labingi: (Default)
[personal profile] labingi
Continuing the Mabinogion Tetrology discussion started here.

Walton's adaptation of the Fourth Branch of the Welsh Mabinogi is her first major book, written in the 1930s, and this may be why it's a bit rough. It also inherits an oddly structured, complex story and navigates it faithfully. It's an ambitious attempt at adding modern psychological depth and realism to this tale, and it's a great idea but not successfully executed, in my opinion. For me as a non-Welsh, lay reader, this is an endeavor that deserves to be redone. The potential is there, but the story falters for two main reasons: too much telling vs. showing and the fact that it's just hard to write a compelling story about unlikable characters.

See my previous post for a spoilery summary. Spoilery thoughts follow... Read more... )

Aten't dead

Oct. 4th, 2025 10:40 pm
dhampyresa: (Default)
[personal profile] dhampyresa
Wish I could blame being tired on giving platelets earlier this week, but no, it is La Maladie TM. And the less said about that the better.


Things I've been enjoying recently:

- L and I finished watching Arcane recently and now I have brainrot.

- T and I are watching Andor (currently on s2e3). It's fine? With occasional moments of great, but somehow I expected more. Hype got me, mea culpa.

- The colours of K-Pop Demon Hunters made my brain go brrrrrrrrrr.

- I've fallen back into the SCP Foundation hole, to no one's surprise. My hole, made for me, etc. I wonder if I could make a rec list?

- The pilot for Knights of Guinevere was fun!

- The first 5 seasons of the White Vault podcast (I've not listened to more yet). I'm not sure it does anything new with eldritch beings but it is well done.

- Did I ever do a proper rec post for the music of The Mechanisms? I should.

- October means it's Short Box Comics Fair. As ever I don't know where to start.

- The two issues of the Sing O Muse zine.

The Missing Madonna is a true crime podcast mini-series that's not about murder.


There should be more. But alas.

Anyway, soon the yuletide tagset will be out and that's kind of like a rec list, innit?
labingi: (Default)
[personal profile] labingi
I have just finished The Mabinogion Tetrology by Evangeline Walton, compiled novelizations of the Four Branches of the medieval Welsh Mabinogi. I highly recommend this work to fantasy fans who like tie-ins to traditional stories and don't mind a non-scholarly approach from a cultural outsider (Walton was American). It's a very "faithful" adaptation in that it takes virtually nothing out. The Four Branches themselves are just a few pages each, so Walton interpolates a lot, clearly from a 20th-century cultural standpoint (including idolization of "progress" and a surprising amount of Buddhism). One book was published in the 1930s, the others in the 1970s. The whole work is about 650 pages long, with the first three branches being novellas and the fourth a short novel.

Speaking as a cultural outsider and lay reader myself, I think she does this quite well. Specifically, I think she does good work with the First Branch (The Prince of Annwn), and the Second (The Children of Llyr) and Third (The Song of Rhiannon) are among the most engaging and rewarding works I've read in a very long time! The Fourth Branch (The Island of the Mighty, a.k.a. The Virgin and the Swine), which was the first she wrote, is hit and miss for me but still worth reading. The whole work is generally quite feminist; I have no doubt was a huge influence on The Mists of Avalon.Spoilery review follows...Read more... )

I made a link!

Sep. 30th, 2025 07:16 pm
labingi: (Default)
[personal profile] labingi
I was trying to figure out how to create a link to a ticket site for our Ursula K. Le Guin Birthday Event. (Come on by if you're near Portland, Oregon!) And the very old program we use to post updates was baffling me. I kept clicking around all the many, many menu options for where to add a link.

Then, I uncovered a note that I could use "unfiltered HTML."

"Can it be," I wondered, "that I could just type in an actual HTML tag?"

And, lo, it worked!

The only reason I remember how to do this after 20 years is Dreamwidth, where I do this regularly (and nowhere else). Thank you, Dreamwidth!

Human Kindness!

Sep. 25th, 2025 07:51 am
labingi: (Default)
[personal profile] labingi
7:45 am, and I have already been the recipient of human kindness. Asked the fellow at disability center if they could convert PDFs to Word for me so to spare me screen time during a chronic pain flare. He said the center doesn't do that, but he understands chronic pain & would do it personally. All my gratitude to this caring man!