lizard

Classical Literature / Poetry / Theater

Poetry of S'task: While S'task wrote in Vulcan, he is also one of the founding members of the Rihannsu movement, a famed poet, and one of the architects of the Imperial Rihannsu language. So I find it very likely that his poetry has all been translated into Romulan and is taught as classical literature. It's short, concise, and preserves old Vulcan forms which have a lot in common with haiku or englynion. This one comes from both the Rihannsu series and Vulcan's Soul.

The Il'qoant Tel'ant: The 'Book of Uncoverings' is the Romulan sacred text, including the story of Ganmadan and other tales of the many gods, monsters, demons, and legendary figures of Romulan mythology. Since most of the oldest ones have Vulcan names, I assume it dates back to Vulcan originally. Source for this is Michael Chabon's Substack, where he put up the chapter about Ganmadan. Listing out all the gods and myths would take a while, so if anyone wants me to do a Romulan mythology follow-up post let me know.

The Tel'laa'vor and the Romul'aad: This is from the Last Unicorn Games sourcebook The Way of D'era. These are long, classic poems focused on telling the history of the Romulan people, the Sundering, the exile and exodus fleet, the early days of Romulus, etc. Equivalent to something like the Iliad, Odyssey, or Aeneid. They form the backbone of classical Romulan literature and theater. The Tel'laa'vor is the poem, accompanied by string instruments like the ryill (lyre) and sirune (angular harp), and the Romul'aad is the play version. The performance takes days and is done on cultural holidays.

Amarcan's 'Axioms': A classical work of military literature, this book is used in officer training at the Romulan Imperial War College / Military Rhetor of the Romulan Star Empire. Context clues suggest it is basically The Art of War but for Romulans. Source: various novels including Vulcan's Heart and the ENT Romulan-Earth War books.

'The Song of the Sun': From the Rihannsu books, this is a long poem which is well-known enough to feature in other forms of artwork (it's engraved into a table in the book). You can read some of it here. The impression I get is that it's a more modern poem but still quite famous and in an older style of poetry. IIRC the author's name is mentioned, but I gave up after flipping through my book too long.

'Vehe'rr Ihlan' by tr'Ehhelih: This classical work of philosophy by tr'Ehhelih becomes banned media in the modern Empire, but is smuggled around in the right circles. It calls society out or leaving Vulcan with the goal of a peaceful way of life only to fall immediately to factional violence again and calls for pacifism and conscientious objection to military service. You can guess why it was banned. It translates to 'The Non-Apology' and this is fascinating to me because it's an instance where both old Romulan and new Romulan agree, since 'veherr' is how Elnor apologizes on-screen in PIC. (We also get 'udt' for 'what' and if I keep going on this I'll get off-topic...)

'Taer'thaiemenh' by V. Raiuhes Ahaefvtheh: This is that poem you see quoted all the time in Romulan fan-circles. It starts out the Rihannsu series as a pre-title page, and is about the central ethic of Romulan virtue ethics: mnhei'sahe. You can read it here.

'Contemplations' by tr'Hrmaellieh: Another poem from the Rihannsu books, but this one has only one line quoted. Context makes it seem like it's in the style of Roman philosophical literature, something like Meditations but with more of a Pythagorean vibe.

'Warrior's Dawn' by Dezrai: Another poem with only one line to speak of, from Death in Winter. Context clues make me think this is in that briefer Vulcan-originating style that S'task and Ahaefvtheh's poems are, but there's not enough there to know for sure.

Classical Theater: Michael Chabon talks about Romulan theater on his Substack in ways that make it really, really clear that it is based on Japanese theater. The classical style has all actors wearing masks and layered costumes like in Noh but with the elaborate plotlines, setpieces, and special effects innovations you get in Kabuki. Info about the Romul'aad in The Way of D'era says that they also use a Greek chorus style heater technique. Stories mostly revolve around Romulan mythology and history, with major plot twists revolving around hayagawari-style on-stage costume changes. A common motif is using this technique to reveal that someone was a god in disguise, but I imagine it also extends to other types of character changes, like for example having someone move from 'hero' robes to 'villain' robes to indicate betrayals, things like that. One aspect of Romulan hayagawari is to leave it ambiguous if the "final" mask is in fact really the final mask. According to Michael Chabon, classical theater's motifs are closely aligned with queerness and genderfluidity in Romulan society. I have a lot of headcanons about this; if people want me to make a post about genres/stock character archetypes please let me know and I will 100% do that.

Revenge Plays: Once again, the source is Michael Chabon's Substack. This is an offshoot of Romulan theater enjoyed by the masses. It seems to flip the script on the inspirations, with Noh-style small, intimate staging and Kabuki-style maskless costuming. From context clues plots seem to be basically identical to kyōgen and sewamono, following lower-class people in soap opera style plots, which might be subversive compared to the propagandistic classical plays. Like classical theater, it can involve crossdressing actors. This is the genre of theater that Narek ran away to join a theater troupe to do in his early adulthood in Michael Chabon's backstory for him! I also have a lot of headcanons about this, ask if you want me to post.

Vulcan Erotica: I cannot remember which book this is, but it's a style that is well-known enough on Romulus to end up in I-want-to-say Charvanek's internal dialogue, so probably Vulcan's Heart or Vulcan's Soul. In the genre, the female lead negotiates with her lover's father for increasingly luxurious gifts, like silks, incense, etc. There are also hints of another genre centered around the Unbonded priestesses of Seleya who assist unmated or widowed Vulcans during pon farr, for uh... obvious reasons... I don't think I need to explain this one.

Vulcan Sci-Fi: Okay I'm not 100% sure if this would survive to Romulus, but in Spock's World there is a Vulcan tradition of science fiction literature before they get outside Vulcan space for real. It's possible this survives on Romulus, but I could also see them discarding it because, well, they were the first to go out there for real.

Modern Literature / Poetry / Theater / Holos

Revlav: A rare canon Romulan literature thing! The revlav is a highly formal Romulan poetry style consisting of (IIRC) five words or syllables per line, five lines per stanza, five stanzas per poem. It is often a riddle, and the plot of Discovery S5 revolves around one. While this is technically a traditional poetry form, I'm putting it into modern because IMO the highly structured format (good for improv) and riddles (good for games) implies it's a product of the Romulan trivia-game S'darha and thus a post-exodus innovation.

Four Moons Rising Poetry: Four Moons Rising is a Romulan holiday that's implied to be equivalent to the real-life Lunar New Year. One of the traditions on the holiday is writing poetry celebrating the night sky, which I imagine get published often enough to be its own genre of modern poetry. Source on this one is Vulcan's Soul.

Colony Collapse Disaster Horror: There are, according to The Last Best Hope, two genres of Romulan horror film. In the first type, a new space colony encounters indigenous life who wipe the colony out, pretty obvious what kind of anti-alien propaganda this is selling. In the second, more popular, type, the new colony collapses over generations due to climate disaster, underestimating the alien and unfamiliar biome, with the planet itself as the hostile alien entity. The function of dropping this detail is to parallel what's happening with the solar radiation fucking up Romulus immediately pre-supernova with the genre. IMO, paired with the Rihannsu books' lore about how Ship-Clans are treated and Vulcan's Soul's "space is a desert" stuff, the propaganda here is a three'fer: make the Imperial core scared of aliens, suspicious of clans who prefer to settle on alien worlds, and also chest-beat about Romulans conquering the last desert.

Revenge Soaps: Another one I've seen is an off-hand mention of "revenge soaps" which I can only imagine is the soap opera version of Michael Chabon's low-brow revenge theater plays. So, uh, Romulans like soap operas, confirmed. I cannot remember which book but I'm pretty sure this one is also in The Last Best Hope. I like to think there is at least one government-sponsored soap that has been going for a few centuries without interruption and has become a cultural force.

Detective Literature: I headcanon that Romulans go absolutely obsessive over detective stories and mystery thrillers. But I also have this vague, distant memory of reading a book where my headcanon got confirmed, with Tal Shiar protagonists being a common trope. I can't remember if this is legit or not. But IMO it's a solid headcanon and I'd be surprised if it is not canon in some way shape or form.

T'Eleijha the Raven: This isn't modern, since it's a folk-tale, but like all good folk-heroes, there are dozens of stories about this character. They are typical trickster-stories in the vein of Raven, Coyote, etc. and I feel like it's safe to assume there's a thriving genre of children's media about them. Source for this one is the Rihannsu series, again.

Monan the Seer: Another one in the folk-tale genre that I assume is a common character for books, film, etc. adaptations. Monan is a seer with a great fortune and a lizard familiar. His legendary fortune is sought after by robbers, whom the tiny lizard kills and almost dies in the process. It's a boy and his dog, except it's Romulan Merlin and a probably venomous baby dragon familiar. 10/10 love him. Source is the FASA RPG Romulan ship recognition manual sourcebook.

Trillpas-and-Telepathy: Okay hear me out on this because this is a stretch… but it's a canon-supported stretch. In Spock's World we see there's a genre of Vulcan virtual reality gaming that is essentially a sword-and-sorcery MMO set on ancient Vulcan. Since the Rihannsu books make a huge deal about how the Vulcan equivalent of the internet played a huge role in early Romulan society, I'm assuming they took this on the exile with them. The Last Unicorn RPG sourcebooks use the tongue-in-cheek name "trillpas-and-telepathy" to refer to this genre when setting campaigns on old Vulcan and I've just decided it's what I'm calling it in-universe too. Anyway, the reason it's on this list is in STO we pass some Romulan NPCs talking about their Vulcan arena holodeck game, and it does sound like holodeck adventures set on ancient Vulcan is a thing Romulans do. So yeah, Romulan xianxia using old Vulcan as the setting.

Porn: Right, remember the Vulcan love poetry? Well, they also just have completely typical porn. Source: In Vulcan's Heart a bunch of rebel teenagers hack a government broadcast to put porn on everyone's holocasters instead. The actual rebellion (plus Spock) then track the teens down to get them to put their guy, Narviat, on air illegally. Please imagine a dignified military man with Imperial heritage staring into the middle distance as scraggly teens in military surplus excitedly yell slang at him because that is exactly how this scene goes. 10/10 beta canon moment, I love them so much.

Have my no-evidence headcanon genres as a treat:

Basically, from what I am understanding as a poet, someone who enjoys detective and sci-fi Lit and History - Is I would make it on Romulus 😂😂😂!

I mean, It kind of works within their culture of mind games and mystery!

But I also learnt new things too and that is always a good thing - Thank you @aehallhyon !

From one romulan fan to another!

@bigblissandlove1 @alpenromulanerin -

Warning: some stuff maybe headcanon, but it works!

Jadzia speedpaint

This makes majoring in graphic design worth it

For the record, I didn't even like this episode that much. I just saw a reference on Pinterest I thought was perfect for it. The ref is down below

@acarefreewind

Okey