Snowflake day 8, Temeraire poem, and crossover fic for me!!
Day 8: In your own space, share a favorite piece of original canon (a TV episode, a song, a favorite interview, a book, a scene from a movie, etc) and explain why you love it so much.
The last time I did this challenge (which I found rather challenging even then, because how does one narrow it down to a single piece of canon!) I went with "favorite quotes from favorite books in favorite series", so this time, I figure I should look at non-book media. And for TV shows, I've already answered this effectively here [DW link], so would just be restating/re-embedding the top picks for the shows I'm fannish about -- i.e. the bits from "Jaynestown" and "Who Are You" and "And the Rock Cried Out", etc. Which I guess leaves, effectively, movies:
So let's go with, favorite scenes from favorite movies:
1) Lord of the Rings -- the beacon lighting scene from RotK. It's a gorgeous trilogy (even though I didn't always agree with its choices), and the end makes me tear up like the end of the book does, but there is a single scene that is an indisputed favorite for me in the entire PJ-Tolkien-oeuvure, and that's the beacong-lighting scene:
I think probably one of the reasons I love it so much is that it does something only a cinematic adaptation can do -- it's all sweeping visuals and swelling music, and while normally I'm after movie adaptations for reproducing books I love as closely as possible, this is one case where the medium actually can be MORE awesome. And it's (almost) all scenery, which I don't tend to have fixed visuals for, unlike characters or magical creatures, who can look "wrong" to me -- this just looks majestic and beautiful.
2) Galaxy Quest -- the pig-lizard scene :D
I've watched the movie a bunch of times, and every time I watch it on a rewindable medium, I watch the pig lizard scene at least twice, because it never stops being hilarious, from the design of the critter itself to everyone's expressions.
3) Indiana Jones franchise -- the "Where doesn't it hurt" Indy/Marion scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark, which I first watched when I was 11 or so and which was, ahem, foundational in terms of certain fannish tastes which have endured ever since.
I think/based on past discussion, no-one with a fondness for h/c who watched that mvovie at an impressionable age needs any sort of explanation :P
*
Also, guys, guys! You may recall I've been rattling on about the Character Roulette Meme-generated "Hermione, Laurence, and Galeni high school AU" Temeraire/HP/Vorkosiverse crossover that I've wanted to become a real thing? Well! A kind passing Snowflake person/brand new friend,
sunlit_stone actually wrote it, as fulfillment of one of the items on my wishlist, which was a) something I totally did not expect to happen and b) really awesome! It is now up on AO3, with delightful additional notes, and it is PERFECT, so (if you're one of the discerning fiew who are fans of both of the smaller fandoms) you can read it too: A Diversity of Perspective (500 words, gen)
And also also, I appear to have written a Temeraire-verse rondeau. It's Napoleon/Laurence (I reread the passage at the end of League of Dragons, and basically off the charts), and from Napoleon's POV, thus obnoxiously titled in French (B gave me a weird look but complied in translating "to a dear foe" for me; he's used to this sort of thing by now):
A un cher ennemi
Also under the cut, if you prefer:
Come sit with me. Empire shrunk to tiny room,
I know the soldier's lot, won't cavil at my doom --
Let now, as ever, my sole flaw be one of pride.
And yet the irony of it can't be denied:
I'm vanquished now by the very one with whom
I would have surely triumphed, had Fate's fickle loom
Woven one thread athwart, my luck's light to relume,
And you, that vital day, had chosen wisdom's side:
To stay with me.
But if, somehow, a different path could bloom,
Regrouping, Admiral, I would presume
Upon your stalwart heart. I know you'd bide,
More faithful to me than any bride;
Even in St Helena's dismal tomb
You'd stay with me.
[Blathering]
Blathering (spoiler-cut on LJ / simply skippable on DW) -- turns out rondeaux are hard, yo! XD (Originally, I was thinking villanelle, but Napoleon apparently doesn't care for villanelles. They're too static.) Anyway, so once I figured out it was going to be a rondeau, I actually started out with an eight-syllable line, like "In Flanders Fields" (although there doesn't seem to be a required meter?) and when I got to the end, realized that I'd forgotten to have the "rentrement" (the bit repeated as line 9 and 15) opening the first line -- oops. So then I had to go back and put it in, which of course lengthened the line, which was probably for the better, as 8 syllables was making the thing overly compressed. Except that I didn't really need the extra bunch of syllables in the third stanza, and didn't want to dilute it too much with random stuff, so if you look closely, that one is actually only ten syllables per line, not twelve. Which I'm pretty sure is not how rondeaux are supposed to work, but shh.
The "rentrement" is also not quite kosher -- I do believe it's supposed to be repeated exactly, but that sounds boring in such a short poem, and hard to make it GO anywhere, so I fudged that around a bit -- I feel like it's similar enough that it still functions as a rentrement, but not so repetitive.
There's one other thing I tried to do a little bit, although I'm not sure it's noticeable at all (nor should it be necessarily) -- I was playing with the idea of a non-native English speaker (with excellent command of the language, of course) writing in English, and thus choosing maybe slightly unusual words, or using them oddly. It all started with "relume", which is there just to make the rhyme, but it's a French-y sort of word, and after that point I tried to see if I could stick a few more in. "Vital" in line 8 is one of those (it's Latin-based, of course, but comes into English via Old French) and so is "dismal" in line 14 (from Anglo-Norman from Old French), and back in the first stanza, "cavil".
Anyway, I'm excited! It's a new fandom for me for fannish poetry, and a new poetic form (which I hate less than a sestina ;P), so, all-around good :)
This entry was originally posted at https://hamsterwoman.dreamwidth.org/1067533.html. Comment wherever you prefer (I prefer LJ).
The last time I did this challenge (which I found rather challenging even then, because how does one narrow it down to a single piece of canon!) I went with "favorite quotes from favorite books in favorite series", so this time, I figure I should look at non-book media. And for TV shows, I've already answered this effectively here [DW link], so would just be restating/re-embedding the top picks for the shows I'm fannish about -- i.e. the bits from "Jaynestown" and "Who Are You" and "And the Rock Cried Out", etc. Which I guess leaves, effectively, movies:
So let's go with, favorite scenes from favorite movies:
1) Lord of the Rings -- the beacon lighting scene from RotK. It's a gorgeous trilogy (even though I didn't always agree with its choices), and the end makes me tear up like the end of the book does, but there is a single scene that is an indisputed favorite for me in the entire PJ-Tolkien-oeuvure, and that's the beacong-lighting scene:
Click to viewI think probably one of the reasons I love it so much is that it does something only a cinematic adaptation can do -- it's all sweeping visuals and swelling music, and while normally I'm after movie adaptations for reproducing books I love as closely as possible, this is one case where the medium actually can be MORE awesome. And it's (almost) all scenery, which I don't tend to have fixed visuals for, unlike characters or magical creatures, who can look "wrong" to me -- this just looks majestic and beautiful.
2) Galaxy Quest -- the pig-lizard scene :D
I've watched the movie a bunch of times, and every time I watch it on a rewindable medium, I watch the pig lizard scene at least twice, because it never stops being hilarious, from the design of the critter itself to everyone's expressions.
3) Indiana Jones franchise -- the "Where doesn't it hurt" Indy/Marion scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark, which I first watched when I was 11 or so and which was, ahem, foundational in terms of certain fannish tastes which have endured ever since.
I think/based on past discussion, no-one with a fondness for h/c who watched that mvovie at an impressionable age needs any sort of explanation :P
*
Also, guys, guys! You may recall I've been rattling on about the Character Roulette Meme-generated "Hermione, Laurence, and Galeni high school AU" Temeraire/HP/Vorkosiverse crossover that I've wanted to become a real thing? Well! A kind passing Snowflake person/brand new friend,
sunlit_stone actually wrote it, as fulfillment of one of the items on my wishlist, which was a) something I totally did not expect to happen and b) really awesome! It is now up on AO3, with delightful additional notes, and it is PERFECT, so (if you're one of the discerning fiew who are fans of both of the smaller fandoms) you can read it too: A Diversity of Perspective (500 words, gen)
And also also, I appear to have written a Temeraire-verse rondeau. It's Napoleon/Laurence (I reread the passage at the end of League of Dragons, and basically off the charts), and from Napoleon's POV, thus obnoxiously titled in French (B gave me a weird look but complied in translating "to a dear foe" for me; he's used to this sort of thing by now):
A un cher ennemi
Also under the cut, if you prefer:
Come sit with me. Empire shrunk to tiny room,
I know the soldier's lot, won't cavil at my doom --
Let now, as ever, my sole flaw be one of pride.
And yet the irony of it can't be denied:
I'm vanquished now by the very one with whom
I would have surely triumphed, had Fate's fickle loom
Woven one thread athwart, my luck's light to relume,
And you, that vital day, had chosen wisdom's side:
To stay with me.
But if, somehow, a different path could bloom,
Regrouping, Admiral, I would presume
Upon your stalwart heart. I know you'd bide,
More faithful to me than any bride;
Even in St Helena's dismal tomb
You'd stay with me.
[Blathering]
Blathering (spoiler-cut on LJ / simply skippable on DW) -- turns out rondeaux are hard, yo! XD (Originally, I was thinking villanelle, but Napoleon apparently doesn't care for villanelles. They're too static.) Anyway, so once I figured out it was going to be a rondeau, I actually started out with an eight-syllable line, like "In Flanders Fields" (although there doesn't seem to be a required meter?) and when I got to the end, realized that I'd forgotten to have the "rentrement" (the bit repeated as line 9 and 15) opening the first line -- oops. So then I had to go back and put it in, which of course lengthened the line, which was probably for the better, as 8 syllables was making the thing overly compressed. Except that I didn't really need the extra bunch of syllables in the third stanza, and didn't want to dilute it too much with random stuff, so if you look closely, that one is actually only ten syllables per line, not twelve. Which I'm pretty sure is not how rondeaux are supposed to work, but shh.
The "rentrement" is also not quite kosher -- I do believe it's supposed to be repeated exactly, but that sounds boring in such a short poem, and hard to make it GO anywhere, so I fudged that around a bit -- I feel like it's similar enough that it still functions as a rentrement, but not so repetitive.
There's one other thing I tried to do a little bit, although I'm not sure it's noticeable at all (nor should it be necessarily) -- I was playing with the idea of a non-native English speaker (with excellent command of the language, of course) writing in English, and thus choosing maybe slightly unusual words, or using them oddly. It all started with "relume", which is there just to make the rhyme, but it's a French-y sort of word, and after that point I tried to see if I could stick a few more in. "Vital" in line 8 is one of those (it's Latin-based, of course, but comes into English via Old French) and so is "dismal" in line 14 (from Anglo-Norman from Old French), and back in the first stanza, "cavil".
Anyway, I'm excited! It's a new fandom for me for fannish poetry, and a new poetic form (which I hate less than a sestina ;P), so, all-around good :)
This entry was originally posted at https://hamsterwoman.dreamwidth.org/1067533.html. Comment wherever you prefer (I prefer LJ).