Not AU exactly -- AW through a blurry, malfunctioning telescope

[rthstewart]

In the following, we now cover 15-16 years, and this goes places I did not intend, and we end up not in AU exactly, but maybe. It's not what I'd intended. The first part is re-hash of the commentfic and I blame lady_songsmith for the prompt that took us to the Amazon and then anastigmatfic for where we’ve ended up, however improbably. The very end is new.

Comments

[vialethe]

Also late to the party - and also very much an awkward newbie to commenting on this thoroughly amazing verse, but I had Thoughts.

On Peter's seeming double standard towards Susan's behavior vs Edmund's, I do wonder if it might not have something to do with their roles in Narnia, where Peter always knew Edmund was his 'logistics man,' doing all the uglier Rat and Crow things Peter didn't want to know about. Whereas while he obviously knew Susan was involved in it as well, perhaps he saw her more as a partner in the more high and noble aspects of everything? And so now in England he's disappointed that she doesn't share those same ideals, where he always knew that Edmund didn't. Still sexist of him of course, but for me at least that makes it more understandable.

[rthstewart]

Hey there and welcome! When and how did you come on board? What have you read? I never know these things unless someone tells me! I know you wrote that cool AU with Edmund and Susan remaining behind!

I've found these discussion really interesting. People are making certain assumptions and I'm finding the assumptions about Edmund especially intriguing. Peter and Edmund did discuss this ambiguity back in TQSiT and Susan and Edmund discussed it in AW. Edmund and Peter discussed how he used to deliver to Peter the truth or the lie and that he would never lie to Peter, which raised the issue of whether Peter would ask. So, there's the question of whether this seems out of character for Peter or whether it is in character but just objectionable to readers -- in short, people are mad at him and how do readers feel about being mad at the High King? Does it make sense? I'm just "thinking aloud" here.

[autumnia]

I don't think it's necessarily that Peter is out of character. We've seen his views on the world and life change over the course of the summer in TSG (such as the warning Edmund gives Susan that the High King with his many titles have suddenly become anti-colonial

[rthstewart]

Very clear! You are so wonderful. I so appreciate you sharing your thoughts on all this.

[vialethe]

Thanks for the welcome! I came on board through the comment fic posted in the Last Battle AU community; I enjoyed it lots but was terribly confused by it until I finally dug around in your journal last week, found the links for TSG, and read all three parts in about four days. Obviously, I enjoyed it, and will do my best to go back and comment at some point.

I don't think Peter is ooc at all either - autumnia expressed very well what I was trying to say above. Then again, I've also never minded being mad at Peter when he's wrong, which he clearly is here.

I am interested to see if there is a point at which Peter would ask Edmund to lie rather than know what he's really been up to; if there is a point where Peter has that same 'I don't want to see you doing ugly things' attitude towards Edmund that he seems to have towards Susan.

[rthstewart]

Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed them! The AU comm is hopefully broader than the fic of fic spawn of TSG. I do hope others add other things to it!!

[vialethe]

Sorry to interrupt a discussion that has gotten far deeper than what I had so far considered with this piece, BUT

[rthstewart]

Thank you so much, for this post and the one you just made. I've been swimming in doubts of the highly negative variety-tear-it-all-down-go-to-ground-like-I-did-in-1996 and I really, really appreciate this. I hope that you'll eventually consider, amidst your many other obligations, setting up some sort of anon account, whether on LJ, as a fake email, or an ff.net account and we can take it off line sometimes. If you wish, of course. For now, again, thank you. I wallow about and then I see something like this and realize that folks really have read a whole lot and are really trying to pull things together and it's very humbling. Thanks again.