anon_j_anon

I just stumbled upon this and haven't read it yet, but I wanted to say, "thank you!" A story that combines one of my favorite fandoms and my middle name makes me so happy. It's like Christmas and my birthday all wrapped up in one. I'm off to read!

I have such a hard time reading your writing because it asks so much of me-it pulls emotions that are so painful and deep. It's horrible but oddly catharthic at the same time.

The thing is, I am used to not being too challenged by fanfiction: the characters usually behave in a predictable fashion and even when angst is the primary flavour, I'll respond in a relatively shallow fashion. I'll get a little weepy, a little emotional, but I'll get over it after a few minutes and move on to more cupcakes 'n rainbows type stories. I'll go back and re-read if I need another hit of sentiment.

But your work sticks for a longer time, and I can't decide if I love you for it or hate it. The way you write Kirk and Spock make them hyper-real: their emotions and their turmoil cuts too deep. It's weird; when I see you update, I both dread and look forward to reading. I'll admit that I don't think I've re-read too many of your work because it's just this side of painfully real-I end up sitting here gasping for air. It's a testament to your skills. You're fucking amazing, honestly.

Though this is woefully inadequate, what she said.

I wrote a reply to her-- it's below if you'd like to read.

...

I don't know what to say to this. I want to apologize because I know that getting emotions pulled from you is, as you said, painful and deep. I honestly didn't mean for this fic to be so intense. I was focused on the plot, not racking up the emotional content to "superstrong". I guess it just naturally spills out of my writing because I see/feel things that way.

I wrote Sviksu in five nights. 40K pouring out of me for five straight nights--I couldn't think or do anything until I had finished it. I should have realized that this fic was going to be intense simply by that fact, but I didn't. It was only after I posted and slept (for 20 hours, would you believe) that I got the epiphany--this entire fic is actually a huge allegory about something very personal, that has been weighing very heavily on my mind. I had no idea until after I had written it what it's actually about, to me.

So I will apologize. I'm sorry that my work hits you that way. But I will admit to being... glad. Glad that it has an impact and that it stays with you. Glad that something borne out of my subconscious dealing with some pretty heavy shit can be compelling to you, despite the fact that we are different people and our experiences are disparate.

Thanks for your words. They mean a lot to me. And thanks for reading, even though it take so much from you. That means a lot to me too.

"So I will apologize. I'm sorry that my work hits you that way. But I will admit to being... glad."

You shouldn't apologize - oddly enough, it was a compliment to your writing skills that your fics draw such a depth of emotion. (It's entirely on me that I am having problems with dealing with that wellspring of feeling.) I think you're a brilliant writer, and I'm so glad that I found your work. It helps jar me out of my (usually preferred) shallow emotional existence and confronts me with something BIGGER.

Oh my... crying right now, can't quite collect my thoughts. This piece was amazing. Absolutely beautiful. Every line of it. I can't say enough to properly praise this. Just wonderful. Thank you for sharing.

Thanks for reading and commenting. I'm glad you found it compelling.

What a wonderful work: so thoroughly realized and so heart-wrenching. Your meditations on the rights of man and the wrongs of slavery were very thought-provoking. And of course, your depiction of T'Pring was refreshing: she felt like a real woman, who really loved her man, even while he was struggling with huge philosophical issues that she couldn't comprehend.

So much of this was vividly written, but I have to point to my favorite part, when T'Pau stood on a spaceship with young Spock and pointed out Vulcan to him. Very moving scene. Using Aida as a framework was a brilliant match for these characters! Thank you so much for this lovely, tragic story.

Thanks so much. And I'm glad you liked the characterization of T'Pring. I don't much like some of fandom's take on her. I wanted her to be just as complex, if not more so, than K/S, and dynamic to boot.

I enjoyed writing that scene with T'Pau as well. Vulcan women in general seem to very strong willed, and I wanted to explore that a little.

I shouldn't be online, but images from this story continue to haunt me. Somehow my mind keeps attempting to wrap itself around the enigma of your Spock, whom we never truly come to read and is only truly known to Jim -- his hidden side requires a parallax view I am not quite capable of projecting. This story hits me in a more personal way than even Two Summers, even without the context of your e; and I don't think it has to do with the structure of Aida alone. Indeed, your changes to the palimpsest -- five acts instead of four, T'Pring's late realisation that Jim is her rival, as opposed to Amneris' realisation in Act II ... -- made the text much tighter for me, and left room for a much more differentiated take on T'Pring and the questions of slavery than I feel the opera allowed. (Then again, I haven't seen Aida in years; admittedly, I am glad for that, because it helped me focus on the text. For my next reading, I'll try to keep the music in my ear, see what effects that has. Ekphrasis.)

So. I haven't said anything but the obvious, but this story has a force of attraction that is unlike anything I have read recently.

I should be sleeping. It's 4 am here, and my sleep schedule is shot. But...

Did you read my notes for this? Here and another here?

It was so strange. While writing, I felt kind of detached, but the words were pouring out of me. Afterwards, I was drained. I think the force of that compulsion (my own compulsion) came out in the writing, though I have no idea how.

I wasn't satisfied with so many of the ideas put forth by the opera, on the nature of love and slavery and so forth. And Radames declaring at the end that he wasn't a traitor? That just sounded like a man in denial... maybe I perceived his character incorrectly though. I get that the idea is that he didn't betray anything because he was true to love, but the fact remains that he betrayed Egypt and was willing to desert her for Aida. And Amneris, saying that the priests had no mercy as though love absolved all? Sometimes I wonder about librettists.