marlene has been noticing this quality, and how readily he shared it, and biting her own lip to stop noticing it.

Suddenly though, his face darkens.

“Jesus, fine,” he grouses, moving his hands like he’s swatting away a fly.

“Okay, listen,” Marlene gets his attention back.

Tommy looks around as if to indicate his lack of choice.

Marlene pinches the bridge of her nose and looks up at the ceiling like she’s stemming a nosebleed.

“I’m ‘bein’ weird’ because I’m remarkably attracted to you and it is distracting me,” she grits out, like she’s reading off a list. Earlier, he’d thought he murmured the “bein’ weird” comment to himself.

Tommy looks blankly at her and scoffs.

“Fuck, no need to go to that kind of fuss, you can just say it’s a Firefly secret without the theater,” he rumbles.

Yeah, Joel caught him looking and gave him a good-humored nudge earlier in the week. Maybe a few times that week. He didn’t want to fuck this up, so he sat on his hands and overcorrected when he’d slip into flirting with her. He’d gotten intense looks in return, but never the laugh he was hoping to elicit, so he shrugged and assumed she wasn’t noticing or wasn’t interested.

“Hey,” Marlene says, soft offense in her voice. “I’d tell you, if it was that. It’s yours to know, too.” She toys with her pendant, the room incredibly tiny to her now.

Tommy’s eyes widen and he gets to his feet, taking the time afforded by the motion to figure out what to say.

He gestures to himself again, lingering on the blood stains on his shirt, poking the small bun his hair was in, the multiple holsters on his legs. He furrows his brows and raises one as if to ask “you sure?”

Marlene fidgets with her coat, rolling her eyes and trying very hard to look at his eyes.

When her sightline clearly goes to his mouth, Tommy closes the distance and kisses her. He’s gentle, seeming to consider the right way to approach it, but his hand on the back of her neck is firm and makes her shiver. Marlene’s hands fly up to his hair, working her fingers in and dismantling the tie carefully holding his shaggy winter-long hair back.

Tommy advances until Marlene is pinned against the table behind her, each drawing back to catch their breath in the wake of their bodies aligning fully.

“The balls on you to start the night stuck in a storm like that, if you were wrong,” Tommy mumbles against her mouth, getting swatted in the chest for it.

“Texas? Shut up,” Marlene says frankly, nipping his lower lip and going for his coat purposefully.

“Yes ma’am,” he replies, shrugging out of it willingly and kissing her with both hands on either side of her face. She’s nearly a foot shorter than him but all animated, electric force, and he wants to rise to meet her.

Marlene presses her tongue into his mouth and he outright moans. Whether it’s just been too long or his crush being consummated was really that good wasn’t something he could say in the moment.

Tommy’s hands traipse over her body, tugging at layers as he goes to get closer as she does the same. He gets enough of a hold on her tongue to suck it, hard, at the same time he gets one hand under her shirt.

A little gasp and a quiet fuck, Tommy and Marlene pulls back, breathing hard and meeting his eyes.

“This isn’t stupid, right?” she asks with sincerity. Tommy looks at her dumbly, flushed across his high cheekbones, spectacularly hard and now very confused.

“I’d uh, prefer it bein’ weird tomorrow over you stayin’ quiet any longer,” he echoes her earlier words and shifts, hands not fully off of her. His pupils are huge, but he clears his throat and steps back respectfully.

“Not gonna go tellin’ anyone, if that’s it,” he adds, hearing himself near-whine.

“I haven’t had a lot of normal, I’m sorry. I really like you,” Marlene is the most open he’s ever seen her, voice low. He could listen to the woman talk for hours, might honestly be enough after a few minutes the way his heart hammered now.

“I really like you. Dunno ‘bout normal, but I’d like to kiss you now and continue doin’ so later,” he replies quietly, pulling closer to her again and palming her jaw.

Marlene fists a hand in his shirt and crushes their mouths together. Tommy lets her lead him a moment before pulling back again. Marlene grunts in frustration at him, thinking they’d gotten everything out of the way.

“Just don’t want to shoot you,” he explains, disarming and laying out weapons on the shelf in what he was realizing now was a stand-alone guest house. Marlene’s quick tension melts into a laugh as he smiles at her, pretty blue eyes sparkling.

Fuck, that’s going to be hard to ignore around the others, she thinks. Then again, he’d passed the difficult to ignore threshold weeks ago when Luce had shoulder-checked her for incautiously staring at all of him as he walked away. Marlene spent the rest of the day thinking about the breadth of his shoulders every time she’d had a moment to collect her thoughts between issuing orders and keeping a frequently hobbled organization alive, to her extreme chagrin.

Tommy eyes her impatiently as she does the same, unclasping a holster replete with a row of shivs and tossing it aside. He quirks a smile, familiar with her usual arms, but still finding it endearing as hell in this new context. Endearing for a woman orchestrating an insurgent group; endearing for a woman whose proud thrust of the chin made his spine stiffen before he realized the full extent of why. He’d not noticed she was a full head shorter than him before, never felt relevant. Until, tonight, he was relieved of the burden to avoid thinking of ways to please them both.

She barely has time to toss it aside before his hands reach her thighs and haul her up onto the table. Marlene smiles bigger than he’s seen, and it’s almost a shame to cover her mouth with his until he feels her.

Marlene strokes the roof of his mouth pointedly and he leans his weight into her to avoid his knees buckling. Tommy kisses her back with just as much need, yanking her sweatshirt’s metal zipper down so hastily it’s slightly warmed as it goes.

Meanwhile, Marlene gets through his shirt’s buttons with no problem, finding him cooperative in shrugging one shoulder and arm free. She pauses carefully when she gets to his injured arm, looking up at him for permission to finish removing it, irrespective of her ankles locked behind his hips already.

Tommy burrows his forehead into her opposite shoulder, kissing along her clavicle and tugging her shirt to expose the top of her back. Marlene efficiently removes the fabric, avoiding too much contact.

“Tommy, I need to wrap this,” she murmurs into his hair.

“Hmm?” he looks up at her like he hadn’t torn himself open while prone on a broken patch of floor enough to need stitches.

“Let me,” she untwines her legs, Tommy almost pouting, shifting his belt to accommodate the loss of friction.

“Here,” she identifies a packaged sponge from a shelf nearby—close enough to sterile—and tears the bloodied end off of Tommy’s shirt. He watches her with consuming focus, eyes on her neat eyebrows, gorgeous lips…not wincing as she tugs the makeshift bandage tight. Without taking his eyes off of hers, this woman that made him think hope was even conceptually in his grasp, he thinks it might hold through the night.

Marlene looks back up at him when she’s done, and Tommy doesn’t bother to inspect her work, kissing her and pushing her right back where they were on the table. She likes watching him move, and more now, loves the feel of it. His stomach is all wonderful cords of muscle between her thighs, and his callused hands stretch and flex over her abdomen, begging their way higher.

He catches both nipples in his index and thumbs and she bites his lower lip in instant reciprocation, fingers at his belt. Tommy pulls her shirt off without patience, bra following once he accepts that there’s no clasp and it has to go over her head. He runs his fingertips down the length of one leg appreciatively. Marlene adores his complete lack of focus—he’s fully with her, taking the chance to feel everything he can as its presented. She wants to do the same to him.

Tommy grunts in irritation when his fingers find the top of her hiking boots, realizing they both still have boots on and they’d have to pull apart again. He kneels and sits back on his heels, pants open, and pulls one boot into his lap, tearing at the laces. Marlene watches him appreciatively, something remarkably sweet about and absolutely unnecessary—he can absolutely just bend her over the table, now—but he finishes quickly.

“C’mere,” she reaches out to him, intending to be polite. She tugs off her boots with practiced ease, dropping them to the floor.

Tommy steps towards her, jerking one boot off with one hand in a practiced separating of his laces, toeing it with his other foot. He repeats it and doesn’t return to her waist, instead snatching at both ankles and pulling her jeans away in one motion before moving between her knees. Marlene inches close to him, first knuckles hooked greedily in his pants and tugging him closer.

He takes to one knee, urging her leg over his shoulder and kissing her thigh before resting his head on it and giving her a pointed look. Marlene nods, sighing into the warm oscillation of his fingers outside her underwear. He sucks her through them, pulling her lips into his mouth and causing her to jump.

“Fuck!” she hisses, tilting her hips and wriggling closer to the sensation. Tommy hooks his thumb inside and draws them to one side, tongue following closely along his path.

He works slowly, appreciatively, pretty blue eyes watching her face as he slips his tongue just past her entrance. Marlene sighs and shakes, dropping her knee over his shoulder. He huffs a laugh through his ministrations and laps at her openly, bringing his fingers up to stroke her, trying just one at first.

“Tommy—” Marlene starts, temporarily distracted by his fingers finding the right spot to press on all of her nerves, “please, please,” she finishes weakly, losing her train of thought.

Tommy rises suddenly, fingers still playing at her, curling inward once he worked them in fully.

“I’m not planning on stoppin’ tonight,” Tommy starts, cut off by Marlene kissing him again, voracious. He was starting to notice how determined she looked before she’d lunge in at him, and it turned up the corners of his mouth to be the target of it.

Fuck it, Tommy thinks, getting his cock free and lining up to her, reciprocating her kisses all the while. He tries to pull back, ever careful and more mindful this far into the apocalypse to not compromise anyone’s ability to dead-sprint. Marlene scratches the nape of his neck as she tugs his hair, anchoring him back and gripping his shaft to guide him in. They moan together, open-mouthed and adjusting to the angle and each other.

Tommy grips her hips and thrusts a little erratically, hilariously close. Marlene holds onto him, the sensation and stretch of him making her mouth fall open with soft sounds in his ear.

“Get on your back, Miller,” Marlene hisses, nipping his ear.

Barely slowing his pace, Tommy looks amused, then comprehending, then stirred up. He pulls out, breathing hard, and does what he’s told. Marlene strips off her remaining layers before making her way over to him, a nest of their clothing slowly accumulating where he leaned back on his hands.

Tommy’s throat goes dry—she’s scarred from things he witnessed. Composure and strength radiates off of her. He sits forward involuntarily, getting kicked gently in the chest for it. Unlike the relatively well-behaved Southern girls in his past, Marlene wasn’t looking to him to lead the whole time. That, and the intensity of trust between them made him like an animal showing its neck to a superior. His back flattens to the ground as Marlene straddles him, wasting no time to tease him.

Tommy arcs until the top of his skull almost touches the floor behind him, the way she rolls her hips and rides him sincerely unprecedented.

“Marlene—” he groans, reaching for her face, wanting her closer, as good as being fucked into the ground feels.

She gives him a warm conspiratorial smile, hands that should be bracing against him actually just taking the opportunity to feel up what she’d suspected was so nice for months. She rolls her head back, chin tipped up and long neck before him. Tommy fans his fingers over her throat, down her sternum, over her abdomen, mouth open with rapt attention.

Marlene cries out, freezing and shivering above him, hips pounding against him every few seconds like it was beyond her control. The way she clenches down on him and rolls her hips combined with her moving above him, sweat beginning to bead—Tommy surges up and captures her mouth.

Once she begins to slacken with the rush of bliss, Tommy slams her down onto him with his hands digging into her ass, hard enough to bruise. It’s less strokes than he’d admit before he urges her of off him and comes with a shout onto his own chest, Marlene’s hand joining his through it. She kisses him through his peak, lamenting that they can’t just come for each other completely tangled up. Tommy leans into her even as she pulls back for a breath, full of need for her.

The chill of their surroundings takes back over as they come down together over minutes, mouths sliding over each others’ lazily, Tommy holding them up, Marlene’s hands in his hair. He trails one hand down to graze her ass, sucking the tip of her tongue as he does. Marlene makes a small surprised sound.

Against her mouth, Tommy murmurs, “I’m completely ready to see what this is about,” smiling up at her with his eyes sparkling as he gives her a lewd squeeze. Marlene silently reaches for his tossed shirt, pulling it around herself to fend off the cold.

She piques an eyebrow with intent, still breathing deeply and reaching to finish getting him undressed as he leans up to her again.

[go2harsha-blog]

Ganapati - Once and Future Leader

In which Harsha Prabhu follows in the footsteps of the Elephant-headed God and bumps into some inconvenient truths

"Vakratunda Mahakaaya, Suryakoti Samaprabha Nirvighnam Kuru Mey Deva, Sarva Kaaryeshu Sarvada"

Ganesh Mantra

(The lord with the curved trunk and a mighty body, with the luster of a million suns I pray to thee, to remove all obstacles from my path)

Ganapati procession, Arambol, Goa, September 2019. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Arambol, Goa September 2019

Bhajan Mandali

Ganapati, aka Ganesh, the elephant-headed god, has many devotees among the Hindu community in India. Many Hindu households install an image of the god and offer prayers, conduct rituals and invite their neighbours for a darshan (viewing) of the god and share lunch or at least prasad (ritual offerings) together.

In the evenings, groups of musicians (mandali) go from house to house and sing bhajans (devotional songs) in his honour.

Bhajan mandali at a house in Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

One night in Arambol, I visited five households with a bhajan mandali. Apart from hymns to Ganapati there were many abhangas (songs) composed by Tukaram, the Marathi Bhakti poet-saint, beloved of the people.

The singing sessions were robust; the tea, coffee, fruit and snacks provided by every household plentiful. In one house we went to, the owner locked the doors to ensure that we finished all the food and drink he had to offer. What with the round of lunches and snacks, my midriff began to resemble the ample girth of Ganapati.

After a set number of days - anywhere between two and twenty one - these Ganapati idols are immersed (visarjan) in the sea or any available waterbody.

Sarvajanik Ganapati

Ganapati procession, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Besides these household Ganapatis, there’s also the Sarvajanik Ganpati, a ‘people’s Ganapati,’ that is set up in a public place for the community to worship.

Last Thursday this Sarvajanik Ganapati - which was on show at a public hall in the village - was set atop a pick up truck and wound his way through the main street of Arambol to the sea shore. He was accompanied by singing and dancing women - resplendent in their traditional, nine-yard sarees, nose rings and other accoutrements - and children and men playing drums. Along the way groups of young boys lit firecrackers.

Ganapati procession, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

To escape breathing the fumes from the firecrackers and the loud explosions they made, I made my way down to the beach. The sun was about to set; the tide was coming in.

Ganapati procession, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Soon groups of women descended on the beach. These were the singers and dancers from the street parade.  I began to notice what sounded like a low murmur enveloping the beach. At first I couldn’t work out where the sound was coming from. Then I realised it was coming from the gathered women. They must have all been whispering prayers under their breath. It sounded like the humming of bees.

Ganapati procession, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Then the truck with the Ganapati appeared and manoeuvred on the sand. More prayers, more dancing by the women and drumming by the men. Fireworks lit the now-dark sky.

A simple prayer was read out in Marathi, expressing the humble hopes of the people: As in past years we have been worshiping you. Please forgive us for any misdemeanors on our part. Please help children gain knowledge through education. Please also help all people get jobs and become healthy and wealthy. Please bless everybody.

Ganapati visarjan, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Then, with shouts of “ Ganpati Bappa Morya, pudhcha varshi loukar ya” (Hail Father Ganapati, come back soon next year), a bunch of men lifted the idol from the truck and walked him into the sea. The incoming tide pushed the watching worshipers to higher ground. Thus ended this year’s Ganapati celebrations in Arambol.

Ganapati visarjan, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Leaving the beach, I heard one young man tell his friend: “Ganapati has gone. Now we can eat fish.”

This was a reference to the fact that, for the period of Ganapati’s stay in the village, Goa’s Hindus refrain from eating fish or meat of any sort, or even eggs - a big sacrifice for people for whom fish is a dietary staple.

I thought to myself: Goa’s fish better watch out.

Ganapati visarjan, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Ganapati - a potted history

I am indebted to the work of Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Marxist philosopher and historian, for much of what follows. Errors in interpretation are my own.

In his landmark book, Lokayata: A Study in Ancient Indian Materialism, Chattopadhyaya uncovers the tangled web of the Ganapati story, following its twists and turns, marking the vicissitudes of the rise and fall and subsequent rise of Ganapati.

Ganapati means leader/father (pati) of the tribe or group (gana) in Sanskrit.

Clearly, Ganapati is very old, a totemic figure from India’s tribal past.

Ganapati visarjan, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Ganapati is mentioned in the Rig Veda (1200 - 900 BCE) as  "the seer among the seers, abounding beyond measure in food, presiding among the elders and being the lord of invocation.”

In the Rig Veda, however, Ganapati refers to a person and there are many Ganapatis, described as  leaders of different groups or tribes. “Ganesvaras, or Ganapatis, and Vinayakas are here represented as…many in number and present everywhere” (Bhandarkar). What’s more, the Rig Vedic Ganapati has not yet received his iconic elephant head.

Sakti Ganapati

Chattopadhyaya suggests that Ganapati is associated with the early agricultural tribal society that predates the time of the Vedas. He connects it with fertility rituals to do with mother goddess worshiping cultures.

Chattopadhyaya mentions how In some parts of India, Ganapati-worship is followed by the worship of Gauri, the mother goddess,  and is connected with rituals to do with the new moon and the sowing cycle, where the goddess is depicted as “a bundle of plants, along with her human representative - a virgin.”

(I saw a remnant of this in Goa. Just before my neighbour’s household Ganapati was whisked away by the men to be immersed in the sea, the matriarch of the house ran out of the house with a sheaf of plants and blessed the idol, saying “Gauri, Gauri.”)

According to Chattopadhyaya, Ganapati is also a key figure in Tantric rituals. There are 50 different names for Ganapati in Tantric literature; and some of the followers of Ganapati (e.g. Ucchista Ganapati) were also ‘vamacaris’, ‘tantrics,’ who practiced ritual group sex.

There are also female versions of Ganapati, know as Vinayaki, shown with the head of an elephant and the body of a youthful woman (Silparatna, 16th century). These too may have Tantric origins. Similarly, the Buddhist Hevajra Tantra mentions an elephant-headed goddess, Ganaptihrdya.

Then there are the Sakti Ganapatis, where Ganapati is shown embracing a female, where the male god is depicted as being subordinate to the goddess. Chattopadhyaya points to the idol in the famous Ellora caves, where Ganesa is  “subservient to the seven women, called the seven mothers (sapta matrikas).”

Ganapati procession, Arambol. Pic: Harsha Prabhu

Ganapati as trouble-maker

The patriarchal backlash was predictable.

Perhaps because of this heterodox, tribal, matriarchal and Tantric connection, in the Griha Sutras (500 BCE), commentaries on the Vedas, we find Ganapati inspires dread: a follower of Ganapati “…sees in dreams waters, men with shaved heads, camels, pigs, asses…”

The Upanishadic Brahmin sage Yajnavalkya (8th-7th century BCE) saw Ganapati in the same vein: “Being possessed of Ganapati, the Princes Royal do not obtain the kingdom.”

Chattopadhyaya’s masterly analysis - combining comparative history and anthropology - shows the Ganapati story to run parallel to the destruction of tribal society in India and the rise of monarchies and centralised state power, buttressed by the panegyrics of patriarchal Brahminism as an ideological force providing the social glue to cement the status quo, including caste discrimination.

No doubt that’s why the Manusmriti, the Lawbook of Manu (2nd century BCE - 3rd century CE), a Brahmanical text, looks down upon Ganapati. Says Chattopadhyaya: ’A couplet ascribed to him (Manu) describes Ganapati as the deity of the depressed classes, the Sudra, and this in clear contrast to Sambhu, the deity of the Brahmanas, and Madhava, the deity of the Ksatriyas.’

Indeed, many of the names of Ganapati - Vignakrit, Vignaraja, Vigneshwara - suggest this adverse history. ‘Vigna’ means ‘trouble’ in Sanskrit.

Trouble-maker Transformed

How did the Vignakrit, ‘trouble-maker’, become today’s remover of trouble?

The transformation of a radical force into its opposite is a tribute to the powers of co-option exercised by the ruling classes in all societies, but is a special hallmark of Indian culture. It’s always the winners in the culture wars that shape the narrative, that write the history books.

One way of doing this is to make room for this radical figure of popular appeal - originally a person, then a totem, now a god - and include him in the premier pantheon of the gods. Again, Indians are masters of this kind of mystification and cultural assimilation.

Thus, a whole back-story is created for Ganapati, including how he got his elephant’s head, and a new lineage, wherein he becomes the child of Shiv and Parvati, and is admitted into the mainstream Hindu canon of worship.

It’s a classic tale of the absent father, Shiva, who does not recognise his son, Ganapati, who is guarding his mother, Parvati, while she bathes. The father beheads his son; but then relents on discovering his true identity and crowns him with the head of an elephant. It’s your typical Oedipal story, but with a happy ending, worthy of Bollywood.

Far from seeing him as a trouble-maker, the medieval Puranas - especially Skanda Purana, Narada Purana and the Brahma Vaivarta Purana - are full of hyms praising Ganapati.

Chattopadhyaya, quoting A K Coomaraswamy, tells us the elephant-headed version of Ganapati that we are familiar with appears around the time of the Guptas, in 5th century CE. Before this, Ganapati is shown with other heads, including bull and snake heads, again betraying his tribal, totemic origins.

Inconvenient Truth

Still, some inconvenient truths remain to be explained.

One of the names of Ganapati is Ekadanta, ‘one-tusked’, and he is depicted thus in art and iconography. How did Ganapati come to lose one tusk?

The Brahma Vaivarta Purana says he lost his tusk in a battle with Parshurama, the Brahmin who was also a warrior. If nothing else, this suggests a struggle between Ganapati, the leader of the common people, and the aggressive Brahmin proselytisers.

Interestingly, this same Parshurama is credited with the creation of Goa. In the Sahyadri Khand of Skandha Purana, he is said to have shot an arrow at the sea god and caused the whole Konkan coast - of which Goa is a part - to be created. Here we have a thinly disguised tale of the Brahmin colonisation of South India, presented as a creation myth.

Tilak’s Dream & Hindutva

Ganapati worship in its current, public form was the brainchild of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, social reformer and nationalist, and dates from the 1890s.

Tilak observed the popularity of Ganapati among the masses in Bombay and sought to propagate it in a public manner - the Sarvajanik Ganapati - as a strategy to both subvert the British ban on people gathering in public spaces post the Indian Mutiny and as a tactic to ‘bridge "the gap between Brahmins and non-Brahmins", thereby building a grassroots unity across them to oppose British colonial rule’ (wiki).

130 years down the track - and 72 years since India won independence from the British - while the public celebration and worship of Ganapati has grown in leaps and bounds across many states in India, so has the gap between ‘Brahmins and non-Brahmins,’ which has now become a chasm, with caste-based atrocities, including lynchings of Dalits - the Sudras of the Manusmriti - on the rise in India.

Dalits are beaten up for merely growing a moustache, or riding a horse to a wedding, or participating in a dance - all activities only permitted to the upper castes.  Dalits also frequently die from asphyxiation while manually cleaning sewers - which caste-obsessed India still permits in the 21st century, as a job reserved for Dalits alone.

Tilak’s dream of unity among Hindus has been zealously taken up by the Hindu Right under the leadership of the RSS and its political face, the BJP government of Narendra Modi, with the avowed aim of turning India into a Hindu nation.

Here, unlike in Tilak’s time, the enemy is not the British, but secular India.

Apart from discriminating against India’s many minority communities and tribal population, this Hindutva project is a false unity, as it’s a unity under the hegemony of the Brahmins and the upper castes, as any persecuted Dalit would know. Despite the co-option of a Dalit as the President of India.

And while Dalits continue to be an underclass, tribal India, from which matrix Ganapati originated, doesn’t even figure in the national discourse, except as a shadowy victim on the margins of a rapacious state bent on depriving tribals of their forests and livelihoods via resource exploitation and displacement caused by big dams and mining.

Echoes of the Tribal Past

D D Kosambi, Marxist historian and polymath, says: “The entire course of Indian history shows tribal elements fused into a general society. This phenomenon, which lies at the very foundation of the most striking Indian social feature, namely caste, is also the great basic fact of ancient Indian history.”

What accounts for the persistence of an ancient totemic figure like Ganapati in 21st century India?

Chattopadhyaya offers a classic Marxist analysis and points to the ‘uneven development’ of Indian society. “This feature of uneven development remains a characteristic of Indian history throughout the successive ages, down to the very modern times.”

In other words, slums coexist with smart cities, as anyone who knows India will testify.

And what is true of the social and economic life, is also reflected in people’s ideology, including religion and rituals. Superstition coexists with space travel.

Indeed, the ancient and the modern jostle for space in the Indian mind today.

While tribes decay into castes and then morph into classes in a modern context, somewhere in their hearts and minds India’s people retain echoes of the archaic, tribal past.

Meanwhile Ganapati - the father of the tribe who became a totem and then a god - still awaits his destiny as the once and future leader of the common people - and the remover of all obstacles in their path.