in the tumblr tagging system, unsourced artwork is considered especially heinous. on this blogging platform, the users who source these felonies are part of an elite task force called the source your fucking artwork unit. these are their stories.
Finally, a week after my arrival, I found David in the empty Rijksmuseum, just after sunset, sitting on the bench before the great Rembrandt portrait of the Members of the Drapers’ Guild.
The Tale Of The Body Thief – Anne Rice
I went to the Rijksmuseum today and I brought my book with me just to take this picture. I like to imagine Lestat really stood at the exact spot where I was standing today.
I’m not fishing for attention, but I think @i-want-my-iwtv might want to look at this because it’s VC related.
This is absolutely VC related!! Vampires appreciating the hell out of and talking about art is one of my favorite things ❤
“The faces
are exquisitely beautiful, full of wisdom and gentleness and a near angelic
patience. Indeed, these men more resemble angels than ordinary men.
They
seemed possessed of a great secret, and if all men were to learn that secret,
there would be no more wars or
vice or malice on earth. How did such persons ever become members of the
Drapers’ Guild of Amsterdam
in the 1600s?
…’Are
there any vampires in this world who have such faces?’ [David] asked. He
gestured to the men staring down at us from the canvas. ‘I am speaking of
the knowledge and understanding which lies behind these faces. I’m speaking of
something more indicative of immortality than a preternatural body anatomically
dependent upon the drinking of human blood.’
‘Vampires
with such faces?’ I responded. ‘David, that is unfair. There are no
men with such faces. There never
were.
Look at
any of Rembrandt’s paintings. Absurd to believe that such people ever existed,
let alone that Amsterdam was full of them in Rembrandt’s time, that every man
or woman who ever darkened his door was an angel. No, it’s Rembrandt you see in
these faces, and Rembrandt is immortal, of course.’ ”– Lestat, The Tale Of The Body Thief
In a purely literary sense, fanfic doesn’t exist. There is only fiction. Fanfic is a legal category created by the modern system of trademarks and copyrights. Putting that label on a work of fiction says nothing about its quality, its creativity, or the intent of the writer who created it.
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction this year went to March, a novel by Geraldine Brooks, published by Viking. It’s a re-imagining of the life of the father of the four March girls in Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. Can you see a particle of difference between that and a work of declared fanfiction? I can’t. I can only see two differences: first, Louisa May Alcott is out of copyright; and second, Louisa May Alcott, Geraldine Brooks, and Viking are dreadfully respectable.
I’m just a tad cynical about authors who rage against fanfic. Their own work may be original to them, but even if their writing is so outre that it’s barely readable, they’ll still be using tropes and techniques and conventions they picked up from other writers. We have a system that counts some borrowings as legitimate, others as illegitimate. They stick with the legit sort, but they’re still writing out of and into the shared web of literature. They’re not so different as all that.
While I don’t roleplay as any Italian Renaissance characters, it is one of my areas of knowledge and I have many books that I think would be helpful or useful to the roleplayer who wishes to add historical, political, economic, and intellectual context to their work.
Lisa Jardine & Jerry Brotton, Global Interests: Renaissance Art Between East and West
Highly recommended for any Armand player. Explains how Ottoman Empire and Venice interacted through economic and cultural exchange. Lots of stuff to be learned here, and just a great and easy read. If you can’t get to anything else in the book, at least get the preface and the first chapter (I think; it’s been years since I’ve read it though I remember all the lecture slides), which give a great summary and taster about the topic and the authors’ approach. You probably would want to continue after that. This is one of my favorite books.
Gene Brucker, Florence: The Golden Age, 1138-1737
Tons of pictures, giant book, great survey of the feel of the time period.
Joanne M. Ferraro, Marriage Wars in Late Renaissance Venice (2001)
Venetians be suing each other, guys, all the freakin’ time, over marriage contracts. First-person stuff, lots of records, it’s awesome and lively and oh my god how sassy must Armand have gotten?
Okay to be honest, it’s mostly legal gossip, actual depositions, legal records, etc. Give it a skip if you really don’t care about he-said-she-said.
Jerry Brotton, The Renaissance Bazaar: From The Silk Road to Michelangelo (2002)
Really lively read about how Armand probably shopped, told by a recently deceased scholar who was a giant of European Renaissance history. Really cool depiction of how East and West exchanged culture and also created some serious problems that we deal with today.
Ulinka Rublack, Dressing Up: Cultural Identity in Renaissance Europe (2010)
Because Bianca’s pearls in her hair and Armand’s hose and doublet meant something. Also, lots of fun pictures here, and you can imagine the various costumes Marius would have used to disguise, perform, and hint at a different identity.
Lisa Jardine, Worldly Goods
Super awesome street-smart history (with pictures) about how multicultural the economics of Ottoman Empire-infused Italy was. Just super cool and wide-reaching.
Heather Gregory, Selected Letters of Alessandra Strozzi
Probably the best book for figuring out what Marius would have nagged Armand and Ricardo about. It’s this awesome Italian lady who just writes letters to her sons nagging them about stuff they forgot to do.
Francesco Petrarca (trans. David Marsh), Invectives
Stop giving Armand boring essays to read for homework, Marius.
Jon Thiem, Lorenzo de’ Medici: Selected Poems and Prose (1992)
Lorenzo really liked making dick jokes. Let Armand write some, too!
Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Artists and Painters
Pretty much Vasari going around Italy throwing shade at everyone and gossiping.
Paolo Uccello really hated cheese and Michelangelo was a dick who snatched really nice pieces of wood from competitors by auctioning early.
Peter Robb, M: The Man Who Became Caravaggio
To be honest, this is a pretty controversial biography of Caravaggio, or as Robb claims, “Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio”.
It’s Caravaggio shittalking, dueling, and fucking his way across Italy until the fuzz finally comes after him. Oh, and he apologizes to his patrons a lot and then paints horse butts next to priest faces, so this book kind of made him my childhood hero.
Books I have NOT read but know of:
Guido Ruggerio, The Boundaries of Eros: Sex, Crime, and Sexuality in Renaissance Venice
Find out if Marius (and those gold-painted giggling guys testing Armand) were legit.
Judith Brown, Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy
I think this is just a fun title about an important topic that probably gets ignored a lot.
Michael Rocke, Forbidden Friendships: Homosexuality and Male Culture in Renaissance Florence
I have more sources I can recommend, but these are nice to get started and were sitting on my bookshelf.
Some have expressed interest in what sources I use for references to the Royal Maréchausée or Nicolas’ political views or assignat inflation debates or les Amis de la Verité. Much of it is an accumulation of a lifetime of interest, but here are some good sources to get started:
Maria Linton, Choosing Terror: Virtue, Friendship and Authenticity in the French Revolution (2013)
How do a bunch of well-meaning dudes end up guillotining people who just look at them funny later?
Mark Darlow, Staging the French Revolution: Cultural Politics and the Paris Opéra, 1789-1794 (2012)
Really amazing archival research showing how cultural discourse via performances were key to forming public opinion, even though the state had a super-monopoly on what got to be performed.
Remember how Lestat talks about how Renaud’s isn’t really legit and the Comédie Française is where all the legit actors perform? It’s because of the government, y’all.
William Doyle, Aristocracy and its Enemies in the Age of Revolution (2009)
Traces the beginning of the decline of nobility and the effects of naming a particular group “the aristocracy”.
He also wrote a very short history called Old Regime France that’s worth a read if you care about 1648-1788 France, back when Lestat’s dad would have been important.
William Doyle’s actually kind of the ultimate first word in French Revolution survey work. He wrote the Oxford History of the French Revolution and he wastes no time with presenting really accessible detailed information that will give you a good feel for the era.
Jeremy Jennings, Revolution and the Republic: A History of Political Thought in France since the Eighteenth Century (2011)
Really huge survey of intellectual history, political theory, sociocultural history, and political economy.
Charles Walton, Policing Public Opinion in the French Revolution: The Culture of Calumny and the Problem of Free Speech (2009)
Really impressive analysis of how censorship during the French Revolution really messes up ancien regime and new republic troubles.
If you don’t have a lot of time, the Very Short Introductions series has great brief reads on aristocracy and the French Revolution.
Alistair Horne, Seven Ages of Paris
Super sassy and gossipy exploration of Paris from the very beginning. Great research but lots of in-jokes about Bourbons and Plantagenets and stuff and not enough teasing of the Carolingians but I’ll deal. Not great for a first-time history read, but good if you have some foundational knowledge of French history. Just a fun book.
Joan DeJean, How Paris Became Paris: The Invention of the Modern City
I haven’t read this one! But it’s on my reading list.
Baroness Emma Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel
A novel! But very good for the feel of an era. Also known as the further adventures of Lestat. Very fast read, guilty pleasure, dashing about France, and it even has mistaken identity comedy!
Rafael Sabatini, Scaramouche
Another novel! Basically Nicolas tries to avenge a friend’s murder and fucks up really badly.
Books I haven’t read but mean to:
R.R. Palmer, The Twelve Who Ruled: The Year of the Terror in the French Revolution
Yes, that Robert Roswell Palmer, the guy who wrote the Palmer & Colton European history textbook everybody lugs around in high school. He’s a fantastic and engaging writer with just the right amount of information to make you feel like a native in that time period. I can’t wait to read this book.
I think he wrote a book called Catholics and Unbelievers about the same period.
Simon Schama, Citizens
Apparently really comprehensive from pre-Revolution all the way through Thermidor.
Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution
He wrote this huge 4-part history of the world and I hear it’s a great way to contextualize what was happening in France. So, probably use this for figuring out what Nicolas felt about Italy and England, and why Lestat sent Renaud’s troupe to good ‘ol Blighty.
I-want-my-IWTV 