#subplot polls

[brushie-art]

I've fallen into the superhero brainrot...

[belle--ofthebrawl]

Does Tumblr want to help me put together a fictional romance series for the ghouls to read at book club?

[seaglasswrites]

Writers,

[talesofsorrowandofruin]

WIP Summary Poll

Thanks for tagging me, @mrbexwrites! :D

Rules: Pick a bunch of your WIPs and summarize them as badly as possible, then ask your followers to vote on which one they'd be most likely to read. Multiple/all/none options are completely optional.

I did this for WIPs, so instead I'll do it for subplots within WIPs:

Tagging @oh-no-another-idea, @kidukami, @stesierra, and anyone else who wants to do this! :D

[majjiktricks]

thinking about how my young not-yet-realized-queer ass looked at the iron man movies, tony and pepper's relationship, and went "they share a bed. they have each other on speed dial. they are constantly worried for each other's wellbeing. these are two best friends."

i said as much to my mom and she looked at me like i had two heads. my MOM had to tell me thats what a romantic relationship looks like. because to me? thats just shit you'd do with your best friend idk man.

[memento-morieris-carpe-noctem]

Hear me out, Mina but it was completely unrequited. She just ends up loathing Dracula twice as much and Dracula realizes no one ever loved his possessive ass.

[itscubetime]

okay everyone my curiosity is overpowering and my shame is non-existent so here we go

[italian-lit-tournament]

Italian literature tournament - Third round.

Propaganda in support of the authors is accepted, you can write it both in the tag if reblog the poll (explaining maybe that is propaganda and you want to see posted) or in the comments. Every few days it will be recollected and posted here under the cut.

First, propaganda for Ludovico Ariosto, then for Guido Cavalcanti. The quantity of material will be colossal, so just scroll down for more.

For the Ludovico Ariosto stans:

by @larmegliamori

The opposing party has brought on the big guns, I see: us Ariosto girlies, gays and they must bare our teeth and ambitions.

So, here's my two cent on why you should vote Ludovico Ariosto!

Extreme relatability: Deeply entrenched into the politics of his time (as the firstborn of ten children, of which one was disabled and other five were women), but at the same time just wanting to stay home to live of his poetry? Dare I say iconic. Perfect representation of us literature kids.

He actually managed to marry his muse, Alessandra Benucci, and did it respectfully!

Working various jobs for patron(s) he didn't particularly like? Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.

Not to mention his most widely known work, the poem "Orlando Furioso" (The rage of Roland), has all the goos stuff us modern audiences would like! It features:

A wide, diverse cast, spanning from Ireland to India, stretching probably to the (by then) newly discovered Americas;

Fantasy elements: faeries, sorcerers, giants, orcs, the first modern iteration of the hippogryph and even a fantastical voyage to the Moon!

Citations and references galore: from Virgil to Ovid, from old chansons de geste to Boccaccio!

Proto-feminism and gender studies: Ariosto's female characters, although often very feminine, are actively involved in their story arcs. The poem also features two warrior women, Bradamante and Marfisa, the former of which is the protagonist of her own subplot. Said subplot heavily relies on gender, may it be appearances or not. And let's not forget the famous tirade at beginning of the fifth canto, where the author berates femicide! If you're willing to open your heart to his writing, Ludovico Ariosto reveals himself to be a compelling, layered, modern author, and yet there's a levity to his writing that works like a balm. Vote for Ludovico Ariosto (even if only for the memes)!

I'd also like to add that Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, in the 70s, got a theatrical AND television adaptation that was too campy for its own good.

It featured, amongst other things:

- 1500s inspired costuming (it sure was... A choice but I'm not complaining)

- Mechanic horses (that literally ran on rails) and hippogryph:

- Olympia of Holland, one of the most tragic characters in all the poem, as a vamp (slay):

(Posing with Orlando/Roland in on the left, with her lover Bireno on the right)

- Astolfo literally ENTERING INTO A HOLE TO GET TO THE MOON:

The television adaptation was partly shot in the famous Baths of Caracalla, in Rome. If you want to witness this masterpiece yourself, it's on YouTube! In two parts.

Remember to always stan Zio Ludo, and vote for him! ✨

Hello everyone! For today's Ariosto Propaganda Piece, I'd like to talk about the Satire.

Those seven pieces written in terzina dantesca (because our boy Ludo knew how to pick his role models) are an interesting insight about early 1500s society and Ariosto's character and private life. They all start from an actual event in his life and enlarge towards society as a whole, often with a critical eye towards it.

The first one, destined to his brother Alessandro and a friend, starts these absolutely iconic lines:

[Quick translation: Ruggiero, if you make me so ungrateful in the eyes of your descendants, and it bears me no advantage to have sung your worth and your mighty deeds, why should I stay here, since I don't know how to cut huns on a fork, nor how to hunt games with hawks or dogs?]

A bit of context: Ariosto's first patron, bishop Ippolito d'Este, had to move from Italy to Hungary and wanted all his court to follow him. Ariosto refused because of health and family matters, and he was threatened with the loss of all the benefits he had previously granted him. Note that Ariosto was basically a kind of personal secretary to Ippolito, carrying out different important missions for him, and even risked his life a couple times to carry them out. So it's understandable he feels disappointed at his patron's reaction... and that's why, in this more "private" writings, he complains with Ippolito's ancestor, the hero Ruggiero he had extensively wrote about in his main poem.

Honestly, a genius move. Not something you see often in poetry, is it? Another reason why you need to vote for this man ;)

For the Guido Cavalcanti stans:

Propaganda in favor of Guido Cavalcanti by @eresia-catara

May I add further propaganda for Guido: He's a noble, he disdains aristocrats, he was Florence's number one Server of Cunt, he was the city's faggot, he was heretical, he went on a random pilgrimage but interrupted it and managed to be buried in a church anyway, he had an archenemy who sent some men to murder him on said pilgrimage, he came back and tried to murder him back in plain daylight, he gave zero fucks about politics, he got exiled because he was considered a menace for the city. He SAW DANTE's poetical talent, encouraged it, shaped it, and through him the whole of italian literature. Think about it. Also they became besties until they evolved to a tormented psychosexual haunting dynamic (see break-up poem) where Dante himself actually exiled him. In the 13th century his poetry anticipates so many of the literary themes of the XXth century, going from fragmentation of the self (his is basically vivisection and dispersion of his parts), to dissociation from one's own mind and body, lack of identity, irony, desecration, his poetry is full of schizophrenic-like hallucinations, reading them is truly a trip, and yet his language is profoundly meoldic and sweet. And there's also gender-fuckery. and theater, of course, because his poems develop like a scene from a theater (adding layers to the dissociation). So really he has it all guys.

The thing is, Ariosto feels very contemporary but Guido is the og relativist and unreliable narrator. His poetry offers NO truth whatsoever you only have a sequence of schizophrenic hallucinations and what he describes only seems like it's real but who knows, the narrator is dead, how can he even speak or if he's alive he's not because he has dissociated himself from his body and is only coldly contemplating his own murder. He's not reliable because he has lost his reason, his soul has crubled into pieces and each piece has fled his body. Also he hears voices, and feels a sadistic presence in his mind in the form of a woman watching him die. This man was too ahead of his time, he was too dramatic, too eccentric, but also too acute and sensible, he must have looked deranged and we love him for it. and deserves to be voted!

Guido Cavalcanti propaganda by @girldante

GUIDO CAVALCANTI PROPAGANDA ABBIAMO:

LA DISSOCIAZIONE SCHIZOFRENICA:

IL COMICO, IL SIMPATICO BURLONE, IL MEMATORE ANTE LITTERAM:

IL MACABRO, IL GORE, I SINTOMI™

IL BREAKUP TOSSICO PASSIVO AGGRESSIVO CON DANTE

in conclusione

you can find my old propaganda here, but listen, while i do respect zio ludo's rizz, a vote for guido cavalcanti is a vote for gender roles reversal, death-life liminality, medieval atheism, antisocial freaks obsessed with philosphy who imagine their pens are talking to people about their owner's suffering (what is wrong with him), eye carving enjoyers (what the FUCK is wrong with him), sons who are sacrifical lambs, people who have long swinging necks like geese (allegedly???), and gay breakups involving dante alighieri. and also, well, I don't recall ariosto wearing a miku binder. twice.

in conclusion

Guido Cavalcanti propaganda by @apis-vergilii

Here’s my Guido propaganda: @girldante and @eresia-catara have already covered the poetry reasons, and I’m here to get metatextual about the whole thing.

Simply put, this is the Weird Niche Hellsite, and Guido is the Weird Niche Hellcandidate.

We live in an era of the cynical enshittification of the internet. In a sickened sea of dying social platforms, AI slop, and every last pixel being for sale, THIS is still the webbed site where a bunch of strangers can rediscover a lesser-known medieval poet in all his angsty, gothy glory, abandon all pretense of ironic detachment or mature indifference and go absolutely apeshit over his life and work, breathlessly and deliriously creating everything from exhaustively researched essays with footnotes, to anime fan art and inexplicable photoshops. This is the place where Goncharov happened. This is the place where we stole the president’s shoelaces. This is the place where a heretical medieval Tuscan stilnovista got himself a full-on Fandom, and we are all so much the better/worse for it.

So vote for the spirit of the old internet in all its dorky glory. Vote for the joy of learning things for fun and not for school. Vote for the bizarre Florentine emo goth. A vote for Guido Cavalcanti…is a vote for all of us.

if all else fails to convince you, well, i don't recall ariosto having an historical fantasy saga centered around him where he gains clairvoyance and gets increasingly more and more manipulated by the manifestation of his generational trauma. also he gets out of his body to have epic fights with spiritual creatures.

this should be a testimony to how his cuntserving echoed through time

Propaganda by @girldante and @eresia-catara that I guess should be read together:

well. seeing as we're on topic. Was Ariosto ever described as having

les bras d'Hercule avec des mains de nymphe by a 19th century french story? It is not made up guys, he served androgynous cunt so hard it didn't go unnoticed. Guido simply suggests fluidity.

Like. Arms like Hercules and hands like a nymph.

And Lorenzo il Magnifico also Fangirled over him in a letter to the Federico of Aragon

he (Lorenzo il Magnifico!!) was simply begging him to read his poems, and that's because they are absolutely eatable in all their irreverent, elegant, goth glory.

Finally, Boccaccio wrote about him in his Decameron (VI,9) and, truly, can you say no to him:

this little ballerina? look at how sad he looks!

would you look at that! Guido Cavalcanti propaganda is publicly sponsored by thee Lorenzo De' Medici himself!!!

as for the last bit, Boccaccio's novella from Decameron, where Guido calls out a bunch of idiots through a riddle that said idiots will take a bunch of time to understand and then proceeds to abandon them jumping over a grave, was cited by thee Italo Calvino in his Lezioni Americane as an example of his conception of lightness, as in the ability to lift oneself over the heaviness of the world.

In conclusion: Guido Cavalcanti is literally your fave's fave.

[four-rabbits-in-a-trenchcoat]

Obligatory and quite pertinent

[chiconisroc]

Poll for "Trust Me" fanfic : )

Today is my birthday and wanted to set up a poll for you all for it, hahaha So, I have given Shockwave a subplot mostly because it will come to Starscream in some way. And currently debating if I should give a tiny subplot to Prowl and Ratchet as well. keep in mind, with Prowl's back story, there will be a certain decepticon included too : ). If i do the subplots, it would definitely be super small compared to Shockwave's. I was just trying to decide to the subplots since if i did, it would give peeps more of a story of how hard their situations are currently, especially with Starscream's situation. But yeah, debating to either show that tiny subplot by writing a tiny background past or simply just tell it (which means wouldn't dive into it too much but will bring up a little bit)

So yeah, it's up to you peeps what you prefer : o

[symphonyofsilence]

While making this poll I noticed that actually Wangxian are the subplot to the 3Zun story. The whole plot happened because of Nie Huaisang's 10 years old revenge plot against Jin Guangyao. Which happened because of the whole huge 3Zun drama.

Jin Guangyao was the one who killed the villain of the past time of the story and won the war. He was the one who went from being a poor outcast to the Xiandu.

The climax of the story is The Guanyin Temple. In the Guanyin Temple the main characters are Jin Guangyao, Lan Xichen and Nie Huaisang.

Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji are... kinda there. Flirting and hugging each other.

In fact If you erase Lan Wangji very little of the plot will change.(I mean the book is in the romance genre so yeah, in that way it will definitely change drastically. But I'm talking about in- universe changes). Even in his own romance plot, he didn't have a very active role since LXC was the one who screamed at WWX about LWJ's love for him.

[exonerin]

what is next on ur docket of fics would you say

That's an excellent question! Thank you, anon. I love talking about future projects. After DAUNTLESS (12/18-19), I'll first finish Bad Blood (2/3). After that... how about we make it a democratic decision?

1. fake dating to evade the Order's matchmaking efforts:

Just when the Order relaxes its rule on dating to fix their reputation, Anakin's marriage crumbles, its faulty foundation caving in.

Recently divorced but forced to watch his peers match up, Anakin is tempted to claw his eyes out. He will not participate in this charade. Too late, he learned his lesson. Love just isn't for him.

However, when the Council starts applying increasing pressure to find a partner for the Order's public image, Anakin can only turn the one other person who resists the Council's matchmaking attempts: Obi-Wan.

(There's also some Temple bombing subplot here. I've already written a good chunk of this fic, so the wait time would be relatively short).

2. Sith! Obi-Wan for a mission:

The Temple's scientists have isolated the substance that turned Ahsoka Dark on Mortis. And now, it'll be used to help Obi-Wan and Anakin infiltrate a Dark Force User conference. The aim: assess whether they will support the Separatists.

Blending in is... not as much as a challenge for Obi-Wan as Anakin had expected. Which is a problem for Anakin, because now Obi-Wan flirts with him.

(This one has a fun little plot twist that I'm insanely smug about. Either way, I have rewritten the first bit of the fic a couple of times. Anakin is simultaneously the best and worst Dark Force User in this, because he's too bamboozled by Obi-Wan's change in attitude to really put on anything of an act. He walks around dazedly after his Master like a good Sith apprentice (that's another delightful catch, of course. Knight Anakin gets to be Obi-Wan's apprentice again. Like, this is bound to end well, right?)

3. omegaverse: Anakin hides being an omega. Obi-Wan helps:

A few people know Anakin is an omega. Anakin himself, the Temple Healers, and Obi-Wan -- the unlucky soul who had to drag a recalcitrant Anakin to the Healers for his first heat (a slight that Anakin still resents. He would have been fine in his room).

This is already more people than Anakin is strictly comfortable with.

So, when the Chancellor notices Anakin smells of omega, his reflex is to lie. In one of less... brilliant flashes of inspiration, he claims that he just smells of Obi-Wan.

You know, his alpha former Master?

A few days later, the Senate passes a bill to demote all omega generals in the GAR, quoting 'a tendency to hysterics.'

And while Anakin certainly feels like being hysteric, he needs a solution. Fortunately, the Council won't allow this and has a program where alpha members scent mark their omega partners during missions to hide the omegas.

Obi-Wan, on the other hand, wants to know why everyone seems to believe he's an omega. He doesn't mind, but he's a little confused about the dogged pursuit of the Senate when all his files clearly state he's an alpha.