#they have so much in common tbh

[mattiebluebird]

something something Duke started his training arc right before Tim died, meaning for most of that year he & Bruce were both grieving; Bruce having completely lost his son (there wasn't even a body) and Duke having functionally lost his parents (they're there but they're not there)

[dire-vulture]

Dragon that is the hardest to pronounce

[feroluce]

So I went to the wiki page for the henghill Bullet & Brain mission of 2.2 looking for some dialogue I had missed and

a) I found something incredibly tasty that slotted into some other thoughts I'd been having, more on that on another day, and

b) I saw this super fun little trivia at the bottom, which!

I knew Penacony characters like Boothill took a lot of inspirations from old movies, but I didn't realize it was even in his and Dan Heng's relationship, that's so cool!!

It fits them very well, it's such a fun reference. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" was an old buddy Western film (from 1969- nice) about a pair of outlaws. Butch Cassidy was the leader of a gang, and described as clever, affable, and talkative. Meanwhile, his closest companion, the Sundance Kid, was known as a man of few words.

Cassidy's original birth name was much more plain, but similar to Boothill, he took on a new moniker when he became an outlaw. "Cassidy" had been the last name of his beloved mentor, who taught him how to shoot and ride. And Sundance Kid was known as he was because Sundance was the name of his hometown, and it was the only place that had ever managed to catch and jail him, back when he'd been younger (also similar to Dan Heng, but ouch).

These two stick together like glue throughout the length of the film- through Cassidy's leadership of the gang being challenged, through a train robbery gone wrong, through being pursued by mercenaries, and even through fleeing to Bolivia and trying to start over together.

I don't want to say too much more, since the mission title is referencing one specific movie that I've never seen. I kinda wanna watch it now, though, just to see the inspiration that went into Boothill and Dan Heng and how they get along. I just think it's really sweet that these two were literally made to be the best of bros, how lovely is that. 💕

[silusvesuius]

n*loth not being able to bag anyone over the (human term) age of 25-30 at most is the only logical and real conclusion to me because it can be just explained away as him wanting to prove and control everything and anyone (Cus he's a man!) but being stuck in that demographic because his unbearable and vile personality is a force that nobody can look past once they've outgrown the possible fear and idolization period of anyone but also n*loth in particular.

[womenaremypriority]

Overall, even though I think the word ‘TERF’ is a silencing tactic, and although the hatred towards’TERF’s is sexist and absurd- I can understand why it’s an emotional topic for people, I can understand why people wouldn’t want to be around gender critical women and would think we don’t have similar goals on the topic. But I loathe the word SWERF and I think it’s ridiculous and dangerous. Because I really do think feminists with different opinions around the topic have similar goals, and getting anything remotely helpful done would be 10x easier if being a ‘SWERF’ wasn’t considered such a no-go in activist spaces. It genuinely helps no one. Lessening sex trafficking, making sure people can exist the industry, reducing violence and negative stereotypes, humanizing women in the industry, etc. The fact people genuinely are scared to include ‘SWERF’s in their spaces and activism is genuinely so pathetic and a real shame.

[ninesugars]

some stories you’re like. the point was never ever ever the suffering. it was about the love that overcame. you understand

[pine-arten]

play colors

[incorrectsibunaquotes]

no but lowkey the mabian scene in the s3 finale was actually really sweet

[thedrotter]

filler doodles about how i comedically whitewashed myself as a child (despite also being the darkest i had and still have ever been in my entire life) because i cannot wrap my head around it

[the-eclectic-wonderer]

Summary:

Some short character studies on the notes of Madonna classics.

Do you all remember cassettes and tape players? They were so much fun! Oh, man, I must have spent hours rewinding my tapes with a pen. What a delightful experience that was. I should go for a little scavenger hunt in my bedroom and see if I still have a few around!

... ahem, anyway, have something short and fun inspired by my car karaoke sessions to Madonna's Celebration album. Let me know what you think, if you'd like! Hope you enjoy!

[notmoreflippingelves]

[rosykims]

finished rogue trader. so mad about it i had to take a nap and then start a whole new playthru again to cope <3

[shions-chin-scar]

[medichamcham]

(wistful sigh) sometimes i do wish more ppl shipped orbitshipping... wah wah .

[longagoitwastuesday]

So so indebted to u for posting those lovely illustrations from Cyrano <333 & even more so for yr tags!! I'm completely in love w yr analysis, please feel free to ramble as long as u wish! Browsing through yr Cyrano de Bergerac tag has given me glimpses of so many adaptations & translations I'd never heard of before! I'll be watching the Solès version next, which I have only discovered today through u ^_^ As for translations, have u read many/all of them? I've only encountered the Renauld & Burgess translations in the wild, & I was curious to hear yr translation thoughts that they might guide my decision on which one I buy first (not necessarily Renauld or Burgess ofc). Have a splendid day & sorry for the likespam! 💙

Sorry for the delay. Don't mind the likespam, I'm glad you enjoyed my tags about Cyrano, and that they could contribute a bit to a further appreciation of the play. I loved it a lot, I got obsessed with it for months. It's always nice to know other people deeply love too that which is loved haha I hope you enjoy the Solès version, it may well be my favourite one!

About translations, I'm touched you're asking me, but I don't really know whether mine is the best opinion to ask. I have read... four or five English translations iirc, the ones I could find online, and I do (and especially did, back when I was reading them) have a lot of opinions about them. However, nor English nor French are my first languages (they are third and fourth respectively, so not even close). I just read and compare translations because that's one of my favourite things to do.

The fact is that no translation is perfect, of course. I barely remember Renauld's, but I think it was quite literal; that's good for understanding the basics of the text, concepts and characters, but form is subject, and there's always something that escapes too literal translations. Thomas and Guillemard's if I recall correctly is similar to Hooker's in cadence. It had some beautiful fragments, some I preferred over Hooker's, but overall I think to recall I liked Hooker's more. If memory serves, Hooker's was the most traditionally poetic and beautiful in my opinion. Burgess' is a whole different thing, with its perks and drawbacks.

Something noticeable in the other translations is that they are too... "epic". They do well the poetic, sorrowful, grief stricken, crushed by regrets aspects of Cyrano and the play in general, but they fall quite short in the funny and even pathetic aspects, and that too is key in Cyrano, both character and play. Given the characteristics of both languages, following the cadence of the French too literally, with those long verses, makes an English version sound far too solemn at times when the French text isn't. Thus Burgess changes the very cadence of the text, adapting it more to the English language. This translation is the one that best sets the different moods in the play, and as I said before form is subject, and that too is key: after all, the poetic aspect of Cyrano is as much true as his angry facet and his goofy one. If Cyrano isn't funny he isn't Cyrano, just as he wouldn't be Cyrano without his devotion to Roxane or his insecurities; Cyrano is who he is precisely because he has all these facets, because one side covers the other, because one trait is born from another, because one facet is used as weapon to protect the others, like a game of mirrors and smoke. We see them at different points through the play, often converging. Burgess' enhances that. He plays with the language itself in form and musicality, with words and absences, with truths masking other truths, with things stated but untold, much like Cyrano does. And the stage directions, poetic and with literary value in their own right in a way that reminded me of Valle Inclán and Oscar Wilde, interact with the text at times in an almost metatextual dimension that enhances that bond Cyrano has with words, giving them a sort of liminal air and strengthening that constant in the play: that words both conceal and unveil Cyrano, that in words he hides and words give him away.

But not all is good, at all. Unlike Hooker, Burgess reads to me as not entirely understanding every facet of the characters, and as if he didn't even like the play all that much, as if he had a bit of a disdainful attitude towards it, and found it too mushy. Which I can understand, but then why do you translate it? In my opinion the Burgess' translation does well bending English to transmit the different moods the French text does, and does pretty well understanding the more solemn, cool, funny, angry, poetic aspects of Cyrano, but less so his devotion, vulnerability, insecurities and his pathetism. It doesn't seem to get Roxane at all, how similar she is to Cyrano, nor why she has so many admirers. It does a very poor job at understanding Christian and his value, and writes him off as stupid imo. While I enjoyed the language aspect of the Burgess translation, I remember being quite angry at certain points reading it because of what it did to the characters and some changes he introduces. I think he did something very questionable with Le Bret and Castel-Jaloux, and I remember being incensed because of Roxane at times (for instance, she doesn't go to Arras in his version, which is a key scene to show just how much fire Roxane has, and that establishes several parallels with Cyrano, in attitude and words, but even in act since she does a bit what Cyrano later does with the nuns in the last act), and being very angry at several choices about Christian too. While not explicitly stated, I think the McAvoy production and the musical both follow this translation, because they too introduce these changes, and they make Christian as a character, and to an extent the entire play, not make sense.

For instance, once such change is that Christian is afraid that Roxane will be cultured (McAvoy's version has that infamous "shit"/"fuck" that I detest), when in the original French it's literally the opposite. He is not afraid she will be cultured, he is afraid she won't, because he does love and appreciate and admires those aspects of her, as he appreciates and admires them in Cyrano. That's key! Just as Cyrano longs to have what Christian has, Christian wants the same! That words escape him doesn't mean he doesn't understand or appreciate them. The dynamics make no sense without this aspect, and Burgess (and the productions that directly or indirectly follow him) constantly erases this core trait of Christian.

Another key moment of Christian Burgess butchers is the scene in Arras in which Christian discovers the truth. Burgess writes their discussion masterfully in form, it's both funny and poignant, but it falls short in concept: when Cyrano tells him the whole discussion about who does Roxane love and what will happen, what they'll do, is academic because they're both going to die, Christian states that dying is his role now. This destroys entirely the thing with Christian wanting Roxane to have the right to know, and the freedom to choose, or to refuse them both. As much as Cyrano proclaims his love for truth and not mincing words even in the face of authority, Cyrano is constantly drunk on lies and mirages, masks and metaphors. It's Christian who wants it all to end, the one who wants real things, the one who wants to risk his own happiness for the chance of his friend's, as well as for the woman he loves to stop living in a lie. That is a very interesting aspect of Christian, and another aspect in which he is written as both paralleling and contrasting Cyrano. It's interesting from a moral perspective and how that works with the characters, but it's also interesting from a conceptual point of view, both in text and metatextually: what they hold most dear, what they most want, what most fulfills them, what they most fear, their different approaches to life, but also metatextually another instance of that tears/blood motif and its ramifications constant through the whole text. Erasing that climatic decision and making him just simply suicidal erases those aspects of Christian and his place in the Christian/Cyrano/Roxane dynamic, all for plain superficial angst, that perhaps hits more in the moment, but holds less meaning.

Being more literal, and more solemn, Hooker's translation (or any of the others, but Hooker's seems to love the characters and understand them) doesn't make these conceptual mistakes. Now, would I not recommend reading Burgess' translation? I can't also say that. I had a lot of fun reading it, despite the occasional anger and indignation haha Would I recommend buying it? I recommend you give an eye to it first, if you're tempted and can initially only buy one.

You can read Burgess' translation entirely in archive.com. You can also find online the complete translations of Renauld, Hooker and Thomas and Guillemard. I also found a fifth one, iirc, but I can't recall it right now (I could give a look). You could read them before choosing, or read your favourite scenes and fragments in the different translations, and choose the one in which you like them better. That's often what I do.

Edit: I've checked to make sure and Roxane does appear in Arras in the translation. It's in the introduction in which it is stated that she doesn't appear in the production for which the translation was made. The conceptualisation of Roxane I criticise and that in my opinion is constant through the text does stay, though.

[purpleshadow-star]

Apparently there's been a lot of discourse about Nico and Percy on Twitter lately? Idk about here cause I haven't seen much personally, but here are a few facts I think people need to remember, coming from someone who is rereading the series right now:

Nico and Percy do NOT hate each other. They don't even dislike each other

Nico never hated Percy. Nico never really blamed Percy for Bianca's death (he was projecting. This was explained in tbotl).

Nico never wanted Percy dead or to get any revenge on Percy for Bianca's death

Percy never bullied Nico or was even outright mean to him, except for in the Last Olympian

Nico and Percy were on good terms by the end of the Battle of the Labyrinth. They were fine. There was literally no bad blood between them

NICO WAS WRONG TO TAKE PERCY TO HADES WITH NO WARNING. Nico thought Percy wouldn't get hurt because Hades told him he wouldn't hurt him (remember, Nico has no reason not to trust his dad), but Nico still could have at least explained the situation to Percy before taking him to Hades. There was no need to trick him. Percy might have even agreed to go talk to Hades to help Nico in exchange for Nico's help gaining the curse of Achilles, or explained his history with Hades and that Hades was most likely tricking him. Nico probably would have listened! There should have been communication from Nico to Percy

PERCY WAS WRONG FOR THE WAY HE TREATED NICO IN THE LAST OLYMPIAN. Yes, he was stressed. Yes, he was under a lot of pressure. That does not excuse his actions. Him being mad at Nico is 100% understandable. Him holding a sword to Nico's throat and purposely not moving it when he realized Nico was there to get him out is inexcusable, especially when he claimed Silena and Luke were heroes after they got multiple demigods killed and almost killed him/ got him killed multiple times (he called them heroes in the same book, when he was just as stressed, if not more so bc he was literally in the middle of fighting a war and people were dying around him). All three of them took actions to right their wrongs, but only Nico isn't considered a hero to Percy? Why, because he didn't die for him?

Regardless, Nico and Percy DO NOT HAVE BEEF after that. Nico convinced Hades to help and goes and helps in the battle of Manhattan, and Percy appreciates and acknowledges it. No more beef between them

I'm going to stop here because I haven't reread the Heroes of Olympus series yet, and I don't want to misremember anything, but the point is:

Nico and Percy have a complicated relationship. They both have hurt each other, but they've moved past it. They're friends. They're not super duper close, but they do care about each other, and no one can or should deny that.

The faster people accept that they both have done bad things to each other and have moved past those things and don't dislike each other, the faster we can put an end to this ridiculous discourse.