Maybe I've finally grown up, but I can't handle anime with cool protagonists any more. You can't have a mecha pilot called Undertaker; he should be a mouthy kid who reacts so badly to a minor insult he gets both his parents killed and joins a subversive organization.
He could not have made a better move for his subsequent reputation than dying in 1950.
“Suppose one reads a story of filthy atrocities in the paper. Then suppose that something turns up suggesting that the story might not be quite true, or not quite so bad as it was made out. Is one's first feeling, 'Thank God, even they aren't quite so bad as that,' or is it a feeling of disappointment, and even a determination to cling to the first story for the sheer pleasure of thinking your enemies are as bad as possible? If it is the second then it is, I am afraid, the first step in a process which, if followed to the end, will make us into devils. You see, one is beginning to wish that black was a little blacker. If we give that wish its head, later on we shall wish to see grey as black, and then to see white itself as black. Finally we shall insist on seeing everything -- God and our friends and ourselves included -- as bad, and not be able to stop doing it: we shall be fixed for ever in a universe of pure hatred.” ― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
When he's right, he's right.
Interestingly, Jacqueline Audry made a film of the novel in 1951 that left out very little of the novel's more risque elements. Points to the French film industry.
And that was my book report.
It isn't until the end that she realizes that for Julie, this was a story of her losing the woman she loved to mental illness and a malign person. Her relationship with Olivia was a coping mechanism and a terrible moral failure on her part.
The novelette is often praised for Olivia's descriptions of her feelings and it's certainly good stuff, but I'm a sucker for the POV stuff. Olivia, self-absorbed teenager that she is, mostly misses the dissolution of a long-term relationship that ends in death.
It's interesting how similar the mood is to the Class S stories of Nobuko Yoshiya. Refined teenagers having sexual awakenings to teachers reading classic literature, etc. I have heard that Colette might be the common ancestor here.
Julie notices Olivia's crush and cultivates it with special favors such as dates in Paris, but won't cross certain physical lines. Definitely good for your psychosexual development.
Our 16-year-old heroine is firmly in the Julie camp and soon falls in love with her. She doesn't have the vocabulary or conceptual framework for loving another woman, but she's not really bothered by it either. No sense of sin for this daughter of freethinkers.
Julie's special friend is the kind Signorina Baietto, while Cara's is the evil Frau Riesener, who's driving a wedge between Cara and Julie in an attempt to gain control of the school and later probably murders Cara. Her death is not based on reality and feels a bit melodramatic.
At this boarding school, every girl must choose either Mlle Julie (cool intellectual who's a little too into being admired by her students) or Mlle Cara (annoying hypochondriac) as their object of admiration. Julie and Cara are a sort-of out couple, and both have side pieces working as teachers.
The real name of the author was Dorothy Bussy (née Strachey), a friend of Virginia Woolf's, to whom the novel is dedicated. It's a semi-autobiographical novel of her time at a French girls' school run by Marie Souvestre in the 1880s. It was published in 1949, so quite a bit after the events.
The cover for Olivia by Olivia, being a black and white drawing a late 19th century Parisian boulevard (?) with several horse-drawn carriages and an obelisk in the middle.
Studying Anglo-French yuri.
@why.bsky.team is blocking me.
Made it, Ma!
Die Ehe der Maria Braun and Angst essen Seele auf are both good and audience-friendly. If you're in the mood for toxic German yuri, Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant is quite something.
Just out of curiosity, did you ever happen to watch any R.W. Fassbinder films?
"Here's why advocating for a healthy work-life balance and pursuing a career you find fulfilling is ontologically evil" sure is a bold new direction for feminism.
No wonder Patrick Stewart's agent thought this shit was going to get cancelled soon.
I don't remember who suggested it, but I found it delightful: what if he was a junior official told by his superiors to send these weirdos back home to Galilee and this was his clever solution?
I don't think Madoka's even a "deconstruction" of magical girl anime when just about every plot point in it has a precedent in Sailor Moon or other classics of the genre. Sailor Moon was also considerably less cowardly about its queer elements despite being ~20 years older and a kids' show.
Incidentally, taking WIP photos like this is a good idea because it can lead to you, say, realizing you put the right arm on backwards.
I'll have to steal this one.
Huh. I guess my sporadic reading hasn't been statistically representative.
And Joker maybe twice.
That's one of the good insights of Zeta. No matter how righteous the AEUG's cause, none of the people who joined it early on did it for admirable reasons.
TOS ended in 1969 and TNG started airing in 1987, so 18 years.
He's voiced by Koyasu and he's such a loser.
Yeah, it's just the crying face emoji everyone uses. Thin gruel for a moral panic.
Barbatos HG gunpla, missing its legs. Painted with gold and blue and red metallic paints.
Barbatos HG WIP. I realize all the metallic and blinding white paints make him look like a fancy drum major, but I'm hoping heavy weathering will give him a nice tarnished Dark Souls fallen hero look. I'll probably also redo the arms to get rid of the seamlines and do some touch ups with paint.
Josephine Tey's the Daughter of Time, in which her detective hero concludes Richard was innocent, is a very fun read.