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Many things that I am needing to keep me singing
I have awesome friends. A few days ago, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
deadcities_icon sent me his stunning cybersexpunk calendar del.ici.ous tension: a digital romance, and today in the mail I received a packet of decaf masala chai from strange_selkie. Oddly enough, I feel better already. You guys rock.
I'm re-reading Tanith Lee's Sung in Shadow (1983), which I first discovered in late high school and which has slunk into my subconscious from time to time since then. I can't shake the feeling that, as a retelling of Romeo and Juliet, it's drawn more from Zeffirelli's 1968 film than from the bare play itself—particularly in the contrasts and relationship of its Romeo and Mercutio, the dark and beautiful Romulan Montargo, who is more innocent than he likes to think, and the older, fair-haired, sardonically unstable Flavian "Mercurio" Estemba. If so, I suppose it's nice to know that I wasn't the only one who fell in love with John McEnery's Mercutio.
"Why not anticipate? What else have we of free will but anticipation?" Mercurio, arguing for the discussion's sake, questioning nothing, believing very little, mesmerizing the guardsman as a matter of course, smiled gravely at him. "A man, young or old, may go to bed healthy, wake at dawn with a pain like a knife in his side, and be laid in a box by sunset. Or a man may cut his thumb on an awl, a scratch no bigger than a cherry pit, and he may sicken of that, and take that road to a box. Or the earth may shake, as it did here, ten years past, stones fall on your noodle and brain you. Or a plague may breed in the very air. Who can outrun plague? Oh, all roads lead to boxes. It is a chancy business, life. And so, my friend, we kill each other on the streets, the pith of the thing being Surprise! Amazement! My Lady Death, we are before you."
"Death's a woman, then?"
"Love and death, women both. Trust neither."
The grinding, soaring street cry of the whores wafted up again from over the walls. Mercurio, taking it as a bizarre accompaniment, began to sing a courtly love melody of the Higher Town.
"Dance with me while time is yet slow,
Clocks run faster far than you know;
Wear your rose flesh like a glove
For roses wither. Fear it, love."
His voice cut through all like a gold wire, through time, place, dust, heat and faith. A girl on a balcony averted her eyes from him superstitiously, among the terra-cotta pots of flowers. Romulan looked at him, entranced. None of them had heard a verse sung better, or a love song more like a knell.
"A rose will bloom; it then will fade . . ."
deadcities_icon sent me his stunning cybersexpunk calendar del.ici.ous tension: a digital romance, and today in the mail I received a packet of decaf masala chai from strange_selkie. Oddly enough, I feel better already. You guys rock.I'm re-reading Tanith Lee's Sung in Shadow (1983), which I first discovered in late high school and which has slunk into my subconscious from time to time since then. I can't shake the feeling that, as a retelling of Romeo and Juliet, it's drawn more from Zeffirelli's 1968 film than from the bare play itself—particularly in the contrasts and relationship of its Romeo and Mercutio, the dark and beautiful Romulan Montargo, who is more innocent than he likes to think, and the older, fair-haired, sardonically unstable Flavian "Mercurio" Estemba. If so, I suppose it's nice to know that I wasn't the only one who fell in love with John McEnery's Mercutio.
"Why not anticipate? What else have we of free will but anticipation?" Mercurio, arguing for the discussion's sake, questioning nothing, believing very little, mesmerizing the guardsman as a matter of course, smiled gravely at him. "A man, young or old, may go to bed healthy, wake at dawn with a pain like a knife in his side, and be laid in a box by sunset. Or a man may cut his thumb on an awl, a scratch no bigger than a cherry pit, and he may sicken of that, and take that road to a box. Or the earth may shake, as it did here, ten years past, stones fall on your noodle and brain you. Or a plague may breed in the very air. Who can outrun plague? Oh, all roads lead to boxes. It is a chancy business, life. And so, my friend, we kill each other on the streets, the pith of the thing being Surprise! Amazement! My Lady Death, we are before you."
"Death's a woman, then?"
"Love and death, women both. Trust neither."
The grinding, soaring street cry of the whores wafted up again from over the walls. Mercurio, taking it as a bizarre accompaniment, began to sing a courtly love melody of the Higher Town.
"Dance with me while time is yet slow,
Clocks run faster far than you know;
Wear your rose flesh like a glove
For roses wither. Fear it, love."
His voice cut through all like a gold wire, through time, place, dust, heat and faith. A girl on a balcony averted her eyes from him superstitiously, among the terra-cotta pots of flowers. Romulan looked at him, entranced. None of them had heard a verse sung better, or a love song more like a knell.
"A rose will bloom; it then will fade . . ."
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The Birthgrave
Cyrion
The Silver Metal Lover
Sabella, or the Bloodstone
Sung in Shadow
Anackhire
Ah, hell, all the rest of them...
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I've never been able to find Cyrion! I've read a few of the short stories in other settings, Dreams of Dark and Light and Women As Demons, but I've never managed to locate the entire collection. Lucky. : P
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Here, try here (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/2277216496/qid=1148671541/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-4297973-1967840?s=books&v=glance&n=283155).
I am not sure of this edition, it is not the original, but it appears to be the complete book!
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Forget the first one I posted above, it looks a bit fishy, as though it's not an authorized edition...
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I think it's just the recent translation into French. But I'd rather have a copy in English. : P
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The good news is, you can get an English copy from the Amazon Marketplace for a penny.