thirty-obsidian

[thirty-obsidian]

(literature girl summer) we're back to finishing a book in two days

[thirty-obsidian]

Theory for ‘If we were villains’

TW: mentions of suicide and just general If we were villains angst

After Richard (who once again was being an asshole) tried to drown James in the lake and everyone else has left, an interaction between James and Oliver occurs. Now I -like many others- am a firm believer that James is still alive and I believe that this is even more proof than we already have:

“You want me to stay” I asked. I didn’t want to leave him.

“Please,” he said, in a small voice. “I just couldn’t deal with the rest of them, for a while”

This book is littered with foreshadowing throughout and I’m certain that this is a perfect example. This scene is a way of proving that James’ suicide note was in fact a clue for Oliver. Let me explain:

In both scenarios James has been drowned, once by Richard and once in a supposed suicide. Already this links the two scenes but it goes further. In the scene above after James has been submerged he lets the others in the group head back to the castle but asks Oliver to stay, and I believe that he is doing the same thing with his suicide note. The letter he sends is not only addressed for Oliver only, but it includes an extract that is important to his and Oliver’s relationship, that letter and the message hidden within it was something that James knew only Oliver would see. By using the extract of Pericles he sends out a message he knows Oliver would see as a clue.

The parallel between the two scenes is undeniable. Both times James has been submerged (literally or not) and has kept himself and his emotions hidden away from his group all whilst quietly begging Oliver -his lover- to stay and help him.

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I'm reading Shakespeare's Pericles Prince of Tyre to help with my If We Were Villains hangover and if you think im dissecting every single line to work out what happened after THAT ending? You're absolutely correct. Let's dive right in.

That whoso ask'd her for his wife,

His riddle told not, lost his life

Right from the beginning, the audience is told that, for someone to win Antiochus' daughter as their love interest, that man must solve a riddle or death would follow. What is James' note to Oliver if not a riddle? More than that, like Pericles, he is reaching out to Oliver, asking him for help. The death that would follow Oliver not solving the riddle would be James Farrow since, even if he does live, he'd remain dead to the world - but of course Oliver notices the hidden message immediately.

So sharp are hunger's teeth, that man

and wife

Draw lots who first shall die to

lengthen life

Here Cleon is lamenting the poverty of Tarsus and he notes how couples are deciding who shall die so the other might live. James made that decision withour Oliver's knowledge but, reading more into the words, we have death being treated as a means to continue living. James was suffering in his despair and he would have thought that the only way he could continue living is as someone else. He chose to let James die but, as an actor, he is practiced at letting one name go before taking up another - thereby lengthening his life.

At the beginning of Act II, Gower returns and remarks:

And he, good prince, having all lost,

By waves from coast to coast is tost:

Till fortune, tired with doing bad,

Threw him ashore, to give him glad

The relevance to James here seems pretty clear. Referring to Pericles as good prince seems notably similar to Oliver calling James worthy prince as they concluded their fateful performance of King Lear. The mention of fortune is also interesting as, in the aftermath of Richard, one way James tries to cope is to give up responsibility and blame fate. It's not inconceivable that James decided to give himself up to fate and let the waves either claim him or throw him onto a new shore to start again.

Then we get to the lines James specifically left for Oliver:

the sea hath cast me on the rocks,

Wash'd me from shore to shore, and left me breath

Nothing to think on but ensuing death:

And have no more of life than may suffice

To give my tongue that heat to ask your help;

Which if you shall refuse, when I am dead,

For that I am a man, pray see me buried.

James is giving Oliver a choice here. After the huge sacrifice Oliver made for him, he wouldn't blame him if he refused this plea for help. If he does, he only requests when I am dead...pray see me buried. James could be asking Oliver to let James Farrow stay dead to the rest of the world - even if he now suspects he may yet live. We can't underestimate the extent of James' guilt when he disappeared - he must have felt he had no right to ask Oliver for anything else whilst simultaneously knowing that he would answer his plea regardless because that's just who Oliver is - always generous to his fellow performers even to own detriment.

This was a goodly person,

Till the disaster that, one mortal night,

Drove him to this.

It is no wonder James returned to this particular play in the years of Oliver's incarceration. Helicanus is lamenting how one mortal night has driven Pericles to the shell he has become. A good man wrecked by a single tragic event. If anyone can relate to that - it's James.

This play is about a tragic figure, who thinks he's lost all, eventually being reuinted with those he loves. These lines are from Pericles' reunion with his wife, Thaisa:

O, come, be buried

A second time within these arms.

We know James has been buried once, lost at sea, and in order to go on I shall be telling myself that he will be buried a second time in Oliver's arms. Pericles Prince of Tyre ends with the joy that comes from a reunion after lovers being separated for years - 14 years to be exact which, if Oliver finds James, will be the same amount of time since the two of them first met at Dellecher.

So if, like me, you've been a little broken by unanswered questions since finishing that last page take heart because I am now more convinced than ever that James and Oliver will be crown'd with joy at last.

[thirty-obsidian]

If We Were Villains

Foreshadowing, or something akin to that

[thirty-obsidian]

I finished reading "If we were villains" a few hours ago, so while I'm still going through the 5 stages of grief, here are the gayest scenes between Oliver and James that I made sure to save while reading even though I had no idea at first if it's going anywhere or not.

1. Oliver unconsciously leaning in when James was pretend-hitting him during class. (ACT I - scene 9)

2. James covering Oliver with the fake blood on Halloween. (ACT I - scene 12)

3. Oliver staying with James after the Halloween incident. (ACT I - scene 12)

4. "I wanted to give Richard ten bruises for every one he'd put on James." (ACT II - scene 2)

5. Oliver waking up next to James. "The strange sudden thought that I didn't want to move struck me." (ACT III - scene 10)

6. Oliver kindly informing us that he's the only one who knows every inch of James. (ACT III - scene 18)

7. "I desperately wanted him to stay, seized by the nonsensical idea that if he left, I would lose him, irretrievably.", "Forget to think of her." (ACT III - scene 18)

8. Oliver being blindly, savagely jealous while watching James and Wren kiss during R&J. (ACT III - scene 18)

9. Oliver thinking about James after having sex with Meredith. (ACT IV - scene 1)

10. Oliver going to spend the night with Meredith in the hopes that it'll help him forget about James. (ACT IV - scene 1)

11. Oliver yelling at James that he can't be mad at him or hate him. (ACT IV - scene 7)

12. Oliver having a crisis while watching James and Meredith kiss. (ACT IV - scene 9)

13. "He was my friend—much more than that, truthfully", "My infatuation with James transcended any notion of gender." (ACT V - prologue)

14. ""You didn't tell me." I didn't realize until it was out of my mouth that that alone was worse than any of the rest of it.",

"I never wanted you to look at me the way you're looking at me right now." (ACT V - scene 5)

15. "Worthy prince, I know't." and of course, the not so brotherly kiss. (ACT V - scene 6)

16. "Of course, the only person I really wanted to see was James." (ACT V - scene 7)

17. "You know why.", and James begging Oliver to let him make things right and kissing his hand the last time he went to see him. (ACT V - scene 7)

18. "But more than that—you must know—more than anything, I just need to see James." (Epilogue)

19. Oliver admitting at least to himself that he still is in love with James. (Epilogue)

[thirty-obsidian]

go read if we were villains and then pls come back and talk to me about it :)

[thirty-obsidian]

my favorite genre of book is "inverted mystery in which a group of students in a pretentious-sounding college participate in murdering their friend. the narrator tells the story by recalling his past, and is supposedly mediocre in his major compared to his friends. also featuring queer/queer-coded main cast, the asshole friend™️, and a man named richard"

[thirty-obsidian]

“Beauty is rarely soft or consolatory. Quite the contrary. Genuine beauty is always quite alarming.”

-Donna Tartt

[thirty-obsidian]

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

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“Forgive me, for all the things I did but mostly for the ones I did not.”

-Donna Tartt

[thirty-obsidian]

reading a book isn't enough i want the book to, as julian said, consume me, devour me, unstring my bones. then spit me out reborn.

[thirty-obsidian]

"Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it."

-Donna Tartt; The Secret History

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"Someone - was it van Gogh? - said that orange is the colour of insanity. Beauty is terror. We want to be devoured by it, to hide ourselves in that fire which refines us."

The Secret History - Donna Tartt

[thirty-obsidian]

feeling that oppressive urge to have a group of friends who have weekly dinners at someone’s apartment, flock together on campus, debate literature and philosophy over wine soaked nights, study in the library together long after everyone’s gone, write each other letters when we’re apart for the holidays, run about the woods at night and be utterly, utterly free.

[thirty-obsidian]

“But, you know, that feeling? When you wake up in the morning and you have somebody to think about? Somewhere for hope to go? It's good. Even when it's bad, it's good.”

subway girls 

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“Strange, isn’t it? To love a book. When the words on the pages become so precious that they feel like part of your own history because they are. It’s nice to finally have someone read stories I know so intimately.” ― Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea.

[thirty-obsidian]

Perhaps that is what it's like being with other people. Perhaps even people you like and admire immensely can make you see the World in ways you would rather not.

– Susanna Clarke, Piranesi