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letsgetrowdy43 · 8 months

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My sweet boy ☆—

Request: 🐞Warren gets his first girlfriend and Honey gets emotional cause her baby is growing up.

Picture this!! Warren x Black Cat character

Au Masterlist!!

Growing up Warren was always a shy boy. He was popular in the sense that he was extremely talented in his sport, the one that his father and uncles were also stars in, and the one that had news outlets buzzing about him and the generational talent they claimed him to be. But no news article or tabloid would ever capture just how humble and timid he was.

So when Warren Hughes eventually brought home a girl, everyone within the Hughes' family and friends was shocked.

The girl in question was Marissa, who happened to be so far away from Warren's usual world, but she was perfect for him. She held little to no knowledge about the hockey world, which was something Warren almost preferred, no pressure, no expectation, just her poetry books and detective fiction. Her mother was a professor at UBC, head of the English facility, specializing in nineteenth-century literature, leading Marissa to her love of Poe's work. And she, well she was just some literature junkie who craved a fiction-like love. which she received from one of the purest hearts in her lifetime.

Marissa had always been the pinnacle of his desires, he'd be lying if he said that he hadn't pined after her for the better half of middle school and high school. Something about her awkwardly blunt demeanour, and warm smile made him forget his name, made him forget the entire English language in fact.

Warren asked her out in their shared bio class, his face a very cute shade of pink as he stuttered about wanting to take her out for coffee. Her eyes went wide at his invitation, she was weird, she was deliberately known as the weird girl in their graduating class so to Marissa she was either living a dream or he was trying to set her up for some sick joke.

If you had told her within the next month she would've fallen absolutely head over heels for him, she would've said that you were lying, but it was true. Warren Hughes, the infamous hockey himbo, was the easiest person to fall in love with. In the span of the first month, she had met his family, kissed him at the fair, and somehow convinced him to try reading classics.

He prom-proposed to her in April of that year, nothing spectacular just a bouquet of tulips and a few shared kisses as they drove around the coast of Vancouver in her mom's car. Warren was her passenger Princess, and she was the keeper of his heart, it was perfect in the ways that they were total opposites but so right for each other all at the same time. It was like from pen to paper, and then to real life, a portrayal of the purest fictional love.

Honey loved Marissa, she was always respectful, and a pleasant guest in the house, but most importantly she had brought a little more love into Warren's life. It had been his draft year, and just like most boys who have the spotlight turned on them, Warren was seemingly losing a sense of his being within the media and the articles. But Marissa changed that, and Honey quite literally loved her for that.

The woman stood in the living room, tears in her eyes as she fixed her son's tie, “it's almost as if you do this for every game day,” she teased as her hands flattened out the collar of his dress shirt. “I said I could do it, just want it to be perfect,” he mumbled as she smiled, her hands cupping her son's face as she scrunched up his face. "for my health, please stop growing," she said, voice growing weaker as the tears started, Quinn and Hayden came into the room, all dressed up and ready for the picture portion of the night.

"When did Marissa's family say that they would be here?" Quinn asked as Honey found her at her husband's side, trying to dry her tears as she watched her once baby fix his styled hair. He looked down at his phone, "They should be here any minute," he shrugged before a quiet knock on the door made him freeze, cheeks blazing red as the anxiety of prom night kicked in.

Honey opened the door with a beaming smile, "perfect timing!" she said pulling Marissa's mother into a hug as she ushered the young girl's family into the house.

Marissa looked beautiful, there were far better words to put just how good she looked, but Warren couldn't think of a single one. She wore a pale yellow dress, lace and tool decorating the skirt and shaping her hips, showing just enough cleavage to seem modest but still teasing what she had. Her hair fell so perfectly just above her shoulder, bangs styled the usual way but were accentuated with the metal headband she wore, little stars forming a crown on her head as she smiled at her boyfriend whose face lit up like a candle.

"Hi," she whispered from the other side of the door frame, Warren's body blocking her from entering the house, stuck in an anxious trance that made her stomach roll with nerves, "you okay?" He shook his head, riding himself off the dazed expression and smiling shyly, "You look perfect," he mumbled making her smirk. "Don't look so bad yourself handsome," she said with some more confidence, raising up on her tiptoes to press and gloss-covered kiss to his cheek, making his face blush a much deeper red.

He took her by the hand and led her into the living room where the two families waited for them. A gasp left Honey's lips as she saw them both, tears in her eyes as she watched Warren spin the girl around, his cheeks rosy and face broken out into a grin as his girlfriend hugged herself closer to his side. The two of them grew anxious under their families' stares as both dads tried to hurry up the picture taking process and getting 'the show on the road, so they could be early for the grand march portion of the night.

"Quinn," Honey whispered through her smile, "look how happy our baby is, let him have a moment," she said quietly before pressing a kiss to her husband's cheek. "Remember when we were that young," he grinned thinking back to their prom when Honey spent months being mad at him. Even though they weren't together at the time, he'd promised to take her to prom if neither of them were in relationships, the time came and he never asked, just assuming they were going together. She spent weeks mad that he had forgotten about her, until the night before when he asked what time she wanted to be picked up. "Yeah when you forgot to ask me to prom," she laughed as his lips formed a straight line. "I wasn't the brightest," he shrugged making his wife laugh, thinking about the very couple-looking prom photos that hung in her living room for years, constant teasing from their sibling about how in love they looked even with the lack of established relationship.

They took photos out by the trees in their front yards, tiny pink petals blossoming on the branches as each family took photos with their respective child and then the two of them taking photos together. Honey held it together for all of her photos and broke the moment Warren dipped Marissa as she placed a kiss on his cheek for a photo.

Her hand covered her mouth to muffle her cries as she leaned against Quinn, "thought you said you weren't gonna cry, only during the grad ceremony," the man mused as she nudged Quinn's side. "Shut up, our baby is grown and in love, I hate it," she sniffed, "remember when took him home from the hospital and our moms were gushing over how much he looked like you? I miss him being that small," she whispered as Quinn laughed and wrapped his arm around her, hugging her into his side as she wiped the tears. "I do too, but now he's a whole person, and we helped shape him into that person" he grinned as Warren shook Marissa's father's hand, and was pulled into a hug by her mother, "and I'd say we did a pretty good job."

Warren placed a kiss on Marissa's cheek as she went to talk to her family and Warren went to his. "Is it okay if I drive my truck to the school, therefore we don't have to rely on you guys to pick us up?" Honey nodded and looked at Quinn. "You're not drinking if you drive?" "Of course not," he shrugged, "We don't know if we are even going to the grad party but if we do and I drive I won't drink, and if I want to I will call one of you," Quinn smiled and nodded as he squeezed his son's shoulder. "Deal, now go have fun," he approved with a grin as Warren ran into the house to grab his keys.

Quinn grinned at Honey, "I'd say we did an amazing job," he bragged causing Honey to cry even more. "Please stop talking Q," she groaned as she led the way to their car, saying their goodbyes to Marissa's family as they got into the van. They watched as Warren opened the passenger side door for the young girl who blushed at his actions, got into his car and drove off in the direction of the school.

Honey couldn't stop the growing, it was inevitable, but she could join along for the ride, watching as her son turned from one of the sweetest boys into a caring man.

#thelittlesthughesau!!#captain huggy celly #quinn hughes #quinn hughes x reader #quinn hughes blurb #quinn hughes imagine #quinn hughes fanfiction #quinn hughes x y/n #quinn hughes fic #nhl x reader #nhl fic #dad!quinn hughes #jack hughes

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whencyclopedia · 22 days

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Marie de France

Marie de France (wrote c. 1160-1215 CE) was a multilingual poet and translator, the first female poet of France, and a highly influential literary voice of 12th-century CE Europe. She is credited with establishing the literary genre of chivalric literature (though this is contested), contributing to the development of the Arthurian Legend, and developing the Breton lais (a short poem) as an art form. Marie's published works include:

Lais (including the Arthurian works Chevrefueil and Lanval)

Aesop's Fables (a translation from Middle English to French) and other fables

St. Patrick's Purgatory (also known as The Legend of the Purgatory of St. Patrick)

She was trilingual, writing in the Francien (Parisian) dialect with a command of Latin and Middle English. Her lais were developed from the earlier Breton lais poetic form and so she must have also known Celtic Breton and been acquainted with Brittany. Her works influenced later poets, notably Geoffrey Chaucer, and her imagery in St. Patrick's Purgatory would be used by later writers in depictions of the Christian afterlife.

Marie's works were popular in aristocratic circles but frequently featured lower-class characters as more worthy and noble than their supposed social superiors and always cast women as strong central characters. Her vision of female equality has led to her designation as a proto-feminist in the modern day, and her works remain as popular as they were in her lifetime.

Identity

Her actual name is unknown – `Marie de France' is a pen name given her only in the 16th century CE. All that is known of her comes from her work in which she identifies herself as Marie from France. Based on details in her work including knowledge of place names and geography, and the sources she drew from, scholars have determined that Marie spent a significant amount of time in England at the court of Henry II (r. 1154-1189 CE) and his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine (l. c. 1122-1204 CE).

Scholars suggest Marie may have been Henry's half-sister who perhaps followed him from Normandy to England when he was crowned king in 1154 CE. The Lais of Marie de France are dedicated to “a noble king” who is most likely Henry II but precisely how Marie meant this dedication is unclear. Marie's poetry often features women imprisoned or otherwise poorly treated by men and this theme mirrors Henry's relationship with Eleanor.

Throughout their marriage, Henry was unfaithful to his wife numerous times and carried on an open affair with the noblewoman Rosamund Clifford. When Henry's sons rebelled in 1173-1174 CE with Eleanor's support, the king had her imprisoned for the next 16 years. This same sort of relationship, often with similar details, appears in a number of Marie's works. Further, Henry does not seem to have been as fond of poetry and poets as his wife was and so an interpretation of Marie's dedication as sarcastic is probable.

In modern-day scholarship, Marie is almost always credited with establishing the genre of chivalric literature, but this seems unlikely as her works clearly draw on a pre-existing tradition of courtly love literature whose central motifs she inverts. In courtly love poetry, the knight is seen rescuing the damsel in distress; in Marie's works, the knight is often the one who has imprisoned her in the first place or, sometimes, the one in need of rescue.

#History #CourtlyLove #EleanorofAquitaine #Guinevere #WHE #[#]

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oftenwantedafton · 4 months

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Secret Smile - College English Professor/Vampire Steve Raglan x Female College Student Reader

Chapter 1

Rating - Explicit

Warnings - nothing explicit in this chapter

Summary - Your freshman year of college begins with a last minute transfer into an evening session of English Literature 101 with Professor Steve Raglan.

From the moment you first meet, the man puzzles you. Challenges you. Invites you to bring him the words you’ve never shared. Promises you something darker in every secret smile.

Also available on AO3

English Literature 101 - Steve Raglan

That’s the class you’re sitting in this semester. Evening slot, surrounded by non traditional students. A schedule conflict brought you here. A last minute change. You’ve already missed the first three classes. You think you must be the youngest person here, glancing around nervously at a sea of foreign faces. These are people that have stayed home to raise children; people who have had second thoughts and are switching careers. You are neither. You are just starting out, still an undeclared major, adrift in that vague notion of a liberal arts education.

You decide to occupy a spot in the back corner, waiting for the instructor to walk in. The door opens and the chatter among the students becomes subdued.

The middle aged man that enters the classroom is tall, his impossibly long legs carrying him in a brisk stride to the front of the classroom. He places a leather briefcase that looks ancient on the desk along with a couple of books and some papers. You see white threaded through the darker hair, especially at the temples and running through a neatly trimmed beard. The gold framed aviators he’s wearing have eased down the bridge of his nose and he pushes them back up with a gesture that looks like he’s done it hundreds of times, an absent, impatient adjustment. The bowed head lifts and his eyes meet yours.

You freeze, your breath held. There is something in that look. A predator targeting its prey. Piercing light slate blue eyes trap you. A slight twitch of pale lips. Amusement? You don’t know what to call it. Had you thought him middle aged because of the marbling in his hair? His skin is smooth, unblemished. You cannot mark his age by these aspects of his appearance alone. It is something in those eyes. In that weighted stare.

“Welcome back, everyone. I understand we have a new student joining us. Why don’t you introduce yourself?”

Oh God, not that. You hated having the spotlight on you. You stammer your name and your major. Apparently that satisfies the English instructor and he begins the lesson.

You hate being forced to read. You don’t mind reading; quite the opposite. You just don’t like being told what books to enjoy. How you’re supposed to feel about them. Maybe that wasn’t the theme the author had intended to present. Maybe they just wrote out of boredom and it somehow accidentally became popular. You didn’t think anyone should be able to dictate an individual’s response to literature.

The instructor’s voice is unusual, a combination of a harsh rasp that makes you wonder if he’s a smoker and a slightly nasally intonation to some of his words. It’s not unpleasant, just different. You’re focusing more on the sounds of the words than the words themselves and you belatedly realize people are gathering into groups to discuss the last several chapters that had been assigned.

“Would you come up here, please?” Steve’s sharp eyes find yours again.

You slide out of the chair and make your way to the front of the classroom. He drags an empty chair over next to his and you both sit down.

This close, you now learn there is a distinct scent to the older man. Also not unpleasant. Not cologne, not soap, something else. It reminds you of a candle recently extinguished, of smoky reeds of incense, of damp earth after summer rain.

The long sleeved striped shirt Raglan is wearing doesn’t quite reach his wrists. You see surprisingly willowy joints and lines of fine dark hair. There are tiny diamonds printed on his tie.

“I have a copy of the syllabus here for you. You’re going to have to put in some extra work to get caught up to the others. I don’t typically allow students to join this late into the semester.”

The stapled packet of papers that you assume must be the syllabus still sits on his desk, trapped beneath his long fingers.

“I’m sorry. Something happened last minute and—”

“I’m not interested in excuses. I need to know if you can do the work. If you are worth the investment of time, as it were.” That twitching smile reappears. A canine pokes from beneath his top lip. Very white and very sharp looking.

“I’ll get caught up.”

“We’ll see.”

You reach for the syllabus. He keeps it imprisoned and you tug futilely, letting your hand drop.

“Give up that easily, do you?”

He was…testing you? What was with this guy? You glance back at the rest of your classmates, but no one seems to notice the scene unfolding in front of them.

“No.” You reach again and this time his fingers lift to brush yours in the briefest graze that could certainly be considered accidental, except you know it isn’t.

“Why undeclared?”

“What?”

“Your major. You’re that indecisive?”

You hesitate. “I don’t want to choose the wrong career path.”

“Plenty of people return to school. The group behind you is evidence of that. There’s more to it than that, isn’t there?”

You chew your bottom lip. “I know I’m supposed to pick something practical. Something that I can support myself with. That doesn’t line up with my interests.”

“Which are?”

“I mainly enjoy writing.”

“What type of writing? Journalism or…No. Creative writing, isn’t it?”

You nod. How had he guessed correctly?

“And why don’t you think you can make a career of that?”

“I don’t want to teach. And there’s no guarantee I’d be successful. It’s too much of a gamble. I just regard it as a hobby.”

“Times are changing. There are a lot of self published authors out there now.”

“It’s too risky.”

“So you’d rather be miserable doing something you don’t enjoy simply because it ‘pays the bills’.”

“That’s kind of how the world works, isn’t it?”

“You’re awfully cynical for someone so young.”

“You’re awfully judgmental towards someone you’ve just met.”

Steve leans forward. “There it is. A little spark. Not completely resigned to your fate then, are you? I think you’re destined for something more.” The chair creaks as he eases back again. “I’ll give you until the end of the week. Come to my office on Friday evening. The hours are posted there.” He points to the packet you’re holding.

You flip through the pages. “I can’t do Friday evening, I’m working. Do you have anything during the day?”

“I never work during the day.”

“Why not?”

Another smile. Both canines exposed, both equally sharp. “The night is what I’m accustomed to. If you can’t do Friday you’ll have to be ready that much sooner on a different night. No excuses. Understood?”

You nod, about to stand when he halts you, fingers curling around your wrist, blocked from view by the desk, if anyone had cared to look. “Bring me something you’ve written. A sample of creative writing.”

“I don’t write for other people. It’s just for myself.”

“Well. Add that to your assignment then. You’ll write something for me. Yes?”

“I’ll try,” you manage evasively. His touch is warm, firm, unyielding.

“Try very hard.” The manacle of his hand vanishes abruptly and he stands, addressing the classroom once again. You return to your seat.

You can still feel his fingers on your skin.

***

The coursework piles up that week.

You struggle to keep up but you’re determined to finish getting Raglan’s assignment done at the very least. The reading that is; you’re still not comfortable with the idea of sharing your personal writing.

Even more uncomfortable with the man himself. He’s attractive, but intimidating. You can’t tell what he’s thinking; he seems to be able to read you like an open book. His smiles that border on condescending confuse you; even more so when they soften to something secretive, amused. You’re not in on the joke. You don’t understand.

You manage to swap shifts at the coffee shop you work at part time and now find yourself outside your English professor’s office door that Friday evening. The rest of the building—a house that has been converted to offices, actually—is empty. Most of the teachers and administrative staff have left for the weekend. You’ve arrived a bit later than you’d intially intended. It’s already dark outside.

You inhale deeply and knock on the door. You hear Steve’s voice beckoning you inside.

“Come on in. Have a seat.”

The office is small, crowded. Lined with shelves of books. The furniture looks well worn, like the battered briefcase he uses. A single hardbacked chair is positioned before his weathered desk.

You sit. He folds his hands and rests his chin on them, regarding you. The silence lengthens. You squirm and clear your throat.

“I finished the reading assignment. I’m all caught up.”

The hands relax, no longer supporting his bearded face. “And the other?”

“I wasn’t able to.”

“You’re lying.”

“Excuse me?”

“Why are you so afraid of someone reading your writing?”

“I’m not afraid. It’s just…it’s mine. It’s personal. Not meant to be shared.”

“Yet you want to do this for a career.”

“No. I told you. It’s just a hobby.”

He removes his glasses and sets them down on the desk, the frames still unfolded. “Do you want to pass this course?”

You frown. “Yes. And I’ve done what you asked. I got caught up. I switched shifts to be here tonight.”

“You didn’t do everything I asked, though.” He rises, moving around the desk. The desk lamp throws his shadow, dark and menancing on the rows of books.

“You can’t make me. That’s not anywhere in the course description. The course name is English Lit, not Creative Writing. I can go to the Dean and…”

“And what? What will you tell him, exactly?”

“That you’re making me do extra work.”

“Maybe I see potential and I’m trying to foster it.”

“Harassment.”

He barks a short laugh. “Harassment? What have I done to harass you?”

You swallow nervously. “Touching my wrist in class, for one thing…”

“My dear, that is not a touch.” His fingers wrap around the metal armrests of the chair you’re seated in and he leans towards you. That smell from before is heavy in your nostrils. “Would you like to know what a touch is? Hmmm?” His face moves so his lips are beside your ear. “When you have crossed a century. When the only dawn you see is one printed on a page or captured on a screen. When the stale blood that circulates with the beat of an immortal heart is invigorated by another, gifted, teeth in skin, that is the touch I speak of. How fast your own heart is beating…”

Your breath rasps. This cannot be real. He cannot be real.

“You will give me new words. Transcend the tedious mediocrity and monotony of an ephemeral existence.” He sinks a hand into your hair and pulls your head back, exposing your throat. “Do you want to know what it is to be truly touched? A brush with eternity?” You feel his lips dust over your throat. The points of his upper cuspids scrape over your skin. The line of your pulse is drawn for him along the arch. Your eyelids flutter. His scent is all around you. The fragrance of forever. Unyielding earth and undaunted metal. “How strange evolution is. Once canine teeth were a sign of prowess, lending dominance when choosing a mate; then withering away over time to more gentle points. Working quite in reverse when I was granted a gift of everlasting life.” Another soft kiss, a gentle counterpoint for what is to come.

His voice and his scent have you spellbound, captive. You cannot move. Sharp fangs pierce your flesh. The pain is there and gone in a flash. His mouth seals wetly against your throat. Pulls at you, drinking from you. He moans at the taste and it vibrates along your skin. A new frequency.

The hand tightened in your hair eases; the sucking pressure abandons your neck. There is a trail of crimson leaking from the corner of his bottom lip. A bloom of color in his cheeks. Mouth no longer pale. Your color, now on him. Inside of him.

Just enough to satiate. Decades of practice. So many more years between you than you’d intially thought.

“You will bring me your writing.” He wipes at the blood trail and it stains his beard. “I’ll give you one more day. You’ll return to me tomorrow night. No excuses.” He holds out a hand, offering you assistance to stand. You find yourself needing the support, suddenly lightheaded. You do not protest when he tugs you with more force than necessary, drawing your body against his.

You do not resist when those smirking lips close over yours.

#william afton x reader #william afton x you #steve raglan x reader #steve raglan x you #dividers credit @saradika-graphics

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litres-of-cocaine · 4 months

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you people don’t know what death of the author is.

it’s from Roland Barthes’ essay of the same name about the viewpoint of academic interpretation. the essay argues that literary criticism should base itself around the reader’s interpretation rather than authorial intention. essentially saying what the author was TRYING to convey is irrelevant in comparison to what the text ACTUALLY conveys. there is some debate about the value of this method, but it is almost universally preferred by academic literary circles.

crucially, it does NOT refer to amputating a writer from the ownership/creation of their work for whatever reason. so people claiming death of the author to justify buying harry potter stuff is just plain wrong. what they are doing is (unsuccessfully) separating the art from the artist which is a dumb as fuck concept anyway but also notably different to what death of the author is.

death of the author does have some relevance to jkr if we are thinking about her attempts to retcon/add/change elements of the books outside of the narrative (i.e. on twitter and even on pottermore to an extent), as it problematises the literary norm to decenter authorial intention that has been a standard since Barthes’ 1967 essay.

(this does get tricky though if we are thinking in terms of popular culture rather than academic standards, as authors commenting upon their work and elaborating on the world their characters inhabit is a perfectly acceptable thing in modern publishing. i would say jkr’s excessive interest in exerting control over her fiction does encroach upon both lines, however, as she tries to alter the potential interpretations of her work without any textual basis and problematises academic interest as well as just the leisure associated with understanding)

this is mostly in response to people saying that death of the author doesn’t work when the author is alive and /no/ you are thinking of ‘separating the art from the artist’ which is a separate but not unconnected idea.

what annoys me about this is that it not only completely misuses death of the author but also suggests that separating the art from the artist can ever work. (it does not).

although they might seem fairly similar they actually assume completely different things. decentering authorial intent does not mean that the artist is unconnected to their output. if we were to analyse The Importance of Being Earnest, ignoring Wilde’s own experience with living a scandalous double-life would be short-sighted. we can’t isolate literature from their contexts and death of the author doesn’t try to do that. The implicit attributes of Wilde’s life seeping into the play’s narrative is a fact and we can talk about that without considering what Wilde intended. What Wilde wanted in his narrative is irrelevant, whether he intended the parallels to his own life is irrelevant, the fact that these similarities are there is interesting. The artist is the creator, a very significant factor in the text’s construction, but they don’t get to decide what their text means with any more authority than the next person.

if we ‘separate the art from the artist’ this is negated. suddenly we cannot analyse the text with any kind of seriousness as the foundations of the text have disappeared. you cannot separate jk rowling from harry potter because so much of the text is built upon white english middle class sensibilities. what we write and how we interpret what other people write is based on our identities, and who we are. you take that away the book might as well be empty.

so yes separating the art from the artist doesn’t work in jkr’s case because it never works, and what you are talking about is definitely NOT death of the author.

if someone wants to buy crummy wizard hats then they should go for it, but pretending that you’re safe from blame is ridiculous .

#if you are going to do something bad knowing it’s bad accept it #don’t try and pander your way out of it #do it!!! accept that human beings do shitty things!!!#and if it makes you feel bad about yourself - good. don’t do it next time #jkr #jk rowling #harry potter #death of the author #separating the art from the artist #terfs suck also 👍#hope this helps #long post #discourse

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irelandseyeonmythology · 6 months

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DIAS Black Friday Sale

Once a year, the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS), offers a sale for Black Friday -- DIAS is one of the major publishers for Celtic Studies, many of the best studies of medieval Irish material have come through there.

Some books that I recommend, personally:

Fergus Kelly, A Guide to Early Irish Law (26.25 Euro, normally 35) (THE introduction to law in medieval Ireland)

"", Early Irish Farming (26.25 Euro, normally 35) (Everything you wanted to know about day to day life in medieval Ireland but were afraid to ask. Literally. Everything.)

Medieval Irish Prose

Fergus Kelly, Audacht Morainn (18.75 Euro, normally 25)

Are you planning on becoming a medieval Irish king? Do you want to know what you should do to involve the total destruction of the natural order? Then this is the text for you! Now with English translation!

In all seriousness, this text is used a LOT with regards to studies of ideal kingship in medieval Ireland.

Cecile O'Rahilly, The Táin from the Book of Leinster (26.25 Euro, usually 35)

I'll be real with you, lads: I hate Cú Chulainn. I hate him. I hate his smug, misogynistic face. His creepy multi-pupiled eyes. The shitty way he treats Emer. The way that his presence is like this black hole in the study of medieval Irish literature that means that the Ulster Cycle can get a prestigious yearly conference held in its honor while the other cycles are left with either crumbs or outright dismissal. I think the Táin is boring and episodic as a piece of lit and I've never found anything overly redeeming about it over any other piece of medieval Irish literature, especially since imo other pieces of literature do women (and homoeroticism) much better and get much less praise for it.

...that being said. It's important. It IS iconic, both as a piece of medieval Irish literature and, in general, to Irish literature. Its status as The Irish Iliad means that, if you want to study medieval Irish stuff...you have to read the Táin. And this is a version of the Táin that you might not have gotten, translated and edited by a master of Old Irish, with commentary.

"", Táin Bó Cúailnge: recension I (10 Euro, normally 35)

See above.

Early Irish History and Genealogy

T.F. O'Rahilly, Early Irish History and Genealogy (30 Euro, normally 40)

So. On the record, a lot of what he says here is absolutely not currently believed in the field. Just. No. BUT. There's a reason why I always recommend him anyway, and it's because if you're serious about doing a study of Irish Mythology, whatever we take that to mean...you will not be able to avoid this man. His ideas were very popular for decades and still often are to people who don't really focus on mythology. It's better to know where these ideas come from and to identify them than not, and O'Rahilly, in his defense, had an *excellent* knowledge of his sources. It's dense, it's difficult (rather like the author himself, from the accounts I've heard), but it's necessary if you really want to attack this.

Joan Radner, Fragmentary Annals of Ireland (22.50, normally 30)

There is so much weird shit in the Fragmentary Annals. So much.

Welsh

Patrick Sims Williams, Buchedd Beuno: The Middle Welsh Life of St Beuno (22.50 Euro, normally 30)

I know what you're thinking: "Why the FUCK are they recommending this book about a random Welsh saint? Answer: Because this is how I learned Middle Welsh. The introduction to Welsh at the front of the book + the VERY good index at the back is still one of the best ways to learn Middle Welsh. Also if anyone was watching the Green Knight film and going "Why is there a lady with her head chopped off?" this answers that question.

R. L. Thomson, Pwyll Pendeuic Dyuet: the first of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi, edited from the White Book of Rhydderch, with variants from the Red Book of Hergest (15 Euro, normally 20)

Once you've gotten enough of a hang of Middle Welsh to know the basics, it's time to dive into the classics, and what better way to do it than with the Mabinogi, starting at the very beginning, with the First Branch? Personally, I dislike a lot of Thomson's orthographic decisions, but, hey, it's the First Branch, and that's Middle Welsh orthography for you.

Ian Hughes, Math uab Mathonwy (22.50 Euro, normally 30)

The Fourth Branch, my beloved. Incest, rape, bestiality (well...pseudo bestiality, really), creating a new life while not being willing to deal with the consequences of it...it truly has it all. Not for the faint of heart, but absolutely worth the read if you can stomach it because imo it handles its themes very well and it's incredibly haunting.

And a lot more -- go in, shop around, see what's available. Even with the older books, they're often things that we're still referencing in some way into the present.

#long post

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tfyoulookingatgiuxs · 7 months

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Class Fight

Steve Harrington x Soft!Reader

𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘: You are a normal student at Hawkins High, but unlike others you were reserved and quiet. But lately you've been watching Steve Harrington, the most popular boy in school. You were ready to declare your love but someone had been blocking you for quite some time, and now you had enough...

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒: Angst, blurb, fighting, bad language, violence, blood, bullying, bad ending, fem!reader, use of Y/N, your surname is Williams, confession rejected, crying.

𝐀/𝐍: And here is the first one-shot about Steve. Unlike Billy, I prefer Steve, so if you want more things about him, let me know! Sorry for my english, this is not my native language. Please support and reblog! hope you enjoy! (DIVIDER NOT MINE)

It was a simple day in Hawkins. Especially at Hawkins High, the school you attended. You felt happy today, in fact, very happy. Today you had a plan in mind, something you thought you would never do, confess your love!

You had fallen in love with him over a year ago. Steve Harrington. The most handsome and popular boy in school, he is implied to be a womanizer, he has had superficial relationships in the past with many girls and after his last girlfriend dumped him, Steve is now always in the company of his friends. He is very rich and you recently discovered that he does not have a good relationship with his father. He doesn't put much effort into school, he just prefers to have fun and enjoy his adolescence. You had spoken to Steve several times, he seemed to be fascinated by your way of dressing and your sweet personality. He also praised you for your intelligence. You were studious and responsible and he seemed intrigued by this detail, an example being his last girlfriend, Nancy Wheeler.

But not today. You wanted to tell him everything you felt. You were tired of this friendship of yours and wanted your relationship to turn into something more.

You opened your locker to get your literature book and admired the photos of you and Steve hanging on the small steel door. And then you saw the letter you had written to him. You smiled. I have to do it at all costs. This is my big day.

You said to yourself and then heard the bell ring.

You got the supplies and also the letter for Steve. You arrived and sat in your usual seat. Your classmate Mandy was absent so you had a large amount of space to put your stuff down, and then you saw it. Steve had come in and as soon as he saw you he smiled at you and you smiled back, blushing slightly. He sat down in front of you and you couldn't help but admire him.

"Hi Steve" whispered a girl with curly blonde hair in a bob, a pink long-sleeved blouse and a light blue skirt that reached her knees, finally white ballet flats that softened her figure.

Kelly White.

A girl the same age as Steve. Graceful, intelligent, kind and ambitious. She seems to have no flaws, but in reality she was a simple bully who made fun of others and was above all a spoiled little girl. She has had many lovers in the past and short-lasting relationships, this is due to her person. As is well understood, no one would ever want to be with a spoiled bitch, where the world revolves around her. She was Steve's friend, even though they don't spend most of their time together. But Kelly was hitting on him, getting too close, batting her long eyelashes to make people think she was a fucking saint. You knew full well that Steve would never fall in love with her. Kelly was popular, but everyone knew her wickedness, but lately Steve seemed far too pleased with her feminine and very attractive figure.

As soon as Kelly caught your eye she smirked but you ignored her. You don't know if she knew about your crush on Steve, but even if she did, you didn't care. You didn't want to fall into her trap.

In the middle of the class while the teacher wasn't looking, Steve turned to ask you for a pencil and you gave it to him "Thanks Williams" He winked at you and you turned red. The sound of something falling though caught your attention "Oops" came from Kelly's lips and she stood up to pick up the dropped pencil. You got furious when the bitch showed her ass in full view to Steve and he smiled.

Bang!

The teacher's hand slammed on the desk and ordered the student to sit down. While happy that Kelly had been scolded, you were still enraged by the disgusting act she had made in front of your lover.

She wanted to keep Harrington around her finger tight. But it wouldn't be like that.

Class was finally over and Kelly slipped out of class quickly. Steve on the other hand did the same, no longer wanting to be in Mrs. Daphne's class.

"Williams" The teacher called you. “Can you kindly give these to Kelly?” You nodded taking the papers. You went looking for the high-heeled bitch and when you found her you felt extremely hot with jealousy. She had given a kiss on Steve's tender cheek and so before doing anything else you threw her papers in the bin, so that next time she would get her first bad grade of her fucking perfect life.

You went to take refuge in the schoolyard. You wanted to cry but you couldn't, you didn't even understand the reason for this sadness. You needed some advice, but your friends were absent today, so you had no one to vent to. After a long walk you came across the phone that was outside the school, and you took a chance, dialing the home number.

You had good parents. Seriously, they always cared about you, and maybe too much. To the questions "Mom, why do I feel sad? Should I give him away or do I feel so bad?" She replied "No, no, no. Don't choke darling" her sweet tone suggested you not to get caught up in insecurities and negative thoughts. You heard mumbling and your heart filled with joy, your father intervened "Take her by the throat" the phrase at that moment began to echo in your head. The two argued for a bit and you ended the call thinking about your father's words.

You would have waited for recess to make her pay...

That's how it went.

You would have done as your father told you. You would get revenge for what she put you through. She had chosen the wrong person to ruin the day of and your eyes darkened when in the courtyard she stole the letter that was for Steve, tearing it into pieces. You lost your temper.

Her face was messed up and your hands were bloody. Her entire perfect appearance had become hideous, full of bruises, blood and mud. The people around you continued to cheer you on, no one did anything to stop the fight, they were spectators after all...no one cares who gets hurt, as long as there is entertainment everyone is good at watching and enjoying the scene.

Your hands were around her neck, your knees pressed into her arms so as not to make her move. You heard someone yell, and you looked up to see Steve's figure approaching the crowd and an adult behind them.

The teacher broke you up after you broke her. And you saw Steve, your one true love call you a monster...

You didn't have time to react, you were both sent to the principal. Kelly was very injured while you, besides your messy hair, only had a few scratches and a bloody lip.

You were both expelled, but that didn't matter to you now, your parents wouldn't have minded. You should have gone to Steve.

After you were treated in the infirmary you thanked the woman and ran to find Harrington. You found him in front of his locker with Carol and Tommy.

"Steve!" You ran to him, not caring about the looks of the two lovers behind you. He made a face that wasn't what you expected, he looked bored. Surely the earlier fight must have upset him.

"Hey..."

"Look, I'm sorry about what happened today. But I just wanted to talk to you" He shook his head "Okay" Tommy and Carol exchanged a sly look as they did so.

"I...I don't want to be friends with you anymore" you started and Steve almost looked at you speechless "I would like to be something more than just a friend. I've always liked you and I would like to stay by your side for the rest of my days" two friends behind you remained speechless, from your corny declaration to say the least "I love you Steve" your eyes shone with hope while from Tommy and Carol's mouths came an "Ohhhhh" accompanied by a giggle.

Steve fixed his quiff but his look was always bored or unconvinced "Wow...a beautiful love declaration Williams, but I'm sorry" the light of hope went out in your eyes looking at the lines of his face "Aww, Stevie don't do that, the princess might feel bad about it" said Carol "I didn't know that princesses got blood on their hands" He looked at you making you feel guilty. You hated Kelly, and half the school enjoyed seeing her face smashed into the ground, so why should he be the only one who worried about her? “Come on man, Kelly is a real bitch,” Tommy said.

"Exactly, in short, the princess did well in my opinion" Carol smiled.

"It's true" he stated looking at the two, and then looked at your stony face "But if you think that now you are better than her you are very wrong Williams" he said and then left while Tommy and Carol continued to laugh.

"We're sorry princess!" Carol shouted while her boyfriend laughed "Ohh Steve Harrington scolded a poor little girl, what a cruel man" Steve rolled his eyes as his voice became more and more distant "Come on man stop it! I'm not intrigued by hypocritical girls" Your heart broke in two.

Tears fell from your face as the laughter even though far away made you feel sick.

You came home crying with a hurt heart. Not only were you rejected, you were also made fun of.

This was the worst day of your life.

#spotify #melanie martinez #steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x fem #stranger things #stranger things steve #steve harrington angst #steve harrington blurb #stranger things steve harrington

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skz-rin · 2 months

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『📜』 ── 20 fun rin facts

✮ She was born with the name Ophelia Chaerin Bao but her mother got her middle and last name changed when applying for American nationality.

✮ She knows how to play the violin and a bit of piano.

✮ She used to take ballet, Ballroom dancing and hip hop lessons as a child. Learned all three but never finished a course

✮ Her parents are not legally divorced but are separated i.e they live separately and never interact. They went their separate ways because they both thought long distance at that time would be difficult and now they just don't talk anymore.

✮ Her and her brother have different last names due to her parents' divorce agreement.

✮ She also knows horse riding and would often do it when she was younger.

✮ She has different introductions for her name depending on the language she's speaking as in she introduces herself as 'Ophelia Bae' in english, 'Huilin Bao' in chinese and 'Hyerin Bae' in korean.

✮ She has been trained in opera singing

✮ She spam posts very often both on bubble and instagram she says she wants to maintain a friend like with her fans and that its important to 'keep the in the loop'.

✮ She is a huge fan of romance movies specifically old 80s-2000s romance movies and often watches them to relax

✮ Despite being named after a popular literary character she is quite bad at literature and has expressed her dislike for it, especially Shakespeare.

✮ When she's mad or hyped up about something she will end up blending her languages into one another which makes it very difficult for people to understand.

✮ She speaks with Chan and Felix solely in english except for during schedules.

✮ On a related note she plays the foreigner card way to often.

✮ She signed up to be a kpop idol partly because she wanted to and partly to spite her mom after a fight.

✮ She loves to design and make clothes so she often tailors her own clothes or upcycles them. she also posts tutorials on instagram for STAY.

✮ Social butterfly. She likes meeting new people and learning about them. She has a reputation of being able to make friends anywhere and with anyone.

✮ She is always donating to charities and NGOs and orphanages anything she can donate to. It's something she's been doing since she was little and wants to keep doing it.

✮ She likes running and can run really really fast, is the fastest in her group.

✮ She loves animals and cannot choose which is her favourite pls don't ask her to she might just cry on the spot.

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homomenhommes · 2 months

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THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … March 23

1653 – In New Haven Colony, six teenage males are sentenced to be flogged for "wickedness in a filthy corrupting way with one another."

1874 – J.C. Leyendecker, German-American commercial artist, born (d.1951); A highly popular American illustrator of Dutch ancestry, Leyendecker was born in Germany and emigrated to the United States at the age of eight in 1882 with his parents, his sister, Augusta, and two brothers, Francis Xavier "Frank" Leyendecker, and Adolph Leyendecker.

Arrow Collar Man

J.C. Leyendecker was one of the most successful and recognizable commercial artists of the 20th century, best known, perhaps as the creator of the sleekly handsome Arrow Collar Man. Almost seven decades after the height of his vogue, the Arrow Collar Man still appeals. Blond, classically handsome, patrician, somewhat aloof, probably a bit of a shit, he is definitely more interested in himself than he is in any of the beautiful women pictured with him. When he first appeared in magazine ads, the Arrow Collar people received carloads of fan letters from adoring women eager to discover the identity of the sexy artist's model. Some proposed marriage. Little did they know that the Arrow Collar Man was the artist's lover, Charles Beach, blond, handsome, patrician, and vain.

1932 Olympic Rowing Champs

Over forty years, Leyendecker illustrated covers for the enormously popular Saturday Evening Post. In total, he produced over 300 illustrations for the magazine. The mainstream image of Santa Claus as a jolly fat man in a red fur- trimmed coat was popularized by Leyendecker, as was the image of the New Year Baby. Also notable is Leyendecker's illustration of the Three Kings, from the Christmas 1900 edition of the Saturday Evening Post and the one above honoring the 1932 Olympic Champions U.S. Rowing Team.

Leyendecker drew propaganda posters during WWI, encouraging people to buy war bonds. But what could be more deliberately homoerotic than his recruiting poster for the U.S. Navy with its semi-naked men and the phallus symbolism of the cannon and the shell, not to mention the line "These men have COME ACROSS."

In 1914 the Leyendecker brothers built an estate in New Rochelle, NY, where they, their sister, and Charles Beach, lived. Leyendecker was the chief influence on, and a friend of Norman Rockwell, who was a pallbearer at Leyendecker's funeral in 1951. Leyendecker was elected to the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame in 1977.

1903 – Frank Sargeson (d.1982) was the pen name of Norris Frank Davey. He is considered one of New Zealand's foremost short story writers. Like Katherine Mansfield, Sargeson helped to put New Zealand literature on the world map.

Born in Hamilton, Sargeson has been credited with introducing New Zealand English into short stories. His technique was to write the story without mentioning the setting. He also used a semi-articulate style which means that the story was written from a naive point of view. Events are simply told but are not explained.

Although Sargeson became known for his literary depiction of the laconic and unsophisticated New Zealand male, his upbringing had in fact been middle-class comfortable. Upon completing his training as a solicitor, he spent two years in the United Kingdom. Sometime in the 1930s, he began living year-round in his parents' holiday cottage in Takapuna, a northern suburb of Auckland. He eventually inherited the property which became for several decades an important gathering place for Auckland's bohemia and literati.

When author Janet Frame was released in 1955 from eight years of voluntary incarceration in New Zealand psychiatric hospitals, Sargeson invited her to stay in a former army hut on his property. He introduced her to other writers and affirmed her literary vocation and encouraged her to adopt good working habits. She lived in the shed for about a year, during which time she wrote her first novel, Owls Do Cry.

During the 1930s and 40s, Sargeson experienced considerable economic hardship, as his literary output earned him very little money. This experience left him permanently sympathetic to the Left. For example, he quietly advocated closer relations between New Zealand and Maoist China.

He was also gay at a time when sodomy was illegal in New Zealand. In 1929, he was arrested on a morals charge in Wellington, but later acquitted. His biographer believes that this trial explains why Sargeson adopted a pen name and never practised the profession for which he had trained.

Sargeson died in Auckland.

1923 – Georgina Somerset (d.2013) was a British dentist and former Royal Navy officer. She was the first openly intersex person in the United Kingdom.

Somerset was born on 23 March 1923 in Purley and christened George Edwin Turtle. Her birth was registered outside of the usual time limit because of confusion as to her sex. Ultimately, the obstetricians decided to assign her male. She was educated at Purley High School for Boys, a grammar school in Croydon and Reigate Grammar School, an all-boys free school. She went on to study dentistry at King's College Hospital, London, and qualified in 1944.

As a newly qualified dentist, Somerset was called up to the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve as the Second World War was coming to an end. She was promoted to temporary surgeon-lieutenant on 27 March 1946 with seniority from 21 September 1945. She left the military in 1948.Upon returning to civilian life, she established a dental practice in Croydon, London. In early 1960, she sold this practice and moved to Hove, East Sussex, where she ran another dental practice until retiring in 1985. Somerset wrote two books: Over The Sex Border published in 1963 and her memoir A Girl Called Georgina published in 1992.

Somerset's father was a Freemason and initiated both his sons into the Craft in 1945. She rose to become Worshipful Master of her Lodge but resigned from the craft in 1953. Having felt female from a young age, Somerset underwent gender confirming surgery in January 1957. She had previously been rejected by the eminent plastic surgeon Sir Harold Gillies, as she had turned up to her appointment in male morning dress. In 1960, after sworn testimony from her doctors, she was given a new birth certificate with her chosen name of Georgina Carol Turtle and her sex as female.

In June 1962, her engagement to Christopher Somerset, distantly related to the Duke of Beaufort, was announced in the Court and Social page of The Daily Telegraph. They married in St Margaret's, Westminster, London, in October 1962. This made her the first known woman to marry in a church after officially changing sex.

Georgina Somerset died on 30 November 2013, aged 90.

1956 – Steven Saylor is an American author of historical novels. He is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied history and Classics.

Saylor's best-known work is his Roma Sub Rosa series, set in ancient Rome. The novels' hero is a detective named Gordianus the Finder, active during the time of Sulla, Cicero, Julius Caesar, and Cleopatra. Outside this crime novel series, Saylor has also written two epic-length historical novels about the city of Rome, Roma and Empire. His work has been published in 21 languages.

In the early 1980s, following a move to San Francisco, Saylor became an editor at Drummer magazine, a popular gay S/M publication at the time. He explained in a later interview that the erotic fiction he wrote in his twenties emphasized the seriousness with which he undertook the task, stating, "I probably did more actual rewriting on those stories than anything I've done since, because for me, writing erotic fiction is like writing a piece of music, because if one note is wrong, you lose the audience."

Saylor has also written two novels set in Texas. A Twist at the End, featuring O. Henry, is set in Austin in the 1880s and based on real-life serial murders and trials (the case of the so-called Servant Girl Annihilator). Have You Seen Dawn? is a contemporary thriller set in a fictional Texas town, Amethyst, based on Saylor's hometown, Goldthwaite, Texas.

Saylor contributed autobiographical essays to three anthologies of gay writing edited by John Preston, Hometowns, A Member of the Family, and Friends and Lovers, and prior to his novel-writing career he published gay erotic fiction under the pen name Aaron Travis.

Saylor has lived with Richard Solomon since 1976; they registered as domestic partners in San Francisco in 1991 and later dissolved that partnership in order to legally marry in October 2008. The couple split their time between Berkeley, California, and Austin, Texas.

1960 – Terry Sweeney is an American writer, comedian and actor. He started identifying himself as gay as early as the fourth grade. Sweeney is best known for his appearances as a regular cast member of Saturday Night Live (SNL) during that program's 1985-86 season. He was discovered by Lorne Michaels while Sweeney was performing in a New York play, Banned in France in 1983.

Sweeney was SNL's first openly gay cast member; He was "out" prior to being hired as a cast member. His run on the show came at a time when there were few openly gay characters or actors on television. For roughly 27 years, there were no other openly gay cast members on SNL, until Kate McKinnonwas added to the cast in April 2012. However, as of 2012, no other gay males (out or otherwise) besides Terry Sweeney have been cast members on SNL.

During his season on SNL, he became known for his celebrity impersonations, particularly female impersonations of stars like Diana Ross, Patti LaBelle, Joan Collins, Brooke Shields's mother Teri Shields, and Joan Rivers, as well as Ted Kennedy (the only male celebrity he impersonated). His most notable recurring character was a portrayal of then-First Lady Nancy Reagan.

While at SNL, he faced many hardships from both the writers and cast because of his sexuality, especially from Chevy Chase. Sweeney was told by Ron Reagan, who hosted one of that season's episodes, that he was "more like his [Reagan's] mother than she is."

Terry Sweeney's partner is Lanier Laney, a comedy writer who also wrote for SNL in the 1985-1986 season. According to a 2000 magazine article, they met during a sketch called the "Bess Truman Players". Laney and Sweeney were also writing partners for Saturday Night Live during the 1985-1986 season, the movie Shag, and the Sci-Fi Channel cartoon Tripping The Rift.

1962 – Openly gay Marc Cherry is an American writer and producer. He is best known for being the creator of the show Desperate Housewives.

After graduating from high School, Cherry attended California State University, to study theatre and initially considered a career in performance. He decided to move to Hollywood and pursue writing work. His move came at a bad time; the 1988 writer's strike hit as soon as Cherry arrived.

In 1990, he became a writer and producer for the long-running hit sitcom The Golden Girls. He later created Some of My Best Friends a 2001 sitcom that was based in part on the film Kiss Me, Guido.

In 2002, a conversation with his mother inspired him to develop a show about the fractured lives of four upper middle class suburban women. After HBO, FOX, CBS, NBC, Showtime, and Lifetime Television all passed on the show, Cherry got his big break when his agent was arrested and went to jail for embezzlement. His new agents brought the show to ABC, which decided to pick it up. The series, Desperate Housewives, was an immediate ratings smash and generated enormous national (and subsequently, international) debate. Cherry received several lucrative offers from various parties, but chose to sign a long-term deal with Touchstone, since their network had shown faith in Desperate Housewives when no one else would.

He says he added the gay couple to the script to underline the growing "normality" of having gay neighbors.

Desperate Housewives continued to be popular for seven more seasons and Cherry took more of a back seat during its eight and final season.

Cherry has been described as a 'somewhat conservative gay Republican and was the recipient of the Log Cabin Republicans American Visibility Award in 2006. Cherry was described in an article about him in Newsweek as a "somewhat conservative, gay Republican."

1978 – Mario Armando Lavandeira, Jr., better known as Perez Hilton (a play on "Paris Hilton"), is an American blogger and television personality. His blog, Perezhilton.com (formerly PageSixSixSix.com), is known for posts covering gossip items about celebrities. His blog has garnered negative attention for its attitude, its outing of alleged closeted celebrities, and its role in the increasing coverage of celebrities in all forms of media.

On his blog, Hilton is open about his homosexuality and about his desire to "out" those who he claims are closeted gay celebrities. When former 'N Sync member Lance Bass officially came out as gay on July 26, 2006, Hilton received criticism for having been partially responsible in the outing. "It upsets me that people think what I'm doing is a bad thing," Hilton told Access Hollywood. "I don't think it's a bad thing. If you know something to be a fact, why not report it? Why is that still taboo?" On November 2, 2006, another celebrity often questioned by Hilton for remaining closeted, actor Neil Patrick Harris, revealed that he is gay.

Prominent members of the gay community who have criticized Hilton's outing tactics include Arts & Entertainment Editor of The Advocate Corey Scholibo, AfterElton.com editor Michael Jensen, and Damon Romine, spokesperson for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. Kim Ficera, contributing writer for AfterEllen.com, wrote,

"I have to question the character of a man who attacks others on such deeply personal levels, without provocation and for self-benefit, monetary or otherwise...If he's emotionally incapable of exhibiting even the tiniest bit of compassion for closeted people, if he can't be sensitive to the fact that coming out is a very personal decision and that the process can be difficult for some — especially celebrities — I feel sorry for him. If his juvenile behavior is his shtick, I think it makes him a much more pathetic figure, and one the gay and lesbian community should not support....If we support behavior like Hilton's, we applaud shallowness, arrogance, rage and invasion of privacy, and risk becoming what we despise."

Some of Hilton's fellow gossip bloggers have also objected to his approach. Author, screenwriter, and former friend Japhy Grant has also questioned his motives, writing on Salon.com, "Spreading gossip is just your average pedestrian variety of immorality. Claiming that you're doing it to further civil rights is an outright sham."

When questioned on Midweek Politics about whether reporting on celebrities' sexual orientation incites homophobia by making it news, Hilton indicated that he did not believe so. He said that coming out in Hollywood is not necessarily a bad thing, citing Ellen DeGeneres and Rosie O'Donnell as examples:

"I know there is some controversy about outing people, but I also believe the only way we're gonna have change is with visibility. And if I have to drag some people screaming out of the closet, then I will. I think that lots of celebrities have an archaic fear that being gay will hurt their career but look at Rosie. Look at Ellen."

Some prominent gay rights advocates disagree. GLAAD spokesperson Damon Romine told Salon.com,

"Media speculation about a celebrity's orientation is not something we support. This kind of gossip can lead some people to the decision to come out, as we've seen recently, or it may drive others further into the closet. People are going to become more guarded and secretive and not less, because they don't want to create any opportunities [for anyone to out them]."

Actor Bruce Vilanch said, "What purpose does it serve? These [people like Perez] are professional homosexuals. They are gay people for a living. They have to respect the rights of homosexuals who aren't professional." In an article entitled "Just How Dangerous is Perez Hilton?", AfterElton.com suggested that Hilton's actions put people's careers at risk, because anti-gay bias is still a prominent part of American culture. He continued, "Both as a gay man and a journalist, I question whether the gay community should approve of Hilton's actions.... Being associated with someone who publishes photos of panty-less starlets and scribbles dirty notes...makes us look infantile and ridiculous."

2005 – St. Kitts and Nevis: The Windjammer Barefoot Cruise ship with 110 gay men is not allowed to dock on the island. Officials stated that they don’t want homosexuality to be part of their culture.

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stephensmithuk · 5 months

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His Last Bow

Originally titled in full "His Last Bow. The War Service of Sherlock Holmes" and later "His Last Bow: An Epilogue of Sherlock Holmes", this was originally published in 1917.

It is the final story in His Last Bow, the final short story in the canon covered by Letters from Watson and agreed by all the key chronologists to be the final canon appearance of Holmes and Watson.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had openly supported British entry into the First World War in 1914.

The story came about after a visit to the Western Front in 1916; asked by a French general what Holmes was doing, Doyle had responded that he was too old to serve. He then decided to write this story as a means of boosting morale.

To put it mildly, the British public had gone a bit spy-crazy in the lead up to the war; fearing "Teutons serving them croutons" i.e. Germans living in the UK acting as intelligence agents for the Kaiser.

The Riddle of the Sands is one such work of popular literature on this theme, which is the subject of Letters from Carruthers coming in September.

There was also the fantastical works of William Le Queux, who started off with the French and Russians as his enemies before switching to the Germans; he also had his works serialised in the Daily Mail, a British middle-market tabloid that was founded in 1896 and has been happily engaging in right-wing sensationalism since to the point Wikipedia has banned them as a source. Le Queux for his part believed the Germans were out to get him for exposing their spy networks - he hadn't, they weren't and the Metropolitan Police refused him protection.

The Benz company had produced the first practical motor car in 1885; they of course later merged with Daimler to become Mercedez-Benz. I cannot find a 100hp example of their vehicles.

The German Chancellor in 1914, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, was a moderate, who reluctantly went along with many German policies like unrestricted submarine warfare and tried to initiate peace proposals on a number of occasions in the war before being ousted in 1917.

Flushing is the historical English name for the Dutch port of Vlissingen; it had a ferry connection to Sheerness until 1994.

At the outbreak of war, diplomats on both sides were allowed to return home unmolested, after locking down their embassies and burning anything sensitive they could not take with them.

Britain, France and Prussia had signed a treaty in 1839 guaranteeing the neutrality and independence of Belgium. The German invasion of the country on 3 August gave the UK justification for war and moved a Cabinet divided over the matter to firm unity.

There was a fear of Irish civil war at this point; the Liberal government, reliant on Irish and Labour support for a Commons majority after the two elections of 1910, had passed legislation creating a devolved government for the island, called Home Rule. This was vehemently opposed by Ulster Protestants and both sides were receiving weapons - from Germany in fact - in preparation for a fight as Whitehall tried to arrange a compromise. The Germans in fact believed the British would be distracted by a civil war, but in fact the Home Rule legislation was suspended for the duration and both militias decided to support the war effort. That stopped things... until the more radicial Irish Republic Brotherhood launched the Easter Rising of 1916.

"Window-breaking Furies" refers to the suffragette movement that sort votes for women, some of who engaged in direct action like breaking windows and also planting bombs or arson, although they made sure the latter was done when the buildings were empty to avoid killing anyone. These tactics were as controversial at the time as the tactics of modern-day groups like Just Stop Oil. When the war broke out, the suffragettes stopped their militant actions and supported the war effort; their imprisoned members being released as part of an amnesty.

John Bull is a national personification of the UK, typically a stout middle-aged man in a Union Jack waistcoast, frequently seen in cartoons at this time. He rather fell out of popular use post-war and is rarely seen today, unlike Britannia, who remains a widely used figure.

The Rosyth Dockyard was built from 1909 for refitting Royal Navy ships and submarines; although now privatised, it retains that role and is currently building the five Type 31 frigates.

Carlton Terrace was the home of the German Embassy until 1945; after the war, the property and its contents were sold off at auction. The Federal Republic of Germany set up at Belgrave Square in 1951 and remains there to this day.

Junkers were the land-owning aristocracy of Prussia, who exercised considerable political power up until 1945, at which point most of their holdings ended up in the USSR, Poland or what became East Germany. The land was broken up, usually ending up in collective farms; accused of war crimes, those Junkers who ended up in Soviet hands frequently ended up in NKVD camps or even executed. Their descendants did not get them back after reunification.

The King's English is another name for Received Pronunciation, the "standard" dialect and accent of British English.

Tokay or Tokaji is a sweet wine from the Tokaj regions of Hungary and Slovakia, the designation being protected under EU law in a similar way to Champagne. Imperial Tokay, which was the highest quality Tokaji Essencia, was reserved for the Austrian imperial cellars, often being passed to other European monarchs as gifts. This stuff is still drinkable after over 200 years and even the relatively new stuff isn't cheap.

A naval flotilla would be based at Harwich in both World Wars.

The reference to Holmes being sixty here is where the common estimate of 1854 being his birth year comes from.

Portland is a prison and young offenders' institution in Dorset. Notable past inmates include George Edalji (whose miscarriage of justice was exposed by Doyle), John Babbacombe Lee ("The Man They Couldn't Hang") and the controversial comedian Roy "Chubby" Brown.

Fratton is an area of Portsmouth.

In reality, the Home Section of the Secret Service Bureau, later MI5, had managed to identify the key German agents by monitoring their postal correspondence. The police then rounded them up in August 1914 and once the cross-sea cables were cut, contact with any agents in the UK became close to impossible. Little intelligence of any use came from them in any event; the Germans seem to have not even been aware of the British Expeditionary Force being sent to France, which was hardly a small event. Gustav Steinhauer, head of German naval intelligence's British section, got subjected to a rant about his agency's incompetence from the Kaiser that lasted the better part of two hours.

Twelve German spies would be executed during the war, eleven by firing squad at the Tower of London, which hosted its final execution (also of a spy) in 1941.

Skibbareen is a town in County Cork, now in Ireland.

The final speech by Holmes at the end also featured in the 1942 Basil Rathbone film Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror, based on this story.

So Holmes and Watson drive off into the sunset. What happened to them after that? All we know is that both survived the war and at some point Dr Watson stopped writing about his dear friend. They deserve to have had a long retirement.

I will be doing these for the individual chapters of the novels next year; I have already done ones for the first two chapters of A Study in Scarlet that I will repost.

#letters from watson #sherlock holmes #history #factoids #acd canon #his last bow #last

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babala-chongya · 2 months

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Bleach captains and lieutenants literacy headcanons in no particular order*

and knowledge or lack thereof of foreign languages sometimes

Kenpachi Zaraki - i love him very very much but im gonna be honest with y'all. I don't think this man can even read kana. His most advanced linguistic achievement is switching to a more modern Japanese dialect since he was likely raised speaking heian era Japanese

Yachiru Kusajishi - shinigami women's association taught her to read and write a little bit out of concerns for her development

Genryusai Yamamoto - as literate as it gets. Understands both modern and earlier era (heian being the earliest) Japanese (although has hard time catching up with newer vocabulary and sounds like a Taisho era man). Fluent in mandarin chinese, has read plenty of Ming and Qing dynasty literature

Unohana Retsu - same as the previous entry, but the way she speaks you could never tell that she's over a thousand years old because she sounds pretty modern

Chojiro Sasakibe - perfectly literate in Japanese and secretly decently speaks some romance language like Italian or Portuguese (only secretly because nobody asked him)

Mayuri Kurotsuchi - surprisingly despite his definitely horrendous handwriting (but not surprising at all considering he's a scientist) he can actually spell. Tried to learn another language (probably chinese or korean. possibly - and hear me out - greek or arabic to read some very old science books) at some point for research purposes but gave up after a year or so and can only say very basic stuff

Nemu Kurotsuchi - decent enough at Japanese. Actually learnt whatever language Mayuri was studying to translate him the books he wanted to read

Sui Feng - speaks mandarin chinese and maybe some local dialect/language like Hakka or Wu as native languages. Japanese is not a mother language but she never really makes mistakes because yoruichi would never let her forget if she did

Byakuya Kuchiki - HAS to be canonically the most literate man alive. Definitely read the original genji monogatari manuscript but had to specifically learn heian dialect because he was born when the era already ended. Well versed in Chinese and definitely studies some stereotypically artsy language like French, Italian or Arabic or even one of languages of Indian subcontinent. Vedic Sanskrit possibly.

Renji Abarai - avoids spelling big scary words if he's not sure how to properly spell them. Tries to learn the same languages as his captain but doesn't succeed at the same rate

Shuhei Hisagi - considers himself good enough at Japanese so he picked up some popular European language to learn like Spanish or German

Rangiku Matsumoto - occasionally makes grammatical mistakes. Probably just to piss off toshiro enough to convince him to not give her any paper work. Knows a couple of trendy English slang words from human world

Izuru Kira - perfectly good in Japanese. Couldn't utter a word in another language if his life depended on it. Doesn't care doesn't plan on changing

Shunsui Kyoraku - learnt a couple of french phrases to impress women. Nobody was impressed. No one ever saw him pick up a pen so god knows if he can actually spell or if he just learnt a bunch of famous people quotes by heart and recites them occasionally to sound smarter than he is

Marechiyo Omaeda - can only spell in kana on a good day. Reads like a middle schooler (on a good day). Sui Feng gave up on him

Rojuro Otorobashi - mediocre at Japanese, desperately tries to learn French just for the aesthetic. Which is hard because this is almost the opposite of how you learn a language

Shinji Hirako - very much literate and capable of writing very formal letters because he might be a dumbass but he's also a genius captain. Definitely learnt English, but can only say basic sentences + knows some slang from Western songs, movies and video games

Sajin Komamura - good in Japanese from every era since Heian. Im not sure if he's physically capable of writing

Tetsuzaemon Iba - canonically speaks a local Japanese dialect (which is cool ig cuz my language has no dialects idk what it's like). Fixed his written speech a little bit under Komamura

Akon (guess we can count him now so i will) - speaks Japanese and Chinese (his shikai release command is literally in mandarin chinese so silence) as his native languages. Perfectly normal, not striving for perfection as always

P.s. because i forgor

Ikkaku Madarame - speaks mandarin chinese and japanese as native languages, sometimes makes mistakes while writing but doesn't care because nobody trusts him to write lengthy reports anyway and he's not really willing to.

#everyone not mentioned is perfectly mediocre #bleach #bleach headcanons

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vivaldisspring · 4 months

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Due to popular demand (5 people asked me), I shall tell the story of how I married my TC

LONG READ AHEAD – THIS IS 7 PAGES ON MY WORD DOC

Hi TCC! I’m Anissa, I’m 27 years old, but I’ve had dumb tcs since I was 11 because of whatever the hell is deeply wrong with me. Before I start, I want to point out how very lucky I was to be surrounded by sensible, responsible, righteous adults as I grew up, so that I was never exposed to any danger – and I’m including adults in the tcc, as I was around here when I was a minor as well. I hope, if you are a minor, you understand that my story is a college story, everything happened between adults (and it started when I was 21), and absolutely nothing that I will say here applies to a high school setting. To be completely honest, it is not exactly any advice for a college setting either, as you will see that I have sorely regretted a lot of my actions and they have led to people getting hurt (mostly me). Even when it comes to professor-student relationships, I would still advise you to not act on your crush, or at least wait until you’ve graduated college. Had I done that, I would’ve spared myself a lot of headache. Also, I do believe as you get older, large age gaps get easier to deal with.

PART 1: JAMES (my crush)

I was 18 when I started college as a History major. It was 2015, and due to issues with my family that I’m not going to go into, I was severely depressed. I soon dropped out of college, spent some time away, and returned in 2017 (20 years old) as a Foreign Languages major this time. So, at 20 years old, I was still a freshman, which to me was super embarrassing, but oh well. Mental health first.

That’s when I met James (not his real name). He was a professor at my university, mainly teaching English. (I do not live in an English-speaking country, so English here doesn’t mean literature in English, but rather the actual language – reading, writing and listening skills in English). James was in his mid-thirties back then, I think, had gotten his PhD and a professor job at my university not too long before. The way it happened is, he published on the department’s Facebook page a notice that he needed an assistant to one of the English classes he taught. His only requirement was, the student needed to have finished the course with the highest grade. That was my case, as I had taken that course the previous semester (with a different professor). In my university, when you’re an assistant to a professor in any class, you get credits. I wanted credits, so I emailed him expressing my interest. He said great, come by my office next week at this time, and we can talk about it.

I went to his office as we had agreed, and that’s when I first met him in person. We talked for a bit, I thought he was very nice, and we agreed I would be his assistant in that specific English class. As his assistant, I was present in all of his classes, I helped take attendance, set up the projector, organize the desks/chairs, prepare the assignments, hand them out, grade them if necessary, answer any questions the students might have, etc. It was a Reading Comprehension class, so I also selected texts in English that I thought would be a good fit for him to assign to the students. This meant that we spent a lot of time together and we had a lot of contact outside of class, discussing plans for the course and solving problems that showed up. We would meet earlier than the time the class started, and after the class ended we stayed together for a while too. I didn’t have a crush on him immediately – it developed throughout the semester, because I guess of our growing proximity.

Now, let me tell you. When the crush did develop. I was OBSESSED. It was INSANE. I’d had crushes on teachers before, in middle school and in high school, but NOTHING LIKE THIS. Those crushes paled in comparison; they were reduced to jokes. My crush on James CONSUMED me, mind, body and soul. I don’t think I can stress this enough. I was a MESS – it was so deep, so strong, unlike anything I’d ever felt before. I thought about him every single minute of every single day. I planned every single one of my actions around him. I dressed for him, I got into credit card debt from buying expensive/pretty clothes that might appeal to him, I started a diet so I could lose weight for him (I was the thinnest and unhealthiest I’d ever been during that time), I started doing exercise (I would go jogging for 2 hours straight) also to lose weight, I wore short skirts, I showed cleavage, I put on more makeup than ever in my life. I wrote poems and songs for him, I overanalyzed our interactions and his very micro expressions, every word that he said. Every praise from him was like the highest high from the most powerful drug – the tiniest word of perceived disapproval was enough to render me suicidal. I AM NOT EXAGGERATING. I hesitate to call it a crush. It was an ILLNESS. I stalked this man, I stalked him online (I found out everything I could about him and his friends and family), I stalked him physically (I would wait outside his office, at a reasonable distance, for him to come out - sometimes I would go up to him and talk to him, sometimes I would just walk by him and wave, pretending it was a coincidence we were in the same area, sometimes I would just watch him walk up to his car and drive away. I wrote down his license plate and looked for his car everywhere I went. I found out what neighborhood he lived in, and I used to go there in hopes that I could find out his exact building by checking parking spots for his car, and maybe I could also run into him there?). I found out he had a girlfriend and stalked her too, and I compared myself to her to the point of insanity. I shed literal blood, sweat and tears, I dedicated months of my life to this sick obsession, and this sick obsession ONLY. This was all I had. Guys, I did things I can’t even speak of here, because they were too wrong, too petty, quite frankly too embarrassing to admit even to strangers on Tumblr. That’s how bad it was.

I couldn’t regret it more. I think, being severely depressed, I considered this crush my lifeline, and I poured my soul into it like it could save me from darkness. But it was darkness, it was awful. And the worst thing? James didn’t deserve to have to deal with it. He is actually a good guy. I’m pretty sure he noticed how I felt, but he never once took advantage of it. He kept his distance, kept everything professional and ethical, never made advances, never did anything inappropriate, and reacted to my inappropriate behavior very well. He knew I was depressed, he tried getting me into therapy, but there was only so much he could do.

Looking back, I feel my crush on James as something of a curse. I was cursed with it – and it still lingers to this day, I still feel the pain from having been burned alive by these feelings even though I’ve put out all the flames by now. I’m fine, I’m better, 6 years later I’m the healthiest I’ve ever been… but I still shake at the sight of James. I still feel like I can’t quite breathe, even though I’m happily married now and most of the time it’s like James never existed. If I run into him, I can’t say it’s not a blow.

I hope one day I can get over him completely. I wanted to tell you guys the James story because I don’t want this to be simply a “omg I got married to my tc, if I did it you can do it too!!” kind of post. I don’t want to encourage anyone to go after their tcs like I went after James because it DOES NOT END WELL and I know better than anyone how unhealthy a teacher attachment can be. I still love to hear all about your tcs and your cute interactions with them and I so relate to how you guys feel, the good parts and the bad parts, I’m absolutely not judging anyone and I love this community so much. I even write tc/age gap stories, I’m always looking for books, movies, fanfics, etc. I love the trope, I love it. But I can’t lie to you – this particular experience in 2017 screwed me over hard.

Okay. I hope that was enough of a cautionary tale. Let’s move on.

PART 2: MARK (my husband)

So I was James’s assistant in that class, and then in some others. Whenever possible I would also sign up to be his student in courses he taught. This lasted for all of 2017 (the height of it) and 2018 (got slowly better, he was no longer the center of my universe, but I still loved him).

And in the meantime, I met Mark (also not his real name), another one of my professors. While James was in his mid thirties, Mark was in his late forties (which was older than my preferred age gap). The Foreign Languages major at my university focuses mostly on English, Spanish, and French – while James taught English Comprehension, Mark taught French History (actually the exact course title is more specific, so I’m not going to name it, but it’s basically French History).

Now, remember how I said my first choice of major at the university was History? (I was persuaded to change it, I regret it, let’s not talk about it.) At that point, I was still very much a History nerd, and French History was my jam. You can still go back to my posts about Robespierre (love of my life) from 2013/2014 here on the archive to this very Tumblr account. So needless to say, I knew an awful lot about the French Revolution going into Mark’s course.

Fun fact: the first time I enrolled in one of Mark’s classes, I thought absolutely nothing of him, but I did know one thing – all of the department offices were shared by two professors, and James’s office was shared by Mark. So on the very first day of class with Mark, he (Mark) was like “guys, I forgot some papers I wanted to hand out to you, they’re in my office – would someone be so kind as to hop in there and get them for us?”. (Office was located very close to the classroom) I was a shy student who almost never spoke in class or volunteered for anything, but when I tell you I JUMPED OUT OF MY CHAIR and practically yelled over another student was already offering, I was like “I’LL GO, I’LL GO, DON’T WORRY PROFESSOR, LEAVE IT TO ME”. I knew James would be there because his class had ended just before Mark’s started. Mark thanked me and so off I went, happily. James was indeed there, working on his desk. I knocked on the door, “Hi professor, may I come in? It’s just that Mark asked me to pick up these papers right here, don’t mind me, thank you so much, hope you’re doing well, see you next class?”. It was such a short interaction with James, but it MADE MY FUCKING DAY.

One week later I dropped out of Mark’s course because arriving on time for his class was getting in the way of me spending more time with James after his class.

Yeah. The irony.

I only saw Mark again on the next semester, when I enrolled in his class once more and there was nothing keeping me from finishing the course. We got closer as time went on precisely because none of the other students even really knew who Robespierre was, and I not only knew his name, but all of the names of the main French revolutionaries and the specific radical/moderate groups they were part of, and exactly their role in the start of the French Revolution leading up to their death. I was not new to being the teacher’s pet – most of my professors loved me at that time, so I ended up being an assistant to many professors apart from James, and Mark was only another one of them. I never had a crush on Mark. When I tell you he meant nothing to me, even though we were so close and we got along so well and had so many interesting conversations about the French Revolution – still my obsession with James was deep and I didn’t have eyes for anyone else.

So how did it happen, you ask me?

One day, Mark and I were having such a good conversation, it ended up lasting longer than we anticipated. We were talking, I was walking to the bus stop, he was walking home because he lived so close to the university and he didn’t have a car. He actually rode a bicycle to the university, but that day he just dragged his bicycle with him by his side so we could keep talking. We decided to stop at a food place and grab something to eat. And we kept talking. Conversation just flowed really naturally with us, and it was kind of a relief to not have to overanalyze everything I say and everything he says. I could just talk about History, I could just fangirl over Robespierre (Mark totally gets it, he thinks Robespierre is awesome too), I could just be myself. I didn’t have many friends at the university, no one I could really talk to and just have a good time with, so Mark was a godsend. We ordered food, kept talking, argued over the bill, then resumed heading towards our destinations. I had long passed my usual bus stop, but there were many stops I could go to, so I just decided I’d take the bus on the one closest to Mark’s place.

At this point, there was definitely a vibe already, we were both going out of our way to keep spending time together. I’m not sure what inspired my actions here. Maybe I wanted to forget about James for a while. Maybe I wanted a chance to make James jealous somehow. Maybe I just wanted someone to be into me, since James clearly never would. So I made up an excuse to go up to his apartment. We spent some more time together in his balcony, overlooking the city, and then out of the blue he’s like:

“You know, James broke up with his girlfriend.”

I was SHOCKED. I was SHAKEN TO MY CORE. I swear to God, I wanted to scream, I wanted to jump, I wanted to dance. I was SO HAPPY. But I couldn’t do any of that now, could I? So much was going through my head. How did Mark know about my feelings for James anyway? (Why else would he say that??) Was I so very obvious? Had James mentioned anything to him? What about the vibe between Mark and me? WHAT WAS EVEN GOING ON?!

I tried my best to not let out my hysteria over the news that James and his girlfriend had broken up. I tried to say as nonchalantly as I could:

“Oh, really? What a shame. Why did they break up?”

“She had an abortion, it seems, that he didn’t agree with.”

Guys, I can’t even describe the turmoil inside me. I’ll be honest, it affected me so much I don’t even remember what I said next, or what he said, or the rest of our conversation. The next thing I remember, Mark and I were making out on his couch and then the rest is history.

Okay so. Mark knew I liked James, not him. I knew Mark himself had just gotten out of a difficult relationship – he had lived in France for a while and had been in love with a French woman. When he returned to our country (he had to, because of his job at the university), she came with him, they had plans to get married and have children and everything. But she wasn’t able to adapt to the new culture and to being away from her family, so she broke up with him and went back to France. There, she got back together with her ex, and soon she was pregnant by him. Mark was still grieving that, he was still very much in love with her. So basically, I wasn’t really into Mark, Mark wasn’t really into me – we were both aware of that – and we started something of an ~~affair~~ (sex, it was just sex, friends with benefits at most) having agreed that it would be nothing more, considering our feelings for other people.

And like that, it stayed, for many months. And then, I don’t know. I guess when we were together, it was hard to keep it just sex, because we got along so well. We had so many of the same interests (e.g., French Revolution), and other things we introduced to each other – he got me into so much 80s/90s music, I got him into horror movies. We also found out we both loved Nietzsche, so we started reading Nietzsche together, and it was SO productive. He helped me understand so much of what Nietzsche wrote, that now I consider my readings of Nietzsche when I was 16/17 to have been useless, I didn’t GET IT AT ALL. And (he says) my thoughts on what we were reading helped him deepen his understanding as well. I started spending a lot of time at his apartment, and we just had so much fun! Also the sex was amazing

Eventually, we decided to give it a try. We just made sense for us to date, right? If we were attracted to each other and we were the best of friends, literally what was it about James and French Lady that was so important to keep Mark and I from moving on with our lives? Especially when French Lady was already married to another guy, and James was just not interested in me no matter how hard I tried to be something he might want. It made sense to at least try. So try we did, and you know what? Best decision I ever made.

PART 3: JAMES/MARK (how it ended)

James and I were supposed to work together on a project. It wasn’t a class this time, just a separate academic research project. It was the perfect chance for me, because it would give me even more time to spend with him. But honestly. What was the point? James didn’t want anything with me. This was crystal clear. And I was trying to move on with someone else. The topic of the research wasn’t even something I liked to study (it was no French Revolution!), it was literally just an excuse to spend time with James. And that didn’t seem fair, considering I was dating Mark now. So I decided to drop out of the research project.

But I’m not going to lie to you guys. I still loved James very much, and it was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. In fact, it was so hard that I kept putting it off, I kept delaying it, to the point I kind of ghosted James for a little while. I was so paralyzed by the prospect of giving up on him completely. And you don’t ghost someone on a research project, that’s shitty academic behavior. (Mark didn’t know about any of this, by the way. He still doesn’t to this day. I had stopped talking to him about James, because well, awkward, right?)

So one day, I decided it was time. I can’t ghost him any longer. I wrote a James a LONG (!) email, explaining why I had ghosted him (I blamed it on my depression), apologizing profusely for dropping out of the project, complimenting him intensely, and then, finally, asking him if we could maybe meet for coffee one of these days, I would like to give him a hug. Remember, this was a LONG email, and it ended with a question (can we meet in person?). Two days later, I get an answer. I don’t remember it word for word (it hurt me so deeply, I deleted the whole email exchange 5 minutes after reading it), but it was something in the lines of:

“Hi, Anissa. Thanks for explaining. Don’t worry about it, I completely understand. I hope you can get the help you need.

Best regards,

James”

I don’t think I need to explain how painful it was to receive an answer like that, after I had opened up so much to him in long paragraphs, and expressed a desire to see him. And as I got that answer, I started to ask myself why the hell I even wrote such a long email, why the hell I even asked to see him (said I wanted to HUG HIM), when I was dating someone else. In hindsight, that was an asshole move on my part. I guess James thought so too.

I don’t know if James knew about my relationship with Mark. When it comes to James and Mark, the truth is they never got along. I only found out as Mark and I became more intimate and he felt more comfortable confessing that he hates James, always has, and James hates him right back. They both avoided being at the office together. Mark thinks James is stupid, James thinks Mark is arrogant. And since I was Mark’s student, we kept our relationship a secret all along, and I’m sure Mark never told James anything. But who knows? Maybe he found out another way, maybe he guessed it. Maybe he doesn’t know at all, he just answered so coldly because he was angry at me for ghosting him on his project.

Guys. Ever since that email… I never talked to James again. We saw each other from a distance plenty of times at the university, and hell, I even took one of his classes again (it was mandatory, there was no way around it). It was 2020, during the pandemic, so it was all on Zoom, and I never had to say a word to him or show my face on the call. I took the online quizzes, and at the end of the semester I submitted a paper I had written for the final assignment. I received feedback from him saying the paper was excellent. It gave me a little bit of joy, as his praise was does… but also, a little bit of disgust. I know everything that went wrong between me and him was my fault. But I’m only human, and I can’t help it, I resent that email. I resent it a lot. I stopped talking to James partly out of respect for my new boyfriend, partly out of hatred for James and his stupid fucking email that broke my heart into a million pieces.

Flash forward to 2021. Mark and I were better than ever. One day, we’re like, you know what, if we get married we can probably save up on health insurance (I could be included in his health insurance, as his wife, and I was at that point without any health insurance at all). So I told my mom, “by the way mom, Mark and I are getting married for health insurance reasons”. My mom was over the moon and decided to plan the whole wedding. At first we wanted something small, but my mom went crazy and did something bigger than we planned (still small, because pandemic, but bigger than we wanted – there was an actual reception with my closest family and friends, back in my hometown). It was cute. Though I hate the pictures because I look so fat in my wedding dress. Being with Mark, I gained weight again, because he makes me feel loved me whether I’m thin or fat, and quite frankly fat is healthier for me. I still carry the harmful fatphobic feeling of inferiority from back when I was losing weight for James though.

2021 is when I should have graduated, but the truth is that when I had a crush on James, I fucked up a lot of my class schedule (remember how I dropped out of Mark’s class just to be able to spend time with James?) to make it work in favor of my obsession with him. And then the pandemic happened, which delayed my courses even more (we lost a whole semester there). So unfortunately, I only got to graduate last year, 2023, at the old age of 26 (awful, terrible, I hate it, I feel like shit for it, especially because it was my fault, my depression that kept me from college in 2015/2016, my sick obsessive crush that ruined my life in 2017/2018, and it was 2019 when I was able to start healing).

I’ve been married to Mark for 3 years now and it’s been THE BEST YEARS OF MY LIFE. I’ve never been healthier, physically and mentally, and I love him so much, and we have 2 cats, and I love my cats, and our little family and our little home.

Sometimes I feel guilty that I don’t feel (and never have felt) for Mark what I felt for James. But I think this is a good thing in the end. I think it’s the reason why my relationship with Mark is so good and so healthy. Because what I felt for James was an illness, not love. And I love Mark for who he is as a human being, NOT as a teacher. James was my teacher crush through and through, it was always about his position, his authority, his praise, his reproach, his distance, his inaccessibility – never about his friendship. Because as much as I might want to fool myself sometimes, we never were friends, we were always teacher and teaching assistant.

I’m gonna end it on this note: last month (December 2023), I presented my final paper (a research paper every student has to present in order to get their diploma by my university). For the final paper, most of the professors in the department are present to watch you speak and present your research findings. So that was the last time I saw James – he was there to watch this semester’s graduating class present their papers. He watched me present mine. When I got up on stage, he was sitting directly in front of me, facing me in a way that made it almost hard for us not to stare at each other. I was deeply affected by his presence. I don’t even remember how my presentation went, I was so conscious of James being right there in front of me. When I finished, I was congratulated and complimented and praised by almost every professor in the department, they all had loved my research. All except one. James didn’t say a word to me. I didn’t say a word to him either. At a certain point we were pulled into the same circle of conversation, but we both kept quiet, let other people speak, looked away when our eyes met, and made sure to walk away in opposite directions as soon as possible. I have no idea why he’s being like this, whether he hates me for ghosting, whether he hates me for being with Mark, whether he just doesn’t care about me at all and never has. I just don’t know. I’ve been trying my hardest not to care too.

Anyway. This was a ride. If you made it this far, I LOVE YOU. I may need to go cry now.

#teacher crush #male teacher crush #teacher crush community #teacher x student #teacher attachment

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