Я разговариваю сама с собой:

someone probably already made a million post about the thematic relevance of julian’s lecture to the greek clique in chapter 1 in the overall narrative, how so much of what he is saying gets mirrored at various points as the story progresses. after all, this is the lecture that made the greek clique want to perform a bacchanal.

but i just noticed this one little parallel that is making me lose my mind a bit, to be honest.

I always found it peculiar that it was bunny who answered julian here – you’d think he wouldn’t remember the latin name for the erinyes, or that someone else might have said something. yet he is very engaged right now, “his eyes dazzled”.

i think there are two main reasons why bunny is the one who mentions the furies.

the first reason relates to julian’s words before his question. from a narrative point of view, by answering, bunny gets linked to these paragraphs.

“It is a terrible thing to learn as a child that one is a being separate from all the world, that no one and no thing hurts along with one's burned tongues and skinned knees, that one's aches and pains are all one's own. Even more terrible, as we grow older, to learn that no person, no matter how beloved, can ever truly understand us.”

bunny, the one often compared to a child, already before and especially after finding out about the murder starts hurting, worrying, and quickly realizes he is the only one to feel this way. the others are not sharing in his worries. they excluded him from the successful bacchanal, henry mocked him in his diary, and no one confided in him. they hid the fact that they murdered someone from him with apparent ease. after italy, suddenly henry is all chummy with richard, and the group includes him even more – and bunny feels like no one understands him, no one is willing to. they treat him like a dumb child, and try to keep him quiet.

the second reason why I find it peculiar that bunny is the one to answer julian is to be found in julian’s segue to bunny’s answer.

the book often mentions dante, who was led through hell and purgatory by virgil. while the number of erinyes/furies is ambiguous in greek mythology, virgil, in the aeneid, mentions three: alecto (endless anger), megaera (jealous rage), and tisophone (vengeful destruction). and isn’t this the core of bunny’s behaviour prior his murder? his anger towards the rest of the group, and especially henry, at excluding him, mocking him. his jealous rage towards richard. his vengeful destruction – almost revealing what the group has done, exploding at henry, mocking charles’s drinking, deriding and belittling camilla and her relationship with charles, being cruel to francis bc of his sexuality, alienating even richard, who didn’t have much to do with any of this, by trying to expose his lies about his past and how much money he has.

in chapter 5, richard wonders how come bunny was losing his mind and turning against his friends post-murder reveal (pls ignore richard being a pretentious baby btw) and we get this amazing insight from camilla.

in julian’s own words, the erinyes/furies drove people mad by turning “up the volume of the inner monologue, magnif[ying] qualities already present to great excess, ma[king] people so much themselves that they couldn't stand it.”

and isn’t that what camilla is alluding at here? as if possessed by the furies, bunny becomes so much himself, or what he thinks the others see him as – stupid, simple, annoying, less sophisticated than the others – that he cannot bear it, no one can. it all magnifies, all that he thinks the others dislike about him, belittle him for, laugh behind his back about.

there’s also something to be said about julian asking about the erinyes/furies by their greek name and bunny answering with the roman one. when it was in rome with henry that it all started to fall apart. but yeah

Солнце и ты- все, что мне было бы нужно! Если бы солнце светило мне в макушку, а я могла смотреть на твое красивое лицо

There is no way I’m gonna make my studies without killing myself but pretending that i am scientist from Los Alamos and it’s 1944

Crack concept: Atsushi doesn’t exactly get absorbed…not completely that is.

Akutagawa: Weretiger!

Atsushi: Oh my god can you lower your volume I’m right here!

Akutagawa:…Well get off the floor then!

Atsushi: Oh jee let me just get my nonexistent leg and my nonexistent arm and oh yeah the entire MISSING HALF of my body and then I’ll be right up there with you.

Akutagawa: Sarcasm is unbecoming of you.

Atsushi: When my leg comes back I’m going to throw it at you.

Akutagawa: I see nothing changed now you’ve lost half your brain.

Atsushi: I see being bought back to life didn’t give you a sense of humour.

Akutagawa: Does it hurt?

Atsushi: You remember when you cut my leg off, the first time?

Akutagawa: Obviously.

Atsushi: I would prefer having that pain over this…every day of my life over this.

Akutagawa: You damn fool, why would you protect me?

Atsushi: Why would you protect me?

Akutagawa: I asked you first!

Atsushi: I asked you second!

Akutagawa: That doesn’t even make sense!

Atsushi: My consciousness is split between here and a 4th dimensional plane of reality where I’m being guided by a hallucination of my dead Headmaster pretending to be Dazai.

Atsushi: Nothing in our lives makes sense.

Akutagawa: I suppose you’re right.

Atsushi: Oh man am I dead? Did you just admit that?

Akutagawa: Idiot you’re not allowed to die until I kill you.

Atsushi: Well I’m at least half way there-ow!

Akutagawa: Don’t even joke about that!

Atsushi: Okay ow! Jeez keep that up and I’ll start to think you were worried- stop kicking me!

Fyodor:…Did you get any of that?

Gozen shrugs.

Заебали

Morning routine before Greek class 🏛️ 📖

I think artworks are too kind to Richard’s hair, here is my lore-accurate nail scissors haircut for him.

Isn't writing romantic? You take pieces of yourself and others to Frankenstein into a character who will live longer than any of you. They will be immortalized because of your hand, your words, and your world, and even if readers 20 years from now don't understand, they will read the story and find themselves in the lines.