I’m Sorry

Fun Fact:

I learned this while researching for my Prince Hamid essay. Naturally reading about the Ottoman Empire leads you to learning about the Sultans and then by extension the Harem. I can’t find a place for this fact in my essay, but it left me absolutely hysterical with laughter for some time so here it is…

Prior to 1861, all artist renditions of the harem at the Ottoman palace had been done by men. Now I’m not sure if you’re aware, but the penalty for a man seeing a woman of the sultan’s harem was death. However, all these paintings were created and they resulted in so much romanticizing of the harem all throughout the western world. Beautiful women, dancers, lithe bodies, all generally partially naked just there and hanging out together. It was the college dorm fantasy of the time.

Enter Henriette Browne, a French painter, with royal and diplomatic ties, who travelled to Constantinople (among other places). She would paint there and usually favored eastern subjects. She enjoyed school scenes and scenes with women especially. Anyhow, she’s given access to the harem. Henriette is the first painter who sees the harem because she’s a woman and she was allowed by law to be there. She paints the harem, among other subjects, and returns to Europe.

Cue all of Europe’s collective gasp when she unveils her Une visite, interior de harem, Constantinople to the eagerly awaiting public. Her painting shocked and stunned them because she had actually been inside and painted no partially clothed women.

But where’s all the naked ladies?!

George Costanza

Are the writers saving all the deaths for the finale....???

GOT spoiler ahead!

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that episode. The whole battle from what I could see was great, it was intense and the music was just blowing me away. And sure I’m happy at Arya being a badass and taking out the Night King but it felt too easy and too quick. It didn’t give us any answers either. I dunno. They made the enemy too powerful, too mysterious and gave him too much hype that I thought there would have been a larger one on one fight with someone then killed.

Even Sam loves the Stark girls

love a Sansa and Sophie stan

I’m reading Katherine by Anya Seton

and I’m torn.

On one hand, the attention to detail is breathtaking.  Seton has fully immersed me in the 14th century, palaces and plagues and all.  Geoffrey Chaucer’s brief appearances are delightful.  The friendships Katherine forms with the other women in her life are a driving force for most of the first half of the book.  Not to mention this gem:

“I am no duchess, no queen, but I have been your equal in love, for this I dare to tell you how I feel.”

On the other hand…

The romance.  

I’m over two-hundred pages in, and Katherine just seems so miserable with John.  They’ve barely had a conversation about something other than how they love each other…and I cannot stress how few meaningful interactions they have had leading up to their affair.  

He comes onto her as soon as his wife—her friend—dies, then even stronger as her husband is dying.  

And when they finally get together, he’s in talks to get married the entire time.  Their “honeymoon” overlooks his future fiancee’s homeland.

He just steamrolls her hesitations and ignores how becoming his mistress decimates her sense of self-worth.  And then he gives her his deceased wife’s ring as a symbol of their love!

Every declaration of love or step forward in their relationship involves her crying and hating herself and her situation, and he is infuriatingly oblivious.

I get that a book published in the 1950′s would have faced backlash if Katherine actively pursued John.  And I’m sure the references to sex caused a scandal when it was first published…but I’d rather have the heroine enjoying the hero and their relationship than simply giving up.

Let’s hope the third-act break-up will lead to Katherine putting her foot down and John recognizing that she is his equal, not just in love, because right now, their “romance” reads less like a love story and more like harassment.

It’s like a bunch of annoying teenage girls are telling us this story... Damn you Reign - lazy historical writing strikes again!

What level of Evul™ TV Henry VIIIs are you on a scale of Damian Lewis getting drunk and talking about his sex life in Wolf Hall to Mark Stanley growling “YOU PROMISED ME SUNNNSSSS” like an actual demon in the new Anne Boleyn trailer

Sansa knows that of all the Starks that were ripped from Winterfell, she suffered the most to get it back. She’s the driving force for getting it back. Now she’s being told, “It’s not yours, and it’s not the Starks’ anymore. It belongs to Hitler’s daughter, the worst person in the world’s daughter, the daughter of the person who murdered your grandfather and uncle in the worst way possible. And guess what? Your brother, who you convinced to step up when he wanted to fuck off because of his death experience, bent the knee to her and is telling you that she’s your queen.” What part of Sansa’s reaction to any of this is irrational?

Bryan Cogman on the conversation between Sansa and Daenerys. Even when they were smiling, you felt the stakes involved. (via sophietisthebest)

Bran and Sam should have written A Song of Ice and Fire. Sam wrote the prose and Bran did all the research. 

Bran should have been either King of the North, Master of Whispers (with his own army of literal little birds to replace Varys), or an advisor to the new king or queen of Westeros, not king himself. 

‘Who has a better story than bran the broken?’ is blatant meera and jojen reed erasure (osha and hodor as well). Osha busted them out of winterfell, jojen showed up with his green dreams to guide them to the three eyed raven, and meera dragged his ass home after. The only thing bran managed to do is touch the night king and get a bunch of people killed (including the last living members of an entire species). Bran in general has very little agency in his own story. Jaime throws him out the window, robb leaves him in charge, theon takes the castle, the three eyed raven decides to train him. Even when he finally seems like he might actually do something in the battle with the dead, he just doesn’t.

I saw the point made that if the idea had been that the person with the most stories, that knows the most history, should be king, then this might work a little better. A 'those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it’ type thing. But as it stands, it’s such a ridiculously unsupported choice.

The Lair of the White Worm (1988)