I know some folks are wondering what the bloody-blazes is taking me so long to write BTB and how it's gonna end. I will share with you the last sentences, just to satiate your curiosity. I've had this planned from the beginning.

Rocks fall. Everybody dies.

KIDDING. I'm not Tasty or anything!

Now back to my regularly scheduled evening of whacking my head on a desk and doing battle with the twin demons of perfectionism and writer's block.

Lots of things lately have got me thinking about the unspoken boundaries in Narnia fic, which leads to an excessively overthinky post. It's got me thinking about Going There, as Tasty says, and where the lines of There happen to be.

rthstewart has delved into all manner of New Interesting Things, with the natural science and biology, and more recently the war efforts in both America and England. Rth is the Captain Kirk of Narnia fic: boldly going where no writer has gone before! She lives in the There.

TastyAsItGets (if she's on the old el-jay I don't know it) just posted an interesting blog entry about how she is Going There, and a bit uneasy about the reception it will get. She seems determined though, and I am pleased, because when a fandom lacks a constant influx of new ideas, it stagnates. She's a damn good writer and I am interested in seeing what her There looks like.

I tend to sort of Go There euphemistically; I reckon that the references I make are fairly obvious, but can also be avoided/ignored if one is uncomfortable with the There that I have Gone to. This all feels like a lot of waffling and I sort of wish I had the huevos to just boldly Go There, but as yet, alas, I do not.

This is a small fandom, and fairly well-insulated, and the fen tend to be of a more conservative bent than, say, Harry Potter. (I've seen things in Potterfic that'd turn yer hair white...) So I guess it stands to reason that There is not as, aheh, far-out-there as in other fandoms.

But I don't know where There is, exactly. Where do you think it is? What's your limit? What's the difference between far and going too far?

A quick note on Voyage of the Dawn Treader casting.

( Pictures below cut. )

Been sick. I went to the ER and all I got was this stinkin' t-shirt bill sick.

Which is an unpleasant activity and I do not recommend it, although seeing a notation on the bill which says EMERG. ROOM - $1,299.00 is good for a laugh. If I wanted to sit in an uncomfortable bed in a room full of odd smells and watch Mythbusters I would do it in a motel. Then I'd get Magic Fingers at a quarter a go and a continental breakfast too.

I apologize if I have missed replying to any email, reviews, &c. as my brain has become somewhat liquefied with slothfulness and a lack of energy. All seems to be bettering, though it is too soon to say for sure.

And appeals to my love of language.

Thieves' cant or Rogues' cant was a secret language (a cant or cryptolect) which was formerly used by thieves, beggars and hustlers of various kinds in Great Britain and to a lesser extent in other English-speaking countries. The classic, colourful argot is now mostly obsolete, and is largely relegated to the realm of literature and fantasy role-playing, although individual terms continue to be used in the criminal subcultures of both Britain and the U.S.

Do not ask how canting can help Ana; ask instead how Ana can cant for Narnia.

It was claimed by Samuel Rid that thieves' cant was devised around 1530 “to the end that their cozenings, knaveries and villainies might not so easily be perceived and known”, by Cock Lorel and the King of the Gypsies at The Devils Arse Apeak in Derbyshire.

COZENINGS, KNAVERIES, AND VILLAINIES. Folks, this is real stuff.

Angloromani was used for day to day matters, while Cant was used for criminal activities. A thief in 1839 claimed that the cant he had seen in print was nothing like the cant then used by gypsies, thieves and beggars. He also said that each of these used distinct vocabularies, which overlapped; the gypsies having a cant word for everything, and the beggars using a lower style than the thieves.

And there's even linguistic drift! Ah, j'adore!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thieves%27_cant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_New_Dictionary_of_the_Terms_Ancient_and_Modern_of_the_Canting_Crew

(reference of the above: http://www.archive.org/details/newdictionaryoft00begeuoft)

http://www.pascalbonenfant.com/18c/cant/

Is live. Check me out with my Mad Updating Skillz.

Then the thing happened: as the Dwarf gazed steadily at Edmund, his eyes widened in a flash of recognition. Edmund knew he had never seen the Dwarf before in his life. He also knew this meant he was correct, and he dearly wished he wasn’t.

Follow the link to fic.

'Cos this is the fourth one, you see.

( Boom-de-yada! )

Chapter 21 of BTB is live. FINALLY.

At any other time, Edmund would have teased Peter about being after the Dryads again. That he let it pass showed Peter, more than anything else, how serious Edmund was.

Story is here.

I have a new chapter of BTB to post and fanfiction is not accepting uploads. Some funky kind of error.

Grr argh.

(It's a good one, too! Swear.)

This is a fic for Breeze's challenge over at NFFR. If you're not there yet, you should be.

You can read it here, or you can read it over on fanfiction -- whichever you prefer.

Still here? All right, then....

( Follow the merry link to shiny golden fic. )

So then I read Twilight, because the thing to do when you're already woozily ill is to fill your skull with trashy teenfic.

And after that I read the sequel, because they're not exactly difficult reads or anything.

(To be honest, it's Cleolinda's recaps that got me to do it; I found them hysterical.)

But O my reader and O the delight of my eyes, I cannot be having with this much victim-blaming and cultural appropriation. I cannot, because I only have so many brain cells to spare, and I need to save them for their inevitable destruction by the migraines I get, not the fiction I read.

It is good that I read this all on my computer instead of in physical books. The books would have been put through the fuckin' wall and then I'd have to have new walls installed plus I'd be on the library's shitlist. I did not throw the computer because I need it for other things, and it's not its fault I made it show me this crap.

Lots of people with lots more education and authority have said these things better than I have. I just wanna bitch anyway. Feel free to skip it.

( Grr. Argh. WTF, MATE? )

Now, some recommendations.

If you want to know what happens when you marry Edward, go get Sleeping With The Enemy, the 1991 flick with Julia Roberts in it.

If you want to know about Indians, go read anything by Sherman Alexie.

So there's that. Feel free to rebut, or to rant along, if you so desire.

I guess now you're expecting it of me, hmm?

(I'm sort of very postdrome migraineous and woozy, so this may not be as scintillating as was previously; apologies)

(also I still can't match names to voices, sorry)

( Ascast commentary, where Corin gets hit by lightning and Ana tries damn hard not to be )

No, the OTHER British wizard with black hair and a big secret. Watched Merlin just now; this one.

One: did they have fancy cloth like that? I always have this thought. I can be watching something about magic and fairies and catch a polyester fabric and I will be thrown by historical inaccuracy. Why this is I do not know. I can handle fairies and dragons and sorcerers, I just hit a snag when medieval folk are wearing synthetic fibers. There may be something wrong with me.

Two: Yeah, this show is chock-full of hoyay, isn't it?

Three: Arthur somehow reminds me of a young and smirky Vladimir Putin. Don't ask me how 'cos I don't know.

Four: NO, REALLY, GUYS, THAT'S A LOT OF HOYAY.

Five: Giles! Hello, Giles! You're still the most awesome thing on a screen whenever you're on it.

Six: what is that girl, twelve? Fourteen?

Seven: As much as I appreciate the sidhe mythology, I find it hard to be concerned when the bad guys are the sheeeeeee. It just doesn't work in speech, not when they empasize like that.

Eight: I wonder if that's real chainmail or if they did that thing they sometimes do where they use knitting that's been painted. I can't tell. I need new spectacles.

Nine: But who cares, because GILES GILES GILES.

I blame rthstewart for this, in the best sort of way.

I've never done a drabble before, and I find it limiting in intriguing ways.

( The Morning After.... )

Links to not forget:

Tawaif (history, culture, etc)

Tawaif on wikipedia

Trimurti (wikipedia)

Repost - resources & tech levels in Narnia...

( Someone, please, put a hurdy-gurdy in a story. I beg you. )

The "three wives of Adam" story that Gaiman wrote is in the trade-paperback collection called "Fables & Reflections," which is book six, out of ten, in the Sandman series. I'm not up enough on my comics to know the correct terminology from here on in, so someone kindly correct me if I'm wrong. Since each TPB is a collection of individual comic books, I'm inclined to say that the relevant part is a book titled "A Parliament of Rooks." Then, the Eve story itself is, in that comic book, the second of three stories told.

Sandman is pretty widely known, so likely you can go down to your big-box bookstore (borders, barnes & noble, etc) and find it and read it.

Now, as for Lilith, the nameless woman, and Eve... there's a brief mention here of the succession of Adam's female companions. According to 'Parliament' and that Wiki article, this all is told in greater detail in a midrash called "The Alphabet of Ben Sira," which has a Wiki overview here. I've yet to find a full copy of that online anywhere. If I do I will link it here.

As near as I can tell, Islam and Judaism have more of a mention of Lilith than Christianity, which in some variants has omitted her entirely. The nameless second wife is - from what I can tell with two hours of internet research, so I may be wrong - only mentioned in the Ben-Sira midrash. Or -- to put it in fandom terms, wife number two is an OC, not a canon character, and she first appears in a story told by Ben-Sira to, I believe, Nebuchadnezzar. Although I'm not sure how the Jewish tradition treats add-ins and apocrypha; it might have been filtered into canon, so to speak.

Point is, this tradition we have, of retelling stories and adding bits? IS OLDER THAN DIRT.

Have I ever mentioned that fandom gets me learning about things I never would have, otherwise? And that I am often totally baffled by what I wind up researching? Cos I am, I really am.

I wanted to do this for the first one, but.. I didn't, because I'm all scatterbrained. So I'm doing it for this one. Wheeee. And since you lot go on, expect this to be a rather lengthy set of reactions.

( Many thoughts contained within; gratuitous photos too! )

So. There's what I think. Floor's open, y'all.

I figure youse guys are aware of me being there, but in case not....

Behind the Borders, chapter 20, is live.

Have an excerpt:

“Let me tell you a story that was old by the time Edward of Narnia first heard it. It is one that was not forgotten, in the dark cold winter, after the Humans were banished from the land and the land was lost to the world. Rather, the forest-folk – steadfast in their memories, always – kept the story alive. This story is older than Edward, and older than his fathers and grandfathers and great-grandfathers, for it is a story about the beginning of the world.

It is the story of Aslan and the Stars and the Trees. It is the story of life in Narnia, and how the world remembers what it is. If it is ever forgotten, the Talking Trees will perish by iron and fire, and all of Narnia will disappear into darkness.”

Perfect. So bloody perfect.

(Not that Bosch wasn't a crazy man. Trepannings, whee!)

The period in which the triptych was created was a time of adventure and discovery, when tales and trophies from the New World sparked the imagination of poets, painters and writers. Although the triptych contains many unearthly and fantastic creatures, Bosch still appealed in his images and cultural references to an elite humanist and aristocratic audience.

( Click for picture. )