Free Associating

My current "back to my roots" Highlander fannish revival has spun off into a slightly embarrassing cul-de-sac. I spent most of my afternoon hunting down the very few Queen of Swords fics out there. Helm/Montoya, naturally, because really, what's the point of having Peter Wingfield and Valentine Pelka on the screen snarking and making eyes at each other if you're not going to slash them? It's Methos/Kronos lite! Now, with 30% less chance of either one dying or the world messily ending!

The thing is, with a guilty pleasure period piece like QoS, what little fic exists tends to be on the purple side of prose, so reading them is a bit like wallowing in the kinky, gay versions of the sort of pulp romance usually called Her Pirate Lover or The Savage's Bride. Not bad, for what they are, but not my usual thing. I feel so trashy. Still, there's something irresistible about poor Dr. Helm being kidnapped (again) by Montoya's pirate ex-lover and Montoya sailing to the rescue while denying his feelings manfully (because he's a baddie and doesn’t feel love, not him, no sirree). It's like eating a whole pint of Ben & Jerry's- it'll probably make you queasy, and it isn't very good for you, but it sure is fun while it lasts.

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Speaking of trashy romances, a while ago derryderrydown mentioned Rosemary Sutcliff's Blood and Sand, not a book I knew previously (and not a trashy romance, but I’m getting to that part), and one that I now want to read. The title Blood and Sand, though, is one I know, as a 1922 silent film about a toreador and his lovers, starring Rudolph Valentino and Nita Naldi (superior to the '41 remake, which has a great cast including the luscious Rita Hayworth, but which loses lots of points for starring Tyrone Power. Feh). That made me think of the first Valentino film I ever saw, arguably the the Valentino film, The Sheik.

So that's a lot of free associating that led me to my current nightstand reading material, the book version of The Sheik, written in 1921 by E.M. Hull (must have been a big seller, too- it went through 37 printings that year alone). It was an antique store purchase several years ago but I've never read it 'til now. And whoo nellie, is it a read...

If you've seen the movie, you know it's your basic "fair-but-cold innocent English aristocrat kidnapped by savage sheik to satisfy his nefarious desires, because he's foreign and hot-blooded and doesn't know any better" plot. Gotta love those early-twentieth-century racial and sexual politics. It's all appalling, of course, but it's also so melodramatic that it's funny, all swooning and sinister leers and "Oh, you brute! You brute!" she wailed, until his kisses silenced her. But it all works out okay in the end (I'm recklessly spoiling here) because A- being a weak-willed woman, Diana naturally falls in love with this masterful man who has awakened her sleeping passions (that's how they talk in this thing! All the time!), and B- he's not really an Arab. He's English/Spanish. So he's, you know, foreign, but not too foreign.

If my eyes rolled any further back in my head, I'd never see again, but I can't stop reading it. It's just... fascinating.

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My sister left for Spain today, where she'll be doing geology-type things for two weeks in the Pyrenees. I'm really happy for her, since she's never been to Spain, she loves geology (she starts grad school in it this fall) and it sounds like a fun trip. I'm also really, really jealous. The North Country is emphatically not Spain. Yet here I am. Alas. Have fun, sis!

Actually, come to think of it, this has been a very Spanish post. Queen of Swords was filmed there, Blood and Sand was set there, the Sheik's mom was Spanish, my sister is off to play there, and I'm listening to flamenco guitar. I feel like one of those educational segments on Sesame Street. Except for the pirates and the ravishing and the m/m smut, that is.

And speaking of pirates, ( my pirate quiz results, nicked from... I forget completely. Oops. )