188 posts
Latest Posts by josephsapha - Page 7
I WAS LOOKING FOR SCREEN SHOTS ON MY COMPUTER SO I COULD MAKE A JOKE ABOUT THE ANTIVIRAL FANDOM BUT I FOUND THIS INSTEAD
HIGH AS FUCK
why dont you read/watch something that forces you to confront the fact that you are capable of feeling empathy for a person who has done deeply cruel or evil things. And maybe you’ll calm down
needed to clip just this part of the interview bcus it’d the funniest 25 seconds of all time
literally we need to get rid of the stigma of questioning once and for all.
call yourself gay. call yourself ace. call yourself a lesbian today and a nonbinary bi trans man tomorrow. its fine. literally no community has ever been harmed by someone thinking that label might apply to them and then discarding it later. anyone who says otherwise is drinking the exclusionary kool-aid and isn’t worth the time it would take to argue with them.
Hanya Yanagihara, A Little Life / Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot / Donna Tartt, The Secret History
Plz talk more about Richard Papen and his sexuality thx
i will gladly do that !!! now it was about three months since i reread the secret history so maybe i won’t be able to point out everything in the book but someday im going to reread it & make a post abt it or something. because wow. he is so gay………
so look. his descriptions of his male friends are so much more detailed than his description of camilla. if he now likes camilla that much, why is he more focused on describing francis and henry?
he kisses francis back just because. he lets francis to continue to kiss his neck. they are literally messing around and he is enjoying it. sure, he tells francis to “give him a break” but when francis says it’ll be fun, he doesn’t protest again. like if charles hadn’t walked in on them, had they slept together? i am not doubting it.
he sees charles as very good looking. he appreciates camilla’s androgynous looks a lot. because she doesn’t look very traditional feminine. because she reminds him of charles??? he likes charles so much tho??? like charles abuses his sister and when richard gets to know this, he stays on charles’ side. like through the end he thinks what henry and camilla does is wrong? because it hurts charles but also? because henry is with camilla? idk that’s just how i see it? if he truly was in love with camilla, he would have left charles? like, if he is so in love with her, then why isn’t he furious with charles for how he has treated her?
the month where he lives with henry he seems content & happy. or, he is extremely comfortable around henry. they had just met but ? he is so comfortable in henry’s company. i so wish donna tartt had written out richard’s attraction to henry and that he and henry would have been lovers, it starting with henry saving richard’s life and their relationship developing during the time they lived together.
and last but not least, “i loved him too.” he hasn’t known henry for a very long time when henry takes his own life but richard actually confesses that he loved henry. he could’ve say “i miss him too” or something but nope. richard doesn’t seem to marry anyone after camilla declined his proposal. okay so. why? i see it partly because he is traumatised after what has happened but he can never talk about it because then he will risk going to prison. = he needs a partner who he can talk about his trauma with. henry is dead, charles is god knows where, camilla doesn’t want him and francis is already married. so he ends up alone with his degree in english literature.
he doesn’t seem very interested in girls over all to be honest? like on parties and such. he is very fixated by the greek group & especially francis, henry and charles. i don’t know but when i read the book, i don’t see henry’s & julian’s relationship as teacher and student, i think they’re having an affair in some way. this you won’t think of if you don’t have those queer glasses as i am wearing. it is due to those glasses i think richard being gay would be so logical? i know some may only see me as a queer boy projecting but believe me. i don’t like richard at all so why the heck would i project on him. i get why people see him as bisexual and ofc everyone has their own headcanons, but to me it is extremely important that richard papen is gay because i see so many actual proofs for it in the book so it would make so much sense to me?? (not that you need to prove a character being non straight but this is something i have thought of every time i have read the book)
so what i think we have here is a story with some of the best characters i have ever read about, a case of compulsory heterosexuality and an amazing but wasted potential to get a queer perspective on a story with a fantastic heart wrecking storyline
for that’s about it & sorry it became so long, i just,,,,its so important to me that richard & henry both are gay !!
as im rereading crime and punishment one of the things that makes me remember why i love this book so much is that it takes the whole "brooding male character is too intelligent for the surrounding laymen, his lack of empathy makes him more masculine, he is above the average person" male fantasy and flips it on its head. raskolnikov wants to believe he's all of these things. he wants to believe that he's already so detached from society that he's above it and beyond saving. that he's already a bad guy, that it's just a burden he'll have to bear, and that if he's gonna alienate himself he might as well play the part of the monster. he might as well commit murder (both to prove that he can do it, and to lift himself and potentially others from financial hardship) because he knows he can put himself into a logical mindset since he believes he's so good at turning off his emotions. he won't feel any guilt or compassion, right? he's a step above human, right? so he must be the perfect sacrificial lamb to bear the burden of murder.
but he's not. and the book is just him constantly betraying himself. he wants so badly to believe that he's capable of cold-blooded premeditated murder, and that he's capable of putting his humanity aside for the "greater good." he swings between considering himself a sort of superman for his ability to commit murder, and considering himself scum of the earth for even thinking of such a thing. he never just considers himself human. but the problem is that he is human, and he's a lot better of a person than he wants to admit. he's absolutely full of contradictions. in the same breath as cursing himself for being crushingly poor, he gives away his remaining money to children in need--despite it logically putting him in a worse financial situation. within the same hour he kills an old woman with an axe, after he nearly gets home, his first instinct is to go out of his way to return the axe to the worker he borrowed it from, cleaned up and in the same position he found it--despite him acknowledging that returning it was much riskier than just getting rid of the axe somewhere else.
raskolnikov paradoxically wants to commit the perfect crime, and get recognition for it. but as soon as it's recognized, he's no longer gotten away with it. with recognition comes confession, and with confession comes the realization that he's just not the guy he thought he was. he's not some ultra cunning, heartless, cold-blooded mastermind. he's not the napoleonic figure he admired. he's not a cardboard cutout of solid logic and reason 100% of the time. he physically falls ill from his own mental battle ffs. no matter how much he plans the murder, he still panics. no matter how much he tiptoes around conversations after the murder, he still feels guilt. no matter how much he isolates himself from his friends and family for the sake of self-crucifixion, he still allows himself to be fed soup by them, one spoonful at a time, while they gently blow on it so that he does not burn himself.
he's driven by emotion just as much as logic. the biggest problem with raskolnikov is that his humanity far exceeds his own expectations. and learning that redemption is possible is scary, because it means learning humility and taking accountability for oneself. having something to live for and improve toward is as much of a heavy nuisance as it is an honorable goal. only a person with some amount of goodness can recognize that and still choose to undertake that task, regardless of how logically inconvenient it is. and raskolnikov is, unfortunately, a much better person than he thought.