So there I am on one of the various facebook writing groups I frequent, and someone starts an "unpopular opinions" thread. This was already never going to end well, obviously.
It doesn't take long for someone to throw in "sexuality can be unimportant". I roll my eyes, because if any trope in the world is overdone, cishet privilege about what constitutes importance is overdone.
And then this guy in the comments agrees, and says that there are stories that don't call for it in the slightest - "The Hobbit for one".
And obviously, this is true! The Hobbit doesn't mention sexuality at all!
... um, until page 4.
"...long ago one of the Took ancestors must have taken a fairy wife."
Oops.
But that's the only one, right?
... no, not even the only one on that page.
"Not that Belladonna Took ever had any adventures after she became Mrs. Bungo Baggins."*
Oops again.
I could go on, but I'd only end up re-reading the whole of The Hobbit tonight and that wouldn't get this blog post written. Suffice to say that sexual orientation is referenced numerous times in The Hobbit.
"That's not sexuality!" cry the usual suspects.
Oh, no?
If the descriptions of Bilbo's various ancestors and relatives had mentioned one of his aunts taking a fairy wife, they'd call it sexuality, and probably cry about tokenism / corrupting children / the Gay Agenda, or whatever it is they're currently crying about.
"Sexuality" in books isn't just for LGBTQ+ people.
The fact that you don't see opposite-sex relationships as "sexuality" is an artefact of history and of your straight privilege, I get it. And it's hard to start seeing the wood for the trees, to get your eye in and notice what's been in plain sight all along. It's natural that you're going to feel a bit weird at first about seeing non-straight sexuality represented as casually and equally as straight sexuality has always been. Your discomfort is noted.
But.
Could.
We.
Just.
Move.
On.
Already.
Please.
* There is of course nothing to say that Belladonna Took was not bisexual, or indeed a lesbian hobbit who only married Bungo to preserve her reputation, and oh gods stop me before I write this fanfic
Tuesday 16 October 2018
Thursday 27 September 2018
It's just a...
I have seen so many sentences start with that three-word phrase lately.
It's just a joke
It's just a cartoon
It's just a song
It's just a TV show
It's just a book
It's just a costume
It's just a movie
Stop it.
It bloody isn't.
Cultural expressions (which I am going to use as a catch-all for the things listed above and anything like them) do not spring out of a vacuum. They not fall from the sky, devoid of earthly context. They are not meaningless, they are not neutral, and they are certainly not harmless.
Cultural expressions are exactly what it says on the tin: ways of expressing the culture from which they spring. They are firmly rooted in the mores of that culture. They define in-groups and out-groups: even if they take a counter-culture stance and push back against those classifications, they must still define them in order to pick at them. They are the way in which a culture maintains itself, both promoting its beliefs and policing them.
Nothing is "just". The subtext is everything. And it's okay to ask questions about that. In fact, it's crucial that we do.
We need to ask why it's funny to joke about how women are "bad drivers" when its provably incorrect. What does that mean about our society?
We need to ask why calling a cartoon racist upsets people more than a cartoon being racist. What does that say about who we wish to protect most?
We need to ask why we're not uncomfortable with creepy songs about men stalking women in the name of romance. What are we as a society hoping to achieve with these songs, and to benefit whom?
We need to ask why the first sacrificial character in yet another TV show is the sole representative of a disability group, whose disability exists in the story to make them vulnerable to the attack. What does this story teach us about who is valued?
We need to ask why a book where a woman's consent is repeatedly overridden in a heterosexual relationship is considered a titillating fun read, while books about consenting same-sex relationships are banned as obscene. What moral standards matter to us?
We need to ask why using a real culture as a Hallowe'en costume is a standard while members of that culture wearing their own costume in daily life is frowned upon. Whose skins are for wearing and whose are for being worn?
We need to ask why a children's movie franchise can be dripping in complicated and largely unnecessary heterosexual relationships but a hard line is drawn against showing one same-sex relationship in the same franchise. Who decides what's 'safe' for children to see and know?
... I mean, we know the answer to all of these, don't we. Our society is still sexist and racist and ableist and homophobic at its core.
That's why we must ask, and ask, and keep asking.
We need to ask whether it's good enough.
Is it good enough for children and adults with disabilities to only see themselves represented as inspiration porn or sacrificial lambs?
Is it good enough for non-straight people to only exist as tragic outcomes or dirty secrets?
Is it good enough for children and adults of colour to only see themselves in big franchises on the periphery or on the side of evil?
Is it good enough to relegate women to the same roles and tropes again, and again and AGAIN and AGAIN?
Is this story... this comfortable old story about straight white mostly-male people with some token others thrown in to be lost in dramatic circumstances or to stand in as shorthand for evil... the way we want to see ourselves?
Is it good enough?
Cultural expressions deserve our closest scrutiny. They are our deeply-held beliefs leaking out at the seams and making themselves manifest in the world. At the very least, we owe it to the vulnerable and the oppressed and the under-represented to examine how we include or exclude them from those stories. At the very least, we owe it to ourselves to ask the hard questions and hear the hard answers.
Stop making excuses when people scrutinise cultural expressions and ask whether their representation is good enough. Stop getting defensive when people criticise racism, ableism, sexism, homophobia and the rest. Stop having hysterics just because someone asked you to see it from someone else's point of view, or to put yourself in their shoes and consider how it might look to them.
It's just a question.
It's just a joke
It's just a cartoon
It's just a song
It's just a TV show
It's just a book
It's just a costume
It's just a movie
Stop it.
It bloody isn't.
Cultural expressions (which I am going to use as a catch-all for the things listed above and anything like them) do not spring out of a vacuum. They not fall from the sky, devoid of earthly context. They are not meaningless, they are not neutral, and they are certainly not harmless.
Cultural expressions are exactly what it says on the tin: ways of expressing the culture from which they spring. They are firmly rooted in the mores of that culture. They define in-groups and out-groups: even if they take a counter-culture stance and push back against those classifications, they must still define them in order to pick at them. They are the way in which a culture maintains itself, both promoting its beliefs and policing them.
Nothing is "just". The subtext is everything. And it's okay to ask questions about that. In fact, it's crucial that we do.
We need to ask why it's funny to joke about how women are "bad drivers" when its provably incorrect. What does that mean about our society?
We need to ask why calling a cartoon racist upsets people more than a cartoon being racist. What does that say about who we wish to protect most?
We need to ask why we're not uncomfortable with creepy songs about men stalking women in the name of romance. What are we as a society hoping to achieve with these songs, and to benefit whom?
We need to ask why the first sacrificial character in yet another TV show is the sole representative of a disability group, whose disability exists in the story to make them vulnerable to the attack. What does this story teach us about who is valued?
We need to ask why a book where a woman's consent is repeatedly overridden in a heterosexual relationship is considered a titillating fun read, while books about consenting same-sex relationships are banned as obscene. What moral standards matter to us?
We need to ask why using a real culture as a Hallowe'en costume is a standard while members of that culture wearing their own costume in daily life is frowned upon. Whose skins are for wearing and whose are for being worn?
We need to ask why a children's movie franchise can be dripping in complicated and largely unnecessary heterosexual relationships but a hard line is drawn against showing one same-sex relationship in the same franchise. Who decides what's 'safe' for children to see and know?
... I mean, we know the answer to all of these, don't we. Our society is still sexist and racist and ableist and homophobic at its core.
That's why we must ask, and ask, and keep asking.
We need to ask whether it's good enough.
Is it good enough for children and adults with disabilities to only see themselves represented as inspiration porn or sacrificial lambs?
Is it good enough for non-straight people to only exist as tragic outcomes or dirty secrets?
Is it good enough for children and adults of colour to only see themselves in big franchises on the periphery or on the side of evil?
Is it good enough to relegate women to the same roles and tropes again, and again and AGAIN and AGAIN?
Is this story... this comfortable old story about straight white mostly-male people with some token others thrown in to be lost in dramatic circumstances or to stand in as shorthand for evil... the way we want to see ourselves?
Is it good enough?
Cultural expressions deserve our closest scrutiny. They are our deeply-held beliefs leaking out at the seams and making themselves manifest in the world. At the very least, we owe it to the vulnerable and the oppressed and the under-represented to examine how we include or exclude them from those stories. At the very least, we owe it to ourselves to ask the hard questions and hear the hard answers.
Stop making excuses when people scrutinise cultural expressions and ask whether their representation is good enough. Stop getting defensive when people criticise racism, ableism, sexism, homophobia and the rest. Stop having hysterics just because someone asked you to see it from someone else's point of view, or to put yourself in their shoes and consider how it might look to them.
It's just a question.
Sunday 1 October 2017
Intolerance, Tolerance, Acceptance
The three faces of the Equal Marriage debate
Despite my sexuality, it's not often I find myself feeling like part of a persecuted minority. Incidents of direct discrimination have been rare, and living in the UK since coming out (where civil partnerships were long-standing and same-sex marriage followed) has cushioned me from most experiences of being a second-class citizen.
The same-sex marriage "debate" in Australia has brought this safe space crashing down.
For the uninitiated, the situation is thus: the homophobic, heavily fundamentalist-influenced conservative Australian government, facing increasing pressure to allow a free conscience vote on an act to introduce same-sex marriage, decided instead to hold a non-binding postal plebiscite to gauge the public's mood. This was in spite of a number of well-conducted polls indicating majority support, and in spite of the dire warnings by a number of charities and lobby groups that this would open an extremely negative can of worms. Forging cruelly ahead, they have decided to give validity to the idea that it's okay to vote on other peoples' human rights.
Fun time to be a non-straight Australian.
Predictably, intolerance hasn't been hard to spot. The bigots' campaign has been as nasty as it's been illogical, accusing non-straight people of everything from child abuse to trying to destroy western society entirely. They've used the usual slew of made-up "statistics" and outrageous claims, peppering news feeds, letterboxes and windscreens with vileness across the nation. My exposure to it has thankfully, through distance and a carefully curated social media environment, been limited to seeing my friends and groups complaining about the horror of it.
Where I have found heartbreak (and I think my friends have too, straight and not) has not been on the line between intolerance and tolerance, but on the line between tolerance and acceptance.
For a long time now, Australia has been a society that is broadly tolerant of non-straight people. Apart from the vicious conservative fringe who are currently having a field day, most Australians accept that non-straight people exist, have jobs, have families, contribute to society. Gay pride parades are enthusiastically attended; civic buildings have been known to fly the rainbow flag; homophobic hate crimes are relatively rare. The overwhelming opinion is that being non-straight should not mean you are allowed to be harmed. Tolerance says, "You are allowed to live amongst us unmolested", and Australians have largely got that down pat.
Acceptance is something else. Acceptance says "you ARE us", and it is at this hurdle that I have lost friends and my friends have lost friends. This is the mundane rejection that stings most cruelly and has infiltrated every part of our daily social media life.
It's the hurdle of "I have nothing against gay people, but..."
It's the hurdle of "Why would they WANT to get married if they don't want to be like straight people?"
It's the hurdle of "Can't they just call it something else?"
It's the hurdle of "The etymology of marriage says..."
It's the hurdle of "I'm not religious but..."
It's the hurdle of "They already have de facto legal protection..."
It's the hurdle of "Traditionally, marriage has been..."
It's the hurdle of "Aren't there more important problems to solve?"
These are the people who have never unfriended me over my sexuality (there were a few who did, long ago, or who I unfriended when I discovered their views). They've been quite comfortable staying my friend, interacting with me, heart-reacting my posts about my stepson, asking and answering parenting questions, cheering on each others' achievements... all the while believing that I should not be married, that I was a second-class citizen, that I was not deserving of rights that they took for granted.
They're the people who would never say a bigoted word in their life, who would meet my wife with absolute pleasantness and grace, but will quietly return a 'no' vote because their pastor says so.
They're the people who are completely unable to connect their "I love you, but these are my beliefs" with the dehumanising viciousness of the 'no' campaign.
They're the people who, when pressed, will admit that they feel that marriage is the exclusive province of straight people, but will recoil from your response as though you have harmed them.
Acceptance means admitting that the people you're tolerating to walk amongst you are actually... people. Just people, who want to have access to the things that people do, like get married. It's been a shock to discover just how many people - nice, "tolerant" people who would protest vigorously against non-straight people being harmed - believe that giving non-straight people access to important social institutions like marriage is a step too far.
It's not enough to tolerate those who are different to you, allowing them to live in your world but refusing them access to its most significant social rites of passage. I am shattered from the effort of trying to convince people who apparently like me but do not understand that.
Thursday 1 December 2016
NaNoYesIDid
30 days, a massive sleep deficit, large quantities of rum balls, small quantities of creme de cacao, 17 chapters, at least one scene that was only there to get me over the word count, and 50,037 words. I did it!
Not only did I win NaNoWriMo, but I've completed a full novella this time. Being YA means the word count can be a little shorter than your average novel, though I might well expand it significantly when I come to edit it. I'm not touching it again until January, to give it a good long simmering time first.
I think some parts of it are actually quite good. Several people want to see it and/or the drafted bits and pieces of The Damn Novel, but I'm still a little scared to set them free. Maybe next year ;)
I think I'm going to go compose music and do Christmassy things for a few weeks, then I might just start working on The Damn Novel again.
Monday 4 July 2016
Power
Once upon a time, there was a man who wanted to be in Power. He had some Power but it wasn't the one he wanted. His friend from school had the Power he wanted, so he was jealous and sad.
One day, the man came across a peaceful field in which a cart and a team of horses had been left. The horses were wearing labels, which read xenophobia, poverty, disengagement and class propaganda. The man looked at the horses and thought:
"I could drive these all the way to Power!"
So he gathered up his friends, and they stuck new labels on the horses, so they all said the same thing: LEAVE. It had to be in capitals, you see. Then they painted some lies on the side of the cart and set off towards Power.
The cart went slowly at first, but the horses were strong, and soon it was rattling along at an alarming speed. Up ahead, the gates of Power loomed.
"Are we sure about this?" asked a few small voices.
"Of course! We're nearly there!" cried the others.
In the middle of the night, with a startling crash, the man and his cart broke through the beautiful gates and into Power. The horses shook themselves free of the reins and started running around, trampling everything in their path. As they did so, the man and his friends looked around in dismay. Not even counting the damage that the horses had done, Power was not the luxurious land they had imagined. I fact, it was a miserable wasteland.
"What's happened here?" the man demanded of the only person he could see. It was his old school friend, who shrugged and climbed off his mouldering throne.
"It was fine until you lot got here," he said, and he wandered off out of the gates.
The man looked at the throne, but it didn't look quite so good any more, while the land outside the gates looked as green and pleasant as ever. With a resigned sigh, the man turned and walked back out of the gates again. Behind him, the throne cowered as his friends crowded around it, pushing and shoving each other and occasionally shouting at the horses.
As the man vanished back into the countryside, one last person got out of the cart. He patted the lie painted on the side affectionately, spent some time glancing between the throne and the green land, then made up his mind.
"I'm going too!" he shouted, but no one cared.
One day, the man came across a peaceful field in which a cart and a team of horses had been left. The horses were wearing labels, which read xenophobia, poverty, disengagement and class propaganda. The man looked at the horses and thought:
"I could drive these all the way to Power!"
So he gathered up his friends, and they stuck new labels on the horses, so they all said the same thing: LEAVE. It had to be in capitals, you see. Then they painted some lies on the side of the cart and set off towards Power.
The cart went slowly at first, but the horses were strong, and soon it was rattling along at an alarming speed. Up ahead, the gates of Power loomed.
"Are we sure about this?" asked a few small voices.
"Of course! We're nearly there!" cried the others.
In the middle of the night, with a startling crash, the man and his cart broke through the beautiful gates and into Power. The horses shook themselves free of the reins and started running around, trampling everything in their path. As they did so, the man and his friends looked around in dismay. Not even counting the damage that the horses had done, Power was not the luxurious land they had imagined. I fact, it was a miserable wasteland.
"What's happened here?" the man demanded of the only person he could see. It was his old school friend, who shrugged and climbed off his mouldering throne.
"It was fine until you lot got here," he said, and he wandered off out of the gates.
The man looked at the throne, but it didn't look quite so good any more, while the land outside the gates looked as green and pleasant as ever. With a resigned sigh, the man turned and walked back out of the gates again. Behind him, the throne cowered as his friends crowded around it, pushing and shoving each other and occasionally shouting at the horses.
As the man vanished back into the countryside, one last person got out of the cart. He patted the lie painted on the side affectionately, spent some time glancing between the throne and the green land, then made up his mind.
"I'm going too!" he shouted, but no one cared.
Monday 6 June 2016
Palette
Recently, I've been treating myself to a re-watch of Babylon 5. I missed this iconic 1990s Sci Fi series on its first run, and was only introduced to it a decade after it first aired; this is the first time I've watched it since.
One of the things that struck me on this viewing was how much the colours and soundtrack reflect the ambience of the 1990s. Pan flutes and orchestral bell glissandi fill the background; the walls are a mottling of blues, purples and pinks; the technology is built around crystals.
It feels like being 16 again.
The New Age tenor of the 1990s was one that drew me in as a teenager. I remember the scent of incense in the air, whale song and pan flute relaxation music in the background, cheesecloth and stretch velveteen, crystal pendants, blue-purple paintings of fairies touching noses with dolphins under a mystic moon. Sun-drenched days when my friends and I would take the train to Fremantle, eat ice cream from waffle cones in South Terrace Piazza, and lose ourselves in the (often unattainably expensive) mixture of cute, eclectic, romantic, spiritual and mystic wares in The Pickled Fairy, Ark of Joan and Into Camelot. Back then, every shopping centre had its "crystal shop" packed with geodes and prisms, slices of dyed agate, figurines of every mystic tradition from Ireland to Peru and back again, candles and oil burners, books and CDs, and cheap silver jewellery. I bought it, too... I had candles galore, crystals at every window, Tony O'Connor cassettes, glittery posters, cheesecloth outfits. Perhaps mercifully, I don't have any pictures handy to prove it. Have a very 90s fairy figurine instead:
It's easy enough to create a sensory experience when you have the senses to play with, but it's more challenging when all you have is words. In fantasy, it's so easy to fall into the sensory shortcuts that the reader recognises - the pseudo-Europe of cold stone castles and oak trees. The Kingdom of the Sunset Sea is no such place. It's a sun-drenched land of red gravel and eucalyptus, of hot thunderstorms and dust, of cubic plaster houses and domed turrets replete with geometric designs. Every time I edit, I see more places where I can hint at the palette that paints the ten-towered world.
One of the things that struck me on this viewing was how much the colours and soundtrack reflect the ambience of the 1990s. Pan flutes and orchestral bell glissandi fill the background; the walls are a mottling of blues, purples and pinks; the technology is built around crystals.
It feels like being 16 again.
The New Age tenor of the 1990s was one that drew me in as a teenager. I remember the scent of incense in the air, whale song and pan flute relaxation music in the background, cheesecloth and stretch velveteen, crystal pendants, blue-purple paintings of fairies touching noses with dolphins under a mystic moon. Sun-drenched days when my friends and I would take the train to Fremantle, eat ice cream from waffle cones in South Terrace Piazza, and lose ourselves in the (often unattainably expensive) mixture of cute, eclectic, romantic, spiritual and mystic wares in The Pickled Fairy, Ark of Joan and Into Camelot. Back then, every shopping centre had its "crystal shop" packed with geodes and prisms, slices of dyed agate, figurines of every mystic tradition from Ireland to Peru and back again, candles and oil burners, books and CDs, and cheap silver jewellery. I bought it, too... I had candles galore, crystals at every window, Tony O'Connor cassettes, glittery posters, cheesecloth outfits. Perhaps mercifully, I don't have any pictures handy to prove it. Have a very 90s fairy figurine instead:
 |
| Given to me at Christmas 1992. Her name is Lilia. I shouldn't really still know that, right? Photo: CSF |
Thursday 26 November 2015
Not a win, but a drabble...
Some years, there's just nothing you can do.
It's been a very bad November here in the Seaforth Finch household. A member of the extended family became and remains gravely ill, the washing machine inflow pipe has developed a leak, we've found more woodworm in the floorboards, and we're still trying to paint the house.
I've written 10,000 words of NaNoWriMo, but there was just no getting more out of me this year. I've been out of spoons, and I've not been able to shut myself away and write - my need for connectedness has been too great. But still, I've been writing, and reading, and there will be other years.
I'm a great fan of the "On This Day" function on FB, and recently a post from 2009 came up in which I mentioned a piece of writing I'd done for an assignment that had creeped me out. After an extensive search of my hard drive and my emails I managed to track it down. I no longer found it that creepy, but amongst the collection of short stories, poems and journal entries that formed the assignment there was the cute little piece below. I have no memory of writing it, and suspect this is because it was done after midnight!
Apparently I was already thinking up ways to use this fairytale long before The Twelfth Princess Dances leapt into being in my head...
Alternate voice from the Brothers Grimm fairytale “The Twelve Dancing Princesses”.
It’s not easy being the prince of a hidden underground kingdom.
I mean, think about it. There’s no sunlight. The fuel bills are astronomical. And if that’s not enough, some ancient treaty insists that we hold a ball every night to dance with anyone who stumbles down into our world. Every night. Never a decent night’s sleep, never dark or quiet . . . of course, the dancing is fun and the girls are pretty, but sometimes a bit of shut-eye would be nice, you know?
I remember this time a while back, when these twelve sisters used to come down every single night. The secret doorway to their world was on the other side of the lake, but did they bring a boat? Of course not! They were a pretty lot, but not the brightest. So every night we had to row across the lake, as if the dancing wasn’t already enough to wear us out.
Now, these twelve sisters . . . we used to ask ourselves, how did the king end up with twelve daughters old enough to go dancing, and none of them married yet? The youngest one, she was barely more than a child, and a silly giggling thing too . . . but the eldest must have been almost thirty. Wouldn’t any self-respecting king have offloaded a few of them by now? They were pretty enough, after all.
Anyway, these sisters used to come down every night to dance with us. The twelve princes, they called us. We weren’t all princes, of course, but how were they to know? They believed us! Every night they would come, and dance until they put holes in their shoes, and then back across the lake again to deliver them home. Beats me why they didn’t just wear stronger shoes and stay all night.
From time to time these girls, laughing and flirting, would tell us about the knights who were trying to win their hands. The king knew about the girls’ dancing of course, because the daft biddies didn’t have the sense to hide their worn-out shoes. The king wanted them stopped – I guess it’s hard to marry off your daughters when you can’t account for their whereabouts. So these men would volunteer to find out where the girls had been. Fools, said the princesses, drugged into sleep! And off with their heads in the morning when they couldn’t explain why they had slept through the excitement.
Heartless witches, really, these princesses. Seems a bit harsh. Surely they could’ve given those guys a fighting chance. I mean, I’m not the marrying type myself, but it can’t be all bad and it’s better than letting some poor sucker lose his head, right?
Well, as it happens, one day those princesses didn’t come. We waited in the boats, having a laugh, making jokes and so on. Hours late, the door opened, but only one princess slipped through, and she wasn’t wearing dancing shoes. I think she was the ninth, or maybe the tenth – can’t keep them straight in my head, these days – soft young face, red hair, nice … well anyway.
With a pathetic look, the chit told us that they’d been found out after all. The night before the latest knight had managed to follow them, and had dobbed them all in to the king. Darned if we could figure out how he’d done it, but that was that. The knight was marrying that eldest, and the king was moving the princesses to another part of the castle and bricking up the secret doorway first thing tomorrow. Silly fool should’ve done that in the first place. Didn’t bother us any – we had other doors of course.
We never saw the princess again after that. We heard about the grand ball they had, when the knight married the eldest. Grand affair apparently … not that we’d know, not having been there. You’d think after all the time they spent drinking our wine, eating our food and wearing away our ballroom floor that they could’ve sent us an invite!
But I guess if you’re running away from your father’s house to dance the night away with an underground prince, it’s the adventure that matters, not the man. We have other doors, and other princesses. We’ll dance on.
It's been a very bad November here in the Seaforth Finch household. A member of the extended family became and remains gravely ill, the washing machine inflow pipe has developed a leak, we've found more woodworm in the floorboards, and we're still trying to paint the house.
I've written 10,000 words of NaNoWriMo, but there was just no getting more out of me this year. I've been out of spoons, and I've not been able to shut myself away and write - my need for connectedness has been too great. But still, I've been writing, and reading, and there will be other years.
I'm a great fan of the "On This Day" function on FB, and recently a post from 2009 came up in which I mentioned a piece of writing I'd done for an assignment that had creeped me out. After an extensive search of my hard drive and my emails I managed to track it down. I no longer found it that creepy, but amongst the collection of short stories, poems and journal entries that formed the assignment there was the cute little piece below. I have no memory of writing it, and suspect this is because it was done after midnight!
Apparently I was already thinking up ways to use this fairytale long before The Twelfth Princess Dances leapt into being in my head...
Alternate voice from the Brothers Grimm fairytale “The Twelve Dancing Princesses”.
It’s not easy being the prince of a hidden underground kingdom.
I mean, think about it. There’s no sunlight. The fuel bills are astronomical. And if that’s not enough, some ancient treaty insists that we hold a ball every night to dance with anyone who stumbles down into our world. Every night. Never a decent night’s sleep, never dark or quiet . . . of course, the dancing is fun and the girls are pretty, but sometimes a bit of shut-eye would be nice, you know?
I remember this time a while back, when these twelve sisters used to come down every single night. The secret doorway to their world was on the other side of the lake, but did they bring a boat? Of course not! They were a pretty lot, but not the brightest. So every night we had to row across the lake, as if the dancing wasn’t already enough to wear us out.
Now, these twelve sisters . . . we used to ask ourselves, how did the king end up with twelve daughters old enough to go dancing, and none of them married yet? The youngest one, she was barely more than a child, and a silly giggling thing too . . . but the eldest must have been almost thirty. Wouldn’t any self-respecting king have offloaded a few of them by now? They were pretty enough, after all.
Anyway, these sisters used to come down every night to dance with us. The twelve princes, they called us. We weren’t all princes, of course, but how were they to know? They believed us! Every night they would come, and dance until they put holes in their shoes, and then back across the lake again to deliver them home. Beats me why they didn’t just wear stronger shoes and stay all night.
From time to time these girls, laughing and flirting, would tell us about the knights who were trying to win their hands. The king knew about the girls’ dancing of course, because the daft biddies didn’t have the sense to hide their worn-out shoes. The king wanted them stopped – I guess it’s hard to marry off your daughters when you can’t account for their whereabouts. So these men would volunteer to find out where the girls had been. Fools, said the princesses, drugged into sleep! And off with their heads in the morning when they couldn’t explain why they had slept through the excitement.
Heartless witches, really, these princesses. Seems a bit harsh. Surely they could’ve given those guys a fighting chance. I mean, I’m not the marrying type myself, but it can’t be all bad and it’s better than letting some poor sucker lose his head, right?
Well, as it happens, one day those princesses didn’t come. We waited in the boats, having a laugh, making jokes and so on. Hours late, the door opened, but only one princess slipped through, and she wasn’t wearing dancing shoes. I think she was the ninth, or maybe the tenth – can’t keep them straight in my head, these days – soft young face, red hair, nice … well anyway.
With a pathetic look, the chit told us that they’d been found out after all. The night before the latest knight had managed to follow them, and had dobbed them all in to the king. Darned if we could figure out how he’d done it, but that was that. The knight was marrying that eldest, and the king was moving the princesses to another part of the castle and bricking up the secret doorway first thing tomorrow. Silly fool should’ve done that in the first place. Didn’t bother us any – we had other doors of course.
We never saw the princess again after that. We heard about the grand ball they had, when the knight married the eldest. Grand affair apparently … not that we’d know, not having been there. You’d think after all the time they spent drinking our wine, eating our food and wearing away our ballroom floor that they could’ve sent us an invite!
But I guess if you’re running away from your father’s house to dance the night away with an underground prince, it’s the adventure that matters, not the man. We have other doors, and other princesses. We’ll dance on.
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