#blue castle

Let me present to you ✨THE BLUE CASTLE: Graphic Novel - Volume I✨

This cover is just screming to me. To look away from it. But I just can't. Sometimes I'm alured by this kind of shit. I need to dig deeper. Come with me on this spectacular journey.

We''ll see about that. This rich imagery and cinematic depth.

Valancy's room is such a compendium of obsolete Victorian trends, banished upstairs to a space nobody cared about.

Top left: The very engraving of Queen Louise of Prussia! As a beautiful 17-year-old, Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz enchanted the future King Frederick William III of Prussia. By all accounts, Louise was a paradigm of feminine virtues, while also serving as her husband's chief political advisor.

Top right: A sample of yellow floor paint, used to cover and seal pine floors. Linseed oil and ochre paint formed a durable, washable finish. Softwood floors upstairs are not a surprise for a respectable but not wealthy family like Valancy's.

Bottom: 1875 "Moy" burgundy wallpaper; Victorian shell box; Victorian beaded pincushion. Many of us today would probably find these quaint and charming, but from about 1910 into the mid-1970s, they would have been seen as intensely outdated and shoddy.

Here, for contrast, is a light, cheerful, up-to-date 1920s bedroom, courtesy of Armstrong Linoleum. I've seen similar looks promoted as early as 1906.

And here...

an old chromo of a puppy sitting on a rainy doorstep. That picture always made Valancy unhappy. That forlorn little dog crouched on the doorstep in the driving rain! Why didn’t some one open the door and let him in?

...is a probable inspiration for that chromo, since this painting was widely reproduced. Note the title, as it's on-theme for Valancy.

Sir Edwin Henry Landseer, There's No Place Like Home, 1842.

I’ve finished the novel. Its ending is dreamlike, almost fairy-tale perfect, yet incomplete in my eyes. The parallel with Anna Karenina strikes me: if a woman rests her self-awakening upon another person, her lover, that foundation will never endure.

If another person lights up Valancy as the sun, sooner or later she will recognize others are only moons borrowing radiance. She is the sun herself. Only she possesses the strength to escape her suffering and confinement, and craft a bright new life.

Previous |

So we've come to the end of what I've decided is Part 2! I'll be taking a couple months to build up a buffer of pages going into Part 3, especially because since starting this project, a lot of my circumstances have changed - mainly that I'm working full time again and I don't have as much time to dedicate to this project as I used to have. That said - this puts us past the halfway point of this project!

Regardless, I'll be back as soon as I can be. I want to finish this project before moving onto new projects, so don't worry, this won't be left unfinished!

To everyone who's commented/liked/reblogged: thank you so so much! It's really really helpful and encouraging to see people respond positively to this project, especially on days when I'm particularly frustrated.

Semifinal

Lucy Maud Montgomery is better known for Anne of Green Gables

Douglas Adams is better known for The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Not many people can have Emily's talent, Pat's sensitivity, Anne's charm, Rilla's courage or Kilmeny's beauty.

But many people, just as Valancy:

have insecurities,

go through a time when they feel unloved and unwanted,

are afraid to offend someone,

find it difficult to voice their opinions,

rely on their sense of humour to survive,

have their own "blue castle",

hope for a "dustpile of their own".

Valancy is just a girl. A woman with insecurities, hopes and dreams.

She teaches us that there is a courage in each one of us, even though sometimes we cannot find it.

She teaches us it is possible to find friendship, love and happiness in every situation.