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jackdaw-kraai · 1 year

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The thing I think isn't talked about enough in all these conversations about "AI art" is how, even if you work out all the kinks, even if you get it to the point that it works perfectly according to the most lofty goals set, even if all that came true... AI will still disappoint when set next to even just a moderately skilled human artist. Not because of any technical flaws with the product, but because of its fundamental limitations as a tool.

AI, as we understand it right now, without all the grandstanding and doomsday predictions and near-mythological qualities we ascribe to it, works on binary. Down to its core, stripped to its studs, it works on binary code, and you see that reflected in the design. Every choice it makes, every result it produces, is a result of a million, billion "yes or no" questions asked of it that chain together into a coherent response. Endless amounts of "TRUE or FALSE" results spat out when data is fed into it, that string together to form a conversation, or an essay, or a painting, or a comic. At least, when trained on enough data to weigh the odds in favor of what the creators want it to do.

If you ask ChatGPT to tell you something about romance, it filters its endless data banks for what that training data it was given matches your request and what results in those tests were rewarded by its programmers and which were discouraged and based on all that, it begins making TRUE or FALSE choices with the odds weighed by that data. That's how all AI we currently have fundamentally work, and that, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. It's a tool, and tools are hard pressed to be evil. What it is, however, is vastly inferior to the process of a human writer for one simple fact: when asked a question, we have more options than to answer it TRUE or FALSE.

If you ask a human writer to tell you about romance, they too will draw upon all the memories they have stored away of what they know about romance and base an answer off of that. But they will also draw up all the knowledge they have on astronomy, to compare the feeling it creates inside to that of hydrogen fusing, and that of medicine, because it burns so bright inside that it feels like your rib cage feels like it should be alight from the inside until it looks like an inverted x-ray image. A human writer will visualize the way love feels and draw connections an AI couldn't fathom, because it was never trained to do so. And more than that, if a human writer tells you about romance, they won't tell you just about romance.

They will tell you about how romance happens.

They will tell you about what romance between a young Polish woman and a young Polish man living in what would one day be the powiat of Bieszczadzki on the border with Ukraine, but for now are just the Bieszczadzki mountains, in the spring of 1914 would have looked like. And they will tell you about how it looked like all the months afterwards as the young man is drafted into the army and their home is ravaged by WWI as the Bieszczadzki mountains become one of the most bitterly contested regions in the Eastern Front during the war. They will tell you about how romance, how the love blooming from it, cannot fix the damage wrought by senseless battles fought by powers so much greater than the two of them, but how it carries them through the war nonetheless.

And what's more, they will know enough about the history of Poland to parallel the growing love between these two young people with the growing, not-yet-formed modern state of Poland that will once again rise from the ashes of the war after having previously been partitioned by greater powers into non-existence.

A human writer will not only have the knowledge to do that, they will have the skills and manner of thinking necessary to form the thoughts that will lead to such a story and make it into something incredible. An AI, no matter how well you train it, no matter how good you make it at emulating a writer's style, will not be able to form the same thought process. Not because it is flawed, but because it simply isn't built for that.

An AI cannot experience nationalism or patriotism for a country, an AI cannot reason out how people might have lived in the absence of credible historic evidence when it runs up against a gap in its data, an AI will not understand the link between fragile, young love blooming in adversity and a country struggling to be reborn in spite of the greater nations around it that wish it would remain dead. It cannot do this, because it isn't based in "TRUE or FALSE" questions. It's based in the painfully human experience of complicated emotions, difficult thoughts, and yes, even deeply flawed ways of looking at the world that nonetheless are beautiful exactly for having those flaws.

An AI, at its core, with where the technology is right now, is a machine of averages. Even if we polish it to peak performance, that will not change. At peak performance, it will still give you an average of all the possible answers it could give, it will be technically flawless, and it will never be anything even close to a fraction of the lightning in a bottle that a writer with categorically shit technique can capture if their heart and mind are put into it.

And let's be honest here and step a foot outside of the bubble of speculation, just for a bit: AI will never, ever, give you an answer or story that pushes boundaries or makes you think like even the most technically incompetent but passionate authors are able to.

Because in order to push boundaries, in order to deliver a message, you have to be willing to make people uncomfortable. You have to be willing to be messy and raw to the point that your story bleeds. And even if we polished AI to perfection, even if, by some miracle of a completely new and fresh coding base, it could do all those things... the humans pulling the strings of the machine would never allow it to do so. Because if their machine produces stories that push boundaries, that have things to say, that make people uncomfortable, it's not going to be profitable. It's not going to be advertiser-friendly. It's not going to please the stock market. And let's be honest here, in the end, that's what matters to those people.

AI cannot write the stories that people want it to, that they truly want it to, because in the end, the stories we want to hear are not the stories it can tell. The stories we want to hear are, in the end, painfully human, in all the best and worst ways possible. And if you want a human story, if you want to have something like that lightning in a bottle, AI can never be more than a tool in making them instead of the maker itself. A potentially useful and innovative tool, but nothing more than that.

Because if you want human stories, no one but a human will be able to write them. And no one but a human will be able to read them and understand what's being said.

#wga strike #chatgpt #ai #ai critical #wga solidarity

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verdemoun · 3 months

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Truelly intrested in how Jack is doing in the timewrap, like his relationship with the gang, whats his favorite thing in this era. I know in this AU he past away just 3 years after abgail, but in some datas in the game and other theories said he lived enough to write a book; in my headcanons he should have had a friend who fought in WWI who also get very traumatised, and probably being part of one this early mafia gangs from the 1920s. When John argue with Jack about him becameing an outlaw he would just reply " at least i didn't had to go to the army and dying in a horrible way some random battlefield in a senseless war, or surviving and get traumatised for life" then Jack leave the room that got in silence, who heard that probably got curious about the war, hope they were intrested about knowing what heppended in this 100 years they were dead.

I know you said you got a lot of asks but I like to share this ❤

this ask has been haunting because i love jack so much. he is my boy like i just want him to be happy and get a chance to act his age and find fun and happiness. but boy his relationship with john in timewarp is so far away from good. accidentally wrote 1k words so below the cut

jack has almost no memories of the gang. he remembers being told they're not meant to discuss arthur because it upsets his father, and that if he sees 'uncle dutch' around he's meant to stay well away

it is a lot like meeting those long distance relatives who say 'wow i haven't seen you since you were 'this' tall!'

he gets along pretty well with most of them because a) he is a very polite young man and b) they're such a fun group to be around in modern era. damn straight at a cookout none of them care he is technically under modern era drinking age they see him as an adult and encourage him to be an adult in that rdr2 a quiet time style

he wishes arthur was his dad a little bit. he is constantly trying to inch his way into isaac and arthur's father son activities (which isaac encourages and arthur allows)

hosea getting to see how him teaching jack to read has become such a major part of his identity like jack is a nerdy little bookworm and how exciting they both find it when hosea ask about what jack's been reading and jack can talk to someone about books again

the silent assurance of getting to know lenny. lenny being an adult with a job and very settled into modern era with a life so far away from what he was in 1899 who died at the same age as jack. lenny is proof he can get used to modern era and settle and leave the mistakes and trauma of canon era behind in a healthy way

his favorite thing about modern era is without a doubt isaac morgan. having someone his own age who Gets It. even though they had wildly different experiences of timewarping and general lives, being the child of a VDL gang member is a very specific niche they both know too well

also just - time. not having a ranch or to hunt for food, with the gang still helping each other out so jack isn't expected to rush off and get a job all the hours that would have been spend doing ranch work jack can spend exploring his interests, reading, learning about modern era and getting into trouble with isaac but having the actual time of day required to be a kid (he is 19. he is a kid who never got to be a kid)

i think eventually they would have gotten into a screaming match. john getting sick of jack sulking in his room reading and glaring at him like it was his fault he became what he is vs jack seeing how john changed over 3 years to raise addie alone when he timewarped and how quickly abigail runs back into his arms as if john didn't leave them ruined and with nothing when he died. in timewarp au, abigail died at the end of summer 1914 and jack didn't make it to christmas of the same year.

starts with john asking what happened to jack's college fund. jack had already applied to college and gotten rejected very politely on financial grounds prior to 1911, but with the assurance he was extremely intelligent for a young man who lacked formal education.

jack began corresponding with the literature professor regularly (simply because he still craved that paternal bond and quickly came to love having someone he could actually discuss books with instead of just talking at). john began saving every cent he could to have the money tucked away to get jack into college because he always wanted his son to be happy and better than what they were.

jack laughed and said they had to use that money to survive. he wouldn't have gotten in anyway, and even if he did he couldn't leave abigail on her own.

john, maybe drunk or just too frustrated to hold back, snapped he was too smart to be that much of an idiot, he could have gone to college after abigail died and lived a normal life

jack finally losing it. what did john expect? he was going to survive the great war, and then world war ii a few decades later? forget the first 19 years of his life, survive two wars that ended or ruined millions and millions of lives, settle down with a nice wife and be old enough to watch the moon landing on a boxy black and white tv?

he only made it to 1914 and was still devastated by the war - because the literature professor, his one escape from what life was after john died, a canadian who volunteered to go fight because it was a noble cause, didn't even make it to the front line. the ship he was on sank. there wasn't a funeral or burial, just a letter that might as well have read 'any chance of salvation for you is gone'. jack learning that dying for a noble cause was just as stupid as dying for revenge, because once you're dead you're dead

jack admitting he was planning on dying anyway because what else was there the only thing killing edgar ross did was give jack the satisfaction of knowing at least one of them outlived the bastard

john not actually having the words to express he's been there and he knows what that's like, the survivor's guilt he felt over arthur's death and needing to kill micah and how sorry he is jack had to experience the exact same thing

jack still did have a book published and when he found out he was mortified. in writing to the professor over 3-4 years he'd started sending him drafts of a biographical novel heavily based on his childhood memories of the van der linde gangs and sneaking into john's room to read arthur's journal (which john held all those years). when the manuscript was found in the professor's desk, the university was impressed enough to have it published on a very small scale.

isaac morgan, who had a very bizarre morbid fascination with the idea of jack, the little cousin he never got to meet, who exists somewhere across time as simultaneously younger than him but has already reached 19 and killed edgar ross and been executed for it, stole a copy of it from the university's library when he was only 12 and has read it over a dozen times by the time jack timewarps.

jack is horrified because it was a draft and he started writing it at 15 imagine jumping 100 years into the future and finding out something you wrote unedited at 15 was not only published but considered a valuable and significant part of narrative history.

when jack is in a mood, isaac with read excerpts to him and jack will be so overtaken by cringe and trying to snatch the book off him he will forget whatever passing thought was making him depressed

#rdr2 timewarp au #jack marston

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howtofightwrite · 1 year

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Hey! I'm back! I'm mostly hoping for a direction to be pointed in, because I don't actually know where to start. So I've got my very large world that I'm working in, and a few plotlines are looking like they're going to have professional mages in Europe during WWI / WWII. While I'm not super interested in dedicating entire novels of story to answering the question of "and how does magic change this" because honestly, the answer goes in the range from "secret mages change ultimately very little about the results, but there was magical fighting there too probably" to "it never happened thanks to magical intervention and now I need to figure out how the modern day is different without two very major historical events".

That being said, I'm likely to at least have to give a broad-strokes answer to it. I don't have much knowledge about WWI/II, since it's never been a period of history I've been interested in studying - I'm vaguely aware of the broad strokes of the Holocaust and also Canada's involvement, since that made it into highschool education several years ago. So I've got some serious knowledge gaps I'd have to fill. But if I do have to sit down and figure out how magic would change things, where should I be looking for examples / inspiration?

(I haven't answered the question yet on if mages were well-known to most non-magical societies at the time, and if so to what extent. I know that'll majorly affect what I can do, but not exactly how or in what ways. ^^; )

There's a lot to unpack here, so let's start with one of the most basic parts. The first and second world wars were extremely different conflicts. Technology, strategies, and attitudes towards war were completely different between them. You can't, really, transplant events from one to the other without dealing with serious thematic shifts.

Beyond this, there's a some real world mysticism associated with both conflicts. The first World War came in at a time when then the Spiritualist movement was gaining traction. If you're unfamiliar with this, it's probably simplest to describe this as a new age religious movement that mostly died out in the early 20th century. To the best of my knowledge, this never really penetrated into decision making regarding the war, but it was an element of, “life back home,” during the war.

The second world war is a lot better documented in this regard. The upper echelons of the Nazi party were particularly interested in creating a, “mythical basis,” for their ideology. This included forays into pseudoscience, faked archaeology and anthropology, and outright mysticism. There's a very real, historical, reason why you'll frequently see Nazis tied to the supernatural, and it has a historical basis.

Unsurprisingly, some of the German Spiritualist societies directly transitioned into the Nazi party, either directly or by supporting them. So, there is some continuity between these points. If you want a slightly more extensive primer on this, Wikipedia does have a pretty decent article on the actual history (including how it is frequently over-represented in popular fiction.)

Now, if you want to know what the world would look like without the first world war, I don't know. As in, that changed so much more than you realize. Don't even take this as a complete list, because I'm scratching across the surface from memory.

The first world war changed Europe's attitude towards military conflict irrevocably. Prior to this, European powers had viewed war as almost a diversion. Military hardware had been advancing rapidly in the late 19thcentury, but outside of a few border skirmishes between African colonies (I think it between was the Dutch and British), there hadn't been any serious armed European conflicts in over a century. Even early military officers who realized the destructive potential of machine guns were frequently punished and disregarded when they warned their superiors of what these new weapons were capable of. Before the outbreak of war, the expectation was that the first World War would be fought similar to how the Napoleonic campaigns had played out. Obviously that didn't happen, and by the end of the war over twenty million had died, with another twenty-one million wounded.

World War II was a direct consequence of the first World War. Germany was forced to sign crushing reparations in 1919 with the Treaty of Versailles. This started the resentment, and anger, that the Nazis exploited in their rise to political power over the next two decades. Again, the interwar period is something you want to look at in more detail.

The First World War created the Soviet Union. Specifically, the Russian Revolution of 1917 was a direct consequence of the Imperial Russian mobilization against the Axis powers. There were more factors, but if Archduke Franz Ferdinand didn't soak a bullet in in 1914 Sarajevo, there would have been no Soviet Union.

If there's no Soviet Union, there's no Cold War. If there's no Treaty of Versailles, there's no Nazi Germany.

And we're not even done.

Woodrow Wilson's speech on Self Determinism to (if I remember correctly) the League of Nations gave a lot of smaller nations the belief that the 20th century would be characterized by greater respect and autonomy to them. (It's seriously a very hopeful speech.) For many colonized powers, they were under the impression that this meant they would granted independence (or at least, granted dignity) under the new world order that was being ushered in. This included powers like Algeria and Vietnam who were under French Colonial control. (This will come up again later.)

It's easy to remember the Germans. Germany was one of the Axis powers in WWI, and of course, again, in WWII. Do you remember the other major Axis powers in WWI? Because most of them don't exist today. The Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires were carved up between the Allies as spoils of war. This directly lead to the creation of the Balkans, and of course the conflicts there in the 90s. But, it created the modern Middle East.

Similarly, the French and British laid claims to swaths of the Middle East (which were previously part of the Ottoman Empire), with little regard for the indigenous ethnic groups. Setting the modern borders for Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey (and I'm probably forgetting a few more.) Also creating problems (like the instillation of the Pahlavi Dynasty in Iran, which set the stage for the modern, Theocratic State, after the 1979 Iranian revolution.) Again, without the first World War, and specifically without the Treaty of Versailles, modern Iran would be unrecognizable, as it was part of a major Eurasian power. Similarly, without the Treaty of Versailles, there would have been no Iran Iraq wars, and probably none of the Iraq wars as we recognize them today.

The carving of the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires also created a bit of resentment from Russia. Russia formally withdrew from the war after the 1917 revolution. As a result, they were completely cut out of reparations. So, while France and Britain were carving up the Middle East and helping themselves to Germany's economy the Russians were told to kick rocks. Historically (going back to the middle ages) Russia struggled to shake a reputation of being the, “backwoods,” of Europe. Technologically, socially, and economically, they struggled to keep up with European advancement. Some of this simply comes down to the distances, the harshness of their climate, and the difficulty of effectively governing such a massive nation. It's not an indictment of the Russian people. However, in the aftermath of WWI, the newly founded Soviet Union found itself in a particularly rough situation. They suffered heavier casualties than any other allied power (coming in second behind Germany for overall dead throughout the war.) (For reference, the Russian military mobilized more troops than any other power in WWI, their casualties were in line with other allied nations.) This was part of the political atmosphere that lead to the revolution, but it also meant that their exclusion from the Versailles reparations was particularly stinging. When I said that without WWI, there would be no cold war, it's not just because the Soviet Union wouldn't exist. Imperial Russia was an ally of the British.

If this wasn't bad enough, the Russian Revolution of 1917 also resulted in a six year civil war, in which Allied powers intervened on the side of the Czarists.

As a quick aside, Allied powers and Axis are the WWII terms. Technically, if you want to be precise, the contemporary terms were Entente Powers, with the UK, France, Italy, Russia, and so on, with the Central Powers referring to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, The Ottoman Empire (also sometimes referred to as Turkey at this point), and Germany. It's also a little like referring it to World War I. No one in 1919 would have referred to the conflict as, “The First World War,” or, “World War One.” No one was expecting a sequel to get pumped out less than twenty years later. The contemporary term was, “The Great War,” or, sometimes, “The War to End All Wars,” which was unfortunately too optimistic.

In a quick admission, mea culpa, I can't remember exactly how the First World war affected China. There was continuity between the Treaty of Versailles and the rise of the PRC, but I don't remember the exact cause and effect beyond Mao's trips to Moscow.

In the case of Vietnam (at the time, referred to in Europe as, “French Indochina,”) Wilson's speech on Self Determinism, followed by the deliberate exclusion of minor powers and colonized (or, if you prefer, subjugated) nations from the Treaty of Versailles sent some very mixed messages. In particular, Ho Chi Minh was actually in Paris during the negotiations, with the intention of representing Vietnamese interests. (There are a few stories like this, though I can't remember the full roster.) Though, somewhat obviously, the French were not interested in recognizing one of their colonies as an independent state. It's a little more reductive to say that, “without WWI there would have been no Vietnamese war. Vietnam has a strong history of throwing off foreign, occupying, powers. They expelled the Chinese multiple times, they stopped the Imperial Japanese ground campaign during WWII, they threw out the French and then did the same with the United States. Most of those are events that would not have happened if WWI didn't occur, but expelling foreign powers is part of their cultural identity. In this specific case, it's worth knowing that US involvement in Vietnam came at the behest of the French, invoking a now debunked political concept called, “The Domino Theory.” The fear was that a Communist Vietnam would (through simply existing) inspire communist revolutions in adjacent countries, and policy makers at the time feared that failing to contain the spread of communism from China to Vietnam would see a, “domino effect,” of revolutions producing Soviet friendly states across the entirety of southern Asia, from Indonesia, across India, before reaching Iran. Typing this almost 75 years later it seems laughable, but that was the political calculus of the day.

In the case of US politics, the 19thcentury, and even into the early 20thcentury, the US maintained a somewhat isolationist stance. Wilson struggled to get the US involved in WWI, and the Senate only declared war in 1917 (three years after the war had started.) After the war, the US withdrew back into a mostly isolationist stance. The biggest event in the 20thcentury that affected US foreign policy was the Japanese attack on December 7th1941. That single moment gave Roosevelt the “political capitol,” to completely redirect American foreign policy, and lead to the much more internationally aggressive America that we see today.

If you're expecting me to, once again, say, “this wouldn't have happened without WWI,” in this case, I'm not sure. Imperial Japan's campaign in the Pacific is part of WWII, but it's one of the very rare pieces where the instigating events (and, even some of their military campaigns) predate WWI. Japan had already won a skirmishing war against Russia in 1904 and 1905. Imperial Japan had annexed Korea in 1910. In 1931 they invaded Manchuria, and by '37 had nominal control over the province. Even in the absence of WWI, Japan's military ambitions were seriously ramping up.

So, in the simple question of, “how much did these events affect?” A lot. And, I'm going to stress, aside from looking up dates, this is all off the top of my head. There is a lot of fallout from one nineteen year-old Serbian Anarchist with a pistol.

If you just want a historical breakdown of the events of World War I, in excruciating detail, I'd suggest The Great War on YouTube. From 2014 to 2019 they did a weekly ~10 minute news video covering the events 100 years earlier. So, if you want a detailed chronology, this is probably the place to start.

So, the thing I don't quite get when you're talking about the mage conflict not mattering might just be a communication issue. This isn't really an indictment of you, but you may want to reconsider any pitch that runs along the lines of, “my characters don't do much to affect the world.”

What you're probably looking for is a fairly reasonable, “secret war,” structure, where your characters are confronting an unconventional threat that runs in parallel to the rest of the war. This is your normal, “save the world,” plot. While these can be a bit cliché, they are pretty easy to write. The stakes are easy to grasp and articulate. It's not incredibly creative, but it is effective. Really the biggest danger with this structure is simply audience fatigue.

If you intend to expand the story into a series, you've already put the biggest threat you can on the table. Doing that again can feel repetitive, and stepping back from that into smaller threats can easily disappoint the audience. The problem with escalation is “the line goes up,” and once you've threatened to destroy the world, you can't really get the same results from doing that again.

You can build a series around dismantling a plot to destroy the world a piece at a time, though if that's your goal, you might want to start smaller and build your way up. While it's not the only option, one structure for serialized meta-stories like this would be to start with some independent, small-scale stories. As you progress your characters might realize that they're dealing with a greater threat, so the natural progression is for them to start trying to gather information about the foe who is orchestrating the threats they're seeing. This can include trying to determine what their foe is doing, and a lot of minor stalling actions, where they try to deny their foe various necessary resources. (This could include eliminating individuals supporting their enemy, it could include capturing or destroying artifact MacGuffins.)

As your characters discover more about their foe, and cause more problems, they're going to come under more direct retaliation. This could be simple situations where your characters are being literally hunted. Or a character who's operating undercover might be exposed and captured. Alternately, a cunning foe might try to implicate members of your characters as double agents, they might assassinate secondary characters who are helping your heroes. If they have the authority, they may even order conventional military forces to pressure your characters.

As a quick aside, it can be very easy to find yourself writing heroes who primarily focus on maintaining the status quo. Even the basic, “save the world,” concept is rooted in the idea that you don't want to see the world changed into something unrecognizable. When you have your characters on offense like I'm suggesting, it can do wonders for making them feel like they have actual agency, and and less like passive participants in your story. Similarly, a villain who retaliates based on your heroes actions can feel like an active participant in the story, even if they have yet to appear on the page. It can be very threatening to have your characters facing off against an enemy they can't even identify.

Ultimately, this structure would tend towards a situation where your characters (or at least your surviving characters) would be able to assemble a plan to finally eliminate their foe. As a general rule, for tension, you want your characters to assemble the best plan they can with the information they have, however, the more risky it is (especially when those risks are unavoidable), the more tense the situation will be. If you're willing, this would be the time to start killing characters without warning. Forcing the survivors to adjust the plan on the fly, and quickly find replacements when characters with critical skills are suddenly gone. (In general, the shock value of killing main characters has severely diminishing returns, however, this is a genre element for commando stories, and that's basically what you're looking at here.) Structurally, most of your characters have played their parts by now, and the series is ending once the mission is over, so you won't need those characters for something later. All that is left is to finish it go home, or (if you really want to twist the knife), scratch off the last characters and close the story.

I suppose, another approach would be to argue that the fantasy elements are ultimately a meaningless attempt to avoid the horrors of war, that your mages have no meaningful effect on the outcome of events because they're effectively LARPing in a warzone. It's unpalatable, brutal, and thematically perfect when looking at World War I. And there is some historical truth to this. A number of mystics and self-proclaimed mages tried to influence the outcome of both world wars to no effect. There is room for scathing indictment of fantasy as a genre when intersects with the entirely real horror of the war. Somewhere between Tolkien and Aleister Crowley, there is usable material to light up both both of them. Now, having said that, this would not be easy to write. You'd basically be working with the magical realism genre, though I don't think I've ever seen it used quite this viciously. If you really want to set the world on fire and walk way, this would be an option.

The obvious place on where to start your research would be with history books. Again, The Great War has that very detailed chronology and from what little I've seen, they've been branching out into other topics, including a few things I mentioned in passing.

For World War II, I'm not sure what I'd hold up as a definitive primer. Wikipedia is not a terrible starting point on this reference. In the case of World War II there was an entire cottage industry of documentary production companies that focused on World War II content back in the mid-to-late-90s. There are probably tens of thousands of hours of documentaries on the subject. Including a lot of very specialized documentaries. You can find full multi-part series on the historical context Nazis and the occult. I don't have any references on hand, but, I've run across more than one over the years.

-Starke

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#howtofightwrite #Starke answers #writing advice #writing reference #writing tips #writing historical fantasy

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gaykarstaagforever · 3 months

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Stop giving Wolverine a backstory. His backstory is random snippets of him looking exactly the same, being confused and angry in the Napoleonic Wars, the American Revolution, the US Civil War, out West in a cowboy hat, WWI, WWII, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and in 2024, probably the Gulf War and the post-9/11 shit.

His one moment of peace is him in Feudal Japan, where no one seems to care that he's a white guy from Canada. And that ends the same way all of these end, him shrugging off mortal wounds and murdering everyone with weird retractable knuckle knives.

He has fragmented memories of being tortured for Weapon X. Never explain when that happened or what they did to him. He just triggers on that and vaguely remembers Deadpool being there.

Then he shows up this one time in rural Canada to annoy the Hulk, and the rest is Professor X telling him to calm down.

"WHAT ABOUT HIS NATURAL BONE CLAWS?"

That is lame and stupid and no.

The fact that he only remembers snippets of centuries of chaos and one nice time in pre-Modern Japan is what makes him the perpetual murderous edgelord he is.

That, and the yellow costume with the big pointless eye-wings.

And boot-wings. And black rib stripes. It's an iconic look.

Never take that away from him.

Leave Wolverine alone.

#rant #marvel #wolverine

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sixminutestoriesblog · 1 year

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poppies

In Flanders Fields the poppies grow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

In Flanders Fields by John McCrae

I have always found the excerpt above, and the rest of the poem that comes after it to be pleasant to the ear, sweetly melancholic and, to be honest, more than a little creepy once you hit the threat at the end. The mental image of mostly desiccated World War I soldiers clawing their way out of the upturned soil, spilling flecks of half rotted uniform and red flowers from their bodies as they drag themselves forward after me just because I don't feel like holding a grudge against another country for a war nobody really should have been in in the first place isn't exactly what I suspect Lt. Col. McCrae was going for but its sure the picture he painted in my mind. Not cool, John. Not cool.

In other news, the poem did help make the poppy a popular symbol for war veterans that died in battle, especially overseas. These days red paper poppies are worn in jacket lapels and sold on street corners in multiple Western countries during Remembrance Day, Anzac Day and Memorial Day. Today that's pretty much the only association most of us have with the flowers but for the soldiers that lived during that time, the red corn poppies were a familiar sight, being some of the first and hardiest plants to grow in the churned up soil around trenches, the morass of no-mans-land between and yes, the freshly dug graves that grew almost as quickly as the poppies themselves across the battlefields.

Poppies were associated with the dead long before WWI however.

Hey, August babies! Let's talk about one of your birth month flowers (and keeping corpses in their graves)!

Did you know that poppies have been found in graves and carved on tombstones all the way back to Roman times? The Greeks and the Romans associated the poppy with forgetfulness and sleep. Giving the dead poppies was supposed to help them sleep in peace, though I did see one article speculating that the poppy seeds found in some graves was more akin to the old legend that the undead have obsessive-compulsive disorder and will be compelled to stop whatever they are doing to count scattered small items like seeds.

GIF by gifs-of-puppets

Who knew Sesame Street was so in touch with its darker side?

Back to the point, the Greek gods Hypnos (sleep), Thanatos (death), Nyx (night) and Morpheus (dreams) all have poppies as their flowers. Pappa means 'milk' in latin and the milky sap as well as the seeds of poppies have been used since ancient times to grant forgetfulness, peace and sleep, tracing as far back as the early Egyptian empires. Multiple opioids are made from the poppy with some of the most famous being opium, heroin, codeine and morphine, named after Morpheus for its dreamlike effect on the human brain and body. The opioid crisis has been with us since at least Victorian times and for many of the same modern reasons back then as well.

Speaking of escape from pain, Demeter, the goddess of agriculture, is associated with poppies as well. It was said that after Persephone was kidnapped by Hades, Demeter was so distraught that the gods gave her poppy seeds to help her sleep and escape her grief for a time. Afterward, the flower would spring up wherever her footsteps fell. The ancient Assyrians also associated poppies with agriculture and in fact, even today, poppies seen growing in cornfields are considered lucky and a sign of a good harvest to come.

Poppies in China are also considered lucky, or at least the smell of them is and they are a melancholic symbol between lovers too. The story I read claims that the poppies growing on his lover's grave gave a Chinese hero the inspiration he needed in battle.

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz employed a poppy field to put its heroes to sleep.

Poppies should only ever be given in bouquet of thirteen. Any other number of poppies is considered unlucky.

Greek athletes would mix poppy seeds, wine and honey for an invigoration drink.

In Wales, sleeping with poppy seeds under your pillow will show you the face of your future lover or give you the answer to whatever question you were thinking of when you fell asleep. The seeds are a ward against forgetfulness.

#poppy #poppies #august #Demeter #morpheus #folklore #superstition #herbalism #cottagecore #birth flower #birth month #wizard of oz #vampire #flanders fields #anzac day #remembrance day

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bookaddict24-7 · 5 months

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REVIEWS OF THE WEEK!

EVERY WEEK I WILL POST VARIOUS REVIEWS I’VE WRITTEN SO FAR IN 2024. YOU CAN CHECK OUT MY GOODREADS FOR MORE UP-TO-DATE REVIEWS HERE.

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155. Red Fox Road by Frances Greenslade--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

While I enjoyed RED FOX ROAD, I found it weirdly difficult to sit and not let my mind wander while I read. Normally, survival books have me in a chokehold, but it unfortunately took me a while to get fully hooked by this story.

But with that being said, I DID enjoy the story. I found it incredibly fascinating how this child was able to survive in a situation where most adults would be forever lost. The level of preparation she had was incredible and admirable. There were, of course, instances where he age came through in her loneliness and memories, and those were the moments where it made it even more incredible that she was so prepared.

Alongside her modern struggles to survive, we also get flashbacks full of grief and a mother with a complicated mental health history. The image we see of a happy family, bickering over being lost, slowly evaporates as we learn more and more about their past and present circumstances.

I may have also felt an incredible sense of loss and sadness by the end of this book.

RED FOX ROAD is a great book, not just for the survival aspects, but because it dealt with so many important issues that I think a lot of younger readers would benefit from.

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156. In Memoriam by Alice Winn--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I should just hand Alice Winn my heart because she already tore it out of my chest with IN MEMORIAM.

Listen, I knew this was going to be beautiful and that it was going to destroy me, but it doesn't make it any easier when it DOES EXACTLY what I predicted would happen. This book was beautiful, emotional, jarring, and unapologetic. Winn didn't hold back her punches and it shows wholly.

IN MEMORIAM follows two young boys (who are merely on the cusp of manhood) when World War One begins, causing the death of not only so many boys they know, but their innocence and childhood. I'm not saying that this book is the end-all for information about WWI, but some of the things I learned made me so mad and heartbroken. Especially the women who would give those stupid white feathers.

It was so eye-opening seeing the relationships between all of the boys when they were in private school, but also later seeing how those relationships played out in the real world. There were definitely some heartbreaking moments that happened with those boys that didn't directly relate to the MCs.

One of the most memorable aspects of Winn's novel was how she didn't shy away from the gorier aspects of war. No one was safe in her writing--one moment you're laughing with one character, and the next it's being described how he was blown up, or his head rolled off into a ditch. This book is hard to stomach for that aspect, but I think it made it for an even more memorable read.

The romance between the two MCs was one of those that constantly has the faintest heartbeats, with the occasional rapid palpitations. I think that was the best way for these two to have a lasting love for each other during such a tumultuous time (especially when their love was illegal).

Finally, another one of my favourite things about this book is how the two MCs create their own lives and live their own experiences after a certain point. They have the opportunity to show who they are and grow as characters before their love can continue.

Definitely one of my favourite books of the year. I want to re-read this one day and mark the hell out of my physical copy (I did the audiobook this time around). Such a powerful read.

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157. Done & Dusted by Lyla Sage--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

DONE & DUSTED is one of those romances that is simple, straight to the point, and is just a bit uncomplicated until the very end. I'm a simple romance girly, so I love romance books like this.

The best part of this book is how this went from enemies to lusty lovers in a blink of an eye. And while normally I'm not a fan of insta-romances, I think this one felt different because while the attraction felt like a "lightning struck" moment, these two characters have a history. They've known each other for years (through the FMC's brother), so it's not like an instant attraction with a stranger. Lyla Sage cut right through the longwinded bullshit of internal debate and just gave us a MMC who immediately knew he wanted to sleep with his best friend's younger sister.

I also liked the homey feeling of this book. I love books where the MCs have this strong sense of home and belonging, so no matter what happens they will always have a place to fall back on. Also, it takes away the opportunity for any bullshit because the characters are so unapologetic about where they belong.

The spice was good, but not abundant. The relationships with the side characters were good and added just enough of a deeper layer to the story.

DONE & DUSTED isn't the most memorable romance, but it was a good time. I liked how straightforward it was and how there wasn't a third act breakup. It was just a lusty and angsty good time, while being surrounded by cowboys.

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158. The Prospects by K.T. Hoffman--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

THE PROSPECTS was a breath of fresh air because I loved the way both of these characters had their own internal battles to fight, and that the love interest had a heavy case of anxiety (considering how rarely we get stories where the hunky love interest is anxiously walking through life).

The representation was great and I really appreciated that the author started the story with a disclaimer that this was more of an optimistic Trans sports romance. I extra appreciated this because constantly reading Queer stories with heaping spoonfuls of homophobia and transphobia can be overwhelming (and I say this as a cis woman), and I just want these characters to get their happy endings and the uncomplicated romances that so many cis and straight couples get in these stories.

But I also liked that while this is definitely a more hopeful romance, this is also something that explores and presents an honest view into the life of an athlete. I especially liked the comment of how sometimes winning a game is truly about luck and how even though one can be at the top, they can mess up, too.

I really enjoyed this romance and the heavy sexual tension between the MC and his love interest.

Star taken off because of certain instances where I wanted to punch a character. And because despite this being an intriguing story, it felt a little long. Either way, this was still an enjoyable read!

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159. Deadlocked by Charlaine Harris--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I will always be blown away by Sookie's character arc in this series. The way she grows so much through her experiences, to the point where she is wholly different and more mature in her reactions to things, is so impressive.

I think this is another one of my favourites because of the way the mystery is weaved into the story and that reveal. I never saw any of that coming or building up in any of the previous books. I also feel like we got some closure with some of the characters from the past books.

The story is clearly gearing up for the final book in the series AND I CAN'T BELIEVE IT. I can't believe I'm finishing the penultimate book in this series. It's been a year and I am so proud.

Now to wait for the last book from the library!

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160. Older by Jennifer Hartmann--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I love age-gap romances. I've always enjoyed them (within reason, of course). Of all the age-gap romances I've read, OLDER is probably one of the ones that I've read that truly considers the others who would be brought into the relationship and which had that history of abuse (for one character) that explains a bit more of how the FMC gained the interest in older men. It's not a sleazy, sex-crazed, and single-minded read. OLDER has so many layers to it that it was impossible to put down.

Jennifer Hartmann is one of those authors who write so well that you know your reading life is about to change. Her books are really hard to put down and they make you question not just your morals, but if you seriously should consider therapy. Of the three books I've read by her, this is probably my favourite, but all three have been impactful.

OLDER is definitely not for everyone. It explores a relationship that is highly questionable, especially by societal standards, but I think was done in an artful way. The relationship between the FMC and her best friend's father is a slow burn as the connect beyond anything sexual. There is so much emotion and heart in this book, and the FMC's past is so fraught with pain that I honestly just wanted the best for her.

This reminded me a bit of BIRTHDAY GIRL because both books explored the complex relationship between the couple before anything truly sexual happens, building that foundation that is needed for a relationship to survive the judgment of society. I think that more often than not, these relationships (in real life) are predatory--and trust me, I can sense it when I read certain books that have an age-gap, but give me the biggest of icks--but sometimes you get beautiful relationships like this one that consider so much more than the physical.

The relationship between the FMC and her best friend was also so sweet, but I can also understand how complicated it all was--especially since the FMC felt deeply for her adoptive family. This family and the steps the FMC takes to better herself were truly the best healing this character could have asked for. I loved it all!

I loved OLDER and I love Hartmann's writing. This was definitely one of my favourite reads of the month!

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161. Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I will give Meryl Wilsner this: her romance books are absolutely filthy.

As I'm writing this review, I am picturing that one locker room scene and I just, wow. CLEAT CUTE isn't overtly spicy, but when the spice gets going it is HOT. The way it's written is so vivid that it made me wish I could switch places with one of these characters because, damn.

Anyway, this is my second Wilsner novel and while I enjoyed MISTAKES WERE MADE more, I could appreciate this one for what it was. I was hooked from the beginning and loved watching this grouchy soccer superstar fall for her rookie teammate. Watching her slowly melt and be so confused as to why she's caring more about her teammate was adorable.

The rookie FMC was a ball of energy and as someone who isn't so high energy, I can understanding how she might be an exhausting character. But as one reads and learns more about the character, one might be able to further understand why the character is the way she is. I think once I had more context clues, I started to appreciate her and understand her. I have people in my life who are as high energy as this character and while some days are more tiring than others, I will always love their enthusiasm and excitement.

I also loved that this was about the world of female soccer. It's so under-represented in fiction, so it's always a breath of fresh air. Also, I loved the cast of characters and wish I could explore this world further!

I need to read more from this author because phew, she's good.

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162. High Wizardry by Diane Duane--⭐️⭐️⭐️

I love these books in theory, but sometimes I wonder how different a middle schooler's brain was back when this was first published. There were so many science terms and science situations that my brain noped out so many times. I am 100% not a science person and these books are always reminding me of that, LOL.

The adventure itself was fun and I loved that the MC's sister is now a part of their magical world, but holy hell the lingo. It was like reading A WRINKLE IN TIME all over again.

I'm continuing this series even though my brain doesn't understand half of the lingo. Also, this is starting to feel more like a teen series than middle grade one.

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163. Call it What You Want by Brigid Kemmerer--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I've been trying to read more books off my shelves this year and CALL IT WHAT YOU WANT has been living on my shelves for a very long time. I'm happy I finally got to it because phew, was that a great read.

We follow two teenagers after their lives have been changed completely either through their own actions, or the actions of those around them. And while they are navigating their battles with guilt, depression, grief, and inability to trust, another character introduces another situation into the mix. There was so much depth on offer with CALL IT WHAT YOU WANT, that it felt like I was over-full by the end of the story.

The way the two MCs worked off each other worked well because they taught each other some pretty important lessons about assumptions and different kinds of loneliness. I also thought their relationship brought some levity to the admittedly darker aspects of the book.

I thought the pacing was great and I found it super easy to read this one (physically) in a day. It's such a compelling story that I didn't want to put it down. I wanted to see certain characters get what they deserved (which was SO satisfying), and others have the awakening they needed to be able to move forward with their lives.

Also, I want to say that the level of forgiveness in this book between characters will always be impressive--especially since there was seemingly so little of it at the beginning of the book.

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Have you read any of these books? What were your thoughts?

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Happy reading!

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spider-xan · 2 years

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I understand why people are into Quincey Harker fights in WWI headcanons and plots where the Crew of Light desperately tries to keep him out the moment war is declared, and everyone can write what they want, but I do think that sometimes, these ideas are approached with an ahistorical understanding of how the British largely felt about going into the war at the start, in which the sentiment was very much that it was going to be a fun jolly adventure for a few weeks, serving your country was a noble duty (especially prevalent among the upper classes who made up the commissioned officer class), and very real fear of German expansion mixed with British patriotism, and our understanding of the Great War being a horrifying waste of life and the dawning of modern warfare is something we only know in retrospect, along with how people tend to be less knowledgeable about WWI and sometimes conflate it with WWII, where people very much feared another war and tried to avoid it as much as they could due to the memories of WWI, hence Appeasement policies for so long.

Also, it might surprise people to learn that there were British soldiers who actually enjoyed the war or just found it boring! I highly recommend watching They Shall Not Grow Old (2018), which is colourized WWI footage set at a modern frame rate with audio from interviews with British WWI veterans talking about their experiences as narration.

#dracula #dracula daily #quincey harker

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xx-vergil-xx · 6 months

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god Verg I love a Structure so much, it’s gonna be “despicite, dei, gaudete” for the WIP game & I would love to hear more about the said structure if you feel like sharing it!

hello!! an excuse to talk about my project? yes please thank you <3

so it’s three “layers” which are entangled (maybe laced is a better word — i’m still ironing out final structural presentation, but the core is there)

1. sopwith, a book published in 1950 about pilots in WWI — aiming for an american modernism style, steinbeck influences (god i love steinbeck) with a dash of the faintly surreal, though i wouldn’t call it experimental. presented in standard book style, not terribly long

2. the life of sopwith’s author, who was himself a pilot in the second war, discharged after a serious plane crash — sopwith is published after his stint in the air force and he spends the last six years of his life in a new york hotel (based on the chelsea) obsessively redrafting a second edition of sopwith and filling a horde of journals, which themselves are published 50 years later as an academic text (though the second edition of sopwith never sees the light of day). told in journal passages

3. the efforts of a lit studies doctorate to piece together what it was sopwith’s revised version (never published) was really trying to say while she struggles with her own psychiatric health and her relationship to literature and the world at large. told in footnotes on sopwith, journals, and letters to her brother.

that’s the simplest sort of breakdown — the lit. studies doctorate ends up living in the same hotel the author lived in while she’s working and enters a psychological spiral where she becomes entangled with those last years of the author’s life and the thing he was trying to excise via his book, so the lines get a little blurry as the whole thing progresses. there are lots of throughlines about doubling/communication/the effort of people to corral the world with the written word/etc — inspired a lot by jorge luis borges and also house of leaves. i’m still in the glorious haze of Throw It All On The Page so i expect there’ll be some. refinements? (please god)

despicite, dei, gaudete is the first thing the author ever wrote and published — it’s a novella about an odd family myth a grandmother is telling her grandson, but taking a borges tact what we read instead of the actual novella is the lit doctorate’s essay about it, an excerpt from the middle of which i shall offer you here :)

thanks much for the ask my friend <3 <3

The seemingly obvious moral is twofold: old gods are infinitely cruel, and splitting up in strange forests is a terrible idea (a fact any B-list horror film will readily remind us of). Little chou hears this story, and when the telling of it is over, we discover that chou is now an old man, telling the tale to his granddaughter, and we have been hearing the telling of a telling, itself impressed upon by dimly-recalled circumstance and the erosion of an old man’s memory. Now we see why the impressions of intermediate narrative — a family dinner, a bedtime, a certain firelit drawing room — are so loosely sketched, so half-filled and yet so elemental. They are the memories of a child.

Most take Despicite as Witten’s first establishment of in loco, absentia on the basis of the fact that the real narrative concealed within is the life of chou, understood to us by the particularity of the details he does remember: his mother’s hand vividly recalled, posed mid-stir over a soup pot, thought by many to imply both her early death and chou’s pursuit of the culinary arts; the flames in the hearth and the strange vision chou has of the stones blackened, suggesting at one time that the house burned down; chou’s exquisite ekphrasis of the ceiling in his childhood bedroom, so vivid one cannot help but think that this is where we find him now, perhaps confined to the same quarters he slept in as a child, an old man at the end of his life. Legion readers have pointed out the obvious Biblical influences, the echoes of Cain and Abel (raised as a Protestant in his hometown of Valentine, Nebraska, it’s no small wonder that Witten’s works tend to touch on Christian themes). The first brother, killed and then dismantled by the second, plays our ready Abel, and the second our more hapless Cain, whose inciting sin is perhaps his abandonment of his brother to the dark wood in pursuit of his own reckless belief. He then attempts to “hide” his sin by rectifying it, collecting his brother in an attempt to reverse his transformation into earth. It’s no great leap. Our Cain, of course, is not condemned to wander, but instead condemned to a miserable stasis, from which he similarly does not escape.

#writing #fiction #god only knows #i’m having so much fun writing all this nonsense and i expect it’ll carry me through the next several months #vergil says hello #vergil says things #thanks very much for stopping by and indulging me my friend <3 #<3 <3 <3 <3 <3

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woodsteingirl · 6 months

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my best autistic trait is the connections i am able to make BY the way. everything i have ever loved is related but only if you have my beautiful mind. did you know paul fussell who wrote the great war and modern memory, a book i consider sort of an authority on cultural conceptions of wwi, also wrote an essay in 1981 called ‘thank god for the atom bomb’ which is, in his way, an incredibly 1960s influenced publication. and i disagree with him about most of it, but it’s my interesting fact of the day.

#samael speaks

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batrachised · 2 years

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Rilla of Ingleside holds a special place among my heart with the Anne series, because Rilla is one of the more interesting characters of Anne's children. Most of the other children are who they are from the beginning and stay that way; Jem remains dashing, Walter remains sensitive, even if the characteristics develop a more adult flavor as they grow up. But Rilla changes a lot. Rilla, at the beginning of Rilla of Ingleside, is flighty and airheaded. Not who we'd expect the daughter of the beloved Anne to be. She's immature, self-involved, and selfish, but believe it or not, I don't mean that harshly, because Rilla is also fourteen. If she were in modern day, I describe Rilla as a future influencer, obsessed with her instagram likes and insistent on getting pictures just so. Rilla wants to go to socials and dance with handsome boys and wear pretty shoes even if they cut her feet open and seem older than she is, and she does all of that and more, for all intents and purposes going to be more self-involved than ever with every passing year.

And then WWI hits. And everything changes.

I once read, although I'm going off of memory here, that Rilla of Ingleside holds a unique place as a semi-historical document, because it gives insight into what life was like during WWI on those little Canadian islands like PEI. Places where the war was very far away, yet all too close. You really feel the effects of the war in Rilla; LM Montgomery does a masterful job of describing all the young men leaving, the laughing disdain for the war that turns into a grim understanding of what it really is, what it really costs, and the quiet every day horror of it. In incredibly effective line of the book, one of the characters drearily comments how waiting for the mail every day used to be exciting, but now is torture. Imagine only getting updates sporadically, every few weeks, as your husband or brother or sweetheart or father is off at war, hearing the mail and knowing that this time, this time could be the time in which you learn that they're never coming back (on that note, the line Somewhere in France genuinely makes me tear up).

This is the new world Rilla faces. Dances are gone, because the men are off being slaughtered; socials are war focused; shoes need to be saved to avoid frivolous spending; the world has been turned upside down. She's forced to grow up very quickly, and very grimly, although there are quite a few bumps on the way. That's the charm of the book to me--it's classic LM Montgomery, all the way through, with gossiping housekeepers and wistful young women and characters who seem lived in and real, but also--it's world war 1. And LM Montgomery doesn't sugarcoat it. One scene in the book shows a character crying after learning that soldiers were bayonetting babies.

The whimsy of Anne of Green Gables faces the horror of WWI, and although you'd think the two would clash, LM Montgomery merges them masterfully. The whimsy simply makes the horror all the more cutting, and the horror makes the whimsy all the more sweet. Rilla faces all the typical trials of an LM Montgomery heroine, but she starts from a different place--she's much more shallow than a typical LM Montgomery heroine--and the path she walks is harder in a lot of ways. It's Anne of Green Gables, but with the shadow of WWI over it; the sense of the deep evil in the world that touches even our beloved PEI, but also the recognition of how powerful the community's small light is in a dark, dark time.

#lm montgomery #rilla of ingleside #anne of green gables #rilla blythe #anne shirley

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transfemyoungblood · 9 months

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hello everyone. do you want to hear about my roleslaying with roman time loop au. you will. you will hear about my roleslaying with roman time loop au. (this is a long post, so its under the read more link)

there are three loops. the first two are relatively normal and coherent (although the second one is a bit stranger than the first), but then in the third one, nothing makes sense, and the time-space continuum is falling apart.

the first loop is the canon story-line, as it is.

the second loop is set in a futuristic and highly technological world, drawing inspiration from the early stages of US/EU imperialism and the WW1/ WW2 era. the bard kingdom is a militaristic imperialist empire that has created a sphere of influence worldwide. because this draws on the age of modern warfare, the guards have access to things such as guns, bombs, poisonous gases, and other forms of chemical warfare. the bard college is a gigantic structure located in the middle of a highly futuristic and technologically advanced neon. this is where the fey used to live. the bard king is a lot like imperialist politicians of the 19th and 20th century, meaning that hes very obviously a money-obsessed warmongering prejudiced fuck.

in this loop, youngblood never left the college, and doesn't have any memories from his life before he was enlisted. prior to the events of the plot, he accidentally burned noise (like in canon), but so severely that it killed him. youngblood's guilt over the incident keeps him anchored to the bard college. youngblood is also traumatized by the horrific warfare he had to participate in, and especially by how dire the consequences of modern war technology are. this is inspired by "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfred Owen, a poem written by a former WWI soldier about the traumatic experience of seeing a fellow soldier suffocated by mustard gas. the poem is also very critical of the nationalism that encouraged people to enlist. prior to noise's death, noise was the only thing that kept youngblood from despising the bard college entirely and leaving. noise was completely loyal to the empire, but youngblood loved him anyway.

roman does not remember how or why hes in the bard college, but at the start of the story, its his first day there. he has a vague idea of his family legacy, but doesn't remember his past and has little recollection of his family. still, upholding the legacy motivates many of his decisions. (i have the idea that reston is a mining / steel town, purely because of how important steel and fossil fuels were in the era that i'm drawing inspiration from)

youngblood and roman eventually meet, and have the vague memory of meeting each other before. youngblood is much more volatile and straight-laced. roman's anxiety is much more prominent, and so is his need to be the hero in the situation. roman still wants to be friends with youngblood, and still wants to get to know him better. eventually, roman helps youngblood work through his guilt and shows him that hes worthy of being cared for and that he does not have to suffer through the bard king's abuse, despite the horrible things he's done in the past. eventually, they escape the bard college together. until the loop restarts again…

the third loop is inspired by classic fairytales, drawing from the medieval period and also the neoclassical era, with some inspiration from the renaissance era as well. It also has some inspiration from surrealist art. the third loop is. very strange. incredibly weird. its falling apart, but still running because that's what the loop is supposed to do. the bard college is still built on fey land, but now its an insanely massive superstructure. there are a lot of things in the structure that just don't make sense: windows in the floors and ceilings, doors that lead nowhere, halls that seemingly go on endlessly without any destination, stairs that lead to walls, and unnecessary architectural elements that end abruptly and have no purpose. it's seemingly never-ending, and just expands on and on. everywhere you go, there are flowers sprouting where they shouldn't be. it is impossible to get in or get out without the bard king's guidance, because it is built like a maze. the bard king can also change the entire structure of the bard college at will, making it even more incomprehensible.

there aren't any teachers / authority figures in the school except for the bard king. there also aren't any students / guards other than the known cast of bard characters. there are seemingly other people at the college, but they aren't real, because they're all indistinguishable and faceless.

like in the second loop, youngblood hasn't left the college, and still doesn't have his memories from before he was there. he is much quieter and withdrawn; he presents himself as a perfect prince but has a boiling temper underneath. prior to the events of the plot, youngblood's relationship with noise is extremely rocky. he loved noise during his childhood, but started to resent him over time due to his ignorance of how horrible their situation was, and how unflinchingly loyal he was to the college. eventually he deliberately kills noise out of this resentment. youngblood is incredibly lonely after this and starts to regret his decision. the bard king intentionally fuels his guilt about the situation to manipulate him into being loyal and thinking he deserves to be abused.

roman enters the plot as the perfect image of a knight in shining armor. he doesn't remember anything about how he got to the bard college or why hes there, but like the second loop, the plot starts on his first day there. he has no recollection of his family legacy, but he has a faint, vague, muddled memory of a prince with light hair and dark skin who inspired him to keep living. this memory guides a lot of his actions. he's still the kind and compassionate person that he was in the canon timeline, but his need to be the hero in the situation is very strong, and he does tend to come off as domineering because of this. he's constantly anxious about his lack of memory.

(the prince saving roman's life is supposed to be what is left of his memory of youngblood before this time loop. roman tends to see youngblood as this perfect idealized prince figure, but eventually learns to see youngblood as the nuanced person that he is, and accept him flaws and all)

the end of this loop follows the same structure as the second one. of course, in this loop it would unfold in a different fashion. when roman and youngblood escape the college, there is an attempt to restart the loop again. however, the third loop is falling apart so incomprehensibly that it's nearly impossible for the timeline to be recovered. they're sent to the start of the loop with their memories intact, and their surroundings are practically nonexistent.

#roleslaying with roman #rswr roman #rswr youngblood #roman of reston #youngblood ra #apex eclipse #time loop au

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noneedtoamputate · 9 months

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happy birthday jess! i hope you have an amazing day with all the people you love :) in the meantime, what made you come up with the main concept for "every beautiful thing"? there aren't many post-war bob fics, which makes your fic really interesting!

also, do you have any good non-fiction ww1 book recs? (if not that's fine, i'm just curious)

Hi Blu! Thanks so much for the birthday wishes. I rewatched BoB th past summer for the first time in more than a decade. I was drawn to Chuck from the first episode on, I think, because I knew how it ended for him. I started doing some basic research on his life after the war, and I couldn't find much. When I thought about writing a BoB fic, giving Chuck a happy ending, or at least some kind of resolution appealed to me. I knew with his kind of inury, recovery would take a long time. Then i read this fic and it gave me a jumping-off point. I think setting the fic post-war gives me a lot of freedom. I don't have to worry about canon or as many historical details (although I still find myself looking up all kinds of facts when I'm writing).

Learning more about WWI is on my reading/history to-do list. While I know the major elements, for what is arguably the defining event of the 20th century, most Americans don't know as much as we should, probably because we were only in the war for less than a year. One book I read in college was Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory. While it's more literary cricticsm than history, it discusses how the culture was changed by Great War literature. A fantastic book, especially if you are familiar with the WWI poets.

BIrthday Ask Me Anything

#asked and answered #personal #birthday

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eldritchqueerture · 4 months

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Okay I thought of something to ramble about and it’s the utterly bizarre and confusing relationship the CW show Riverdale has to chronological time. Apologies in advance for how long this rant will be.

Disclaimer: it’s been several years since I’ve watched Riverdale, and I never actually finished the show. This is all based on my memories. Also, I’m pretty sure the seasons I never got around to get EVEN weirder with their timelines.

So, season 1 makes the setting of Riverdale anachronistic as an obviously deliberate stylistic choice. The characters all have computers and cell phones, but they’ve also got rotary landlines, and the cars all look like they’re from the 50s, and the costumes tend to be vaguely vintage-inspired. Honestly I always found this element kind of fun - it’s a unique-ish style, and it pays visual homage to the era the original comics were set. (Side ramble: season 1 is both the most normal the show ever was and also the closest it ever got to being “good” in a traditional sense. Season 1 was a reasonably competent teen drama/murder mystery with an interesting aesthetic - it wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but it wasn’t terrible. And then it almost immediately went off the rails in ways that are wildly entertaining but a lot harder to take seriously. Post-season-1 Riverdale is, imo, the peak of “makes no damn sense, compels me though” tv)

And then in season 2(?), there’s an awkward cross-promotional thing where a bunch of characters go to the movies to see the 2018 film Love, Simon, and talk about how great Love, Simon is, and shuts generally urge the viewers to please go see Love, Simon - now in theaters. And it’s like. Oh. So it is set in the modern day, then? This is just a modern day town where everyone drives cars from the 50s?

And from then on it’s kind of hard to tell if the writers are trying to set it in a nebulous anachronistic dreamscape like in season one, or if it’s concretely set in the modern day - they kind of go back and forth.

And then. There’s the time skip. I can’t remember what season it is, but eventually, the writers announce that after the characters graduate from high school, there’s going to be a seven-year time skip, and the rest of the season will pick back up with the characters as adults. This seems like an idea that will accomplish a lot: it will allow the show to stop pretending that these clearly-in-their-20s-and-30s actors are fresh out of high school, it will allow the characters to take different paths after high school and then just pick up the story when they’re all back in Riverdale, and also, it will explain away why none of these characters are wearing masks or social distancing or at all acknowledging the global pandemic that is currently happening. Win-win. Makes sense. But then.

The characters are all about to graduate, and Archie is trying to decide what he wants to do after high school - does he want to go to college, or does he want to join the army? And right before graduation, he’s in the high school, and he sees a photo of a previous graduating class of Riverdale High posing in their uniforms before they go off to fight in what is very clearly WWII. And Archie hallucinates some soldiers in WWII uniforms during graduation, and that makes him decide to join the army. So WWII happened in the past. Makes sense so far.

And then the time skip picks up with Archie getting out of the army, and in all the flashbacks, it is very clear that he just fought in WWI. There’s trenches, and WWI-style uniforms, and Archie has shell shock (which obviously can and does happen in any war, but the way it’s framed in this feels very WWI-coded. I don’t know how to explain it, but it is.) So WWI is the present now?

And Betty’s post-time skip storyline is *just* Silence of the Lambs. Like she’s training to be an FBI agent and hunting down a serial killer and there’s a lot of VERY on the nose references. So the costuming and set design of her storyline is super 1970s, but then she meets up with Archie the WWI vet?

And THEN, in Veronica’s storyline there’s a scene where she’s arguing with her dad about his sexism and she says something like, “It’s 2021, dad, women aren’t property anymore,” and it’s like. ??? You just skipped seven years into the future?? Shouldn’t it be 2028? Was the show secretly a period piece set, very specifically, seven years in the past the whole time?? If it’s 2021 why aren’t any of the characters acknowledging covid? Was Love, Simon released seven years earlier in this universe?

And then Jughead gets kidnapped by Mothman.

sometimes i will learn things about riverdale and its just. more unhinged than i ever expected

#is this how people feel about supernatural #ask #ronnie tag #this is insane ldnfkndkd #it does sound like a fun idea tho! if. there was a consistent idea behind it #like timelines converging and stuff #also as a local love simon enjoyer i do have to agree. love that book and love that movie

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