WOULD YOU DO IT?
Aug. 19th, 2013 09:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
burnadette_dpdlSo this is my irrepressibly longer response to tori_writes's post "CAPSLOCK FRIDAY: WOULD YOU DO IT? EDITION" http://vc-media.dreamwidth.org/221174.html. A person could write volumes of dissertation on this subject. Especially with the caveats that:
1. IF YOU ACCEPT, HOWEVER, YOU MUST LEAVE YOUR LIFE BEHIND. YOU AREN'T ALLOWED TO TURN ANYONE YOU KNEW OR EVER SEE THEM AGAIN. YOU CAN'T GO BACK FOR YOUR PETS OR FAKE YOUR DEATH OR DELETE YOUR INTERNET BROWSING HISTORY.
2. IF YOU SAY YES, THE VAMPIRE WILL WHISK YOU AWAY THEN AND THERE, AND YOU WILL HAVE TO REMAIN WITH THEM FOR AT LEAST 50 YEARS.
My publicly posted response, but in sentence case:
Had to wait for other people to post first, afraid to be the first to reply, for fear of attempting to be silly and it reading as flippant, or killing the post itself with a wall of text... So I'll try to keep it brief and go into more depth in my own damn journal, if anyone wants the larger wall of text to climb... XD
1. Would I do it? Yes! Of course. F*&k my family and friends, etc., lol. And I'd choose Louis. First of all, although he may appear weak, he's got strength enough. He's done it successfully twice. Further proof of strength: Aren't there sporadic references throughout the VC that he takes out any extraneous fledglings or vagabonds who dare to hunt New Orleans? And particularly appealing as targets if they have the brilliant idea to seek him or Lestat out (E.G., the fledglings and others circling the church holding a comatose Lestat in MtD). Plus, "the Dark Gift is different for each of us." So Louis could be a carrier of decent latent powers.
2. But more importantly, to get Louis in the position wherein he has to override his principles, he would have to be in that tantalizing state of bewitched devotion (E.G., Armand admitted to *pushing* Louis into giving it to Madeleine, and Merrick admitted to *pushing* him into giving it to her). To be on the receiving end of Louis' devotion, whether legitimate or not, would be intoxicating. Not even Lestat gets 100% devotion from Louis. Remember the tortured scene in TotBT in which Louis wouldn't give Lestat the Dark Gift. The ONE person Louis is supposed to be the MOST LEGITIMATELY DEVOTED TO. I've brought that scene up before, so I'll refrain from beating that particular dead horse. For NOW. Keeping the corpse for later...
3. So, choosing Louis, if I wanted Super Deluxe Brat Prince©®™ powers, too, seems that those are easily acquired as long as you know how to tease His Royal Bratness properly. One can argue that Merrick doesn't even count as canon, but she only had to exist as Louis' fledgling to be given Super Deluxe Brat Prince©®™ powers. Stat-y-pants loves to give that out. Stat-y-pants is a manwhore about giving that out. I think he lusts over the ACT of giving that out.
Okay, you want some more? Need to be plied with absinthe or a thimbleful of brandywine? Have some, then go to my damn journal. http://burnadette-dpdl.dreamwidth.org/1720.html
Longer response ACTIVATE:
But SERIOUSLY... I'm sure we've all considered such a question, with or without the caveats of divorcing your current life... if you're a hardcore VC fan, I would think that you would yearn to be part of the Coven of the Articulate. Somehow have a place within its particular flavor of love swirled with a ribbon of dark chocolatey tension... sprinkled with the spicy clashes... To exist with them, without interfering with the dynamics already there, would be to live in a kind of Wonderland.
As a friend of mine put it, and I will give her credit if she's willing to receive it: "As for having to cut yourself off from everyone you care about - yes, that would be painful. Selfish too, yes - but I sort of see it more as a hardship for ME, because I need those people in my life, than as a hardship for THEM, because they would miss me."
It's taken a long time to find my place, and to build those bonds with new friends and older ones, time and care to hold onto them over the years. To watch my family grow up and grow apart was painful, but it's the natural course of life. We all had to leave the nest someday. But we still return to it on occasion and even though the dynamics have changed, we still care about one another. I'm as separated from my brothers as Lestat felt, that they never really *got* him or cared to try. But he still sent them money and gifts when he had those things to give. Is he just a generous person? Maybe, but maybe he was also genuinely reaching out and trying to build a relationship with his family, if only from afar.
tori_writes's post "CAPSLOCK FRIDAY: WOULD YOU DO IT? EDITION" http://vc-media.dreamwidth.org/221174.html. A person could write volumes of dissertation on this subject. Especially with the caveats that:1. IF YOU ACCEPT, HOWEVER, YOU MUST LEAVE YOUR LIFE BEHIND. YOU AREN'T ALLOWED TO TURN ANYONE YOU KNEW OR EVER SEE THEM AGAIN. YOU CAN'T GO BACK FOR YOUR PETS OR FAKE YOUR DEATH OR DELETE YOUR INTERNET BROWSING HISTORY.
2. IF YOU SAY YES, THE VAMPIRE WILL WHISK YOU AWAY THEN AND THERE, AND YOU WILL HAVE TO REMAIN WITH THEM FOR AT LEAST 50 YEARS.
My publicly posted response, but in sentence case:
Had to wait for other people to post first, afraid to be the first to reply, for fear of attempting to be silly and it reading as flippant, or killing the post itself with a wall of text... So I'll try to keep it brief and go into more depth in my own damn journal, if anyone wants the larger wall of text to climb... XD
1. Would I do it? Yes! Of course. F*&k my family and friends, etc., lol. And I'd choose Louis. First of all, although he may appear weak, he's got strength enough. He's done it successfully twice. Further proof of strength: Aren't there sporadic references throughout the VC that he takes out any extraneous fledglings or vagabonds who dare to hunt New Orleans? And particularly appealing as targets if they have the brilliant idea to seek him or Lestat out (E.G., the fledglings and others circling the church holding a comatose Lestat in MtD). Plus, "the Dark Gift is different for each of us." So Louis could be a carrier of decent latent powers.
2. But more importantly, to get Louis in the position wherein he has to override his principles, he would have to be in that tantalizing state of bewitched devotion (E.G., Armand admitted to *pushing* Louis into giving it to Madeleine, and Merrick admitted to *pushing* him into giving it to her). To be on the receiving end of Louis' devotion, whether legitimate or not, would be intoxicating. Not even Lestat gets 100% devotion from Louis. Remember the tortured scene in TotBT in which Louis wouldn't give Lestat the Dark Gift. The ONE person Louis is supposed to be the MOST LEGITIMATELY DEVOTED TO. I've brought that scene up before, so I'll refrain from beating that particular dead horse. For NOW. Keeping the corpse for later...
3. So, choosing Louis, if I wanted Super Deluxe Brat Prince©®™ powers, too, seems that those are easily acquired as long as you know how to tease His Royal Bratness properly. One can argue that Merrick doesn't even count as canon, but she only had to exist as Louis' fledgling to be given Super Deluxe Brat Prince©®™ powers. Stat-y-pants loves to give that out. Stat-y-pants is a manwhore about giving that out. I think he lusts over the ACT of giving that out.
Okay, you want some more? Need to be plied with absinthe or a thimbleful of brandywine? Have some, then go to my damn journal. http://burnadette-dpdl.dreamwidth.org/1720.html
Longer response ACTIVATE:
But SERIOUSLY... I'm sure we've all considered such a question, with or without the caveats of divorcing your current life... if you're a hardcore VC fan, I would think that you would yearn to be part of the Coven of the Articulate. Somehow have a place within its particular flavor of love swirled with a ribbon of dark chocolatey tension... sprinkled with the spicy clashes... To exist with them, without interfering with the dynamics already there, would be to live in a kind of Wonderland.
As a friend of mine put it, and I will give her credit if she's willing to receive it: "As for having to cut yourself off from everyone you care about - yes, that would be painful. Selfish too, yes - but I sort of see it more as a hardship for ME, because I need those people in my life, than as a hardship for THEM, because they would miss me."
It's taken a long time to find my place, and to build those bonds with new friends and older ones, time and care to hold onto them over the years. To watch my family grow up and grow apart was painful, but it's the natural course of life. We all had to leave the nest someday. But we still return to it on occasion and even though the dynamics have changed, we still care about one another. I'm as separated from my brothers as Lestat felt, that they never really *got* him or cared to try. But he still sent them money and gifts when he had those things to give. Is he just a generous person? Maybe, but maybe he was also genuinely reaching out and trying to build a relationship with his family, if only from afar.
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Date: 2013-08-20 04:25 am (UTC)Which sort of ties in to the question of maintaining friendship or family bonds from "beyond the grave". I think this would also depend on how much you cared about the ones you left behind. Cutting off all contact might be tougher for you, but possibly also more merciful for them - because you couldn't really maintain the charade of "playing human" for very long, and sooner or later you would have to fake your death anyway, or just disappear without a trace and risk them losing their minds with worry (I'm thinking of Nicolas here). I think if I truly loved someone, I would rather believe them dead than know they are somewhere far away and all I'm ever going to see of them are gifts or money sent through the mail. That would make me feel like they don't give a shit and are just trying to appear magnanimous for their own sake. Just saying...
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Date: 2013-08-21 11:41 am (UTC)It's also interesting to flip things and imagine how that must have looked to the villagers, come the Revolution - they're getting by in whatever ways they can, while the lords take their greater wealth and security for granted so much that they can afford to run it down! Lestat hunted to keep his family alive, but it should never have come to that if they'd had a healthy estate (which would in turn have employed more people). I've got away from my point about the family, but you get the idea: there was a malaise there which Lestat, as part of his growth process, tried to break out of and fix in various ways, but finally had to leave altogether. I think that's very familiar to a lot of people from unhealthy family situations - as is his urge to give back to, and to raise up, what he's left behind.
I wonder how things would have worked out if his family had all escaped the Revolution. Would they all have come with his father and ended up with Lestat and Louis? Would that have stabilised the situation (giving Louis a substitute for the mortal family he was losing by degrees) or worsened it?
significance of gifts
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