crowbrained.

As a former music teacher, I can also say that "learn the fundamentals first" is the death knell for a vast percentage of beginners, especially adult learners.

I've run into this with drawing several times, where some well-meaning artist has lectured me on needing to study anatomy properly or not use shortcuts like CSP brushes. And oh, believe me, I know. I know exactly how to learn an artistic discipline in a structured way. I just...don't want to!

The thing is, I'm not aiming to be a professional artist. I want to draw my gay little anime guys. I would undoubtedly improve at art much faster if I approached every gay little anime guy drawing as a study exercise. But I would also have quit drawing a decade ago if I couldn't just let myself enjoy drawing imperfect fucked-up little guys with whatever shortcuts I needed to body myself across the finish line.

With my adult piano students, my approach was always "What's your goal?" If their goal was to learn exactly one Elton John songbook to play at parties, then...that's what we did. We'd put tape on the keys to label the notes, and just fuckin go for it. Learning exactly one Elton John songbook is a good and noble musical goal, full stop.

Some of my students needed and enjoyed a more structured approach to learning; if they wanted to be able to play classical music, then yes, scales were going to have to enter the equation at some point. And yet others would learn the Elton John songbook, catch their white whale, and realize they wanted to explore more of the ocean. The scales were still there for them to learn!

Often the choice isn't between "learn art well" and "learn art imperfectly" - the choice is between "learn art imperfectly" and "don't do art at all." To which I say, learn imperfectly! Or, what the hell, don't 'learn' art. Just do, and enjoy the doing of it.

because this happens CONSTANTLY.

in soc ch19, he and nina have barely survived the shipwreck. he still believes she’s his enemy. he’s injured, freezing, exhausted and he actually starts walking away from her when he realizes she might simply lie down on that beach and never get back up but then he turns around. because she saved his life and whatever he thinks of her, that means he owes her something. even better, when she looks at him with the exact same resentment at needing his help, he recognizes himself in it. he knows she doesn’t want to owe him either, so he makes the decision for her, pulls her up and they limp away together.

then there is kaz in soc ch40, he nearly drowns and matthias is the one dragging his unconscious body out of the water. he flips him over and immediately starts doing cpr while going, “I. Should. Let. You. Die.” which is already hysterical because MATTHIAS, DEAREST, YOU’RE JUST MAKING SURE HE DOESN’T.

and the second kaz is awake and breathing again, matthias goes right back to being angry with him. “you almost drowned. you should have drowned and you don’t deserve miracles, asshole. you desecrated the sacred ash.”

YOU HAD YOUR CHANCE???? you dragged him out of the water and helped resuscitate him. because, of course, kaz deserves to drown philosophically. the moment kaz begins drowning in practice, matthias is the emergency medical service.

aand soc ch41 is where this whole thing becomes one of the things i love most about him. nina is tearing through the drüskelle with parem. matthias watches boys he knew twitching and bleeding and he doesn’t decide they’re innocent people. the narration explicitly says, “They were monsters, he knew it.” he knows what they have done. he knows what they would do to nina. he knows what they would do to him now. he still looks at them and sees boys who were taught the same hatred and fear that he was.

so he asks nina to stop. and nina is the one who reminds him: “You know they would not offer you mercy, Matthias.”

and his answer is, “I know. But let them live in shame instead.”

that line gets me because there is no expectation of reciprocity there. he’s not sparing them because he thinks they would spare him. nina literally makes sure he understands that they WOULDN’T and he agrees with her. he still doesn’t want them dead.

then somehow lb makes this even worse five minutes later with brum. brum sees that matthias has betrayed him and shoots him, in the chest. if nina hadn’t taken parem and altered matthias’s body, matthias would be dead right there. then nina turns that same power on brum and what does matthias do?

“He’ll live?”

THAT’S HIS QUESTION. this man who groomed him, lied to him, used him and has just attempted to kill him is bleeding from his ears and matthias’s immediate concern is making sure nina hasn’t killed him. he doesn’t even sit there thinking about how brum just shot him. there is no satisfaction that the man who tried to murder him is suffering. he just wants confirmation that he’s going to survive.

and i think this is why reducing matthias’s development to “he learns grisha are people” misses something i really love about him.

nina (and jesper, and even kuwei) changes what he understands about grisha, about the drüskelle, about fjerda and about everything he had been taught. but they don’t manufacture his capacity for mercy from nothing. that instinct is already there. what changes is who he allows himself to extend it to. and his mercy is never the same thing as forgiveness.

he can think you’re a monster and ask that you live. he can know you would kill him and ask that you live. he can be actively furious with you while dragging your unconscious ass out of the water. matthias helvar’s moral position is that he reserves the right to hate you very much but you’re going to have to remain alive for him to do it.

also also also, if you want to extend this pattern all the way to the end, there is joran. matthias doesn’t tell nina or inej who shot him. even in his final moments, he chooses to protect his murderer. and i think matthias has always had an unusually strong awareness of the actual harm he is capable of causing. in soc ch35, when he finally understands what separates him from brum, he thinks,

“One of the things he’d respected most in his mentor was his mercilessness, his willingness to do hard things for the sake of the cause. But Brum had taken pleasure in what he’d done to these Grisha, what he would have gladly done to Nina and Jesper. Maybe the hard things had never been difficult for Brum the way they’d been for Matthias.”