Because I don't think the motif of the Chosen One being someone reared in (relatively) humble circumstances but of actually elite birth is particularly British?
(Especially when the examples given are precisely 2 distantly separated in time, King Arthur and Harry Potter.)
This was claimed as being about the Dead Hand of British Classism by somebody ( Read more... )

What I read
It was all K J Charles, all of the time: The Magpie Lord (2013), A Case of Possession (2014), Flight of Magpies (2014), two shorter pieces about the same characters, and the related Rag and Bone (2016) and Jackdaw (2015) (is there going to be an redemptive arc for the thoroughly obnoxious guy in the Council Hall, or is he irredeemable ( Read more... )

Okay, that thing that's doing the rounds about 'how to fall in mutual love': essayed (iz an EXPERIMENT!) by two Guardian columnists here -
I can't, at this remove in time, remember whether this was in the 'sessional' (1 year) psychology course I did as part of the famous Foundation Year when I was a fresh-faced undergraduate back in the Upper ( Read more... )

Mulling over something yesterday on Twitter about that apparently weird combination of misogyny combined with desire for women - if women are so awful why do these men want them and obsess about them so much? -
My immediate and rather cynical reaction was that the bits these men want, being cis straight men, are, unfortunately, going around ( Read more... )

Am in the final throes of completing the catalogue of papers of Yet Another Eminent Shrink - given the demand for the existing collections in that area, this seemed the next one to knock off.

Anyway, I am now at the stage of dealing with the files of articles and papers sent to YAES by colleagues.

Most of whom sent those pieces that they consider ( Read more... )

Could be a design statement, but I'm going with making-up error: the patterned part of a new pair of socks comes on the soles, I discover when I put them on, and would be pretty much invisible even were I to be wearing the lightest and strappiest of sandals.

***

No - no - (Frankie Howerd voice) - don't mock: Three colours rule this autumn: mustard ( Read more... )

Okay, I was thinking about current and recent kerfuffles and hoohahs in the corners of the internet that I frequent, and there seems to be an element going on of women failing to be magic mirrors* and giving to certain men in question the completely non-judgemental positive regard + tons of admiration which they feel to be their due.

Which made me ( Read more... )

Thinking about fairytales. (No, really, this has been formulating for some time and is not in any way generated by Royal Wedding, srsly.)

I am currently reading for review a book with a Jungian/Campbellian take on myth and fairytale (which managed to irk me quite early on the intro, but I persisted).

But, anyway, at one point it was talking about ( Read more... )

Article in today's Guardian G2 by a woman who underwent the 'Hoffman Process', which sounds a lot like some of the more intensive stuff that was happening within the 'growth movement' way back in the 1970s*.

And I do wonder if changes will stick, and whether there'll be an enormous slump, after all that intensity. Going in with a particular desire ( Read more... )

In spite of having my yoga class today, I still finally let out an increasing groundswell of strop at someone on one of my listservs who has been being annoying for about a week now. (Maybe, however, I did it in a more serene and caring way than I might otherwise have done...)

I.e. asking a question aimed at a previous post which was (to my mind) a ( Read more... )