southslates

[southslates]

i miss how i interacted with fiction, especially romantic fiction and fandom and all of it, before i had actually been with men. i can't get into it any more. i'm stuck in real life dating which has higher highs and also lower lows and i just can't enjoy writing or reading fiction when there's a man in my life and i can't figure out why and i miss having dreams and being silly with my expectations. i never thought i would lose fandom when i grew up and i'm not even grown up! i'm 19 and i feel like i miss my childhood and the fun i had. i don't want to. i just want to enjoy escapism again

#does anyone relate or am i just going insane i guess #i feel like i literally try to come back but it doesn't feel as fun as it used to #and also real men drive me crazy because they can be so good and also so bad

[southslates]

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes (2023) dir. Francis Lawrence

#snowbaird

[southslates]

I kind of like that love isn't enough for Coriolanus and Lucy Gray. It's a good juxtaposition to the "love conquers all, love always wins" message that we've been fed since birth. Suzanne Collins tells us that there are villains who exist who are not motivated by love, who give it up on their rise to power - and that love is not a one-size fits all thing that should be romanticized in the moment.

#coriolanus snow #lucy gray baird #snowbaird #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the hunger games

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One of my favorite character parallels between Coriolanus and Katniss and something I always feel when writing him is the obsession with food. I've never read another series where it's a real focus of narration and it adds a very real dimension to his villainous character. In real life food is a constant thought most of us spend at least an hour a day on. So much of his thought process can be expressed the way he thinks about this very basic need all the time. What a beautiful unreliable narrator, truly

#coriolanus snow #katniss everdeen #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the hunger games #i've never written a character who is always thinking about food like this #i didn't even realize till now how much of a focal point that is for my interpretation of the character #honestly i don't know what i write i just think vaguely and sit down for a few hours and then black out and the writing is done #it's so strange #like i never really feel aware when im doing it #anyway #dee writes

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Wait, did Sejanus and Billy Taupe get themselves killed on their own?

I mean, that's not unbelievable, I was just thinking that Coriolanus shot Billy Taupe dead and hid the corpse. And Sejanus...poor boy.

��

Let's just say in this AU that whole scene never happened... so Mayfair was abandoned by her new boyfriend but is still alive. Coriolanus doesn't know where Sejanus and Billy Taupe disappeared to, and hadn't known explicitly of Sejanus's treasonous plans... so he just assumes the two idiots got themselves killed.

Hopefully that makes sense :)

#dee writes #angel-starbeam #the planet of love #i hope this is about that 😭 #or it's an embarrassing assumption for me to make

[southslates]

just dropping in to say i am loving the planet of love! idk how they'll turn out but much like coryo i am gonna treasure their domestic bliss (...pseudo domestic bliss? he's still murdering ppl) while it lasts 💙

Aw, thank you! I really love that story, domesticity is my favorite trope, but it wouldn't be the two of them if it wasn't a bit morally corrupt! I'm so excited for everyone to see where I take it ❤️

#anon asks #dee writes #the planet of love #snowbaird

[southslates]

me while writing: oh my god this phrasing is terrible and these words are inaccurate. everything is a nightmare and this reads awfully. i’m a mistake of a writer

me while reading: *completely ignoring any odd phrases or whatever bc the story slaps* i love this fic wtf

#currently having a day where words are not wording and i am spending far too much time trying to get thg worldbuilding correct in my stories #even though im literally writing lucy gray x snow fic like i dont think anyone cares im just being pedantic

[southslates]

Wasn't sure what options you were looking for and distances can vary. Feel free to add an actual measurement in the comments or tags :)

#so funny to see this on my feed as i go to school on the beach so i am always there so funny

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I cannot believe I hit 1000 kudos on a fic I posted not even three weeks ago. like HOLY FUCK. thank you anyone who is reading i am singing now while rome burns that is INSANE. i am glad you guys are hopefully enjoying that fun little bit of my imagination

[southslates]

Do you have snowbaird fic recs?

I actually never read fic for pairings I'm actively writing for because I don't want to end up unintentionally plagiarizing other fanfic authors! If anyone who sees this does have recs I'd love some to keep on hand :)

#snowbaird #coriolanus snow #lucy gray baird #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #anon asks

[southslates]

The hardest part of writing a new fic is when you've spent hours working on a chapter or story and you're excited to post it, and then you don't have a good title or summary to post it with, & you know the title/summary is what's important if you want people to actually read what you wrote because everyone on AO3 judges books (fics) by their covers, the pressure is always so on

#if you see me changing my summaries look away.... #ao3 #i write for myself but i post for other people and i feel like that's fair enough

[southslates]

The Planet of Love

In which Coriolanus Snow never kills the mayor’s daughter, Sejanus Plinth dies of his own volition, and officer training is moved to Twelve.

Multi-chapter fic on AO3.

She’s silent, her mouth a bit open. Coriolanus speaks again, barely desperately. “Don’t you love me, Lucy Gray? We survived the Hunger Games! Isn’t our love written in the stars!” 

Because at the crux of this, he is just a young man, not wanting a rejection from a sweetheart. His life is not going as he wanted, is it too much that right now he just wants the girl?

His knee is starting to pain and he is about to get up and ask for a reassignment to another district, perhaps, when she speaks oh-so-quietly. “I will.”

Did he hear her right. “What did—”

“I will marry you,” she repeats, louder, and he can see a smile crawl onto her face. “Now tell me you’ve got an actual ring somewhere, Coriolanus Snow!”

#snowbaird #coriolanus snow #lucy gray baird #coriolanus x lucy gray #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the hunger games #tbosas

[southslates]

Katniss is like Lucy Gray this, Katniss is like Sejanus that, and yes find that's all good and true and lovely but Katniss Everdeen is also a direct parallel to Coriolanus Snow and people NEED to start talking about this because it's driving me crazy.

Think about it: they both grew up poor and deeply vulnerable, losing parents at a very young age, with a matriarchal adult (Katniss' mother and Coriolanus' Grandma'am) who fails to provide for them emotionally and physically. They intimately understand the threat of starvation, even developing with stunted growth because of it, and their narrations in the books share a fixation on food. Throughout their childhoods, both experienced constant fear and suffered a fundamental lack of control over their circumstances. Because of this, they're inherently suspicious of the people around them. They resent feeling indebted to others, especially those who have saved their lives. They're motivated almost entirely by family and deeply connected to their communities. Both are used and manipulated by the Capitol, both are forced to perform to survive and despise every inch of it, both are thrown into the Arena and made to kill. Both have a self-sacrificial, genuinely sweet sister figure acting as their conscience. Peeta and Lucy Gray - performers and love interests with a fundamental kindness and sense of hope about them - fulfill markedly similar roles in their narrative. Both contribute to the development of the future Hunger Games, Snow throughout tbosas and Katniss towards the end of Mockingjay.

It's easy to ignore these similarities because, as mirrors of each other, they are exact opposites. Katniss is from District 12, viewed and treated as less than human; Snow is the cream of the Capitol crop, given the privilege of a name with social weight, an ancestral home, and the opportunity of the Academy despite having no more money than a miner from 12. Katniss has no agency over her life, and responds by being kind whenever she's able, while Snow justifies horrendous evils in order to continue his quest for complete control. Katniss does everything she can to protect her family; Snow does everything he can to protect his family's image as an extension of his own ego. Katniss loves her District and connects with its inhabitants on a meaningful level, but Snow is indifferent at best to his peers - the apparent "superior people" - and only engages with his community for personal gain. Katniss emerges from the Arena horrified at herself and the system, but Snow takes his trauma and turns it into an excuse to perpetuate the violence with himself at the top. Katniss cares for Prim until her death and then snaps at the loss of her little sister, while Snow survives on Tigris' blood, sweat, and tears and then torments and abandons her, presumably because she calls him out on his insanity. Snow actively adds to and popularizes the Hunger Games because of his vendetta against the Districts following his childhood wartime trauma - Katniss briefly agrees to a new Hunger Games in the pursuit of vengeance, but later stops them from happening by killing Coin and choosing a life of peace and privacy. Snow is obsessed with revenge, but Katniss empathizes with the Capitolites and does what she can to keep them from suffering. He exists in a cruel system and selfishly upholds it; she exists in a cruel system and works to dismantle it for the good of her family and community, at great personal cost. And Peeta and Lucy Gray are incredibly similar, but Katniss and Peeta forge a relationship of genuine love and understanding that shines in comparison to Coriolanus' obsessive projection onto Lucy Gray.

So, yeah, Katniss is Lucy Gray haunting Coriolanus. But I bet you anything that eighty-something year old President Snow looks at her, the girl on fire, bright and young and brilliant, emerging from a childhood of starvation with a relentless hunger for success, a talented and charming performer helping her win the Games, and he sees the ghost of his own past. And that's why he's so afraid of her! Because if he sees himself in her, then he's up against his own cunning, his own talent for manipulation, his own charisma, his own genius. He's up against the version of himself that he once wished to be, with the nightmare army of his childhood at her back and her star-crossed lover at her side, spewing Sejanus' truths in his own voice. This isn't to say that Katniss ever achieved the level of power and agency that Coriolanus did during her time with the rebellion, but it is to say that Snow was taken down by what truly terrified him - his own morality, come to finish the job.

#fantastic meta #i know i write a little bit of funny fanfic but i swear i understand how despicable the character is #but bad characters make good and meaningful stories sue me

[southslates]

Lucy Gray and Coriolanus make me think of that one quote about tragedies...we know the ending going in, we know they won't make it, that whatever they feel for each other isn't enough against power and society and the rest of the world, but the love is there, and that matters despite it all.

that drives the rest of the Hunger Games series later on, of course, but even if the book was a stand-alone...the two characters don't have to end up together for this to be a love story, love is not just a means to a happy ending, it is a force in itself.

their love was wrong and twisted and borne from terrible circumstances and it didn't last, but the fate of the world hinged on the fact it was ever there. even if it had no consequences further on in history, it was important that it was there. it's just so human.

#lucy gray baird #coriolanus snow #snowbaird #tbosas #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #this is making me insane

[southslates]

when does the next chapter of "i am singing now while rome burns" come out?

I have an exam tomorrow lol, but I'll finish and edit it tomorrow after that hopefully :)

#i am singing now while rome burns #anon asks

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so excited about this new tbosas AU I'm writing.... I seriously haven't written so much in years. but I love it! fanfic is becoming what it was to me in the beginning, just about me and the writing ❤️

(this isn't even about i am singing now while rome burns....i started a whole other au while writing that.... hopefully it stays a one shot)

#personal #dee writes #tbosas

[southslates]

I love the fact that Lucy Gray's true intentions are never revealed to us through a combination of Coriolanus' unreliable perspective and the lack of backstory we have about her true personality. I mean, the first time we see her she puts a snake down a girl's back, clearly showing she's not afraid to get her hands morally dirty. but for all Coriolanus assumes she loves him, she plays him. it's most obvious when she decides she's going to run away and doesn't even offer for him to go with her. what Snow has for her is obsession, and he clearly feels it far more than she does. love makes him crazy, not her. nobody else could have done that to him like she did

#the ballad of songbirds and snakes #coriolanus snow #lucy gray baird #coriolanus x lucy gray #snowbaird #the hunger games