Fic: Eaten Up in Miserable Circumstances

[gileonnen]

Title: Eaten Up in Miserable Circumstances
Author: gileonnen
Fandom: Pre-Richard II
Characters/Pairings: Richard, Anne, Robert; mentions of Richard/Anne and Richard/Robert
Rating: PG
Warnings: Casual references to a polyamorous relationship, academic wittering on
Summary: Richard had entertained dreams of revolutionizing the field of medieval studies, once

Comments

[lareinenoire]

I think what really grabbed me about this fic is how incredibly well you nailed the process of writing a thesis. That is exactly what it feels like -- days and days of transcribing documents and knowing you're not actually accomplishing anything despite having hundreds of pages of notes and spending hours on end in the library because notes don't do anything on their own. Also, the brain-eating capacity of random little things that you just can't figure out.

But what's also lovely here is how the subtly drawn the relationships between Richard, Anne, and Robbie are -- how they exist outside of but are still deeply related to Richard's relationship with his work. Also, TINY CARS. ♥

[gileonnen]

I'm so glad that this came through! I was practically giving myself aneurysms over the procedural nonsense, and you know what? No one cares about the procedural nonsense. The process is where the emotional weight is, and it's a maddening process, and that's what I want to get right.

[lareinenoire]

Oh, yeah, the procedural nonsense is its own thing but you really captured the daily process and how utterly aggravating it is. You totally got it right.

(Amusingly enough, I didn't necessarily do the small scraps of paper, but I did tend to write shelfmarks in my diary, so there are literally lists of nothing but shelfmarks on certain days of the week.)

[gileonnen]

(And I write these notes in my LJ. I think this may be a generational thing. >_>;;)

[lareinenoire]

See, I would write notes in my LJ, but my notes are often kind of embarrassing. Like, 'Don't forget milk or YOU WILL REGRET IT' or things like that. ;) And it made sense to have them in my diary because I always had it with me and Duke Humfrey's Library didn't get wireless Internet until my second year. Of course, when it did, there went my productivity...

[gileonnen]

Heee. I private-lock them. I've been taking my notes in grad school on LJ since my first semester; I've got 105 locked posts of nothing but class notes. And that's not even counting the locked to-do lists and locked research and scholarship posts.

[lareinenoire]

See, that's really handy! I'd never have thought of that. I'm trying to put together lecture notes for at least the first few weeks of class (if not more than that) so I can start off ahead before I descend into SHEER PANIC. We'll see how well that works. Also, when you took that class on the Matter of Britain, did you end up reading 'Culhwch and Olwen'? If so, is it not TOTALLY on crack?

[gileonnen]

We did not! But our professor made it known that we would be TERRIBLE PEOPLE if we did not read it. I'll bump it up my list!

[lareinenoire]

You will like it a lot, I think. It's so clearly a written-down version of a tale people have been telling next to bonfires for generations, and it is also the BIGGEST WELSH-MYTHOLOGY CROSSOVER EVER. Which is hilarious to me despite knowing nothing about Welsh mythology. I am seriously contemplating having my students try to explain it in terms of modern comic books or something like that.

[angevin2]

Richard is SO LUCKY the internet is not widespread when he's writing his thesis. ;)