#quotidian writing

[days-of-reading]

Somewhere in the files of General Mills is a letter from the very-short-story writer Lydia Davis. In it, Davis, who is widely considered one of the most original minds in American fiction today, expresses dismay at the packaging of the frozen peas sold by the company’s subsidiary Cascadian Farm. The letter, like many things that Davis writes, had started out sincere and then turned weird. Details grew overly specific; a narrative, however spare, emerged. “The peas are a dull yellow green, more the color of pea soup than fresh peas and nothing like the actual color of your peas, which are a nice bright dark green,” she wrote. “We have compared your depiction of peas to that of the other frozen peas packages and yours is by far the least appealing. . . . We enjoy your peas and do not want your business to suffer. Please reconsider your art.” Rather than address her complaint, the company sent her a coupon for Green Giant.

Dana Goodyear, “Long Story Short: Lydia Davis’s Radical Fiction,” New Yorker (March 17, 2014)

#dana goodyear #lydia davis #quotidian writing #profiles #tny #nonfic #food

[quotidian-oblivion]

How I picture Leon finds out that Merlin has magic:

Merlin was tired.

Not because of the abundance of chores and the fatigue that came from running around after yet another assassin, but because he hadn't used his magic at all for the past month. Yes, even with the presence of the assassin. Gwaine had fortunately been there to knock the guy out and throw him in the dungeons, catching him red-handed.

He had been trying to stay as cautious as possible, which was why he hadn't used magic in such a long time.

But the fact was - Merlin was born with magic. It was as natural as breathing to him. So when he didn't use magic for an extended period of time, he would get tired.

He needed to use magic. Just a small bit.

He would do it in the safety of his room, but he was currently carrying Arthur's armor to his chambers from the training field and it was heavy and he was so so tired and- well, it would only be a small spell.

He put the armor down, checked that no one was around, then held up a palm. His eyes flashed gold and a small fire appeared on top of it.

Just because he had missed his magic, he flashed his eyes gold and made the flame morph into a butterfly. He smiled as it slowly flapped its wings, staying on Merlin's palm.

Then Merlin heard a gasp and he snapped his head to the newcomer.

The thing about knights was that they were trained to be as quiet as possible even in armor. It was required for certain missions as well as hunting. But armor was impossible to be quiet, so Merlin, having spent a significant amount of time with them, had trained himself to automatically hear when they were approaching. And since they were always in their armor anyway, even sleeping in it sometimes, he had relied on that to alert him of anyone crossing the hallway.

After all, anyone else - servants and nobles alike - wouldn't bother quieting their footsteps while walking.

If they did, it would be because of malicious intent so it wouldn't matter if they saw Merlin or not.

But occasionally - very very occassionally - knights walked around without their armor.

That, combined with their light footsteps and silent movements, had caught Merlin unaware.

So when he snapped his head over to look at Leon staring with wide eyes at the butterfly made of flame in his hand, Merlin was surprised. More than that, he was afraid.

The two of them froze, with Leon's gaze on the fire butterfly and Merlin's on Leon, standing rigidly like deers caught in the wild.

Then Leon raised his eyes from the butterfly to Merlin, then back to the butterfly, then back to Merlin again-

Before he spun on his heel and walked the other way whistling jovially like he hadn't seen anything.

Merlin was still frozen like a deer. He didn't move until several minutes later when he did hear armor clinking against each other. That was when he got rid of the butterfly and hefted the armor up, walking back to his room, leaving Arthur's armor in favor of panicking.

~

When Merlin met Leon in the armory that evening, he tried to approach him. Leon, recognizing what Merlin was trying to do, let him, moving into a secluded changing room far from the armory with the other knights and squires and pages.

Leon nodded at Merlin in greeting when Merlin closed the door.

"Leon," Merlin started. "What you saw-"

"That you were shirking Arthur's chores? No worries. I didn't give you away before, I won't do so now."

Merlin blinked. "What?"

Leon sighed. "Look, Merlin. I don't get paid enough, even as a knight. Not with all those missions and calamities that keep getting Arthur into trouble. So I refuse to deal with anything above my paygrade. Even you avoiding chores."

Merlin blinked again.

Leon clapped a hand on his shoulder, and with a smile, left the room.

Merlin looked after the knight, wondering for the first time, exactly how many times the knight had committed or aided or turned a blind eye against treason for him to be this casual about it.

#Mhgmgmhmgmghm not sure #but i wanted to write #quotidian writes #bbc merlin #merlin bbc #merlin's magic reveal #merlin's magic #merlin emrys #merlin fanfiction #merlin fanfic #merlin fic #leon #sir leon #bbc leon #leon bbc #knights of the round table #merlin #merlin tv #bbcm #arthur pendragon

[rightwriter]

Some common pitfalls of new writers!

#opening hook #writing advice #rightwriter #youtube #writing tips #writing #creative writing #writer #on writing #writeblr #writers on tumblr #book writing #author advice #Youtube #diane callahan #quotidian writer #writer mistakes #writing help

[mispeltnostalgia]

SCREAMING CRYING THROWING UP

SO ME AND @quotidian-oblivion ARE AT THE LIBRARY AND WE WERE MAKING TEA/COFFEE AND I WAS TELLING HER ABOUT THE STUPID IDEA I HAD TO MAKE COFFEE USING ENERGY DRINK AS THE LIQUID. NOW I MAY BE STUDPID BUT NOT STUPID ENOUGH TO ACTUALLY DO IT.

ANYWAY THERE WAS THIS DUDE AND HE WAS LIKE "No don't do that. my brother had a heartattack at 31 from doing that." and we were like "oh thats not great" and he was like "yeah and hes 33 now so don't do that. I'm an ER nurse so i've seen it all"

I WAS SOBBING AND WANTED TO LEAVE AND THEN QUO OPENS HER FUCKING MOUTH AND ASKS "have you ever seen anyone in the ER after they've taken 11 shots of coffee" and this man was like "i had a guy come in who tried to inject coffee into his veins, he died" AND QUO WAS LIKE "oh that sounds like something people in america would do" LIKE SHUT UP PLEASE QUO LET US LEAVE!!!!!!!

Anyway thats why you don't ever take Quo out in public because you will get told off for the conversations you have.

#nogolsta says hi #quotidian convos #HE FUCKING WALKED BEHIND ME AS I WAS WRITING THIS KILL ME PLZ #i hate talking to people in public #i also hate being told what to do #so now to spite the ER dude i'm gonna drink myself to a grave through caffine #Quo is going to be the death of me #i love her dearly but like LET US LEAVE THE AWKWARD SITUATION PLEASE I BEG OF YOU

[themundanemudperson]

Allg! Thanks!

Where do you post your writing? Is it on ao3?

Hehe that's the thing

I don't really post it? Cuz of this, like, need for it to be perfect, and I haven't really finished any of my works, so I just let them sit in my docs

I mostly write original works (as in I've actually started original works, and have the first chapters of a couple of things written). But I've drafted SO MANY fics that I'll probably never write. Sigh

But tysm for asking!! :)

#life's mundanity #mundane writes #or #more accurately #mundane doesn't write all that much #quotidian convos

[uncertainwallflower]

What is your process for going about writing a new chapter?

^^

Hey Quo! Thanks for the ask 💗

Well, first off, open a fresh page (I work in Notion). I tend to have a rough idea on what I want to happen in the chapter (if not? consult the plan), so I dot point those scenes. Then, if I have any already-written snippets (just from spur-of-the-moment inspiration), I pop those where they fit amongst the dot points.

Then, if I’m vibing with a particular scene I’ll write that, otherwise I’ll work my way through the dot points, fleshing out the chapter, skipping when I’m feeling unmotivated.

Often I’ll be working on multiple chapters at once, jumping back and forth when the mood takes me, so the process isn’t quite so clean cut but that about sums it up.

#bella answers #writing process #quotidian oblivion

[wordsforyourwip]

Advantage

Eclipse

Quotidian

#writing prompts #one word prompts #prompt list #prompt blog #writing inspiration #wfyw word sets #daily prompt #advantage #eclipse #quotidian

[pitofgorgons]

All writing problems are psychological problems. Blocks usually stem from the fear of being judged. If you imagine the world listening, you'll never write a line. That's why privacy is so important. You should write first drafts as if they will never be shown to anyone.

Erica Jong

#quotes #writing #quotidian writer #diane callahan #youtuber #definitely recommend her channel

[rthko]

I recently saw a post with Fran Lebowitz saying, "a book isn't supposed to be a mirror; it's supposed to be a door," and it made me think about the state of "representation" discourse online. I thought back to an anon I once received from someone who claims to get "secondhand embarrassment" from "drag queens, leather daddies, and kinksters with pup hoods acting like they represent all gays." Many thought my response was too harsh, that I ought to show more sympathy to people who do not "relate" to nor feel "represented" by these modes of queer being. Blame it on online fandom, blame it on heteronormativity, but we are too concerned with "relatability." It is the sort of "relatability" advertising executives concern themselves with, or "relatability" of people who treat their online presence as a "brand." It is a notion I find alien to queer art and culture.

I have never done drag, nor do I consider myself a part of the leather community beyond befriending others who do and owning some gear. I do not "relate" to these expressions in any vulgar, literal sense, but they are still deeply resonant. And how many of these individuals truly "relate" to the images they peform? Drag artists and leatherfolk are purveyors of fantasy. In their daily lives, they might not be bikers, rockstars, pop divas, or mythical beasts, but they reinvent themselves through metaphors and performances. These theatrical performances are no more absurd than the quotidian performances expected by cis straight society. Larry Mitchell writes, “The faggots act out their fantasies without believing them to be real. The men act out their fantasies always proclaiming that they are real."

This could explain why literal attempts at relatability are often less resonant than campy extravogant fantasies. I once wrote a rant about how Taylor Swift is not a gay icon, and an anon smugly told me, "Taylor makes music for everyone and not just gays." Yes, I suppose she does make music for "everyone," in the same way that the Midwestern weather reporter voice is the universal accent of the English speaking world. But diva worship was never about "relating;" rather, it's about survival through the evocation of patron saints of strength and glamor. Most celebrity or mass media attempts at "relatability" are at best clueless or at worst insulting. I would much rather participate in a campy fantasy, which is in its own right more "real." Susan Sontag describes camp as the "farthest extension, in sensibility, of the metaphor of life as theater.”

I am not telling anyone to stop pushing for the recognition of diverse stories. This is crucial! But the recognition of queer stories should also come with an understanding of queer modes of resonance. When has John Waters ever produced something "relatable?" Who cares? His work resonates, in fact, more than a lot of "safe" gay media that should be all accounts be more "relatable." The "average" listener would not necessarily relate to SOPHIE. They may find her work otherwordly or downright unsettling. But she did not produce music for the "average" listener, at least not before the rest of the musical landscape dragged to catch up with her. Adam Zmith writes: "Inside SOPHIE’s words, performances and final act is the queer utopia of always grasping, always dreaming of a freer life." We are living the wildest dreams of our former, closeted selves, but we are still always grasping, never quite satiated. Queer art is not just autobiographical but aspirational. Let art be a door.

[quotidian-oblivion]

I don't want to write this, but I'm at TEASS with Nog and I just got hit with a sudden epiphany:

Fic Idea

Mini Jason finds Mini Tim wandering around the supermarket, lost, and he hands a wad of cash to Tim (who is very confused, but goes along with it) and "buys" him.

"Hey, Bruce! Remember the allowance you gave me to buy whatever I wanted?"

"Hrn?"

"I bought a brother!" *shoves Tim forward*

*Bruce spits out coffee*

And Bruce cannot say no. Because Jason already seems attached to the kid and the kid to Jason, plus Tim says that his parents don't want him and hurt him??

Dick, Alfred and Babs are somehow involved in this too.

#quotidian convos #quotidian fics #fic idea #fanfic idea #fic prompt #fanfic prompt #writing prompt #writing prompts #fanfic prompts #fic prompts #fanfiction prompt #fanfiction prompts #story prompt #prompts #tim drake #jason todd #bruce wayne #dick grayson #barbara gordon #alfred pennyworth #batfamily #batfam #dc #batdad

[familyabolisher]

haphazard assortment of thoughts on the unwanted guest:

firstly, it really does have to be said—crazy good, probably my favourite of all the tlt short pieces, and i say that as someone who lost my mind over as yet unsent for like a week. excellent conceit and excellent execution, just a really gorgeous piece of writing. the play format of course reminds me of what abigail says to harrow in htn—that the river bubble is a ‘play [she’s] directing’—the inside of one’s head as a stage in which other actors can intervene & whereby mileage can be gotten out of Symbolism as immediately “real,” tangible presences that the kind of realist baggage that a more quotidian prose form would usher in would probably falter in accomplishing. it’s a lot!! i think even if i wasn’t already a tazmuir writing style defender (contra the insistence that she’s yknow homestuck fanfiction serial numbers filed off hack) then this would have had me floored anyway. 

the play format also works in the way that muir’s general dexterity in form and willingness to really make use of craft as a technical space where discourse can be generated always works—i’m talking about the ‘fanfictiony’ voice in gtn which manages to say something both about fanfiction and about the text itself, the use of the dramatis personae as a space where atmosphere can be established and plot points hinted towards (thus blurring the lines between what is and is not diegesis), the drastic shifts in style between different close thirds, the shifting from third- to second- to epistolary first-person, the use of poetry both diegetic and not (the noniad, the epigraph poems…), the mimicry of the ‘voice’ of the king james bible in the nona epilogue—she never stays in one place for too long and she never seems to stick to one central style or form, and it really works in her favour. insofar as tlt as a whole is a very ‘patchwork’ kind of work, building itself up from its big big index of references and intertexts and memes with hugely variant levels of ‘prestige’ or legitimacy attached to them, the ‘patchwork’ use of form really works in muir’s favour. however i am also fuming because i was right in the middle of writing a tlt fic which jumps into a play format two-thirds of the way through and now my idea doesn’t look ORIGINAL but ANYWAY—

& i really do need to flag my good friend vee’s mercy/augustine fic, which makes use of a similar conceit and pulls it off masterfully—i am deeply jealous of vee’s talent and i think the unwanted guest makes this piece (from 2021!) shine even more, if anything.

i am DYING to see where muir is going with the use of hamlet, of all things—dulcie quoting it to palamedes immediately catapulted my mind back to abigail’s reference to ‘that undiscovered country’ in htn. obviously muir likes to drop contemporary (or contemporarily canonical) references and turns of phrase all over the place, but the attention drawn to the quote as diegetically referential (“I like that. Is it from something?” / “Yes. It’s complicated.”) has me wondering about a) the survival of ‘pre-res’ literatures ~over the river and like WHY and b) what a thematic interlocking of tlt and hamlet can do, here…….real aveheads remember cytherea ophelia theory where i tried to use ophelia as a point of reference for teasing out some arguments about cytherea and death and aesthetics and white femininity and whatnot. all of which is to say i need to sit with this hamlet reading a lot more but i love it, i am so here for it.

of course ‘kissing or feeding, we can’t be sure’ calls to mind ‘how meat loves meat,’ alecto biting harrow’s mouth by way of a kiss…and the general thematic throughline of, you know, certain practices of love as practices of consumption, naberius later being figured as the ‘meat’ in question contains echoes of this eroticism which ofc guides the contours of the necromancer/cavalier dynamic, eroticism as a currency of power, we know all of this stuff because it’s all over the text but i am just thumbs-upping it from the sidelines

the coffins had me thinking of utena’s black rose arc, which is a fun link to make considering the equivalent moment in the main body of nona is also referencing utena, ie. with the ‘rules’ of the duel being that cam has to get the handkerchief out of ianthe’s pocket as kind of an equivalent to skewering the rose. i feel like the tlt/utena overlap is pretty self-explanatory but it’s just fun to see the fingerprints all over lol

i think a lot of this was treading old ground thematically (erotics of consumption, dog motifs, we’ve seen it already!) but i will say that i did Yell Out Loud over ‘who's she got dawdling behind her but that creature—tugging visibly at her leash like an overeager dog.’ reminded of the other memorable use of ‘leash’—’even the devil bent for god to put a leash around her neck’—and, of course, the endless parade of commonalities between gideon & alecto. anyway there’s not really anything in this line that we didn’t already know about gid as a character, thematically speaking, but i point it out because it inflicted +100 psychic damage when i read it. gideon as a ‘creature’ is particularly slimy, & sort of puts me in mind of ianthe's tendency to talk about what appears to us as 'butch masculinity' (as opposed to the more effete masculinity of augustine or even babs) with a notably derogatory slant (the 'hurtful threats of sexual violence' line comes to mind); i don't know that i have much to say about it here specifically but it's an interesting one that i think informs the kirianthe dynamic pretty heavily (especially when held up against, like, harrianthe ... ianthe has a kind of respect for whatever harrow's gay and stupid gender is Doing (at least insofar as she can mould it to her own desires; i'm thinking of the dios apate forcefemme scene lol) in ways that i don't think she has for kiriona? but this is v off-topic, lol).

i have never been especially taken by dulcie as a character but i think this may finally have forced me to fold and admit that she’s great. her haters!!! her agonies!!! camilla would have to cook!! the balance between levity and sincerity was really well-managed. & i love the double meaning of “unwanted guest” as both palamedes intruding on ianthe’s mind palace and naberius setting up shop inside of her.

i need a week to sit with where this idea of the consumed soul as being literally ‘digested’ such that it can begin to ‘inhabit,’ however immaterially, the host body, or like to alter the characteristics of the host body such that to carry out such a consumption is to kind of kill yourself as well, slots in with lolita theory. or like, i need alecto right now. i am however reminded of chew, a short story that muir wrote in 2013, which also plays with these ideas of sexual assault as a forcing of a part of yourself meaningfully ‘into’ another person, and cannibalism as the reenactment of such a process, figured in the story as kind of a reclamation or at least an assertion of permanence—“I was always going to be in the ground with him in me,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure, that’s all. I just wanted to make sure.”—which the unwanted guest seems to kind of, play with in reverse? i don’t know, but i’m interested—as ever—in where muir wants to take these ideas of rape and consumption and absorption that she’s got in her hands.

i keep returning to…i hesitate to say ‘parallels’ because i think that imposes a narrative onus that i’m not actually that convinced by, but these, like, commonalities between babs and gideon. gideon is played off against so many people (cristabel, loveday, alecto being the big ones) that it feels kind of inane to add another person to the pile, but like…they’re the two who get got in canaan house, they’re both ironically ‘false’ cavaliers and expressions of the ‘truest’ or most paradigmatic form that cavalierhood ‘can’/’should’ take, they both have unconventionally gendered names (‘babs’ is a shortened form of ‘barbara,’ it is a typically feminine name imo) and (by our standards) somewhat unconventional genders (gideon is butch, babs effete)—and of course the unwanted guest places a lot of emphasis on the coercive ‘making’ of cavalierhood (the reference to babs being ‘fixed’ were he to have a disability! ianthe’s glib ‘society really is to blame’ comment—ironic, obviously, but not wholly untrue) not dissimilar to the emphasis that gtn puts on cytherea moulding gideon into the state she comes to be in at the end. babs and gideon as the two possessed corpses in nona, obviously. two wildly diverse but ultimately converging trajectories! a dialectical tension between their fundamental ‘opposition’ (as by-the-book cavalier vs whatever gideon is doing) and their fundamental ‘sameness’ whereby the dialectic is resolved in their mutual deaths. also just, of course, continuing the throughline that muir has had going for a while now, of gender/gendering as a set of coercive enforcements loyal to a hegemonic structuring of the world.

that’s all i’ve got, i think. just. really good everyone say thank you tazmuir

#.txt #tlt #the unwanted guest spoilers #this was originally bullet points but tumblr's formatting is bad and i can't be bothered editing to improve the flow here. so. #rape cw

[artful-aries]

I’m absolutely the type of person to smile and wave back at Dottore as he sails away in a boat, completely forgetting that he’s supposed to be the villain. Totally not true story no no

Short scenario please? :3

My lovely anon, here is your request finally. This was soooooo fun to write.

Content Warnings: None really, but Dottore is a little bit condescending and also thinks you’re crazy for majority of this fic

​​Prosaic Introductions - Dottore x Reader

​​​Though he is not a conventional man, or even a conventional human being for that matter, Dottore sees this as a tool for his benefit. In fact, it is an aspect that he prides himself on, not being like the rest of the weak minded fools of this world. Their eyes might as well be sewn shut for the amount of good their vision does them. The people of Teyvat are, in large, utterly pathetic and small minded, unable to see the bigger picture. Their faces blur in his mind, day after day after day, they come and go from his presence, nothing more than dust in the air to him, filling space.

​​

​​And yet, there was you, a common citizen of Snezhnaya that for some reason stood out among the rest. It was a fact that Dottore truly detested. He had no time nor purpose for this…fixation he had on you, yet thoughts of you nestled in his brain like a cockroach, multiplying in intensity and difficult to eradicate. What was it about your quotidian life that drew his attention?

​​

​​It started when he had the unfortunate luck of meeting you by happenstance. He had been running an errand for one of his experiments; a task normally assigned to his assistants, had he not experimented on and terminated them all due to their lack of basic capability. You had bumped into him on accident at a Snezhnayan market, the blithering fool you were.

​​

​​Dottore looked down at you, his expression clouded by his mask but the edge of his mouth tapered downward, the only visible sign of his displeasure. Ordinarily when people saw a Harbinger, let alone The Doctor, they made sure to make their presence scarce if they could.

​​

​​But not you.

​​

​​You blinked in surprise, as if you weren’t the one who had just run into him before smiling brightly, “Oh, sorry! My head must have been in the clouds, I wasn’t paying attention. Sorry for running into you.”

​​

​​Your demeanor was so bright and cheery, Dottore wondered if there was something wrong with you. Did you not know who he was? He doubted that very much. There wasn’t anyone in Snezhnaya who didn’t know who the Harbingers were. Perhaps this was your way of trying to deflect any wrath he might bring for running into him. Most people tried appealing to him through politeness, and you were likely no different. It was a useless gesture; he had better things to do with his time than be concerned with the apologies of ordinary people.

​​

​​“Think nothing of it,” Dottore replied quickly, not having the time or energy for this social exchange. If he had been in a bad mood, he might have been more vicious, but at the moment he simply wanted to get the supplies he needed for his research and resume his experiments.

​​

​​You clearly had other plans in mind, as you continued talking to him as though he were an acquaintance of yours, “The snow is so thick today, its a wonder how I didn’t get frostbite on the way here. What brings you out in this weather?”

​​

​​Dottore paused for a moment, unsure of how to respond. Why were you talking to him? Surely there was a reason for it, as it seemed highly unlikely that you would simply just…strike up conversation with a Harbinger on a whim. What was your goal? Did you have an ulterior motive, or did you happen to leave your sense in the clouds you had just lost yourself in?

​​

​​He blinked slowly at you behind his mask before he replied bluntly, “Gathering materials for research. Now if you’ll excuse me, I must be on my way.”

​​

​​He had quickly left, ending his first encounter with you as abruptly as it had started. Yet now, weeks after the exchange he found himself thinking about it, about you, more and more. You were strange, that was for certain. Dottore wondered what it was that made you tick, what drove your actions that day. Was it for a chance at political gain? Were you somehow a spy, or perhaps you had some other plot planned, one that he could not predict. Each possibility seemed as unlikely as the next, and yet, the thing that puzzled Dottore the most was why he cared so much in the first place. What did it matter what your intentions were, he was likely not going to ever see you again.

​​

​​And yet there you were again in his line of sight today, as though you had been summoned by his mere desire to observe you closely. Dottore hadn’t regretted terminating his useless assistants, but now he was almost grateful he had done it. Having to leave his laboratory for supplies presented him with this opportunity to study you more.

​​

​​He watched from a distance as you argued with some fellow. Dottore hypothesized that he might be a jilted lover, or perhaps he was merely a friend whom you were having a dispute with, or even a complete stranger. Whatever the reason for the argument, Dottore did not care; he was far more fascinated by watching how you reacted to the stimuli. The way your brows furrowed, the downward curve of your mouth as you frowned, the faint redness reaching your cheeks out of anger, it was all useful data in determining what kind of person you were. You seemed to wear your heart in your sleeve, for better or for worse, and it was an idea that amused Dottore as he watched you argue with the man in front of you. People easy to read were easy people to manipulate, but he stood to gain nothing from expending the effort. Watching you brought him a strange sense of satisfaction that he couldn’t explain.

​​

​​Dottore was about to walk away, satisfied with the new observations he was able to make of you, but he noticed a shift in the argument, especially coming from the man. Whoever he was, he was becoming increasingly agitated with you, a fact that you seemed to pick up on as your body grew tense. Strange, so you could be perceptive of others after all, when you wanted to be. Part of Dottore wanted to sit back and watch what would unfold; if things were to escalate into a physical fight, he wanted to see what you would say, what you do. The idea was thrilling to him, having the opportunity to see you backed into a corner, to see your survival instincts take over, to see what you would look like when you were terrified. Yet, strangely enough he felt his body moving towards you despite these compulsions.

​​

​​Before he knew it, he was standing next to you and placing a hand on your shoulder, “You seem to have a knack for talking to the wrong people, don’t you?”

​​

​​Your eyes practically lit up as you looked up at him, a sight that confused Dottore. Were you…happy to see him? Considering your argument with the man in front of you, he figured that would be a valid reaction.

​​

​​“Oh, it’s you!” You breathed with relief as you broke out in a grin, “It’s nice to see you again.”

​​

​​The man you were arguing with, upon seeing you act so casually with an infamous Fatui Harbinger, scurried off without a word. Whatever your argument had been about, it was clearly no longer worth the effort to him. This made Dottore chuckle to himself slightly. So his reputation did precede him. In that case, why was it that you didn’t seem to have the same reaction as him?

​​

​​He removed his hand from your shoulder as he replied, “Most would not be so keen on seeing a Fatui Harbinger.”

​​

​​To his surprise, you didn’t flinch or sound shocked at all about him mentioning his status. That ruled out the possibility that you simply just didn’t know, and made you a far more interesting specimen in Dottore’s eyes. You simply shrugged, “Sure you have a scary, super important job, but you seem nice.”

​​

​​Dottore had been described as many things in his life, and nice was not one of them. It baffled him that you could come to such a conclusion after only seeing him twice, yet you picked up quickly on the antagonistic feelings of the man you argued with before. Truly, the depth of your perception was skewed, and it made him want to know more.

​​

​​You took his stunned silence as him expecting something, and cleared your throat as you introduced yourself, “I’m (Y/N). It’s nice to have you engage in conversation this time.”

​​

​​(Y/N). What an incredibly ordinary name, contradictory to the constant perplexity you threw him into. You were odd, and more and more Dottore found himself wanting to analyze you, to find the root of your oddities and mannerisms.

​​

​​You nudged him, an action that took him by surprise as he blinked at you- not that you could tell behind his mask. “Well? Are you going to introduce yourself?”

​​

​​Dottore let out a small chuckle at your insistence, what was left for him to introduce? Everyone in Snezhnaya knew who he was, moreover, what he was capable of. Still, he humored you as he replied, “You may call me Dottore, if it pleases you.”

​​

​​Your face lit up, clearly satisfied with his answer, “Thanks for helping me, Dottore. That guy was a jerk,” You seemed to get nervous for a moment as you looked down at your feet, shuffling them in the snow before looking back up to ask him, “Can I count on seeing you around more often?”

​​

​​You looked almost…hopeful, like you wanted to see him more. How strange you were, almost insisting on seeing a man who you knew wrought much turmoil and bloodshed as much for his own purposes as well as the Tsaritsa’s. Clearly, your psyche was different from most, if not altogether damaged. It was fascinating to him that he couldn’t predict what you would say or do. You seemed to operate outside most conventions, much like himself.

​​

​​“Perhaps,” Dottore finally answered, but chose not to elaborate further as he continued to be on his way, leaving you confused at his response. He smirked to himself at the thought, how nice it was to make you the confused one. Despite his ambiguity, he had every intention of seeing you again. He just had to know more; to study you, to break you down and build you back up, to figuratively dissect you until he mastered your inner workings and understood your quirks. You were his captivating little side project, and he couldn’t wait to begin his research on you.

​​

#genshin impact #genshin #genshin imagines #anon asks #genshin x reader #reader insert #genshin imagine #dottore #dottore x reader #Il Dottore

[wakkoroni]

Ouija Board Headcanon

I've mentioned it so much I might as well explain it. Okay so this is the headcanon that me and @quotidian-oblivion have been talking about. While Damian was dead Jason got an Ouija board to keep him company in the afterlife. Instead of this just being a way to communicate, it kind of escalated and now Damian haunts the manor. Nothing scary, he just makes Jason's life a living hell. Like Damian will make noises, tosses things across the room, etc. Basically being a poltergeist.

Jason wants to cover up the fact that he used the Ouija board because Damian's death was so recent. He doesn't want to hurt anyone. So, he sticks around the Manor, claiming that he's going to help the family heal or smth. No one really notices Damian's presence. Any thing tossed or strange noises Jason just claims that it was him and no one thinks twice. In private Jason is constantly talking to Damian like "you little shit you did not need to throw that fork" and the response would be an echo of a laugh and another fork tossed.

(I have scripts I can add but I'll probably make them a separate post)

Everything goes to crap when Damian discovers the paint. Now the rooms can be a mess with paint handprints or droplets of paint. Jason is now holding a Windex and a rag trying to wipe away the paint before it dries. Tim catches him cleaning the wall and just shoots him a confused look.

Jason: my coping mechanism is cleaning... Don't judge me

Tim: um okay?

Here's a longer script: Ouija Board Script

As Damian is being a little shit and messing stuff up around the Manor (writing on things, echoing and whispers, and tossing objects across the room or whatever a poltergeist does) Jason has to make sure no one really suspects paranormal activity because then the sage and holy water (or whatever you use to expel ghosts) comes out and it's over for Damian.

But just shenanigans going on, and Jason literally just keeps Damian company. Until one day Damian signs off with "I'll see you soon" and the board goes inactive for days. Jason worries that something happened but he can't really tell anyone without getting in trouble so he just has an internal conflict. Then Damian comes back to life and returns like nothing changed. Jason pulls him aside and is like "you couldn't be more ominous??" And Damian just smirks.

Feel free to add onto this

#jason todd #tim drake #damian wayne #batfam #batfam headcanons #incorrect batfamily quotes #idk how to tag this lmao #vibey writes

[olderthannetfic]

Honestly I suspect a lot of the fanfic-filed-off books that get big, even when they are mundane, work because they do involve some degree of "worldbuilding" in the sense of establishing an elaborate setting. Like I haven't read Love Hypothesis, but it's about science grad students right? That likely requires a lot of explanation of how the world of grad school, science research, etc. works since your average reader is not part of that world. That's just another kind of "worldbuilding."

--

Oh yes.

It doesn't need to be fantasy for it to be worldbuilding. If you made your boy band chefs or your space wizards grad students or any sort of person in a particular milieu with its own culture and rules, a good author will establish how this world works.

It's not just literal explanation either. Sometimes, you need to know how the science works, but sometimes, all you need is to understand the general vibe of the lab and the social dynamics of coworkers. It's often more sense of place rather than rules-based worldbuilding.

A lot of people talk about how Gilmore Girls gave them a sense of place that lots of media in real-ish settings doesn't. I never watched, but it looks like an autumn-themed blog on tumblr or something. Even if your "real world" setting works in quotidian ways, there are still things to establish.

The danger is when someone is writing a super generic coffee shop AU, does not establish much about the vibe of the coffee shop, and is also now missing the part where the space wizards wanted to kill each other in canon and that added spice to the otherwise conflictless fic AU because every fic reader knew it.

There's plenty of pro media that operates like a fandom coffee shop AU, but it bothers to establish more, and it has a plot with a conflict. Think Empire Records with its overall plot about saving the record store and its ensemble with the usual grab bag of ensemble character interpersonal problems.

A person can convert fic into original and have it go great. Many people don't end up doing a very good job unless the fic already spent a lot of time establishing original things.

[mammutblog]

???!! i need to know more.

hello i can’t say too much about it bc i’m still at an early stage of writing! i tagged that under this post bc one of the more common questions i receive is “how do you know this album isn’t made for male pleasure?" I can't say I know for sure, but my belief can stand if the two statements “women were notoriously oppressed during this period of chinese history” (which they were) and “women have a lot of agency within the gender and class system, and built relationships with one another” can co-exist, which i think they can. we often live contradictory lives ourselves and i think people back then did too! the images themselves also tell us a lot about who the intended audience may be, especially if you put it against other similar objects from its time. Anyway! onto the p0rn itself:

if you go to the boston mfa website -> collections -> collections search and then search “secret spring” you’ll find 12 eighteenth century album leaves that depict various scenes of girls hanging out, playing chess, reading porn, buying dildos, doing some fruit sex and more

it’s not unusual for there to be depictions of female sexual intercouse in late imperial chinese p0rnographt but the male gaze-y-ness of them are quite present, such as very lavishly decorated backdrops, an emphasis on penetration, and sometimes the presence of a male viewer/participant

my vibes is that these albums (cr. james cahill for writing about this in the first place) is that the secret spring album centers around a quotidian nature of pleasure and an indulgence in everyday life. if you look closely at the backdrop for example, it feels like a very lived-in space, with tea cups and chess pieces lying around, beds unmade, furniture moved about etc

scenes of pleasure and nudity also seem to be shrouded with a sense of causality and comfort, there is no sense that the women are attempting to seduce or purposefully arouse the viewer, nor do the nudity and sexual acts read as foreplay to phallic penetration.

there is actually a lot of documentation, though not as much as male homosexuality, of women (mostly upper class) exchanging love letters, composing erotic poetry about courtesans, and sponsoring singing girls for entertainment. what i am trying to figure out right now is how to understand these expressions of love, friendship, pleasure and sexual desire without putting contemporary labels on them because it wouldn’t actually help us to better understand relationships between women at the time, anyway i wanted to make this really short but that’s what you get for asking me a question about my research, okay bye!

#ask

[anniekoh]

my mother tape-records my laugh to mail bubblewrapped back home my mother records me singing Ye shabe mahtab mah miad to khab I am singing the moon will come one night and take me away side street by side street sitting on a pilled suburban carpet or picking blue felt off the hand-me-down couch the displaced whatnots I practice the work of worms how much I can wear away with no one watching two generations ago my blood moved through borders according to grazing seasons then a lifeline of planes planes fly so close to my head filled with bomblets and disappeared men scaffolding sprouts nooses sagging with my dead I burn my finger on the broiler and smell trenches

Drone, by Solmaz Sharif, in the poetry collection Look. First published in Blackbird.

Her first poetry collection, Look

In her 2016 debut collection, Look, Sharif—who was born in Istanbul to Iranian parents and grew up in the United States—refused American civil rituals of polite consensus and exposed the ways state violence takes place in and through language. Reappropriating terms from the Department of Defense’s Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, where ordinary English is redefined in service of statecraft, Sharif mapped empire’s brutal trespasses. These words appear in the poems in capital letters, simultaneously disrupting and constructing scenes—often intimate and domestic. In the title poem, for example, the DoD’s definition of “look” (“a period during which a mine circuit is receptive of an influence”) jostles the ordinary one: “Let me LOOK at you. // Let me LOOK at you in a light that takes years to get here.” As the eerie convergence between the militarized and the quotidian agitates the language, any pretense of neutral description falls away. Reading these poems, it is impossible to sustain the fiction of a relationship—including a readership—wholly bracketed from the world empire has made. 

Solmaz Sharif wrestles with the ways that acclaim can become an imperial enclosure; I once heard her say, “I try to write poems that make it impossible to applaud afterward.” Reaching toward forms of relation that are not fully apprehensible from life in the metropole, her work rejects the embrace of any we for whom sharing is an uncomplicated act.

#poetry #solmaz sharif