#turning a simple album into a scholarly work

[cherrynojutsu]

Title: Like Silver

Summary: A companion series for Like Gold.

Sakura misses him so much. She misses the faint smell of woodsmoke and sage, and mismatched eyes captivating in their intensity and unfathomable depths. The Rinnegan is beautiful, soft lavender ringed by hypnotizing layers of circle and tomoe, but flecks of silver dance in his right, tiny asterisms bewitching in nature, if one gets close enough; she’d first noticed it when they were children at the Academy. She knows they're Itachi's now, a slightly different scattering of luminaries aglow in the deep pitch of obsidian, but they're still as enthralling to her as they had been back then. She dreams of that silver sometimes, recalls it any time she sees something similar in color or reflet.

Blank period, canon-compliant, Sakura-centric, some expanded plot points from Like Gold, fluff and pining, eventually becomes a smut fest with feelings.

Disclaimer: I did not write Naruto. This is a fan-made piece solely created for entertainment purposes.

Rating: M (eventual nsfw-ness)

AO3 Link - FF.net Link - includes beginning/ending author's notes

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Chapter 1/?: An Introduction to Electrocardiography

Sakura gazes out the window of her office, a pile of paperwork set aside for a poetic sort of procrastination, trying to indulge for once in a Konoha spring, though she's finding it arduous.

As pretty as it is this time of year, all she can manage to feel is wistful.

Hanami has come and gone already for the most part, though there are a few stubborn cherry blossom trees lingering at the tail end of their blooming. She can see one here from her window, up on the hillside that slopes towards Hokage Rock, clinging to the uneven land. She’s sure its roots have to be all twisted, a labyrinth of gnarled wood clinging to any scrap of land it can wind itself around as its branches and petals try against all odds to reach upwards into the open sky that she can’t take her eyes off of.

There’s a metaphor in there somewhere, but it’s one she doesn’t care to unpack.

This year was her twentieth viewing of her namesake, though Sakura obviously doesn't remember the first few. Her parents take great pride in the retelling of tales from those first few years of her life, the ones she was too little to remember. The highlights come up annually on her birthday without fail, how she grasped at the petals like they were something precious, clutched in her sticky little hands the entire day.

A framed photograph is perched on one of the built-in shelves of her parents' living room, of her and her father on her first birthday. He was holding her up on unsteady legs, ridiculously proud and pointing towards the camera where her mother had been trying to get her to look. Her short pink hair was flying absolutely everywhere, matching the fluttering petals and in-bloom cherry blossom tree in the background, chubby hands grasping upwards. Strawberry cake and frosting were smeared all over her cheeks. They’d had a picnic for her, at the park nearest to their house.

“We came home and cleaned you up, and then your father helped you water your tree for the first time, in the little pink watering pail you unwrapped earlier. You were so cute.” That’s what her mom says every year. Sakura has the sentence memorized at this point, could recite it on cue, if she needed to.

Her parents had planted a cherry blossom sapling in their backyard a few days after they brought her home from the hospital as a newborn, so the tree is around the same age she is. She used to spend time under it often, as a kid, and some of her earliest memories involve sprawling beneath it to study the heavens while her mother gardened. She would also sneak berries from the patch when her back was turned. Sometimes her dad would join in her pilferage, and they would sit beneath the tree like a couple of bandits with stained lips, though those first few years she can remember he barely fit underneath it, as tall as he is. Many a tickle fight had been had, shaded by those branches. She would read books there on nice afternoons, when she was a little older.

The tree is fully grown now, also on the final cusp of its blooming for the year, floriferous wood expanded outwards to drape her childhood stomping grounds in a sea of soft pink. They have a picnic under it every year, in her family’s backyard, when they celebrate her birthday together. Her actual birthday has come and gone, but her birthday dinner is two days from now. Her parents swung by her apartment on Sunday afternoon for a bit with outlandishly large cupcakes, but her mom had mentioned they’d do dinner and a gift on their usual night, Thursday, since it works so well with their schedules every other week.

“We have to have your picnic, under your tree, like always. It’s a tradition! My beautiful girl. I can’t believe you’re twenty. It seems like just yesterday you were only yay high,” her dad had told her, gesturing below his knees before hugging her too tightly, ruffling the hair she'd inherited from him before they left. The cupcakes were strawberry with cream cheese frosting, one of her favorite treats. They’d left her with four extra to enjoy between then and Thursday, one for each day if she wanted it, turning her birthday into more of a week-long affair than a one-day celebration.

She and Ino had demolished two of them while watching some of the terrible movies they love to hate together, later that evening. It had been a smorgasbord of strawberries, really, because they'd washed them down with strawberry daiquiris, sugary sweetness topped with ridiculous amounts of whipped cream. They'd sat on her balcony, after, sipping a little tipsily and just looking.

"You should try to enjoy your namesake more this year, Forehead. You're so busy that I'm not sure you've realized, but you've really grown into it," Ino had said, beckoning vaguely towards a Konoha beginning to bloom, renewed with a warm breeze, spring ushered in by a fluttering of pink petals. Ino likes to give compliments in roundabout ways, she’s learned over the course of their friendship; crass as the blonde can be, she does have her moments. Her words meant a lot to Sakura, so she’s trying to take them to heart, to stop and smell the cherry blossoms, so to speak. It won’t be long before Konoha crescendos into the sweltering heat of the summer.

She loves her parents and her friends. She really does.

But birthdays are weird, Sakura thinks.

Last year, Sasuke had sent her a letter on her birthday. She’s reread it so many times that she has it more than memorized; it’s stitched into the muscle tissue of her heart at this point, or maybe scarred into the lining of her aortic valve, sempiternal markings adorning the tunnels that sustain her, causing her breath to catch every time.

Sakura,

Hanami has come to the wilderness in the Land of Honey. Bees are awakening and foraging for the first pollen of the season, with which to begin again. Cherry blossom petals are everywhere, lining the pathways and floating on the water.

Happy birthday.

-Sasuke

It had been short, simple, and even a little poetic; she had cherished it, as she does all of his other letters. She’d cherished the pressed flower with it just as much; a cherry blossom, neatly flattened with a precision that screamed Sasuke, near exactly the same shade of pink as her hair.

Sakura had started crying when she unfolded the paper to reveal it sitting atop his words. His hawk had waited patiently at her office window for a response to be written and tied to its leg, perched atop the windowsill and watching the goings-on of the village below, absolutely no concept in its predator brain of how much she delights in seeing it fly, a graceful tether to the boy - now man - she has been in love with for ages.

Cherry blossom petals are everywhere. Is there a hidden meaning there, or is she making a mountain out of a molehill?

She’s tried not to read too much into the letters. She's not sure if he sends any to Naruto or not; she's too afraid to ask, because she'll either get a heart-pounding hope if he doesn't get them, or a soul-crushing disappointment if he does. She can't imagine him sending a yellow flower to Naruto, but he may very well have sent him a different gift for his birthday.

Maybe he just thought she would like a flower, which she did - it’s pressed for safekeeping, along with all of his other correspondence to her, sporadically and chronologically throughout a book she keeps on her nightstand, An Introduction to Electrocardiography. It is her take on an album of small things she holds close to her own heart, things she wishes she could read in his. Sakura didn’t want to buy an actual album for such a thing; that felt too formal, for something as ambiguous as her ties to Sasuke, overflowing on her end as they may be. So she’d settled on a book about deciphering the heart’s tells based on science only, electrical impulses and repolarization, the sizes and positions of the chambers, how to diagnose conditions utilizing one’s findings. It’s one she doesn’t need access to anymore, extremely familiar with EKGs after years of study. She’d wanted it to be something no-nonsense, all hard facts and data on how to read activity plotted over time.

Evidence-based. Are letters evidence, though? She’s not sure that would hold up as empirical proof in any of the scholarly journals she’s studied or submitted work to since beginning her research. She thinks wryly, though, based on what she has witnessed get published, that scientific verification doesn’t always matter if you know the right people.

She’s thought many times sifting through it that perhaps it is too optimistic, too hopeful of a book subject for such a thing. Sakura has agonized over it, frankly, wondering whether it was an inappropriate choice.

...But now that they’re in there, it might ache worse to move them somewhere else.

It’s the last day of March now, and she didn’t get a letter this month, which is unusual, because she’s gotten one near each month in the time that he’s been away. She’s paged through the book a few times over the past several days, rereading and admiring the preserved sakura blossom, frozen in suspended animation indefinitely on a page about precordial leads.

Sakura hadn’t really expected anything from him for her birthday, other than a monthly letter like he usually sends... but this year she didn’t even get that. She’s trying really hard to not be disappointed. She has so much to be thankful for, in the grand scheme of things...

...But the petals of the cherry blossom from last year have faded over time, she’d evaluated yesterday, sitting in her bedroom. It might be like her, always pressed in a book, fading whilst stuck indefinitely between the boundless teeth of academia. There is always more data to record, more evidence, with which one can prove or disprove their findings.

No letter this month, though. Nothing to record, no new evidence.

It might be time to move the letters somewhere else, she thinks pensively. Maybe a place where she’s not tempted to look at them all the time; their placement in the book, small scraps of paper that stick out in only a couple of places, makes it easy to go back and reread them. She’s pretty sure she has an empty shoebox in her closet that she could move them to, in a pile rather than catalogued between pages rife with information and a fragile sort of hope. Maybe she’ll do it tonight, put it up in the far right corner of the upper shelf, shoved towards the back so she can’t reach it without the stool, so she’s not tempted whenever the next bout of heartsickness slams into her like one of Tsunade-shishou’s fists used to. She needs to go by the library after work first, to return some things, but maybe when she gets home, she’ll do it. She could eat a cupcake, too; that might make it a little easier.

Sakura misses him so much. She misses the faint smell of woodsmoke and sage, and mismatched eyes captivating in their intensity and unfathomable depths. The Rinnegan is beautiful, soft lavender ringed by hypnotizing layers of circle and tomoe, but flecks of silver dance in his right, tiny asterisms bewitching in nature, if one gets close enough; she’d first noticed it when they were children at the Academy. She knows they're Itachi's now, a slightly different scattering of luminaries aglow in the deep pitch of obsidian, but they're still as enthralling to her as they had been back then.

She dreams of that silver sometimes, recalls it any time she sees something similar in color or reflet. There’s an extremely unique necklace in an antique shop she visits with Ino and Sai from time to time, and occasionally on her own, over on the northeast side of town. It’s a salt-and-pepper diamond, dark grey with inclusions, dainty and set in what must be a hand-fabricated setting. It hangs from a silver chain, towards the back of a display case filled with other vintage and distinctive pieces, but it’s the only one she ever finds herself drawn to. It is so similar to his right eye, dark smoke near black, speckled with beguiling silver startling in its clarity. The bevel cut reveals new flecks dependent on the angle at which you view it.

Sakura studies it closely on each visit, because it is so hauntingly breathtaking and it reminds her of him.

Ino has said it’s not her color, and that she should stick to warm tones and gold, for which she is better suited; Sakura has not confessed to her why it catches her eye so much. Sai has agreed with his girlfriend on the coloring note, sensitive as he is to such things, but the way he studies her every time she tears herself away from it makes her suspect he knows exactly why it captivates her so. It’s been sitting there for years at this point; she has to mentally talk herself out of buying it on each visit. It’s beautiful, but she would spend far too much time gawking at it, and it might hurt more with extended study than the gentle tugging at her heart she experiences when she’s in that old building throughout tiny fragments of lackadaisical afternoons.

Sasuke has been gone for a long time. She hopes he's finding the peace he's been seeking, that he's seeing the world with new eyes just as he'd imagined. She thinks of him every day, sends out little orisons like petals in the breeze in the hopes that they’ll find him, wherever he is.

I wonder where he is now.

Try as she does to enjoy the breath of spring Konoha is right now, and her namesake as Ino said, all she can seem to do is shift her vision to the sky, hoping against hope for a glimpse of a familiar bird-of-prey that will stay an ample amount of time for her to craft a response, before it abvolates away for another month.

Sakura smiles, then, close to laughing at the absurdity of it all, because she is so predictable. She loves this village despite its many flaws and challenges, despite the things about it she and Naruto and Kakashi-sensei and Ino and even Tsunade-shishou, off in the Land of Wind, are trying to change, but even after so many years, she’s still pining for something beyond it, something in the wilds of the sky just beyond her reach.

There’s always next year, she supposes, pupils drawn again towards the outstretched branches of the cherry blossom tree on the hill, before trailing her eyes along further. She can grow a little more to try to reach him. When she was little, she had wanted to grow tall so she could try to touch a star, like the branches of the tree in her backyard did when she and her father laid beneath them on balmy summer nights. He would tell her ridiculous stories about all of the constellations, things she knew had to be untrue, even at the ripe age of five. Precocious, he’d always called her, but in the loving, joking manner he had.

Her gaze follows the horizon, leisurely taking in the rest of her home. It really is a lovely day, despite her yearning. Spring is here again, and today's is a gentle sunset, one last little bit of sunlight with which to conclude March. The temperature is already spiking, unusually warm for early spring, but summers in the Land of Fire are always hot. She really should finish her paperwork, but it’s hard to find the motivation just yet.

Something possesses her, then, to turn her neck more, take in more of the skyline's continuation. She wants to see all of it.

And then Sakura’s eyes fall on an achingly familiar figure cloaked all in black, perched only a roof away and observing her, and she thinks she must have nodded off, because she has to be dreaming.

She subtly pinches herself in the millisecond of time that follows, but she is very much awake.

The words are blooming out of her throat before she can even process what’s happening, exultation sinking into her every vein. “Sasuke-kun!” She moves to crank her window open the rest of the way, and he hops from the neighboring roof down into her office, all nimble legerity that she still thinks has to be a mere mirage conjured from her memories. When he straightens to his full height, she muses that he has to have grown taller. The mere sound of his footsteps on the tile flooring, as familiar a refrain to her as if he’d just walked out of the village yesterday, are a treasure beyond price.

“Sakura.” His voice is a rich timbre that she has desperately felt the absence of; hearing him say her name almost makes her want to cry. She smiles wider instead, to the extent that it almost hurts, and her gaze latches hungrily onto the very eye she was just daydreaming about. A storm of soot and silver, beveled into countless fragments like some kind of dark, rustic diamond, and so staggeringly beautiful that she’s pretty sure she’s blushing just from beholding it. Gods, it's not fair for someone to be so handsome.

“When did you get back?” She asks, utterly overcome with joy. This is better than a letter or any birthday gift she could have received, brighter than any star she’s beheld.

“Just now.” He’s smiling, a small and subtle upturn of lips that is so characteristic of him. Then his words hit her, and her face must be getting redder.

Just now? As in…

“I’m sorry I missed your birthday,” he adds before she can simmer on that for too long, and she has to blink in bewilderment, because that is the absolute last thing she expected him to say. Sakura wonders how much heat can creep into one’s face before they spontaneously combust.

Then she realizes she should probably respond, as humans tend to do in conversations. “Oh! Um… it’s okay.” She folds her hands in front of her shyly, grinning like an idiot. “Thank you for remembering.”

There is a lengthy moment in which she just soaks him in, hoping he can read in her eyes how much she’s missed him. He is still so beautiful, prized eyes and aristocratic angles that have solidified a bit more into the face of a man in the time that’s passed. His hair is different now, covering his Rinnegan eye. His cloak is a little more threadbare, too. He’s tall.

His expression, normally unreadable, is calm. Content, even.

There’s a question nagging at her that she knows she needs to ask. She tries not to bite her lip as she asks it, braces herself for the possibility of not liking the answer.

“Are you… just back for a little while?”

Did you find what you were searching for?

He gazes at her for so long that she thinks he may be glimpsing her soul, peeking into her ventricles to see his own words immortalized there, seared into her core to be felt each time her blood pumps.

“...For more than a while.” And she smiles the biggest she ever has. Oh, this is so much better than a letter or a gift.

“Well, welcome back, Sasuke-kun. It’s… very good to see you again.” It feels as if a piece of her heart has been returned to her, something of the divine stitched back into her chest and full to bursting in omneity.

There is a pause, and then he’s reaching his hand out towards hers, initiating physical contact with a touch that is feather light, so gentle she thinks she is going to start sobbing.

She can’t help it; she pulls him into a hug, tinged with elation. She hopes he doesn’t mind too much; he stiffens for a brief moment, but then settles, wrapping his arm around her and settling his head atop of hers, and she could die happy right there, embracing him with feelings momentarily set free from where they’ve been whelved into her chest.

He smells faintly like sage and smoked cedar, just as she remembered. She can hear his heart thumping, a strong cadence, and it grounds her. Oh, she’s missed him.

“...I’m home, Sakura.” Soft words float above her head, and she can feel the vibration of them through his chest, right by her ear.

Oh, she’s crying.

Sasuke lets her embrace him for a long time, for which she is so grateful. She knows he’s not one for physical contact; it’s a privilege to be allowed into his space even for a single second, let alone for an extended period.

She draws back eventually, glancing up at him again through the tears still collecting in her eyes. Her face blazes when he reaches to wipe them away tenderly with a calloused hand, careful and with a lenity that she’s always known was there, hidden under the surface.

She could just stare at him for hours, she thinks as he lowers his hand. He’s still looking down at her with one of the softest expressions she has ever seen him wear. She really hopes she’s not dreaming.

It’s tremendously hard to get it together, but she tries, because she doesn’t want to spend the entire time crying, not when he's finally back. There are so many questions she’d like to ask him that she’s finding it a challenge to pick one with which to lead.

He surprises her by speaking first, quietly. “I… had something made for you.”

It takes a moment for the words to compute.

Made for me?

Her processing speed must be exceptionally slow, stuck in the utter mush her insides have become, because he adds, “...For your birthday.”

Sakura blinks, and furrows her brows in confusion. “Made… for me?”

He nods. “...I’m sorry it’s late.” The way he speaks it is cryptic, like the apology weighs more than one needed for a tardy gift. Doesn’t he know she doesn’t care? He could have showed up in July with something for her, and it still would have made her knees weak and her heart thump furiously in her chest.

Made for me? She’s still stuck on that sentiment as he breaks eye contact and turns to rummage through his satchel, beneath his cloak.

Sasuke pulls out a medium-sized flat box, a simple white, and she doesn’t know what she expected, but it wasn’t that. Something that comes in a box is a lot more formal than a pressed cherry blossom, something more… permanent.

She reaches out to take it on autopilot, and is stupidly distracted by the way his hand brushes against hers, a small spark that makes something in her quake. She wonders if he felt it, too.

Sakura clutches the box with both hands like her life depends on it, murmuring softly, “Thank you, Sasuke-kun.” She’ll wait until later to open it, after he’s left; whatever it is, she doesn’t want to embarrass him, and she also isn’t sure she can tear her eyes away from him just yet, anyways.

Is it just the lighting in her office, or are his ears a little flushed? She didn’t notice that before; maybe he’s had a drawn-out journey back. She wonders how much ground he covered today, if he’s still winded. He might need to rest.

But then he mumbles, voice husky with what she assumes is disuse, “...You should open it.”

His words echo in her head again. I… had something made for you.

“Okay,” she answers in a hushed voice, so she doesn’t scare him away, shifting slightly to set the box on her desk carefully. Suddenly she is very nervous, anticipation settling into her gut.

When she lifts the lid, she swears her heart ceases beating.

The most exquisitely intricate uchiwa fan she has ever laid eyes upon is placed in the box before her.

It’s carved into a likeness of a cherry blossom tree, branches twisting lissomely into bamboo framework, impossibly fine. A different set of words is reverberating in her head now.

You should try to enjoy your namesake more this year, Forehead. You're so busy that I'm not sure you've realized, but you've really grown into it.

Made for me?

“O-oh.” Sakura is not sure what she expected, but it wasn’t this. She fights back the tears, biting her lip and wide eyes soaking it all in, enjoying her namesake in a way that is entirely unprecedented in its sheer severity. The amount of time it would have taken for someone to sculpt and bind and sew is unimaginable; every detail is finely wrought, flawless down to the silk and stitching, lacquered and carved pale wood shifting effortlessly into eighty slivers of bamboo, intricately webbing silk together with the lithe grace of gossamer. It’s a cherry blossom tree, petals and all, pearlescent thread shifting slightly, gorgeously in the light, unimaginable detail. She has stitched people back together countless times over the course of years, but even her expert dexterity would look like a child’s first embroidery stitching in comparison. The stamen within the petals are nearly more detailed and finely milled than an actual, real life cherry blossom, plexure sutured in a fashion so baronial that it’s impossible to believe human hands were even responsible for it.

The silk. Oh, the silk. The color shift bears a striking resemblance to the Uchiha insignia. This is not a gift one gives to a teammate.

Oh, she's crying.

This has to be a dream, some kind of paracosm her heart thought up to give her brain the high of a lifetime. Hope burgeons and unfolds in her chest cavity, bleeding into her extremities like the pale pink shifting into red before her eyes. She’s never, ever going to forget this, not even if she lives to be one hundred years old.

Made for me?

She picks it up with disbelieving hands, grasping it more carefully than she’s ever held anything in her entire life, as if she’s going to wake up at any moment and it will dissolve into synapse, lost in the hazy juncture of morning the way one tends to lose awareness of the contents of a dream upon coming to lucidity. To her absolute bewilderment, it stays solid in her hands, a finery made even more unbelievable by touch. The grooves of the carving are as gentle as his hand had been on hers earlier. She thinks it would have had to be commissioned at least a few months in advance, outlandishly expensive. She’s never seen silk like this. She doesn't know; she's smart, but she's no artisan. Maybe she should ask Sai. She's crying.

She adores it.

Tears won’t stop welling in her eyes; she thinks they may be escaping from a tender spot inside her chest that’s been reserved for him since she was a child, a leak in a metaphorical dam. She takes a steadying breath, blinks, almost has them conquered. Get a grip, Sakura.

Then Sasuke’s hand is on hers, gently turning the handle over.

Her name is carved into the pale wood, on the back in formal calligraphy, Sakura daintier and more perfect than she could ever write it, as if it had just been uncovered in one of the inner layers rather than whittled there manually. Sasuke presses her fingers to it before loosening his grip, and in that second it feels as though his lost hand is in the wood, caressing her from split atoms in the grooves from the other side.

The tears spill over her cheeks - she admits defeat - intricacy of the entire thing blurring out of focus but still somehow burned into her retinas for all eternity.

Made for me, made for me, made for me-

Her voice finds her after a few more tears fall. “It’s beautiful.” Her voice is barely above a whisper, overwhelmed with complete and utter awe, trying desperately to choke down a sob. “Thank you, Sasuke-kun. I… I’ll treasure it. Always.” She cradles the fan closer to her chest, her heart - maybe An Introduction to Electrocardiography wasn’t a poorly-chosen book, after all; there is much to be read from something this precious - and regards him with watery eyes. She wishes she wasn’t crying; the distortion of the tears is making it hard to see the silver she’s loved and missed so much.

His hand lifts to her face after a moment, and to her surprise, he wipes away her tears again. She barely catches the something-more in his eyes, then, through the waterworks, precious metal flashing and pouring into the words scarred into her ventricles to live there forever, fortified in silver, but he is looking at her so -

“...Always,” he agrees, voice a little breathless, sparking scintilla near hypnotizing her in their luster, and he seems so happy -

Then he leans down to press his lips gently to hers, and this is better than her heart stopping, like when she opened the box. This time, her heart soars, and she touches a star she’s been dreaming of for eons.

#naruto #sasusaku #ssfanfiction #cherry writes #like silver #fanfiction #i'm really out here with just hundreds of pages of fanfiction in my google doc drafts huh

[jackie-talks-about-starkid]

The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals (Rewatch #11, 11/20/2020)

YouTube publish date: December 23, 2018

Number of views on date of rewatch: 4, 394, 741

Original Performance Run: October 11 - November 4, 2018 at the Matrix Theater in Los Angeles

Ticket price: General Admission - $37, Priority - $69      Digital Ticket: $15      Rush Ticket via TodayTix: $18

Director: Nick Lang

Music and Lyrics: Jeff Blim

Book: Matt Lang and Nick Lang

Cast album price and availability: $9.99 on iTunes      Release date: December 23, 2018

Parody or original: original content, slightly inspired by Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Funding: $127,792 by 3,419 backers via Kickstarter (x)      Original Goal: $60,000

Main cast and characters

Paul - John Matteson

Emma - Lauren Lopez

Ted - Joey Richter

Charlotte - Jamie Lyn Beatty

Bill - Corey Dorris

Professor Hidgens - Robert Manion

Sam/General McNamara - Jeff Blim

Alice/Greenpeace Girl - Mariah Rose Faith

Musical numbers

     Act I

“The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals” Characters: Ensemble “ La Dee Dah Dah Day” Characters: Ensemble “What Do You Want, Paul?” Characters: Mr. Davidson and Paul “Cup of Roasted Coffee” Characters: Nora, Zoey, and Emma “Cup of Poisoned Coffee” Characters: Nora, Zoey, Hot Chocolate Boy, and Ensemble “Show Me Your Hands” Characters: Sam, Police Woman, Police Man “You Tied Up My Heart” Characters: Sam and Charlotte “Join Us (And Die)” Characters: Charlotte and Sam

     Act II

“Not Your Seed” Characters: Alice and friends “Show Stoppin’ Number” Characters: Professor Hidgens “America Is Great Again” Characters: General McNamara and Ensemble “Let Him Come” Characters: Ensemble “Let It Out” Characters: Paul and Ensemble “Inevitable” Characters: Paul, Ensemble, and Emma

Notable Notes:

The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals won 12 2019 BroadwayWorld Los Angeles Awards (x)

Best Musical - Local

Choreography - Local: James Tolbert

Costume Design - Local: June Saito

Director of a Musical - Local: Nick Lang

Featured Actor in a Musical - Local: Robert Manion (Joey Richter and Corey Dorris were the other two nominees in this category)

Featured Actress in a Musical - Local: Jaime Lyn Beatty (Mariah Rose Faith was also nominated)

Leading Actor in a Musical - Local: Jon Matteson

Leading Actress in a Musical - Local: Lauren Lopez

Lighting Design - Local: Sarah Petty

Musical Director - Local: Matt Dahan

Scenic Design - Local: Corey Lubowich

Sound Design - Local: Ilana Elroi and Brian Rosenthal

Cultural Context: 2018

The #MeToo movement originated by Tarana Burke gains international popularity on social media

The revival of Queer Eye premiers on Netflix

Beyoncé headlines Coachella (#Beychella), becoming the first black woman to do so for the music festival

Megan Markle marries Prince Harry

Avengers: Infinity War opens in theaters on April 27th

Content Analysis:

The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals has the most original concept of a musical I can think of for any piece of musical theatre, on Broadway or off. It is a musical that is focused on Paul, a guy who, believe it or not, doesn't like musicals, but due to a mysterious zombie-like infection brought to his town, Hatchetfield, finds himself stuck in an apocalyptic scenario in which anyone can be infected by a hive-mind that forces anyone it infects to behave as if they were in a musical. Because of this, the only people who actually perform musical numbers in the show are those around Paul who are infected with this musical disease, which makes each musical performance all the more dramatic, as well as allows for the acting of the main characters to be much more at the center of attention than they would normally be if the characters were expected to sing out their feelings as if the audience were watching them develop through the lens of a traditional musical.

The strong book and emphasis on the characterization of the small main ensemble highlights the incredibly strong performances by the actors. The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals is an interesting work in StarKid's repertoire in that the characters represented onstage are the most 'normal' characters the audience has seen in a StarKid universe. By now, the Starkid audience is used to seeing either parodies of well-known works, such as Harry Potter or the DC comic universe, inventive imaginings of other universes or periods of time, such as Starship or Firebringer. Yet, this production emphasizes the kind of characters and settings one sees in everyday life rather than the characters one sees in a sci-fi novel or fantasy world. The characters are played to represent a specific type of character often seen in media, and specifically mimic horror movie tropes with a comedic twist. For example, Professor Hidgens represents the off-kilter scholarly type, Paul is the everyday man dragged into the evil schemes of an unknown being's plot, Emma is the relatable final girl, etc. Yet, these character types and what they represent mirror the kind of everyday people we see in reality. Sure, they are written and played with comedic intent but their lives and place in the plot are human enough that the audience does not need to make the make-believe leap of connecting with non-human or glorified human characters-these people ARE human. Emma is an intelligent woman whose adventurous life turned into one full of grief for her sister and finds herself stuck in a terrible job in the hometown she tried so hard to get away from. Paul is a simple man playing the reluctant hero, but whose heart and genuine care for the people he is close to reminds us of the best of humanity when our society is constantly filled with examples of our worst behaviors. Bill just wants a relationship with the daughter he's drifting away from, Charlotte just wants her husband to love her, and Ted is there because, let's be honest here, we all know a Ted.

The characters also happen to be played by actors the audience would not expect to play that specific character type. For example, Joey Richter is known for playing lovable, funny, and relatable characters in StarKid's works, yet in The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals, he plays the most morally repugnant yet incredibly hilarious characters in the show and he plays that part so well and so convincingly that it's hard to believe he's actually playing against his type. Jaime Lyn Beatty, like other StarKid works, performs a strong, comedic character type as she always does, yet her performance as Charlotte has the most dynamic internal life of any character the StarKid audience has seen her play.

The most notable performance comes from Jon Matteson who plays Paul. His role as the protagonist, who is onstage nearly the entire, time holds the piece and the universe of the story together so perfectly. His dry delivery and incredible comedic timing work so well for the character that it feels as though you can go up to Matteson right after the finale and expect to talk to Paul himself because he embodies the role so well. Matteson’s performance feels so natural and honest that it's heartbreaking, even for the most fanatic musical theatre nerd, to watch him realize that he's fallen victim to the Apotheosis and turns into the thing he hates the most-a musical theatre character.

A horror-comedy musical is a hard thing to pull off, especially on a budget that was almost entirely crowdfunded, and even harder to execute successfully, which is why the only few commercial horror-musical comedy staples I can think of at the moment art Little Shop of Horrors, Sweeney Todd, and to a certain extent, Heathers. Yet the consistent hard work that goes into creating a StarKid musical and the unique environment that process produces makes anything seem possible and destined for success. The level of creativity going into this production company and the work they create as a team is something that just cannot be done with traditional musical theatre as seen on Broadway because of such large overhead and emphasis on creating a profit rather than creating art. There have been and will continue to be many different creative teams making unique musicals for the general public, but taking into account global accessibility for all demographics and concept originally, The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals proves StarKid continues to take the lead and doesn’t need the exclusion of any demographic in order to do so.

P.S. Happy Black Friday! Don’t forget to get in line to buy your Wiggly dolls ;)

#@TeamStarkid #the guy who didn't like musicals #tgwdlm #hatchetfield theatrical universe #hatchetfield universe #htu #team starkid #starkid productions #starkid #starkid musicals #musical theatre #theatre #musicals

[bisexual-in-progress]

Writeblr Life Week Day 2 - WIPs

Hiraeth

Ten years after being kidnapped off the streets, twin sisters Dahlia and Iris Lillium are uncomfortably reunited with their elder siblings. Plagued by their memories of the struggles they’ve faced, the mischievous duo struggle to make the reunion last. However, eager as they are to slip away from their overprotective family to explore the world they long since left behind, they soon find themselves face to face with a force threatening to consume it - as well as an old threat that followed them home.

My major project, based on some characters me and some friends made. Dahlia and Iris are very near and dear to my heart, and I’m doing a lot of wordbuilding on this one in order to assure some grand adventures for them. This story includes: A doting older brother who cooks, multiple girls with magical books, an ancient scholarly tower, elves and cat girls and dragon people galore, sisterly hijinks, a golden dragon that is ridiculously large, and the power of love.

Serene Phobia

Every night, Faye is haunted by the same dream: The ocean, a song, and a pale girl. With each iteration comes a growing longing that slowly eats away at her, leaving her to grasp at every chance for distraction. But when the dreams begin to seep into reality, Faye finds herself faced with a choice - stick to the mundane life she’s come to know, or dive headfirst into into an unknown fate?

Something that started as a comic idea, but I can’t really draw very well (at least, consistently) to be honest. I took the plunge into making a story full of lesbian mermaids because I liked the dynamic of a bratty mute mermaid princess and her tough girlfriend who will fight anybody for her. This story contains magical singing, morbid curiosity, lots of hugging, mating dances that lead to souls intertwining forever, a mom for the small lesbian herd, and second chances at happiness.

Seelie

Unofficial Description: There are two rules when interacting with the fae: Never make a deal with them, and never deny an invitation to the Fae Queen’s court. Teenage Rore’s life is turned upside down when an invite to the court leads to her friend Elliot breaking one of these simple rules, forcing her to challenge the Queen in order to change their fates.

Inspired by the album that got me through my last couple of semesters at uni (which I listened to twice today just having thought about it), Seelie is one of my secondary WIPs that I haven’t given much attention yet. It has a very general completed outline, but the details are still left up in the air. I won’t say much about this one beyond the description - partially because there aren’t many details yet to share, partially because it’s going to be a mere ten chapters overall (length of said chapters undecided currently, though).

Untitled (”Fourth Witch”)

Unofficial Description: Once upon a time, three witches were born every century. However, after three witches born as triplets tore the world apart, the cycle mysteriously ended - taking all traces of magic with it. However, rumors of a red-eyed girl have stirred not only rumors of the cycle’s return, but remnants of its past.

So I don’t remember what spurred this idea, honestly. I think I was planning on making an RPG because I know it spawned from messing around with RPG Maker (specifically just messing with the character creator and coming up with designs). It’s pretty much a story of two twins and their two friends going on adventures while some kinda gay shenanigans are going on under their noses.... is the best way I know how to describe it. This one doesn’t have much of a plot yet, but I do plan on getting around to it eventually - it’s just kind of on the backburner. Definitely contains some reincarnation bits, polygamy, some weird aunt-and-uncle-esque pair, and annoying siblings of both the normal and magical variants.

Untitled “Beauty and the Beast”

Unofficial Description: The world is filled with curses bred from sorrow and anger. A rose born from the cycle of pain is cursed with the power to ease it at the cost of herself. By chance she stumbles upon the one who is willing to go to the ends of the world to free her from this fate, as well as others like them who are just looking for a place to call home.

I had a dream recently about a woman happily married to a man who was cursed to be a beast. Key features of this dream were the two of them being very very in love, the girl being cursed in some way, the setting being a somewhat ruined castle on a cliff on a moving island (the staircases were dangerously suspended over the sea with no railings), and the enchantress being a black elf woman who the beast was cool with who was speaking of how the woman would eventually die if she took on too many other curses. Not much to this yet except it’s already turning very much into a found family story.

Untitled “Asylum”

I don’t actually have enough to go on for this one to write a summary at the moment. Also based on a somewhat recent dream (but older than the above), it’s more of an aesthetic right now. A girl wakes up in an asylum run by a witch who very specifically wants her. She tries to escape with a younger boy who is used to the asylum and an older man who was trapped in a fantasy world and is trying to cope with the fact the mundane life he knew was a lie. I wrote down a pretty long summary of the dream, so I have a good deal to work with and already have three of the major characters designed. I’m a bit excited for this one because it’s got a bit of a horror aesthetic going on and I’ve never really touched on horror before.

If any of these stand out to you and you’d like to be added to the taglist, feel free to let me know!

#writeblrlifeweek #writeblr #fantasy #fantasy writing #lgbt writing #wip #wip description #this post has been q'd #long post

[quarantinemusiccalendar]

Day 10: J.S.Bach - St Matthew's passion

What other musical masterpiece could I even introduce on a Good Friday, then one that deals with the Easter story. And when dealing with passion, there are some good ones out there. But none as good as the St Matthew Passion, the oratorio by J.S.Bach.

In 1727, Johann Sebastian Bach, a musical director of the Thomasschule at the St. Thomas Church (Thomaskirche) in Leipzig, being a very competitive and complicated personality, extremely confident in his musical abilities and who had lifelong troubles with authorities, composed a monumental oratorio for the coming Easter. Having a go at this genre once before with his St John Passion in 1724, this time he went even bigger. The St Matthew Passion is written for two choirs and two orchestras and it is even longer and even more atmospheric. I mean, what else is the epitome of the saying “Go big or go home.” Bach himself was aware that he wrote history while composing this music. And even today, this three-hour masterpiece of the St Matthew Passion remains one of the most poignant musical works ever written.(1)

The narration follows the structure of the Gospel of Matthew (Chapters 26 and 27) in the German translation of the Luther Bible. The story begins with the anointing in Bethany, through the Last Supper, the arrest in Gethsemane, the interrogation, the trial before Pontius Pilate, crucifixion and burial.

The aria ”So ist mein Jesus nun gefangen“ (Part 27a - Aria for Soprano and Alto in E minor), a lamentation after the arrest already interspersed with the sounds of a shouting, is followed by a choral “Sind Blitze, sind Donner in Wolken verschwunden?” (Part 27b - Choral in E minor) for both choirs picturing a violent skirmish and the horror and chaos that ensued.

The Choral “Wer hat dich so geschlagen“ (Part 37 - Choral in F major) is a point where the central melody used throughout the work gets simplified and concentrated in a contrite lamentation. It’s based on a simple direct personal question: “Who has hit you?” It’s a peaceful and tender part and could be almost used as prayer on its own. This one single part, less than a minute long, is my most favourite part of the St Matthew Passion and has been a constant spiritual tool of mine for few years now. I keep coming back to it quite often, Easter or not.

The Aria “Erbarme dich“ (Part 39 - Aria for Alto in B minor) begins with a solo for violin which brings in a sense of concentration and utter sadness and grief, then turns again into a melody suggesting compassion and forgiveness. And then the alto joins in and together with the violin they meander through the air in intertwining melodies.

The St Matthew Passion was not heard in more or less its entirety outside Leipzig until 1829, when young Felix Mendelssohn performed a version of it in Berlin. Mendelssohn's revival brought the music of Bach, particularly the large-scale works, to public and scholarly attention. There are a lot of good recordings of the St Matthew Passion out there. A 1989 one by Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists, conducted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner, a 2001 one by Arnold Schoenberg Choir and Wiener Sängerknaben, conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt and  the 2013 one by RIAS Kammerchor and Staats- und Domchor Berlin conducted by René Jacobs  are very good ones. I have also seen it performed live by Collegium 1704 and Collegium Vocale 1704, conducted by Václav Luks here in Prague and it was superb as well. I can recommend it to anyone who would be thinking of getting tickets to seeing it life. But the best one in my opinion is the one from 1998 sung and performed by Collegium Vocale Gent, conducted by Philippe Herreweghe.

Have a nice meaningful Friday, relax and enjoy.

Album highlights: - Part 1 - Chorale “Kommt, ihr Töchter, helft mir klagen” - Part 3 - Chorale “Herzliebster Jesu” - Part 27a - Aria “So ist mein Jesus nun gefangen” & Part 27b - Chorale “Sind Blitze, sind Donner in Wolken verschwunden?“ - Part 29 - Chorale “O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß” - Part 37 - Chorale “Wer hat dich so geschlagen“ - Part 39 - Aria “Erbarme dich” - Part 40 - Chorale “Bin ich gleich von dir gewichen” - Part 65 - Aria “Mache dich, mein Herze, rein”

Playlist: https://spoti.fi/2R41MS0 Note: This is the 2nd playlist, the one for the classical / orchestral music: Quarantine Classical Music Calendar.

Links and References: (1) St. Matthew's passion - J.S. Bach @Flagey.be St Matthew’s passion - Wikipedia

#j. s. bach #st matthew #easter #oratorio #lockdown #quarantine

[noahsalmon-blog]

How to Title an Exposition, if You're Bad at Labeling

When your task is regarding composing a research study newspaper or some other scholarly paper, there is nothing at all even worse than generating the name for your work of art. Some of you might believe it is an quick and easy activity to receive the headline for your term paper, however you ought to certainly not be actually too optimistic within this case. This activity calls for a terrific attempt coming from a writer as the label is some type of a skin of your essay. Thus, if you don't know exactly how to title an essay successfully, listed below are couple of suggestions and ideas for you to manage.

Writing Your Essay Title from the ground up

Most of pupils as well as novice writers dismiss one facet that is exceptionally important at the exact beginning of the creating process. The headline is not a prank, as well as you should be very serious about it.

Yes, also academic essays have to deal with this awful pattern of dismissing fantastic essays along with poor titles. The title of your essay functions as a trigger for a viewers that creates that person decide quite promptly. And it is the only essay title that may create your reader to begin reviewing your essay, specifically in the instance when they do not need to have to.

A lot of readers only offer an essay one opportunity to make it happen, and you as an writer ought to create a blessed strike with the label immediately. And that is what you ought to be actually prepared to. You must begin assuming how to headline an essay before even beginning it. The blank webpage may seem a ordeal for you, but a blank page even without title must create you terrify your trousers off.

3 parts of a great essay label

Listed below you have three major aspects that bring in a label to seem like a top on a king's scalp (in case your newspaper is truly worth of reviewing it):.

- Main topic recap.

- Hook to catch viewers's attention.

- Makes your essay to stand up out from the group.

Three Tips on How to Title an Essay

Allow's start along with 3 practical pointers that will help you to headline your essay properly.

Maintain it easy

Simply try to become quick and accurate. Any type of exposition headline possesses its major function of naming a paper. It means you don't require to go overseas and tell the whole entire story right initially. Merely bring in a conclusion along with couple of terms. It must be crystal clear and also short like a header in your favorite newspaper or trademark to a blockbuster. Simply use handful of words that are going to receive your audience right relevant, and also's it.

Use proper words

While several of you do not recognize where to start, other ones simply do not understand where to quit. An helpful name is going to certainly not contain too fancy term frameworks without make use of. Merely specify and also carry out not waste your opportunity. Make use of couple of major key phrases as triggers that will certainly hook your viewers and produce him carry on reading.

Stay clear of acronyms and also jargon.

You're trying to significant, may not be you? Thus why do you make an effort to make use of those incline lingo phrases in your scientific research work? Do you would like to look smarter than you are actually? Effectively, it is certainly not important to make use of those less-known abbreviations in your essay's title. You can easily utilize those that are actually connected to the major topic but do not make an effort to thrill your audience along with those cheap tricks. It does not work, yet simply intimidates your reader and makes him go additionally to the following service the dining table.

20 Tips on How to Title an Essay

- Take out simply one sentence from your draft as well as create it act as a label.

- Come up along with one thing different than your draft has.

- Use well-known What, Who, When, or even Where inquiry to begin your paper.

- How as well as Why inquiries also in the video game.

- Any various other inquiry trick also creates feeling.

- Get an image that will certainly entice your audience.

- Get a unexpected photo that has nothing at all alike along with your subject matter.

- Those names with - ing phrases consistently operate.

- Those names with On phrase are actually also fascinating.

- Make your header lie regarding your primary subject.

- Describe your major topic with simply one term. Is it possible? If of course, you possess your headline.

- Or even if there is no evident phrase, you may make an effort to acquire some enigma around along with yet another certainly not extremely noticeable phrase.

- Any two-word headline.

- Any three-word label.

- Any four-word title.

- Any five-word title.

- Steal or even spin and rewrite any sort of well-known record, flick, album title that matches your essay.

- Did you acquire something also evident and also basic? Pretend you're Yoda and also turn the terms.

- Pretend you're Yoda redoing any sort of popular record, motion picture, album title that fits your essay.

- Join pair of straightforward titles in a double one.

Verdict

Our provider does not intend to claim that the head of your essay participates in the major part in its success. No. Our team only desire to point out that it matters and also matters a great deal. It is actually up to you to make a decision where the boundary of the "a lot" ends. Merely always remember these 4 straightforward policies concerning title functionalities:.

- Content prophecy.

- Attention grabbing.

- Tone image.

- Keywords maintaining.

While keeping these four tips in your thoughts, you get a far better perspective of the whole job of the header.

Title-writing is not simply a duty for a few minutes. It is a process, as well as you should address it like that. While composing your essay, you're operating as a artist who is actually creating his work of art, the procedure of title-writing makes you think a lot more like an archivist or even compressor. You need to press the entire notification and also subject matter into just one straightforward, quick, yet a very clear and memorable words. Take your time as well as perform not rush, of training program, if your deadline enables you. If you still possess any questions or really want to get professional aid, just fill out our simple purchase type, and our company will definitely assist you out.

#Essay

[liamdasler-blog]

Just how to Title an Exposition, if You are actually Bad at Entitling

Every time your task concerns creating a research newspaper or even every other scholarly newspaper, there is actually absolutely nothing even worse than generating the title for your showpiece. A number of you might assume it is actually an easy duty to receive the headline for your investigation newspaper, however you must certainly not be too confident in this case. This task calls for a excellent effort from a article writer as the headline is some kind of a skin of your essay. Thus, if you do not recognize how to label an essay successfully, here are few pointers as well as tips for you to handle along with.

Composing Your Essay Title from square one

Most of pupils and also novice article writers ignore one aspect that is actually very significant at the very start of the creating method. The label is actually certainly not a joke, and you need to be quite major about it.

Yes, also scholastic essays suffer from this dreadful fad of disregarding great essays along with poor labels. The headline of your essay functions as a trigger for a viewers that creates her or him make choices very quickly. And also it is actually the only essay headline that can easily create your reader to start reading your essay, especially in the event when they don't need to have to.

The majority of viewers merely give an essay one odds to create it occur, as well as you as an writer should make a blessed strike with the headline as soon as possible. And also is what you need to be actually prepped to. You ought to start assuming just how to title an essay prior to also starting it. The empty page may seem to be a headache for you, however a blank page even without label must make you intimidate your pants off.

3 elements of a really good essay headline

Below you have 3 main parts that create a label to resemble a crown on a king's head (in instance your newspaper is actually actually worth of reading it):.

- Main topic summary.

- Hook to grab viewers's focus.

- Makes your essay to attract attention coming from the crowd.

Three Tips on How to Title an Essay

Allow's start along with three practical ideas that will assist you to label your essay properly.

Keep it basic

Just try to be actually quick and also accurate. Any kind of composition label possesses its own primary functionality of calling a study. It implies you don't need to go overseas and also tell the whole entire tale right initially. Only create a summary along with couple of words. It needs to be very clear and quick like a header in your beloved paper or even trademark to a runaway success. Merely utilize handful of phrases that will get your reader right to the aspect, and also's it.

Usage appropriate phrases

While a few of you don't know where to begin, other ones simply do not recognize where to stop. An successful title will definitely certainly not have also lavish phrase frameworks with no usage. Just receive to the point and also perform not squander your time. Use couple of principal search phrases as triggers that will definitely hook your visitor as well as produce him proceed reading.

Avoid acronyms and slang.

You're attempting to severe, aren't you? So why perform you attempt to make use of those incline jargon words in your science work? Do you intend to look smarter than you are? Effectively, it is not essential to utilize those less-known acronyms in your essay's label. You can utilize those that are attached to the principal topic yet do not make an effort to wow your viewers along with those affordable techniques. It doesn't work, however merely frightens your viewers and also creates him go even further to the following deal with the table.

20 Tips on How to Title an Essay

- Take out only one sentence from your draft and also create it function as a title.

- Come up with something various than your draft includes.

- Use famous What, Who, When, or Where question to begin your newspaper.

- How and also Why concerns additionally in the activity.

- Any various other inquiry secret additionally makes good sense.

- Get an image that is going to entice your viewers.

- Get a shocking graphic that possesses absolutely nothing alike with your subject matter.

- Those titles with - ing words constantly function.

- Those labels with On phrase are likewise intriguing.

- Make your header deception about your main topic.

- Describe your primary subject along with only one word. Is it achievable? If of course, you have your label.

- Or if there is actually no evident phrase, you may make an effort to receive some puzzle around with an additional certainly not extremely evident phrase.

- Any two-word headline.

- Any three-word title.

- Any four-word title.

- Any five-word title.

- Steal or revise any type of famous record, motion picture, cd title that accommodates your essay.

- Did you get something too noticeable as well as simple? Claim you're Yoda and turn the terms.

- Pretend you're Yoda redoing any type of popular record, movie, album title that matches your essay.

- Join 2 straightforward titles in a dual one.

Verdict

Our provider doesn't intend to state that the head of your essay plays the principal duty in its own results. No. Our experts simply would like to claim that it matters and matters a great deal. It depends on you to choose where the border of the "a lot" sides. Only consider these 4 simple policies regarding title functions:.

- Content prediction.

- Attention grabbing.

- Tone image.

- Keywords keeping.

While always keeping these 4 pointers in your mind, you obtain a much better scenery of the whole entire job of the header.

Title-writing is actually not simply a job for a couple of moments. It is a method, as well as you ought to manage it like that. While creating your essay, you're functioning as a artist who is making his masterwork, the process of title-writing makes you feel much more like an archivist or converter. You require to compress the whole information and also topic in to simply one easy, short, but a very clear and appealing phrase. Take your opportunity and also perform not hurry, obviously, if your deadline enables you. If you still possess any type of questions or even intend to receive expert assistance, only fill out our straightforward order blank, as well as we are going to help you out.

#Essay

[topmixtrends]

OF HOW MANY literary journalists can we say that one of the defining intellectual publications of the second half of the 20th century grew out of a piece of that journalist’s occasional criticism? Probably not many, and yet that’s exactly what Elizabeth Hardwick achieved with her 1959 Harper’s Magazine essay “The Decline of Book Reviewing.” Four years after the essay appeared, the editor who had commissioned it — Robert B. Silvers, who died earlier this year — went on to found, with Barbara Epstein, The New York Review of Books, enlisting the support of A. Whitney Ellsworth, Jason Epstein, Robert Lowell — and Elizabeth Hardwick, whose essay Silvers always pointed to as the earliest source of inspiration. “That essay is crucial,” he told New York magazine on the occasion of the Review’s 50th anniversary in 2013.

“The Decline of Book Reviewing,” included here in a long-overdue collection of Hardwick’s essays (selected by the novelist and critic Darryl Pinckney and published by NYRB Classics), is a powerful and persuasive broadside against the “sweet, bland commendations” that were all too common in the book pages of daily newspapers in Hardwick’s time — and, one is a little embarrassed to admit, are still too common in the twittering society of mutual admiration that is our literary culture today. In a famous passage, Hardwick berated The New York Times for the “flat praise and the faint dissension, the minimal style and the light little article, the absence of involvement, passion, character, eccentricity — the lack, at last, of the literary tone itself,” that too often characterized its literary coverage. She viewed the Times as a kind of bloated provincial rag — a judgment that surely must have ruffled a few metropolitan furs over at the Gray Lady. Yet Hardwick, despite her polemical tone, was being more than just polemical: she was being hostile in the defense of a value. (She did not generally traffic in gratuitous hatchet jobs or cultural postmortems.) She took books — literature — seriously, and could not suffer the sight of alleged newspapers of record treating something so important so blandly:

[T]he drama of the book world is being slowly, painlessly killed. Everything is somehow alike, whether it be a routine work of history by a respectable academic, a group of platitudes from the Pentagon, a volume of verse, a work of radical ideas, a work of conservative ideas. Simple “coverage” seems to have won out over the drama of opinion; “readability,” a cozy little word, has taken the place of the old-fashioned requirement of a good, clear prose style, which is something else. All differences of excellence, of position, of form are blurred by the slumberous acceptance. The blur eases good and bad alike, the conventional and the odd, so that it finally appears that the author like the reviewer really does not have a position.

Hardwick was in her early 40s when she wrote “The Decline of Book Reviewing.” The last essay included here in The Collected Essays, an appreciation of Nathanael West, appeared in The New York Review of Books in 2003, when Hardwick was 87. In the intervening four decades she not only managed to live up to her own exacting standards (the dull thought, the tired phrase, may knock but never enter), but she also grew to become one of the 20th century’s towering writer-critics, deserving of a seat at the table of Virginia Woolf and V. S. Pritchett. Like them, she approached criticism artistically, metaphorically. George Eliot, she writes in one of the essays collected here, was “melancholy, headachey, with a slow, disciplined, hard-won, aching genius that bore down upon her with a wondrous and exhausting force, like a great love affair in middle age”; William James and his siblings, in their childhood, were “packed and unpacked, settled and unsettled, like a band of high livers fleeing creditors”; the Jewish businessman Simon Rosedale, in Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth (1905), is “weighted down, as if by an overcoat in summer, with a thickness of objectionable moral and physical attributes.”

On every page of this book you will be reminded that Elizabeth Hardwick was not simply a great critic but a great writer. This distinction matters. Hardwick’s essays are always sticking their neck out; their aphoristic grace and easy impressionism are a way of speaking to their subjects in their own language, without deafening them with comprehension and analysis. For instance, in the great essay on Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” (1853) — is there, indeed, a greater essay on this story? — Hardwick is not, in the scholarly or theoretical manner, trying to solve the enigma of Bartleby’s resignation; she eschews this temptation, and even gently reprimands Melville for, in the story’s final sentence, inviting it. Instead, she follows Bartleby’s language — his style — and offers up her own in comparison:

Bartleby’s language reveals the all of him, but what is revealed? Character? Bartleby is not a character in the manner of the usual, imaginative, fictional construction. And he is not a character as we know them in life, with their bundling bustle of details, their suits and ties and felt hats, their love affairs surreptitious or binding, family albums, psychological justifications dragging like a little wagon along the highway of experience. We might say he is a destiny, without interruptions, revisions, second chances. But what is a destiny that is not endured by a “character”? Bartleby has no plot in his present existence, and we would not wish to imagine subplots for his already lived years. He is indeed only words, wonderful words, and very few of them. One might for a moment sink into the abyss and imagine that instead of prefer not he had said, “I don’t want to” or “I don’t feel like it.” No, it is unthinkable, a vulgarization, adding truculence, idleness, foolishness, adding indeed “character” and altering a sublimity of definition.

I find this passage astonishing. Notice how quickly Hardwick is tempted into literary detail (“suits and ties and felt hats” [my emphasis]) and metaphor (“a little wagon along the highway of experience”), and then, tellingly, how she encourages us to view Bartleby from the perspective of his creator, Melville, by entertaining poor alternatives to his famous utterance. She is writing as a creator herself, sharing in the language of literary creation, and all the while still managing to perform the task of the critic. No comprehensive analysis of “Bartleby” that I’ve ever read is as suggestive — perhaps because Hardwick, in the end, dares to be just that: suggestive, as opposed to conclusive; aphoristic, as opposed to comprehensive; metaphorical, as opposed to merely critical.

Born in 1916 in Lexington, Kentucky — a place she wasn’t sorry to be from, she said, “so long as I didn’t have to stay there forever” — Elizabeth Hardwick moved to New York City in 1939 to study English at Columbia University. She published her first novel, The Ghostly Lover, in 1945 and shortly afterward was enlisted by Philip Rahv to pen book reviews for Partisan Review, where she quickly gained a reputation for her acerbic, cutting style. (When Rahv asked Hardwick what she thought of Diana Trilling, The Nation’s book critic, Hardwick quipped: “Not much.”)

In 1949 she married the poet Robert Lowell, a decision that would shape her life for decades to come. They were engaged while Lowell, who suffered from bipolar disorder, was recuperating from electric shock treatment in a hospital north of Boston. Hardwick was warned against the union by the poet-critic Allen Tate, who described Lowell’s mental state at the time as being “very nearly psychotic.” Shortly before the engagement he even went so far as to call Lowell “dangerous,” claiming there were “definite homicidal implications in his world, particularly toward women and children.” Lowell’s Boston Brahmin father was no fan of the engagement either. “I do feel,” he wrote to his afflicted son, “that both you and she, should clearly understand, that if she does marry you, that she is responsible for you.”

But even these warnings could not have prepared Hardwick for the mental breakdowns and momentary break-ups, the impulsive infidelities and public indiscretions she would suffer through for the next 20-odd years. “I have sat and listened to too many / words of the collaborating muse,” Lowell self-incriminatingly wrote, “and plotted perhaps too freely with my life, / not avoiding injury to others, / not avoiding injury to myself.” Their turbulent marriage finally ended in 1970 when Lowell left the United States for England to live with Lady Caroline Blackwood, whom he married in 1972. For Hardwick, however, worse was yet to come: Lowell famously made public art of their marital difficulties and divorce; in the poetry collections For Lizzie and Harriet and The Dolphin, both of them published in 1973, he quoted from Hardwick’s personal letters to him, a trespass his friend Elizabeth Bishop scolded him for in a stinging letter: “It is not being ‘gentle’ to use personal, tragic, anguished letters that way,” she wrote, “it’s cruel.”

Though she suffered greatly, Hardwick maintained that marrying Lowell was one of the best things that had ever happened to her. She called him an “extraordinarily original and brilliant and amazing presence, quite beyond any other I have known.” Speaking to Darryl Pinckney in 1985, she said that Lowell, for all his flaws, was at least encouraging of his wife’s intellectual pursuits:

He liked women writers and I don’t think he ever had a true interest in a woman who wasn’t a writer — an odd turn-on indeed and one I’ve noticed not greatly shared. Women writers don’t tend to be passive vessels or wives, saying, “Oh, that’s good, dear.”

Women writers — and women in literature more generally — were the focus of Hardwick’s most influential collection of essays, Seduction and Betrayal, published in 1974. (Regrettably, and a little ill-advisedly, it is not included in The Collected Essays; it was reissued separately, in 2001, also by NYRB Classics.) These stirring, evocative portraits — of the Brontë sisters, Zelda Fitzgerald, Sylvia Plath, Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Wordsworth, and others — have sometimes been viewed as a veiled response to Lowell’s betrayal, though this notion seems reductive, as if Hardwick needed Lowell to betray her in order to challenge perceived truths about literary history. Seduction and Betrayal was a challenge to precisely such notions: the romantic view that women writers are either victims or heroines (or both). “Toward the achievements of women,” Hardwick had written in an earlier essay, “I find my own attitudes extremely complicated by all sorts of vague emotions.” These attitudes and emotions were to the benefit of her readers, for if they were not complicated they would not interest us, at least not from a literary perspective. As Hilton Als has beautifully put it, the human impulse in Hardwick’s writing always outweighed the abstract.

Though Hardwick achieved her greatest success in 1979 with Sleepless Nights, a much-admired collage-like quasi-novel, the compressed density of her style was always more suited to literary essay, which may be why it was the genre she remained most faithful to. In sheer size alone, The Collected Essays, which spans six decades and 600 pages, is a testament to the happy union between author and form. Hardwick could quite simply squeeze more into a sentence than most writers could an entire paragraph. Reviewing a new biography of Ernest Hemingway, she writes of the literary biographical genre that “in a hoarding spirit it has an awesome regard for the penny as well as the dollar.” William James, in The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902), was guilty of “running on both teams — here he is the cleverest skeptic and there the wildest man in a state of religious enthusiasm.” And, in an essay on Simone Weil, we are told: “the present fashion of biography, with the scrupulous accounting of time, makes a long life of a short one.”

There is a danger for the reviewer, when describing Hardwick’s essays, of becoming a mere anthologizer, a dazed and dazzled collector of writerly gems. This is partly because Hardwick herself was a serial jeweler: “I like the offhand flashes, the absence of the lumber in the usual prose,” she once said. But now and again, the writing becomes all flash and no lumber — her style, so hypnotically idiosyncratic, can veer off into eccentricity and become difficult to follow, as demonstrated by her tendency to write sentences that are hardly sentences at all but dashed-off story outlines. From a single essay: “The overwhelming scene, the tremendous importance of the union and its dismaying, squalid complications of feeling, Yasnaya Polyana, the children, the novels, the opinions”; “Every quarrel, every remorse, moments of calm and hope and memory. Diaries, rightly called voluminous, letters, great in number, sent back and forth”; “Lady Byron’s industry produced only one genuine product: the hoard of dissension, the swollen archives, the blurred messages of the letters, the unbalancing record of meetings, the confidences, the statements drawn up”; and so on. It’s like reading literary criticism written by Augie March.

Still, these are minor complaints — the unavoidable thumbprints of such playful, busy hands. For whether she is reporting from the front lines of the Civil Rights movement or tracing the contours of Robert Frost’s reputation, Hardwick revels in her subject matter. Everything in these essays, be it real or fictional, comes alive to Hardwick’s touch. And how funny she is! In Marge Piercy’s novel Dance the Eagle to Sleep (1970), “the girls are constantly available and practical — I’m afraid rather like a jar of peanut butter waiting for a thumb.” William James (again) was guilty at times of being “a sort of Californian; he loves the new and unhistorical and cannot resist the shadiest of claims.” And Peter Conrad’s Imagining America (1980) is described as “a text that bristles like the quills on a pestered porcupine.”

¤

If Hardwick’s achievement as an essayist has been left to cool somewhat in the collective shadow of her more illustrious contemporaries, The Collected Essays is a much-needed bringer of heat. For Hardwick was mercilessly free of the many occasional sins of her time: she had none of Susan Sontag’s modish, Francophile theorizing, none of Norman Mailer’s wounded egoism, but neither did she succumb to the breezy generalities of Alfred Kazin. She was, on the contrary, George Orwell–like in her good judgment and common sense, admirably demonstrated in this collection by the moral beauty of her essays on the Civil Rights movement and the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

Because she outlived them all, the last third or so of The Collected Essays revisits many of those fellow writers who belonged, like Hardwick, to the intellectually gilded age in American letters that spanned the second half of the 20th century (an age that might be said to have ended, earlier this year, with the death of Bob Silvers). Hardwick knew and befriended the likes of Mary McCarthy, Dwight Macdonald, and Philip Rahv, not to mention European exiles like Hannah Arendt and Nicola Chiaromonte. In the last half of this collection, then, we learn that an “evening at the Rahvs’ was to enter a ring of bullies, each one bullying the other”; that Edmund Wilson gave the impression of “a cheerful, corpulent, chuckling gentleman, well-dressed in brown suits and double martinis”; that Hannah Arendt, in her apartment on Riverside Drive, served “cakes and chocolates and nuts bought in abundance at the bakeries on Broadway.”

Yet such anecdotes are kept mostly in the margins; Hardwick always stopped short of outright memoirism. Despite her strong voice and presence on the page, the impression she leaves is one of humility. She was not a romantic of the self; living with Robert Lowell and witnessing the self-destruction of so many of her contemporaries (Randall Jarrell, Sylvia Plath, John Berryman) probably inoculated her against the myths of the mad genius. Thus what she admired in the Brontë sisters was not the romantic notion of them having managed to write any novels at all but rather “the practical, industrious, ambitious cast of mind too little stressed. Necessity, dependence, discipline drove them hard; being a writer was a way of living, surviving, literally keeping alive.” Similarly, she was impressed by Zelda Fitzgerald’s “fantastic energy — not energy of a frantic, chaotic, sick sort, but that of steady application, formed and sustained by a belief in the worth of work and the value of each solitary self.”

In Sleepless Nights, the narrator writes of her mother’s child-rearing (she gave birth to nine children): “It was what she was always doing, and in the end what she had done.” In a similar vein, The Collected Essays are a tribute to Hardwick’s ceaseless activity as a literary essayist, as a critic and a reader — proof, indeed, that being a writer is a way of living.

¤

Morten Høi Jensen is the author of A Difficult Death: The Life and Work of Jens Peter Jacobsen (Yale University Press, 2017).

The post Flash and Lumber: Elizabeth Hardwick’s Essays appeared first on Los Angeles Review of Books.

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[phobio2000]

Solving Problems

I read this novel. This clan is famous for knowing techniques from everybody, and when they want to kill someone, they would use the same techniques as the one they want to kill, hence they are very famous. Yet, as the story goes on, it is revealed, that although they know a lot of techniques, it's not possible to defeat every enemy using the enemy's techniques, as the enemy has practiced that technique for many years while they themselves need to learn everything form everywhere. Hence, they devised a special technique that deflects the enemy's attack back to himself and make it look like he is killed by his own techniques, very tricky. The clan has a secret agenda of destabilize the country, start a rebellion, carve out a piece of land for themselves, and reign. They are descendants of a kingdom that perished long ago and they try to restore it, but when the country is stable, there's no opportunity. Hence, they sort of build this reputation to make them famous, so that, when the time comes to start a rebellion or build relationships, they'll have more leverage. Yet, they are actually overrated for this very reason, though still very strong. Well, the story goes, that one day the young master was practicing a stick fighting technique. His distant cousin's maid reported to her, saying that he looks great, moving very fast and smooth. She's in love with him and studies all the techniques in a scholarly fashion in order to be a part of his world, and she knows better than him, though she does not practice anything. She said that he's doing it all wrong, that stick fighting technique should not be fast and smooth, but slow and full of variations that reacts to the enemy's movements. The maid said that the young master has the manuscript for the physical movements of the techniques but not the internal philosophy behind it (the way of the stick vs the way of the heart), he is rather overly confident that he can figure out the philosophy part on his own. But she said that this technique is has been one of the most powerful, passing down only to its respective clan leaders for thousands of years, it's not going to be easy. I love this writing because, through a few sentences, everybody's personalities have been pretty well portrayed. Brilliant. I guess I have an urge to write about the way of the stick vs the way of the heart today. As it turned out, for that stick technique, one is useless without the other. For example, in a different novel, the clan leader was secretly passing down the heart techniques; she knew her daughter was sneaking around, but she didn't care, because without the stick techniques, it means nothing. And then, in a separate occasion, the previous clan leader was dueling someone, when they got too tired to fight physically they started to fight verbally, describing the technique for the other person to fight back with his own description. And he didn't mind someone else was present, because without the heart techniques, the stick technique itself means nothing. And that lucky guy just happened to be at both places and got the whole technique down, stick and heart. So creative, fun :D. I think what I gleaned from it is that, the best techniques should have the "stick" and "heart" components to them. Some techniques have sophisticated "stick" component and the "heart" aspect is simple, and vice versa, while the more you develop each the more powerful you become. For most people, they only emphasize on one and neglect the other, and they work really hard to maximize/optimize, yet perhaps shifting focus on the other side would mean tapping in to an undeveloped area of great potential. Why am I writing this? Because I've been thinking about a problem for a long time and want to share some thoughts. There's this age old debate of business vs family. They seem to be always conflicting each other. If you want a successful business, you need to spend time on it, taking time away from family, and vice versa. Some people may be too ambitious for their own goods and neglect family, but some are really sincere, wanting to make a difference. I watched a movie on the life of Margaret Thatcher, and she put family life on the back seat in order to be a good prime minister, and she did well, although she's controversial. And there are those who focus on family life, spends lots of time with family, holding a stable job, not a strong performer, but a decent human being. Well, some of them perhaps neglected their responsibilities to work the fields. Perhaps when an economic storm came, they'd get laid off with no place to go because they got too comfortable at their job, thinking that it's just going to be like that forever. But like, how do you successfully do both? I've heard stories of people in FRCC church that turned down promotions in order to have more time with family and serving church. I think this is great, as they were already making good money and are qualities hard workers. I've heard of women giving up successful careers to be a full time mom, which is not an option for men. But is there more that can be done? Well, I think that, for business, why do you work so hard? Is it not to make money and improve your circumstances, lifestyle, and level of happiness? Wouldn't you be happier if your family life is thriving at the cost of you making a little less money? As for ministry, things get a lot more complicated. First, there's that same dilemma as the business people, need to take care of the church business. But more than that, this is God's business, and it's about saving souls, ending sufferings, doing good, and the need is dire. Second, church is more than a business, it touches so many areas of people's lives, pretty much every area, in fact. When people come to church, the bring with them the troubles of their lives, e.g., poor quality family life due to workaholism or something. If they come to church and see that it has the same problem, how will that person feel inspired? People long for that sense of inspiration, transcension (out of this world, different from the norm), idealism, truth, dream, and answers, and when they come to church and see that it's no different from work, except the people apply the same thing towards building church instead of business, they won't feel inspired. By the same token, though, if they do feel inspired, then they'll volunteer to evangelize, like those Apple evangelists back in the days. So I think, the problem comes down to how to inspire people the same way rather than how to push more and harder. Because the more inspired they are, the less you have to push,, easier to sell, in another word. And I think that's when the ministry life and family life merges. Investments into family life inspires people who desire the same thing, and that will benefit the ministry. When you invest in your family, you'll encounter a lot of intricate detailed problems with spouse, children, and etc--everybody has those problems, and if you work towards becoming an overcome of those problems, and share them, guess what, people are inspired and want the same thing, and if you share with them that you rely on God and all the specifics on how you did it, they're going to imitate you like sheep! And then they'll get so excited about what they accomplished and how their lives improved they'll tell everybody. This is how I envision the gospel should be spread. The way things are going now, it's often words without substance, or words with substance but no relevance to the individuals being preached to. But when the way of God is interwoven into everything you do, everything is integrated and you become what you preach and your life's story becomes the gospel that inspires people around you even without explicit preaching. It's real, substantial, relatable, and it works because you are the living proof! Next point. Proverbs said that we are to seek wisdom like gold and hidden treasures and stuff. When it comes to seeking gold, one can sift through mounds of dirt for gold dusts or dig up nuggets in a gold mine; the return on investment comes down to where you work. And where is the best place to work when it comes to serving God in a ministry? You don't know, it's a faith thing. Ruth went with Naomi simply because she loves him, and that turned out to be the best place for her, although it didn't seem like it at first. I think often times the best decision is the one that perfects love the most, and when you make that decision, you can trust God to place you in a gold mine instead of sifting for gold dusts. I remember Lauren Daigle said that her grandpa was dying when she's on a time crunch for her album, leaving that aside to see grandpa was a tough decision, but the right decision, but look at her now, insanely successful and well recognized, everyone loves her. Sometimes you just don't know but your heart deeply compels you and you just gotta go with it. In an episode of Top Gear, Jeremy Clarkson said that the best songs are those that were written in five minutes, or some really short amount of time. The thing with life is, that, although we are required to be diligent, at the same time, grasping inspiration is like chasing ghost sometimes. So when we make decisions based on love, who is to say that God won't help us catch a few more than we deserved? Just some thoughts on how I think of these problems and how I approach solving problems. . . :P

[thecloudlight-blog]

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Moreish and Moorish: a foodie tour of Andalucía

In the back streets of Seville, out of the solar, faraway from the crowds queuing for the Alcazar and cathedral, my lady friend and I were placed to paintings in a kitchen. It’s now not absolutely everyone’s concept of a holiday, perhaps, but we had been right here for a behind-the-scenes tour of travel Andalucía’s cuisine.

Chop any such,” said David Ciudad, our guide-cum-culinary-trainer

Handing me a bulb of garlic. He turned into displaying us how to make salmorejo, the gazpacho-like Andalucían bloodless soup of tomatoes, garlic, salt, and olive oil; and espinacas con garbanzos, a stew of chickpeas, garlic, cumin, and spinach – Indian flavours which might be a legacy of thgitanos who settled here from Rajasthan in the 7th century and have had a lasting have an impact on the tradition. Both dishes are simple, tasty and cheap.

The kitchen David makes use of for instructions doubles as an artwork gallery, which when we visited had an exhibition of acerbic newspaper cartoons.

For pudding, David took us to look his buddy Marta, a Sevillian singer who now once in a while welcomes travelers to her domestic to devour. She served us a dish of chocolate ice-cream with orange-flavoured olive oil, her personal introduction.

This insider’s view of the place’s culinary delights is a part of a brand new food excursion organized by means of Pura Aventura. The tailormade trips include everything from cooking training to farm visits, assembly connoisseurs along the way. The excursions are targeted at the meals, however, there are alternatives to getting lively too, including a visit to the Doñana countrywide park, an expanse of wetlands and woodland wherein uncommon species which include the Iberian lynx and imperial eagle are determined.

Our cooking lesson complete, we raided a few tapas bars earlier

Than leaving Seville and riding an hour west into Huelva province. We drove up into the hills of the Sierra de Aracena y Los Picos de Aroche herbal park to the Finca La Fronda inn. Set in a cork all right and chestnut forest, and cooled via an upland breeze, the lodge has a satisfactory view over the village of Alájar and strives to be eco-friendly with recycled water, solar strength and a reliance on local food materials. It’s run by way of a family descended from William Wordsworth, and a big portrait of the poet sits inside the living room.

U2’s Joshua Tree Tour Could Inspire Similar Band Reunions For Albums Turning Thirty This Year

Since their iconic album The Joshua Tree turns thirty this 12 months, Bono and U2 are doing an excursion to celebrate the anniversary. They plan to carry out in several towns in North America and Europe, starting in Vancouver on May 12 and finishing in Brussels on August 1.

Fans will possibly experience listening to the band play the songs from that album, consisting of the big hits With or Without You and I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For. Perhaps the celebratory excursion will inspire different British alt-rock bands to reunite to perform in honor of the thirtieth anniversary of comparable amazing albums.

Among the ones unforgettable albums is Louder Than Bombs by means of the Smiths

But a reunion of Johnny Marr and Morrissey could appear extremely not going. Roddy Frame and Aztec Camera would please quite a few fanatics with the aid of traveling to commemorate their album Love, which additionally turns thirty.

Better than any of those, however lesser well-known, changed into The People Who Grinned Themselves To Death by using the Housemartins. Released in 1987, this album showed off the capabilities of the front man P. D. Heaton.

Heaton’s songs are politically charged, despite the fact that his messages are wrapped in a delicious coating of sweet melodies and catchy choruses. The maximum direct political track is the identity tune itself, an obvious condemnation of British those who supported the management at that time.

“The those who grinned themselves to demise, they smiled a lot they did not take a breath,” Heaton sings. “And even if their kids we ravenous all of them idea the Queen turned into charming.”

We’re Not Going Back, song three at the record warns towards the longing for the Britain of the past.

“Do you don’t forget the good vintage days?” Heaton asks rhetorically. “An empty stomach and a tear-stained face. Don’t flip lower back the clocks, it is now not because it changed into.”

The spotlight of the album might be Me and the Farmer, on which the noun within the identity serves as a metaphor for each exploitative boss or government. It is a subject so nicely documented within the lyrics of Woody Guthrie in the United States of 40 years earlier than.

“He’s chopped down sheep, ripped up fields, bullied flocks,

Heaton claims. “And worked his workers proper across the clock. Though God loves his wife a bit, He hates the farmer through and thru.”

You Better Be Doubtful, all, however, closing out the report, gives a caution to the ones in rate. It foresees a rise up against the mistreatment and inequality Heaton perceives within the England of the late eighties.

“The rich up within the citadel have not completed consuming yet, they may throw you a bone or a spat out the stone, however knowing them that is all you will get,” the primary verse reads.

Moorish Spain by means of Richard Fletcher

In Moorish Spain Richard Fletcher achieves a large feat. In a brief book he not most effective chronicles the bones of nearly a millennium of history, but also offers a great deal that provides to our know-how of the social context, both of his chosen generation mainly and of history in preferred.

Moorish Spain does now not aspire to scholarly excellence.

Richard Fletcher’s stated aim is to provide a fuller and greater accurate account of Islamic rule within the Iberian peninsula than the cursory bills supplied in tour books. He also aspires to a remedy of the difficulty that is more correct than the romanticised function of 19th century travelers, money owed that served to create after which perpetuate fantasy.

And paramount in this myth is the obtained opinion that during Moorish al-Andalus all things social were both sweetness and light and pure harmony. Not so, says Fletcher, as he chronicles electricity struggles, intrigues and repeated war. He describes the one-of-a-kind hobbies that ensured that struggle, both small-scale and local or larger-scale and spread across a much broader front, changed into in no way very far away. When competing events felt that they could all advantage from interaction and trade, it changed into, he shows, in large part pragmatism that saved the peace.

His story begins in the early eighth century whilst the primary invasion of what we now call Spain arrived from Morocco. It ends with the expulsion of the Mozarabes within the sixteenth century. In among, in a quite short and accessible e-book, he illustrates how moving alliances and opportunity for brief-time period gain blend with broader perspectives and humanitarian worries to give a patchwork of records. And this patchwork is characterised, exceptionally, through our incapacity to generalise. Throughout, it is the particular that is critical.

In contrast he gives a number of generalised overviews and illustrates how none of them is extra than partially accurate.

In a quick however telling very last bankruptcy he offers a generalisation of his personal to demonstrate how dominant modern ideas can filter records to be able to enhance its very own credibility. Tellingly, he additionally reminds us of the way lots chronicled records relates handiest to the recorded evaluations and lives of a wealthy, sometimes knowledgeable elite. How a great deal element of lifestyles inside the twentieth century USA may be gleaned half a millennium from now if the most effective source turned into a telephone ballot of Hollywood celebrities?

Richard Fletcher’s book consequently transcends its very own problem rely. It affords a rounded, cautiously reconstructed image of a massive swathe of records. In this kind of quick account, of path, he can only gift a especially small amount of detail, however what is there is going an extended manner past what the average reader may ever discover from a shallow vacationer guide. The style is easy however never racy and the content material has a feeling of reliability that shows a 2nd visit might be profitable.

Travel Garment Steamer: Portable Clothes Steamer Buying Guide

A tour garment steamer is a brilliant travel companion for casting off wrinkles from clothing, freshening and sanitizing linens, and plenty more. If you’re a common vacationer, you recognize the ache of inn irons. I was a a hundred% enterprise traveler for decades and I found out quickly that a transportable journey garment steamer became the handiest dependable desire for getting rid of wrinkles from my commercial enterprise apparel.

If you journey a lot, you understand what I’m talking about. Do any of these conditions sound acquainted?

O No iron within the motel room and a whole lot of trouble getting one delivered to the room

o No ironing board with even extra trouble getting one introduced to the room

o An iron that does not get hot with apparent corrosion popping out of the holes due faucet water utilization

o White mineral construct-up coming out of the holes getting all over your dark apparel

o An iron that glaringly ironed a few fabric that melted to it and now is prepared to switch itself on your apparel

Road warriors can leave that all that behind by using getting a easy tour garment steamer.

What have to you search for in a tour handheld garment steamer?

Portability

It appears easy, but whilst you study some of the handheld garb steamer designs, it makes you wonder if they’re certainly designed for portability. Your travel steamer desires to healthy into your suitcase, backpack, or convey-on with room for all your other essentials. Fortunately, most of the famous journey steamers are properly-designed to absorb as little space as possible for your journey baggage.