#lit: trc

[the-unseelie]

“They’re all raven boys,” Blue said.

Her mother shook her head. “No, he’s more raven than the others.”

#trc #the raven cycle #ronan lynch #lynch brothers #pynch #the dream thieves #the raven king #blue lily lily blue #maggie stiefvater #the raven boys #ya books #ya lit #book art #books #bookblr #bookish #the raven cycle ronan #trc ronan #trc fanart #trc art

[aaronstveit]

Being Adam Parrish was a complicated thing, a wonder of muscles and organs, synapses and nerves. He was a miracle of moving parts, a study in survival.

#trcedit #trc #the raven cycle #adamparrishedit #adam parrish #yalitedit #litedit #storyseekers #booksociety #usercossette #reputayswift #** #mine.gif #lit #birdverse #happy birthday to my favorite guy<3 #author: maggie stiefvater

[illiterategreywarenonthebench]

Cannot believe there are people out there who think Adam Parrish would ever take Ronan’s last name as if he didn’t spend 4 books clawing his way into spaces built to be inaccessible to him, trying desperately to have his own name said in the same breath as Dick Gansey III’s. His relationship to class is so much more complicated than wanting to run away from it. Taking the Lynch name would surely feel fraudulent to him and god doesn’t he already suffer enough with feeling like he doesn’t deserve the spaces he occupies

#adam parrish #ronan lynch #trc #gangsey #lit #literature

[jeanmoreaux]

ofc this guy was born on all saints' day wdym

#cannot believe no one put this on my dash yet. they were onto something when they said if you want something done do it yourself lol #ronan lynch #trc #tdt #lit #the raven cycle #the dreamer trilogy

[audif1]

dreamer feat a note to myself “haunted roomba”

#ronan lynch #my art #the raven cycle #trc #the raven boys #call down the hawk #ya lit #ya lit fanart

[henessy]

compilation

#that post left me Thinkin. they are very dear to me #love how fast they crash and burn as much as i love their silly puppy love in trb. divorced besties..... #lit. trc #lu talks

[davidstirlings]

"The people who came to the little, bright blue house at 300 Fox Way didn’t mind the imprecise nature of their fortunes. It became a game, a challenge, to realize the exact moment that the predictions came true." (x)

#the raven boys #the raven cycle #myedit #trc #trcedit #lit #litedit #maggie stiefvater #my gifs #gifs #gif #my art #300 fox way #blue sargent #richard gansey #adam parrish #ronan lynch #noah czerny #the dream thieves #blue lily lily blue #the raven king #i was messing around with this neon sign format ages ago and decided to make it into a gif like 5 years later

[libraryfag]

Wales is to fantasy girlies what korea is to kpop stans.

#my posts #trc #howls moving castle #diana wynne jones #hmc #lit tag

[bi4bihankking]

The Raven Cycle Summary:

teenage girl makes friend with horde of Strange Boys who are looking for the grave of dead welsh king Glendower in west virginia. i dont actually care very much about the gay people in this one i do think theyre kind of overrated but thats okay im glad other people are having fun and at all times im seconds away from correcting them on ronan characterization but i havent yet so. thumbs up.

The Song of Achilles Summary:

Retelling of the Illiad, focusing on the relationship between Achilles and Patroclus

#raven boys #raven cycle #trc #the raven boys #the raven cycle #maggie stiefvater #the song of achilles #song of achilles #madeline miller #lgbt books #lgbt literature #queer books #queer literature #lgbtqia #poll #bookblr #booklr #books #literature #queer lit

[waestlandbaby]

When the Gray Man said "Adam Parrish and his band of merry men*" he was so right for that

*people who are a little bit in love with Adam Parrish

#the gray man knows #adam parrish #trc #lit #pynch #gangsey #the raven cycle

[tophbefong]

the greywaren. the fire inside ronan was what kept him alive.

#the raven cycle #birdverse #trc #trcedit #paleedit #litedit #literatureedit #mysticalpale #palemakers #paleresource #paletmblr #palenet #gifmakersource #yaedit #userjaime #gif* #lit* #trc* #this been sitting on my drafts orever hehehef #forever*

[anoiseofgloriousdisdain]

november boys

this art reworked

#pynch #adam parrish #ronan lynch #adam x ronan #pynch art #the raven cycle #trc #trc art #the dream trilogy #tdt #tdt art #greywaren #the magician #queer #queer characters #queer lit #queer art #queer artist #fanart #digital art #art #illustration #anogd arts #anoiseofgloriousdisdain

[aaronstveit]

editing challenge vs. @beachsread ❀ favorite character from the raven cycle

He left bloody fingerprints on the rock, but there was something satisfying about that. I was here. I exist. I’m alive, because I bleed.

#trcedit #the raven cycle #trc #adamparrishedit #adam parrish #litedit #yalitedit #birdverseedit #birdverse #storyseekers #booksociety #usercossette #reputayswift #idk who to tag in lit edits anymore </3 #editing challenge: coco #mine.graphic #** #author: maggie stiefvater

[walkerrenee]

"Crushed and broken," Gansey said. "Just the way women like 'em.” ― Maggie Stiefvater, The Raven Boys

#my edit #i made this like 4 years ago lol #so sorry for the shit quality (: #consider it my official come back to this blog #maybe it'll stick this time #the raven cycle #richard gansey #trc #ch: gansey #maggie stiefvater #tdt #lit #litedit #yaedit #trcedit #gansey

[stroobae]

Okay so basically I got to do a presentation about chapter 30 from The Dream Thieves in my Creative Writing class and I got way to carried away writing a full analysis so I thought I'd post it here

I think this passage is so great because it's packed with symbols that completely encapsulate the character of Ronan Lynch. Firstly, we have Ronan’s tattoo, which holds a lot of significance in terms of its literal purpose and what it figuratively represents. We learn here that the literal purpose of the tattoo is to instill fear and intimidation among others. Ronan is a very damaged person, and uses his physical appearance as a warning sign for others to steer clear of him after his father dies. He has a shaved head, a permanent scowl, and most intimidating of all: a tattoo which stretches from the back of his neck all the way down to his waist. His tattoo has a lot of grotesque, frightening imagery in it, which is interesting considering its design is made up of “things from his head.” The fact that the dark imagery portrayed in his tattoo is from his head reveals the struggles and dark things that come out of his own mind. His tattoo is a literal manifestation of Ronan’s inner self portrayed in a scene on his back. He’s quite literally wearing his heart on his sleeve (or on his back rather). It’s also mentioned that Ronan has never been able to see the tattoo fully, because it’s on his back. It can only be seen by others standing behind him, and also, when he’s naked (which is something I’ll come back to later). I think that the placement of his tattoo specifically is a really important metaphor alongside the idea that Ronan’s tattoo represents his whole character and inner self. The fact that Ronan cannot see the whole picture of himself and only “bits and pieces” seems like a large indicator that Ronan doesn’t know fully who he is. In the prologue of The Dream Thieves, it’s stated that Ronan has three secrets, all of different natures; the nature of the second secret being one you keep even from yourself. So essentially, Ronan has a part of himself which he doesn't even truly understand, and I think that this is really accentuated by the fact that he can't see his whole tattoo (his inner self) because it's always behind him. However, others also can’t see the whole tattoo unless he takes his shirt off to show them. (BIG THING FOR LATER!)

In the epilogue of TDT you find out (along with Ronan himself) that he’s in love with one of his best friends, Adam. During this chapter, the reader hasn’t been told yet that Ronan is in love with Adam; mostly because the book follows his point of view, and he doesn’t actually know this about himself yet either. It’s made into a plot twist of sorts in the epilogue, and many readers said that they weren’t aware that it was coming at all. A lot of people felt that Ronan’s crush on Adam came out of nowhere. But if you’re me and love to look WAY too deep into every single line of a book, you’ll know that this isn’t the case at all. This dream is a dead giveaway of Ronan’s feelings. First of all, dreams–especially the way that they’re portrayed in this book–are a look into one’s inner conscience. Your dreams are able to display your deepest feelings and desires, even if you’re not consciously aware of them in real life. Ronan especially is a character who has walls built up, and doesn't verbally communicate how he feels to any other character. He doesn’t even allow himself to examine his own feelings/desires, and has a lack of self-vulnerability and personal emotional intelligence. So in his dreams, his most inner part of himself comes to the forefront of his mind and shows him things he didn’t even know he wanted. To validate this idea, we have the fact that Ronan can fully see his whole tattoo in this dream. His tattoo represents his inner self, and he is finally able to see this part of himself within his dream. The dream begins with Dream Adam tracing his tattoo, and in Latin (which I’ll unpack later) he says,“Scio quid hoc est” which roughly translates to “I know what this is.” Once again, returning to the idea that Ronan’s tattoo is a manifestation of himself, we have Adam physically touching it and telling Ronan he knows what the tattoo means. He understands its whole purpose; why Ronan got it, what it’s really depicting. Dream Adam isn’t intimidated by the tattoo like most people because of its gruesome imagery, but instead he knows that it’s really made up of things from Ronan’s conscience, that it’s a representation of who he is inside. What’s really being portrayed in this scene is Ronan’s desire to be truly known by someone, which is a common theme in the series. The fact that the person shown “knowing” Ronan in his dream is Adam specifically is really important as well. Up until this point, we know that Adam and Ronan are friends, their relationship is shown to be tense and is characterized by squabbles which are resolved by the end of the day. We don’t really know exactly how they feel about each other yet based on their surface level interactions. Therefore, this chapter is extremely important in developing their relationship. We now know partly about how Ronan truly feels about Adam. Not necessarily what their relationship currently is, but what he subconsciously wants it to be. Ronan wants to be known by Adam and believes that he has this capability, since it’s Adam who fills this role in his dream. 

In the dream, Dream Adam then transforms into Kavinsky, who’s the antagonist in this installment. Kavinsky is an adrenaline junky who’s presented to have an infatuation with Ronan. He gets him to do crazy things: dangerously drag race in the streets, take questionable dreamt-pills, and throw molotov cocktails at white Mitsubishis. He’s infatuated with Ronan mainly because of Ronan’s outward reputation and appearance, his mutual love for perilous activities, and the fact that they share the supernatural ability to take things out of their dreams. Kavinsky wants someone to enable him; who he can be an enabler to. Kavinsky thinks that they’re one in the same, and that Ronan is an exemplary candidate for a self-destructive partner. In Ronan’s dream, when Adam turns into Kavinsky, Ronan disappears entirely. He becomes only his tattoo, which gets smaller and smaller until it's simply a tiny Celtic knot. The notion that Ronan disappears and that his tattoo (all that’s left of him, a manifestation of his conscience) gets smaller when Kavinsky appears, shows that he literally feels small when he’s with him. Kavinsky belittles Ronan. He misunderstands who he is, and boils him down to his wildness and rash spontaneousness. He quite literally swallows Ronan whole in the dream; he destroys all that he is. Dream Kavinsky tells Ronan in Latin, “Scio quid estis vos'', which roughly translates to “I know what you are.” WOOOOOF. OH, IT'S SO GOOD. I GOT CHILLS. This could have SO many meanings. “I know what you are” could mean that Kavinsky knows that Ronan is a dreamer, just like himself, or it could also mean that he knows Ronan is gay (if we’re revisiting that idea of this dream bringing to the forefront parts of Ronan that he doesn’t know about himself yet). Adam and Kavinsky are complete opposites in Ronan’s dream, and furthermore, his life. The dream versions of the two represent what he wants, versus what he’s settled with. Currently, Ronan doesn’t think that he’s worthy of someone who truly knows and loves him. Instead, he’s resigned himself to a homoerotic unlabeled relationship with Kavinsky—who doesn't actually care about who he is, and only wants someone who he can destroy his life with. The exact phrasing of the things Dream Adam and Kavinsky separately say to Ronan are SO significant. Essentially they’re telling him the same thing: what they think they know about him. It's the words which they use to say this which makes these statements wildly different. Dream Adam says “I know what this is” about Ronan’s tattoo, meaning that he knows Ronan’s inner self. He knows this thing which he can’t normally see all of himself display of terrible things from his own mind. Dream Kavinsky says “I know what you are” which displays his assumption of Ronan’s outer character.  It’s a bold assumption and an incorrect one. The difference between Adam and Kavinsky to Ronan, is that Ronan wants Adam because he’s different from himself, and doesn’t want Kavinsky because he’s too similar to him. To an extent, I think Ronan fears Kavinsky because he’s who Ronan would be if he didn’t have Gansey or Adam in his life to keep him sane. Initially, Ronan does like to have someone to let off steam with, but he eventually realizes doesn't want an enabler to ruin his life with. He wants someone like Adam–his polar opposite–to know him, to ground him. He wants to feel alive, and awake. 

Another interesting element to this chapter is that Ronan’s dream seems to be erotic in nature; it’s a wet-dream. This is a little jarring for a YA novel, but I personally think eroticsm and sex used in literature as metaphors for conveying relationships and character vulnerability is really beautiful and clever. The significance of it being a sex dream is the fact that Ronan, as previously stated, isn’t someone who verbalizes his love for people. He shows it through physical intimacy and acts of service. Intercourse is literally as close as one can be with another person, and Ronan is completely vulnerable and laid bare in this moment. In it Ronan is naked, which we know because the dream begins with Adam tracing the tattoo all the way down his bare back. Remember, Ronan’s tattoo can only be seen fully when he’s naked, which adds another layer to this. Here it’s assumed that he had allowed Dream Adam to see his tattoo, because he had to have taken off his shirt to see it. Circling back Ronan’s tattoo placement, it’s something that not only can’t be fully seen by himself, but also can’t be fully seen by others unless he decides to strip naked for them. Here he allows Adam to see it and even trace the lines of it down his back. He felt comfortable enough to be vulnerable with Adam like that, and to inspect his whole being. The fact that Kavinsky then appears and the tattoo becomes smaller represents Ronan's uncomfortability with Kavinsky. He didn’t mean for him to see that part of himself and shrinks away in shame until Kavinsky devours the tattoo without permission. It really enforces the idea that Ronan wants and chooses Adam, but Kavinsky forces himself into his life and takes from Ronan without asking. Finally, Ronan awakes from his wet dream “euphoric and ashamed.” This could either be about the fact that it was a sex dream with not one, but other boys, or the confrontation of his true desires. He’s ashamed to admit what he really wants, and doesn’t allow himself to fully comprehend what this dream means. Ronan even thinks that he never wants to sleep again, which really means that he doesn't want his dreams to confront him with his true feelings again. This can tie into the metaphor about Ronan’s sexuality in terms of the fact that he got off to Adam and then Kavinsky, or that he doesn’t want to let his guard down and admit what he truly wants. 

It’s now finally time to unpack the use of Latin! Hooray! Throughout the series, we’re shown that Ronan is really flippant about school. He’s constantly on the brink of expulsion from Aglionby because he doesn’t go to any of his classes or do any of the work. However, the one class he has consistent attendance in as well as the highest overall grade is Latin—second to his proficiency in the language is Adam. They’re both in the same class, and are said to be able to almost fully understand and speak perfect Latin. The use of this dead language is a common theme in the series, and almost all of Ronan’s dreams are in latin. There’s an underlying meaning in that alone. A fun tidbit if we’re looking into the meaning of latin phrases we have the imagery of “claws and beak” described about the imagery of Ronan’s tattoo. The latin phrase “Unguibus et rostro” translates to “claws and beak” and is an expression about fighting with everything you have for something you want. It’s idiomatically comparable to phrases like “heart and soul” and “with all one’s strength” (thanks to ravenclawsandbeak on tumblr for sharing this finding with the fans).  In the final book in the series, there’s a short chapter which is essentially a call-back to this chapter, and follows the format in which it’s written pretty clearly. However, Ronan is awake this time rather than dreaming. 

This chapter is more or less a sex scene between Ronan and Adam, and is essentially the exact opposite to Ronan’s wet dream in TDT. Here, Ronan’s desires are no longer a fantasy that came to him in a dream, he finally has exactly what he’s wanted all along. in which they admit their feelings for each other, which is done indirectly and not through words. The fact that it's through a sex scene is significant because it's showing their intimacy. Intercourse between people is literally as close as two people can get. As a couple, Adam and Ronan rarely verbalize their feelings about each other, and so this intimate act is really them letting down their walls and allowing themselves to be completely vulnerable to each other. Here, we have Adam studying Ronan's tattoo in real life this time, just like in his dream (Something he’s only able to do because Ronan allowed him). He sees all the fine details in its design, and interestingly enough, speaks aloud this latin phrase “Unguibus et rostro” (This also begins a common theme of Ronan and Adam speaking in cryptic latin phrases rather than just actually telling the other of how they feel about each other, but that's a story for another time). This, as everything else does, has multiple meanings; it shows that not only Adam correctly interprets the imagery on tattoo, showing that now he does truly know and understand Ronan’s inner self. But also it reiterates the meaning of this phrase: that Ronan has appropriately fought with all he had for what he wants. He was able to reject Kavinsky and stay true to himself and his principles, and he realized his feelings for Adam, and was able to let his guard down enough to reach out to Adam and let him know how he actually felt about him. And similarly, he allowed Adam to love him back. 

So why did Maggie Stiefvater include the chapter in TDT? It completely breaks the flow of the main story, interrupts two other character’s POVs, and comes seemingly out of nowhere. It's not described where Ronan is, who he came to sleep, when it’s happening. It feels as if the placement of this chapter didn’t matter; it could appear anywhere and still have the same effect. My theory? I think that Stiefvater specifically placed this chapter here because she thought it was an appropriate time to learn more about Ronan, and she wanted the chapter to stick out due to shock value. Because it’s at such a seemingly random moment, and its content is brief and strange, it’s a stark outlier from the rest of the chapters. For me, this strategy totally worked. When I think back to this book, this chapter is by far the most memorable one. I remember it almost immediately when I think about any specific line/chapter from this book. Even though the dream seems random and complex, it has so much meaning packed into it about Ronan’s inner conscience and character. Stiefvater wants to reveal all of these things about Ronan previously analyzed without directly telling us. 

#trc #the raven cycle #the dream thieves #the raven king #ronan lynch #adam parrish #joseph kavinsky #ronan's dreams are weird and i love them #literary analysis #lit analysis is my passion and so is this book

[reputayswift]

Being ADAM PARRISH was a complicated thing, a wonder of muscles and organs, synapses and nerves. He was a miracle of moving parts, a study in survival. The most important thing to Adam Parrish, though, had always been free will, the ability to be his own master. This was the important thing. It had always been the important thing. This was what it was to be Adam.

↳ HAPPY BIRTHDAY @julesblackthorns

#adam parrish #adamparrishedit #the raven cycle #trc #the dreamer trilogy #tdt #trcedit #maggie stiefvater #ya lit #yalitedit #my edit #*characteraesthetic #lit #tdtedit #pynch