The Tradëscan Codex

It's amazing how little most of the yuletide stories read as fanfic. I'm not putting that forward as a good or bad thing, but I do sorta think that there is a slash/fanfic aesthetic, and that the yuletide stories seem much more geared towards a more traditional one. A difference between the way to books versus the way we respond to television? OR something else?

Of course, the stories most likely to have me click on them were ones with summaries that seemed to be female-centered gen; the least were those that sounded like m/m slash. So the fact that my reading was more heavily gen than usual may bias those results.

For some reason, not it seems particularly poignant that there's so little Shakespeare femslash on the web. Maybe I'll write some--either Celia/Rosalind or Kate/Bianca, or both. (Any suggestions as to other possible Shakeseare femslash pairings? Perhaps surprisingly, the possibilities of Learcest doesn't really seem to be exciting me.)

I haven't found anything that really seems reminiscent of Ari's or Carrie's or anyone else's styles (with the caveat that I'm not sure I could recognize most of my friends' styles), so I'm looking forward to the reveal to point out some more good fic. Chances are, though, their stories are in fandoms with which I'm just not familiar.

Same deal as anyone else: you guess which fic I wrote for yuletide or prettylightsfic (or for 3_ships once I write it and it gets posted) and I'll write you something. Something substantial for yuletide, since your chances are something like one in a thousand, more like a drabble for prettylightsfic.

ETA: Comments are now screened. I'll unscreen comments which aren't guesses.

It is ungodly hot and I cannot sleep.

To me, Robert A. Heinlein's appeal has been located primarily in the characteristics associated with his later work, which is for all intents and purposes professionally published fanfic, even down to the "fanfic aesthetic" that cathexys sometimes likes to talk about. There's the adolescent fantasy and the will to power, the constant emphasis on sex, the so-called "id vortex" being close to the surface, the incest, everything. Mix with a healthy helping of didacticism and philosophizing, and you pretty much have my ideal work of fiction, fan or professional. So it isn't surprising that Heinlein's my favorite writer.

But Heinlein knows how to wrench one's heart, too, when he wants to. Perhaps the best example is the novella "The Tale of the Adopted Daughter" contained within the novel Time Enough for Love, which just happens to be my favorite book. But another is "The Green Hills of Earth," the tale of Rhysling, the blind bard of the Spaceways. Heinlein really recreates a sense of the longing for Earth in the heart of his reader, and the recounting of simple heroism really touched my heart and brought a tear to my eye.

Most recently, when I took my evening walk for exercise. (On second thought, that tear might have been sweat--my eyes were stinging from the salt water.) I was listening to a dramatic recreation of "The Green Hills of Earth" by X Minus One (whomever they are, but they do a decent job) and I thought I would share it with you all now. I really recommend listening to it.

You can download it using any of the following links:

http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=AD6853E5191A1E29
http://www.sendspace.com/file/v1wb27
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QXAZ5UQ4
http://up-file.com/download/3151cc873985/Heinlein,-Robert-A---Green-Hills-of-Earth.mp3.html

I also watched the Liz Taylor Taming of the Shrew--it was one of the free movies on On Demand. I had never seen the play before, and I suppose there are a lot of things to say about it. Out of all them, I suppose that's the one I most want to say--that there are a lot of things to say about it. It's just so incredibly rich. As I watched it, I was struck by how many different ways it could be interpreted, how the lines the actors were speaking could have been played in a complete different way. There are just so many different ways that Kate can be played or understood, ways that her motives could be constructed, that there isn't really anything at all that one can say definitive about the play, because the face it shows is so radically different when viewed from different angles. It really is pretty amazing. (Of course, this is in part a result of elements of the play not making any sense. Somehow Shakespeare gets away with having this be a part of his genius and not a sign of his inability.)

In its way, every performance of a play (well, unless it's a Beckett play) is like its own fanfic, filling in the gaps in canon, making some things clear that weren't originally, shifting the emphasis. And of course movie versions often even add in the extra sex during those gaps, so in that way they're exactly like fanfics. (Although they tend to be boring OTPs like Hamlet/Ophelia or Romeo/Juliet. Where's the onscreen Rosalind/Celia? (Then again, I don't think I've ever seen a movie version--or, for that matter, even seen it on the stage--of AYLI, so maybe there would be onscreen Rosalind/Celia. Everyone agrees that play is the gay, after all.))

And since there's no way one could possibly turn a Shakespeare play into a movie without some massive cutting, I now have my Riverside Shakespeare open on my bed. It's not at all because I'm entertaining thoughts of Kate/Bianca incest femslash. No, not at all.

Anybody who can point me to already written Kate/Bianca wins a billion points. I'd even take 10 Things I Hate About You Kate/Bianca, because, hey, Julia Stiles and Larissa Oleynik are hot. (Not that that is all that relevant in fanfic, but hey.)

When you see this on your friends, post Shakespeare in your journal.

I thought about doing something obscure, but really the following passage is IMO the greatest in Shakespeare, and so what if it's not an unpopular opinion? It has the metafictional and metatheatrical elements of "All the World's a Stage," but in such a way that the philosophical implications of world-as-text bubble so much closer to the surface. And it's wedded to such powerful passion, fatalism, and grief, as Macbeth mourns for his wife at a time when he can't let his grief get ahold of him.

Macbeth, Act V, Scene V, lines 22-33
She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more; it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.