Beware of Italics

I've got gay pirate brainrot

Wakes up from hypnosis where he was about to marry a woman he’s never seen before with his mystery girl’s voice, the instant he wakes up then the cute girl he’s actually fallen in love with now has that voice. Then she drops to the floor and has a fish tail, and then the first girl is suddenly cackling “too late!” and bursting out of her skin. So it turns out she’s actually an octopus woman who drags herself over to the real mystery girl - who’s a mermaid?! They’re real?! - and taking her back into the ocean. And Eric has no idea what’s going on here but okay, one of these women is clearly evil and he needs to go after his mystery girl.

And all of this happens/he realizes what he has to do within like, a single minute.

Prior to this he was just living out a sweet romance after having a Meet Cute with a shipwrecked girl, but okay, guess he’s involved in whatever the fuck this is. Acting first, questioning later.

Look at this clip from Childey Corner fight from 1976 TBC adaptation! Valancy just smashed some random country boy in the spine like the sassy diva she is 💋

You dropped thi👒-- THIS, QUEEN 👑!

Whole scene is a hot mess; after a few second of Barney vs everyone else fight ladies of Chidley are like hell no! and they are the one pacifing party... with the power of their high heels and flinging chair xdd

Oh, Valancy. I’m proud of her for buying herself something beautiful, and I hope one day she will feel she deserves to wear it.

There’s a hint at the existence of breasts here! I’m imagining people reading it and being shocked a hundred years ago…and I confess, I’m delighted.

I like Valancy’s church experience. I don’t know what else to say about it. I just like it. I guess what I’m trying to say is that that’s what partaking in religion should be—something that you like, and something that you feel does you good. That simple description is so much more real to me than any other description of religion Montgomery writes. I don’t know if it’s a me thing, or if it’s that for once, she was writing what she herself believed rather than what she thought she was supposed to. I wonder if there’s any parallel between how Montgomery writes about romance and how she writes about religion. In “The Blue Castle”, both reject the conventions that she often uses in other books, and both feel more real and right and healthy than the others.

I don’t know. I started that paragraph with absolutely no idea where I was going, and I’m not quite sure where I went. But there it is.

I’m glad Valancy goes to the dance herself, if that’s what she wants. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about Roaring Abel ordering her to do it. I think he means well, but in the context of what we’ve already discussed of his not giving Cissy information she needed and then blaming her for not having it, something feels a little…off to me. Let me try to organize my thoughts. I think I a) don’t like the idea of an employer giving their employee orders about how to spend their spare time, b) feel that Abel should have given Valancy more information about what she would experience at the dance. Am I asking too much of the “old sinner”? Maybe. But still.

All of that said, I’m thrilled that Valancy is wearing the dress. She deserves to feel beautiful.

Cissy is the best. Her father may not prep Valancy, but she does.

Valancy’s reaction to being called “no beaut but cute-looking” makes me wonder how she would react to being called “tolerable” by Mr. Darcy. At first I thought she might take it as a compliment. Then I changed my mind. Valancy may enjoy being noticed for the first time in her life, but she has dignity, and she would feel the sting of everything else Darcy says just as much as Elizabeth—if not more. With how fragile her self-esteem still is, I worry she would take it too much to heart. Let’s be thankful that she has Barney instead.

CHAPTER TWENTY

This is a long chapter!

Oh, I know that feeling of wearing something you like but being too self-conscious to wear it in front of people, and then a few months later you’re wearing it all the time and you’re like… “What was I even embarrassed about, anyway??”

Old Mr Towers believed exactly what he preached and somehow it made an enormous difference.

No notes.

“No beaut but cute-looking, I’ll say. ‘Jever see such eyes?”

That’s a much better compliment than just a bland ‘beautiful’.

-one that she was quite safe; the other was that this was why she had wanted to come to the dance. It had been such an absurd hope that she had no recognised it before, but now she knew she had come because of the possibility that Barney might be there, too.

It’s okay, Valancy, you’d be forgiven for going even if you had consciously realised it was because you wanted to dance with your Prince Handsome.

BARNEY’S MOMENT HERE!!!!!!

He swung her out through the open window behind him, vaulted lightly over the sill and caught her hand.

“Quick - we must run for it - they’ll be after us.”

And THEN THEY RUN HAND-IN-HAND THROUGH THE WOODS.

So he had actually come up to look after her.

Which, by the way, girl, is why he’s dressed the way he is. Also, I just want to point out that even if Barney hadn’t rescued her, Abel would’ve, or Valancy would’ve saved herself. It’s just nice and romantic that Barney was there and jumped through a window with her.

-ashamed of being found in such a place by Barney Snaith. By Barney Snaith, reputed jail-breaker, infidel, forger and defaulter. Valancy’s lips twitched in the darkness as she thought about it.

Yup. It’s embarrassing but it’s ironically funny, too.

Aaand then they run out of fuel. It’s like the L.M Montgomery version of the one-bed trope.

(also I wonder why he doesn’t suggest that they both walk to get fuel? Especially since they’d end up in Deerwood anyway, where she could always just crash at her mother’s for the night if she was really exhausted. I don’t feel like it’s out of chivalry. Maybe he saw her face when she sat down on the pine tree and thought she wasn’t physically strong enough?)

“If you don’t, I needn’t. I haven’t any reputation to lose.”

“Nor I,” said Valancy comfortably.

Happy Pride!

If you want to learn more about Shakespeare’s queerness I recommend Straight Acting: The Hidden Queer Lives of William Shakespeare, by Will Tosh. I’ve just started it but so far it’s doing a great job examining what queerness looked like in Shakespeare’s time.

Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival

I will be at the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival this weekend, June 13-14, at the Downtown Ann Arbor District Library. I will also be running a “how to draw stick-figures” workshop on Saturday, June 13 at 11:30am. I realize that (a) this is very late notice, and (b) most of you aren’t in the Ann Arbor area, but if you are… stop by and say hello! I will have printed mini-comic versions of the above comic available!

Shakespeare Anyone? Podcast

This is one of those things that really resonated with me as a trans person with a lot of trans friends of all genders. You finally buy the gender-affirming clothes, you're dazzled by them in the shop, you go home and put them on in private, and yes, you look just like the mental image of yourself...

except you also feel awkward and foolish and you know everyone would hate it and you're just crushed about it. And you bury them under the clothes you hate because it's just easier to keep wearing those.

As with all my Trans Thoughts on The Blue Castle, I obviously know these are things applicable to a lot of people of all experiences, of course, and I am by no means saying Valancy is trans or intentionally trans/queer coded! But if you go with my previously mentioned observation that Valancy has been forced into one specific gender/presentation (old maid, basically from childhood) and is wanting desperately to be seen as a specific gender/presentation (pretty young woman), it's one of those things I couldn't let pass.

This is one of my favorite chapters in the book. I think it strikes a wonderful balance at what it is trying to say.

“When Abel Gay paid Valancy her first month’s wages—which he did promptly, in bills reeking with the odour of tobacco and whiskey”

Montgomery is trying to be balanced in her depiction of Abel: He is responsible enough to give her wages “promptly” but unconventional enough to have them smell of tobacco and whiskey.

“Valancy went into Deerwood and spent every cent of it. She got a pretty green crêpe dress with a girdle of crimson beads, at a bargain sale, a pair of silk stockings, to match, and a little crinkled green hat with a crimson rose in it. She even bought a foolish little beribboned and belaced nightgown.”

Iconic. So iconic that I want to buy clothes myself, and I hate doing that.

“No doubt her mother was sitting in the room this lovely June evening playing solitaire—and cheating. Valancy knew that Mrs. Frederick always cheated. She never lost a game.”

Wonderful character detail.

“Yet she sighed as she went down to meet Barney Snaith in her old snuff-brown silk. That green thing had been very becoming—she had seen so much in her one ashamed glance. Above it her eyes had looked like odd brown jewels and the girdle had given her flat figure an entirely different appearance. She wished she could have left it on.”

In this chapter Valancy is very motivated by her crush on Barney. Some might find it annoying, I love it personally.

“But there were some things John Foster did not know.”

Well, John Foster is a man.

“An old man, who lived in Port Lawrence and came out by the lake in a little disappearing propeller boat”

That type of boat was invented in 1915, so the book is taking place after that. Good, good.

“An old man, who lived in Port Lawrence and came out by the lake in a little disappearing propeller boat to give a free service to the people of the small, stony farms back of the hills, who would otherwise never have heard any gospel message.”

I like that he is giving free services. And apparently Free Methodists were originally an abolitionist sect. Good again.

“Oddly enough, Roaring Abel disapproved of her going to the hill church as strongly as Mrs. Frederick herself could have done. He had “no use for Free Methodists. He was a Presbyterian.” But Valancy went in spite of him.”

Valancy is afraid of nobody. She is her own person now.

“If she only had a necklace or something. She wouldn’t feel so bare then.”

Foreshadowing.

“You look so nice and—and—different, dear,” said Cissy. “Like a green moonbeam with a gleam of red in it, if there could be such a thing.”

Cissy is the person who first likens Valancy to moonlight! I love this.

“At first the dance was quiet enough, and Valancy was amused and entertained. She even danced twice herself, with a couple of nice “up back” boys who danced beautifully and told her she did, too.”

We have been told in Long Night of the Soul that Valancy was good at dancing.

“No beaut but cute-looking, I’ll say. ’Jever see such eyes?”

Again, Valancy’s eyes are commented on.

“The big room was decorated with pine and fir boughs, and lighted by Chinese lanterns.”

I gave the Chinese restaurant Chinese lanterns in my fanfic and had Valancy admire them. I wish I had remembered that she saw them at Chidley Corners already.

“Valancy, alone in her corner, was feeling disgusted and repentant. Why had she ever come to such a place? Freedom and independence were all very well, but one should not be a little fool. She might have known what it would be like—she might have taken warning from Cissy’s guarded sentences. Her head was aching—she was sick of the whole thing.”

Some might find this didactic but I think Montgomery makes it work. This event won’t make Valancy more subdued again, and yes, women sometimes need to be careful for their own safety. It is a very good lesson, efficiently told.

I also love that Cissy also dislikes Chidley Corners and tries to warn Valancy.

“It was at this moment that she saw Barney Snaith looking in over the heads of the crowd at the doorway. Valancy had two distinct convictions—one was that she was quite safe now; the other was that this was why she had wanted to come to the dance. It had been such an absurd hope that she had not recognised it before, but now she knew she had come because of the possibility that Barney might be there, too. She thought that perhaps she ought to be ashamed for this, but she wasn’t.”

Some readers might be annoyed at all roads leading to Barney, I am not. Valancy had been yearning for romance since page two, and sexual repression is one of her main demons. I love her lack of shame in admitting this to herself.

“Valancy tried desperately and vainly to free herself. She was being dragged out into the maze of shouting, stamping, yelling dancers. The next moment the man who held her went staggering across the room from a neatly planted blow on the jaw, knocking down whirling couples as he went. Valancy felt her arm grasped.”

Look, I am not normally a fan of male love interest saving the main character from sexual assault and this becoming a bonding moment in their romance. I am not necessarily a “fan” either in this case, but the surrounding context of Valancy’s broader excessive freedom arc and Cissy’s previous warning make it okay for me.

“And yet she was enjoying herself—was full of a strange exultation—bumping over that rough road beside Barney Snaith. The big trees shot by them. The tall mulleins stood up along the road in stiff, orderly ranks like companies of soldiers. The thistles looked like drunken fairies or tipsy elves as their car-lights passed over them. This was the first time she had even been in a car. After all, she liked it. She was not in the least afraid, with Barney at the wheel. Her spirits rose rapidly as they tore along. She ceased to feel ashamed. She ceased to feel anything except that she was part of a comet rushing gloriously through the night of space.”

I do love this. I love this ride. Actually Chapter 21 (the next chapter) might be my favorite in the book.

“Well, what’s the matter with that?” said Valancy.

“We may have to sit here all night,” said Barney.

“I don’t mind,” said Valancy.

Barney gave a short laugh. “If you don’t, I needn’t. I haven’t any reputation to lose.”

“Nor I,” said Valancy comfortably.”

I love her so much. I love her wit. I love her bravery.

"––I want to tell you that you have acted an iniquitous part in luring this weak and unfortunate girl away from her home and friends, and––"

From the wonderful world of Jane Austen analysis, I've learned that sometimes back in Ye Olden Days, even close relatives could be referred to as friends (I think in Pride and Prejudice, someone talks about Lydia's friends when they clearly mean her relatives)... but even if that was still the case when The Blue Castle was published, friends, huh. Such hypocrisy on Uncle James's part to use that word. So very friendly you've always been towards her!

~

"Then Cousin Georgiana came—on her own initiative, for nobody would have thought it worth while to send her."

I'm really starting to get the vibe that all of the Stirling women would be so much happier if they dared to follow Valancy's example and free themselves from the clan.

~

Fun facts about the Free Methodist Church: one of their founding principles was freedom for all people from slavery, and they started ordaining women as deacons (a lower rank of clergy that's not eligible for senior leadership roles) since 1911. Wonder which one of these things weighed more heavily on Mrs. Frederick when she took to her bed after hearing the rumours of Valancy's conversion?

~

Though I obviously don't like that Valancy is in danger for a while here, I do like that she's shown to be a bit naive about certain things in life. She has lived a very sheltered life, it feels very realistic that she doesn't really understand how a drunken party might turn out to be like.

What doesn't feel realistic, to be quite honest, is Barney. He arrives just when he is needed, saves Valancy by decking a would-be molester with apparent ease, and we've already found out he's a perfect gentleman who never forgets to bring oranges to a dying woman, an adventurer, and also a friend to all animals. Feels a bit Gary Stu-ish, dare I say?

But then again, I guess there are the rumours of Barney being reputed jail-breaker, infidel, etc., etc. Perhaps the fact that he has a bad reputation and the idea that he might be hiding something is supposed to balance out the overflowing Prince Charming qualities.

~

Translation notes:

"Roaring Abel crossed the kitchen at a bound, caught him by his collar and his trousers, and hurled him through the doorway––"

In Finland, we have a word for this specific manouver: "niskaperseote" = "neck-ass-grasp". Sadly, the translator does not use it here.

Sources

“Have you no sense of shame?” demanded Uncle James. “Oh, yes. But the things I am ashamed of are not the things you are ashamed of.” Valancy proceeded to rinse her dishcloth meticulously.

I love this line

“I understand that your motive is quite—ahem—commendable.” Dr. Stalling felt that he was very broad-minded indeed—especially as in his secret soul he did not believe Valancy’s motive was commendable. He hadn’t the least idea what she was up to, but he was sure her motive was not commendable. When he could not understand a thing he straightway condemned it. Simplicity itself!"

That last line has come to mind on many occasions - it is unfortunately quite true for many people. I try to make sure it isn't true of me!

Everyone 👏 get 👏 more 👏 curious 👏 now!

“Fear is the original sin,” suddenly said a still, small voice away back—back—back of Valancy’s consciousness. “Almost all the evil in the world has its origin in the fact that some one is afraid of something.” Valancy stood up. She was still in the clutches of fear, but her soul was her own again. She would not be false to that inner voice.

Ah I love this line too!

Then Cousin Georgiana came—on her own initiative, for nobody would have thought it worth while to send her. She found Valancy alone, weeding the little vegetable garden she had planted, and she made all the platitudinous pleas she could think of. Valancy heard her patiently. Cousin Georgiana wasn’t such a bad old soul.

I'm rather fond of Cousin Georgiana

Mrs. Frederick wept. It would really have been so much easier to bear if Valancy had died. She could have worn mourning then.