This post is based on wild speculation. I agree that what I'm writing about is not the only possible explanation; it's guesswork, and I only hope it's logical
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I absolutely agree with all of this, and incorporated a lot of this same thinking into my fic Blood Brothers. In terms of literature, I absolutely think that Damon and Stefan are the two periods of nineteenth century lit. Damon is the Romantic, Byronesque as fuck, and we can even look at Manfred as an example-- to steal the Wiki summary:
Manfred is a Faustian noble living in the Bernese Alps. Internally tortured by some mysterious guilt, which has to do with the death of his most beloved, Astarte, he uses his mastery of language and spell-casting to summon seven spirits, from whom he seeks forgetfulness. I don't think the number seven is a mistake; I haven't extensively studied this work but I doubt it would be a stretch to say anything about the seven deadly sins in relation to it. For Damon, he needs the Gothic, the Romantic, and it is all or nothing for him. I think he feels things TOO strongly rather than not strongly enough, and that's why the Civil War was especially traumatizing for him. And I think your assessment of basing
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OMG, what you're sayig about slavery is just amazing. Would you mind if I just edited the main post and quoted you? I was trying to think of a paraphrase, but failed miserably.
Damon is Byronic to the core, and I love to watch his romantic narrative getting crushed. Right now, I feel he is eclectic, constantly under construction, still, even after so many years, trying to find a narrative that would fit. The only difference is that now he has many more to choose from.
I like the fact that this show and True Blood are set in the South, because the fact is that we do have ghosts and vampires here.Interesting point. I'm from Europe, and from the part of Europe that didn't even experience colonialism, so every time there is a conversation about slavery, I have this nagging feeling that I don't know what I'm talking about. With TVD it's even harder, because the show itself avoids the subject. There seems to be a popular fandom opinion that Damon was an abolitionist, but I disagree? I mean, no one forced this uniform on him (or at least
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Please feel free to quote! I feel it's so important to Damon's characterization that he is just this absolutely crystallized moment in time. I'd actually like to see some more vampires of younger ages, such as during the Reconstruction or during the Civil Rights movement, to see how living and dying in that period forms them. I really liked the nod Stefan gave to remember Sheila Bennett as a young civil rights activist and how she was still fierce
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All this long history blabber is basically to say that there were a lot of reasons for what happened during the Civil War and for why people made decisions as they did (and my personal feelings that both sides made a lot of bad and long-lasting decisions). They are very complex and difficult issues, which is probably why TVD doesn't want to deal with them at all, which is somewhat typical for communities in the South: we don't want to live in the past, we want to move ahead. But the problems and complexities from the past, as well as the emotions attached to them, still come out. I've grown up in and around Atlanta, and I'm used to our demographics of ~50% blacks, ~40% whites, and ~10% Hispanic, Asian, and other populations. I love that amount of diversity. I love that Atlanta has such strong opportunities for POC to be in positions of authority where it's kinda a crapshoot elsewhere. And yet, we all check ourselves for trying to eradicate the problems that have evolved over the centuries, like we're looking back over our shoulders
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I'm a former History major (mostly specializing in antiquity, but still, I had to do my fair share of the 19th century) who then became an English major, so I have some general idea about Civil War and its causes. What's more confusing is how it influences what's happening now. The ghosts, as you say it. (Btw, I think TVD referred to that once - Tyler asked Carol about the old Lockwood cellar, and she said sth like "we don't talk about this kind of rooms").
Thank you for the explanation and the additional reading :D. Novel-lenght comments are love ♥
Yes, Carol is very much the type of person who wouldn't talk about Those Kind Of Rooms. There are a lot of types of people who will and won't talk about the Civil War and slavery- someone wealthy, white, and a bit insulated, like Carol, would like to call herself colorblind (despite teh fact that wasn't it her in early s1 who was going to rip the black kid from the caterers a new one for not having the candles lit? And then Bonnie lit them with magic?). On the far other end of the spectrum, you have white people out in the country who will fetishize the South and its glory days- but they're not very good with history, and they ignore the fact that if those days were here again, they would likely be dirt poor, working for someone else, and just barely better than slaves themselves. (I'm sure plenty of men joined the Confederate army just to get a decent meal.) And then many black people WILL bring up the past- I have had discussions where "Your ancestors enslaved my ancestors!" is supposed to end a disagreement, on the basis that white
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Manfred is a Faustian noble living in the Bernese Alps. Internally tortured by some mysterious guilt, which has to do with the death of his most beloved, Astarte, he uses his mastery of language and spell-casting to summon seven spirits, from whom he seeks forgetfulness. I don't think the number seven is a mistake; I haven't extensively studied this work but I doubt it would be a stretch to say anything about the seven deadly sins in relation to it. For Damon, he needs the Gothic, the Romantic, and it is all or nothing for him. I think he feels things TOO strongly rather than not strongly enough, and that's why the Civil War was especially traumatizing for him. And I think your assessment of basing ( ... )
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Damon is Byronic to the core, and I love to watch his romantic narrative getting crushed. Right now, I feel he is eclectic, constantly under construction, still, even after so many years, trying to find a narrative that would fit. The only difference is that now he has many more to choose from.
I like the fact that this show and True Blood are set in the South, because the fact is that we do have ghosts and vampires here.Interesting point. I'm from Europe, and from the part of Europe that didn't even experience colonialism, so every time there is a conversation about slavery, I have this nagging feeling that I don't know what I'm talking about. With TVD it's even harder, because the show itself avoids the subject. There seems to be a popular fandom opinion that Damon was an abolitionist, but I disagree? I mean, no one forced this uniform on him (or at least ( ... )
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I'm a former History major (mostly specializing in antiquity, but still, I had to do my fair share of the 19th century) who then became an English major, so I have some general idea about Civil War and its causes. What's more confusing is how it influences what's happening now. The ghosts, as you say it. (Btw, I think TVD referred to that once - Tyler asked Carol about the old Lockwood cellar, and she said sth like "we don't talk about this kind of rooms").
Thank you for the explanation and the additional reading :D. Novel-lenght comments are love ♥
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