british romanticism: i went into the woods and i found a beautiful woman, but she wasn’t really a woman, she was my Muse and the woods is my mind
american romanticism: i went into the woods and found the devil and he gave me a clock, but the clock was actually the industrial revolution and it fucking killed me
italian romanticism: i went into the woods and toppled face down over a root which proves nature is but a cruel stepmother, also this must somehow be a sign that God wants us to get rid of those fucking austrians
french romanticism: i went into the woods and found a peasant woman, but she wasn’t really a woman, she was the Republic and the woods is the people of France, wild, free and unconquered
polish romanticism: i didn’t go into the woods and i didn’t find any woman, we held a seance instead and summoned ghosts and listened to how they died, and then i was in a prison cell listening to my inmates while having existential crisis, but bottom line fuck Russia, Prussia and Austria
Finnish romanticism: me and my six brothers went into the woods and built a new house, but got drunk and the sauna caught fire and we had to escape half-naked
Japanese romanticism: I went into the train station where the woods used to be and found an ugly woman, but she wasn’t really a woman. She was Japan in transition toward industrialization and the urbanized landscape was actually the Japanese people’s sentimentality toward the old days.
i love that charles dickens got paid by the word. like i cant even be mad when he’s boring and long-winded bc i would do xactly the same??? i wouldnt use contractions or colours at all. want to say the word red? too bad. we r now only using “the colour of freshly-spilled blood on snow; the hue of the horizon when the sun sets over the deserts of sub-saharan Africa” BOOM guess who can afford 2 eat now: me and my boi dickens
What I love about Alexandre Dumas, in contrast, is he got paid by the line. So it’s not really wordy, it more like 80% dialogue which makes it sound pretty modern but also ends up like-
okay now I can’t help but imagine Malory as Sebastian Stan like
“gotta throw in all the characters!!”
omg as a HUGE NERD who discovered Irish mythology as a wee kidlet and then as a teen discovered why “primary sources” are totally different from Lady Freaking Gregory and Yeats and SERIOUSLY PAY ATTENTION TO WHO TRANSLATED STUFF (AND ADDED/REMOVED BITS FOR LOLZ) VERSUS WHO WROTE SHIT DOWN COS IT WAS ALL VERBAL AND 27 DIFF VERSIONS OF THE SAME SHIT EXISTS DEPENDING ON HOW MANY MILES APART THE PEOPLE WERE and by 16 I had already read EVERYTHING I COULD GET MY HANDS ON about Celtic folklore and mythology all over Europe and no-one prepared me for The Mabinogion and shit, but I read IT ALL, including hilariously dodgy ‘scholarly’ books by Jon & Caitlin Matthews like there are no words I cannot even and it made The Mists of Avalon look totes legit and FYI wow so not.
Then when I was at uni I LOVED taking Arthurian Lit so much I TOOK THE SAME CLASS TWICE cos Leslie Donovan changed up the book list the 2nd time and then 10 years later watching people be confused as fuck when Merlin happened and having to explain to them “no, seriously, you don’t understand–Morgana wasn’t Arthur’s sister until way later, originally it was unclear WHO actually died at Camlann–Mordred or Arthur or who was even like the bad guy there–and all the shit you keep referring to is 20th century poetry or novels or the goddam Disney movie omg here’s all the Pre-Geoffrey Monmouth History of Britain Welsh stuff before the French got ahold of it GODDAM FUCKING BRITTANY ok no really, it makes total sense in context and THOSE WACKY NORMANS added Lancelot and shit to make Eleanor of Aquitaine’s court laugh and OMG LEMME TELL YOU ABOUT 8TH CENTURY MONKS THEY’RE HILARIOUS” and let’s face it, no-one was prepared for that shit. IT WAS AWESOME.
Also, The Romance of Arthur is the best fucking book ever. I have the 1994 edition, and clearly need to find the 2013 expanded edition omg I didn’t even know it existed.
lady bracknell, i admit with shame that I do not know. i only wish i did. the plain facts of the case are these: on the morning of the day you mention, a day that is for ever branded on my memory, i prepared as usual to take my virginity out in its perambulator. i had also with me a somewhat old, but capacious hand-bag in which i had intended to place the manuscript of a work of fiction that i had written during my few unoccupied hours. in a moment of mental abstraction, for which i never can forgive myself, i deposited the manuscript in the basinette, and placed the virginity in the hand-bag. and i left it, god forgive me, in the cloakroom of one of the larger railway stations in london. victoria.. the brighton line. i lived for that regret ever since. i would never forgive myself.
There once was a girl named Lenore And a bird and a bust and a door And a guy with depression And a whole lot of questions And the bird always says “Nevermore.”
Footprints in the Sand
There was a man who, at low tide Would walk with the Lord by his side Jesus said “Now look back; You’ll see one set of tracks. That’s when you got a piggy-back ride.”
Response to ‘This Is Just To Say’
This note on the fridge is to say That those ripe plums that you put away Well, I ate them last night They tasted all right Plus I slept with your sister. M’kay?
Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening
There once was a horse-riding chap Who took a trip in a cold snap He stopped in the snow But he soon had to go: He was miles away from a nap.
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night
There was an old father of Dylan Who was seriously, mortally illin’ “I want,” Dylan said “You to bitch till you’re dead. “I’ll be pissed if you kick it while chillin’.”
I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud
There once was a poet named Will Who tramped his way over a hill And was speechless for hours Over some stupid flowers This was years before TV, but still.
THE ONE FOR DO NOT GO GENTLE
IM CRYING
A chap from a faraway land Said two big stone legs (topless) stand An inscription fine Reads “this shit’s all mine” But all there’s to see is the sand.
OMFG,
The Second Coming
The falcon flies wider in scorn All things fall apart, or are torn And now, what rough beast Will arise in the East And slouch Bethlehemward to be born?
Edgar Allen Poe, “The Raven”:
Enthroned on the bust by the door, The raven exclaims “Nevermore!” It’s rather annoying, For I was enjoying My mourning for dear lost Lenore.
Edgar Allen Poe, “The Bells”:
Bells are quite noisy, it’s true, And each has a quite distinct hue, From silver and gold Different stories are told, Foretelling both glory and rue.
W. H. Auden, “Funeral Blues”:
Shut off the clocks and the phone, And let no dog bark with his bone: Let the planes overhead Only say “he is dead”… Now I’m sorry, there’s nobody home.
T. S. Eliot, “The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock”:
A man can walk down on the beach Roll his pants up and munch on a peach; He isn’t deluded And won’t be included By mermaids that sing each to each.
T.S. Eliot, “The Wasteland”:
You called me the hyacinth girl When you gave sweet Shakespeare a whirl; The city’s unreal, And the dead men don’t feel, So let’s let the storm warnings twirl.
Lewis Carroll, “The Jabberwock”:
‘Twas mimsy out there by the wabe And all of the momewraths out grabe. The Jabberwock’s dead (Some kid took off its head, And his father said “You’re my best babe!”).
Beowulf:
Terribly troubled, the Thane Demanded defense from a Dane For fierce in the fen Mighty monsters maimed men Great Grendal gave plenty of pain.
William Butler Yeats, “Stolen Child”:
Come on, human kid, and let’s go, There’s so much to see and to show. Run off with the fae, Hurry fast, skip away, And you’ll never a mortal life know!
John Keats, ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci":
The sedge is all dry; spring has sped, And the birds that once sang have all fled. The merciless dame Goes on making her claim To young hunks who keep winding up dead.
Lord Tennyson, “The Princess”:
The echoes keep fading away With the splendor that ebbs with the day, But the castle is grand In this bright fairyland, And there’s not that much else I can say.
Christina Rossetti, “Goblin Market”:
At goblin men we mustn’t stare, And we shouldn’t go to their Fair. Their fruit may seem tasty, But we can’t be hasty, And don’t let them play with your hair!
So I’ve been listening to an audiobook of Moby Dick in my downtime, and omg this book is weird. Like prepare yourself for it being super racist, but it’s also intensely gay??? The main character gets gay married to his Pacific Islander roomie like the night after he meets him???? Also I just got to the part with Captain Ahab and omg he is so Extra™ like he actually throws his pipe overboard because it doesn’t fit with his ~*~aesthetic~*~ Let me tell you Great American Literature is wild
UPDATE in this chapter the narrator can’t shut up about how hot his particular friend boyfriend Queequeg is and describes in loving detail how they’re tied together by this rope while he holds Queequeg over the side of the boat (actually he says “wedded,” WEDDED, i ask you) and he’s never felt more intimate with another human being in his life
JUST WHALERS BEING BROS
FURTHER FUCKING UPDATE OH MY GOD
okay so item 1: this book recently went from “somewhat racist at brief intervals” to “let’s have a whole chapter of unremitting racism” so like. be aware of that if you ever plan on reading this? it was not fun times
ITEM TWO
Y’ALL.
There is a whole chapter about Our Hero holding hands with his fellow whalers.
WHILE THEY MASSAGE WHALE SPERM.
I could not make this shit up. Here it is, in all its slimy glory, Chapter 94: A Squeeze of the Hand –
“Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers’ hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say,- Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness.”
THIS IS THE GAYEST THING I’VE EVER READ. MELVILLE IS LEGITIMATELY JUST TAUNTING ME NOW. HE’S CREEPILY ROLLING HIS LITTLE WHALER HANDS IN WHALE SPERM AND DARING ME TO SAY SOMETHING WHILE I JUST STAND THERE WITH MY FUCKING JAW ON THE FLOOR. THIS BISEXUAL ADMITS DEFEAT. I HAVE BEEN OUTFLANKED BY HERMAN FUCKING MELVILLE AND HIS GAY-ASS WHALE SPERM
FINAL. FUCKING. UPDATE.
this is what i said to @manicpanic88 earlier today, so naïvely: i said, “Meville is straight up thirsty for whales.” I added, “This man truly wants to fuck a whale.”
Let me be clear (and by the way SPOILERS up to antepenultimate chapter of the book follow this parenthetical): I am now on chapter one hundred thirty-something and we have only just now found the whale. Like. This book has been one hundred and thirty chapters of Real Nantucket Whale Thirst™ and almost no actual (Moby) Dick, do you get me? You out there who like pining fic, THIS BOOK IS THE ULTIMATE. Melville did it first, but GAYER, and WITH WHALES.
Anyway so this whole book everyone who has seen or even heard about Moby Dick is like “whoa my sweet fancy aunts, don’t go lookin’ for that there whippersnapper” (this is my attempt at imitating Melville’s weird imitation of a Nantucket accent, it’s not going well for me but it didn’t go well for him either), “whoa, THAT’S A BAD FISH, I heard he took someone’s head clean off / killed his twelve best mates / blew up a ship with the power of his LASER FLUKES!!” i mean no one actually says “laser flukes” but THIS IS THE LEVEL OF BADNESS WE ARE DEALING WITH. THIS IS NOT A NICE WHALE. YOU SHOULD NOT TAKE THIS WHALE HOME TO MEET YOUR PARENTS AT SPRING BREAK, HE WILL DRINK ALL YOUR BEER AND LEAVE THE HOUSE SOMEHOW FULL OF DOG POOP, WHILE IT IS ALSO ON FIRE.
and yet.
here is what Melville has to say about this bad motherfucker when we finally, finally see him for the very first time:
“A gentle joyousness – a mighty mildness of repose in swiftness, invested the gliding whale. Not the white bull Jupiter swimming away with ravished Europa clinging to his graceful horns; his lovely, leering eyes sideways intent upon the maid; with smooth bewitching fleetness, rippling straight for the nuptial bower in Crete; not Jove, not that great majesty Supreme! did surpass the glorified White Whale as he so divinely swam.”
RAVISHED EUROPA. STRAIGHT FOR THE NUPTIAL BOWER. WE GET IT, HERMAN. WE GET IT. YOU WANNA FUCK A WHALE. YOU WROTE A WHOLE ENTIRE BOOK ABOUT WANTING TO FUCK THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WHITE WHALE IN THE WORLD, WHO PROBABLY ALSO HAS PURPLE EYES AND PUTS ITS FLUKES UP WHEN SOME PREPS STARE AT HIM. WE GET IT.
Kimchi and Justice 