@ce

Transgender community, please please please do NOT use this product! It will kill you if used, please do not use it whatsoever.

But what will take place tomorrow is truly, tangibly, a matter of life or death. The presidentials second stage sees the first stage winner, a hawk, corrupt lawyer who's been in charge of defending far-right paramilitaries, Catholic church pedophiles, and the biggest pyramid scheme fraudster in our history, along with having actively helped coordinating paramilitary operations to further the historical persecution of anybody from the Colombian Left even as mild as social democrats along with rampant land dispossession driving forcible displacement, having sworn to diminish state resources and operational scale by deleting entire ministries and offices around social funding to "optimise" the public treasury (what Milei, Noboa, Kast, and Paz have done in Argentina, Ecuador, Chile, and Bolivia) and who literally actively threatens to eviscerate everybody on the Colombian Left and anybody disagreeing with it going as far as to expressly state he intends to do here what Netanyahu has in Palestine and Lebanon as he admittedly identifies as an Islamophobe, having received full sponsoring to do so by Trump's government; against a social democrat human rights lawyer who has dedicated his entire career to defend the very people targeted and affected by everything the former has been involved in, who led a historical case against a former president who's the central figure in contemporary far-right politics in the country and extractivistic coke paste trafficking all across Latin America (case during which the country's major judiciary proved said human rights lawyer right). The human rights lawyer's father, one of the very few actual Communist congressmen we've ever had, was murdered by paramilitaries on the order of the national army leading ranks back then after years of having been forced into exile with his son and wife because of having been made into military targets precisely because of his partisan and militant persuasion.

I've made my thoughts on liberal democracy very clear in this site as a fellow Communist, I hate that liberal democracy has led us to this once again. But if you pray and believe to any degree in the divine, please, please, pray that the latter of the aforementioned ends up winning these elections. We've deployed just about any material resource we've come along with to support and promote his campaign because it will truly make a different between going back to be ruled by systemic state terrorism as we were for decades; or continuing social and labour reforms, institutional support for the proletariat (including dispossessed peasants forced into proletarisation), historically neglected victims of misogyny, femicide, queerphobia and transphobia, and the diplomatic policies through which we've come to support Palestinians as part of The Hague Group.

silhouette in the field

https://archiveofourown.org/works/74743451

These are the two stories I wrote for Yuletide: "Mothers of the Brazen Spear" - the title being a quote from Euripides' play "The Trojan Women", on which it is based - and "Courting the Chamberlain", which is both fanfiction based on the novel "Sieben Jahre" by Tanja Kinkel and 18th century RPF.

"Mothers of the Brazen Spear": my recipient had asked something Andromache-centric which lets her interact with the women she doesn't interact with in the play, Polyxena and Cassandra. (They all interact with Hecuba, of course, which is why Hecuba doesn't show up in my story.) I added Helen, and tried for something that does the heartrendering tone of the play justice but also offers at least a bit of hope for Andromache.

Medea Victoris

This is a really-really old-old thing, and it’s not even finished (I’m not going to finish it)

It was supposed to include Paris, Troy, and all that

by the way, just so everyone knows what not to do, shift+r reblogs a post instantly

Holy shit in the background, his friend is not just describing the necessity of war or whatever, but the idea that the people they are fighting aren't even a sentient race, so everything is totally fine and justified and man who even cares?

And they aren't even paying attention! They're eating what looks to be a quiche or something very similar and marveling at how delicious it is which tells us how much this is just the background of their day to day lives. It doesn't even register with them! Which is a really interesting way to insert this, as a casual breeze-by so we get an idea of how callous this world can be.

Women do this too. Aggression isn't a gender expression. this is not an 'exclusively male' behaviour. You're just sexist. Gender essentialism is a harmful bias; and it obscures real life problems.

My mother slammed a wooden spoon on the counter so hard- it broke in 2- the blowl flew out of the kitchen and broke the glass in the china cabinet. That spoon was a threat to me, specifically, because I 'was on her last nerve'. She was showing me what she wanted to do to me. Because "I was asking for it".

Doors slammed! or pounded on. or locked. objects thrown. my belongings put in the garbage.

anyway, if you read this:

Bullying and on-line abuse is certainly not a gendered behaviour either!

Snail crossing

There has been a half-complete version of post on my Dreamwidth journal under a “Private” filter (my eyes only) here since 9 December, 2018, just waiting for me to get the energy and mental focus to write an essay outlining all the textual evidence in Act 4, scene 1 (Ophelia’s “madness” scene). But at this point, I don’t think the required energy for that will ever come – at least, not for the long essay format.   So I’m just going to post my conspiracy theory Thesis Statement here:

Ophelia did not commit suicide – she was murdered. By Queen Gertrude (probably).

Just imagine how classroom discussions, and essays in literary academic journals would go if it were read that Ophelia did not break under the weight of a cruel world, but instead had to be eliminated because she knew too much, and was on the brink of inciting a rebellion against King Claudius (Yes, that’s actually alluded to in the text).

QUEEN GERTRUDE:  I will not speak with her. Gentleman:  She is importunate, indeed distract:    Her mood will needs be pitied. QUEEN GERTRUDE:  What would she have? Gentleman:  She speaks much of her father; says she hears    There’s tricks i’ the world; and hems, and beats her heart;    Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt,    That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing,    Yet the unshaped use of it doth move    The hearers to collection; they aim at it,    And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts;    Which, as her winks, and nods, and gestures    yield them,    Indeed would make one think there might be thought,    Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.

A bit later, Ophelia comes in, singing. Not of flowers, yet, but alternating between a mourning song, and a very bawdy song that a young noble lady of sixteen years should not be singing in public, just in time for Claudius to hear her.

KING CLAUDIUS:  Conceit upon her father.

OPHELIA:   Pray you, let’s have no words of this; but when they    ask you what it means, say you this: [translation: You want to know what it means? I’ll tell you what it means!]

   Sings    To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,    All in the morning betime,    And I a maid at your window,    To be your Valentine.    Then up he rose, and donn’d his clothes,    And dupp’d the chamber-door;    Let in the maid, that out a maid    Never departed more. KING CLAUDIUS:  Pretty Ophelia! OPHELIA:  Indeed, la, without an oath, I’ll make an end on’t: [Let me finish!]    Sings    By Gis and by Saint Charity,    Alack, and fie for shame!    Young men will do’t, if they come to’t;    By cock, they are to blame.    Quoth she, before you tumbled me,    You promised me to wed.    So would I ha’ done, by yonder sun,    An thou hadst not come to my bed.

[So here’s a song about a woman having sex out of wedlock because a guy promised to repay her… and then he reneges on his promise because she had sex with him]

And then Ophelia exits, spouting seeming madness, and Claudius says to Horatio:

Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you.

So Claudius suspects something – whether that’s a suicide watch, or to make sure she doesn’t inspire rebellion – isn’t explicitly stated in text.  But in any case,  Ophelia’s not alone.

Then, Leartes comes in, leading a mob of commoners, who  are chanting that he should be king (see the comment of Gentleman, above). And we have this exchange:

Leartes: Where is my father?

Claudius: Dead.

Gertrude: But not by him.

That, right there, is a single line of iambic pentameter. Which means that Gertrude literally does not skip a beat to defend Claudius before thinking of protecting her own son.

And now Ophelia comes in and sings her “mad flower song.” This Wordpress article outlines the symbolism of each flower and herb (It also spells out specific actions by Ophelia which are not spelled out in the original). The meaning flies right over our heads, but audiences of the time would have grokked it immediately; There’s “Grief” and “remembrance;” there’s also “flattery” and “deceived lovers” and an herb commonly used to induce abortions…

And the next news we hear of Ophelia is that she’s “Drowned herself.” Who delivers this news? Queen Gertrude – with an overabundance of minute detail of the scene as it happened.

Finally, there’s the fact that Ophelia was being hastily buried in the churchyard – even though that was strictly forbidden for suicides. The younger gravedigger thinks that’s because Ophelia was a privileged noblewoman, and getting special treatment. The older gravedigger reminds him (and the audience) that not all people who die by drowning are at fault…

And then I realized that Hamlet had to have the murder plot revealed to him by the ghost of his father, because he was away at school, but Ophelia was there at court, the whole time, and could have seen everything going down. But who pays attention to teenage girls hanging around the edges, or worries about what they see or don’t see, amirite?

I do think Ophelia was having a mental breakdown, triggered by grief and shock. But I think it was more of the “loss of situational awareness” and “blind to the danger” variety, instead of “no longer have the will to live” variety.

Thank you.

And then there are these lines from Queen Gertrude, after she agrees to talk with Ophelia, and Horatio exits to go fetch her:

To my sick soul, as sin’s true nature is, Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss: So full of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.

I’ve always liked that line about spilling something because you’re trying too hard not to (because RELATABLE). But I only just now realized that Shakespeare was putting underlines and circles and arrows around the whole issue of the queen’s quilt (and active role in the whole scheme with Claudius), by making those lines a pair of rhyming couplets, when  nothing else in that scene rhymes.

I think the common interpretation of Ophelia has been handed down to us by literary critics and theater directors, who have all been men, and idealized the manic pixie dream gilrl, so they’ve always cast Ophelia as the tragic and doomed version of that.

Finally, there’s the fact that Ophelia was being hastily buried in the churchyard – even though that was strictly forbidden for suicides. The younger gravedigger thinks that’s because Ophelia was a privileged noblewoman, and getting special treatment. The older gravedigger reminds him (and the audience) that not all people who die by drowning are at fault… 

I went back and reread that bit (which really should be included in the list of evidence that Hamlet is a black comedy – in the script, the two gravediggers are named “First Clown” and “Second Clown.”

Anyway, it’s the elder gravedigger who argues that Ophelia committed suicide, but in the process, reminds the audience that it shouldn’t be counted as such. I’ll just quote that bit:

Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here stands the man; good; if the man go to this water, and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he goes,–mark you that; but if the water come to him and drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life.

So, he’s arguing that because Ophelia went into the water, she must have committed suicide – but we, in the audience, who’ve just witnessed Ophelia’s madness just a few scenes earlier (even ignoring Queen Gertrude’s suspicious behavior), know that Ophelia did not “Wittingly” go into the water, because she was (at the very least) so lost in madness that she fell in accidentally.

(Instead, I opted to post something new, to put fresh thoughts in my brain)

I would suggest Ophelia’s murder didn’t start with the drowning, and that it wasn’t even entirely related to Laertes.

So first, we have her song about sex out of wedlock. It’s worth noting that much earlier in the play, when she and Laertes speak right before the “to thine own self be true” speech, there are hints that she herself is already “a maid no more,” at Hamlet’s hand. Now keep in mind the rest of the play takes place over the course of, at a minimum, several months, and:

If that’s true, and if perhaps Ophelia has a Little Problem, that little problem–legitimate or not–is heir to the throne.

So if it gets out that Claudius might have been responsible for the death of Hamlet, Sr–and Hamlet, Jr gives us plenty of reasons to be suspicious even before the ghost appears–then he’s almost certainly going to die at the hands of a mob. In which case Hamlet would ascend to the throne, but–oh, what’s this? Hamlet’s dead? Well, then the next in line is–

–a commoner’s child.

Yikes.

So Gertrude offers Ophelia some help with her Little Problem. All of the plants mentioned in the “mad flower song” could be used, in conjunction with each other, as abortifacients, but there’s one very important thing to note about them:

They have to be very, very precisely measured. Or they can cause sudden severe mood swings, hemorrhaging, excessive bleeding, disorientation, lack of focus, muscle weakness, difficulty breathing, unconsciousness, and death.

#Personally, I’d be more willing to bet on Claudius poisoning her with Gertude’s help. Once you’ve poisoned the king, one peasant girl isn’t much of a stretch. I also think the play works without Ophelia being pregnant; a Lot of plants can be used as abortifacients, and the other flower symbolism is too pointed to be accidental. She could have been poisoned for being too close to Hamlet without a specific fear of an heir […] #Also, i have long held that either Gertrude pushed Ophelia in the stream for insulting her or faked Ophelia’s death to get her the hell out. #Depends on how I’m feeling on the day to day. but that speech is far too detailed for Gertrude not to be involved somehow.

First off, I want to clear something up: Ophelia was no “commoner” or “peasant girl,” but a highborn (albeit young) noblewoman, with free reign to wander the royal palace as she pleased.

That’s part of the younger gravedigger’s argument as to why she (who supposedly committed suicide) was allowed to be buried in the churchyard; both gravediggers assume this is a case of unfair class privilege that gives the noble classes a free ticket to Heaven when a commoner would be sent to Hell without a second thought.

Anyway, back to the “Flower Speech”: When I was first rereading that scene after my “Oh, holy Crap!” moment, I thought Ophelia’s inclusion of abortifacients in her ‘bouquet’ was as a warning to Gertrude.

The very opening lines of the scene are an unnamed Gentleman warning Gertrude that it’s Ophelia who is encouraging the common people to fight for her brother (Leartes) to usurp Claudius, and take the throne.

If Leartes succeeds in his rebellion (as Ophelia probably assumes he will [judging by what I was like as a 17-19 year old]), and she gives birth out of wedlock, well, the new king has a bastard for a nephew. Nothing to boast about. But nothing to kill for, either; Gertrude and Claudius may be nervous about any baby Ophelia may be carrying, but from Ophelia’s P.O.V., she has little motivation to seek help with an abortion.

But if Gertrude gives birth a little too soon after her wedding, that would be proof that she and Claudius were having sex before the murder in the garden, and thus, provide evidence that she had a hand in it.

Getting rid of Ophelia, while framing her death as “suicide by madness” does two things: It silences a provocateur to the rebellion, and also taints its legitimacy, if the most popular voice of the revolution among the common people turned out to be “Not quite Right in the Head (and a blasphemer, too boot).”

Gertrude dying by the poisoned wine meant for Hamlet is more Karmic Justice than a tragic accidental death (that spurs Claudius to suicide).

Ophelia was picking flowers for a flower crown (Gertrude lists the flowers, and additionally doesn’t mention the “grosser name” that shepherds give the long purples/dead man’s fingers. She’s almost certainly eliding a name that evokes dicks, which could absolutely support some of the ‘linking Ophelia and/or Gertrude to illicit sex’ reads.)

Ophelia falls in the river.

Ophelia floats in the river “mermaid like” for a while, long enough to sing “snatches of old tunes.”

Ophelia’s clothes become muddy and waterlogged, and drag her beneath the water until she drowns.