1. “Raven” was an occasionally-encountered name for a girl in the contemporary period, and “Ebony” would be at least recognizable as a name. The other elements of this name are flatly atypical.
2. During this part of the War Period, this character’s hairstyle would not be considered shocking, but it would be viewed as garish and nonconformist.
3. A contemporary music performer known for a melancholy style of music and a gothic and dramatic aesthetic. The title of the work probably comes from one of her songs. However, her aesthetic and attitude has little in common with that in this work, being much more conventional and less garish.
4. A member of the contemporary band “My Chemical Romance”, also notable for a “gothic”, melancholy, and macabre aesthetic
5. i.e. the speaker considers him to be handsome and attractive; despite the pornographic material later in this work, the word “f_______” is here used only as an expletive.
6. Vampires as romantic figures had been increasing in popularity over this period, with a trend away from malicious monsters towards seductive but more benevolent figures, romanticized by their capability of being terrible.
7. Strangely, despite the characterization of this character as a Satanist, “witch” should here be characterized as having meaning similar to “wizard” and not “idolater”, “sorceress”, “maleficar”, or other practitioner of what we today recognize as “witchcraft”. The background material to this work constantly faced accusations of being satanic by an uneducated reactionary public to whom the difference between technology, wizardry and witchcraft was not meaningful (”witch” was sometimes even considered a female equivalent to “wizard”!), which completely failed to diminish its popularity.
8. It is important to understand that “goth” as an aesthetic, counterculture or subculture had a completely different meaning in the contemporary period than it does today – what remains similar is the love of the melancholy, the macabre, the dramatic, the romantic, and contempt for conventionalism. In the mid-to-early-late War Period, “Gothic” people were associated with contempt for morality, certain types of sexual display (usually of a shocking and sometimes fetishistic type), various forms of concupiscence, and a fairly significant connection to the occult and even to outright Satanism, though the latter was all but universally an affectation (this is true of most Mid War Period satanism). See contrast on p 321, The Gothic Movement In the Catholic Church. Moreover, the “gothic” aesthetic as described by this character is a stunted and over-the-top form that has also been corrupted by the counterculture-commericalism that was universal in the Late War Period.
9. A clothing store mostly specializing in counterculture-commercialized and faddist apparel. Critics accused it of being a mercantile vulture that fed by turning more honest and vivacious countercultures into fads.
10. It was almost unheard-of for women in the Mid or Late War Period to wear corsets, but they appeared in the Gothic subculture (which itself heavily borrowed from sources such as Victorian-era clothing, including mourning dress). However, what Enoby is describing is probably not actually a true corset, but a “corset top”, which is essentially a laced bodice. Either would be worn with neither chemise nor overblouse.
11. Probably a nondraped skirt that barely passes her wrist.
12. Hose, stockings, or tights in the form of a wide-open mesh
13. Probably not actually military issue boots; these were tall, heavy black leather boots with lacing all the way up.
14. This character’s outfit would be considered inappropriate for school in the Late War Period, but not shocking to Late War Period mores except by its garishness.
15. Originally meant students at a university-preparatory school; with the extremely high percentage of students seeking to attend university in the Late War Period, this came to mean a subculture of young people who adopted a highly conventionalistic and professionalistic attitude and sought admission to the prestigious and traditionalistic universities in the Eastern United States, often without academics being their true passion. Such people were often viewed as social climbers and sometimes attracted contempt from both their less-professionally-oriented peers and from those who were true intellectuals.
16. Also known as “giving the finger”; a very rude gesture in the War Period as it is in ours.
18. This phrase went through considerable popular memetic mutation (as did the entire tract): “It was _______ <weather> so I felt ________. A lot of _______ stared at me. I ________ them.” See extra material 34c.
17. I.E. “How are you today?”, “how are you feeling?” as a greeting.
do you think the writer of My Immortal lives in quiet pleasure knowing what they’ve brought into the world cannot be killed nor can they be held accountable
The slow horror of this post, of realizing:
1. First, that this is about My Immortal, fairly obvious from the start. Okay, meme time.
2. Second, that this is characterized as a future English literature class’s textbook footnotes a la our time period’s school texts of Shakespeare works, which, haha, seeing that framed as if this future literature class would be so far removed from our understanding of culture as to need these notes and yet would still be in a literature class formatted similarly to ours, especially combined with the idea that My Immortal would be considered typical “literature,” that’s funny, right?
3. Third, that by “the War Period/the Late War Period” they mean us, and the implications of that name for the time period added to the idea that so much culture from this time period has been wiped out and would be totally unfamiliar to the students of this class, and oh. Oh, that’s not… that’s not funny anymore.
[ID: A mostly uncolored comic of Jon and Martin on a gray background. Martin is a tall, fat, white man with shoulder length hair pulled into a ponytail, scruffy facial hair, freckles, a tooth gap, body hair, and round glasses. He is wearing small earrings, a t-shirt, sweatpants, and socks. Jon is a shorter, thin Arab man with long curly dark hair with lighter streaks pulled into a low bun over his shoulder, a full beard and mustache, and his skin is covered in various scars. He’s wearing a long-sleeved shirt and half-moon glasses and his lower half is covered by a blanket.
Jon is sitting on a couch, humming and drawing in a sketchbook as Martin walks by, curious, and leans over the back of the couch.
Martin:What are you drawing?
Jon jumps and holds his sketchbook to his chest, blushing.
Jon:Err… Martin: Can I see? Jon: It’s not finished…
Martin sits on the couch and Jon turns away with sparkling eyes.
The drawing is a work in progress of Martin wearing white drapery, holding the bottom up to expose his legs while his other arm is raised by his head, with more drapery hanging over his arm. His chest is partly exposed, his hair is undone, and his expression is soft, looking down and to the side. His freckles and body hair haven’t been drawn yet, but he is partially colored in with red bits for his hair, blue shadows on the drapery, blush and skin tone partly rendered, and a golden background.
Martin stares at it, awestruck, blushing with his mouth hanging open as Jon presents it with his eyes closed. A note says Martin is having “many thoughts, head full”. He looks at Jon with the same expression. The final panel shows his head drawn massively as he yells, gesturing at the sketchbook. His text is in all caps.
Martin: That’s the ugly phase?! Jon:I-I mean it’s far from finis- Martin:Jon.
end ID]
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i think jon is an artist and the beholding beams all kinds of art knowledge into his brain at the safehouse to help him out with that. i think he uses these powers to express his love for his boyfriend by drawing him a lot in increasingly flattering ways and he’s a lil shy about it
also i am VERY tempted to like. finish jon’s drawing some time because like. it turned out better than i was intending to make it aklsjdhajdh
whumper turned whumpee being found and rescued by a stranger who doesn’t know of their past and whumperee desperately trying to hide it from their new caretaker. At first, it’s because they fear caretaker will kick them out if they knew and whumperee is relying on caretaker to survive. As time goes on though…whumperee realizes they can’t stomach the idea of caretaker finding out their past and being disgusted by them because whumperee has come to care about the person who saved them and values their opinion
