Mar. 12th, 2024

anghraine: k-2so tracking jyn and cassian by explosion (kay [explosion])
I reblogged this post and said:

This is a … really odd post to start getting obvious bots on.

Tagged: #it's weird because there are a bunch on a post about rogue one's soundtrack #and now it's starting on this one with some of the same accounts but no reblogs and ... ????????????

[ETA 3/12/2024: if there's anything I don't regret about withdrawing from Tumblr, it's the bots. I know clearing out Dreamwidth's is tedious for Denise, but I for one am very grateful that she does it.]

[ETA2: I couldn't resist the urge to use this icon, though it's unfair to the honor of K-2SO. He would never! Unless he thought it was funny.]

anghraine: a picture of grey-white towers starting to glow yellow in the rising sun (minas anor)
Unsurprisingly … there’s an AU that lives rent-free in my head where Faramir remains Ruling Steward in Gondor, and Aragorn wholly dedicates himself to rebuilding Arnor (assisted by Gondor after the war).

Sometimes it’s in a Denethor lives scenario; it’s not like Denethor was ever going to concede the Ruling Stewardship, healing hands or no healing hands, but his gratitude(!) to Aragorn for saving Faramir might lead to him being much more accommodating as an ally than he would otherwise be.

But also, sometimes it’s not out of strict necessity—perhaps Elrond “only” requires the restoration of Arnor for Arwen’s hand and so that’s the overriding goal that Aragorn focuses on, (rightly) trusting Faramir to have his back in Gondor. (And/or he himself wants to prioritize Arnor; he could, of course, become King of Gondor but largely leave it in Faramir’s hands while dealing with Arnor, and I sort of wrote a fic where this is the case, but ehhh.)

Or there’s some vague idea where Elrond’s conditions are the same and Aragorn has to make a very hard choice, but makes it nevertheless, and it’s Elrond who ultimately concedes, accepting a future for Arwen as “only” Queen of Arnor. This works most easily with alive!Denethor, but idk, part of me prefers the idea of it as an independent choice even though I’m really into scenarios where Denethor survives.

The thing is, of course, that Aragorn in the book is so focused on becoming King of Gondor and feels so strongly that it is his right to do so that it takes a lot of finagling to make it work. It’s just not probable for his character.

…and yet.

Tagged: #legendarium fanwank #putting that one there to be safe since it's kind of intrinsically wanky #éowyn: no longer do i wish to be a queen #faramir: well technically you wouldn't be... #aww but éowyn as the ranking lady of gondor is also really charming to me #i know that at the end of the day it's no less monarchist but ... i like and want it
anghraine: an illustrated drawing of gracechurch street in london (gracechurch street)
An anon asked:

Hi, I found your fics on AO3, are they finished but published? I’m a little confused

I replied:

Nope! Well, mostly nope.

I do have a fic (also completed on AO3) that I self-published to pay for my undergrad textbooks many years ago, but I have long since removed it from publication. Otherwise, I have 44 WIPs on AO3 for a bunch of different fandoms (many would infringe copyright if I tried to publish them), and they are for-real WIPs. I’m just that much of a fandom butterfly.

But when I complete chapters, I post them.

anghraine: a photo of green rolling hills against a purply sky (hertfordshire) (herts)
An anon asked:

I know that Elizabeth Bennet being a brunette is fanon but can the fact that Caroline Bingley at one point criticizes her as having turned “brown and coarse” since the winter be a textual support to it? Since a blonde or a redhead would be less likely to tan so easily?

I replied:

Eh, Caroline is exaggerating; I’m more inclined to take Darcy’s interpretation that Elizabeth is as tanned as anyone who travelled in the summer might be.

You miiight extend it to evidence against red or very light blonde hair, I guess. But lots of people can tan (even if they have to get sunburnt first!).

anghraine: a woman with long brown curls in a white 1790s-style dress with a blue sash (elizabeth (dress))
moggett responded to this post:

Doesn’t Elizabeth canonically have dark eyes, though? I think that suggests brown hair, though obviously sometimes light-haired people can have dark eyes…

I replied:

She does, but as you say, plenty of people with red or blonde hair have dark eyes. You could maybe say it’s more likely that someone with a tan and dark eyes has brown or black hair—no more than that IMO.

(I think there’s a difference between “X suggests it’s more likely” and “X suggests it’s the case.”)

Tagged: #i actually do imagine elizabeth with brown hair #and darcy with black or near-black hair #i'm just strongly against fanon imperatives

anghraine: shmi in tpm; text: full of grace (shmi [gratia plena])
I got a follower who I thought might be a bot, but I checked their blog out of morbid curiosity and their most recent post was about how stupid “Mary, Did You Know?” is, so they’re good by me.

Tagged: #IT'S SO STUPID #my mother has it on her playlist so i hear it everyyyyy year and i'm trying not to dampen her spirits or whatnot #while internally like ... how could mary not know??? did she just forget????????
anghraine: a man with long black hair and a ring on his hand (faramir [hair])
There’s a line in LOTR about how the people in Minas Tirith stare at Legolas because they’ve never seen anyone so beautiful, and—

Well, it presumably predates Tolkien’s later idea that Númenóreans are barely distinguishable from Elves in appearance; modern Gondorians might look different these days, but at least some of them are said to look like ancient Númenóreans.

And, after all, some of the Edain also were virtually indistinguishable from Elves. Tolkien’s later work tends to treat the human-Elvish difference of appearance as more of a spectrum than a hard line. It seems a little continuity break, if a very minor one.

… But “Elvish” there is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Elves don’t all look alike! And the Edain who look like Elves specifically look like Eldar, so perhaps when Tolkien says Númenóreans looked like Elves, he means Eldarin Elves in particular.

Headcanon conclusion: Legolas looks Silvan, and Gondorians just think Silvan Elves are super hot.

Tagged: #i'm really entertained by the idea that gondorians think noldor et al look 'like us but More' but silvan elves are where it's really at #deep blogging #truly the deepest #also i appreciate that this is apparently reciprocal to some extent? at least legolas thought boromir was notably pretty
anghraine: a painting of a man from the 1790s sitting on a rock; he wears a black coat, a white waistcoat and cravat, and tan breeches (darcy (seriziat))
Following up from the Fitzwilliam family headcanons, headcanons for the living Darcys c. 1796 + some nearer (non-Fitzwilliam) connections. It’s … more involved, so a basic chart is here.

LADY GEORGIANA CARTERET, previously Lady Georgiana Darcy, née Lady Georgiana Howard—the daughter, sister, and aunt of impecunious dukes. Left with virtually no dowry by the extravagant Howards, the proud Lady Georgiana was married as a girl to Alexander Darcy, whose respectability and multiple estates satisfied her family. She later married her cousin, the Hon. Frederick Carteret. Now twice-widowed, Lady Georgiana enjoys both fortune and pride, joining them with a good deal of practical sense and family affection.

GEORGIANA HARCOURT, previously Georgiana Carteret—the daughter of Lady Georgiana and the Hon. Frederick Carteret. She had little immediate fortune beyond that granted by her affectionate half-brother, Christopher Darcy. Milder and more romantic than either her mother or sister, she was permitted to marry a younger son of the prestigious Harcourt family, but is not devoid of her family’s pride or spirits.

PHILADELPHIA, Lady Auckland, née Philadelphia Carteret—the daughter of Lady Georgiana and the Hon. Frederick Carteret. She dutifully married according to her family’s choice and unexpectedly found long years of companionship in doing so. She was close to her half-brother Christopher, and has always taken a great interest in his children, Fitzwilliam and Georgiana. Her pride is mostly contained to a strong sense of dignity and determination to have her way, and she is otherwise pragmatic, kind-hearted, and friendly.

JAMES STANLEY, Lord Auckland—the elder son of Lady Auckland (née Philadelphia Carteret). He is quieter than is usual for his family, though agreeable enough, and actively pleasant when he considers it in his or his family’s interests to be so. He is principally interested in his estate, which is not yet quite sufficient to the political career he longs for.

GEORGE HOWARD, Earl of Carrington—the great-nephew of Lady Georgiana. He is the first Howard in generations to have any sense of economy, and his arranged marriage to an heiress did not much alter his prudential habits. He has a sociable disposition with a liking for music and theatre, but lives quietly near Pemberley with his wife and a poor cousin, no longer dependent on Darcy and Carteret generosity, but grateful for having received it.

SARAH, Countess of Carrington—Lord Carrington’s wife. She was the daughter of an extremely wealthy American tradesman, cheerfully accepted her arranged marriage, and was relieved to find her aristocratic husband equally sanguine. She also shares his sense of prudence and is careful to avoid the appearance of presumption or ambition, though she certainly possesses the latter. She generally likes other people and has a distaste for confrontation.

BEATRICE HOWARD—a granddaughter of one of Lady Georgiana’s younger brothers. She is devoutly religious, has never married, and was left near-penniless by her parents’ deaths, which took place shortly after Lord and Lady Carrington’s marriage. They insisted on bringing her into their household and she has lived as a dependent on them ever since, treated kindly by them and the Darcys, but conscious of her precarious situation in the world.

THE HONOURABLE REVEREND THOMAS STANLEY—the younger son of Lady Auckland. More authentically pleasant than his brother, he combines an easy-going nature with a dutiful and honest one, which has always endeared him to his mother’s nephew, Fitzwilliam Darcy. When a living near Pemberley fell open, Darcy offered it to Stanley, who has now spent several years at Kympton.

FITZWILLIAM DARCY—the son of the charming, benevolent Christopher Darcy and his elegant wife, Lady Anne (née Fitzwilliam). Darcy resembles his mother’s family physically and temperamentally, and as a consequence, has often been perceived as more of a Fitzwilliam than a Darcy, especially as he is somewhat closer to his mother’s family. But he is by no means estranged from his father’s, and the strict principle and easy generosity of his conduct towards them have left them proud to claim him for their own.

THE HONOURABLE CLARISSA STANLEY—the only daughter of Lady Auckland. She is handsome enough to still avoid the title of “old maid,” but well into her twenties. Although too polite to show the exasperation she often feels, she is very much more interested in “knowing things,” whether news, books, or the goings-on of relatives, than society. And although she has never been concerned with her personal advancement, she cares deeply about her family’s.

CASSANDRA DARCY—the eldest child of a late-married judge, who was himself the much-younger brother of Alexander Darcy (father of Christopher). Her father’s success in his profession left his children with comfortable fortunes, but his and his wife’s deaths also left the children nominal wards of their mother’s family. In practice, the children would have been largely neglected if not for the interest taken by their cousin Christopher, despite his advanced age and poor health. Cassandra, now twenty-three, retains a strong sense of responsibility for her siblings and both duty and affection towards the wider Darcy family.

LAVINIA DARCY—Cassandra’s younger sister. Lavinia is a lively, good-natured, but obstinate girl of twenty-one. She somewhat shares Cassandra’s sense of duty towards the Darcys and responsibility for their young brother, though to a lesser degree. The handsomer of the sisters, she has little interest in marriage, but very much enjoys dancing, conversation, and music. Despite very great differences in character, she is deeply fond of her late cousin’s children, Fitzwilliam and Georgiana, readily turning to the elder for advice and the younger for a ready ear.

GEORGIANA DARCY—the sixteen-year-old daughter of Christopher Darcy and Lady Anne Fitzwilliam. Her extreme shyness makes it difficult for others to understand her, even many of her own relations, who often do not know what to make of her beyond finding her sweet and accomplished. Georgiana is both, though less interested in accomplishments for accomplishments’ sake than as simply a lover of music and art. She has a great deal of patience, little opinion of her own merits, and is both very close to and awed by her clever brother.

ALEXANDER DARCY—Cassandra and Lavinia’s ten-year-old brother, the heir to the bulk of their father’s wealth. He is not a difficult child in the usual sense, but rather, gentle, mild, and in delicate health. He tends to be overwhelmed by the charismatic Darcys who surround him. Although he loves his sisters and admires his always-assured elder cousin, Fitzwilliam Darcy, he is particularly fond of his unassuming cousin Georgiana.

Tagged: #yes this is more out there and i know but... also i'm really fond of them so /shrug #also i sort of entertained myself with the idea that the fitzwilliams give normal names and it's the darcys et al who are pretentious af #not solely bc of the howards either. they're just Like That
anghraine: a cropped image of the official art for the mesmer class in the original guild wars game (mesmer (guild wars))
[personal profile] heckofabecca responded to this post:

THIS IS THE QUALITY CONTENT I AM HERE FOR!!!!

I replied:

haha ty!! I aim to serve
anghraine: a painting of a couple walking on the lawn of haddon hall in derbyshire (pemberley (haddon))
[personal profile] heckofabecca responded to this post:

<3 <3 <3

hard for me to follow how exactly everyone’s related without the visual aid of a family tree, but does that stop me loving this? ABSOLUTELY NOT, KEEP IT COMING


I replied:

Thank you! Here are charts and a guide:






The characters in red are the ones who are still alive c. 1796: Lady Georgiana Carteret née Howard (mother of Darcy’s father); Georgiana Harcourt née Carteret (half-sister of Darcy’s father); Philadelphia, Lady Auckland née Carteret (half-sister of Darcy’s father); Cassandra, Lavinia, and Alexander Darcy (first cousins of Darcy’s father); George, Lord Carrington (Darcy’s second cousin), and Sarah, Lady Carrington, née Sarah Pratt; Beatrice Howard (Darcy’s second cousin); James, Lord Auckland; Rev. Thomas Stanley; Clarissa Stanley (Darcy’s half-cousins); Darcy and Georgiana.

[ETA 3/12/2024: there is a small mistake here; Lord Carrington's father, the duke, is still alive in 1796 and should also be outlined in red (otherwise Carrington would be the duke). In my headcanon, Carrington has become the canonical duke involved in the Ecclesford theatricals by the time of Mansfield Park. But it would not have happened yet during P&P.]
anghraine: a painting of a man c. 1800 with a book and a pen; the words love, pride, and delicacy in the upper corner (darcy (love)
[personal profile] heckofabecca responded to this post:

Fantasticccccc

I replied:


:D :D

/sigh

Mar. 12th, 2024 10:25 am
anghraine: vader extending his lightsaber; text: and now for the airing of grievances! (Default)
I got a reblog on one of last year's posts, and Tumblr does this thing where it recommends "similar" posts according to its algorithm. Sometimes it does bring up cool ones, so I clicked on one that looked interesting.

...turns out, the algorithm linked my post (which was about Mrs Gardiner) to a post going on about Darcy having a redemption arc.

Anyway: character growth =/= a redemption arc and Darcy is no more redeemed by his arc than Elizabeth, thanks.

(Seriously, has anyone ever once described her growth through the novel as a "redemption arc"??)
anghraine: a painting of the sons of the 2nd earl of talbot by thomas lawrence; the elder is red-haired and rather plain, the younger black-haired and pretty (fitzwilliam and darcy)
Eek, the headcanons [ETA 3/12/2024: this is referencing the Fitzwilliam headcanons here and here & Darcy headcanons here and here] inspired a fic and I don’t have time T_T

(aka I wrote a page and a half and now have sadly shut down the doc)

Tagged: #my deeply original title is 'headcanon fic'
anghraine: a letter from the 1790s, written on yellowing paper (letter [1790s])
I reblogged this post and added:

First part of the rough draft—

I.

At least, Lady Georgiana thought, Darcy had the mettle to write to her himself.

The letter came as only a moderate surprise; his mother’s sister, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, had written earlier, warning her of what was to befall them. All their plans for Darcy were overthrown. He had set himself upon marrying the daughter of a very minor gentleman with connections in trade. Nothing like Carrington’s situation, Lady Catherine hastened to assure her; the girl had no fortune, no better connections, nothing to soften the disappointment attending the alliance.

“Disappointment” was not Lady Catherine’s word. But then, she never had more than a passing acquaintance with decorum. Lady Georgiana suspected that Lady Catherine had only just restrained herself from observing that Darcy did not need to bring a monumental fortune into the family through marriage, the way that Lady Georgiana’s great-nephew had done. Even Anne de Bourgh’s fortune would not have done for Carrington; but it would do very well indeed for Darcy.

Or so they had all thought.

True, Lady Georgiana did not quite believe Lady Catherine’s note when she first received it. The woman could be fanciful in odd—very odd—ways, and was not overburdened with understanding. But a letter from Darcy shortly followed his aunt’s.

Lady Georgiana read it several times, though it was brief, for him. Lady Catherine had not invented the whole thing, after all. Perhaps not any of it, for while he mentioned no relations in trade, he mentioned no other connections, either—only that the young lady was daughter to a gentleman living near his friend Bingley’s estate. And Lady Catherine, whatever her faults, had never been prone to falsehood; likely this girl really was the niece of some London merchant.

Lady Georgiana would not term such an alliance a disgrace, as Lady Catherine had; a gentleman’s daughter was a gentleman’s daughter. But certainly, Lady Georgiana's grandson could have done better for himself—very much better, even had he no connections at all. And the Darcys almost always took care to marry with an eye to connections, as his father had done with Lady Anne, and his grandfather with Lady Georgiana herself.

She was Lady Georgiana Carteret, formerly Lady Georgiana Darcy, formerly Lady Georgiana Howard, daughter, sister and, presently, aunt to Dukes of Holdernesse. In her youth, and indeed long after it, her family could not spare the money for dowries worth speaking of. Instead, they arranged for her to marry Alexander Darcy of Pemberley, attracted more by his unencumbered estates than anything else. He died young, and Lady Georgiana married again not long thereafter—but, contrary to what might be expected, she was fonder of her son and two grandchildren by Alexander than the descendants of her marriage of choice.

She placed the two letters side-by-side on her writing table and studied them, unable to avoid observing the far greater courtesy of Darcy’s note. Who were the Fitzwilliams, after all? Rich and influential, to be sure—but nowhere near as ancient or respectable a family as the Howards or Darcys. They would not decide her actions, however much she hoped they would not share Lady Catherine’s insensible fury, for Darcy’s sake.

There must be no public disruption of ties, Lady Georgiana decided, and she felt ill-inclined to a private one. Darcy was her grandson, the only son of her only son, and a grandson who had always treated her with the respect and polite affection she considered her due. She, Lady Georgiana, would see what could be made of this girl; for now, she contented herself with responding to the letters.

To Lady Catherine, she replied with several pages of nothings. It was a fine art she had long since mastered.

To Darcy, she wrote, I wish you joy.
anghraine: a picture of grey-white towers starting to glow yellow in the rising sun (minas anor)
It’s a day that ends in Y, so I’m thinking about Byzantine Gondor again

Tagged: #someday i WILL commission faramir and éowyn in byzantine robes in the 'white lady of rohan' scene #it's not today (i have too many ocs i want lol) but it will someday happen
anghraine: a picture of a wooden chair with a regal white rod propped on the seat (stewards)
sunshine-states responded to this post:

Would that make Imperial Rome Numenor?

Possibly, though it could also be early (or earlier) Gondor. Tolkien says of it:

In the south Gondor rises to a peak of power, almost reflecting Númenor, and then fades slowly to decayed Middle Age, a kind of proud, venerable, but increasingly impotent Byzantium.

He also says that in ROTK:

we come to the half-ruinous Byzantine City of Minas Tirith.

Tagged: #to be fair he also described contemporary gondor as italian and egyptian so it's not just one thing #but byzantine gondor is definitely within the range of his descriptions!

anghraine: a picture of the body and lower face of a woman in late 1790s fashion (catherine (painting))
I reblogged this post and added:

Moving my notes to a separate reblog to match the Fitzwilliam post:

- The Howards were inspired by the nameless duke hanging out with Lord and Lady Ravenshaw in Mansfield Park. Since I made Lord Ravenshaw the same person as the Fitzwilliam earl in P&P, I thought it’d be fun to come up with a social connection between the duke and the Ravenshaws without making him a blood relative of them. I’m imagining that the duke in MP is actually Carrington, after the "present" (in 1796) duke dies.

- I named them “Howard” after the name Austen whimsically invented as a girl: Henry Frederick Howard Fitzwilliam. I’ve always thought the name’s ties to so many of her heroes was intriguing.

- Most of the particulars of the Howards are my own creation, and some have (sort of) come up in previous fics; Lady Georgiana, Lady Auckland, the Carringtons, and Miss Howard are all mentioned in The Letters of Elizabeth Darcy (1796-1798), and Lady Auckland is mentioned in passing in First Impressions. Lady Auckland also appears in person in a semi-crackfic, The Natural Daughter of Somebody.

- Lady Georgiana’s Carteret descendants are relatives of the late Lord Dalrymple referenced in Persuasion (i.e., the man whose widow is Lady Dalrymple and whose daughter is Miss Carteret). The Darcys themselves would also be related, more distantly, as Lady Georgiana herself is a Carteret relation. *waves at board* iT’S ALL CONNECTED

- Kympton is the living that was “supposed” to go to Wickham (…after he had already exchanged it for money). Thomas Stanley is the guy (in this ’verse) who got it instead. If you’re familiar with Austen quasi-canon, you might be able to guess at a little of his future.

- The junior branch of the Darcys are quasi-canon; Caroline Bingley mentions at one point that Darcy has a great-uncle who was or is a judge and whose portrait hangs at Pemberley. For the purposes of this ’verse, I assume the judge is dead, but was much younger than his brother Alexander (Lady Georgiana’s husband/Darcy’s grandfather), and also married quite late in life himself, resulting in children who are roughly contemporaries of Darcy and Georgiana.

*cough* … I think that’s all.
anghraine: darcy and elizabeth after the second proposal in the 1979 p&p (darcy and elizabeth [proposal])
One of the nice things about Pillowfort is I can change my icon without feeling existentially troubled

Tagged: #i changed this one [ETA 3/12/2024: i.e., my usual Tumblr icon since 2011 or so] for a brief while once and just had to go back #it wasn't Right #even though i chose this in a rush #but i just changed my j/c icon [ETA: Jyn/Cassian] to d/e [ETA: Darcy/Elizabeth] bc i'm on an austen kick right now and it's nice to see the new one #though it would be NICER if we could have icon collections and select them for individual posts *cough*

[ETA 3/12/2024: I'm kind of giggling at my obvious reference to Dreamwidth's icon supremacy. I don't think I even have my Tumblr icon (which is a greyscale promo image of Leia in ANH with her giant blaster) uploaded here. I do have 293 other ones, though, including the Pillowfort one I was talking about!]
anghraine: an armoured woman with a sword against a gold background (éowyn (pelennor))
I reblogged a post from marcelgerard about drunkenly calling the Witch-king of Angmar "the bitch-king of Angmar."

Tagged: #éowyn ghost-wrote this

anghraine: vader extending his lightsaber; text: and now for the airing of grievances! (Default)
If I finish grading this batch of 16th-cent lit exams

and email my students their creative writing feedback

and finish my 17th-cent written exam (before Friday)

and then write my 18th-cent written exam

… then I can write fic

Tagged: #this fic is attacking my brain and it's so cool to feel inspired and so not cool to feel it right /now/! #at least my 18th exam is coming up and i am like ninety-five percent sure it's going to involve austen #so the brainspaces will meld at some point #i know the 18th better than anything else anyway so i'm sort of looking forward to it on its own merits too
anghraine: from behind, a woman in a decorated purple and gold uniform oversees a rocky coast (gwen velazquez [victory])
I reblogged this post and added:

Hey, thanks to y’all who helped with that conversation. I got my approval for another year of funding :)

Tagged: #adsf;fd this is like a psychologically crowdfunded phd #but i am really very grateful!!

anghraine: vader extending his lightsaber; text: and now for the airing of grievances! (Default)
Mr Bennet: my brother-in-law probably paid at least ten thousand pounds to arrange my daughter’s marriage. :(

Fandom: Is this poverty?

Tagged: #am i still on this? yES #people go through such acrobatics to make the gardiner-bennets out to be facing down a desperate future and... lol #but it's like—austen was persistently and deeply concerned with the vicissitudes of female dependence on their relatives #you don't have to make that out to be a scenario where they were ever going to go hungry or become governesses or whatever #to be a real concern and a characteristic one! #ajkfdfjkdaf
anghraine: alderaan blowing up; text: alderaan shot first (alderaan)
I reblogged an end of the year fic writing meme and added:

#lol i had to check and see what i did this year at all #but i actually did do some things so!

anghraine: a photo of emilie de ravin (a blonde, blue-eyed woman); text: lucy (lucy (emilie))
brambleberrycottage said:

1 and 8 for writer's ask?

I replied:

1.

My favorite thing that I posted in its entirety this year: probably the gift of men, my Eldarion/Faramir’s daughter fic that I managed to squeeze into my challenge format of seven parts of seven sentences each. It had been rolling around in my head and in scraps for a long time, even though it’s quite short, and I finally managed to get it out in a way I was happy with!

My favorite thing that I updated this year is, inevitably, the chapters of The Jedi and the Sith Lord (the current fic from my Lucy Skywalker [f!Luke] ’verse) that I added. For some reason, TROS ignited my brain and after some four years of no updates I added a ton of chapters within a few weeks.

8.

Which fic this year was the most fun to write? Hmm, it’s got to be Lucy! I just really enjoyed it—the evolving relationship between Lucy and Vader, the droids, the ~drama, the RO cameos, everything. It’s a nice change, too, because while I’m really fond of the Lucyverse, some of it has been a misery to write and this was just a great time.
anghraine: a picture of grey-white towers starting to glow yellow in the rising sun (minas anor)
rain-sleet-snow responded to this post:

The Gift of Men absolutely broke my heart!

I replied:

Oh, that’s so nice to hear! Well, I mean … lol, it was a pretty niche fic for me and not a lot of people read it, so I’m glad that it touched you!

rain-sleet-snow responded:

Honestly, I don’t think anyone writes about the tragedy waiting to happen of Aragorn, Arwen, and Faramir outliving their contemporaries/spouses/children (delete as applicable) quite like you do.

I replied:

Well, thanks! I think a lot of people prefer to avoid thinking about it or to downplay it, which is fine, but I think it’s really interesting character-wise as well as sad, so.
anghraine: anakin in rots looking down; text: lost (anakin [lost])
[personal profile] brynnmclean said:

For the end of the year fic writer questions, 1. What’s your personal favourite thing you wrote this year? and 7. What’s your favourite piece of description or narration?

I replied:

I answered #1 here, and for #7 … hm. It’s got to be from the Lucy fic, but I wrote a lot on it this year. One of my favorite bits of narration, though, was this:

He should have been enraged, of course. He should still be. But he only felt tired—very tired, and very old.

In a rare moment of reminiscence, Vader let himself think back. His mind flitted from the Darth Vader of this miserable day, to a reckless young Jedi Knight, to a newborn slave beneath Gardulla’s palace. Yes, he’d counted right.

He was forty-three.

anghraine: a screenshot of a young woman from the shoulders up, with fancy clothes and brown hair in a ponytail (althea (mid))
rain-sleet-snow said:

9 for the ask meme!

I replied:

9. If you could go back and change something about one of the fics you wrote this year, what would it be?

Ohh, interesting. I usually do just go back and change things if they bother me unless it would take substantial revision or I don’t have the time, so … honestly, I would make my Guild Wars fics a little less dependent on their games.

It’s less of an issue for pro patria (my GW2 fic; it does spend a lot of time just expanding on quests and in-game convos, but the idea of the fic was giving the PC/Althea feelings about things the game doesn’t explore, so that’s kind of the point). But the new one, the last day, is … basically just a summary of the GW1 tutorial in epistolary format, with no explanations for people who didn’t play the game or read (the long) pro patria first.

Tagged: #ascalonian grudgefic #the last day might be a different fic than pro patria but it is extremely ascalonian grudgefic #so it can share the tag

anghraine: vader extending his lightsaber; text: and now for the airing of grievances! (Default)
I reblogged a six degrees of separation from any celebrity meme and added:

#supposedly my great-grandmother was on speaking terms with maria von trapp #and wrote to her about how disappointing it was that her son (my grandfather) had Married Beneath Himself #said grandfather has a cousin who is a big name catholic asshole #lol fun times

anghraine: judy parfitt as lady catherine de bourgh in the 1980 p&p; text: #girlboss (lady catherine [heart])
LOL, the previous post suddenly made me think that part of the reason I’m so amused by the idea that all the different branches of Darcy’s family slightly look down on each other is that it’s pretty much what my family is like?

Mother’s family: both sides are English, but some come from … like, “at some point we were important but fell on hard times for four generations” and look down on the “we were coal miners in Derbyshire and kept dying so we ended up here” side, who think the former group are pretentious assholes.

Both sides look down on my adoptive father’s side, because they’re racist and he’s Mexican. They prefer my bio father, who has a Very Checkered Past, since he’s white, although they also have issues with his mother being Greek and used to “joke” with her about it (Anglo grandma: but she never laughed, weird).

Bio father’s family: mix of Irish and Greek. Apparently the Greek side didn’t want Grandma to marry my grandfather bc he wasn’t Greek, while the Irish side didn’t want him to marry Grandma because she is, and her parents were immigrants. To this day, most of the Irish side doesn’t associate with the Irish-Greek side bc they’re somehow still hung up on it. Grandma, meanwhile, looks down on Mother’s family as trashy.

It’s all some mix of entertaining and exhausting.

Tagged: #i do have other reasons for the headcanon but like... i've never pretended i don't project onto darcy #i hadn't really thought about it in this way though #austen blogging #but mostly just my family blogging
anghraine: vader and luke dueling in esb (anakin and luke)
[personal profile] heckofabecca said:

Give me a 6 :)

I replied:

6. What’s your favorite piece of dialogue you wrote this year?

Heh, I wrote a lot of dialogue. It’s definitely going to come from The Jedi and the Sith Lord … okay, it’s kind of cheating, but my favorite dialogue-heavy moment was very predictably:
“Everything I’ve done has been to save the galaxy!”
“Good job,” said Lucy.
“If it weren’t for your pathetic Rebellion—”
She gave a scornful laugh. “You didn’t think it was pathetic when we blew up the Death Star and shot you out of the sky!”
“When you blew up the Death Star,” said Vader. “The Rebellion is little more than an irritant without you.”
It would be insufferably arrogant to think so. But sometimes—well, she worried about what might happen without her there, without an agent of the Force on their side, while the Empire had Vader, however ambivalent he might be. Lucy set her teeth.
“You can flatter me all you want,” she said. “Do you think it’s ever going to make a difference? If you’re waiting for that, you can just kill me already.”
“That is not your destiny,” said Vader.
She could nearly have beaten her head against the bars on his window.
“As if you don’t take destiny into your own hands all the time,” she said. “Did you call it destiny when you killed Anakin Skywalker?”
Vader’s hand unclenched.
“What?” he said.
“Oh, you thought I’d forget my father if you treated me nicely enough?” said Lucy, her voice rising. “I haven’t!”
His mask turned towards the window, as if searching for some answer in its sickly light, then turned back to her. For a moment, he simply appeared to examine her.
“No,” he said at last. “I am your father.”
For something lighter that leans less on canon … I’m fond of this, from later in the fic:

Finally, her arm went completely numb and Vader knocked the lightsaber right out of her hand. It clattered somewhere on the floor beneath them, while the red lightsaber hummed at her throat.

Lucy looked at the lightsaber, and then at Vader’s unreadable mask.
“Damn it,” she said.
He seemed—she concentrated—something like amused, or at least entertained. Lucy scowled.
“A worthy effort,” said her father.
“For a failure?”
“Yes,” he said, which wasn’t exactly encouraging. “Consider it instructive.”
Thanks,” said Lucy.
“Do you acknowledge your defeat?”
She nearly wrinkled her nose. “I guess.”
He waited, the lightsaber still inches from her skin. It was, though not frightening, certainly unsettling.
“Yes,” she grumbled. “I have fallen before your mighty skills, Lord Vader. Can I get down now?
anghraine: a photo of emilie de ravin (a blonde, blue-eyed woman); text: lucy (lucy (emilie))
[personal profile] heckofabecca responded to this post:

The second one tho…. lololol

I replied:

Lucy’s boundless respect for her father is a thing to behold :P

anghraine: a picture of a woman with a white streak in her red hair casting a spell (lohse (full))
Nothing like strings of bots on random posts to make Pillowfort more appealing tbh. F-lock and a reblog function toggle!!

(I don’t know if those of you with PF accounts ever check it any more—I hadn’t for months until [personal profile] kaz lured me—but if you do, I’m anghraine over there.)

ETA: it looks like I have three invites to give out, if anyone’s curious!

[ETA 3/12/2024: I now have 50 invites, actually. Although I personally prefer DW, feel free to hit me up if you want to try out PF!]
anghraine: a screenshot of fitzwilliam and georgiana darcy standing together in the 1980 p&p miniseries (darcys (1980))
[personal profile] tree responded to this post:

that’s so funny because i, too, was recently reminded that pillowfort existed, and i logged in, and… nope. i still hate it. but i paid my $5, gosh darn it, so that account is gonna sit there until either the site becomes useable for me or we all go up in flames. :D

I replied:

I laughed bc I’d actually thought for a moment, “huh, I wonder what tree thinks of it here? hm, she probably hates it.”

[personal profile] tree responded:


i probably should not feel all warm and fuzzy about being known for hating things but i don’t care. :)


I replied:

lolol, I am a patchwork of resentments great and small, so reasoned hatreds is a quality I can respect :P

anghraine: a female half-elf bg3 cleric holds her hand together, one glowing with divine light (larissa (glowing hand))
I reblogged this post and modified it to:

If I finish grading this batch of 16th-cent lit exams ✔️

and email my students their creative writing feedback ✔️

and finish my 17th-cent written exam (before Friday)

and then write my 18th-cent written exam

… then I can write fic

Tagged: #down to the exams (which is either :) or T_T depending)
anghraine: a picture of grey-white towers starting to glow yellow in the rising sun (minas anor)
Petty whining:

The movieverse’s generic fantasy crown of Gondor is super inescapable and … /sigh.

I get that the canon helmet-crown is much less generic fantasy crown, but that’s fine? Gondor is allowed to have a distinctive aesthetic???

It’s one thing in movieverse art, but it shows up in a lot of things that ostensibly aren’t, and bleh.

Tagged: #i remain convinced that tumblr tolkien fandom is mainly movieverse+silm fanon fandom #like #people are allowed to have fun in different ways etc etc #but i'm going to sit here grumbling in my trashcan about it
anghraine: text: i've had it with these motherfucking sith (samuel l. windu)
I reblogged a post about enjoying not being a teenager but also being lost by new Internet slang and added:

#lmao same #millennial blogging #is my closest tag i think #i'm a decaying elder millennial who does not understand the ways of the youths okay
anghraine: a painting of a man c. 1800 with a book and a pen; the words love, pride, and delicacy in the upper corner (darcy (love)
I’m obviously a big fan of bringing together major or minor characters from across Austen’s novels into one big Jane Austen Cinematic Universe. I do think, though, that there’s a sort of … I don’t know if I’d say problem, but there’s an issue.

If you’ve got a world populated primarily or heavily by Austen’s own characters, I think the “everyone back then thought/did X” argument (though always problematic) becomes stronger than it really is, because it treats Austen’s characters as normative. This goes both ways; Austen’s characters become representative of the typical, and attitudes/conduct assumed to be typical are imposed onto Austen’s characters.

What it tends to erase is the possibility that some of Austen’s characters—certainly not all, but some, especially among the central characters—are extraordinary people. Not necessarily in the melodramatic OTT sense, but in the sense that they’re in some way (usually many ways) atypical of the world around them, even as they’re bound up in it.

Just going w/ P&P, Elizabeth and Darcy are very much embedded within the world they live in, but they don’t live demographically representative lives within it. There’s no point where most young ladies were like Elizabeth, or where most rich landlords were anything like Darcy. Some were! They’re not unrealistic as in beyond the realm of reasonable possibility. But they are beyond the realm of reasonable frequency

I think it’s more apparent that the characters are fairly unique people when you treat the novels as discrete continuities. Alternately, there’s the possibility of a really big world in which the cross-novel Austen characters are a minority who can thus be treated as the unusual people they are. But otherwise … even though I’m really fond of the JACU, I think something pretty important can get lost in it.

Tagged: #strier talks about how historically-minded critics tend to ignore the possibility that elements in fiction might be unusual or surprising #/in their own time/ #and how sometimes 'it seems to be saying this but it would be odd at the time' is just ... an odd thing. bc people write about odd things. #and it got me thinking about this #i remember mags at austenblog used to fight the good fight with this too #and be like ... yeah but just bc real life people usually did such and such doesn't mean it's how austen wrote her characters
anghraine: vader extending his lightsaber; text: and now for the airing of grievances! (Default)
I just saw a reblog of an Austen post I made a month ago and the reblog was like ... "where is all this Austen commentary coming from NOW??"

me, someone who has been posting Austen commentary reasonably often since I made my first livejournal account in 2003: .......

(I know it's not really about me in particular, but it was still pretty surreal!)
anghraine: cassian andor, preparing to assassinate galen erso with his sniper rifle (in the rain!) (cassian [eadu])
I reblogged a formal-ish announcement and title card for Andor. It was subtitled:

“Everything I did, I did for the Rebellion.” Andor, an Original Series set in the Star Wars universe, is streaming in 2022 on Disney+

I added:

#i'm trying to write about milton's divorce tracts and this drops???? #everything i did i did for the rebellion #already my tag for him!

[ETA 3/12/2024: I actually never did watch Andor because everything I heard about its handling of Cassian seemed progressively more annoying, for all the critical (and sometimes uncritical) praise. But despite happening in the middle of PhD exam hell, I did want to preserve the excitement of the moment!]
anghraine: cassian nods at jyn after protecting her during the jedha street fight (cassian [nod])
I unwisely read the comments on the Andor trailer, and I’m still kind of laughing at the person who was like … it looks cool but its existence is sort of confusing??? he wasn’t a popular character or anything??

Oh, honey.
anghraine: a picture of a wooden chair with a regal white rod propped on the seat (stewards)



For my anon who asked if I had any Fourth Age headcanon family trees … indeed I do. :D

This is simplified; people are placed by convenience rather than age, and more of the second generation (Elfwinë et al.) have children than appear here, but I haven’t thought too much that far in. Also:

- Ithíriel, Elros’s wife here, comes from this headcanon; the short version is that she was a Hadorian loremaster who made for an obscure Queen of Númenor but a highly accomplished scholar and patroness of scholarship.

- In POME, Tolkien says that the Stewards were not direct descendants of the line of Elendil but were ultimately “of royal origin,” which I take to mean that they come from some junior Elrosian offshoot along the way. A lot of Dúnedain probably do at this point (many times over, at that).

- In UT, Tolkien says that the ancestors of the Princes of Dol Amroth were kin of Elendil. This doesn’t have to be on the Elrosian side, but my headcanon is that it is and they were related through Inzilbêth.

- I imagine Princess Telperiën as silver-haired and named for Celebrían (not Tar-Telperiën, much as I love her)

- Glóredhel is the only one of Faramir and Éowyn’s children with golden hair, and was named for it and (as I imagine is pretty common) for the Edainic figure from the First Age, not Elves.

- Elfhild*/Elvaeth marries a Dúnadan of the North and goes to Arnor; Athelflaed/Aravain becomes a knight in Gondor (her path somewhat smoothed by her aunt Éowyn’s heroics) and a close friend and protector of Eldarion.

- Morwen’s son Barahir, sister-son of Glóredhel and Eldarion, is the Barahir who wrote The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen.

[ETA 3/12/2024: *I later changed my name about Elfhild/Elvaeth's name. I knew it sounded familiar and couldn't recall why at the time, but this is the name of Théoden's wife and I didn't want to also use it for Éomer and Lothíriel's daughter, but I did want to retain the alternate name Elvaeth after she ends up in Arnor. I went for the sneaky route and renamed her Steorrahild, because the el- of Elvaeth could represent the OE component Elf but also OE Steorra, "star."]

anghraine: elizabeth bennet from "austen's pride," singing her half of "the portrait song" (elizabeth (the portrait song))
I reblogged a meme about "almost names"—names your parents considered for you but didn't end up choosing. I added:

#'almost' would be putting it strongly but my dad wanted 'dorothea' for my aunt and grandmother #it is pretty! #i really like elizabeth though
anghraine: a painting of the sons of the 2nd earl of talbot by thomas lawrence; the elder is red-haired and rather plain, the younger black-haired and pretty (fitzwilliam and darcy)
An anon asked:

Based on your family trees, who is Darcy close to, on both sides of his family?

I replied:

Okay, it is very cool to be asked—thank you, anon. And I needed a break from exam stress, so … here we go with the Fitzwilliams. I’ll do a separate one for the Darcys.

The short version: Colonel Fitzwilliam, Lord Rochford, Lady Mary, and Lord Ravenshaw.

The long and rambly version:

anghraine: a female luke skywalker under the twin suns of tatooine from a painting by ralph mcquarrie (lucy (binary suns))
This kind of needs the original context, so:

ao3commentoftheday said:

the jump from “someone should do this” to “I should do this” is scary, but oh so worth it in the end

beanarie responded:

and then “there’s nothing stopping me from doing this”

fredersens added:

“someone should do this”“i’m someone”

I reblogged the whole thread and added:

#the origins of the lucyverse :) #i was so WAIT WHAT when i heard that it [ETA 3/12/2024: female Luke Skywalker, not my specific take on her in the Lucy fics!] was actually planned and saw the beautiful mcquarrie concept art #with reasonable clothes and a ponytail! #and was like ... well there's no point to fic since luke isn't really an inherently gendered character ... #though that itself makes certain story options possible ... esp if you assume the misogyny is a real in-universe thing ... #some outlines write themselves

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