Yuletide Letter 2011
Nov. 18th, 2011 02:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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Dear Yuletide author,
Thank you so much for signing up for Yuletide this year! It's a big commitment during the holiday season, especially if you're still in school as the semester ends. So thank you for making the time and brain commitment to bring small fandom joy to someone you don't even know.
Just a quick note on my dislikes before I dive into what I love about my fandoms: I really dislike rape/dub con/non con and incest in the things I read. I know that these are important issues that people can deal with respectfully and meaningfully in their fiction, but I have difficulty approaching these in fictional works in a way that doesn't leave me upset, so I would appreciate it if what you wrote didn't include these topics.
I'd also appreciate it if what you wrote wasn't smut. I feel weird asking a stranger to write porn for me -- like I've let someone borrow my underwear. Mature issues and language are fine, just not explicit sex scenes. And non-explicit sex scenes are probably OK, as long as there's story surrounding it. No porn without plot, OK?
I also really prefer gen fic and non-explicit het fic for the most part (let's give it a PG-13 rating or so). I do have very few slash 'ships I like, but they aren't in any of the fandoms I nominated. I am mostly not a big fan of non-canon romantic relationships.
Psmith -- PG Wodehouse
Here's what I wrote in my prompt:
I pretty much just love Wodehouse because he is so witty and his writing transcends to this level of madcap ridiculousness fairly often, like in Mike and Psmith where Mike ends up being chased by Comrade Downing and to escape him, rings the fire bell, which brings all the other boys out of the houses, and somewhere in all that mess, the dog is painted red. Or pretty much every Jeeves and Wooster story there is!
The thought of Mike and Psmith cooking Christmas dinner . . . it would be like Psmith commentating the outtakes of a Julia Child show, where she grows increasingly drunk, except without an ounce of culinary knowledge or any alcohol. Mike would be so earnest and attempting to get things done, but Psmith would be directing him from a chair with such confidence, and Mike, not knowing any better, would listen. In short, it would be AMAZING.
Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms
Here's what I wrote in my prompt:
I hope that about sums it up. This is actually what I requested last year, and I never get tired of it. If you want to see what I got last year, my gifts are right here if you want to write something fresh. If you wrote for me last year, THANK YOU AGAIN! I have re-read every one of those stories at some point in the past year and have loved them anew each time. <3 <3 <3
Really, truly, use your imagination, have fun, and I will be very happy.
Discworld -- Terry Pratchett
Here's what I wrote in the prompt:
That's pretty much it! I find the Rincewind books really hard to get into, though I do like the Luggage. Do your worst, have fun, don't be afraid to be ridiculous or silly.
Jane Eyre -- Charlotte Bronte
Here I can actually expand on my prompt.
What I love about Jane Eyre is how freaking subversive it is in comparison to most novels contemporary to it. (Of course, it's a Gothic novel, so maybe that's to be expected!) Jane isn't sweet, she's assertive, and she and Rochester clearly want each other. I know that some people don't like the 2006 TV adaptation with Toby Stephens and Ruth Wilson, but I love it. It captures all the wildness and untamed qualities of the story, without falling for false ideas about Victorian propriety. It's so easy to see those characters as victims of their own passions, against the backdrop of this tumultuous but beautiful in its extremity part of the world, which is something that's absolutely true about the book.
I also love that Jane comes back to Rochester after she's rich and doesn't rely on him to support her. Her money gives her freedom, and she comes back to him of her own free will. And Rochester realizes what a great gift this is, apart from his disability. She doesn't need him anymore, but she wants him and is determined to have him.
I think I would like it if Adèle and Rosamund find that same self-knowledge and determination. To learn defiance and ways to slip that defiance past the culture which guards their actions. Jane has done in spectacularly and largely by not playing by the rules, but I feel like Bronte lays it out that Adèle and Rosamund are much more bound by those rules in what she says about them in the book. The space they're allowed to play in is much smaller than Jane's, because they have not had to learn to stand up for themselves. They have been surrounded by people who will do it for them, and they're both affluent. But how do they form identities with so many people shaping the space they're allowed in? Can that same subversiveness of the original text be maintained in that much smaller space?
I am not too fond of St. John, though. I mostly just want him to pull the stick out of his butt and give in to the wildness all around him. Perhaps even appreciate what is right in front of him. I feel like he's living in a box or has one of those shock collars for an electric fence on -- if he risks too much by reaching outside the box or crossing the fence, then it will hurt and he's not brave enough to risk it. Going to India is brave, but it doesn't make him reach outside that box. It limits his personal growth, I think, because he doesn't have to question his beliefs. He only asks questions he already knows the answers to; he's decided on the answers before he even asks the question.
That's the end of my letter! Thank you again, dear author, for signing up and I do hope you have fun writing. As long as it's not a long string of fart jokes or endless porn, we'll be copacetic. Promise!
Happy writing!
Thank you so much for signing up for Yuletide this year! It's a big commitment during the holiday season, especially if you're still in school as the semester ends. So thank you for making the time and brain commitment to bring small fandom joy to someone you don't even know.
Just a quick note on my dislikes before I dive into what I love about my fandoms: I really dislike rape/dub con/non con and incest in the things I read. I know that these are important issues that people can deal with respectfully and meaningfully in their fiction, but I have difficulty approaching these in fictional works in a way that doesn't leave me upset, so I would appreciate it if what you wrote didn't include these topics.
I'd also appreciate it if what you wrote wasn't smut. I feel weird asking a stranger to write porn for me -- like I've let someone borrow my underwear. Mature issues and language are fine, just not explicit sex scenes. And non-explicit sex scenes are probably OK, as long as there's story surrounding it. No porn without plot, OK?
I also really prefer gen fic and non-explicit het fic for the most part (let's give it a PG-13 rating or so). I do have very few slash 'ships I like, but they aren't in any of the fandoms I nominated. I am mostly not a big fan of non-canon romantic relationships.
Psmith -- PG Wodehouse
Here's what I wrote in my prompt:
Comrade Author:
I want Mike and Psmith cooking a Christmas goose, all on their lonesome, for whatever reasons you can summon up. I want hilarious hijinks, and I want the goose cooked to at least 165 degrees Fahrenheit as an internal temperature, for the safety of all involved.
If you can also somehow insert some Terrible Aunts or the Empress of Blandings, that would be . . . AMAZING. Perhaps a recipe could come from "Milady's Boudoir"? Maybe Mike and Psmith have been tagged as interim pig minders over Christmas?
I pretty much just love Wodehouse because he is so witty and his writing transcends to this level of madcap ridiculousness fairly often, like in Mike and Psmith where Mike ends up being chased by Comrade Downing and to escape him, rings the fire bell, which brings all the other boys out of the houses, and somewhere in all that mess, the dog is painted red. Or pretty much every Jeeves and Wooster story there is!
The thought of Mike and Psmith cooking Christmas dinner . . . it would be like Psmith commentating the outtakes of a Julia Child show, where she grows increasingly drunk, except without an ounce of culinary knowledge or any alcohol. Mike would be so earnest and attempting to get things done, but Psmith would be directing him from a chair with such confidence, and Mike, not knowing any better, would listen. In short, it would be AMAZING.
Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms
Here's what I wrote in my prompt:
I am open to any and all fairy tales being used here! I'm most familiar with the standard Western fairy tale canon, but if you think I might not be familiar with the story you want to use, please feel free to link to the story in your author's note or to get a message to me with a link to the story before Yuletide goes live. Yes, dear author, I am willing to do research to make your story work!
As for what kind of stories I prefer, I really love meta-fic. If you want to mix up a bunch of fairy tales, where the characters from various stories are all present in the same "universe" that would be great. I guess I mean something like Shrek or the Thursday Next books by Jasper Fforde, but not fic for those things. Like maybe there's an evil witches convention where they get together to share trade secrets or something, or Snow White's step-mom and the Big Bad Wolf hang out and throw darts at a picture of the woodsman, or Baba Yaga ends up being Sleeping Beauty's good fairy godmother. (A Russian Sleeping Beauty would actually be really cool!)
If you'd rather not write something meta-y like that, then I'd love to have a story about a female fairy tale character finding freedom and empowerment and not just being a "princess". You can write about smart women in a fairy tale setting, you can make a female villain sympathetic, you can write a modern story using the narrative structure from a fairy tale -- I am so flexible on this topic. Snow White can decide to be in charge of a mining company, if you want!
Use your imagination, have fun, and I will be happy.
I hope that about sums it up. This is actually what I requested last year, and I never get tired of it. If you want to see what I got last year, my gifts are right here if you want to write something fresh. If you wrote for me last year, THANK YOU AGAIN! I have re-read every one of those stories at some point in the past year and have loved them anew each time. <3 <3 <3
Really, truly, use your imagination, have fun, and I will be very happy.
Discworld -- Terry Pratchett
Here's what I wrote in the prompt:
What I'd really like to get this year is adventures with the Witches. I would like to see Granny, Nanny, and Agnes Nitt being crotchety heroes. (I know I've selected only Granny as a character, but the others weren't nominated, woe!) I just love the Witches, even when they're bickering (arguably the best part). Actually, Nanny is my favorite, so lots of Nanny Ogg will not go amiss.
If you're not comfortable writing the Witches, then political intrigue in the city of Ankh-Morpork would also be welcome. Especially if it involved the newspapers and William de Worde and machinations by Vetinari. Semi-epistolary style would be GREAT -- passages from The Ankh-Morpork Times included as exposition, kinda thing, for example. Do not be afraid to include whatever Watch members you feel necessary! Or wizards, for that matter!
Moving on, I find Mustrum Ridcully endlessly amusing. He appears incredibly stupid and clueless, but I think he understands a whole lot more than he lets on. He probably comes by the obnoxiousness honestly, though! So if you want to write hijinks from his youth (courtship with Granny Weatherwax! y/y/y?) or something else, go ahead. Mustrum Ridcully being funny and difficult is a must, though.
And if you can tie ALL those characters together, go ahead!
(I'm honestly really open about what characters are included in Discworld fic. I'm not incredibly fond of the Rincewind books, but it's open season on pretty much anybody else. I also vastly prefer genfic, unless the romance is established in canon.)
That's pretty much it! I find the Rincewind books really hard to get into, though I do like the Luggage. Do your worst, have fun, don't be afraid to be ridiculous or silly.
Jane Eyre -- Charlotte Bronte
Here I can actually expand on my prompt.
I think my request here can best be summed up as "continuing adventures". Maybe not all the characters mixed together, but if your muse so moves you, then so be it.
1) I am endlessly squishy and would like a more detailed description of Jane and Rochester's life after they get married than what we get in the conclusion. If it is adorable (but still slightly cynical, since that's kind of who they are) I will be happy. I think I might actually be OK with them having sex, as long as it's poetic and not just graphic bonking. Keep it sweet!
2) What happens to Rosamond Oliver? St. John takes off for India, she marries Mr. Granby, and then what? Is she happy? What's her life like? Or what made her fall in love with St. John in the first place? Is it just because he's a super sexy Greek God (with the personality of a wet washcloth)? Tell me more about Rosamond!
3) What does Adèle get up to as a young lady and adult? The summary of her life in the conclusion is kind of underwhelming: "As she grew up, a sound English education corrected in a great measure her French defects; and when she left school, I found in her a pleasing and obliging companion: docile, good-tempered and well-principled. By her grateful attention to me and mine, she has long since well repaid any little kindness I ever had it in my power to offer her."
Adèle as the perfect English lady -- boring? Say it ain't so! Can I have the adventures of Adèle as a young woman in the 1850s/1860s? Can she have some of Jane's rebelliousness and forthrightness, tempered into whatever shape her personality makes it?
What I love about Jane Eyre is how freaking subversive it is in comparison to most novels contemporary to it. (Of course, it's a Gothic novel, so maybe that's to be expected!) Jane isn't sweet, she's assertive, and she and Rochester clearly want each other. I know that some people don't like the 2006 TV adaptation with Toby Stephens and Ruth Wilson, but I love it. It captures all the wildness and untamed qualities of the story, without falling for false ideas about Victorian propriety. It's so easy to see those characters as victims of their own passions, against the backdrop of this tumultuous but beautiful in its extremity part of the world, which is something that's absolutely true about the book.
I also love that Jane comes back to Rochester after she's rich and doesn't rely on him to support her. Her money gives her freedom, and she comes back to him of her own free will. And Rochester realizes what a great gift this is, apart from his disability. She doesn't need him anymore, but she wants him and is determined to have him.
I think I would like it if Adèle and Rosamund find that same self-knowledge and determination. To learn defiance and ways to slip that defiance past the culture which guards their actions. Jane has done in spectacularly and largely by not playing by the rules, but I feel like Bronte lays it out that Adèle and Rosamund are much more bound by those rules in what she says about them in the book. The space they're allowed to play in is much smaller than Jane's, because they have not had to learn to stand up for themselves. They have been surrounded by people who will do it for them, and they're both affluent. But how do they form identities with so many people shaping the space they're allowed in? Can that same subversiveness of the original text be maintained in that much smaller space?
I am not too fond of St. John, though. I mostly just want him to pull the stick out of his butt and give in to the wildness all around him. Perhaps even appreciate what is right in front of him. I feel like he's living in a box or has one of those shock collars for an electric fence on -- if he risks too much by reaching outside the box or crossing the fence, then it will hurt and he's not brave enough to risk it. Going to India is brave, but it doesn't make him reach outside that box. It limits his personal growth, I think, because he doesn't have to question his beliefs. He only asks questions he already knows the answers to; he's decided on the answers before he even asks the question.
That's the end of my letter! Thank you again, dear author, for signing up and I do hope you have fun writing. As long as it's not a long string of fart jokes or endless porn, we'll be copacetic. Promise!
Happy writing!