anarfea

Okay, so I have seen both of the National Theater Live performances of Frankenstein, and overall I was very impressed! I had never managed to see them before because they were never showing in my town. But I'm annoyed that the censored the show for YouTube, though I understand YouTube's TOS. Anyway the below is not so much a formal write up as just a few scattered musings I had while watching the plays.

I've heard it said that this play is the most faithful adaptation of the novel, and I'm not sure if that's true, but they definitely did take some liberties, and most of what the did I think is an improvement. Like they got rid of the awkward frame story Robert Walton, who was always IMO kind of a throwaway character. And they made a more significant role for Elizabeth, which I had mixed feelings about. Like, on the one hand, I appreciate her being given more to do because the character in the book is essentially a prop. But on the other hand, they make her into a sort of audience stand-in and some of the things she says are just a little too on-the-nose for her to feel like an actual human being. And her motives for loving Victor are never clear, because he sure as hell doesn't love her.

I think Benedict was the better actor in both performances, but I think overall I preferred the Creature!batch version of the production because the Creature for me is what makes or breaks the show. But BC's Victor was super interesting, and very Sherlock-y. So that was nice. I really loved JLM's portrayal of the Creature at the beginning of the play. He had rather less flopping that BC, which to be honest BC's flopping was a bit over the top for me. And his pure joy at discovering things like birds and grass and the sun was wonderful to see. But once they both opened their mouths, I think BC gave the better performance. His creature was more erudite, and felt more world-weary, whereas JLMs felt more childlike. I do think, though, that JLM's Victor was kind of flat. BC definitely found more moments of humor, and also I think just gave a more nuanced performance overall. And I loved the actress who played the female Creature! Such a brilliant dancer! Oh, and I loved the lighting and set design. So well done. Especially those overhead lights!

A couple of moments I wanted to talk about. iwantthatcoat  was saying, and I agree, that Victor comes across as aro ace and incapable of love (not saying aroace people are incapable of love! But Victor definitely is), whereas the Creature loves and wants to be loved deeply. They feel that Victor destroys the female Creature partially because he is jealous that the creature understands and feels love and he doesn't. This is a nuance in BC's performance that is really not there in JLMs, who seems more worried that they're going to reproduce. But the anger that BC's Victor feels at the Creature for loving the female is kind of terrible to behold. Also difficult to watch is both of the Victor's perving over the female creature's semi-animated naked body. It made it starkly clear that Victor only sees women as objects, and also is only capable of interacting sexually with a woman who is as object. It's a contrast to how he responds to Elizabeth's attempts to be intimate to him. He says, "who could not desire these breasts," when perving over the female Creature, but when Elizabeth puts his hand over her breast he pulls away.

Elizabeth wants to have children, and her desire to create life the good old fashioned, natural way, is contrasted with Victor's desire to create life from death. And he rejects her, choosing instead to play god and violate nature. I think this symbolic rape of nature that is being brought to the forefront in this adaptation is the reason they added the rape of Elizabeth, a detail not mentioned in the novel.

Normally I'm wary of adaptations adding rapes that aren't in the source material. But I do think this one made sense thematically. I'm super annoyed they had to censor it for Youtube, because I understand JLM and BC played it differently and I would have liked to have seen that. But from what I've heard (and can extrapolate from the Creatures reflections on it afterwards), BC's Creature seems to have regretted the rape and felt like it was necessary to balance the scales because Victor broke his word. Whereas JLM seems to take pleasure in the act of rape and in the memory of it. Of the two, I think JLM's is the braver choice because it's the harder one for the audience to understand and accept. Anyway, I'm annoyed by censorship in general, I do think that a rape scene, like any other scene, tells us something about the characters. And I think they have a place in art.

Anyway, let me know your thoughts!

I'm back from my business trip to New Jersey. And because I visited a friend in New York, I've been instructed to self-isolate for 14 days. I'm on day 5. My husband was told he can come and go as long as I stayed six feet away from him. LOL. So, he's isolating too. Except, we have made a few trips to the grocery store for essentials. But we're working from home, and not going any place we don't have to. I find that I'm really struggling to focus while working from home. It's hard to telework. But I'm doing my best.

I'm still doing the Artist's Way. It's comforting to have some consistency during these times, and I feel like the morning pages are helpful to clear some of the nonsense out of my brain, even though it's mostly whining about how much I hate being cooped up and how scared I am for the global economy and of getting sick and how much I want everything to go back to normal. For whatever value of normal there is while Trump is president.

Anyway, I will try to keep checking in here. 

So, last night I went to see The Invisible Man. I'd seen the trailers, which let me know it's about a mad scientist who turns himself invisible so he can torment his ex. I was... not looking forward to spending 2 hours watching a woman be gasslit. But, it ended up being a surprisingly good movie and a great take on domestic violence. My thoughts (and spoilers) under the cut.

( Spoilers )

So this is a continuation of the "imaginary lives" exercise. I wanted to pretend to be a yarnie. So I dyed some of my handspun yarn. This was a pretty easy dye, I used vinegar and food coloring, no fancy chemicals. Anyway, here's a picture of my yarn in its dyebath:



I'll post a picture of the finished skein when it's dry.

I took Vulgarweed's advice and purchased the book Transcendent: The Year's Best Transgender Speculative Fiction. I read the first story, and I think I made the right call in scrubbing the name "Molly" (or whatever I would have called them) from the novel. The first story, The Shape of My Name, is quite careful never to use the protagonist's deadname, At one point, the character "you" (the protagonist's mother) says, "I need you to watch--". Other times the name is referenced as "the name you called me," or "the name that was never mine." Anyway, deadnaming seems to be a sore subject for the readers who I hope will make up my audience, so I'm going to try to avoid ever having anyone call my protagonist anything but "Hooper" or "Doctor Hooper" until Holmes asks him what he wants to be called and he says "Colin." Then Holmes will call him Colin in private and everyone else will continue to call him "Hooper" or "Doctor Hooper."

The one place I'm unsure of is what name Hooper should use at the Molly house, where everyone goes by female names. I had originally used "Molly" because Hooper can't think of a female name other than their deadname, but I'm thinking that's not the way I want to go for the novel. So I'll have to come up with another female name for the Molly house scenes, I think. I also need a female name for Holmes! 

I'm open to suggestions, if you have any.

So today my afternoon lesson didn't show and I got to free ski with a couple other adaptive instructors. I went ass over tea kettle twice an conked my head pretty good on the first one. But man, was it worth it. They were both from Albuquerque and not that familiar with the mountain, so they let me pick all the runs. And I took them to all my favorite "secret" places--off piste areas where only the locals go. I love tree skiing. It's my favorite kind of skiing and there are some truly great places for it at Ski Santa Fe. I like it when it's not too steep and there's enough spaces between the trees that you can get a good rhythm going. The trees force you to turn, which makes great for practicing. I tend to "shop" for my turns in the moguls (ski until I find a place that looks easier to turn) and tree skiing makes that difficult. It's also just nice to be in nature. The best glades for skiing are old growth, since you want to be skiing in tall trunks without a bunch of branches sticking everywhere. And there's something so peaceful about just making your way through these old trees. Especially when it's snowing, which it wasn't, today, but the point stands. Anyway, I had an amazing time.

Here's a video of some guys skiing one of the runs we did today. Admittedly there's rather a lot more snow in this video than there was today, but it gives you an idea of how magical tree skiing can be. It captures the whisper quietness of it, where all you hear is your own path through the snow and your breath. So many ski videos put music in them, which IMO defeats the point.

 

So, there's been a lot of justifiable backlash about American Dirt, because Jeanine Cummins basically exploited Latine pain for her own profit, and appropriated a Latina identity by citing her Puerto Rican grandma when a few years ago she identified as White. Anyway, I've read some pretty scathing critiques of the novel written by Latine authors, and I'm increasingly feeling anxious about my own novel project.

My own novel, for those of you who have forgotten or didn't know, is about a transmasculine person in Victorian London. And I've had some angst about writing this novel since I'm cis, and now I have more angst about writing this novel. Anyway, but there were some questions that Myriam Gubra posed to writers who want to write about characters from a group they're not a part of, and I thought it'd be a good exercise to answer them:

“Why do you want to write from this character’s point of view?”

I saw The Abominable Bride, and how they made Molly Hooper a cross dressing woman who disguised herself as a man to get ahead, and I was like, "wouldn't it be cool if he were trans?" and that was basically what got me thinking about writing this story. I feel like there are lots of stories about women dressing up as men to do things that women aren't allowed to do, and those are cool stories, but I also feel like I'm not convinced they're true stories? Just, as a cis woman, I can't imagine pretending to be a man 24/7, and I can't see why anyone would--unless they were either trans or gender non-conforming to some extent. So I feel like actually a lot of these "women who dressed as men" were either trans or otherwise gender non conforming, and I wanted to write a story about a transmasculine person in a historical setting because I feel like that story isn't told as often. And I really wanted to write from the POV of character finding their place in the world and finding community, which is what I have kind of always been looking for as a Mexican adoptee adopted by White people, but I didn't want to write that story because I don't want to write an autobiography, so writing about a character looking for a different kind of identity and belonging seemed like the thing to do.

“Do you read writers from this community currently?”

I do and I don't. I mean, I definitely try to read fic with trans characters or written by trans authors. But I haven't read any regular published books by trans people, and I definitely should. I'd been focused on finding trans sensitivity readers, but I definitely need to do more reading. And more research!

“Why do you want to tell this story?”

So, this is the one that concerns me. Because I do feel like I've maybe been a little "savior-y" in that one of the reasons I want to tell this story is because I feel like there aren't a ton of trans stories, and I know that not all trans people want to write trans stories, but I can and maybe having that story out there will help people see themselves represented and that'd be neat. But then, isn't some transmasculine person presumably better qualified than me to tell this particular story?

Also, and this maybe feels like the "but my Grandmother is Puerto RIcan, I'm Latina," I'm bisexual. So, while I'm not trans, I still feel that I'm still part of the broader queer community. I have lots of trans friends. I consider myself a trans ally. But I'm worried about wanting to tell this story for trans people is patronizing. 

And the third reason is that I'd just like to see some fucking diversity of queer representation. Maybe I'm biased because fanfic, but I feel like almost all queer media is m/m. And I's super like to see some other kinds of queer expression. That's also why I decided, after LOTS of angst, not to make Molly/Colin a trans man. Because then my story would be m/m. And my Sherlock would be gay. Not that there's anything wrong with m/m or gay!Sherlock. God knows I've read a lot of it. But a Sherlock who is usually attracted to men but maybe might just go for a woman under the right circumstances and a Molly/Colin who is usually a man but might be a woman under certain circumstances is more interesting to me because it's been done less? Not saying that being bi or genderqueer is inherently more interesting than being gay or binary trans, but I certainly feel like there's less of it which therefore makes it more interesting to me (and also potentially shrinks my audience because there's definitely a bigger audience for m/m romance but I'll worry about that later).

Finally, I just, don't get many ideas for original writing. I haven't written an original novel in all the years I've been writing because I haven't had an idea for one. And now I'm like a dog with a bone and I'm like, please don't take my bone away from me.

Anyway, I'm still going to write this novel. But I guess I should go read some transgender people's memoirs. 

I first connected with Splix through her fics. Holmescet shippers are rare, so I read her fics with relish. Wrong With Us was a favorite. Then I read her other Sherlock fics. The Case of the Green Gown I'm convinced is her best. I listened to her holmescest roundtable on Three Patch Podcast, which is a great discussion and I highly recommend for anyone who wants to hear Alex's voice. I don't think I'm up to it yet but I plan on listening again at some point.

I followed Splix on tumblr and she mentioned who her congressperson was and I was like, "that's my congressman! I bet you live near me!" I had just moved to Albuquerque, my husband and I were separated, I didn't have many friends, and I was overwhelmed with excitement by the idea that there was a fandom person in my town. We watched Season 4 of Sherlock messaging each other. We went to see TFP in the theaters together. We hung out on a handful of other occasions, and it meant so much to me, because I was at a time of big transition in my life and I was really lonely.

Alex was already sick when I met her. But she still made an effort to get out and do things, like come to 221b Con in 2018. We were in a fiction workshop together and got to hang out during the con, and these are some of my favorite memories of her. I'm sorry I didn't make it out to Con*strict. It sounds like those who went had a good time.

Alex won me for Fandom Trumps Hate 2017. She wanted a Euriarty fic. My other winner wanted a Jimcroft fic. And I owed a Sheriarty fic to a friend from another auction. I decided to combine the three into a single story, The Three Little Pigs. It remains one of the stories I'm the most proud of.

Alex gave me her copies of Bridget Jones's diary and Pride and Prejudice. She said she was Konmariing, but I had a feeling that she was getting rid of things because she was preparing for death, even though at the time she was still pursuing treatment options. I knew the time we had together was precious.

I last saw Alex in July. She had a few days of work left before she was starting Hospice. It was clear she was exhausted and she was having trouble walking, but she made an effort to meet me for lunch. She talked frankly about her impending death and I was impressed with the grace and dignity with which she was handling the situation. Her attitude was a great comfort to me. I suspected it might be the last time I saw her, but I was really hoping we'd be able to meet at least one more time. I texted Alex last week to ask if I could see her, but I'm guessing she was too sick or too tired to respond. Write_out posted the news that she was gone on Tuesday.

I didn't know Alex as well as I would have liked, but the times we had together were wonderful. It was clear that she was a great person, as well as a great writer. I am glad that I got to spend the time with her that we did, as she came into my life at a time when I really needed a friend. I didn't say goodbye the last time I saw her because I was hoping I'd see her again. So, I'll say it now:

Goodbye, Alex. I'll miss you. I'm sorry I didn't get to know you better.

So, this is a segment I'm recording for 3 Patch Podcast

Thank you for my pornography!

My discovery of Sherlock fandom in 2013 literally changed my life. I have had untold hours of literary entertainment and countless orgasms thanks to the wonderful erotica that fan creators, both writers and artists, have produced. But most importantly, I've made many close friends, some of whom write me porn, and some of whom I write porn with. And that has been wonderful, and liberating, and I've learned so much about my own sexuality through the fandom. I'm off to get a bee tattooed on my chest today in honor of Sherlock fandom and everything you all have meant to me. I can't wait to see everyone at con next year.

It is finished! I know some people have been waiting to read it until it was done, so, here it is! 15K or Merlock Holmescest ready for your enjoyment. Lots of angst but a happy ending. I'm very proud of it. Mind the tags, there are some warnings there, especially for the graphic violence. Undine are a violent bunch. But all together I think this is one of my more accessible stories.

Now I get to play the game of waiting for comments.