[ID: a rectangular flag with 7 vertical stripes. stripes sizes as follows, medium, medium, thick, medium, thick, medium, medium. colors in this order from left to right: dark grey, darkish grey, grey, light grey, grey, darkish grey, dark grey. End ID]
[ID: a rectangular flag with 11 vertical lines. sizes in this order from left to right: thick, medium, thick, medium, 3 thick, medium, thick, medium, and thick. colors in this order from left to right: dark grey, darkish grey, dark grey, light grey, grey, light grey, grey, light grey, dark grey, darkish grey, dark grey. End ID]
LOSIN: loser in nature, an in nature for terms that have the shared characteristic of being loser/loser-related in nature.
LOSINgender: an umbrella term for all LOSIN (loser in nature) genders. Can also be used to refer to a gender that is not fully defined, but is definitely loser, or a gender in which loser is its defining feature.
Etymology: los(er), i(n) n(ature) [gender]
@radiomogai , @imawanokiwaaa , @in-nature-archive
[ID: a red line divider outlined in yellow. in the center is a red feather outlined in yellow. End ID]
One fascinating thing about the way Hugo writes Jean Valjean's inner conflict is that we're almost never actually in his POV when he makes his final decisions. We spend chapters and chapters exploring Jean Valjean's thought processes as he agonizes over difficult moral choices, but in the final crucial moment, when he actually makes his choice, Hugo "cuts us off" from his internal monologue. We view what his final choice looks like from the outside, from the perspective of other characters.
This is especially significant because Jean Valjean, from the outside, is often pretty unreadable. He is uncannily calm, tranquil, and polite. He's opaque. There's a moment where he's described as a "whirlwind within, calm without;" Jean Valjean uses excessively polite behavior as a defense mechanism, "picking up his calm the way a warrior would pick up his buckler."
The most obvious example of this is the Champmathieu trial, where Jean Valjean agonizes over whether to turn himself in. We spend chapter after chapter inside of his POV, exploring his terror and inner conflict as he weighs his options and invents a thousand excuses for himself-- we explore his trauma-fueled reactions to the concept of returning to prison in painful, agonizing detail, from his horrific memories of prison to his surreal nightmares about being buried alive. The tension builds as chapters fly by and he still hasn't made his final decision, as he hopes some unforseen accident will prevent him from making it to the trial and he won't have to make the decision after all--
But in the final moment, when Jean Valjean *actually* makes the final choice...we're not in his point of view. Instead, it's told "from the point of view" of the courtroom, and Jean Valjean's strange heartbreaking serenity is described solely from the outside.
At the moment where we most want to hear what Valjean is thinking, we're abruptly cut off from his inner monologue.
This becomes even more tragic when the "adrenaline rush" of the courtroom fades away and we witness the aftermath of the trial.
When Jean Valjean returns to Fantine, we see him from the point of view of Simplice and other characters. He's described as behaving "mechanically" as if in shock. From the outside he appears eerily uncannily "tranquil" and completely opaque. It is impossible to tell what he is feeling or thinking.
Jean Valjean responds to Javert's violence toward Fantine with an icy, eerily tranquil restrained fury: threatening him with a leaden bar, saying "I advise you not to disturb me at this moment"-- but you can feel behind that restraint the weight of all the grief/anger from the previous chapters, which he's incapable of letting himself express openly.
He has made this horrible nightmarish sacrifice that he's been agonizing over for thousands of words, he's facing unimaginable violence and grief--- and in the moments where we most want to hear how he's reacting to this, "the line goes dead." We're brutally cut off from his mental state and left to imagine what he might be feeling.
After a few moments of this meditation (Jean Valjean) bent towards Fantine, and spoke to her in a low voice.
What did he say to her? What could this man, who was reproved, say to that woman, who was dead? What words were those? No one on earth heard them.
[ID: a rectangular flag with 7 equally-sized horizontal lines. colors in this order from top to bottom and reflected after the last listed color: pale purple-grey, light purple-grey, purple-grey, dark purple-grey, purple-grey, light purple-grey, pale purple-grey. End ID]
requested by @begendered-queer
PanLOSIN/PanLOSINgender: a pangender term for identifying as every LOSIN gender within one’s experience.
Etymology: pan, LOSIN, (gender)
@radiomogai , @imawanokiwaaa
[ID: a yellow line divider outlined in brown. in the center is a yellow star outlined in brown. End ID]