ARDELLIAN

Gustave Caillebotte - The Floor Scrapers (1875-6)

Original on top, later version below

“Despite the effort Caillebotte put into the painting, it was rejected by France’s most prestigious art exhibition, The Salon, in 1875. The depiction of working-class people in their trade, not fully clothed, shocked the jurors and was deemed a ‘vulgar subject matter.’ 

And like okay, listen, I get that Bridgerton is meant to be about non-white folks getting their fairytale romantic fantasy but you know what's sexier than a boring fairytale romantic fantasy retreading beats you've seen 100 times before in a story that's shoddily told? A GOOD AND WELL CONSTRUCTED STORY THAT MAKES USE OF ITS HISTORICAL SETTING TO SET UP REAL STAKES FOR THE CHARACTERS. I also get that Bridgerton is in ~dialogue~ or whatever with our present but to me it is in dialogue w the Tory party's current (hysterically funny to me) positioning of itself as thee most diverse party in England and therefore the representative of the true needs of its racial and sexual minorities, bc the show has literally nothing interesting to say in dialogue w contemporary racial politics or gender politics. So if it's disengaged from the present and disengaged from the past what in fucks name is it engaged with? Why even bother to make it. Why bother to do anything. Why make something when you can't even use the damn world it's placed in to say something remotely interesting about the characters.

And I wish this was just a bridgerton problem but rly speaking this is a problem with literally every single work of literary historical fiction I pick up today, never mind historical fiction in other genres and what is the point!!!!! What is the point of historical fiction if you're uninterested in the socio-political structures of the past shaping yr characters and simultaneously you have like a weird half-hearted relationship to the present! What is this total lack of commitment!

All of which is to say goddamn why can't everyone be Hilary Mantel*

Randy Ortiz, “Battles”

This is like the literary equivalent of meeting someone who doesn't know Darth Vader is Luke's father.

So they go "I don't understand why anyone would have a problem with this relationship! Yeah he's older and there is a class/power difference but he clearly respects her as a person and it's so refreshing!" and you just cackle, cackle, cackle behind your screen until the inevitable day you get this message.