out of the abundance of the heart

Victorian publishers' bookbindings - from "a selection of gold-blocked publishers' cloth bookbindings of the 19th and early 20th" (National Library NZ on The Commons)

Literature Moodboards // Persuasion by Jane Austen

remember that these novels were published in the 19th century. and that some of the things that were written in these books may seem trivial to us today but would have absolutely fucking shook readers in the victorian era

like,,,,,elizabeth rejecting mr collins because she doesn’t love him even though it would have been considered her duty in her family to marry him? or jane eyre not agreeing to marry mr rochester unless it was on her own terms? hell even anne brontë wrote a lesser known novel about a wife leaving her abusive husband with her five year old son to live a better life?? do y’all realize how unheard of that would be in the 1800′s?? where women were considered more of a commodity than actual human beings??

This book has reached its recipient, so I can share pictures now! This is Deadset by @pbaintthetb, an amazing Nie Huaisang fic in which Nie Huaisang is murdered and becomes a tgcf-style ghost.

I did a kintsugi-look binding for a different calamity au (ironically, one in which Jin Guangyao was the ghost) but spoilers, this was the fic that I first thought of using it for. And while my first attempt was just a surface design on the cover, I built this into the structure of the book itself. The cover structure is inspired by Ben Elbel's "pixel binding" which is a book cover made of many tiny squares; using irregular pieces here makes it not quite as flexible, but I'm still very happy with the effect.

The individual sections of the cover were glued to a thin, flexible paper, then covered with a decorative paper that I worked down into the spaces between (definitely use paste rather than pva for this). The gold is deco foil, often called toner-reactive foil but it adheres to dry pva as well, so I simply filled the channels with pva and then applied the foil using the head of a pin to apply pressure (you don't need heat when applying it to pva).

For the rounded spine, I used leather pieces so that I could still have the thickness but they would be flexible enough that I wouldn't have to sacrifice the irregular shapes.

The moral of the story is not “don’t have a revolution,” it’s that you should always be suspicious of those who promise you this utopian idea of freedom while still aiming to maintain power. The pigs never wanted to actually make everyone free, they just wanted to be the ones in charge. The novel details every small instance of the farm sliding further and further into fascism until it’s too late for anyone to do anything about it.

And 1984 doesn’t have much to do with communism at all. It’s about totalitarianism and fascism. There’s nothing pro-capitalist about the book. A totalitarian government like Big Brother’s could exist in either a capitalist or communist society. The point is the control they have over their people, and how important the flow of information is to that control.

Within positive psychology, personal strengths are defined as our built-in capacities for particular ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving (Linley, 2008).

We all possess distinct character strengths that are associated with the 6 virtues of positive psychology theory (Seligman, 2002):

VIRTUES — CORE STRENGTHS

Wisdom. Creativity, Curiosity, Love of learning, Open-mindedness, Perspective

Courage. Authenticity, Bravery, Persistence, Zest

Humanity. Kindness, Love, Social intelligence

Justice. Fairness, Leadership, Teamwork

Temperance. Forgiveness, Modesty/Humility, Prudence, Self-regulation

Transcendence. Appreciation of beauty and excellence, Gratitude, Hope, Humor, Religiousness/Spirituality

Over 3 years, Peterson and Seligman (2004) explored what personal strengths might look like and came up with the above list of 24 core strengths. They referred to these as character strengths and concluded the following:

These 24 strengths are evident across human history and world cultures.

Each of the 24 strengths exists in all of us to varying degrees.

Positive psychology helps us to acknowledge that we may be stronger in some areas and weaker in others, and that’s okay. It’s what makes us all unique. The point is to identify your pattern of strengths so that you can tap into these to live a more fulfilling life.

The Wheel of Character Strengths

Researchers believe we each have all the character strengths to differing degrees, and understanding how each sits within our personal capacity allows us to respond and behave in more positive ways (Peterson & Seligman, 2004).

Learning your strengths and shortcomings can be an integral part of your personal development. One way to identify your inherent strengths is the 15-minute VIA Character Strength Identification Survey.

This Values in Action (VIA) Survey is a leading assessment to highlight an individual’s character strengths (Peterson & Seligman, 2004). It measures 24 character strengths under 6 overarching categories: wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence.

Symbols of Mental Strength

Positive psychology defines mental strength through the following attributes:

Adaptability

Endurance

Steadfastness

Dependability

Effectiveness

With personal strengths comes the balance of personal weaknesses, and the same is true with mental strength. If not practiced in alignment with personal strengths or without purpose, mental strength may change into its negative counterpart:

Adaptability can become fickleness.

Endurance may lead to martyrdom or victimization.

Steadfastness can turn to inflexibility.

Dependability can become predictability.

Effectiveness may lead to laziness or taking shortcuts.

Being aware of this can help you to adjust where you notice an imbalance. Just as you might go to the gym to build physical muscle and give up bad habits to meet personal fitness goals, you can develop better mental strength through the right mix of behaviors and thoughts (Morin, 2017).

Podfic is a recording of your story by a fan. Sometimes this may include additional sound effects, sometimes other podficcers reading parts of your story. It's ultimately an expression of love for a piece of work that has touched another fan, who simply wants to munch on your words like Cookie Monster.

How can I put my hand up for podfic? I know no podficcers!

It's pretty easy. Ever heard of a permission statement (or "a blanket permission statement")? These are often found on AO3 profiles, and they permit others to interact with your work by reproducing a piece of creative fanwork from it. (This includes remixes, art, etc., but I'm here to talk to you about podfic.) 

A blanket permission statement grants permission to create fanworks from your work. Regarding podficcers, having one of these means that if someone's interested in recording your work, they have your permission and don't need to ask!

But why wouldn't they ask?

Despite the fact that podficcers put themselves out there in the same way as writers do, they're actually quite shy! (Aren't some of us writers?) To help mollify the anxiety of podficcers who are too shy to ask for permission, a blanket permission statement simply erases that step and grants permission.

But how do I know if a podfic is made of my work?

Podficcers usually link the fic as an "inspired by" piece of work, and you get a notification that someone is requesting approval to link a fanwork to yours. If you've received podfic in the past and saw that your work was linked as "inspired by", but never got the email, check your AO3 account's email. You might need to update that!

But I'm a creator of a small fandom/I only have a small number of works. How can podficcers find me?

Fanwork Permission Statements (fpslist.org) is a fan-run website that includes a database of authors who grant permission for podfic. This is sorted by fandoms and authors/artists.

If you can't find yourself on the database, consider making an account or contacting the site admins to have yourself added (but make sure you have a blanket permission statement somewhere they can link to first!). Podficcers use this database to search for authors and works to engage with and potentially podfic, so it's very useful to put yourself on it! It might generate some traffic for you!

There's a really cool script that someone created that allows podficcers to view who has a blanket permission statement for podfic at a first glance while browsing AO3. It highlights your username in green. This is a very, very useful tool, and isn't made possible without authors adding blanket permission statements to their profiles (and also applying to be in the database so the admins don't miss including you). It's helped me find podfic-friendly authors, and I know it's assisted others interested in engaging in works from podfic-friendly creators, too. It's worth adding yourself!

What do I have to say?

It's as simple as: "I grant permission for podfic of my work. Please link back to the original work so I can approve the association and check it out!" (You can use this statement to opt into translations, remixes, art, etc. Check out some of the authors on the database for some ideas!)

This is also a great opportunity to phonetically write out how your username is pronounced, if you feel your username is one that may be easily misinterpreted!

Someone's made a podfic of my work! Now what?

Go listen and comment! Podfic is a labour of love, and isn't one of the most high traffic fan labours. Podficcers put a lot of effort into their works, so go have a listen and comment — all you have to do is say you enjoyed it.

And if you feel shy (I was in that place, too, trust me, hearing my words read aloud by a real life person was super intimidating), remember that the podficcer wouldn't have made a podfic of your work if they didn't think it was out of this world awesome. Don't let imposter syndrome, self-doubt, or the little negative voice in your head tell you anything negative. This is an absolutely awesome thing to have happen, and, honestly, I've learned a lot about my writing and storytelling by listening to someone who doesn't exist in my head (how very fortunate for them!) read my words aloud. 

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