Aaaaaah! I don't know what I was expecting, but it was certainly not this! It's great - so creative, both in form (multimedia?!?! academia! author, are we already friends?) and content. Generally I am not the world's biggest steampunk fan, but I really liked this particular interpretation. Elisabeth's active role in this version nicely subverts the way she functions in the original story. I also appreciated how the cleverness of the framing narrative - that dry, precise academic voice - minimizes the sadness of the story (which is really quite sad!). I think it was interesting that you stuck with the outline - who dies, who lives, who gets married - of the fairy tale, while also rewriting the setting, motivations, and content of the relationships. It makes the whole thing a bit more tough-minded than typical retellings. BUT, there's still the happy ending of the coda, yayyy! I enjoyed this very much, and it's the kind of story I look forward to rereading, too. So great. :)
Commenting after all this time because I fell rather unforgivably into a tumblr-shaped hole after Christmas (I blame Sherlock for all of it, really)...
I'm so glad you like the story! When I first read your Dear Yuletide letter I was terrified that I wouldn't be able to write anything that fit your expectations - your interests seemed so very different from mine, and I am an utter dunce at philosophy and the more intellectual disciplines. But you did say you enjoyed retellings of fairytales, so I moved it into a very vague 18th century framework and added steampunk.
Once that happened the plot moved on its own, though I couldn't help the sadness, it just made more sense than the other possibilities. And I think, this may be something from watching Asian tv series and crying at them, but stories feel more true to life when there's pain and bitterness as well as happiness and achievement.
I was actually finishing up the coda when I realized that I wrote, essentially, a Ruritanian short story. So there's that too, hope you don't mind.
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themis on Chapter 4
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sevenses on Chapter 4
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