"MY FAIR WARRIOR" CHANGES (HALF THE) TITLE!

What???
That Jaimienne Othello AU??? Title change??? Was numbering a chapter ZERO not enough, readers?
Well, aside from the great idea of conveniently titling the skippable (or not skippable) prologue CHAPTER ZERO (capitalized), there has been a slight change in title.
The new half of the title is centered on my passion for the theme of foreignness (one that you may have picked up from frequently reading this blog), and thus, on the non-Stormlander characters in the Stormlands (Jaime, Petyr, Cat, and the youngest Tyrell siblings), who drive the plot forward (as well as Greek chorus Podrick), as the Stormlander characters (Renly, Brienne, most of the supporting cast), though at home, become alienated in some way or other (both Renly on Tarth and Brienne at Storm's End are strangers, after all).
To crown it all, the potential title is: "at the distant shores of a country", the way it reads, completely in lower-case (MY FAIR WARRIOR is capitalized). It's half a verse from an anti-war poem, and "a country" is outside the warzone where the events happened. The keywords are "distant", implying, well, distance and "otherness/uncanniness" (as opposed to close, home, provincialism, etc.), "shores", implying coastalism and how this factor changes the line between "a country" and the outside world, and of course "a country", implying a vast territorial expanse comprising many lands and communities under a single rule (the key is being a Flächenstaat or territorial state). In the title, "a country" refers to the Stormlands or to Tarth (once independent), it could be applied to the Westerlands in CHAPTER ZERO, where it all begins. There, Brienne is a stranger as well.
A review of the poem interprets this line, "at the distant shores of a country", as referring to "living on the other side of the world". Another review simply calls it "a country". Another one says "entirely different countries" and "others (other nations) across the world." To me, it refers at large to the Stormlands in this fiction. Like Cyprus in Othello, the hinterland/backwater setting is a character in its own right in this story. The play put on during the wedding at Storm's End in CHAPTER ONE, in which Renly is Durran Godsgrief and Loras is Elenei, is more than a reenactment of history. Even Penrose and Brella appear as the elemental gods, Elenei's parents (coaxed a little against their will). The story just screams of nationalism. In Renly's own words: "A play put on by Stormlanders, about Stormlanders, for Stormlanders." What about Ser Jaime? And the Imp? Or, what's more, what about Lord Baelish and the Widow Stark? Their opinions on the play differ. While Cat understands the plight of the gods, and Jaime is overawed by Durran's character on stage, Petyr argues with Cat about the play being jingoistic. Tyrion says the same to Jaime, though in a less subtle way. It would be like for a non-French person to watch a reenactment of the Revolution staged in France by French people. Or substitute "French" and "the Revolution" for "Greek" and "the Trojan War," or "British" and "Arthurian legends," or "Swedish" and "Gustavus Adolphus." To Renly and Loras, and all the gathered Tyrells, there is passion, pleasure in the performance. To the spectators, especially to the foreign ones, opinions are diverse. "Jingoistic?" It's merely an opinion. An uncomfortable offshoot of foreignness issues.
When I realized I could not fit in Erudite (for preferring the arts to sciences and being a pacifist as opposed to the Erudite warmongers) and switched to Amity in the eleventh hour... Long story short, I had an epiphany. Like that of including the Verdi-scrapped opening of Shakespeare's tragedy into this retelling as a chapter obviously titled ZERO and subtitled as optional. Just to add the way Cersei and Tywin would react to the one they love eloping with a stone broke and gender-confused Stormlander.(which questions would it raise to the Lannisters?) And that in an AU where she hasn't freed him from the sway of the Night's Queen, and they have merely been squired together until their coming of age (Tywin's banishment from court was the reason to send Jaime to Tarth in this AU) and she has got to the Westerlands to participate in his (and his onee-chan's) name-day tourney.
Othello, like Coriolanus, is the story of a warrior out of water during peacetime, and adjusting to an unsuitable peacetime activity. Cory gets into politics, statescraft, government. The O gets himself a bride who becomes a wife, and who should have stayed a maiden in the first place (thus, Des being as out of place as her spouse). Horton, a male 'phant, gets an egg to hatch. Jaime in canon loses his hand and sees the light thanks to the Maid of Tarth.
Jaime in MFW loses his hand in a swordfight and, later on, takes his life. There's a bit of a complex as he got all geared up to defend the Red Keep in case of siege and then, suddenly, discovering Aerys dead of a stroke in his bedchamber. Still half a child, and suddenly bereft of more field experience (than his earliest raid chasing bandits in the Westerlands) before losing his white cloak and leaving for Tarth. Yet extremely experienced in courtly culture, sucking it all in as Kingsguard as he longs for leaving for the front and not being given the chance until peace returns, when it becomes impossible (much like Zangra in Jacques Brel's song).


MY FAIR WARRIOR - at the distant shores of a country

CHAPTER ZERO
(which can be skipped to proceed to CHAPTER ONE and the real beginning of the story, if the reader so wishes, or else, read to give more information about the background of the story.)

Tossing over to the other side of her shared canopy bed, Cersei Lannister shook her cascade of perfect golden locks in her wake, as she made herself comfortable and reached out with her delicate, white lady hands.


So there you have the full title and the chapter numbered ZERO. With its first line, by the way.