Day 26 and counting
Let's try to finish this out, then. Man, if my life depended on coming up with something every single day, I would be screwed. Speaking of which....
Day Twenty-Six: Favorite classical female character (from pre-20th century literature or mythology or the like)
Scheherazade of The Thousand and One Nights
We all know the story, right? King of a Minor Place and beloved younger brother of the King of Everything Else, Basically, comes home unexpectedly to find his wife in bed with a strapping black slave, rage!kills them both, goes to mope at his brother the King's place for a while, oversees the King's wife having a forty-person orgy while the King is out, and is like, oh, that's alright then, at least my wife was only banging one dude, it could have been worse. He tells the King and they spy the orgyees in the act and after watching the whole thing (apparently), the King is like WELL FUCK. I HATE EVERYTHING NOW. Forget all this "reigning" shit, let's bugger off and become emo vagrants and if we die that's cool because life's not worth living. So they do. And after a while of emo vagranting around, they have to hide in a tree from a big scary djinn, who pulls a total babe out of a chest he's lugging around and is like, yo, babe wat I stole on her wedding night, I'ma sleep for a bit, be mah pillow woman! And once he's asleep, she pushes his head off her lap and makes the King and his brother come down and bone her (over their protests) as part of her on-going sex!revenge campaign on the djinn, and is all like, never trust a woman, we will fuck you up. And the brothers are like, TRU DAT. Also, if this can even happen to something as powerful as a djinn, I guess it can happen to anyone, it could have been worse. And with their man cards restored, they go back to the King's palace to kill that cheating bitch and never trust a woman again, because they will fuck you up. And so they turn to the ~beautiful love~ of incesty slash, as the internet assures us is the correct course in all these circumstances. HA! JK. No, the King's plan to make sure he's never cuckolded again is to sleep with virgins only and then kill them in the morning. So after like three years of this, his subjects wise up and get all the virgins the hell out of dodge. And the King's Vizier, aka the King's Virgin Procurer, is like, what, no virgins anywhere? O shit o shit o shit, my termination package is not gonna be pretty. And the older of his two daughters - a wise and beautiful virgin - sees that he's down, and is like, hey Dad, sometimes it helps to talk about it.
When the Wezeer heard these words from his daughter, he related to her all that had happened to him with regard to the King: upon which she said, By Allah, O my father, give me in marriage to this King: either I shall die, and be a ransom for one of the daughters of the Muslims, or I shall live, and be the cause of their deliverance from him.
Which may just be the most badass line uttered by a heroine ever. And then she hatches a plot with her beloved younger sister, and has her come after the sexy tiems (with the excuse of saying goodbye) and ask to hear a story to wile away the time until dawn. And so Scheherazade pulls out all the classics: blood, sex, magic, revenge, sex, adventure, drugs, sex, family, betrayal, sex, cunning, fights, porny sex, treasure, curses, crime, kinky sex, love, power, interspecies sex, spirits, djinns, monsters, weird sex, with a sex chaser (AO3, basically, if they went a little easier on the sex) ... and, with hooks and timing that network execs would kill for, makes sure the King has to keep her alive for just one more day to find out how the story ends, which, as any fangirl who's experienced hiatus or has accidentally stayed up until 4AM reading books/fic can attest, is totally the most reasonable reaction in this whole story. And after a thousand and one nights of this, they've had a kid or two and the King's fallen in love with her and decides to just keep her alive because she's awesome. And that is how Scheherazade saved herself, and all the other virgins in the empire, through the power of cliffhangers. The End.
... Hopefully I don't need to explain to y'all why my choice was the female character who won the day purely through storytelling. Seriously, that's awesome.
master list
Day Twenty-Six: Favorite classical female character (from pre-20th century literature or mythology or the like)
Scheherazade of The Thousand and One Nights
We all know the story, right? King of a Minor Place and beloved younger brother of the King of Everything Else, Basically, comes home unexpectedly to find his wife in bed with a strapping black slave, rage!kills them both, goes to mope at his brother the King's place for a while, oversees the King's wife having a forty-person orgy while the King is out, and is like, oh, that's alright then, at least my wife was only banging one dude, it could have been worse. He tells the King and they spy the orgyees in the act and after watching the whole thing (apparently), the King is like WELL FUCK. I HATE EVERYTHING NOW. Forget all this "reigning" shit, let's bugger off and become emo vagrants and if we die that's cool because life's not worth living. So they do. And after a while of emo vagranting around, they have to hide in a tree from a big scary djinn, who pulls a total babe out of a chest he's lugging around and is like, yo, babe wat I stole on her wedding night, I'ma sleep for a bit, be mah pillow woman! And once he's asleep, she pushes his head off her lap and makes the King and his brother come down and bone her (over their protests) as part of her on-going sex!revenge campaign on the djinn, and is all like, never trust a woman, we will fuck you up. And the brothers are like, TRU DAT. Also, if this can even happen to something as powerful as a djinn, I guess it can happen to anyone, it could have been worse. And with their man cards restored, they go back to the King's palace to kill that cheating bitch and never trust a woman again, because they will fuck you up. And so they turn to the ~beautiful love~ of incesty slash, as the internet assures us is the correct course in all these circumstances. HA! JK. No, the King's plan to make sure he's never cuckolded again is to sleep with virgins only and then kill them in the morning. So after like three years of this, his subjects wise up and get all the virgins the hell out of dodge. And the King's Vizier, aka the King's Virgin Procurer, is like, what, no virgins anywhere? O shit o shit o shit, my termination package is not gonna be pretty. And the older of his two daughters - a wise and beautiful virgin - sees that he's down, and is like, hey Dad, sometimes it helps to talk about it.
When the Wezeer heard these words from his daughter, he related to her all that had happened to him with regard to the King: upon which she said, By Allah, O my father, give me in marriage to this King: either I shall die, and be a ransom for one of the daughters of the Muslims, or I shall live, and be the cause of their deliverance from him.
Which may just be the most badass line uttered by a heroine ever. And then she hatches a plot with her beloved younger sister, and has her come after the sexy tiems (with the excuse of saying goodbye) and ask to hear a story to wile away the time until dawn. And so Scheherazade pulls out all the classics: blood, sex, magic, revenge, sex, adventure, drugs, sex, family, betrayal, sex, cunning, fights, porny sex, treasure, curses, crime, kinky sex, love, power, interspecies sex, spirits, djinns, monsters, weird sex, with a sex chaser (AO3, basically, if they went a little easier on the sex) ... and, with hooks and timing that network execs would kill for, makes sure the King has to keep her alive for just one more day to find out how the story ends, which, as any fangirl who's experienced hiatus or has accidentally stayed up until 4AM reading books/fic can attest, is totally the most reasonable reaction in this whole story. And after a thousand and one nights of this, they've had a kid or two and the King's fallen in love with her and decides to just keep her alive because she's awesome. And that is how Scheherazade saved herself, and all the other virgins in the empire, through the power of cliffhangers. The End.
... Hopefully I don't need to explain to y'all why my choice was the female character who won the day purely through storytelling. Seriously, that's awesome.
master list