I'm just going to finish up the posting meme today, since it's almost the end of the month. It's been a lot of fun, made me write something here almost every day and think about it, and I've got a source for stuff to develop later into essays on writing if I feel like it, so thank you!
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wendylove wanted to know whether my kids know about fanfiction, and… I guess? I mean, they're adults now, so for all I know they are writing it themselves and it wouldn't be my business. I think they both know I write it, or that I have written it, but it's not really something we share, though the fannish culture is part of the household in a broad sense - we discuss things we've read and seen, and propose alternate endings, and stuff like that - and I wouldn't cringe if they read my fic. But fandom and fanfic as I approach them are my space that I can retreat to, and I like it that way.
philomytha asks about my favo(u)rite Shakespeare play, and oh, that word again, however you spell it. I will give you several, while acknowledging that this is hardly an exclusive list of plays that could be my favorite on any given day. But one thing I like about Shakespeare is his ability to get away with odd structures and mishmashes of comedy and tragedy, so:
The Winter's Tale, because it has this perfect Greek tragedy of a first half (I could say "first act" because that's how it's performed these days, but I am a nitpicker, so no) followed by a rollicking comedy and a fairy tale romance of a finish, and it's all absurd and still somehow works.
Romeo and Juliet, which starts out with a tidy comedy structure that ends in marriage very early, as if the playwright had forgotten he needed to fill several hours, or, more relevantly, the characters didn't understand conflict and narrative and just plowed ahead with their adolescent desires, and then the whole thing tips and falls headlong into disaster. And the fault is shared among just about everybody in the cast: so many little points of decision. I saw a brilliant commedia dell'arte version where in the last scene, as Friar Laurence is telling the story again for everyone's benefit, he said "meantime I writ to Romeo" and pulled the letter out of his pocket to demonstrate, and then gave it the most delightful and awful double-take of horror, oh shit I forgot to mail it - and that's the play. (Even if the actual plot was different.)
Love's Labour's Lost has a similarly weird structure; I'm not sure it's on my favorites list because it's not Shakespeare's best writing (though it's a nice study as an early play, because you can see him trying things out that he reuses in later works), but the ending is fascinating. Comedy comedy comedy we're all getting married now except not. Because the princess has to go back to work, basically.
And of course Twelfth Night - you all expected me to say this - because the characters are so great and the language so beautiful, and because of Malvolio. I love that in the midst of all the happiness and romance at the end there's this justified threat of revenge from the sorry guy going off in a huff. And that all the romances are a bit creepy and sudden, as if the lovers are being manipulated by someone with a pen and a piece of paper who got tired of them.
In other news, I have a cold again. Bleh. That'll teach me to attend public events.
wendylove wanted to know whether my kids know about fanfiction, and… I guess? I mean, they're adults now, so for all I know they are writing it themselves and it wouldn't be my business. I think they both know I write it, or that I have written it, but it's not really something we share, though the fannish culture is part of the household in a broad sense - we discuss things we've read and seen, and propose alternate endings, and stuff like that - and I wouldn't cringe if they read my fic. But fandom and fanfic as I approach them are my space that I can retreat to, and I like it that way.philomytha asks about my favo(u)rite Shakespeare play, and oh, that word again, however you spell it. I will give you several, while acknowledging that this is hardly an exclusive list of plays that could be my favorite on any given day. But one thing I like about Shakespeare is his ability to get away with odd structures and mishmashes of comedy and tragedy, so:The Winter's Tale, because it has this perfect Greek tragedy of a first half (I could say "first act" because that's how it's performed these days, but I am a nitpicker, so no) followed by a rollicking comedy and a fairy tale romance of a finish, and it's all absurd and still somehow works.
Romeo and Juliet, which starts out with a tidy comedy structure that ends in marriage very early, as if the playwright had forgotten he needed to fill several hours, or, more relevantly, the characters didn't understand conflict and narrative and just plowed ahead with their adolescent desires, and then the whole thing tips and falls headlong into disaster. And the fault is shared among just about everybody in the cast: so many little points of decision. I saw a brilliant commedia dell'arte version where in the last scene, as Friar Laurence is telling the story again for everyone's benefit, he said "meantime I writ to Romeo" and pulled the letter out of his pocket to demonstrate, and then gave it the most delightful and awful double-take of horror, oh shit I forgot to mail it - and that's the play. (Even if the actual plot was different.)
Love's Labour's Lost has a similarly weird structure; I'm not sure it's on my favorites list because it's not Shakespeare's best writing (though it's a nice study as an early play, because you can see him trying things out that he reuses in later works), but the ending is fascinating. Comedy comedy comedy we're all getting married now except not. Because the princess has to go back to work, basically.
And of course Twelfth Night - you all expected me to say this - because the characters are so great and the language so beautiful, and because of Malvolio. I love that in the midst of all the happiness and romance at the end there's this justified threat of revenge from the sorry guy going off in a huff. And that all the romances are a bit creepy and sudden, as if the lovers are being manipulated by someone with a pen and a piece of paper who got tired of them.
In other news, I have a cold again. Bleh. That'll teach me to attend public events.
