#mr man (my cat) is NOT a patron of the arts | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

whatavery · 4 months

Text

My part of an art trade with @goobygaba, featuring their OC Sylas and Mordecai Heller himself! I was told to freestyle it, so I decided to make a short compilation of moments between the two. It was a lot of fun writing this one and the last part is partially inspired by an art piece featuring the two.

Again, I'm so glad you liked it, Snail!

August 3rd 1927

Mordecai’s ear gave a slight flick in annoyance. The gambling tables were especially crowded and loud tonight. Even from across the Marigold Room, it was hard to ignore everything that was going on down there – clearly, someone was putting on a show. Standing on the upper level of the party room near where his boss was seated, Mordecai’s green eyes surveyed the scene from afar. The sizable crowd would have blocked his view had he been there in person. Even with the live band music, the gambling table seemed to be the loudest source of noise in the Marigold room.

“Have a seat, Mr. Heller; people are going to mistake you for an ornament, if you keep standing around like that!” Mr. Sweet told him, before he chortled. It had to be the third time or so tonight alone that he’d asked him to sit with him and his guests.

“I’ll stand per usual, Mr. Sweet,” the tuxedo cat simply replied, not averting his gaze from the gambling table, quietly observing.

“Oh, fancy yourself a game of cards, kid?” The older cat seemed to finally have noticed where Mordecai's attention was directed. He chuckled, apparently finding the idea of Mordecai playing cards quite amusing.

“No, I most certainly don’t,” he told his boss, shooting him a rather contemptuous look. Mordecai may be many things, but a gambler was not one of them. He watched as Mr. Sweet pushed his chair out from the table and stood up. Mr. Sweet was a stoutly built man and quite tall as well, and he carried quite a presence wherever he went within the walls of the Maribel Hotel.

“Well, gentlemen, perhaps we should go have a look – I think I know who's putting on a show,” Mr. Sweet told the other guests around the table, though not many of them seemed to be quite as interested as he was. Mordecai sighed inwardly and followed his boss. He hadn't the slightest clue who would be entertaining a crowd like that. His most immediate thought was the Savoys, but he didn’t recall ever seeing them draw people to them like that.

In the main party room, Mr. Sweet guided Mordecai and the rest of the party towards the gambling tables. The craps tables looked downright empty next to the tables where people were playing cards, but even despite still being occupied.

Mordecai flinched when Mr. Sweet grabbed his shoulder and guided him forward through the crowd to watch. “Ah, Sylas! How’s it going, kid? Hope you're remembering to go easy on our patrons!”

Ears giving an irate flick, Mordecai looked upon the three players. The one Mr. Sweet seemed to address looked to be around Mordecai's age. His fur was dark brown with darker accents on his fingers, ears and in the form of dots under his orange eyes. However, what Mordecai took note of immediately was his state of dress.

“Oh, but where’s the fun in that, Mr. Sweet? If they ain’t holding back, I won’t either!” Sylas was dressed in a way Mordecai wouldn't call up to code, far from it; white shirt, black vest with vertical gray pin stripes and a pair of black pants. The dark-furred cat’s white dress shirt had the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and it wasn't very neatly done – very asymmetrically done, in fact. And on top of that, quite a few of the top buttons of that white shirt were undone, showing the dark cat’s chest fluff. Mordecai scoffed quietly.

“Does he work for us?” Mordecai asked with mounting dislike as he looked over his spectacles at the other cat. He turned to look at Mr. Sweet, who grinned at him.

“Sure does. He’s one hell of a card player. Almost as good at playing cards as he is at his job,” the older cat told Mordecai vaguely. Mordecai raised a white eyebrow, staring at Mr. Sweet, clearly awaiting elaboration. Mr. Sweet smirked and lit a cigar in the midst of the crowd and when he saw the look of dislike on Mordecai's face, he only seemed to smirk more. “Oh, you want to know what he does… why don’t I introduce the two of you?”

“Please don’t-”

“Hey, Sylas, I need to speak with you once you’re done here!” Mr. Sweet called loudly before Mordecai could stop him. Laying his ears back in annoyance, Mordecai inwardly groaned and knew that he was in for another unpleasant meeting with some other crazed Marigold employee. As if the Savoys weren't hard enough to deal with…

When Sylas eventually finished his game, Mordecai couldn’t help but notice how much he was playing to the crowd; loudly bidding the people at the table farewell, wishing them better luck next time and he even bowed once he'd left the table. The sight alone made Mordecai frown.

“Ah, gentlemen, sorry for the wait,” Sylas greeted the two, grinning at the two. Mr. Sweet returned the grin and put his hand on Mordecai's shoulder yet again to guide him forward against his will.

“Evening, kid. This here’s Mordecai Heller – said he really wanted to meet you.” Mordecai cast a startled look at the taller, older cat, who just grinned. “Well, you kids play nice – show him your collection sometime, yeah?”

Mordecai looked at Sylas again, taking a glance up and down the other cat once more. Sylas likewise fixed Mordecai with a curious glance as he approached with strong, confident strides, holding out a dark-furred hand for Mordecai to shake. He did so reluctantly, which earned him another curious glance.

“A pleasure,” Mordecai said, tone flat and formal, meeting the orange eyes with his own green ones.

“A pleasure it is,” Sylas agreed with a smirk. “Can’t believe I’m finally meeting you – your reputation precedes you, Mr. Heller. I heard you’re real handy with a hatchet.”

Mordecai was left in silence for a moment as he stared at the other cat. His gaze then turned to Mr. Sweet, squinting at him. He sighed and shook his head when he saw the look on Mr. Sweet’s face. “Of course…”

“Yeah, he usually prefers guns, but I’m sure he could learn a thing or two from you,” the older cat said with a chuckle as he nudged Mordecai with his elbow. “How about I leave you kids alone to talk? You’re already getting along swimmingly well.”

“Sure, we’ll talk!” Sylas loudly announced before Mordecai could excuse himself and leave. Mr. Sweet chortled and walked away to rejoin his guests, leaving the two alone in the middle of the party room. The crowd had dispersed quite noticeably by now, spread between the card tables and the craps tables.

“Please, don’t mind Mr. Sweet, he just likes to… kid around,” Mordecai told Sylas, hoping he might have a chance to get out of this arrangement. He wasn't at all sure just how familiar Sylas was with Mr. Sweet’s antics, however.

“Oh, but I did want to talk,” the other cat nonchalantly noted with a shrug. “Let’s go sit over… there.”

Much to Mordecai's dismay, he looked towards the bar when Sylas waved towards it. He frowned. “Well, if you insist…”

September 7th 1927

“You fool… what were you thinking? Were you thinking at all? No, you stay down there.” Sylas had tried sitting up, Mordecai forcing him back down onto the bed. The sheets around him weren't exactly clean, far from it. Blood stained the otherwise clean, white fabric here and there, though Mordecai couldn’t exactly change the sheets, even if he wanted to – not without getting Sylas out of bed.

“Hey, I don’t question how you do your job-” Sylas began, but as he tried to get up again, he grunted and gave up, laying back down. He supposed he deserved it. “Ow… Alright, no, I’m staying down…”

It had been a work-related accident for Sylas and he knew he had been the cause of it himself. A moment’s carelessness had led to him getting shot. Sylas knew going on these jobs wasn't all fun and games, but he supposed he'd been over-confident as he made to finish off a target, only for them to pull a gun on him. Being a hatchet man wasn't an easy job, far from it.

“Why do you have a fixation on these things anyway?” Mordecai almost spat the words as he held up one of Sylas’ knives with two fingers, as if he'd rather not touch it. Mordecai looked at the small bladed weapon with mounting dislike. After putting it down on the nightstand, he looked back at Sylas. “They’re a liability, obviously.”

It was true that Sylas fancied knives – hell, he'd even go so far as to say he preferred knives and would pick them over guns any day. He had to admit that the fact that they best in close quarters with his targets was their main downside, but usually Sylas was careful. Usually.

“Wait, what time is it?” Mordecai raised an eyebrow at this as he wiped his hands clean with a cloth, but nevertheless he checked his pocket watch.

“It’s… nearly 1,” he told Sylas. He fixed Sylas with a curious look again as he put his pocket watch away. “Why?”

“To think that I’ll be spending my birthday injured… tsk, tsk, tsk… what a pity, eh?” Mordecai stared at him in disbelief, mouth slightly agape. Sylas smirked up at him, finding the reaction rather amusing. When Mordecai stared at him like that, Sylas offered a wink. “What? I had plans – am I not allowed to be sad about having to cancel those?”

“I-… I’m just astounded that you got shot and that’s what you’re thinking about after getting stitched up,” the tuxedo cat said, frowning. He shook his head. “Well, you need bed rest – maybe some day I’ll have to teach you to use guns instead.”

Sylas raised both eyebrows in surprise and grinned. “Oh, really now? How very generous of you. You gonna have your arms around me while you teach me?”

Seeing the stunned look on Mordecai's face made Sylas laugh, though he had to stop as his injuries didn’t make laughing a very fun activity. Sylas swore under his breath.

“I can’t tell if your… attitude is admirable or appalling,” the black cat noted, shaking his head, before removing his glasses with one hand, rubbing his face with the other, he sighed. “Just get some rest, I need to go inform Mr. Sweet of this development.”

“Well, good thing we still got the job done, eh? You have a good night, Mr. Heller – hope to see you soon. I wouldn’t mind some company tomorrow. Well, later today…” Mordecai shot Sylas a look as he crossed to the door of the hotel room. Sylas winked at him and Mordecai sighed.

“I’ll… be about. I’ll inform Mr. Sweet what room you’re staying in… Hmmm… Goodnight…” Mordecai said, before he moved to the door, leaving Sylas by himself for the night. Sylas laid back on the luxuriously soft bed and sighed.

It wasn’t ideal, no, but at the very least he hadn’t been alone. Mordecai had proven to be an asset to have near. Sylas had incapacitated the target with the fling of a knife. He'd seen them drop their gun, but Sylas hadn't counted on them pulling out a second gun when he approached to finish the job. The pain of getting shot was one he wouldn't forget soon, only comparable to the pain and discomfort of the following treatment.

He had to say, even if he didn’t seem to care on a personal level, Mordecai had been a great help; he'd brought Sylas to the Maribel immediately and called a doctor. Sure, it was… unusual, but this hardly seemed to be the first time Mordecai had gone through with an arrangement of this nature. It was just a part of their line of work.

Having Mordecai along on the job was quite pleasant. He was a quiet, yet strangely comforting presence. And what made Sylas smile was the fact that Mordecai more than likely didn’t even realize this.

October 31st 1927

“Oh, Mr. Heller! Or is it Count Heller tonight? Count… Hellercula?” Sylas couldn’t help but grin when he saw the rather annoyed look on the tuxedo cat’s face as he approached him. Truth be told, he hadn't taken Mordecai for the type to dress up, but seeing him in a puffy white shirt, an orange vest and a black cloak with a high collar was a sight to behold. A sight that had made Sylas smile.

“Good evening…” Mordecai said rather stiffly. “I can assure you that if Mr. Sweet didn’t ask me to, I wouldn’t-”

“A shame… it’s fun dressing up, isn’t it?” Sylas asked, cutting in as he moved in on Mordecai. The black cat stood with his hands crossed over his lap as Sylas leaned on his shoulder with his arm. The black cat’s ear gave a twitch. “See? This is fun.”

“This is ridiculous,” Mordecai replied, frowning.

The Marigold Room was fully decorated for the occasion, fake bats hanging from the ceiling, jack-o-lanterns situated in the center of the tables, alongside rather unorthodox decorations such as chains, fake cobweb and what was (most likely) fake bones. Just about every party-goer was dressed up too; if not in full-on costumes, most of them stuck to the color scheme of orange and black.

Sylas had spotted quite a few women dressed as witches, a few men wearing masks, though Mordecai was the only vampire present – at least the only one Sylas had noticed.

Snickering, Sylas rolled his eyes. “Well, I think you make a lovely vampire.”

Mordecai looked Sylas up and down briefly, eyes scanning his form. “And what are you supposed to be?”

“I’m a werewolf, isn’t it obvious?” Truth be told, it likely wasn't obvious, but Sylas felt good about his getup. The brown cat wore a pair of black, pin-striped pants, a white shirt and an orange jacket. His feet were bare and around his wrists and his neck, he wore shiny metallic cuffs with chain links on them. And of course, all his clothes looked torn, especially the knees of his pants and the hem of his shirt and jacket.

Mordecai squinted at Sylas. “You just fell into a thorn bush. Am I correct?”

Oh, a killjoy as usual. Side-eyeing Mordecai, Sylas grinned. “Wouldn’t you like to know, hatchet boy…”

Sylas offered Mordecai a wink of his orange eyes and let out a soft chuckle as the black cat looked anything but amused. He frowned and gave a low sigh. “Well, I see you’re walking around just fine. I take it your wounds have healed?”

“They have, wanna see?” Sylas burst out laughing when he saw the look on Mordecai's face. “Oh, ease up, Mr. Heller. As a matter of fact, how about we go get a drink?”

“You’re welcome to get a drink – I’m not drinking, however,” Mordecai said. To Sylas’ surprise, the monochromatic cat still walked with him towards the bar. He could feel Mordecai's eyes on him as that emerald gaze scanned his form. He knew Mordecai was looking for signs of weakness, signs that he hadn't fully healed.

“I’m fine, Mr. Heller, seriously – I’m alright,” Sylas told him, turning to grin at him. “But your concern is very sweet.”

Mordecai didn’t seem to have a rebuttal to this comment as he silently walked with Sylas to the bar. Taking a seat, Sylas patted the stool beside his own before Mordecai joined him. He seemed hesitant, but the fact that Mordecai had chosen to sit with him despite his hesitation told Sylas all he needed to know.

“One Sidecar, please!” Sylas loudly told the bartender. As he put his hands on the counter, the metallic chains on his cuffs rattled slightly against the wooden surface. Orange eyes settled on Mordecai as Sylas smiled. “And you, Mr. Heller?”

The white-furred bartender cast a curious look in Mordecai's direction, offering a polite smile. When Mordecai said nothing, Sylas gently nudged him with his elbow. He gave an annoyed grunt, ears giving a flick. “Whatever doesn’t have alcohol in it…”

“Slip him a club soda – with one of those little paper umbrellas in it,” Sylas told the bartender, smiling at Mordecai who looked progressively annoyed. And yet he didn’t seem in a hurry to leave. As the bartender set about preparing their drinks, Sylas turned back to face Mordecai. “So… you're not going to run off tonight, are you? You're just here for the party, right?”

“I suppose I am… No jobs tonight,” Mordecai replied, tone exasperated as though he wished he would get called away at any moment. Mordecai's order was finished first, the tuxedo cat staring at the clear, carbonated drink in the tall glass. His eyes settled on the bright orange paper umbrella, which looked quite out of place.

“So you’re all mine tonight, eh? Lucky, lucky me…” Sylas winked at Mordecai yet again, before Mordecai turned to raise his drink, sipping from the straw. It clearly wasn't what he'd normally drink, but as he watched him sip, Sylas just leaned back against the counter as he pulled out one of his knives.

Both Mordecai and the bartender fixed him with very cautious looks. “Do you ever not have one of those on you?”

“I don’t know,” Sylas responded in a snarky tone, raising an eyebrow. “Do you ever not have a gun on you?”

Mordecai had recoiled visibly when Sylas had gestured towards him with his knife, making the brown cat grin. Mordecai scowled at him as the Sidecar was pushed towards Sylas, who eagerly took a big sip. “Fair point… but you don’t see me playing with it every chance I get…”

Sylas offered a shrug as he twirled the knife about in a way that made the bartender flinch. He certainly did make sure to move to the other end of the bar for the time being. When his and Mordecai's eyes met again, Sylas looked quite pleased. “Do you dance, Mr. Heller?”

“… No.” Mordecai squinted at Sylas. “Don’t get any ideas, I’m not going out there.”

The brown cat glanced towards the stage where a band was playing, not an uncommon sight, though they had similarly dressed in orange for tonight. Sylas chuckled lightly. “A shame, you look like you have the frame of a dancer. Matter of fact, I wouldn’t mind seeing you in action. Sure you don’t wanna dance?”

Mordecai nearly choked on his soda as he took yet another sip of it, Sylas bursting out into laughter as he nearly dropped his knife. Mordecai coughed lightly and Sylas patted him on the back to try and help him out. “Easy, easy. Don’t worry, Mr. Heller, I can take a hint – if my ego was smaller I’d be hurt by that.”

Sylas turned back to his own drink and finally put his knife away. When he looked at Mordecai again, the tuxedo cat glared at him, a sight that wasn't too unfamiliar, though it always did make Sylas grin. Knowing that he could get that much of a reaction out of Mordecai was in itself amusing to Sylas – to him it was a sign that he knew Mordecai well enough to push his buttons.

“But in all seriousness… I’m glad Mr. Sweet introduced us – you’re really quite a cutup.” Sylas didn’t know anyone else whod describe Mordecai as a cutup, but he liked to describe him as such. He was certainly a very unique man.

Sylas held up his glass to toast with Mordecai, though the black cat seemed less than willing to do so. Sylas smirked. “Here’s to more jobs without injuries…?”

“To fewer injuries,” Mordecai agreed, finally raising his glass to gently bump it against Sylas’. As the two drank together, their eyes met, the orange fixated on the green. Sylas couldn’t help but look and feel pleased with himself. He felt like he was making progress with Mordecai, even if there was still so much about the tuxedo cat he didn’t know yet. He just saw it as a challenge to get closer, seeing as he never did turn him away completely. Mordecai Heller sure was an alluring man…

#lackadaisy #lackadaisy fanfiction #lackadaisy mordecai #mordecai heller #oc x canon #lackadaisy oc

34 notes · View notes

moregraceful · 2 years

Note

**I** would like to hear about ur steph curry librarian au 👀👀👀👀

i'm in love with u, thank u. also thank u to @kitebird-hockey for asking too, you're the best

important background: real life steph curry has a real life bookclub. it is a literati bookclub called "underrated" and unfortunately i am part of it and i am very satisfied to tell you that his picks are usually pretty good. love an erudite man with a bachelor of arts.

anyway my au is thus: steph curry is a librarian at a midsize library in [unspecified city in the bay area]. the library is, as most libraries are, underfunded, understaffed, overcommitted, and deeply unappreciated by city council. steph does programs! he does outreach! he is doing his best. he does storytime very well and all the little kids are like "mr. steph can you read the pete the cat book about white shoes again 🥺?" and he is like of course my babies, it is important to know the names of colors so you can make good sartorial choices. (does steph himself make good sartorial choices despite knowing his colors? unclear but all the little old ladies call him "that charming mr. curry" so he's doing fine, whatever.)

THE REAL STORY BEGINS WITH KLAY THOMPSON, THE STONER PATRON WHO BRINGS HIS DOG TO THE LIBRARY ALL THE TIME. klay worked in tech, sold his start up to google for millions, and immediately quit his job so he could spend his days doing two things: 1. sit on his boat in the ocean; 2. get high and befriend the cute librarian at his local library. klay is NOT ALLOWED to bring his dog into the library, even tho rocco is very polite and good-mannered. but steph goes outside and pets him as stress relief when he has to throw out too many loud drunk patrons in a row. klay and rocco very happy about that.

anyway one day steph is running his "read to guide dog puppies" program for elementary students and NONE OF THE GUIDE DOG PUPPIES SHOW UP OH NO. and steph's like, oh my god, what do i do, these three second graders are going to be so disappointed that they can't read to a guide dog puppy. and klay walks in with rocco and steph is like MR. THOMPSON YOU CANNOT BRING YOUR DOG INTO THE LIBRARY--actually wait hold on how good is rocco with kids. and klay is like, oh he loves to be read to (klay does not read.) so rocco saves the day! him and klay spend three hours listening to magic treehouse books. rocco and klay are transfixed. (in my head klay is not a literary man, he is a man of the sea, he reads the waves and the stars idk.)

steph is like, so grateful. he's like, i have no money to give you but this lady gave us tomatoes today, would you like some tomatoes? and klay is like steph what the fuck would i do with a tomato??? come drink beer on my boat with me. and steph does and it's very romantic and they get together idk i didn't think this part through super clearly bc i always get distracted thinking abt steph making this face while he's watching klay and rocco get read to by a second grader who is still struggling with long words. and klay and rocco are so gentle and nonjudgmental.

(note to any aspiring librarians reading thing: don't date a patron. don't do it. this is fiction DO NOT DATE A PATRON.)

MY OTHER IMPORTANT IMAGINE IN THIS AU: buster posey is the library director. (buster is here bc i read tim kawakami's article abt buster and steph and it changed me on a molecular level. but this is a klay/steph au, not a buster/steph au.) anyway city council is breathing down his neck abt election year programming and he is So Done. he just wants to run his library in peace and instead he's gotta deal with politicking for money to help his unhoused patrons jfc. he's like steph i'm so sorry but do you have any ideas of election programming to get these fuckers off my back. and steph is like, well. it has always been my dream to book local news blogger draymond green and local news podcaster steve kerr for a panel discussion. buster's like, but they hate each other? and steph's like, yes exactly. buster's like, love the way you think, go for it. pls make sure they talk shit about city council.

so steph books steve kerr and dray and they both say yes because they have always wanted to debate each other in a public forum. and it's a wildly popular program attended by politics nerds and high schoolers. steve and dray spend like the entire time arguing in that way where they basically agree but they're hung up on nuances. but they're also very funny abt it and it goes viral bc a high schooler films them making acab jokes and puts it on tiktok and buster and steph get in so much trouble, but it's worth it.

also klay asks them a question about funding local governance and he's like high as shit and also a millionaire so he dgaf about the way he words it so it's incredibly incendiary phrasing. steve and dray go off on like anarcho-communism and spend 15 minutes arguing about that and buster and steph get in trouble for that too, but it's still worth it.

(dray and steve ARE paid for their services. klay gets some zucchini for being a bro.)

that is my steph curry librarian au. thank you for asking i love you. if you have any further questions feel free to ask. the other warriors are there i just haven't put as much thought into it bc i always think abt steph being kind to little old ladies who can barely carry all the michael connolly books they checked out and they're like in love with him. mood

#i wrote this all out last night and tumblr ate my answer i was so mad lmao #brandon belt is klay's boating partner who gets high with him and talks at length to steph about deep sea fishing #and steph is like so bored but bbelt is important to klay so steph makes an effort to care about deep sea fishing #he checks out a book on deep sea fishing and it's much more interesting than how brandon talks about it #but belt is like permastoned when he's not on his boat so that's to be expected #cage replies #anon #unfortunate birdcage fanfictions #drug mention //#noted librarian steph curry

55 notes · View notes

writing-the-end · 3 years

Text

LoL Chapter 28- In Shadow

Masterpost

A Wizard Hermits tale (AU, designs, ideas belongs to @theguardiansofredland)

Returning to his hometown, Etho hs to balance his past with his present, as well as keep Keralis and Grian from embarrassing him in from of his old teacher and town.

_______________________________

Etho always thought he was a handful- he may act mature, but his mind is full of mischief that would make even a criminal stumble. But dragging Keralis and Grian through the misty swamps of his home, he realizes there are more ways than one to cause trouble.

Keralis goes sloshing away, swallowed up by the fog. The only way Etho knows he still exists is by the loud splash of the bug wizard, followed by a string of curses in his thick accent. Keralis returns to Etho’s side, wrestling a stag beetle and cooing at how lovely it looks.

Grian on the other hand, Etho couldn’t get to shut up. “I think I have half the swamp in my boots.”

“You could just fly.” Etho points out.

“But I can’t see anything!” Grian’s whine echoes through the thick copse of trees, bouncing off submerged ferns and aged wood. “How do you even know where you’re going?”

“Secret ninja techniques.” Etho muses, following the trail at his feet. Beneath the water, he can feel ridges carved into the stone, under the silt. Guiding him to his hometown.

Keralis’s eyes get wider than usual at the sound of a branch snapping in the distance. He whips his head around, pulling on his hat and brushing closer to Etho. “Are you sure we’re alone?”

“We’re not.” Etho grins. Both Grian and Keralis whimper, searching the fog like they’re trying to see a ghost. They might as well be. “The town knows we’re coming. They’ve already seen us, even if we haven’t seen them.”

“Ninjas.” Grian whispers. The trio continues in silence, or at least as silent as Grian and Keralis can be, sludging through the swamp. Grian chatters with himself and the bug wizard, his voice bouncing up cypress trees as tall as towers, clambering over the roots. He gets a foot tangled in the submerged vines, and goes headfirst into the slow moving brown water with a yelp. “Etho, when the hell are we going to get to this town? I haven’t seen any signs that we’re even close.”

“Ah, yeah. I haven’t seen a spot of dry ground this whole time.” Keralis adds. “Are they on stilts? How does a town like that stay out of the swamp?”

Etho feels the carved markings beneath his feet turn into a radiating circle, like a ripple across the surface. He stops, grabbing Keralis and Grian, a grin appearing on his unmasked face. “We’re here.”

Grian turns around in a full circle, looking at the copse of trees. “Uhhh, are you okay Etho? This looks the same as every other part of the swamp.”

“Maybe it’s hidden in the fog? Fog magic?” Keralis waves his arms around as if he’s attempting to feel around in the dark.

Etho leans against a root, grinning. “Try looking up.”

Grian does so, and gasps.

Above their head, a town hovers over them. Lantern lights split through the fog, unveiling themselves like a stage curtain, warm yellow glows dancing off the wood and paper. Beneath the strung lantern lights, dancing will-o-the-wisps above their heads, bridges of plank and rope connect tree to tree and guide the townsfolk across the swamp without making a sound.

The fog continues to disappear, and the town of Shellor unmasks in ripples. Homes and businesses nestled in the massive trunks of the trees or perched on the expansive branches, the open air filtering the earth and water tone of the swamp air through bars, abodes, shops, and shrines. For a second, Grian wishes Mumbo was here to rant about the engineering marvel above his head. How much time it must’ve taken to build a town in the sky, where they even get the fire from, and hidden out of sight, out of sound. He never even realized they were walking beneath it.

“How...how do we get up there?” Keralis tips his head, holding onto his hat so it doesn’t slip off.

“Normally, adults can just climb up ourselves.” Etho launches from the root, grabbing hold of a branch and swinging himself up, higher and higher. “And Grian can fly, obviously. But- I’ll grab the basket.”

“Basket?” Keralis watches the two disappear among the intertwining bridges. A second later, something is dropping back to the ground. It’s not a basket he thought it would be. It’s a lift of sorts. The wood floats like driftwood on the murky swamp water, the walls opening to invite Keralis in. He clambers on the wood panel, surprised to find that the weight hardly even shifts. Even when the walls pull back up around him and the basket starts to rise, he feels like he’s on solid ground. It’s the smoothest lift he’s even been on, something that would put Darlon to shame.

Etho and Grian have their heads poking over the railing as Keralis rises up. “A pretty neat invention, huh?” Etho laughs, running a finger along the rope, watching the pulley system release the weight a distance away. “It’s not used often anymore, really just for when kids need to get down, supplies, the like.”

Keralis stumbles onto the bridge. The warm glow of lantern light invites him deeper into Shellor, and the scent of food makes his stomach growl. Spices that dance with the mist, a warm rumble of quiet laughter from the nearby restaurant. But everyone’s movements are lithe and silent, even if their talking isn’t. Everyone in the town walks without a sound, like cats stalking their prey. Exactly how Etho walks, constantly spooking Keralis when he’s in the middle of reading or baking.

It quiets down, and even Etho pauses. Grian and Keralis turn around, surprised to find Etho prostrating before a shrine. They never took him to be the god-worshipping kind. But they sit down next to him, looking at the shrine. It’s made of stone- how that got up here, neither of them can guess. Lanterns are kept aglow and the crescent shaped bowl protected with a carved wooden gazebo. After a few moments, Etho speaks. “Manys, god of the moon. Patron to Shellor, teacher to the art of stealth. I remember my first lesson to harness my power was to watch the full moonlight travel across the swampwater. Silent, but present.”

“Is that how you learned to be a shadow ninja?” Keralis whispers while Grian lights a dying candle.

“Nope.” Etho chuckles. “I definitely took a more...physical approach.”

“Etho!” All three hermits stiffen at the shrill shriek of the shop owner a few bridges down. “I knew you’d come back! Don’t think I haven’t forgotten about all that candy you stole!”

“Ah, that’s what you mean.” Grian muses, watching as Etho is given an earful by the man. It’s the first time Keralis and Grian have ever seen Etho embarrassed, the pale skin under his white hair blushing red, his hand rubbing the back of his neck.

“Mr. Toku, I think Etho has heard well enough.” A warm voice, quiet but persistent, cuts through the berating tirade. Before her first syllable was uttered, Keralis and Grian knew this was someone of importance. An unusual sense of raging peace, like sitting next to a swollen waterfall in the middle of a forest, exudes from the woman like an aura. She turns, and immediately sweeps Etho into a hug. “It is good to have you home, my pupil.”

“Hello Reverent Nama.” Etho squeaks, hardly able to breathe against such a tight hug. A weak smile appears on his face, the one person he missed most when he left being his teacher, the head monk of Shellor. Nama. He doesn’t even remember her real name, he’s always called her Nama.

“Look at you, so tall! You grew like a shoot, Etho.” She grabs his cheek, looking at the scars on his face. “I still remember the day your magic first showed itself. Have you been using my teachings, anak ko?”

“Nama, I remember it all. But you know me.” He offers a sly grin, but nods silently. “I still like to watch the moon, though.”

“The best teacher, and the mother always with you.” Nama’s voice dips into a lower octave at her sagely advice, before rising back up as a smile creases her warm, deep toned skin. “But you must be starving, walking through the swamp. Come, bring your friends.”

She waves her hands, blue and white robes beckoning the weary travelers deeper into the town. A glint of lantern light catches Grian’s attention, and his eyes go as wide as saucers at the sight before him. The biggest gong he’s ever seen in his life. Taller than Grian, even with his wings stretched high above his head, the silver metal glimmering like the moon at the center of the town. Archways decorate and dance around the massive instrument. Grian’s drawn to the gong like a moth to the flame.

Only to be thwarted by Etho. He grabs Grian by the collar, dragging him back in line with Reverent Nama and the other monks. Keralis giggles and teases Grian even as they enter the raised, thatched house. Bowed roofs similar to the arches and pagodas they saw before protect angular, woven walls and open windows. The swamp breeze filters through the mat-strewn floor as Nama opens the sliding door. Nama disappears into an upper level, before returning with a steaming teapot and five different plates of food. The boys sit at the low table, suddenly alone with the leader of Shellor. Silent as shadows, her peers had disappeared. Like ninjas. “I assume this is not just a family visit.”

“How did you know?” Keralis croons, sipping on the warm tea poured before him. His eyes light up at the fried, wrapped treat set on his plate. His massive bug eyes only unnerve Nama, repositioning in her seat at the sight of such strange friends Etho brought.

“Etho isn’t exactly the visiting kind. A practical pupil, even to the day he left.”

“Nama, you of all people know how to gather information. You see what the moon sees.” She nods at Etho’s words. It’s not hyperbole- it’s her magic. “Surely you have information about husk monsters attacking all over Lairyon.”

“Why does that interest you, Etho?” Nama gazes over the rim of her teacup.

“We intend to stop it.” Grian states, flat and plain. Etho seethes, sending imaginary daggers at the blond angel before him. He needs to be more subtle than that!

“Finally, someone to take up the mantle.” She responds. “I have heard worrisome things, are you three sure you can handle such a task?” When all of them nod, she continues. “Then you need to start here- husks have been attempting to enter Shellor for the past few days. They have broken through our mist barrier, but have been unable to reach the town. I do not think they will stop trying until they reach the bridges.”

“They want to steal your magic, your power. They’ll kill you all.” Etho growls.

“Exactly as what my informants told me. Do you boys think you could defeat an army of mindless creatures?” She pauses, looking at their faces. Seeing the glint in their eyes and knowing. “Excuse me, I have underestimated you. It seems you have already done so before.”

“We’ll need more than just your information, Reverent Nama. We need supplies, tools of stealth that only Shellor can create. We need to use every advantage we can find to stop these husks. To stop-”

“To stop Magistrate Dolios, yes.” Nama nods, a growl breaking through her neutral expression. “Whatever you and your friends need, I will be happy to give. But for now, eat! Tell me, anak ko, who are your friends here.” She leans over to Etho. “Is the one with the large eyes okay? Is he some sort of hybrid?”

Etho chuckles, and welcomes the warm food of home into his body. He missed the taste of good palabok, wishing at least one other hermit could cook his hometown’s food like Nama could. He introduces Keralis, quickly explaining his magic, then moving onto Grian. Even Nama, in all her wise counselling, was shocked to learn he was an angel mage. She knew they existed, beneath the watchful eyes of the moon, but to see one in front of her? And in a guild as wayward as Etho describes?

Their plates are filled as fast as they’re emptied, food appearing out of what felt like nowhere. Etho smiles as he hears laughter rise from his friends and teacher. He left Shellor because he felt restrained. But to be home? It felt freeing, now that he’s an adult. Now that he has his guild, he feels more connected to here than ever before. They continue talking well into the night, until the fog fades and the moon observes the quiet swamp.

Nama closes her eyes, falling into a quiet meditation at the dinner table. But when her eyes open, it’s anything but calm. She rises so fast her knees almost spill the table over, robes fluttering like leaves in the wind. “They’re here. Oh gods, they’re already at the barrier.

“You wanted lessons in stealth? Well, lesson number one- don’t let your enemy see you.” Nama motions for another monk, and he casts his magic circle. In one deep breath, he inhales the magic. And a gust of wind from his lips blows out every single candle. Only the full moonlight bears illumination upon the town.

And the distant crack of lightning, an ashen storm visible through the spindly cypress trees.

Townsfolk shuffle in the dark, accustomed but alarmed. Night is when Shellor is most alive, lanterns lit and moon in full view. Nama sends her monks to scout ahead, to be the first line of defense, before marching towards the center of town.

Towards the gong. It reflects the moonlight, blue luminescence titillating across the silver instrument. A mallet the length of Nama’s arm is plucked from the arch, but she pauses. Looking over her shoulder, she sees Etho practically holding Grian back, the angle bouncing in his boots. Like so many of her other pupils, and who is she to deny him something so exciting? She hands the mallet into Grian’s hand. He wastes no time putting it to work. With wings unfurling and hovering at the center of the circle. One mighty reel backwards, he swings. The mallet strikes the metal, and both Grian and the gong reverberate in response. A low, loud ringing warns the entire town they’re under attack. Grian still feels the sensation of the strike in his arms even after he lands.

“The husks aren’t after anything in particular- they just want as much magic as possible.” Etho warns, pulling free his kusarigama, watching the darkness. In the distance, a blood curdling howl of a banshee turns even his blood cold. He doesn’t want to face that beast on good terms, much less a creepy husk version.

“How can you stop them?” Nama questions, dipping her arms into her robes. She doesn’t need a weapon to be dangerous.

“There’s no crystal.” Keralis warns. “But there is a darkness storm.” He points to the distant canopy, black clouds roiling across the sky.

“We just have to defeat them. One by one, it will weaken the storm and purge the land of their presence.” Grian flutters over the side of the bridge, looking down. Below, among the swamp water and cypress roots, monsters and mages scrabble up the aged cypress wood. Throwing themselves higher and higher, unlike Etho’s smooth agility to the town. “No matter what, don’t let your fighters get caught by the husks. They’ll turn into one.”

“Stealth is our trade, angel.” Nama hums, arm reappearing and offering up supplies to the trio. Smoke bombs, firecrackers, magical climbing gear for Keralis, an enchanted mirror to Grian. “We shall do our best, but you three are clearly the masters in this battle.”

Nama steps back, and bows. Pride swells in Etho’s chest, almost causing him to tear up. If he didn’t hear the snarls of darkness consumed being of pure anger, hatred, and power, he probably would’ve. He’s never seen Reverent Nama bow to anyone else before.

And then she’s gone. Disappearing among her robes, the hermits next see her down at the roots. Battling with a cold rage, like sunlight reflecting off the moon. Etho hands a few smoke bombs to his friends, grinning. “Let’s raise hell, shall we?”

#hermitcraft #light of lairyon #lol #hermitcraft au #hermitcraft fanfic #hermitcraft fic #wizard au #wizard hermits #wizard grian #wizard keralis #wizard etho #grian #grianmmc #keralis #ethoslab

26 notes · View notes

littlequeenies · 4 years

Text

BEBE BUELL: MUSING ON MUSES AND OTHER FANS

📷BEBE BUELLJUNE 17, 2020

Before embarking on a musical career of her own, Bebe Buell was a much in-demand model but was most often seen as the second fiddle to the famous rock musicians she was dating. She, however, saw herself as the Muse to these musicians, inspiring and sharing ideas with them. Inevitably, the term “groupie” would arise. As she says, “I’m not opposed to ‘groupies,’ per se. I just don’t like being called a name or being tagged like a sheep to slaughter’. Bebe elaborates on this idea for PKM.

I remember the first time I saw a photograph of Oscar Wilde. I was five and it was Easter. We were at the Virginia Beach home of my mother’s friends, Poppy and Tilly, who were hosting a Sunday get together. We were dressed in our pastels and frills and the candy and food was flowing. It was an adult affair and, being the only child there, I wandered off to explore while the grown-ups enjoyed their martinis and snacks. I found myself in a living room study area and on the table was a big book filled with photos of poets, painters, sculptors and scholars. I was immediately drawn to an image of Oscar draped on a chair like a velvet throw! It stuck with me and when I got older I looked him up in the school library. At the age of twelve I read The Picture Of Dorian Gray, but my main interest was in Oscar Wilde, the man and his story. I felt an instant connection, just as I have with all the great inspirations in my life. In 1978, when I was living between NYC, Maine and LA, before finishing the year in London, I never missed one episode of Masterpiece Theatre and their 13 episodes of Lillie about the life of Lillie Langtry, played brilliantly by Francesca Annis. To my delight, it explored in great depth the relationship/friendship between Oscar and Lillie, and I became obsessed with knowing everything and anything I could about their dynamic. I was intrigued, too, by the descriptions of Mrs. Langtry in the press at that time in England and the U.S. She was often called a “Professional Beauty” or “The Jersey Lily” because she was born on Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands off the coast of Normandy. She was also one of the most featured women in advertising; her face was everywhere. She was the image for Pears Soap and the most respected painters of the day stood in line just to have a sitting with her. In 1877, she met Edward, Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII, and became his first publicly acknowledged mistress.

One of my favorite quotes was attributed to her from her conversations with Wilde: “They saw me, those reckless seekers of beauty, and in a night I was famous.” This reminded me of the back room at Max’s Kansas City, the temple of cool when I arrived in New York during the era of everything! It was this platonic duo that introduced me to the role of the “Muse”—that is the Artist and the Muse. Throughout history and especially in the arts, there seems to always be a driving force that brings the flora. In the series Lillie, they emphasized how Oscar would repeat Lillie’s quips and observations in his writing. Their banter with one another fascinated me and I often envisioned myself as a “Patron of The Arts”, in a sense, as I’ve always promoted and sang the praises of those whose work I liked. I felt an affinity with that spirit—the gift of inspiring and sharing special ideas with an artist I admired. It wasn’t just music. I adored musing with photographers, writers, film directors and designers, too. Creative energies have always fed my soul. The first time I referenced the term “muse” was in a 1981 interview I did with the Emmy-winning writer Stephen Demorest for the edgy publication Oui. Its sister magazine in France was called Lui. Playboy had taken over ownership of Oui so it was a glossy, classy, European-style men’s delight, targeting a younger demographic. When Stephen approached me about the piece, he showed me a couple other interviews with “It Girls” that had been published.

One was with Patti D’Arbanville, the inspiration for some of Cat Stevens’ biggest hits. He even used her last name in one of the songs, “Lady D’Arbanville”. I knew Patti from the early 70s and, in fact, it was she who introduced me to Jimmy Page in 1973 on a night out dancing with her in NYC. It was a quick meeting, as I was eager to get home to my boyfriend at the time, Todd Rundgren. A year later, I would run into Mr. Page again and the rest is the stuff of rock tales.

I adored Patti so knowing that both she and Jerry Hall had done this particular interview sealed the deal. Like Patti Boyd, Jane Asher, Linda Eastman, Maureen Van Zandt, Sara Dylan, to name a few, the musical muse is the most often of the muses referenced. I recall how so many people wanted to know my viewpoints and opinions about the word “muse” and why I preferred it to the term “groupie”.

Even in Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous, his beloved character Penny Lane’s first words on screen are, “We are not groupies. We inspire the music- we are bandaids!”. The film was Cameron’s love letter to women and how even at that time a stigma was attached to calling a woman a groupie; it was not necessarily a compliment. It was almost like a dismissive jab, on par with “she’s such a slut” or “whore”. Another scene in Almost Famous has all of the members of the fictitious band Stillwater squeezed onto a small plane that, they thought, was about to crash. Secrets were spilled and fingers were pointed. In one of the most moving moments, the William character defends Penny when she is described as “that groupie” by one of the band members. William nails it when he points out who and “what” she really is- a bright light and cherished fan. Someone who loved them all and for all the right reasons.

I feel that women have been unfairly branded and labeled without cause. I’ve often said that I’m not opposed to “groupies,” per se. I just don’t like being called a name or being tagged like a sheep to slaughter. Summing me up for the life I’ve lived, seen through someone else’s eyes or, worse, exaggerating the truth. I didn’t want those I’ve truly loved or the relationships I’ve had to be considered less sincere because of the visibility of my partner.

Certainly loving music or dating musicians is not derogatory. Isn’t it logical, then, that birds of a feather flock together? Like-minded tribes mate or unite because of chemistry? Rock boys and models have been drawn to each other since forever! In the Netflix series Hollywood, you find that sex and sexual favors were the core of the industry. Several of the movie stars everyone loved on screen had started out as rent boys or nude models to make ends meet. Who decides why someone can give a blow job to the “right” person and get a starring role in a movie and another blow job by an aspiring talent gets tossed into the trash can of regret.

Why, after having four children with Mick Jagger, a successful modeling career and now being Mrs. Rupert Murdoch, would anyone refer to Jerry Hall as a groupie? Or gold digger, another favorite term used to describe women who marry well. Or Marianne Faithfull, Anita Pallenberg or Winona Ryder, for heaven’s sake? These are the questions I’ve always had and one of the main reason why I have rejected the term groupie in the press. It’s not a personal attack on those who identify with the moniker. It’s my own rebellion against being labeled and frowned on for the relationships I’ve had.

I’ve taken this stand for a long time, even though it’s also caused some judgement and negativity towards me from other women. It’s almost as if they think I see myself as better than them. Or that I’m not being honest when I don’t just call myself a full-on groupie, and own it. My closest friends tell me it’s just jealousy but that doesn’t make it any less hurtful to have tales and lies circulated about you by people you barely know or those who don’t know me at all. Or to have relationships that lasted for years being reduced to a laundry list of “conquests.”

This is nothing new, of course. Catherine The Great‘s enemies within the Emperor’s Court turned on her and started rumors that she was a sex fiend who had intercourse with horses. That stuck with her throughout her life and even in the museums of Russia, the tale has echoed although it’s completely untrue. Cleopatra and Anne Boleyn were also targeted. Ruining reputations was the way people got their revenge in days of yore. Or in some cases, the reason why some lost their heads to the guillotine. Why is it that women who have power or beauty have been subjected to crazy accusations of sexual voracity or deviance? Eve takes the blame for the banishment from Eden and although she was supposedly created from Adam’s rib, she is seen as a temptress and Adam as her victim.

I believe every woman should identify by how she feels comfortable and for the work she does. I personally prefer to be known for what I do, my accomplishments, my career. However, dating a rock star or an actor should not merit a nasty quip or name calling fest. It becomes unbalanced when just because someone gets famous as, say, a model or an actress and then dates a rock star, that she should get called anything other than what she does to earn a living. I’m not sure “groupie” falls under the umbrella of job occupation. I’d file it under pastime, hobby, passion, or fetish.

The origins of the groupie started with nothing more than a desire to be close to the band—the guys who made the music. Or in some cases, the women. The term came into use in the mid-1960s as slang for women who liked to hang out with musicians. It’s fair to say that not all “groupies” are the same. There are many tiers and pecking orders when narrowing it down. Certainly not every girl who dreams of being with a rock star will waltz backstage and demand sex or give oral gratification. That’s the image I despise and wish would not tarnish the entire viewpoint to the outside world. Some of the girls on the scene want to take the word “groupie” back, to personify what it meant in the ‘60s and early ‘70s. It became something entirely different when the ‘80s rolled around. Bands born out of the LA scene liked a different kind of arm candy than the Rolling Stones or the Beatles. They preferred exotic dancers and porn stars, the girls du jour of the time. Just as music changes with each era, so do the kinds of women who pursue the bands. But, more importantly, what kind of women the bands seek out. One man’s status is another man’s yen.

And then there are those who look at being a groupie as a form of prostitution. I’ve never understood that one because most girls who live that lifestyle don’t charge money to be with their favorite rock god or even their crew. It’s a thrill to be with the band, but it seems the glamor that was once attached to that goal has changed. For me, it was a thrill to fight to say “I’m IN the band”… or even “I AM the band!”

When I was living with Todd, he produced one of the first all-female bands, Fanny. They were so great! June Millington could shred! I felt bewildered when I would hear snide remarks wondering if Todd was sleeping with one of them. I thought to myself that would have never been said or thought if they weren’t women.

The bottom line is preference. We all have a choice. And we all can be whatever we want. We can wear many hats. I see myself as a mother, wife, musician, singer, songwriter, writer, mentor, animal lover… many different things. What I do in my spare time is how I make my soul happy. Who I date is based on connections, fate and karma. We end up with who we’re meant to be with and the experiences we have are all meant to be. I’ve been with my husband Jim for twenty years now. Our 18th wedding anniversary is coming in August 2020. So, I’m writing this piece from the perspective of a wife, mother, working musician, writer and mentor. Not just a girl who had lots of suitors in her youth. Every single little thing is part of the journey.

The first time I saw a photo in Rolling Stone of what they called a “groupie”, I was 15 years old and in the 10th grade. It was 1969, and neither the image nor the word was at all something ugly to me. It just seemed exciting and cool. The girls were so outrageously dressed, and it reflected an almost innocent charm. I didn’t aspire to be a groupie but they seemed like they were the ones who made the guys in the band cool. They helped dress them, created make-up looks and spread the word all over town about how good they were. It didn’t seem to be so much about sex and backstage antics. Maybe I was too young to fully understand everything, especially from the pages of a magazine.

On my first trip to LA with Todd in 1973, when I finally did meet some real girls who liked to be called groupies, it still didn’t seem derogatory. I started to see how it was all just tossed together in some people’s minds. It’s a complex dance between an artist and his muse. None of it is something so vulgar or tainted as being only about sexual conquest. Maybe to some, it’s about that. But for me it was a series of fated encounters that have lasted throughout my life.

Some people see a groupie as a girl who will do anything, including have sex with a roadie, to get to the band. There is that element to the rock n’ roll lifestyle. But it’s not the entire package. Others see groupies as a vibe, the girls who are there when the band makes it, the girls that helped them make it, the on-the-road bestie, or the girls who get the bands drugs and food. Or even give them the clothes off their backs if the band is short a cool stage look. I often joke that that’s how wearing your lingerie out became a signature rock girl look- the band had taken her clothes to wear onstage!

I recall reading where Pamela Des Barres said she was still a virgin when she first discovered her teenage heart being drawn to rock boys. It felt sexual to her and it was also just youthful and sweet. Not a salacious sexual quest. More a desire to be near the music and the men who made it. That’s perhaps what one would define as a “classic groupie”. Or, in some circles, “fan” is the preferred analogy. I can relate to that myself as I knew when I was ten years old, I would hang out with Mick Jagger one day. I knew those were my people… my kind.

Pamela has made a career out of her life as a proud groupie. But certainly she has a right to claim the term because she helped invent it! She now calls it her “groupie heart” and that is something anyone who’s ever had a crush on someone or loved someone’s music so much that it altered your DNA can relate to. Hasn’t everyone felt that way? Every guy or gal who picks up a guitar or slings a mic stand had to have been dazzled by their inspiration or felt a need to pursue that for their own futures. So, my point is this- none of it is negative nor should one word hold so much power that when it’s flung at a woman, she’ll feel shamed or scorned.

When I started to get a bit of fame, the media seemed to want to call me anything but “groupie”. It was “Friend Of The Stars”, “Queen Of The Rock Chicks”, “Leggy Model”, “The Mother Of All Rock Chicks”, “It Girl”… so when the internet entered our lives, I began to see just how judgmental and downright mean people were about the women who hung out with the bands. It started to become something so dirty and taboo that I wanted no part of that term. It’s a thin line, a hard one to walk. Personally, I feel loving music and being attracted to musicians is as natural as doctors and nurses getting along. Humans are drawn to their soul tribe. Music, musicians and all art forms attract me. I’m the moth to that flame.

As an entertainer myself, it always hurt me when what I actually do for my job was ignored or not taken seriously because of the famous names I’ve been attached to. It’s so one-sided to only put that burden on women. It has been the norm for men to be patted on the back and admired for their taste in women and especially if they were able to appeal to many and have tons of sexual experiences. Even in the animal kingdom, the male peacock has the massive plume bloom to attract as many lovers as he can. A male lion can rule the pride with his sexual domination. A male celebrity only becomes more famous if he’s got a beautiful model or actress on his arm. Whereas a woman who’s dance card is busy or even full is often ridiculed or bashed. Branded with the scarlet letter of infamy.

It started to get under my skin when I saw myself defined only by who I’d dated or had close friendships with. It’s the luck of the draw. Some women who are in the public eye can date and marry a celeb several times and be embraced for it. They use it to further their already visible life. They are proud and exploit all their lovers as the playthings that they’ve become. Some have become famous by leaking a porno or being on a reality show. What was once a limited field has become wide open with lots of branches of thought and assumption. I knew it wasn’t going to be easy for me to fight for my image… my persona… my legacy. But I did fight. I turned down almost every request I was presented to be interviewed for groupie documentaries or sensationalized TV shows. Sometimes turning down large sums of money. But I wanted to work hard and felt if I worked hard enough one day I’d be thought of for what I did on a stage, in front of the lens of a camera, as a mother and at times even a manager, more than who I shared my life with. Dare I use the “R” word? I wanted RESPECT.

There’s lots of contrast in the definition of groupie or muse but what about “partners”… the duos who took the world by storm. Sonny & Cher, Karen & Richard Carpenter, Debbie Harry & Chris Stein, Jack & Meg White, Jane Birkin & Serge Gainsbourg, Stevie Nicks & Lindsey Buckingham, Annie Lennox & Dave Stewart, Kim Gordon & Thurston Moore, etc… Or Chrissie Hynde and Courtney Love, who both married musicians. There’s a kaleidoscope of ways women are seen. It all depends on how you are first perceived. The general public seem to hold on to how they first heard of you even if you go on to do many different things in your life. Marianne Faithfull is a perfect example of someone who has been able to transcend her detractors and carry on like the warrior she is. But it baffles my mind how anyone could call her or Anita Pallenberg anything but tastemakers and trendsetters. They were the women I would stare at for hours as a young girl. They fascinated me almost more than the guys they hung out with. Yet I still hear them sometimes referred to as groupies.

Like any entertainer, I have an overwhelming need to be loved and to give love and positive energy to others. That’s why I crave being onstage. The connection with the audience is almost like having the best sex in the world. Or at minimum, a great, soulful hug that sends sparks through your body. I’ve been doing this since 1980, in public anyway. This is my life… not the talented, special men I dated in my youth. That’s part of my story and I will never regret a single heartbreak nor will I ever regret loving to the point of forgetting myself and my own pursuits. But I want to be remembered for more than my dates or suitors. I gave birth to a child who grew up to become a superstar so the role of nurturer has followed me throughout my life. I’ve accepted the fact that my fate is to be a vessel for talent and to enrich those who possess it. It’s become who I am- all the parts and pieces of my karma rolled into one big bang! My artistic side occupies just as much space as my musing side- equal parts love and creative energy.

Things come full circle especially when I get approached after one of my shows by young girls that call me “High Priestress” or tell me that they are my “groupies”. When I hear the words “Bebe, Im your biggest groupie!”, my heart swells but I also like to immediately remind them that I do what I do onstage because of them. Because of the exchange being a performer gives to my being. It’s like fuel… hors d’oeuvres for the soul.

One morning in 2009, I got a call from an old industry friend who had landed at Interscope Records. I was awoken with, “Bebe, you’ve been touted in a song produced by Pharrell Williams called ‘Bebe Buell’ by a young band from Boston called Chester French.” I remember thinking “wow, that’s a nice compliment” because the gist of the song was that someone like me or Pamela Anderson Lee were the creme de la creme of rock-boy desire. There’s a clothing line called ‘Muse & Lyrics‘ that has a blouse/top called “The Bebe” and the brand ‘I’m With The Band’ has named their leopard scarfs and headbands the “Bebe”. There’s even a cocktail called “The Bebe Buell”.

But I think one of the coolest things was having Cameron Crowe name the lead singer in Stillwater Jeff Bebe. He gave me the original T-shirt that was used in the movie, too, and boy do I treasure it! Cameron sprinkled all kinds of little clues and messages throughout Almost Famous. I was especially touched by the Jeff Bebe nod because he knew how much I wanted to be a singer in a band. I remember him once saying to me that I should just go for it. At that point, people only knew me as a model and Todd Rundgren’s girlfriend. I hadn’t even done Playboy yet, so I was still trying to figure out who I was and how to do it. I finally did but it took me six more years to get in the studio and front a band!

It’s moving to be honored and it’s also nice to be appreciated by the younger generation of pop culture lovers. The first time my name was in a song, I was excited by it. My old friend G.E. Smith had a line on his solo album that was about coming to visit “Bebe and Liz”… he came over to my best friend Liz Derringer’s house to play it for us. We were elated… it was cool. I would never be so bold as to sit here and make a list of my lovers or the songs they wrote for me because it seems so long ago. I’d rather leave that up to the fans of the music to decipher and besides not all songs written for others are acknowledged as such. I’ve had several songs given to me as gifts or written to me in letters.

Sometimes the authors don’t admit it because their feelings change and they don’t want to upset their new love interest. Didn’t Bob Dylan write “Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat”, “Just Like A Woman”, “Fourth Time Around” and “Like A Rolling Stone” about Edie Sedgwick, only to later deny it? I know the feeling because it’s happened to me. So, at this point in my life, I just cherish the letters (yes, I still have them so one day when we’re all gone they will maybe solve the puzzles) and I respect and allow artistic license to have its day. It’s an artist’s prerogative to change their minds so I hold no hurt feelings. Music buffs are pretty smart anyway and they usually know the truth, so it matters little unless it’s blatant. The one topic that irks me is that I claimed This Year’s Model was about me. Well, that’s impossible because I didn’t meet and start to date Elvis Costello until he was well into Armed Forces. I was living with him in London when he recorded it in the fall of 1978. He included a couple of lyrics from songs on Armed Forces in letters to me but I can say with certainty that “Party Girl” wasn’t one of them. I guess it was the timing of the release that made people speculate I was the subject, but I wasn’t and never claimed to be. He didn’t even know me when he wrote those records. Why this is disputed has always been a mystery to me. The songs Mr. Costello sent me in letters were from later albums, starting with Get Happy. I will always wonder too why he would say something so false and perpetuate a rumor twenty years later in the liner notes of a re-issue. Here’s to hoping it is finally put to rest. And even with the shame and pain I felt at the time, I feel no regret or ill will toward anyone. To me the truth is pretty obvious. Remember the story I told earlier about Catherine The Great? Revenge is often used when hearts are hurt, and it is very common in the entertainment industry.

In summing up my thoughts on the topic, I feel it’s time in our culture to appreciate the roles women have played in art since the beginning of time. Dali had his Gala, Picasso would hide the initials of his mistresses in his paintings and secretly tell them so they would know it was for them, Clapton immortalized his love and lust for Patti Boyd with the ultimate ode in “Layla” and John Lennon may have written the most beautiful love song of all for Yoko in “Woman”. Or was it Paul McCartney with “The Long And Winding Road” about Jane Asher or “Maybe I’m Amazed” about the spectacular Linda Eastman McCartney?

We can’t leave out the spirited and unique George Sand whose given name was Aurore Dupin. She was born in Paris on July 1, 1804 and adopted the name “George” because women couldn’t write professionally with the freedom of men in those days. She became one of the most popular writers in Europe during her lifetime- one of the most notable writers of the European Romantic era. She would wear male attire in public saying it was easier and more affordable than women’s garb. She was a confidant to Franz Liszt and lover and muse to Chopin. She would lie beneath the piano while Chopin composed, saying it sent the music through her entire body instead of just her ears.

Music is primal and it gets into our bloodstream. It’s easy to see why young girls get crushes on their idols and some even grow up to marry their dream man. But the days of defining women by their sexual desires or “conquests” should be on the wane. I never looked at the men I dated or loved as conquests. Humans aren’t territories to be battled over or ceded to. The human connection is divine. Each and every person we cross paths with is part of our magical life story. So, whatever you identify yourself as is fine. That is your privilege and judgement should not follow even if the choices aren’t the norm. As Oscar Wilde said, “Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.”

*Closing side note* As I was finishing this essay, I was doodling with a People magazine crossword puzzle and one of the clues was “GROUPIE”. Guess what the answer was… “FAN”. The timing was uncanny!

20 notes · View notes

emberbent · 5 years

Photo

Book 1: Fire | Chapter 1: The End

In the heart of Republic City, it was a smoggy, humid afternoon. Through the streets trudged languid couriers with their empty rickshaws behind them; capuchin cats sought shade beneath the parked Satomobiles that lined the curbs; vendors called out their wares - mostly cold treats to combat the oppressive summer heat.

The General’s Tea House, the high street’s most popular tea joint during on-season, was scarcely populated today. The place smelled of wilted jasmine and salty sweat. Two old men sat at the bar, ignoring each other, wasting the afternoon away. A handful of university students studied at one of the tables in the sunken main area in front of the stage.

“Nobody wants hot tea on a hot day,” Shinza complained behind the sheer curtain that partitioned the stage from the back of the house. “Let’s just bail and get some ice cream.”

Behind her, Nero had already uncased her flute. “We need the money,” she reasoned. “Let’s just get it over with, and then I’ll buy you a birthday drink.” She passed Shinza on the way to the stage, bumping hips with her friend for a little confidence. The two had been friends since their days as students at Republic City University; it seemed like they had graduated so recently, but when Shinza stopped to think about how long it had been since that day, and how the two of them, like many others their age, hadn’t ever really found their careers, a black cloud seemed to grow over her head. Expelling a deep breath, Shinza followed Nero out onto the stage, slipping the strap of her guitar over her head. If nothing else, at least she could get lost in the song for a moment.

“Thank you,” Shinza said as she stepped in front of the microphone, in response to the solitary student sitting in the corner table who’d whistled at them. “Thanks. This one’s an old favorite - we hope you like it.”

What Shinza loved about performing with Nero is that the two of them seemed to be two gears in the same mechanism, turning effortlessly together toward the same goal. Nero brought her flute to her lips, and Shinza strummed the first note. Together, they produced an airy, dreamy rendition of Secret Tunnel, one which caught the attention of the two old men at the bar, who by anyone’s assessment might not have been impressed by much at all. By the end of the song, the men and the lone student cheered, with the others applauding on autopilot, not daring to break away from the books in front of them.

Shinza and Nero bowed to their audience, slipping backstage to rest their instruments and take a quick interlude at the bar. “So, birthday girl,” Nero purred, sidling up and climbing into a bar stool. “What’ll it be?”

Shinza, much taller than her friend, perched on the stool beside her and pretended to scan the menu, although they both knew what she would order. “Mmm… pear sake.”

“What a surprise,” Nero teased. Then to the bartender, she said, “Make that two, please.”

Shinza settled, taking in the atmosphere of the place - the shuffling of pages turning; the idle sounds of the students clearing their throats or tapping their pens. Beside her, Nero shifted in her seat. “You’re going quiet on me,” she noted. “What’s up?”

“I don’t know,” Shinza shrugged. “I mean… That’s a lie. I do know. I’m twenty-seven, and this is what I have to show for it? This is what I’ve been doing with my life?”

She’d known her art degree wouldn’t amount to much, unless by some stroke of luck she could manage to become a famous artist, or maybe end up teaching at the university she’d graduated from. But those odds were long, and the competition too strong for those odds to play out in her favor. It had been a risk that hadn’t paid off. Her parents would have happily paid for her tuition, if she’d chosen to be a doctor like her mother had done. But she hadn’t, and now she was saddled with debt from a degree she didn’t use. Feeling aimless was what had brought her and Nero together in the first place, and it was a continuing feeling that they lacked any real value in society that had created such a strong bond between them.

“Hey,” Nero sounded in that famous mom-friend tone of hers. “Look, just because some people are lucky enough to have a passion for something that makes them money in life doesn’t mean we have it so bad. Don’t be so hard on yourself. Besides - we may not be rolling in cash, but I love performing with you. That has to count for something.”

“I do too,” Shinza replied. “I really do. I hope you know that. It’s just… I feel like I’m doing this in the meantime, you know? Whatever that means. I don’t even know what I’m waiting for.”

Behind them, a man and a woman entered the teahouse; neither Shinza nor Nero paid them any mind as the bartender slid them a jar of hot sake and two tiny cups, until the two approached the bar. “Shinza Kwon?” said the woman. “We need you to come with us.”

As Shinza swiveled to face them, it was immediately clear that they weren’t from around here. They wore the garments of Fire Nation officials - which she only happened to know from the Contemporary Fire Nation Studies class she’d taken, and from pictures her father’s family had sent from Fire Fountain City.

“Uh…” Shinza squinted at them. How did they know her name?” “I’m sorry - why?”

The woman and her partner, in unison, placed their knuckles into their palms and bowed to her. “Ms. Kwon, it’s recently come to light that you’re the Avatar. You need to come with us immediately; a lot of time has been wasted already.” Was this a joke? Had Nero set up an elaborate prank on her to cheer her up?

“Hilarious,” Shinza noted. She wasn’t laughing. “I’m not even a bender. You’ve got the wrong person.”

“You’re Shinza Kwon,” the man recited. “Graduate of Republic City University? Daughter of Li Kwon, a retired United Forces captain, and Desa Kwon, a doctor? You live at Eighteen Dichi Street, apartment–”

“Yes,” Shinza stopped him. She felt as if she were melting into her seat. Around her, not a single patron was looking anywhere but at her and the Fire Nation officials. Most of them were slack-jawed; two of them bowed reverently. “That’s me. But I don’t understand. How can I–”

“Time is of the essence,” the man pressed. “Please, we need to get you to your destination.”

Shinza stared them down, as if maybe by sheer force of will, she could find the answer between the two of them. “Can I see some ID?”

The woman rolled her eyes and groaned, unfurling the official scroll - which, by scanning, Shinza came to learn was the official documentation summoning her to the Island of the Sun Warriors - complete with the Fire Lord’s seal.

“Good enough for me,” she said weakly, slipping down off her bar stool, leaving Nero with their untouched sake. Her friend’s dark eyes were wide and round, as if Shinza were a ghost. The officials took Shinza by the arms and gently but swiftly led her to the door. The two patrons who had bowed to her hadn’t lifted their heads yet; one patron who stood by the door made a point of rudely bumping into the three of them as they exited the establishment. The two tucked Shinza into their Sato, parked along the curb; the engine was still running as the woman slipped into the driver’s seat.

“So, hang on,” Shinza sounded. “Where exactly are we going? I don’t understand how you could possibly think I’m the Avatar.”

“We have intel,” the man reported, as if that answered everything. “We’re taking you to the Island of the Sun Warriors so you can start your training immediately. You’re… very behind.”

“When? Like, now?”

“Yes. Right now.”

“But wait, what about my apartment? What about my capuchin cat?”

“We’ll make arrangements for you. Don’t worry.”

Panic began to swell in her chest as the Sato pulled out into traffic, going notably above the speed limit as they dodged other Satos, rickshaws, and people alike. “Can I at least say goodbye to my parents? So they know where I’m going? Please, they just live two blocks from here.”

The two officials looked at each other. “Fine,” said the woman.

They reached her parents’ apartment building, stopping along the curb. “Just hang back here. I’ll only be a second.”

“No. We’re coming with you,” said the man.

Shinza blinked at him for a second and then sighed as she opened the door and slid out of the vehicle and onto the sidewalk. Whoever these people were, their job seemed strictly never to let her out of their sight. Before they entered the building, Shinza pressed the buzzer mounted on the bricks. “Mom? Dad? It’s me. Can you let me in?”

“Hi, baby,” said her mother’s voice. “Everything okay? Come on up.”

Was everything okay? Shinza felt dizzy as the officials led her through the door and into the elevator car. The confinement of the space seemed both to clear her head and make her even dizzier. At last, the bell sounded and the doors slid open, revealing her parents’ floor. Shinza led the officials to the correct door, and she rang the doorbell.

It seemed like days passed between when she heard the sound of the bell and when her mother finally answered the door. But when she did, as soon as she saw her Shinza framed by two Fire Nation officials, she grew pale, understanding in an instant what was happening.

“Mrs. Kwon,” said the man flanking Shinza. “Your daughter is the Avatar. She requested we come visit you on our way to the Fire Nation.”

The door slowly swung open wider; behind her mother, her father caught sight of the three in the doorway. Despite his bad leg, using his cane, he found his way onto one knee, bowing reverently the way they did in his homeland. “Mama,” Shinza said evenly, despite finding herself suddenly blinded by her own tears. “I don’t understand.”

“Go with them, child,” said her father as he painstakingly made his way back to his feet.

“But what about Bao? I’m going to lose my apartment.”

“Don’t worry,” said her mother, placid as the moon, as she wiped away tears with her long sleeve. “We’ll go get Bao. He can live with us.”

The man nudged Shinza. “We have to go.”

“I’ll be in touch,” Shinza called to both of her parents, although she wasn’t sure whether that was strictly accurate. Her parents gazed down the hall at the three of them from the open doorway, her mother blowing a kiss. “We love you, Shinza,” she said. “No matter what.”

Back in the Sato, Shinza wiped tears off her face, embarrassed at having let her emotions gain control of her, especially in front of two people she didn’t even know. As they pulled away from the curb, the city passed them by in a blur. Shinza felt somehow, despite having grown up here and being as familiar with the streets and the shops and apartments along them as the veins on the backs of her hands, she was suddenly a stranger here. The ride was silent for a long time as they left downtown and headed for the port, just on the outskirts.

The man turned around in the passenger seat to face Shinza. “I’m sorry this all happened so quickly. But you should know that you’re doing the right thing. You’ve lost a lot of time, but it’s not your fault. I’m Zhang, by the way, and that’s Mai.”

“Hey,” said Mai, chancing a glance at Shina in the rearview mirror.

“We’re taking you to a boat bound for the island,” said Zhang, “Once we’re there, you’ll start your training.”

“Nice to, uh… meet you, I guess,” said Shinza. She still didn’t know how they could possibly have her, a non-bender, confused for the Avatar. But she had a feeling Zhang and Mai didn’t know, either. For how quickly the trip to her parents’ place seemed to go by, the journey to the port seemed to take an eternity.

“You want some music?” asked Mai, her hand hovering over the radio dial in the dash.

“No,” Shinza replied. “Thanks.”

After what seemed like an eternity in a car with two strangers, the coast finally crept in from the horizon. The air smelled salty as they pulled into a lot that housed the Satos of people boarding the boats that lined the docks. Mai and Zhang came around to collect Shinza, who had already slid out from the back seat.

“I know it’s annoying,” said Mai as she and Zhang took their positions on either side of her. “But surely you’ve heard of everything happening with The Org. We can’t risk anything happening to you. Especially now, when you’re not trained yet.”

The three of them made their way to a dock, at which a sizable travel vessel with the Fire Nation flag waving proudly from its mast sat waiting for them to board. Ahead of them, several families, single adults, and a few unaccompanied children queued along the wooden ramp, each with their tickets ready. She and her escorts didn’t have tickets; the scroll with the Fire Lord’s seal was more than enough to grant them passage.

Shinza had heard of The Org, and had seen the flyers that littered the streets after their periodic demonstrations. She’d even heard whispers that what went on inside the group was much more dangerous than what most people knew about. But the truth was that she’d never concerned herself with the Avatar or whatever The Org had against them. What business was it of hers? Apparently, now, it was very much her business. As Mai flashed the scroll at the person permitting entry, Shinza wished she’d bothered to give a damn when she’d had the chance.

With one last look behind her at the view of Republic City, Shinza boarded the boat, feeling that somehow this marked the end of her life as she had always known it.

10 notes · View notes

elfnerdherder · 6 years

Text

Ill Intentions: Chapter 18

[Support my Writing] [Read on Ao3]

A special thanks to my patrons: @sylarana @jenacar @frostyleegraham @evertonem @starlit-catastrophe @kenobi-is-king @frostylicker Mendacious Bean, Superlurk, Duhaunt6, and Cecily! <3

Chapter 18: Dialogue

“Thank you so much for agreeing to meet me!” the girl gushed. She was pretty, in that I-can’t-remember-quite-what-my-natural-hair-color-is sort of way. Large eyes, thick eyeliner. She ran a blog online and had Will Graham’s face all over it. He wasn’t quite sure when it popped up, but readers assured her that they’d still follow her work *if* the Will Graham fad faded.

“Of course,” Will replied. “I didn’t realize that people were following this so closely. When I saw everyone’s insightful comments, as well as your support as I tried to keep journalistic integrity, I thought that you had some interesting ideas. Your theories.”

“My theory that you already know who it is? Yeah, I know. Not many people believe me. I wrote to you, but you didn’t respond.”

They were seated outside of a coffee shop that didn’t make coffee, and whose only idea of something closely resembling coffee was an espresso. Anything else on the menu had syrup or energy drinks in it. Will settled for a pumpkin spice latte because it felt right at that time of year, and he added another coffee to his watch. He needed to drink water soon.

“Sorry.”

“No, I get it. You’re busy.”

“I have been lately, yeah,” Will agreed.

“So you meeting me means that I’m right, right? You know who it is?”

Will laughed. “I was more interested in you talking about your publisher that would love a writer that could engage like I did. I was going to ask if you could see about presenting a manuscript for me anonymously.”

He didn’t like talking himself up like that. The brag felt forced, pushy, but Nicole didn’t seem to mind. She squinted, much the same way she had when she first walked up to the table, and she adjusted her cat-eye glasses. From writer to writer, she seemed to be able to see bull shit a mile away.

“You have a manuscript?”

“Something I’ve been kicking around for a bit. I think that just about now is the most convenient time to present it.”

“Not meaning to sound rude, since I like you Mr. Graham, but what am I getting out of this?”

Will smiled, and he reached into his pocket, tugging out the handkerchief with care. He set it on the table between them, catching Nicole’s eye.

“That handkerchief,” he said, maintaining eye contact, “belongs to the Chesapeake Ripper. I took it from him.”

Nicole looked from him to the handkerchief, and she snatched it up with hardly a breath, her grip tight enough to tell Will that he now had her undivided attention.

“When you look over that manuscript and send it in for me, I’ll let you post about whatever you like. With this as evidence when that time comes.”

Nicole looked from the handkerchief to Will; her grip didn’t slacken. “Why do you care so much about who this publisher is?” she asked. “She’s amazing, don’t get me wrong, but why her? Why me?”

He finished his drink before he answered. Just around them, there was the gentle murmur and discussions of holidays between friends, the plans just ahead and what lay on the horizon. Normal, calming things. His watch beeped to remind him to drink water.

“I heard that she is willing to publish anyone with a good story. Someone that can see when something’s real and make the most out of it.”

“Yeah?” Nicole pocketed the handkerchief, her silent agreement.

Will stood up and threw his cup away. “I’ve got something she’s going to like. That’s all.”

Jack picked Will up on the steps of Tattler News before the news vans and avid fans could quite get to him. It was the day before Will’s appointment with Dr. Lecter. Will didn’t quite like to admit it, but there was something exciting about Jack stopping him; he wondered if the agent had figured out that something wasn’t adding up.

“Find something?”

“A body. The Maestro.”

He didn’t quite deflate at the mention of the bastard’s name, but something close to it. Will was getting just about tired of the Maestro and his nosiness. His need to be seen. Will Graham & Co.

They rode to the scene in silence. It was an hour or so of countryside dusted in a powder of snow, and Will Graham tracked rolling hills that gave way to branches stripped of their green. The FBI sprung for electric heaters in the leather seats, and Will indulged a little.

The body was found in an open amphitheater in the middle of Wolf Trap National Forest that would normally showcase theater or performances for campers. He stood at the top for longer than was necessary; this he only found out after Jack shouldered past him, headed down with the steps of a man that was maybe getting just a little too tired of this shit. Will wondered about his absent wedding band. Maybe he should have asked in the car.

Snow had fallen in the time between the body being placed and the body being found. Will huddled into his peacoat and tried to breathe through his nose, the air just bitter enough to make his throat uncomfortable. Forensics was busy dusting away at the snow that’d given a fine layer to Mr. Peters’ final form. It was like unearthing a rare and grotesque artifact; each sweep of the soft-bristled brush showed more and more of the mystery beneath.

It sounded an awful lot like Lacrimosa was on the wind. Will could remember it from listening to the old lady next door, the window open to her music room where children did their best to recreate works of art on introductory, factory-glued pieces of garbage. They’d get better with time, she would reassure parents. Maybe invest in a nicer violin, and it wouldn’t sound so squeaky? Maybe some steel strings? Cat gut strings? Maybe don’t buy from Amazon Prime next time?

The notes that hummed when he laid eyes on Mr. Peters came from the belly of a rich and aged cello, something whose notes mellowed and curved around the sound of his death. Despite the build-up of music that’d grown with each death, with each frustrating note as Will willfully ignored the Maestro, this felt somehow anti-climactic in comparison, something soothing and yearning. Will rubbed his ear agitatedly. He wondered of the Ripper had seen the body, too.

“This guy isn’t in any orchestra that I know of,” Jack said when Will made it down the final few steps. “Thirty-eight, single, rents a house somewhere out here.”

Will stared at the mop of unruly brown hair, and he could hazard a guess.

“He also left this,” Jack continued, passing the note over. Rather than look at Will, he continued to stare at Mr. Peters, brow set. His avoiding Will’s face was more telling than the note would be.

“How’s your wife, Jack?” Will couldn’t help but ask. He took the note and held it tight in his left hand, stalling although he couldn’t say why.

Jack side-eyed him, lip curling. “Excuse me?”

“You’re not wearing a wedding band.”

He could tell that Jack didn’t want to answer. Despite the murmur and hum of the forensics team moving about the seats, gleaning everything over for clues, it felt as though there was nothing more than the music, Will, and Jack. His fingers tapped lightly along the paper.

There was no way in hell Jack was going to give him a copy of it. His corkboard would have to miss out on a note.

“Died,” Jack said. There was nary a flicker of emotion as he said it. “She died.”

Will wasn’t sorry for the death –at least there was one death that he didn’t feel some form of culpability for. He looked down to the letter, a weird tightness in his throat.

“My condolences,” he said, and that was as far as he’d go without feeling like an ass about it. He didn’t ask why Jack wasn’t wearing a ring if it was a death that’d taken her and not someone else.

Will Graham & Co.,

The next stanza, I’ll admit, is a stepping stone to the final act. When the Conductor is trying to reach out to the many musicians of their ensemble, more often than not there are one or two persons that refuse to do as they’re asked. The rest of the musicians may reach out, the conductor may also attempt private tutoring or various angles to attempt to make them see reason –

In the end, there are some that do not comply. They must be removed from the symphony so that the performance may continue unhindered.

Does Jack Crawford feel close to finding the Chesapeake Ripper? Does he feel close to finding me? As the conductor, I feel a certain responsibility in helping. Perhaps I will catch your killer for the both of you.

-Another Avid Fan

Will stared at the letter, then at the body in front of him. In that moment, he’d have liked to have felt fear in realizing that he was one of the ones that Maestro felt the need to remove because he wasn’t complying with ‘the plan’. In truth, there was nothing more than a flicker of annoyance, a feeling that out of all of the places he needed to be, this wasn’t one of them. Beside him, Jack held still and waited for him to speak, a certain energy about his silence.

“You ever see something like this?” Will asked.

“Serial killers competing for the attention?”

Will snorted. “I wouldn’t call it competing. You’ve got one going off on their own, killing, and the other’s just trying to catch up.”

“Sounds like you’ve got a favorite, Will.”

Will opened his mouth to reply with something particularly snarky, but he snapped it shut and circled the body instead. Jack’s wife was dead, and she’d died recently. Given everything he’d done –and arguably what he was going to do –he owed it to Jack to be a little nicer.

There was nothing special about the body. It was dressed much the same as the others, the only giveaway about the intentions behind it being the curled brown hair. Will supposed that that was something to consider about himself, that the open and exposed throat didn’t rattle him as it had the first time. Hearing the music had made him nervous, made him wonder at himself.

Just what was he becoming that now, all that he could feel was a vague flicker of annoyance at the timing? The presumption?

His watch beeped: Get ready for lunch.

“We can assume he’s coming after me,” Will said when he finished his lap.

“Or the Ripper.”

“Does he know who the Ripper is?” Will wondered. “If so, maybe we just need to follow the blood trail. This is personal to him.”

“Looks like you’re personal to him,” Jack corrected.

“Maybe. Maybe he knows me, maybe he’s just getting really mad I’m not addressing him in the column. Maybe I keep ignoring him, and it draws him out for you to bring him in.”

“Will,” Jack said, and something in his voice made Will look up from the way snow had gotten inside of the man’s throat, clung to the bleached vocal cords. The wind stirred, dancing small swirls of powder off of the stage. “I got a call from my boss. As of right now, they’re wanting to bring you in and keep you until we can get this under control. The more you’re out in the public eye, the more in danger you are. The more in danger the public is.”

Will didn’t hesitate to let the words sink in. “No.”

“It’s not a request.”

“You can’t –I don’t want –”

“Honestly, I got my ass chewed for how long I left you out here, but that’s neither here nor there. Where the Maestro is specifically targeting you, we’re moving you to a special safe house. I thought maybe showing you just how much danger you were in would help you come to that conclusion on your own, but…”

Jack didn’t finish his thought, and he didn’t have to. Will looked from him to the body, a strangled laugh trying to gurgle out.

Are serial killers your muse?

“Either way, this has gone on long enough,” Jack carried on when Will didn’t speak. His tone brooked no argument. “We’re going to get you taken care of, but first and foremost we’re going to keep you safe. With, or without your consent.”

It wasn’t until they were on their way back from the crime scene that Will found the right words.

“You’re not stupid, Jack,” he said.

Jack glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, but said nothing.

“You know protocol. You know rules, regulations, and the right steps to take,” Will continued, staring out of the passenger window. “You’ve been doing this a long time.”

“I have.”

“So you’d know that protocol said the moment the Ripper sent, oh, I don’t know, the third letter, I should have been pulled. But I wasn’t.”

“That was a mistake that –”

“Don’t bullshit me, Jack,” Will interrupted, and he looked back to Jack with a mildly unsettling smile. “You let me keep my freedom because you hoped it’d bring the Ripper to your front door. I was bait, only you didn’t want me to think I was.”

“You weren’t complaining about it,” Jack pointed out.

“I wasn’t,” Will agreed.

“If you’d asked to be taken to a safe house, I’d have had you there in a heartbeat.”

“Yeah, I know.” Will looked back to the window and tracked the gently rolling hills of snow. The wind often picked up just enough of it to create small, hollowed mounds that rolled and carried across the ground, gaining more snow and momentum as they went. One poor step, and your foot would just keep going until you found yourself hip-deep in the mess of it. Chilled to the bone.

“I’d have never compromised your safety.” Jack sounded as though he were trying to convince himself just as much as he was Will.

“You did, Jack,” Will replied. “Don’t worry, I’m not mad about it. Just trying to let you know that blowing smoke up my ass to tell me you should have pulled me sooner is a shit excuse, and you know it. You haven’t lied to me yet. Don’t make a habit of it now.”

Silence, save for the humming of the heater and the faint catches of music in the background. Jack Crawford played smooth jazz on the radio.

“She’s fought cancer for a year now,” Jack finally said. His voice was raw with the kind of emotions Will didn’t want to share in. “My wife. I’d hoped to catch the Ripper before she died. She’d heard enough about him over the years. It feels…wrong to wear her band until I’ve got him. I think I’ll be able to put it back on once I do.”

He found himself taking on some of it anyway –mostly the grief, the loss. Will curled his bottom lip into his mouth, bit down hard. It seemed that no matter what Jack did, he was destined to lose. No matter how hard he fought, it would never be good enough. Will couldn’t be mad about Jack using him as bait, not when he had such a need at stake. People that always lost became desperate. People that always lost either continued to lose, or they found a way to change the game so that they could win.

“I’ve got a therapy appointment tomorrow with Dr. Lecter, Jack,” Will said when they started to hit traffic going back into DC. “I understand that you’re pulling me, but can I just have a couple of days to get my shit in order?”

Jack didn’t respond to that until they were pulling up alongside Tattler News, where Will’s ‘avid fans’ were waiting with signs and baskets of treats. He put the car in park, looked over, and gave Will a long, searching stare. It was reminiscent of the first time Will had ever spoken with him, seated just across from one another at the coffee shop. Things had spiraled since that moment, left Will hitting the ground running with no time to look back.

“We’re taking you to the safehouse on Saturday,” Jack finally replied. “Whether you’re ready or not.”

“Got it.” Will opened the door and climbed out, sliding his messenger bag over his shoulder. When he went to close the door, he paused, shifting his weight from one foot to the other as he tried to find the right words. This wasn’t a piece of paper. This wasn’t a word doc. That he could tinker with until perfect. This was a person. “Thanks, Jack. For…understanding.”

Jack grunted an affirmative. “Saturday, Will.”

“Yeah, Saturday,” Will agreed, and he shut the door, hurrying past the crowd that tried to rush him with cries of adoration and questions about the Chesapeake Ripper.

Hannibal Lecter’s office was a private practice with a fenced in courtyard and an elegantly painted door sign. Will was five minutes early, and after signing in and filling out the appropriate paperwork, he idled in the waiting room with a sense of unease coupled with excitement wrestling in his guts. The couches were upholstered, nary a magazine out of place on the freshly dusted coffee table; the receptionist didn’t sneak glances at him as though she were questioning what he was there for.

His watch beeped to tell him that he’d better be at Lecter’s office. He swiped the notification away, as well as a reminder that Beverly had texted, and Molly had called twice. He thought to pace, to release the emotions that curled and licked along his short breaths, but reason overcame him. He had to play it calm. He glanced down, allowed his glasses to tilt and adjust crookedly. He had to lie, and he had to be very, very careful while doing it.

Thankfully, among many of his other talents, lying was indeed one of them. As of late, he’d come to know that fact intimately.

He stood when the door opened, and he stared for quite some time when he met the gaze of the man that stood across from him. He had to fight the self-satisfied smirk that threatened to crawl onto his face.

Dr. Hannibal Lecter was handsome in an unconventional way. Poised in the doorway of his office, he wore a blue suit with thin white pinstripes, shoes a polished brown that matched the pocket square in his suitcoat. He was broad-shouldered, but it tapered to narrower hips. His cheekbones were high, his eyes deep-set. Thin lips were set in a placid, emotionless line, and his jaw was illegal in twelve states. Hair was combed, face was clean-shaven; in truth, he was the antitheses to Will Graham’s own mildly abused suit and scruffy beard.

“Will Graham, come in,” he said, and Will’s heart lurched.

He followed him into an office, hardly aware of the feeling of feet pressing into carpet, moving him forward. He could only repeat those four words in his mind, in that voice, his pulse in his throat, his skin becoming somewhat clammy. The FBI had been a surprise; this time, they were on an even playing field.

Will could hardly wait.

The office was just as tastefully decorated as the waiting room, rich mahogany wood and oil paintings of lovely scenery. To the far side was a fireplace and a desk, and in the center of the room sat two comfy looking leather chairs that faced one another.

“A pleasure to see you so soon,” Dr. Lecter –the Ripper –said, extending his hand. “I think we’d both agree that it is on much better terms than an arrest.”

It took Will a moment longer than necessary to shake his hand, but he did, awkwardly studying the two leather chairs. They looked arranged more for a stand-off than an actual conversation.

“Yeah, thanks for that,” he said, looking back to Lecter. “Whatever you said did the job.”

“I assure you that all that I did was tell the truth,” he replied, a quick smile flitting over his lips. It slipped past the professional veneer that he held, made it just a little easier to see the Ripper beneath. A secret for the two of them. The truth, but only just.

“Please, have a seat,” Lecter continued, motioning to the chairs. Will nodded, made his way to the one where his back wasn’t to the door, and he sat down in it, easing into the supple leather with only the mildest of stiffness. “Have you done this before?”

“Therapy?” Will asked, looking around. The loft above housed nothing but books upon books upon books, and he studied them with interest before he looked back to Lecter now seated across from him. “Oh, yes. Several times.”

“How did it work out for you?” he asked. He sat much the way Will thought he might, one leg crossed elegantly over the other, hands clasped in his lap. His expression was still blank, still shuttered to whatever thoughts had to be rushing though his mind. Was he surprised to see Will? Angry? Afraid? Impressed?

God, Will kind of hoped he was impressed. Afraid as well would be a bonus.

“Not too well. One of them told me I kept anticipating her questions, so I knew how to avoid them,” he admitted. He rubbed his ear, stopped when he realized the motion. Lecter’s eyes tracked it the way a bird of prey tracked a mouse in a field.

“Why now, then?”

Will smiled. “Because I finally found something interesting to talk about.”

Dr. Lecter didn’t speak for a while, and Will finally looked away from the corner of his glasses, startled to see an intent, probing expression. It was not so obvious as others, but there was a sensation like he could see into the back of his mind, peel the layers of the skin and find the truth beneath. Will made sure to hold very, very still.

“I’d like to help you, if I’m at all able,” Lecter said. He shifted and rested his hands on the arm rests. “I tend to recommend appointments at least once a week, increasing to two should the need arise but no more. My rate is two hundred per hourly session, although if you are of a lower income I do have a sliding rate.”

“I can pay,” Will assured him.

“If I may, can I ask how you were referred to me?”

“You come highly recommended off of google,” Will replied. That seemed to amuse the Ripper; at least, his eyes lit up and the edge of his lip turned. Will tracked its movement, then looked back to the edge of his glasses.

“How many therapists have you been to before you found your way to me?”

“…Growing up, my dad made me see one, once. Then there was one in high school, one my graduating year, one in the second year of college, and one right around graduating there.” He ticked them off on his fingers, wriggling them with some small bit of irony. “I guess the difference is that I’m seeking one out this time rather than someone shoving them at me.”

They met eyes again, and something taut was pressed to Will’s ribs, testing. There was a set to Lecter’s shoulders, like he was prepared to lash out at any moment. Will didn’t jump up to accuse, though –that would spoil the fun.

“What sort of thoughts intrude in the spaces of your mind?” Hannibal asked. “What most would you like to talk about?”

“Killing, Dr. Lecter,” he said, and he rubbed his mouth like he could soften the harsh sound of the consonant. “I think a lot about death.”

Hannibal nodded like he’d been expecting this, like he’d been waiting for this. “Do you fantasize about how you’d take someone’s life?”

“It’s more like…I recreate how someone else did it.” Will shifted, crossed a leg in order to match the Ripper’s. “Is this a session today, Dr. Lecter? Or is this some kind of consultation?”

“I have the time; consider this your first session, free of charge.” He shifted in his chair, crossed his legs the other way to get comfortable. “At the very least, you can ascertain whether or not the two of us would be a good fit.”

“I’m not worried so much about that,” Will replied. He tamped down the urge to show just how smug he felt. “…When I was twelve, I was put into special education classes because my social skills were sub-par. I was tested and found to be on the autistic spectrum, but high-functioning enough that I was allowed back into regular classes after I saw a few therapists and doctors. Things were…fine. Normal.

“In high school though, we were in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina happened, and there was…a lot of death. There was a lot of looting, desperation, murders…fear. There was a lot of fear.”

“Is that when they discovered that you have hyper-empathy disorder?” Lecter asked.

“Is it that obvious?”

“When one knows what to look for, yes. Tell me, do those glasses have a prescription?”

“No.”

“You avoid eyes.”

“Eyes are distracting,” Will explained. “When you’re trying to see something more than a physical appearance, eyes get in the way of everything else.”

“And I’m sure with your lack of love for many things, why look for something you don’t care to see?”

Will nodded at that, glanced down and pressed his palms together, lining up the fingers with careful precision. It reminded him of his last stint in therapy, a feeling of a cheese grater on his eyes, although he had to remind himself that he’d chosen to be here. He’d chosen to sit down in this room.

Because this was the lair of the Chesapeake Ripper.

“I have a confession,” he said, and he didn’t look up. He could imagine the look on the Ripper’s face at a statement like that. “While you may have gotten me out of an arrest, Dr. Lecter, it looks like Agent Crawford’s ability to keep me out on the streets is coming to an end.”

“An end?”

“Apparently I’m drawing too much attention to myself. I’m being taken to a safe house.”

“A safe house,” he mused, and Will glanced up in time to see the Ripper’s careful mask slip, a flicker of annoyance in the set of his jaw as he cupped his chin in hand and stared across the room contemplatively.

“I thought to tell you,” Will said. “If you thought we were a good fit, I was going to request a last-minute appointment for tomorrow. Just to get my affairs in order before I’m sent away somewhere that you can’t reach.”

There was silence once more in the spacious office. Will kept time with his heartbeats as the Chesapeake Ripper deliberately rose up and went to his desk, taking the time to grab a pen and casually open a small, leather bound book. He glanced across the way at Will, then down to the paper, and he jotted a couple of things down, shoulders squared.

“I can make time for tomorrow at seven-thirty sharp,” he said. “Does that suit you?”

“Do you trust me to be on time?” Will asked.

Dr. Hannibal Lecter looked up from his paper once more, and the smile he gave was something borderline feral. The shadows filled the hollowed spaces of his cheekbones, and Will wondered if that was how he looked when he first observed Will drive a knife into someone’s gut.

When no one was watching, did he always appear so hungry?

“Only time will tell,” he said calmly, and he nodded towards Will’s watch when it beeped. “Perhaps if you program it into your watch, you won’t be late.”

And Will couldn’t help but laugh, completely calm and somehow at ease, even as the doctor saw him out of his office with a hand pressed to the small of his back.

#LiaS scribbles #Ill Intentions #hannigram #slowburn hannigram #journalist!Will #Dark!Will #Grey!Will #hannibal #hannibal fanfic #hannibal au

10 notes · View notes

ibelieveinahappilyeverafter · 6 years

Text

Putting the Cat in Catastrophe Chapter 1 (edited)

Bonjour, mes chers! I’m about to upload chapter two in half an hour or so here, but this is the edited chapter of TCC where I had to edit a few things to make it work better once I finished plotting it all out. Enjoy! Also, a new thing, I’ll be uploading the chapter fully onto tumblr. Neat, huh?

If you’re a Patron of mine then you can find a link the the old version of the story - and even notes of what I wanted to do! - on my patreon at mjanderson! You can pledge as little as a dollar a month and get access to a bunch of cool things. Go check it out!

Click here to read on FFN Click here to read on AO3

Summary: Danny Fenton has just escaped from a secret government testing facility and runs straight into Andrew Riter - a busybody librarian who seems to be obsessed with helping a stray black cat - said stray black cat happening to be Danny himself. The Government gets interested when they find out a seemingly ordinary human can shapeshift into different animals. Danny just wants to return to his family and try to find his lost memories, but he's having a hard time doing so when he's finding less and less reasons for leaving Andrew's side. He couldn't tell anyone his secret - not again - but... But why did he want to trust this man so badly? (Iambic Prose) (Shapeshifter Danny AU)

Warning: This story will have references to laboratory testing, mentions of vivisections, blood, wounds, character trauma, and things of a similar sort. Most mentions of such things will be vague, but there will be heavy mentions of it and warnings at the beginning of chapters when it gets explicit.

<<Next Chapter>>

Chapter One

It could be said that how a person’s day went was largely determined by their mood and their personal worldview. With such an outlook, it would be correct in saying that if you looked upon the day with a cheery smile and attitude, then you would have a happy day no matter what bad things befell you.

Andrew Riter would like nothing more than to punch the face of whoever had said that. Preferably with a knife, but a regular punch and kick to the balls would work just as well, he was certain.

See, Andrew would readily admit that he wasn’t that optimistic of a person - in fact, he was usually downright sour to people and for good reason. He dealt with enough stupidity at work and school, he didn’t need it in his daily life. There was a reason he avoided social contact as best he could. He still did his best to enjoy his days and take them one at a time, of course, but that was very difficult when his day had become a giant shitshow.

It started, as always, when he woke up to nothing but wonderful peace and quiet. That was very bad since it meant his alarm hadn’t gone off. A look to his piece of shit alarm clock had showed he only had an hour to get ready for work. It wasn’t the best, but at least he hadn’t slept through the start of his shift. Which, that was fine. It could have been a still okay day since it meant he got more sleep, but, no.

He quickly found out his depression and anxiety medication were completely empty. Completely as in there was a post-it note reminding him to refill the damn things, but he hadn’t, so screw his past self. The day could have been saved by a good cup of morning coffee and a muffin or two, but his cabinets were dismally empty and the only thing in his refrigerator that wasn’t expired were some eggs and milk. He hated dairy. As for the new bag of coffee he got… He grabbed the wrong one last time he was at the store.

So with a horribly cold shower because the water in his apartment sucked, Andrew had gone out the door and had been five seconds away from a full blown panic attack because of the fucking espresso coffee he bought that existed for the sole reason of people hating themselves. It may not have been as bad if he hadn’t been stopped on the stairwell three times by his neighbors.

Vidya, his sadistic landlord who he was absolutely certain was a witch of some sort due to the fact she always smelled of plants and wore a lot of black and green and had grey hair when she was thirty, had wanted to discuss that month’s rent and was not assured by Andrew telling her - quite often - that his paycheck would be coming in just a few days and could she please stop threatening eviction when she never went through with it? Either commit or don’t, but stop acting like his life wasn’t in her hands, honestly.

He had then been stopped on the second floor by Sam who had spent almost half an hour screaming at him over the ethics of animal testing. Sam was a childhood friend who had ‘coincidentally’ wound up in the same apartment as him and tended to dress on the more vampire side of goth. The black hair fooled no one when the roots were so quick to fade back to blonde. Ugh. She also had this thing about animal testing. Andrew was of the opinion that he didn’t care at all and Sam seemed to think him a monster for not caring about - what even had she been upset about this time? Eyeliner on bunnies? Andrew couldn't care less. Actually, he probably could care less! This was him! Not caring!

Oh and then Tucker. Tucker, another ‘coincidental’ childhood friend and certifiable genius when it came to mechanics and computers and looked like a nerd straight from the 80s or early 90s, had stopped him five feet from the door and spent thirty minutes trying to talk to him about theoretical physics. Andrew was just trying to get his Associate in Arts and then transfer to a nice four-year to study Creative Writing - maybe Journalism if he got curious and or desperate enough. He was not killing himself with a double major in Engineering and Physics or whatever the hell it was Tucker did. Of course, that did nothing to stop the ‘genius’ from talking his ear off. By the time he got outside to his bus stop the bus had been gone for twenty minutes and his shift started in ten. His job was fifteen minutes away by car.

Needless to say, that left Andrew very cranky and running through alleyways and down not so safe streets as he tried to take shortcuts in whatever way he could in order to get to the library he worked at on time. Three minutes of trying to find the right street and proving he had just circled a block and wasted time almost sent him to tears before he heard his phone buzzing with a familiar ringtone.

Taking a breath, and trying not to hysterically laugh at the ‘Werewolves of London’ song he now had playing and couldn’t figure out how to change, Andrew clicked accept call and tried to stay calm. Focused. Peaceful. “Bonjour, grand frère.”

“What did you do and what do I need to fix?” Rude. Randy had called him, thank you very much. “Andy, you only call me that when you want something or you’re about to have a nervous breakdown. Are you about to have a nervous breakdown- Shit, you took your meds this morning, didn’t you?” Dammit.

“I’m not screwed up enough to forget my meds, thanks.” How did his brother always manage to call right when he was feeling at his worst or when he ran out of his pills? He was pretty sure the man had him bugged. It wouldn’t surprise him. He took overprotective to whole new levels. “Why did you call me?”

“Lunch!” Oh. It was one of their lunch days, wasn’t it? “Our lunch breaks should align today, so I figured we could meet up at our usual place around then?” It was ridiculous that Andrew could hear the ‘are you okay’ hidden in those words.

“Lunch sounds fine.” Randy was annoying, but he had this ridiculous way of making Andrew find a reason to not just curl into a ball and never wake up. He also made Andrew feel better about his own wreck of a life considering the messes he got himself into. “You’re paying, Mr. $82,000 a year.”

“Hey, I’m not that good of a vet yet and I’m still paying off student loan debts!” Feeling a small smile on his face, Andrew sighed softly. Randy somehow always made it okay again. He would die before telling that to his face, of course, but still. “I’ll meet you in a few hours. Try not to get lost in your books, Andy.”

“Try not to flirt with the owners of your patients, Randy.” Honestly, his decision to become a veterinarian had come out of left field, but Andrew couldn’t deny he did a good job. “Especially that one you’re so fond of. Now, what was his name… It started with an N?”

“Bye, love you, gotta go!” The call disconnected and Andrew gave in to the urge to laugh. Seeing the time, his laugh quickly fell and, right, he should at least call in to let the library know he was going to be a little bit late. Of course - of course - he got four rings in before his phone died. Because apparently his phone hadn’t charged from the night before even though Andrew had unplugged it this morning.

And as if the gods had somehow heard of his day and decided he needed to suffer even more, the clouds above him rumbled with the menacing beats of thunder and lightning cracked against the sky like a jagged edge of a wound. It took only a second for Andrew to realize he was fucked and two for the rain to begin falling.

Within fifteen minutes he was late, soaked, and felt as if he had offended some minor deity over something or other - or maybe it was Vidya making him suffer for being behind on his rent. Mm. Maybe he had broken a mirror or spilled some salt, actually. That sounded like his kind of luck. Heh. Maybe it was divine punishment. He obviously hadn’t suffered enough for what he had done, right?

By the time he got to the library he was pretty sure his clothes were ruined and he would never be dry again. At least he could get inside and clean up in the bathroom before sitting himself right over a heating vent and sorting books. It was a nice, quiet library and it was raining like it wouldn’t stop for forty days. He was sure the owner wouldn’t mind. In fact, he could even… He… He could stare at the locked doors and dark windows.

Gaze caught on the white notice posted to the main door, Andrew could only stare, utterly speechless. It was Memorial Day. They were closed on Memorial Day. Andrew had just walked for what was probably close to thirty minutes in the rain and… And… At least he wasn’t late. That was great. That was fucking fantastic.

Shoving a hand in his bag to see if he had some magical solution that would fix all of his problems, Andrew stared at the purple umbrella that came out and began mocking him at once. He stared for what felt like an eternity before he clicked the button and ducked into the alleyway. Sitting down on a set of side steps that led to an unstable backdoor, Andrew propped the umbrella up over him and stared at the red brick wall across from him.

It wasn’t even noon, yet, and his day was completely ruined and shot all to hell. The worst part was that this wasn’t even the first time this had happened - maybe the exact circumstances were, but getting screwed over by life? No, no, Andrew was very familiar with getting screwed over.

Glasses fogged up, breath still short from his running, and soaked through to the bone, Andrew could only bury his face into his hands and make a noise that he hoped was closer to a groan than a sob. It was always like this. Life built up to where he couldn’t handle the strain, everything came crashing down around him, and he shattered. Eventually he would put himself back together, but it kept feeling like it was harder and harder to be able to do that.

A clash of thunder and lightning and gust of wind had him trying to bite down another sob/groan. Of all the things he expected to happen next in his life, it wasn’t to hear an answering hiss to his own pathetic noise.

Head jerking up, Andrew stared down at the pathetic scrap of fur that sat in front of him, just as soaked and just as pissed as he felt himself - although the scrap of fur looked to be as broken as Andrew probably looked. Staring for a moment, Andrew huffed and looked at the black cat with a wry smile, “Bonjour, chat noir. Are you the cause of my bad luck today, then?”

At least animals didn’t judge you for speaking French first instead of English, he mused. Sighing, Andrew fixed his glasses, trying to see. He had given up wiping them off after the first few minutes of the rain storm. “Would you like to add to today’s woes, then? I’m sure there’s nothing else you can do to me, at this point, but you’re welcome to try.”

There was a rumbling little growl that sounded utterly pathetic, Andrew huffing out a laugh as he stared at the mangy thing. No doubt the cat was covered with fleas, ticks, and other unsavory bugs. The ribs poking out showed he hadn’t had a decent meal in weeks - maybe months. Poor thing probably wouldn’t make it through the night.

Tilting his umbrella forward, Andrew propped his cheek up on his hand - elbow balanced on his knee - as the fabric kept anymore rainwater from getting on the cat. “There you go. Might as well. Not like I can get much more wet myself.” The rain was freezing as hell, of course, so Andrew was being a complete idiot by doing this for a cat that looked ready to claw his eyes out. Ugh. Why did he have to pity small, tiny things?

The cat grumbled and stared at Andrew hard before leaning forward and giving as quick a headbutt to Andrew’s leg as he could, Andrew amused to see that the cat looked disgruntled at even that much. “You’ve had a very hard life, haven’t you?” The meow sounded like utter, sarcastic agreement. Maybe Andrew was projecting. “I know what that’s like, petit chaton. Would you like to hear about my cursed day?”

So, of course, Andrew spent the next however long telling a cat about how terrible his day had been. The cat seemed to be an attentive audience, at least, nodding along and making little rumbling noises close to a purr as he said something particularly witty. Andrew wasn’t sure if that was meant to be amusement or a reprimand- A cat. He was projecting emotions onto a cat. He had fallen far, hadn’t he?

“I imagine your story is much more interesting, though.” Andrew stared down at the mangy little stray, the cat staring back up at him before jumping up into his lap. Andrew scrambled to keep the thing from falling and not dropping the umbrella, calming his racing pulse down. “A warning would have been nice, you know.”

The cat meowed with what sounded like derision, Andrew huffing and ready to argue before going utterly still and silent as bright blue eyes caught onto him own. “I didn’t know black cats had such bright eyes.” The cat only settled down tiredly, looking utterly exhausted, but those eyes… No. No, it had been years and it was time to get over it. Happy endings like those in his books didn’t exist in this world. The sooner he realized that days like this one were the norm, the better off he would be. After all, you couldn’t get disappointed when you expected the worst, right?

But, still. Andrew couldn’t stop himself from threading his fingers through the small creature’s fur, the threat of tears starting to fade. The fur was rather soft even with the rainwater that drenched them. Actually the storm was starting to lessen into a drizzle.

Leaning back against the unstable backdoor, Andrew sighed and closed his eyes, biting his lip as his fingers tightened on the fur. Black fur with blue eyes. That… “You know, I like to think that black cats are actually lucky.” It wasn’t possible - it wasn’t - but… It wouldn’t hurt him anymore to keep hoping, right?

Just one last time.

#danny phantom #putting the cat in catastrophe #tcc au #iambic prose #ghostwriter #my writing

9 notes · View notes

freenewstoday · 3 years

Photo

New Post has been published on https://freenews.today/2020/11/27/an-exhilarating-life-of-mozart/

An exhilarating life of Mozart

Nov 28th 2020

Mozart: The Reign of Love. By Jan Swafford.Harper; 832 pages; $45. Faber & Faber; £30.

THE MOMENT he saw an organ, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart knew what to do with it. Aged six, already a prodigy on the clavier, he encountered pedals and stops for the first time in an Austrian church. Within moments he was accompanying mass and improvising freely. In the following year, 1763, an official in Heidelberg was so astonished by his organ-playing that he had a plate engraved for his church to mark the boy’s visit. Mozart composed his first symphony at eight. His father wrote that “every day God performs fresh miracles through this child.”

Youthful promise often wanes. With Mozart the reverse was true: his precocity only hinted at the wonders to come. Through him classical music may have found its most ideal expression. As Jan Swafford writes in his outstanding biography, Mozart’s compositions displayed “a kind of effortless perfection so easily worn that they seem almost to have written themselves”. He drafted quickly, often without needing to revise. He “could dispense delight by the yard”. A man of his time rather than a reactionary like Bach or a revolutionary like Beethoven, Mozart was equally at home composing for the concert salon or the opera stage.

Mr Swafford eschews myths about tortured genius. Mozart, he insists, “was fundamentally a happy man”. Despite his natural gifts, he worked relentlessly to master his art. He enjoyed a contented and loving marriage, and deftly parried his scheming father, who clung to his coat-tails while resenting his success. As he made his life’s journey from Salzburg to Vienna he remained childlike and obscene, fixated on bottoms. Mr Swafford describes “an inexplicable force of nature who could rise from a luminous improvisation at the clavier for a round of meowing like a cat and leaping over the furniture”.

He is the subject of many biographies, but the leading one, by Hermann Abert, is 100 years old and 1,600 pages long. Mr Swafford, himself a composer and a programme-writer for the Boston Symphony Orchestra, offers an updated, accessible and authoritative life, beautifully written and full of astute critical judgments and incisive notes on the works. The overture to “The Marriage of Figaro” is all “quicksilver brightness” and “indefatigable energy”; the Piano Trio in B-flat Major has “only a touch of galant preciousness”. “Eine kleine Nachtmusik” is “crystalline perfection”.

Mozart’s way with melody and keen view of human nature—his letters reveal an almost Dickensian ability to paint character—combined to elevate opera from light fare to a serious medium, the author contends. “His wit, his often-mordant scrutiny of people and their foibles, his fascination with the frenzies of love and lovemaking—all this made him the consummate composer” of the form, Mr Swafford reckons. As his characters scrambled around the stage, lost in the human comedy, Mozart gave them divine arias.

He was admired but not adored in his time. Most of his music adhered to conventional structures yet went over the heads of the average listener. Legend has it that his most important patron, Emperor Joseph II, reacted to one performance with backhanded criticism: “Too beautiful for our ears, my dear Mozart, and monstrous many notes!” Mozart, irrepressible and ever cheeky, supposedly replied: “Exactly as many as necessary, Your Majesty!” ■

This article appeared in the Books & arts section of the print edition under the headline “Too beautiful”

Reuse this contentThe Trust Project

Source

0 notes

ignis-scientia-estrogen-brigade · 7 years

Link

I meant to have this chapter up last night, but there was so much I wanted to include and not quite enough narrative time to let it all unfold the way I’d intended for it to, so I got a little hung up stringing together all the details.

I have two more planned chapters of this fic left to wade through (the final one being the sin wagon you’ve all be waiting for) before I resume fulfilling my headcanon and art requests; it might be pertinent to mention that an invasion of visitors will be descending upon my house next week just in time for the annual San Diego Comic Con festivities, so this blog may go dark for a few days due to that. Never fear, though—I’m itching to get back to the drawing board my tablet and stylus, and look forward to firing up my picarto.tv stream again in the near future!

(SFW; Click on the link above or the cut below for the full text of Chapter 3.)

Ophelia doesn’t even ask for permission to accompany him on his walk home this time; she’d scrubbed down the kitchen and taken final inventory while Ignis had stood around twiddling his thumbs as Cid slurped down the last of his darkshells, and she’s already waiting for him at the back alley entrance of the bazaar when he finishes shutting the lights off and locking up the restaurant.

“How long have you known Mr. Sophiar?” she asks, trailing beside him as he steps off onto his usual path back toward his apartment.

He tries not to let his annoyance show, despite wanting nothing more than to be alone and nurse his misgivings in silence. “Over ten years now.”

“So you knew him before the nights grew long?”

“I did.”

“Was he always this cantankerous? I know there’s a certain precedent set for crabby old men, but he seems to have a particularly large chip on his shoulder compared to most.”

“Approximately. Although I do believe he harbors a considerable measure of guilt pertaining to a falling out he had with a close friend some years ago. We all have our daemons in the closet, I suppose.”

“And what, might I inquire, are your daemons?”

Her teasing cadence matches the playful elbow she nudges him with; the strategist clamps down on his jaw and wills his irritation away. “Crustaceans.”

A laugh. “Crustaceans?”

“Indeed. Dreaded creatures—their pointed pincers terrorize me in my dreams. A Karlabos murdered my mother, as it so happens.”

Her giggles ring out through the alleyway, and the sound of musicians hocking their final numbers before packing their instruments for the night drifts in the strategist’s ears. His fingers graze a nearby wall as they round the corner—the one he recalls having been graffitied with Dis Town Iz 2 Hot 4 U many years prior—and Ophelia’s laughs fade on the evening wind.

“Speaking of jokes,” she says, as they near the front steps leading up to his apartment, “I hope you know I was kidding earlier.”

He reaches for the keys in his pocket and frowns. “About?”

“About not being married. It is rather curious to think someone hasn’t snapped you up by now.”

His frown deepens as he struggles to find his keys. “I’m hardly a piece of fish bait.”

“Sorry—I only meant that there’s quite a bit to your appeal. I’m surprised a handsome man like yourself doesn’t have a harem of beautiful women waiting outside the doors of the restaurant hoping for an autograph.”

“I’m not sure I would categorize myself as handsome. At least, not anymore.”

The strategist can already sense the question hovering on the tip of her tongue. “At the risk of dancing around the obvious,” she says carefully, “I was wondering if I might ask you about your sight.”

The hackles on his neck are up again, but he forces an indifferent air. “There’s not much to say, really. I can’t see anything at all.”

“Then why do you wear that visor of yours?”

“Ah.” He finally manages to withdraw his keys and inserts them into the door. “I suppose ‘anything’ is a fairly broad generalization. My right eye is somewhat sensitive to light, and the visor helps to keep the glare of the sun from irritating it too much.”

“So why do you wear it indoors? I’ve never seen you take it off, not even on rainy days.”

He can no longer conceal the exasperation in his tone, and he turns to face her. “Because I don’t like distressing Mr. Tostwell’s customers. There’s a reason why the lenses are frosted—it saves other people from the bulk of the view.”

If he had expected to frighten her and send her scampering off down the alleyway, he is sorely disappointed. “Don’t be absurd,” she replies, her voice gentle. “Your face isn’t distressing in the least.”

In hindsight, the strategist surmises, Ophelia likely wasn’t aiming to remove his visor against his will, and was only intending to run a few fingers tenderly across his cheek. Even still, she ought to have known better than to reach for a blind man’s face with a hand he couldn’t see coming; he raises his own the instant he feels soft fingertips gliding along his chin, deflecting her wrist as he flinches away.

“Sorry,” she says quickly. “I wasn’t trying to—”

“It’s fine.” He gropes for his visor and readjusts it back across the bridge of his nose. “Although for future reference, I’m not particularly the touchy-feely sort.”

He can hear her dismay as her feet shift on the steps beneath them. “Did I do something wrong?”

Other than invade my personal space without my consent? Not at all. The strategist searches for anything to say that might disentangle himself from this delicate predicament without completely deflating her ego; when nothing immediately comes to mind and he’s left grasping at straws, he heaves a sigh and falls back on the oldest excuse in the book. “It’s not you, truly—it’s me.”

His ears then pick up on the sound of her footsteps slowly moving away from the landing. “You know, Ignis,” she says quietly, “you could’ve just told me you weren’t interested, rather than insulting my intelligence. I may not be the cleverest woman in Lucis, but I’m certainly not stupid.”

Walked right into that one, he thinks. “Ophelia, I—”

“Really, it’s all right. I’m a grown woman—I can handle a bit of rejection.”

He props a frustrated hand on his hip, rubbing at his throbbing temple with the other. “Might I persuade you to grab a cup of coffee with me? I think there’s a stand still open near the Coernix Station.”

Her suspicion is obvious even without the use of his eyes. “I thought you just got through patronizing my company.”

“As friends—perhaps get to know each other a little better.” He withdraws his keys from the door and pockets them once again. “Maybe even take a moment to address those pesky closet daemons.”

She remains silent for several heartbeats, until he hears the sound of her footfalls angling away from the steps. “Lead the way.”

His memory of the path leading to the 24-hour convenience store is a little hazier than the one he took to work every morning, but he sets off in a vaguely southwest direction with Ophelia trailing closely behind him. She resumes her morose silence, tiptoeing quietly along the cobblestone sidewalk and never crossing the plane of his forward motion, until the echo of the back alleys gives way to an open pavilion and his occluded eye slowly begins to register the bright lights of the gas station’s neon sign.

The coffee kiosk was actually situated a fair bit away from the Coernix Station, nearer to the wide concrete balcony overlooking the northern end of Taelpar Crag, but close enough to the minimart to capitalize on weary travelers in need of a quick caffeine fix. The strategist generally preferred to brew his own Ebony at home, for reasons that become more apparent as the two approach the stand; he can smell the aroma of underroasted Arabica beans wafting in his nostrils, and his nose wrinkles at the thought of actually having to pay good gil for what amounted to watered-down cat urine.

But it gives him something to keep his hands occupied with, rather than shoving them awkwardly in his pockets while he endures his companion’s loaded silence, and soon they are retrieving their warm paper cups from the kiosk clerk and settling in on a nearby bench.

“You’ve been asking me a lot of questions about myself this evening,” he says, turning his blind gaze in the direction of the valley’s gaping abyss. “Thought maybe you’d consider fielding a few of my own.”

The sound of Ophelia blowing softly on her hot beverage mingles with the stirring of the breeze. “A fair compromise.”

“I’m a little curious to know what exactly happened to your parents, if that’s not too personal an inquiry.”

He then hears her take a slow, deliberate sip of her drink, as if contemplating his words carefully. “Without coming across as calloused,” she says finally, “my father already had one foot in the grave.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’d been fighting an infection for quite some time. Not a starscourge infection, mind you—we probably would’ve been immediately banished from Lestallum if that were the case—but he’d had a history of long illnesses, and it was only getting worse toward the end.”

“Was your mother ill as well?”

“She was not. But she’d heard of an elderly apothecary living in the back hills of Malmalam Thicket who might be able to help him when the doctors here no longer could.” Another sip, another moment of contemplation. “I told her leaving the city posed too great of a risk to their safety, what with all the daemons running about, but she wouldn’t listen. Looking back, I suppose she just couldn’t bear the thought of living life without him. As it turned out, she didn’t have to for very long.”

He grips at the sides of his cup and furrows his brow. “I’m terribly sorry. I imagine that must have left quite the hole in your heart.”

She shifts on the bench beside him, but she doesn’t appear to grow despondent; if anything, the strategist picks up on the slight uptick in her voice. “You would think so, but you’d be surprised. My parents and I never ended a phone call without telling each other we loved one another, and it was the last thing I said to them before they left. At the very least, I haven’t tortured myself into madness by dwelling on sentiments left unspoken.”

Her words cut through him like a dagger between his ribs, and the weight of the skull pendant around his neck suddenly feels as heavy as a boulder. “That’s… very admirable of you.”

“I spent my fair share of time cursing the Six, just as anyone would. But I’ve learned it’s a wasted effort to be ladened down with such remorse, and it’s hardly reasonable of me to cry foul when so many others have lost as much and more.” She then prods him jovially in the shoulder. “I’ve certainly had questionable men leave me with bigger regrets.”

It’s her unbridled earnestness, Ignis realizes, that sets her apart from his former protégé; there was no mystery surrounding Ophelia, no great onus of responsibility that required the complete tempering of all human emotions, and the fact that she was able to remain even remotely positive in the face of such adversity slices through the strategist’s melancholy like a sliver of light through a storm cloud.

“I apologize for my abrasiveness earlier,” he says, swirling his untouched coffee around in his cup. “It seems I’m still nursing a few regrets of my own.”

Rather than acknowledging his admission with a verbal response, Ignis feels her hand reach over and gently squeeze his forearm. His own hands are still wrapped around his cup in a vice grip, and he picks at a rough spot on the waxy rim as a quiet lull descends over the bench.

Then: “What was she like?”

He looks up from his beverage and stares at her for a long moment, although his eyes see nothing but darkness in return. “It’s a funny thing,” he whispers. “I can scarcely remember the sound of her voice, but I’ll never forget the way she used to look at me.”

But it wasn’t only the emerald orbs that had peered past his spectacles and directly into his soul that the strategist recalls to mind, nor was it the fiery red hair that had smelled like lust and restraint and all the delightful things that made her exactly who she was that visits him in his dreams every night; it was her smile he remembers most of all, the one she forfeited when he touched her just where he knew she liked it, when they were behind closed doors after a long day of maintaining rigid facades and could both finally let their guards down, and it was only a small kindness that his precious memories of her had not been purged right along with his sight.

“Was it you who put a stop to things?” Ophelia asks. “Or was she the one who ended the relationship?”

“The latter, more or less.”

“How did she do it?”

“She died.” His voice falters slightly, but he bites down on the inside of his cheek and ignores the painful wincing in his chest. “At least, I presume she did. She was working at the palace when Insomnia fell.”

Ophelia’s side of the bench falls silent for a moment, until he hears the sound of her hair shaking softly against her shoulders. “Was there no evidence of her whereabouts after the invasion? I personally saw hundreds of people fleeing the city before they garrisoned the bridge—is it possible she could’ve escaped in the confusion, somehow?”

“I tried searching for anything that might’ve revealed to me what ultimately happened to her, but the Citadel’s records were all either lost or scattered.” His fingers have resorted to bending the edges of the cup’s rim absentmindedly as he scours his mind for memories he’d long since locked away. “Even Cor Leonis couldn’t tell me very much, and he was her superior officer. Only that she’d been on patrol duty during the peace talks, which was the last time he saw her alive.”

“Did she have any family? Perhaps they might have some leads, if they still walked among the living.”

“Her parents resided in the north, according to her work documents I had access to when I was employed as a royal retainer. She also had a sister living here in Lestallum, although it was unclear whether she had any contact with the family.”

“A sister?”

He nods. “She’d evidently eloped with an Altissian merchant some years back. I could never bring myself to seek her out, though.”

“Why ever not?”

“Because”—he’s gripping the cup so hard now he can feel the paper walls begin to fold in on themselves—“because I never wanted to ask, since I never quite wanted to know the truth of it. She either perished in the fall, or she went out of her way never to look for me.”

Ophelia’s fingers release his forearm, and she runs a hand across his shoulder. “I’m sure if she knew how much you loved her, she would have.”

But her gentle touch isn’t enough to soothe the aching beast inside him, and the tears he’d hoped to stem begin to pool in his one open eye. “It’s hard to say, because I never actually told her so. I thought there’d be time enough later to settle our feelings, when the life we wanted wasn’t quite so at odds with the vows we made to the crown. And now I fear she died never knowing how dearly I loved her.”

“You couldn’t have predicted what was going to happen. Nobody could have.”

It wasn’t so much the lack of foreknowledge, the strategist concedes to himself, that haunted him the most; it was the awful reality of knowing she had almost assuredly been pregnant even before she herself did, because of course he knew, because it had been his job to notice the little things, because he hadn’t believed for even a millisecond that the nausea and indigestion she’d experienced the last few nights they were together had anything to do with the stress surrounding the peace accord. He’d left for Altissia silently fretting about how to properly handle the situation, hoping only that Noct would eventually come to understand the necessity of him stepping down from his duties as royal advisor so that he might step up and take responsibility for his utterly irresponsible actions.

But it didn’t matter anymore, because both Noctis and the redhead were gone—the latter likely buried under a mass grave he’d unknowingly tread upon the last time he ventured into the city—and Ignis was left with nothing but the weight of a skull pendant around his neck that served only to remind him of the unbearable burden of living. “Apologies for unloading on you like this,” he says, righting himself in his seat and resuming a firm grip over his emotions once again. “I suppose in the grand scheme of things, she was a drop in the bucket of everything I’ve ever lost.”

Ophelia’s hand falls from his shoulder, and she lets out a long sigh before finally speaking. “Ten years is a long time to carry that weight on your heart, Ignis. Don’t you think it’s time you forgave yourself?”

He rises from the bench and gropes for the balcony’s railing, emptying his cold coffee over the edge and out into the wind. “Truth be told, I wouldn’t even know how to start.”

Her footsteps stop beside him, and her clothes rustle as she leans agains the balustrade. “You could start by seeking closure. All you have to do is ask around—Lestallum’s not that big of a city, and a Lucian woman married to an Altissian merchant certainly narrows the playing field down quite a bit.”

He then feels the sensation of her fingers entwining in his, but there’s no trace of opportunism in her touch; it’s merely another display of the earnestness that has come to define her, and the strategist closes his own hand around her palm as the tightening in his chest suddenly eases a tad.

“I could even assist you, if you’d like.”

Her voice is quiet, her proposal modest and unobtrusive, and Ignis glances down at her for a long time before offering her a weak grin. “That would be… rather helpful, thank you.”

#sheeeeees baaaaaaaack #the redhead that is #sort of #ignis scientia #ffxv fanfiction #final fantasy xv #ffxv #ff15 #ignis #ignis stupeo scientia

28 notes · View notes

agemintherough · 7 years

Text

A preview for the next chapter: The Misadventures Of The Baroque Works Trio

I'm going away for a week camping in the woods, so I won't be around to answer questions and such. To make up for it, here's a preview of the next chapter, which is gonna be an interesting one. Basically, this is my version of the Miss Goldenweek cover story, which actually started at this exact point in the manga. Obviously, it's more in the spirit of the original, but it will be fun nevertheless: *GWMAPT* "That was six hours of my life I will never get back," Petrea groaned as she stepped off of the sea train. "Remind me to get ANY type of reading material here before we do that again." The Baroque Works trio had finally arrived on Backslide Island, home of the auction house mentioned by the former Mr. 6 and (more famously) Pucci, the city of cuisine. It was a long, grueling wait to get there, but it would all be worth it to get some rare materials for the crew. It was a well-known fact amongst the members of the underworld (as the general public primarily focused on the elegant restaurants that populated the city) that the black market on this island was far smaller and more discreet than its only rival, which was found on the nearby St. Poplar, but there was a wide variety of materials that could be found here. If they truly needed seriously outlawed specialty material, they could always visited St. Poplar on the way home if the deal with Phil fell through. However, the former criminals had a goal in mind and they intended to follow it to the letter. "It wasn't that bad of a ride," Damian pointed out, carrying both his bag and Petrea's who was holding Connie's magical bag that contained the Golden Crown. "The train ride wasn't bad; waiting with a drunk old woman, a child with a pet rabbit who thinks it is a cat, and you two sleeping your asses off was bad!" Petrea counted with a leering glance. "To be fair, do you expect anything less from me?" Genevieve asked. Petrea opened her mouth to protest before shutting it and shaking her head. "...I need a freaking drink." "Why don't we find our, and I say this sarcastically, 'friend' with the stick first?" Genevieve rolled her eyes. "You two can get drunk after that." "What? You're not going to try to join in for at least one celebratory drink?" Damian playfully joked. "Discounting the fact that I'm underage and have no intentions of being a functional alcoholic like Zoro, drinking isn't something I'll ever be interested in. As a painter, I need to keep my head clear. I'd rather focus on the art and not get sloppy," Genevieve explained as they continued to walk off of the train station. "I thought most painters got drunk all the time," Damian commented. "Crappy painters need an artificially created vision to get going," the painter sighed. "I'm different. I want my art to be purely me without any outside help. Besides, most artists can't influence emotions using their paints. If I were to be out of it at all, the entire color and emotional spectrums would...well, it's too long to explain and I really don't have the energy to do so." "And we don't have the energy to listen," Damian smirked. When the young girl shot him a death look, he immediately backed away. "Joking! Joking!" "Hrmph," Genevieve grunted. "I might as well call our esteemed 'broker' now before we get caught up in anything else," Petrea told them, taking out the small Den Den Mushi she hid in Connie's magical bag. "It's an odd choice to meet here on this island for this kind of transaction, but what do I know? I'm only a former assassin with a body count higher than the patrons of these restaurants who has turned into a professional chocolatier and occasional pirate." "That's a sentence you don't hear every day," Genevieve commented as Petrea attempted to reach the young man with the staff.

#gems without measure; a pirate's treasure #chapter preview

3 notes · View notes

nationallampoon · 7 years

Text

Big Boy Donny’s Birthday Party

“I want a ball,

I want a party

Pink macaroons and a million balloons

And performing baboons,

Give it to me, Now!”

~ Veruca Salt

Read Episode 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Meanwhile, in Donald Trump’s White House…Episode 6

“FUCK CARROTS!!!”

That’s what President Donald Trump yelled as he squeezed the trigger on a Soviet ROKS–2 flamethrower, sending a torrent of fire like it came from the mouth of a dragon. The flame shoots almost fifty feet across the South Lawn of the White House before torching Michelle Obama’s beloved vegetable garden.

The arugula and the cilantro ignite first, sending flames seven feet into the air. A loud cheer erupts from the crowd on the South Lawn gathered for President Trump’s birthday party.

“No more of that faggy garden!” Trump yells as he pumps the Soviet flamethrower above his head in celebration.

Don Jr. hushes the crowd, then announces into a bullhorn, “Happy birthday, dad. That was just the beginning. We have a great day lined up. First order of business, we are proud to announce that as one of your birthday presents, will be replacing that gorilla Michelle Obama’s stupid garden. Dad, we’re excited to tell you, that in the garden’s place is coming your very own combination Taco Bell and Pizza Hut!”

The President’s eyes moisten with tears.

The South Lawn is packed with partygoers. All the senior staff, the Trump family, various Fox News personalities, dozens of Wall Street bankers and hedge fund managers, members of both the New York and New Jersey mafias, and a couple hundred Trump campaign donors.

I, your intrepid White House correspondent, will now give you, faithful reader, a systematic play-by-play of all of President Trump’s birthday party activities. I have infiltrated this shindig undercover. My disguise consists of an Italian suit that is way too big on me and a red tie that reaches past my balls. I fit right in.

Near the table piled with birthday presents, a dunking booth is set up. The cold water below the rigged seat is filled with piranhas and electric eels. So many all the creatures can barely swim and move. Sitting on the platform above the treacherous water, hoping nobody will hit the bullseye with a softball, is MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell, who had been kidnapped by Corey Lewandowski and a couple goons the night before. O’Donnell was in the men’s room at Joe’s Seafood Prime Steak & Stone Crab on 15th Street in D.C. After leaving the stall, Lewandowski wrapped a handkerchief soaked in chloroform over O’Donnell’s mouth. After the MSNBC anchor passed out, the two goons grabbed his legs, and Lewandowski rushed the body out the back door of the steak house. With a hose steadily dousing his head in chilled water to keep him shivering, O’Donnell is stripped ass-naked as the kids throw softballs at the target of the dunking booth.

The First Pet, Titties the Monkey, arrived late to the birthday party. Some thought she was meeting with budget committee staff in the Roosevelt Room. The adopted chimpanzee wore her jewel-encrusted purple cloak as she rode a Shetland pony — a gift from the President — around the South Lawn. Many of President Trump’s most sycophantic staffers and hangers-on approach Titties on her pony to kiss her diamond horseshoe pinky ring, another gift from the Commander in Chief.

There’s a moderate line at the book burning station near the Rose Garden. Paul Manafort can barely contain his glee as he tosses Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States into the bonfire rising from an empty oil drum. Next to the book burning, there’s a crowd gathered for the “Midget Tossing” booth.

A troupe of clowns roam around the grounds performing pratfalls and gags. Most adults avoid the clowns, understandably creeped out. But one adult follows the clowns around the South Lawn for the whole party. Eric Trump never left the clown’s side for the entire day. At one point Eric was overheard asking what he had to do to join the performers and “how much is clown college?”

Last week, while on a shady business trip American taxpayers paid for, Don Jr. watched Django Unchained. Per Don Jr.’s request, staffers set up a ten foot by ten foot area for Mandingo fighting. Two African American young men were taken from the White House kitchen and told they are to fight for the amusement of the Trump son. As the men circle each other on the South Lawn, reluctant to throw a punch, 11-year-old Barron Trump joins the ring of onlookers and yells “Dog, I command you to get in there and fight!” Followed by, “Everyone is mine to torment! You’d do well to remember that, you little monster!” One of the men was nearly beaten to death as the Trump boys laughed. He remains in intensive care.

Ten girls wearing string bikinis and stripper wedge heels wander around the South Lawn with a tray held by a neck strap like a cigarette girl in a 1940s night club. Half the girls have sunken cheeks and rotting teeth, signs of meth addiction. On the trays is a variety of McDonald’s Big Macs, chicken McNuggets, french fries and loose pieces of Kentucky Fried Chicken. As they wobble on their 5-inch heels across the grass, the girls hand out fast food treats to President Trump’s guests. Many of the male patrons grabbing a burger put dollar bills into the girl’s bikini bottoms.

A tattooist has set up near the putting green. Pretty girl with short and spiky purple hair, many piercings, and tattoo sleeves on both arms. As party favors, she is quickly inking partygoers with one of the ten designs that have been approved by the White House. Many receive a tat that reads “The Art of the Deal” in block letters. Mostly on their bicep or ankle. As I casually walk by to observe what’s occurring, Corey Lewandowski was in the chair getting a hammer and sickle tramp stamp finished up.

In the former White House swimming pool, President Trump has converted it to an alligator pit used as a threat to deter unfriendly reporters and dissenting staff members. To date seven poor souls have been tossed into the pit for various infractions. Each one labeled “accidental” by the Secret Service. Must be really slippery around that part of the White House grounds. President Trump’s favorite gator is an enormous bull that measures nineteen feet, three inches long named Caligula. As another one of the President’s birthday presents, Trump is brought three kennels with two dogs and cat inside. The animals were pets of discovered White House leakers. All abducted by Lewandowski’s crew. Caligula crawls out of the swimming pool pit and waits with an open mouth for Trump to toss him live dogs and a cat. A horrible crunching sound is heard as all three poor beasts were eaten whole by the gator. President Trump laughed maniacally as he performed the sacrifices.

As I roamed the birthday party, I observed a gentleman that I was sure was a Russian intelligence operative. Probably a spy. His face looked like he would be cast as a Russian thug in a 1980s action movie. Another of my fellow correspondents who was also undercover at the party came up to me and whispered, “That man, at your three o’clock. Gabardine suit. Pretty sure he’s a spy.”

“Agreed, I said,” “And be careful, I think his bowtie is really a camera.”

At the end of the party, Steve Bannon appears holding a leather leash that’s attached to a dog collar around the neck of Stephen Miller who is wearing a Pulp Fiction-style gimp suit. Miller pushes a little cart with President Trump’s birthday cake on it. The cake is a first of it’s kind. Chocolate cake, as beautiful as you can get at Mar-a-Lago, filled with fried chicken. KFC partnered with Williams-Sonoma to make the cake a reality for the President.

Climbing onto a stepladder, Titties the Monkey, ivory conductor’s baton in hand, leads everyone gathered on the South Lawn singing “Happy Birthday” to President Trump.

As the most beautiful pieces of chocolate-fried chicken cake is being eaten, President Trump motions to General James Mattis, currently the United States Secretary of Defense. “Mad Dog! Come’re.”

General Mattis comes to the side of the President. Trump says, “Mad Dog, do me a favor, it’s my birthday, great birthday, the best, did you have some of this cake, tremendous, Mad Dog, give me a list of three places I could bomb the shit out of tonight. Muslim places. The fake media keeps falling for these distractions. Great for ratings.”

“On it, Mr. President. We’ll have a list for you in two hours. Happy birthday, sir.”

Illustration by Mikey B. Martinez III

Read Episode 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Big Boy Donny’s Birthday Party was originally published on National Lampoon | The Humor Magazine Est 1970

#game of thrones #GOP #politics #Trump

1 note · View note

jamesgraybooksellerworld · 4 years

Text

Author INDEX

J.B. 346J

Mary Barber 377J

Mary Barber 373J

Madam De Bellefont 572G

Susanna Centlivre 347J

Susanna Centlivre 357J

Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon 348J

[Martha Hatfield].362J

Mary De La Riviere Manley 122F

Katherine Philips 103G

Mary Pix 376J

Madam Scuddery 296J

Madeleine Vigneron 323

•)§(•

346J J.B. Gent.

The young lovers guide,

or, The unsuccessful amours of Philabius, a country lover; set forth in several kind epistles, writ by him to his beautious-unkind mistress. Teaching lover s how to comport themselves with resignation in their love-disasters. With The answer of Helena to Paris, by a country shepherdess. As also, The sixth Æneid and fourth eclogue of Virgil, both newly translated by J.B. Gent. (?)

London : Printed and are to be Sold by the Booksellers of London, 1699. $3,500

Octavo, A4, B-G8,H6 I2( lacking 3&’4) (A1, frontispiece Present; I3&’4, advertisements lacking ) inches [8], 116, [4] p. : The frontispiece is signed: M· Vander Gucht. scul:. 1660-1725,

This copy is bound in original paneled sheep with spine cracking but cords holding Strong.

A very rare slyly misogynistic “guide’ for what turns out be emotional turmoil and Love-Disasters

Writ by Philabius to Venus, his Planetary Ascendant.

Dear Mother Venus!

I must style you so.

From you descended, tho’ unhappy Beau.

You are my Astral Mother; at my birth

Your pow’rful Influence bore the sway on Earth

From my Ascendent: being sprung from you,

I hop’d Success where-ever I should woo.

Your Pow’r in Heav’n and Earth prevails, shall I,

A Son of yours, by you forsaken die?

Twenty long Months now I have lov’d a Fair,

And all my Courtship’s ending in Despair.

All Earthly Beauties, scatter’d here and there,

From you, their Source, derive the Charms they bear.

Wing (2nd ed.), B131; Arber’s Term cat.; III 142

Copies – Brit.Isles : British Library

Cambridge University St. John’s College

Oxford University, Bodleian Library

Copies – N.America : Folger Shakespeare

Harvard Houghton Library

Henry E. Huntington

Newberry

UCLA, Clark Memorial Library

University of Illinois

Engraved frontispiece of the Mistress holding a fan,”Bold Poets and rash Painters may aspire With pen and pencill to describe my Faire, Alas; their arts in the performance fayle, And reach not that divine Original, Some Shadd’wy glimpse they may present to view, And this is all poore humane art Can doe▪” title within double rule border, 4-pages of publisher`s advertisements at the end Contemporary calf (worn). . FIRST EDITION. . The author remains unknown.

)§(§)§(

An early Irish female author

2) 377[ BARBER, Mary].1685-1755≠

A true tale To be added to Mr. Gay’s fables.

Dublin. Printed by S. Powell, for George Ewing, at the Angel and Bible in Dame’-street, 1727.

First edition, variant imprint..[Estc version : Dublin : printed by S.[i.e. Sarah] Harding, next door to the sign of the Crown in Copper-Alley, [ca. 1727-1728] 7pp, [1]. Not in ESTC or Foxon; c/f N491542 and N13607. $4,500

[Bound after:]

John GAY

Fables. Invented for the Amusement of His Highness William Duke of Cumberland.

London Printed, and Dublin Reprinted for G. Risk, G. Ewing, and W. Smith, in Dame’s-street, 1727.

First Irish edition. [8], 109pp, [3]. With three terminal pages of advertisements. ESTC T13819, Foxon p.295.

8vo in 4s and 8s. Contemporary speckled calf, contrasting red morocco lettering- piece, gilt. Rubbed to extremities, some chipping to head and foot of spine and cracking to joints, bumping to corners. Occasional marking, some closed tears. Early ink inscription of ‘William Crose, Clithero’ to FEP, further inked-over inscription to head of title.

Mary Barber (1685-1755) claimed that she wrote “chiefly to form the Minds of my Children,” but her often satirical and comic verses suggest that she sought an adult audience as well. The wife of a clothier and mother of four children, she lived in Dublin and enjoyed the patronage of Jonathan Swift. While marriage, motherhood, friendship, education, and other domestic issues are her central themes, they frequently lead her to broader, biting social commentary.

Bound behind this copy of the first edition of the first series of English poet John Gay’s (1685-1732) famed Fables, composed for the youngest son of George II, six-year-old Prince William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, is Irish poet Mary Barber’s (c.1685-c.1755) rare verse appeal to secure a Royal pension for Gay, who had lost his fortune in bursting of the South Sea Bubble.

Barber, the wife of a Dublin woollen draper, was an untutored poet whom Jonathan Swift sponsored, publicly applauded, and cultivated as part of his ‘triumfeminate’ of bluestockings. She wrote initially to educate the children in her large family. Indeed this poem, the fifth of her published works, features imagined dialogue of a son to his mother, designed to encourage, specifically, the patronage of Queen Caroline:

‘Mamma, if you were Queen, says he, And such a Book were writ for me; I find, ’tis so much to your Taste, That Gay wou’d keep his Coach at least’

And of a mother to her son:

‘My Child, What you suppose is true: I see its Excellence in You. Poets, who write to mend the Mind, A Royal Recompence shou’d find.’

ESTC locates two variant Dublin editions, both rare, but neither matching this copy: a first with the title and pagination as here, but with the undated imprint of S. Harding (represented by a single copy at Harvard), and a second with the imprint as here, but with a different title, A tale being an addition to Mr. Gay’s fables, and a pagination of 8pp (represented by copies at the NLI, Oxford, Harvard and Yale). This would appear to be a second variant, and we can find no copies in any of the usual databases.

Mary Barber was an Irish poet who mostly focussed on domestic themes such as marriage and children although the messages in some of her poems suggested a widening of her interests, often making cynical comments on social injustice. She was a member of fellow Irish poet Jonathan Swift’s favoured circle of writers, known as his “triumfeminate”, a select group that also included Mrs E Sican and Constantia Grierson.

She was born sometime around the year 1685 in Dublin but nothing much is known about her education or upbringing. She married a much younger man by the name of Rupert Barber and they had nine children together, although only four survived childhood. She was writing poetry initially for the benefit and education of her children but, by 1725, she had The Widow’s Address published and this was seen as an appeal on behalf of an Army officer’s widow against the social and financial difficulties that such women were facing all the time. Rather than being a simple tale for younger readers here was a biting piece of social commentary, aimed at a seemingly uncaring government.

During the 18th and early 19th centuries it was uncommon for women to become famous writers and yet Barber seemed to possess a “natural genius” where poetry was concerned which was all the more remarkable since she had no formal literary tuition to fall back on. The famous writer Jonathan Swift offered her patronage, recognising a special talent instantly. Indeed, he called her “the best Poetess of both Kingdoms” although his enthusiasm was not necessarily shared by literary critics of the time. It most certainly benefitted her having the support of fellow writers such as Elizabeth Rowe and Mary Delany, and Swift encouraged her to publish a collection in 1734 called Poems on several occasions. The book sold well, mostly by subscription to eminent persons in society and government. The quality of the writing astonished many who wondered how such a simple, sometimes “ailing Irish housewife” could have produced such work.

It took some time for Barber to attain financial stability though and her patron Swift was very much involved in her success. She could have lost his support though because, in a desperate attempt to achieve wider recognition, she wrote letters to many important people, including royalty, with Swift’s signature forged at the end. When he found out about this indiscretion he was not best pleased but he forgave her anyway.

Unfortunately poor health prevented much more coming from her pen during her later years. For over twenty years she suffered from gout and, in fact, wrote poems about the subject for a publication called the Gentleman’s Magazine. It is worth including here an extract from her poem Written for my son, at his first putting on of breeches. It is, in some ways, an apology and an explanation to a child enduring the putting on of an uncomfortable garment for the first time. She suggests in fact that many men have suffered from gout because of the requirement to wear breeches. The first verse of the poem is reproduced here:

Many of her poems were in the form of letters written to distinguished people, such as To The Right Honourable The Lady Sarah Cowper and To The Right Honourable The Lady Elizabeth Boyle On Her Birthday. These, and many more, were published in her 1755 collection Poems by Eminent Ladies. History sees her, unfortunately, as a mother writing to support her children rather than a great poet, and little lasting value has been attributed to her work.

•)§(•

3) 379J BARBER, Mary 1685-1755≠

Poems on Several Occasions

London: printed [by Samuel Richardson] for C. Rivington, at the Bible and Crown in St. Paul’s Church-Yard 1735 $4,500

First octavo edition, 1735, bound in early paper boards with later paper spine and printed spine label, pp. lxiv, 290, (14) index, title with repaired tear, very good. These poems were published the previous year in a quarto edition with a list of influential subscribers (reprinted here); this octavo edition is less common. Barber was the wife of a Dublin clothier and her publication in England was helped by Jonathan Swift, who has (along with the authoress) provided a dedication in this volume to the Earl of Orrery. Constantia Grierson, another Irish poetess, contributes a prefatory poem in praise of Mary Barber.

ESTC Citation No. T42623 ; Maslen, K. Samuel Richardson, 21.; Foxon, p.45. ;Teerink-Scouten [Swift] 747.

)§(§)§(

4). 572G Léonore Gigault de,; O.S.B. Bellefont (Bouhours)

Les OEuvres spirituelles de Madame De Bellefont, religieuse, fondatrice & superieure du convent de Nôtre-Dame des Anges, de l’Ordre de Saint Benoist, à Roüen.Dediées à Madame La Dauphine.

A Paris : Chez Helie Josset, ruë S. Jacques, au coin de la ruë de la Parcheminerie, à la fleur de lys d’or, 1688 $2200

Octavo 6.25 x 3.6 in. a4, e8, i8, o2, A-Z8; Aa-Qq8 ; *8, **4. This copy is very clean and crisp it is bound in contemporary calf with ornately gilt spine. La vie de Madame de Bellefont”, on unnumbered pages preceding numbered text./ “Table des chapitres . . .” and “Stances” and “Paraphrases” in verse on final 24 numbered pages./ In the “Avant propos” this work is ascribed to “feüe madame Lêonore Gigault de Bellefont”, but most authorities credit Laurence Gigault de Bellefont with authorship See Sommervogel I 1908 #25

)§(§)§(

5) 374J [ Susanna CENTLIVRE,]. 1667-1723

The gamester: A Comedy…

London. Printed for William Turner, 1705. $4,000

Quarto. [6], 70pp, [2]. First edition.Without half-title. Later half-vellum, marbled boards, contrasting black morocco lettering-piece. Extremities lightly rubbed and discoloured. Browned, some marginal worming, occasional shaving to running titles.

The first edition of playwright and actress Susanna Centlivre’s (bap. 1667?, d. 1723) convoluted gambling comedy, adapted from French dramatist Jean Francois Regnard’s (1655-1709) Le Jouer (1696). The Gamester met with tremendous success and firmly established Centlivre as a part the pantheon of celebrated seventeenth-century playwrights, yet the professional life of the female dramatist remained complicated, with many of her works, as here, being published anonymously and accompanied by a prologue implying a male author.

CENTLIVRE, English dramatic writer and actress, was born about 1667, probably in Ireland, where her father, a Lincolnshire gentleman named Freeman, had been forced to flee at the Restoration on account of his political sympathies. When sixteen she married the nephew of Sir Stephen Fox, and on his death within a year she married an officer named Carroll, who was killed in a duel. Left in poverty, she began to support herself, writing for the stage, and some of her early plays are signed S. Carroll. In 1706 she married Joseph Centlivre, chief cook to Queen Anne, who survived her.

ESTC T26860.

•)§(•

An early Irish female author

)§(§)§(

Political satire by An early Irish female author

6) 375J. Sussana Centlivre

The Gotham Election, A farce.

(London 🙂 printed and sold by S. Keimer,1715. $ 1,900

The Gotham Election, one of the first satires to tackle electioneering and bribery in eighteenth century British politics. It proved to be so controversial that, despite Centlivre’s popularity as a playwright, it was supressed from being performed during the turbulent year of 1715. Centlivre was renowned as one of the greatest female playwrights of her day, and her plays, predominately comedies, were responsible for the development of the careers of actors such as David Garrick. However, despite her popularity, she also made enemies in the literary world of the early-eighteenth century. Most notably Alexander Pope, who, in his Dunciad, referred to her as a ‘slip-shod Muse’, possibly in reference to her participation in the work The Nine Muses, which was published in 1700 to commemorate the death of John Dryden.

English Short Title Catalog, ESTCT26854

•)§(•

A collection of Poems and Letters by Christian mystic and prolific writer, Jeanne-Marie Guyon published in Dublin.

7) 348J François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon 1651-1715 & Josiah Martin 1683-1747 & Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon 1648-1717

A dissertation on pure love, by the Arch-Bishop of Cambray. With an account of the life and writings of the Lady, for whose sake The Archbishop was banish’d from Court: And the grievous Persecution she suffer’d in France for her Religion. Also Two Letters in French and English, written by one of the Lady’s Maids, during her Confinement in the Castle of Vincennes, where she was Prisoner Eight Years. One of the Letters was writ with a Bit of Stick instead of a Pen, and Soot instead of Ink, to her Brother; the other to a Clergyman. Together with an apologetic preface. Containing divers letters of the Archbishop of Cambray, to the Duke of Burgundy, the present French King’s Father, and other Persons of Distinction. And divers letters of the lady to Persons of Quality, relating to her Religious Principles

Dublin : printed by Isaac Jackson, in Meath-Street, [1739]. $ 4,000

Octavo 7 3/4 x 5 inches First and only English edition. Bound in Original sheep, with a quite primitive repair to the front board.

Fenélon’s text appears to consist largely of extracts from ’Les oeuvres spirituelles’. The preface, account of Jeanne Marie Guyon etc. is compiled by Josiah Martin. The text of the letters, and poems, is in French and English. This is an Astonishing collection of letters and poems.

“JOSIAH MARTIN, (1683–1747), quaker, was born near London in 1683. He became a good classical scholar, and is spoken of by Gough, the translator of Madame Guyon’s Life, 1772, as a man whose memory is esteemed for ‘learning, humility, and fervent piety.’ He died unmarried, 18 Dec. 1747, in the parish of St. Andrew’s, Holborn, and was buried in the Friends’ burial-ground, Bunhill Fields. He left the proceeds of his library of four thousand volumes to be divided among nephews and nieces. Joseph Besse [q. v.] was his executor.

Martin’s name is best known in connection with ‘A Letter from one of the People called Quakers to Francis de Voltaire, occasioned by his Remarks on that People in his Letters concerning the English Nation,’ London, 1741. It was twice reprinted, London and Dublin, and translated into French. It is a temperate and scholarly treatise, and was in much favour at the time.

Of his other works the chief are: 1. ‘A Vindication of Women’s Preaching, as well from Holy Scripture and Antient Writings as from the Paraphrase and Notes of the Judicious John Locke, wherein the Observations of B[enjamin] C[oole] on the said Paraphrase . . . and the Arguments in his Book entitled “Reflections,” &c, are fullv considered,’ London, 1717. 2. ‘The Great Case of Tithes truly stated … by Anthony Pearson [q. v.] . . . to which is added a Defence of some other Principles held by the People call’d Quakers . . .,’ London, 1730. 3. ‘A Letter concerning the Origin, Reason, and Foundation of the Law of Tithes in England,’ 1732. He also edited, with an ‘Apologetic Preface,’ comprising more than half the book, and containing many additional letters from Fénelon and Madame Guyon, ‘The Archbishop of Cambray’s Dissertation on Pure Love, with an Account of the Life and Writings of the Lady for whose sake he was banish’d from Court,’ London, 1735.

[Joseph Smith’s Catalogue of Friends’ Books; works quoted above; Life of Madame Guyon, Bristol, 1772, pt. i. errata; registers at Devonshire House; will P.C.C. 58 Strahan, at Somerset House.]

C. F. S.

Fénelon was nominated in February, 1696, Fénelon was consecrated in August of the same year by Bossuet in the chapel of Saint-Cyr. The future of the young prelate looked brilliant, when he fell into deep disgrace.

The cause of Fénelon’s trouble was his connection with Madame Guyon, whom he had met in the society of his friends, the Beauvilliers and the Chevreuses. She was a native of Orléans, which she left when about twenty-eight years old, a widowed mother of three children, to carry on a sort of apostolate of mysticism, under the direction of Père Lacombe, a Barnabite. After many journeys to Geneva, and through Provence and Italy, she set forth her ideas in two works, “Le moyen court et facile de faire oraison” and “Les torrents spirituels”. In exaggerated language characteristic of her visionary mind, she presented a system too evidently founded on the Quietism of Molinos, that had just been condemned by Innocent XI in 1687. There were, however, great divergencies between the two systems. Whereas Molinos made man’s earthly perfection consist in a state of uninterrupted contemplation and love, which would dispense the soul from all active virtue and reduce it to absolute inaction, Madame Guyon rejected with horror the dangerous conclusions of Molinos as to the cessation of the necessity of offering positive resistance to temptation. Indeed, in all her relations with Père Lacombe, as well as with Fénelon, her virtuous life was never called in doubt. Soon after her arrival in Paris she became acquainted with many pious persons of the court and in the city, among them Madame de Maintenon and the Ducs de Beauvilliers and Chevreuse, who introduced her to Fénelon. In turn, he was attracted by her piety, her lofty spirituality, the charm of her personality, and of her books. It was not long, however, before the Bishop of Chartres, in whose diocese Saint-Cyr was, began to unsettle the mind of Madame de Maintenon by questioning the orthodoxy of Madame Guyon’s theories. The latter, thereupon, begged to have her works submitted to an ecclesiastical commission composed of Bossuet, de Noailles, who was then Bishop of Châlons, later Archbishop of Paris, and M. Tronson; superior of-Saint-Sulpice. After an examination which lasted six months, the commission delivered its verdict in thirty-four articles known as the “Articles d’ Issy”, from the place near Paris where the commission sat. These articles, which were signed by Fénelon and the Bishop of Chartres, also by the members of the commission, condemned very briefly Madame Guyon’s ideas, and gave a short exposition of the Catholic teaching on prayer. Madame Guyon submitted to the condemnation, but her teaching spread in England, and Protestants, who have had her books reprinted have always expressed sympathy with her views. Cowper translated some of her hymns into English verse; and her autobiography was translated into English by Thomas Digby (London, 1805) and Thomas Upam (New York, 1848). Her books have been long forgotten in France.

Jeanne Marie Guyon

b. 1648, Montargis, France; d. 1717, Blois, France

A Christian mystic and prolific writer, Jeanne-Marie Guyon advocated a form of spirituality that led to conflict with authorities and incarceration. She was raised in a convent, then married off to a wealthy older man at the age of sixteen. When her husband died in 1676, she embarked on an evangelical mission to convert Protestants to her brand of spirituality, a mild form of quietism, which propounded the notion that through complete passivity (quiet) of the soul, one could become an agent of the divine. Guyon traveled to Geneva, Turin, and Grenoble with her mentor, Friar François Lacombe, at the same time producing several manuscripts: Les torrents spirituels (Spiritual Torrents); an 8,000-page commentary on the Bible; and her most important work, the Moyen court et très facile de faire oraison (The Short and Very Easy Method of Prayer, 1685). Her activities aroused suspicion; she was arrested in 1688 and committed to the convent of the Visitation in Paris, where she began writing an autobiography. Released within a few months, she continued proselytizing, meanwhile attracting several male disciples. In 1695, the Catholic church declared quietism heretical, and Guyon was locked up in the Bastille until 1703. Upon her release, she retired to her son’s estate in Blois. Her writings were published in forty-five volumes from 1712 to 1720.

Her writings began to be published in Holland in 1704, and brought her new admirers. Englishmen and Germans–among them Wettstein and Lord Forbes–visited her at Blois. Through them Madame Guyon’s doctrines became known among Protestants and in that soil took vigorous root. But she did not live to see this unlooked-for diffusion of her writings. She passed away at Blois, at the age of sixty-eight, protesting in her will that she died submissive to the Catholic Church, from which she had never had any intention of separating herself. Her doctrines, like her life, have nevertheless given rise to the widest divergences of opinion. Her published works (the “Moyen court” and the “Règles des assocées à l’Enfance de Jésus”) having been placed on the Index in 1688, and Fénelon’s “Maximes des saints” branded with the condemnation of both the pope and the bishops of France, the Church has thus plainly reprobated Madame Guyon’s doctrines, a reprobation which the extravagance of her language would in itself sufficiently justify. Her strange conduct brought upon her severe censures, in which she could see only manifestations of spite. Evidently, she too often fell short of due reserve and prudence; but after all that can be said in this sense, it must be acknowledged that her morality appears to have given no grounds for serious reproach. Bossuet, who was never indulgent in her regard, could say before the full assembly of the French clergy: “As to the abominations which have been held to be the result of her principles, there was never any question of the horror she testified for them.” It is remarkable, too, that her disciples at the Court of Louis XIV were always persons of great piety and of exemplary life.

On the other hand, Madame Guyon’s warmest partisans after her death were to be found among the Protestants. It was a Dutch Protestant, the pastor Poiret, who began the publication of her works; a Vaudois pietist pastor, Duthoit-Mambrini, continued it. Her “Life” was translated into English and German, and her ideas, long since forgotten in France, have for generations been in favour in Germany, Switzerland, England, and among Methodists in America. ”

P.144 misnumbered 134. Price from imprint: price a British Half-Crown. Dissertain 16p and Directions for a holy life 5p. DNB includes this in Martin’s works

Copies – Brit.Isles. : British Library, Dublin City Library, National Library of Ireland Trinity College Library

Copies – N.America. : Bates College, Harvard University, Haverford Col , Library Company of Philadelphia, Newberry, Pittsburgh Theological Princeton University, University of Illinois University of Toronto, Library

)§(§)§(

8) 362J James FISHER and [Martha HATFIELD].

The wise virgin: or, A wonderfull narration of the various dispensations of God towards a childe of eleven years of age; wherein as his severity hath appeared in afflicting, so also his goodness both in enabling her (when stricken dumb, deaf, and blind, through the prevalency of her disease) at several times to utter many glorious truths concerning Christ, faith, and other subjects; and also in recovering her without the use of any external means, lest the glory should be given to any other. To the wonderment of many that came far and neer to see and hear her. With some observations in the fourth year since her recovery. She is the daughter of Mr. Anthony Hatfield gentleman, in Laughton in York-shire; her name is Martha Hatfield. The third edition enlarged, with some passages of her gracious conversation now in the time of health. By James Fisher, servant of Christ, and minister of the Gospel in Sheffield.

LONDON: Printed for John Rothwell, at the Fountain, in Cheap-side. 1656 $3,300 Octavo, 143 x 97 x 23 mm (binding), 139 x 94 x 18 mm (text block). A-M8, N3. Lacks A1, blank or portrait? [26], 170 pp. Bound in contemporary calf, upper board reattached, somewhat later marbled and blank ends. Leather rubbed with minor loss to extremities. Interior: Title stained, leaves soiled, gathering N browned, long vertical tear to E2 without loss, tail fore-corner of F8 torn away, with loss of a letter, side notes of B2v trimmed. This is a remarkable survival of the third edition of the popular interregnum account of Sheffield Presbyterian minister James Fisher’s 11-year-old niece Martha Hatfield’s prophetic dialogues following her recovery from a devastating catalepsy that had left her “dumb, deaf, and blind.” Mar tha’s disease, which defies modern retro-diagnostics, was at the time characterized as “spleenwinde,” a term even the Oxford English Dictionary has overlooked. Her sufferings were as variable as they were extraordinary the young girl at one point endured a 17-day fugue state during which her eyes remained open and fixed and she gnashed her teeth to the breaking point. In counterpoise to the horrors of her infirmity, her utterances in periods of remission and upon recovery were of great purity and sweetness; it is this stark contrast that was, and is, the persistent allure of this little book. The Wise Virgin appeared five times between 1653 and 1665; some editions have a portrait frontispiece, and it is entirely possible that the present third edition should have one at A1v, though the copy scanned by Early English Books Online does not. Copies located at Yale, and at Oxford (from which the EEBO copy was made). ONLY Wing F1006.

)§(§)§(

122F Mary de la Rivière Manley 1663-1724

Secret memoirs and manners of several persons of quality of both sexes. From the New Atalantis, an island in the Mediteranean.

London: Printed for John Morphew, and J. Woodward, 1709 $4500

Octavo 7 1/2 X4 3/4 inches I. A4, B-Q8, R4. Second edition. This jewel of a book is expertly bound in antique style full paneled calf with a gilt spine. It is a lovely copy indeed.

The most important of the scandal chronicles of the early eighteenth century, a form made popular and practiced with considerable success by Mrs. Manley and Eliza Haywood.

Mrs. Manley was important in her day not only as a novelist, but as a Tory propagandist.

Her fiction “exhibited her taste for intrigue, and impudently slandered many persons of note, especially those of Whiggish proclivities.” – D.N.B. “Mrs. Manley’s scandalous ‘revelations’ appealed immediately to the prurient curiosity of her first audience ; but they continued to be read because they succeeded in providing certain satisfactions fundamental to fiction itself. In other words, the scandal novel or ‘chronicle’ of Mrs. Manley and Mrs. Haywood was a successful form, a tested commercial pattern, because it presented an opportunity for its readers to participate vicariously in an erotically exciting and glittering fantasy world of aristocratic corruption and promiscuity.” – Richetti, Popular Fiction before Richardson.

The story concerns the return to earth of the goddess of justice, Astrea, to gather information about private and public behavior on the island of Atalantis. Delarivier Manley drew on her own experiences as well as on an obsessive observation of her milieu to produce this fast-paced narrative of political and erotic intrigue. New Atalantis (1709) is an early and influential example of satirical political writing by a woman. It was suppressed on the grounds of its scandalous nature and Manley (1663-1724) was arrested and tried. Astrea [Justice] descends on the island of Atalantis, meets her mother Virtue, who tries to escape this world of »Interest« in which even the lovers have deserted her. Both visit Angela [London]. Lady Intelligence comments on all stories of interest. p.107: the sequel of »Histories« turns into the old type of satire with numerous scandals just being mentioned (e.g. short remarks on visitors of a horse race or coaches in the Prado [Hyde-Park]). The stories are leveled against leading Whig politicians – they seduce and ruin women. Yet detailed analysis of situations and considerations on actions which could be taken by potential victims. Even the weakest female victims get their chances to win (and gain decent marriages) the more desperate we are about strategic mistakes and a loss of virtue which prevents the heroines from taking the necessary steps. The stories have been praised for their »warmth« and breathtaking turns.

Manley was taken into custody nine days after the publication of the second volume of Secret Memories and Manners of several Persons of Quality of Both Sexes, from the New Atalantis, an island in the Mediterranean on 29 October 1709. Manley apparently surrendered herself after a secretary John Morphew and John Woodward and printer John Barber had been detained. Four days later the latter were discharged, but Manley remained in custody until 5 November when she was released on bail. After several continuations of the case, she was tried and discharged on 13 February 1710. Rivella provides the only account of the case itself in which Manley claims she defended herself on grounds that her information came by ‘inspiration’ and rebuked her judges for bringing ‘w woman to her trial for writing a few amorous trifles’ (pp. 110-11). This and the first volume which appeared in May 1709 were Romans a clef with separately printed keys. Each offered a succession of narratives of seduction and betrayal by notorious Whig grandees to Astrea, an allegorical figure of justice, by largely female narrators, including an allegorical figure of Intelligence and a midwife. In Rivella, Manley claims that her trial led her to conclude that ‘politics is not the business of a woman’ (p. 112) and that thereafter she turned exclusively to stories of love.

Delarivier Manley was in her day as well-known and potent a political satirist as her friend and co-editor Jonathan Swift. A fervent Tory, Manley skilfully interweaves sexual and political allegory in the tradition of the roman a clef in an acerbic vilification of her Whig opponents. The book’s publication in 1709 – fittingly the year of the collapse of the Whig ministry – caused a scandal which led to the arrest of the author, publisher and printer.

The book exposed the relationship of Queen Anne and one of her advisers, Sarah Churchill. Along with this, Manley’s piece examined the idea of female intimacy and its implications. The implications of female intimacy are important to Manley because of the many rumours of the influence that Churchill held over Queen Anne. ESTC T075114; McBurney 45a; Morgan 459.

)§(§)§(

9) 103gPhilips, Katherine.1631-1664

Letters from Orinda to Poliarchus

London: printed by W.B. for Bernard Lintott, 1705 $5,500

Octavo,6.75 X 3.75 inches. First edition A-R8 Bound in original calf totally un-restored a very nice original condition copy with only some browning, spotting and damp staining, It is a very good copy.

It is housed in a custom Box.

10) 376J Mary Pix 1666-1720

The conquest of Spain: a tragedy. As it is Acted by Her Majesty’s Servants at the Queen’s Theatre In the Hay-Market

London : printed for Richard Wellington, at the Dolphin and Crown in St. Paul’s Church-Yard, 1705. $4,500

Quarto [A]-K4. First Edition . (Anonymous. By Mary Pix. Adapted from “All’s lost by lust”, by William Rowley)

Inspired by Aphra Behn, Mary Pix was among the most popular playwrights on the 17th-century theatre circuit, but fell out of fashion.

“It is so rare to find a play from that period that’s powered by a funny female protagonist. I was immensely surprised by the brilliance of the writing. It is witty and forthright. Pix was writing plays that not only had more women in the cast than men but women who were managing their destinies.”

Pix was born in 1666, the year of the Great Fire of London, and grew up in the culturally rich time of Charles II. With the prolific Aphra Behn (1640-1689) as her role model, Pix burst on to the London theatre and literary scene in 1696 with two plays – one a tragedy: Ibrahim, the Thirteenth Emperor of the Turks, the other a farce – The Spanish Wives. Pix also wrote a novel – The Inhuman Cardinal.

Her subsequent plays, mostly comedies, became a staple in the repertory of Thomas Betterton’s company Duke’s at Lincoln’s Inn Fields and later at the Queen’s Theatre. She wrote primarily for particular actors, such as Elizabeth Barry and Anne Bracegirdle, who were hugely popular and encouraged a whole generation of women writers.

In a patriarchal world dominated by self-important men, making a mark as a woman was an uphill struggle. “There was resistance to all achieving women in the 18th century, a lot of huffing and puffing by overbearing male chauvinists,” says Bush-Bailey.

“Luckily for Pix and the other women playwrights of that time, the leading actresses were powerful and influential. I think it was they who mentored people such as Pix and Congreve.”

Davies believes the women playwrights of the 1700s – Susanna Centlivre, Catherine Trotter Cockburn, Delarivier Manley and Hannah Cowley – “unquestionably” held their own against the men who would put them down. “What’s difficult is that they were attacked for daring to write plays at all,” she says.

One of the most blatant examples of male hostility came in the form of an anonymously written parody entitled The Female Wits in 1696, in which Mary Pix was caricatured as “Mrs Wellfed, a fat female author, a sociable, well-natur’d companion that will not suffer martyrdom rather than take off three bumpers [alcoholic drinks] in a hand”.

While Pix’s sociability and taste for good food and wine was common knowledge, she was known to be a universally popular member of the London literary and theatrical circuit.

“The Female Wits was probably written, with malice, by George Powell of the Drury Lane Company,” says Bush-Bailey. “It was a cheap, satirical jibe at the successful women playwrights of the time, making out they were all bitching behind each others’ backs. So far as one can tell, it was just spiteful and scurrilous.”

Mary Pix (1666 – 17 May 1709) was an English novelist and playwright. As an admirer of Aphra Behn and colleague of Susanna Centlivre, Pix has been called “a link between women writers of the Restoration and Augustan periods”.

The Dramatis personae from a 1699 edition of Pix’s The False Friend.

Mary Griffith Pix was born in 1666, the daughter of a rector, musician and Headmaster of the Royal Latin School, Buckingham, Buckinghamshire; her father, Roger Griffith, died when she was very young, but Mary and her mother continued to live in the schoolhouse after his death. She was courted by her father’s successor Thomas Dalby, but he left with the outbreak of smallpox in town, just one year after the mysterious fire that burned the schoolhouse. Rumour had it that Mary and Dalby had been making love rather energetically and overturned a candle which set fire to the bedroom.

In 1684, at the age of 18, Mary Griffith married George Pix (a merchant tailor from Hawkhurst, Kent). The couple moved to his country estate in Kent. Her first son, George (b. 1689), died very young in 1690.[3] The next year the couple moved to London and she gave birth to another son, William (b. 1691).

In 1696, when Pix was thirty years old, she first emerged as a professional writer, publishing The Inhumane Cardinal; or, Innocence Betrayed, her first and only novel, as well as two plays, Ibrahim, the Thirteenth Emperour of the Turks and The Spanish Wives.

Though from quite different backgrounds, Pix quickly became associated with two other playwrights who emerged in the same year: Delariviere Manley and Catherine Trotter. The three female playwrights attained enough public success that they were criticised in the form of an anonymous satirical play The Female Wits (1696). Mary Pix appears as “Mrs. Wellfed one that represents a fat, female author. A good rather sociable, well-matured companion that would not suffer martyrdom rather than take off three bumpers in a hand”.[4] She is depicted as an ignorant woman, though amiable and unpretentious. Pix is summarised as “foolish and openhearted”.

Her first play was put on stage in 1696 at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, near her house in London but when that same theatrical company performed The Female Wits, she moved to Lincoln’s Inn Fields. They said of her that “she has boldly given us an essay of her talent … and not without success, though with little profit to herself”. (Morgan, 1991: xii).

In the season of 1697–1698, Pix became involved in a plagiarism scandal with George Powell. Powell was a rival playwright and the manager of the Drury Lane theatrical company. Pix sent her play, The Deceiver Deceived to Powell’s company, as a possible drama for them to perform. Powell rejected the play but kept the manuscript and then proceeded to write and perform a play called The Imposture Defeated, which had a plot and main character taken directly from The Deceiver Deceived. In the following public backlash, Pix accused Powell of stealing her work and Powell claimed that instead he and Pix had both drawn their plays from the same source material, an unnamed novel. In 1698, an anonymous writer, now believed to be Powell, published a letter called “To the Ingenious Mr. _____.” which attacked Pix and her fellow female playwright Trotter. The letter attempted to malign Pix on various issues, such as her spelling and presumption in publishing her writing. Though Pix’s public reputation was not damaged and she continued writing after the plagiarism scandal, she stopped putting her name on her work and after 1699 she only included her name on one play, in spite of the fact that she is believed to have written at least seven more. Scholars still discuss the attribution of plays to Pix, notably whether or not she wrote Zelmane; or, The Corinthian Queen (1705).

In May 1707 Pix published A Poem, Humbly Inscrib’d to the Lords Commissioners for the Union of the Two Kingdoms. This would be her final appearance in print. She died two years later.

Few of the female playwrights of Mary Pix’s time came from a theatrical background and none came from the aristocracy: within a century, most successful actresses and female authors came from a familiar tradition of literature and theatre but Mary Pix and her contemporaries were from outside this world and had little in common with one another apart from a love for literature and a middle-class background.

At the time of Mary Pix, “The ideal of the one-breadwinner family had not yet become dominant”, whereas in 18th-century families it was normal for the woman to stay at home taking care of the children, house and servants, in Restoration England husband and wife worked together in familiar enterprises that sustained them both and female playwrights earned the same wage as their male counterparts.

Morgan also points out that “till the close of the period, authorship was not generally advertised on playbills, nor always proclaimed when plays were printed”, which made it easier for female authors to hide their identity so as to be more easily accepted among the most conservative audiences.

As Morgan states, “plays were valued according to how they performed and not by who wrote them. When authorship ―female or otherwise― remained a matter of passing interest, female playwrights were in an open and equal market with their male colleagues”.

Pix’s plays were very successful among contemporary audiences. Each play ran for at least four to five nights and some were even brought back for additional shows years later.[10] Her tragedies were quite popular, because she managed to mix extreme action with melting love scenes. Many critics believed that Pix’s best pieces were her comedies. Pix’s comedic work was lively and full of double plots, intrigue, confusion, songs, dances and humorous disguise. An Encyclopaedia of British Women Writers (1998) points out that

Forced or unhappy marriages appear frequently and prominently in the comedies. Pix is not, however, writing polemics against the forced marriage but using it as a plot device and sentimentalizing the unhappily married person, who is sometimes rescued and married more satisfactorily.”(Schlueter & Schlueter, 1998: 513)

Although some contemporary women writers, like Aphra Behn, have been rediscovered, even the most specialised scholars have little knowledge of works by writers such as Catherine Trotter, Delarivier Manley or Mary Pix, despite the fact that plays like The Beau Defeated (1700), present with a wider range of female characters than plays written by men at the time. Pix’s plays generally had eight or nine female roles, while plays by male writers only had two or three.[

A production of The Fantastic Follies of Mrs Rich (or The Beau Defeated) played as part of the 2018 season at the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Pix produced one novel and seven plays. There are four other plays that were published anonymously, that are generally attributed to her.

Melinda Finberg notes that “a frequent motif in all her works is sexual violence and female victimization” – be that rape or murder (in the tragedies) or forcible confinement or the threat of rape (in the comedies).

^ Kramer, Annette (June 1994). “Mary Pix’s Nebulous Relationship to Zelmane”. Notes and Queries. 41 (2): 186–187. doi:10.1093/nq/41-2-186

PIX, Mrs. MARY (1666–1720?), dramatist, born in 1666 at Nettlebed in Oxfordshire, was daughter of the Rev. Roger Griffith, vicar of that place. Her mother, whose maiden name was Lucy Berriman, claimed descent from the ‘very considerable family of the Wallis’s.’ In the dedication of ‘The Spanish Wives’ Mrs. Pix speaks of meeting Colonel Tipping ‘at Soundess,’ or Soundness. This house, which was close to Nettlebed, was the property of John Wallis, eldest son of the mathematician. Mary Griffith’s father died before 1684, and on 24 July in that year she married in London, at St. Saviour’s, Benetfink, George Pix (b. 1660), a merchant tailor of St. Augustine’s parish. His family was connected with Hawkhurst, Kent. By him she had one child, who was buried at Hawkhurst in 1690.

It was in 1696, in which year Colley Cibber, Mrs. Manley, Catharine Cockburn (Mrs. Trotter), and Lord Lansdowne also made their débuts, that Mrs. Pix first came into public notice. She produced at Dorset Garden, and then printed, a blank-verse tragedy of ‘Ibrahim, the Thirteenth Emperor of the Turks.’ When it was too late, she discovered that she should have written ‘Ibrahim the Twelfth.’ This play she dedicated to the Hon. Richard Minchall of Bourton, a neighbour of her country days. In the same year (1696) Mary Pix published a novel, ‘The Inhuman Cardinal,’ and a farce, ‘The Spanish Wives,’ which had enjoyed a very considerable success at Dorset Garden.

From this point she devoted herself to dramatic authorship with more activity than had been shown before her time by any woman except Mrs. Afra Behn [q. v.] In 1697 she produced at Little Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and then published, a comedy of ‘The Innocent Mistress.’ This play, which was very successful, shows the influence of Congreve upon the author, and is the most readable of her productions. The prologue and epilogue were written by Peter Anthony Motteux [q. v.] It was followed the next year by ‘The Deceiver Deceived,’ a comedy which failed, and which involved the poetess in a quarrel. She accused George Powell [q. v.], the actor, of having seen the manuscript of her play, and of having stolen from it in his ‘Imposture Defeated.’ On 8 Sept. 1698 an anonymous ‘Letter to Mr. Congreve’ was published in the interests of Powell, from which it would seem that Congreve had by this time taken Mary Pix under his protection, with Mrs. Trotter, and was to be seen ‘very gravely with his hat over his eyes … together with the two she-things called Poetesses’ (see GOSSE, Life of Congreve, pp. 123–5). Her next play was a tragedy of ‘Queen Catharine,’ brought out at Lincoln’s Inn, and published in 1698. Mrs. Trotter wrote the epilogue. In her own prologue Mary Pix pays a warm tribute to Shakespeare. ‘The False Friend’ followed, at the same house, in 1699; the title of this comedy was borrowed three years later by Vanbrugh.

Hitherto Mary Pix had been careful to put her name on her title-pages or dedications; but the comedy of ‘The Beau Defeated’—undated, but published in 1700—though anonymous, is certainly hers. In 1701 she produced a tragedy of ‘The Double Distress.’ Two more plays have been attributed to Mary Pix by Downes. One of these is ‘The Conquest of Spain,’ an adaptation from Rowley’s ‘All’s lost by Lust,’ which was brought out at the Queen’s theatre in the Haymarket, ran for six nights, and was printed anonymously in 1705 (DOWNE, Roscius Anglicanus, p. 48). Finally, the comedy of the ‘Adventures in Madrid’ was acted at the same house with Mrs. Bracegirdle in the cast, and printed anonymously and without date. It has been attributed by the historians of the drama to 1709; but a copy in the possession of the present writer has a manuscript note of date of publication ‘10 August 1706.’

Nearly all our personal impression of Mary Pix is obtained from a dramatic satire entitled ‘The Female Wits; or, the Triumvirate of Poets.’ This was acted at Drury Lane Theatre about 1697, but apparently not printed until 1704, after the death of the author, Mr. W. M. It was directed at the three women who had just come forward as competitors for dramatic honours—Mrs. Pix, Mrs. Manley, and Mrs. Trotter [see Cockburn, Catharine]. Mrs. Pix, who is described as ‘a fat Female Author, a good, sociable, well-natur’d Companion, that will not suffer Martyrdom rather than take off three Bumpers in a Hand,’ was travestied by Mrs. Powell under the name of ‘Mrs. Wellfed.’

The style of Mrs. Pix confirms the statements of her contemporaries that though, as she says in the dedication of the ‘Spanish Wives,’ she had had an inclination to poetry from childhood, she was without learning of any sort. She is described as ‘foolish and open-hearted,’ and as being ‘big enough to be the Mother of the Muses.’ Her fatness and her love of good wine were matters of notoriety. Her comedies, though coarse, are far more decent than those of Mrs. Behn, and her comic bustle of dialogue is sometimes entertaining. Her tragedies are intolerable. She had not the most superficial idea of the way in which blank verse should be written, pompous prose, broken irregularly into lengths, being her ideal of versification.

The writings of Mary Pix were not collected in her own age, nor have they been reprinted since. Several of them have become exceedingly rare. An anonymous tragedy, ‘The Czar of Muscovy,’ published in 1702, a week after her play of ‘The Double Distress,’ has found its way into lists of her writings, but there is no evidence identifying it with her in any way. She was, however, the author of ‘Violenta, or the Rewards of Virtue, turn’d from Bocacce into Verse,’ 1704.

[Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, 2nd ser. v. 110–3; Vicar-General’s Marriage Licences (Harl. Soc.), 1679–87, p. 173; Baker’s Biogr. Dramatica; Doran’s Annals of the English Stage, i. 243; Mrs. Pix’s works; Genest’s Hist. Account of the Stage.].

)§(§)§(

11) 296J Mademoiselle Madeleine de Scudéri (1607-1701) A triumphant arch erected and consecrated to the glory of the feminine sexe: by Monsieur de Scudery: Englished by I.B. gent.London : printed for William Hope, and Henry Herringman, at the blew Anchor behind the Old Exchange, and at the blew Anchor in the lower walk in the New Exchange, 1656. $1,300

Octavo A4 (lacking a1&a4) B-P8 Q3 (A1 blank?). Title in red and black; title vignette (motto: “Dum spiro spero”) First edition,Authorship ascribed to Madeleine de Scudéry by Brunet; according to other authorities the work was written by both Georges de Scudéry and his sister. This copy is lacking A1 &a4 index f., titled holed, browned and with marginal repairs (without loss), stained, lightly browned, corners worn, rubbed, contemporary sheep, rebacked,Very rare on the market the last copy I could find at auction was in 1967 ($420)Scudéry was the most popular novelist in her time, read in French in volume installments all over Europe and translated into English, German, Italian, and even Arabic. But she was also a charismatic figure in French salon culture, a woman who supported herself through her writing and defended women’s education .Scudéry’s role as a model for women writers and for women’s education has also been an important topic of recent criticism. Critics including Jane Donaworth and Patricia Hannon have discussed her as an important influence on later women authors and even as a proto-feminist. Helen Osterman Borowitz has attempted to draw direct connections between Scudéry and the great French novelist Germaine de Staël. Critics have long acknowledged, however, that Scudéry was not only an influence on women novelists. Some have suggested that she also opened up new political possibilities. For example, Leonard Hinds has claimed that the collaborative model of authorship that existed in the salons was also a model for an alternative to absolutism, while Joan DeJean has suggested that her work can be seen as a response to political events of her age.In 1641 Madeleine published her first novel, Ibrahim ou l’illustre Bassa, under her brother’s name. This practice of using the name of her brother as her pseudonymous signature was one that she continued for most of her prolific career as a writer, despite the fact that her own authorship was openly acknowledged in the gazettes, memoirs, and letters of the time. Although the precise nature of his contributions is uncertain, Georges did clearly collaborate to some extent with his sister in the writing of her novels, and he wrote the prefaces to several of her books.

She won the first prize for eloquence awarded by the Académie Française (1671), but was barred from membership. Several academicians had attempted to lift the ban against women so that she could join their ranks, to no avail. Although her own authorship was widely acknowledged at the time, she used the name of her brother, Georges de Scudéry, as a pseudonymous signature throughout her career (Dejean)

Wing (2nd ed.), S2163 ,Thomason, E.1604[4]

Scudéry, Madeleine de. Selected Letters, Orations and Rhetorical Dialogues. Ed. and trans. Jane Donawerth and Julie Strongson. The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 8.

John Conley, “Madeleine de Scudéry,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2011/entries/madeleine-scudery/.

Joan Dejean. Scudéry, Madeleine de (1608-1701). The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French (Oxford University Press 1995, 2005).

“Scudéry, Madeleine De (1607–1701).” Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World. . Encyclopedia.com. 11 Apr. 2019

)§(§)§(

12) 323J Madeleine Vigneron (1628-1667)

La vie et la conduite spirituelle de Mademoiselle M. Vigneron. Suivant les mémoires qu’elle en a laissez par l’ordre de son directeur (M. Bourdin). [Arranged and edited by him.].

Paris: Chez Pierre de Launay, 1689. $3,200

Octavo 7 x 4 3/4 inches ã8 e8 A-2R8 (2R8 blank). Second and preferred edition first published in 1679. This copy is bound in contemporary brown calf, five raised bands on spine, gilt floral tools in the compartments, second compartment titled in gilt; corners and spine extremities worn; three old joint repairs; on the front binder’s blank is an early ownership four-line inscription in French dated 1704, of

Sister Monique Vanden Heuvel, at the priory of Sion de Vilvoorde (Belgium).

Overall a fine copy.

This is the stirring journal that Madeleine Vigneron , member of the Third Order of the Minims of St. Francis of Paola, she began to keep it in 1653 and continued until her premature death, (1667) It was first published in 1679 and again in the present second, and final, edition which is more complete than the first. Added are Madeleine’s series of 78 letters representing her spiritual correspondence.IMG_1410

In these autobiographical writings, which were collected and published by her Director, the Minim Matthieu Bourdin, Madeleine speaks of the illnesses that plagued her since childhood and greatly handicapped her throughout a life that she dedicated to God by caring for the poor. She received admirable lights on the divinity and humanity of Jesus Christ, on the mysteries of the spiritual life. The hagiographers have remarked her austerity, her patience, her insatiable desire to suffer for God. Those who knew her perceived in her a virtuous life that impressed them.

This is a very rare book: the combined resources of NUC and OCLC locate only one copy in America, at the University of Dayton which also holds the only American copy of the 1679 edition.

§ Cioranescu 66466 (the 1679 edition).

checklist of early modern writings by nuns

Carr, Thomas M., “A Checklist of Published Writings in French by Early Modern Nuns” (2007). French Language and Literature Papers. 52.

)§(§)§(

End

Updated! A Dozen Early Modern Books by Women Author INDEX J.B. 346J Mary Barber 377J Mary Barber 373J Madam De Bellefont 572G Susanna Centlivre 347J…

#female wits #Irish women #Nuns

0 notes