If the Great Heidelberg Tun had a stroke...

Les Misérables is the Great French Novel - I would also say Gargantua and Pantagruel fits the bill, but that one is a pentalogy saga, and Les Mis is a standalone. And I adore the Friends of the ABC and especially Courfeyrac and Grantaire <3 kyun (I am in the Les Mis fandom for a reason).

Courf is basically your garden-variety shonen protagonist crossed over with a 007 or similar British man of wealth and taste, and a little with Quentin Tarantino. A keet with a kitten motif, a Gascon who truly embodies the regional stereotype - he even has the sword cane for a musketeer or knight in shining armour! - and with a great sense of humour (always with a quip or pun on his lips). Add a little Mercutio to the Courf formula, and you have a character I completely identify with...

but, if Courfeyrac is my idealistic side, Grantaire is my cynical side, a depressed alcoholic artist (from Marseille in my headcanon), in unrequited love with the ephebe of a leader (I coined the term "Enjolsexual" for a good reason), an epicure and a comedian like Courf but it's only a mask in R's case (he signs only with a capital R, une grande R!).

In the dramatis personae "A Group which Failed to Become Historic," Hugo introduces us to R by mentioning his good taste in food and beverages, his knowledge of the Parisian nightlife...

Among all these passionate hotheads and true believers, there was one

cold-blooded skeptic. How did he get to be there? By juxtaposition. This skeptic’s name

was Grantaire and he normally signed with this rebus: R, for grand R,

capital R. Grantaire was a man who took good care not to believe in

anything. And he was one of the students who had got the most out of his

studies in Paris; he knew that the best coffee was in the Café Lemblin and

that the best billiard table was in the Café Voltaire; that you got good pancakes

and good wenches at L’Ermitage on the boulevard du Maine, the best fried

chickens at mère Saguet’s, excellent eel stews at the barrière de la

Cunette, and a certain light white wine at the barrière du Combat. For

everything, he knew all the best places; he also knew how to kickbox, both savate and chausson marseillais, and

make his way around a tennis court, a gymnasium, and a dance floor, and he was a natural

with a singlestick in stickfighting. A big drinker to boot.

And him being an "Enjolsexual:"

Still, this skeptic was fanatical about one thing. This one thing he was

fanatical about was neither an idea nor a dogma, neither an art nor a

science; it was a man: Enjolras. Grantaire admired, loved, and venerated

Enjolras. Who did this anarchic doubter rally to in this phalanx of

absolutists? To the most absolute. In what way did Enjolras enthrall him?

Through ideas? No. Through character. A phenomenon frequently

observed. A skeptic sticking to a believer—it is as elementary as the law of

complementary colours. What we lack attracts us. No one loves daylight

more than the blind. The dwarf girl adores the drum major. ...

Grantaire, in whom

doubt lurked, loved to see faith soar in Enjolras. He needed Enjolras.

held spellbound by that chaste, healthy, firm, upright, hard, candid

character. He admired, instinctively, his opposite. His limp, wavering,

disjointed, sick, deformed ideas attached themselves to Enjolras as to a

backbone. His moral spine leaned on that firm frame. Beside Enjolras,

Grantaire became somebody again. He was himself, in any case, composed

of two apparently incomptible elements. He was ironic and warmhearted.

His indifference was loving. His mind could do without faith, but his heart

could not do without friendship. A profound contradiction—for an

affection is a conviction. That was his nature. Some people seem born to be

the verso, the reverse, the flipside. They are Pollux, Patroclus, Nisus,

Eudamidas, Hephaestion, Pechméja. They can live only on condition of

leaning on someone else; their name is a sequel; their existence is not their own; it is the

other side of a destiny that is not theirs. Grantaire was one of these men. He

was the flipside of Enjolras.

Grantaire, as a true satellite of Enjolras, dwelt in this circle of young

men; he lived there, he was only happy there, he followed them

everywhere. His great delight was to see those silhouettes coming and

going in the haze of wine. They put up with him because of his good

humour.

The believer in Enjolras looked down on the skeptic Grantaire, and the teetotaller

looked down on the drunk. He would dole out a dose of pity from on high.

Grantaire was a Pylades who did not pass muster. Always treated roughly

by Enjolras, pushed away harshly, rejected yet coming back for more, he

would say of Enjolras: “Such a beautiful slab of marble!”

But it is R's first words, his Establishing Character Moment and the start of his epic rants, that truly solidifies his character. Grantaire is introduced using a very surrealistic metaphor (is it the absinthe or his own creativity)?

“I’m so thirsty! Mortals, I have a dream: that the Great Heidelberg Tun has a stroke,

and that I am among the dozen leeches they apply to it. I want

to drink. I want to forget life. Life is a hideous invention of who knows

who. It doesn’t last two ups and it’s not worth two ups. You break your neck

trying to stay alive. Life is a stage set where nothing much actually works.

Happiness is an old theatre decor, painted on one side only. Ecclesiastes says:

Omnia vanitas, ‘All is vanity.’ I couldn’t agree more with the poor bastard, if he ever

existed..."

The Great Heidelberg Tun is the biggest barrel in Europe, located in the cellars of Schloss (Palace) Heidelberg, and always full of good wine. Its size is 7 m long and 8,5 m wide, and its volume is 220,000 litres. There is even a dancefloor on top, and young people dance on it during certain festivals! 

The Tun appears so often in the literature of Romanticism that it has become a meme. For instance, in Moby-Dick, the spermaceti gland of a sperm whale is compared to the Great Heidelberg Tun, being around the same size and also full of a costly liquid. Heidelberg being the Capital of Romanticism, many Romantics either visited the town or studied at its university, the Ruperto Carola, and they had surely danced on the Tun and the image stuck with them:

The Tun is referenced in Rudolf Erich Raspe's The Surprising Adventures of Baron Münchhausen, Jules Verne's novel Five Weeks in a Balloon, Victor Hugo's Les Misérables (in Grantaire's rant, here), Washington Irving's The Specter Bridegroom, Mary Hazelton Wade's Bertha, Mark Twain's A Tramp Abroad and Wilhelm Busch's Die fromme Helena. It can also be found in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick as well as in Lyrisches Intermezzo by Heinrich Heine, later used in the song cycle Dichterliebe by Robert Schumann for the final song "Die alten, bösen Lieder (The Old Evil Songs)". 

(Great Heidelberg Tun. Notice the dancefloor on top!)

Leeches were used then to cure multiple diseases, the prevalent theory of disease being the four humours (fluids): these worms were used to "leech" away superfluous fluids that made the patient ill. Stroke victims in particular were treated with leeches, although this was mostly ineffectual...

If the Great Heidelberg Tun, personified, had a stroke, think of how many wine-thirsty leeches, eager for fine Rhine wine, would be applied to it! And obviously our lovely cynic Grand'R would loooove to be one of them!

ONCE MORE - LOVECRAFTIAN CHILDREN IN ANDERSEN'S XENOFICTION

Finally The Midnight Archives released their Ugly Duckling episode - and I couldn't wait to get to the part where the protagonist spends the winter on a farm with Lovecraftian, monstrous (sadistic in his eyes) children, so I skipped ahead:

The farm children crowd around, excited by this strange pet bird their father has brought home. They've never seen anything like him. They want to touch him, to hold him, to play with him. But the ugly duckling doesn't understand play. He only understands danger. When the children reach for him laughing, he sees only hands coming to hurt him. The same human hands that have always hurt him. Every touch in his life has been violent. Every approach has been an attack. He panics. [...] The children laugh and try to catch him, which only makes his terror worse. The whole cottage descends into chaos. It's almost comedic if you don't think about what's happening inside the duckling's mind. He's been given a second chance at shelter, at safety, at warmth, and he's destroying it because he can't recognize kindness. He's been hurt so many times that even genuine friendliness looks like an attack. 

[...]

From the very beginning, Andersen was marked as different. He was a tall and gangly ginger, with a prominent nose and hands that seemed too big for his body. And, moreover, left-handed. He moved awkwardly, spoke strangely, didn't fit in with other children. He preferred putting on puppet shows and reciting poetry to playing normal games. While other kids in Odense rough-housed, he stood apart, watching, dreaming, already somewhere else. The other children thought he was bizarre, and bullied him. Most surely, he was autistic.

Very clever of the narrator to portray these children as "predators" from the Ugly Duckling's point of view! So far, the only humans he has known before them, the maid on the farm where he hatched (a teenage servant) and the huntsmen (adult men) have abused him; how can he understand play when all the other humans he's known are enemies? - and moreover small children ignore that a pet is not a toy - they haven't developed empathy yet. I have spoken before of Andersen's double standard - ie Children are Innocent (the Romantic ideal) when they're the protagonists VS. Kids Are Cruel (seen as predators by the non-human protagonists) when they're secondary characters. This is NOT unique to Andersen, but can also be seen in other authors, who, unlike Andersen, feature Innocent Children as the protagonists and Cruel Kids as the side characters (even as the villains!) in THE SAME stories. This includes Christoph von Schmid (Good Friedrich and Wicked Dietrich, Good Friederike and Wicked Dorothy, the list goes on), Victor Hugo (Cosette vs. Éponine, both as children and as teenagers), and most importantly Roald Dahl (Charlie Bucket vs. the four Bad Kids, Matilda vs. her brother Michael and Bruce Bogtrotter, the Narrator vs. Bruno in The Witches, the list goes on).

There seems to be a double standard. Whenever children are the protagonists (The Snow Queen, The Little Mermaid, Thumbelina, etc). they are pure and innocent, and victims of suffering we should empathize with 

- but in Andersen's works of xenofiction, where the protagonists are non-human and the children are secondary characters, these children are portrayed as inhuman monsters who only want to play, to have fun, to eat sweets... But in that pursuit, they treat the non-human protagonists not roughly, but even cruelly, and lacking empathy (they chase the Ugly Duckling, pull the Fir Tree's branches, send the Tin Soldier downstream in a paper boat... Not even adult humans are spared, as seen in their treatment of the storyteller [Andersen inserting himself?] also in The Fir Tree, here). 

Long story short: children as protagonists=pristine angels to empathize with, children as secondary characters in xenofiction=sadistic Lovecraftian monsters without empathy. This double standard, especially in the light of Romanticism (Rousseau's and Locke's ideas, Andersen as a Romantic), has always fascinated me.

Here are Maria Tatar's comments on the monstrous, sadistic children in Andersen's xenofiction:

In The Ugly Duckling:

the duckling was afraid they would hurt him. Andersen’s surprising dislike of small children, given the audience for his stories today, is well documented. In the plan for a commemorative statue in Copenhagen, he asked that the child looking over his shoulder be removed from the design. But his hatred of one of the sketches, which reminded him of “old Socrates and young Alcibiades,” may have been inspired by very different anxieties. As a child he was an avid reader, who stayed away from other children. “I never played with the other boys,” he reported in a letter to his benefactor Jonas Collin, “I was always alone.” (Moreover, Andersen was bullied! Note from S. Dermark)

In The Fir Tree:

(This tale is absent from Maria Tatar's annotated edition, but note here how they treat the storyteller [Andersen inserting himself!], showing that not even the human adults are inmune to their lack of empathy!)

Here is the scene as translated by Jean Hersholt:

Suddenly the folding doors were thrown back, and a whole flock of children burst in as if they would overturn the tree completely. Their elders marched in after them, more sedately. For a moment, but only for a moment, the young ones were stricken speechless. Then they shouted till the rafters rang. They danced about the tree and plucked off one present after another.

Then the children had permission to plunder the tree. They went about it in such earnest that the branches crackled and, if the tree had not been tied to the ceiling by the gold star at top, it would have tumbled headlong.

The children danced about with their splendid playthings. No one looked at the tree now, except an old nursemaid who peered in among the branches, but this was only to make sure that not an apple or fig or gingerbread man had been overlooked.

"Tell us a story! Tell us a story!" the children clamored, as they towed a fat little man to the tree. He sat down beneath it and said, "Here we are in the woods, and it will do the tree a lot of good to listen to our story. Mind you, I'll tell only one. Which will you have, the story of Ivedy-Avedy, or the one about Humpty-Dumpty who sat on a wall and had a great fall, tumbled downstairs, yet ascended the throne and married the princess?"

"Ivedy-Avedy," cried some. "Humpty-Dumpty," cried the others. And there was a great hullabaloo. 

The fat little man told them all about Humpty-Dumpty, who sat on a wall, had a great fall, tumbled downstairs, yet ascended the throne and married the princess. And the children clapped and shouted, "Tell us another one! Tell us another one!" For they wanted to hear about Ivedy-Avedy too, but after Humpty-Dumpty the storytelling stopped.

In The Tin Soldier:

street urchins came running along. As is often the case in Andersen’s stories, schoolboys and street urchins can be counted on to engage in sadistic behavior. Saintly urchins like the little match girl are invariably female.

for no reason at all, (his owner) threw him right into the stove. The tin soldier seems to be a survivor, but in the end, he loses his life “for no reason at all”—just on a small boy’s whim. The Tin soldier attributes the boy’s urge to an evil power, suggesting that the jack-in-the-box has engineered his death.

......

So basically here we have the Kids are Cruel (sadistic, lacking empathy, caring only for their own amusement) trope in Andersen's xenofiction, in child secondary characters, stemming from his own hatred of children (misopaedia) stemming in turn from bullying trauma... One of the causes of the Kids Are Cruel trope in real life is explained in Developmental Psychology. It's called ego-centralism and until a child reaches a certain point in their mental development they don't understand that their actions can hurt others even though they are not hurt themselves. This is what happens in Andersen's stories, even though Andersen himself uses the trope to view them as sadistic monsters from the POV of non-humans, to channel his childhood trauma!

- vs. the Children are Innocent (pure, angelic, whose suffering elicits empathy) whenever children are the protagonists in Andersen, stemming from the Victorian / Romantic notions/Rousseaunian and Lockean myth of pristine, unsullied childhood as a black slate. This can lead to an unawareness that they are doing anything wrong. They can commit offenses unwittingly and face a Bewildering Punishment. Children have to learn empathy, and not to be self-centered, and also often have a poor grasp of consequences of their actions. This can then lead to Ambiguous Innocence. Again, ego-centralism.

A well-known experiment by Wimmer and Perner (1983) called the false-belief task demonstrates how children show their acquisition of theory of mind (ToM) as early as 4 years old. In this task, children see a scenario where one character hides a marble in a basket, walks out of the scene, and another character that is present takes out the marble and puts it in a box. Knowing that the first character did not see the switching task, children were asked to predict where the first character would look to find the marble. The results show that children younger than 4 answer that the first character would look inside the box, because the children have the superior knowledge of where the marble actually is. It shows egocentric thinking in early childhood because they thought that, even if the first character themself did not see the entire scenario, the first character has the same amount of knowledge as they did, and therefore should look inside the box to find the marble. As children start to acquire ToM (and empathy), their ability to recognize and process others' beliefs and values overrides the natural tendency to be egocentric.

---

Andersen's xenofictional children see the world as a huge playplace and everything as a toy - they are ego-centralists, they only want to play and have fun, they're rough-housing all the time, but they haven't learned yet that a pet is not a toy, that a plant is not a toy either, and neither is an adult human, no matter how good stories he might tell. They simply haven't developed empathy yet. At heart, all young children are like that, and that is why they're perceived as "naughty" or "rough-housing." I was the same myself as a toddler; I made potions with my shampoos and other cosmetics, I cut my dolls' hair and doodled on their faces, I cut out the characters in fairytales to use them as paper dolls... fortunately all my pets were confined to their habitats (the fish in their fishtank, the turtles in their terrarium, the budgies in their cage) and therefore spared a rough treatment from a young child who moreover needed constant external stimulation, with her autism and ADHD! Like Andersen's bullies, I rough-housed, but like Andersen himself, I also spent the hours away in daydreams and in books, and was bullied both for my social awkwardness and Nordic looks (and I'm left-handed too!). 

LES MIS DnD AU (Vox Machina Style)

THIS AU IS ONLY VOX MACHINA OR MIGHTY NEIN STYLE - THINK OF IT AS A DND UNIVERSE IN GENERAL

I think of this story as kind of Journey to the West or Wizard of Oz - a group of companions with different personalities (a balanced party) going on a quest (likewise, leaving their homeland in the East to find some sacred texts in the West). Also a lot of inspiration from the Holy Grail mythos (especially, but not only, the Monty Python versions!). This is actually a fanfic epic written by Courf in the Hogwarts AU El semen de los ahorcados!

At first only the Main Five are on that quest, being chosen by the gods to find the Sacred Texts, then I'll add Marius, Éponine, and other secondary characters who don't join the party (Ranger Éponine and her little brother Gavroche are guest star party members). Their main characterizations are from El semen de los ahorcados (Hogwarts AU) and from Eleven Moons Duology (Aritsar AU), but in a DnD universe. 

Same pairings as always: Enjoltaire, Courferre, Éposette, etc. Like in these other AUs, characters from other universes like Count Jean de Satigny, Eugénie Danglars and Louise d'Armilly, Éloïse de Villefort, even Josuke, Koichi, and Okuyasu... and many others will show up.

THE CORE FIVE

Enjolras / Paragon Enjolras: human paladin, only child from a very conservative and religious family. Aroace... or is he? Takes up the role of Tripitaka, being the pure-hearted leader who is given the quest in a vision by the gods

Combeferre / Jules-François Combeferre: halfling artificer, quite the Renaissance person (alchemist, gunsmith, electrician, robot maker, you name it). Takes up the role of Sha Wujing (Sandy, the merman), being the most level-headed, though he can give in under pressure. One of the four chosen guardians.

Courfeyrac / Sejanus Cassio de Courfeyrac: catboy (nekomata) rogue/ninja, from a noble family but now a Goliard on the fringes of the law (personality-wise, somewhat like Naruto mixed with Josuke), Combeferre's matesprit. Like Nepeta Leijon, speaks in kitty puns (says for instance "mew" instead of "you"). Takes up the role of Sun Wukong (Monkey King), being the trickster who questions authority and tricks everyone, on a redemption quest - used to be the King of Thieves, but lost his throne on a bet against Montparnasse, and is now a mercenary. One of the four chosen guardians.

Grantaire / René "Grand R": half-elf half-human Cobalt Soul monk/drunken master (lots of inspiration from both Okuyasu and Rock Lee), also a Goliard, Enj's matesprit (though at first Enj won't realize it). Expelled from his order for breaking his vow of chastity. Takes up the role of Zhu Wuneng (Pigsy), being the most self-indulgent member of the party. Another mercenary. One of the four chosen guardians.

Jehanne Prouvaire: elf bard, only child, trans girl, modest offstage but flamboyant on stage, more of a Celtic bard vibe. Takes up the role of Yulong (Dragon Horse) more or less, being the most modest yet the most powerful member, whose magic is only used as a last resort. Also for being gender fluid (Yulong turns more than once into a human woman to seduce/distract opponents). The last of the four chosen guardians.

MINOR CHARACTERS.

Éponine Thénardier: half-drow ranger, dragon rider, guest star party member - in unrequited love with Cosette ('tis a pity she's straight...)

Gavroche Thénardier: youngest of the Thénardiers and team pet (somehow), fully human... or so it seems. Is also a hybrid, though it doesn't manifest until puberty

Azelma Thénardier: the middle child, aspiring rogue, fully human. Becomes Montparnasse's right-hand woman and partner, the Queen of Thieves

Bahorel: berserker, human

Henriette: berserker, dwarf, Bahorel's partner

Jo-Lee: human alchemist/healer, hypochondriac

Lesgles "Bossuet": human (black) necromancer

Musichetta: half-elf bard, more of a classical musician vibe than Jehanne Prouvaire (with Lesgles and Jo-Lee, these three form a trio of mercenaries)

Marius Pontmercy: half-elf scholar (translator) and gunslinger, raised by his human aristocratic maternal family, rediscovering his elven heritage. The kouhai/maknae of most characters.

Cosette: half-elf cleric, raised in a convent. Very conscious of breaking her religious vows. In love with Marius (and vice versa: they even become fiancés)

Jean Valjean: human druid, Cosette's stepfather/guardian, gardener

Étienne Javert: half-drow paladin, Valjean's partner, Cosette's other stepdad

Montparnasse / Caractacus Montparnasse: blue-skinned tiefling (half-oni) rogue, "King of Thieves," Éponine's ex and Enj's kismesis

THAT LES MIS WESTEROS BUNNY

I had this plot bunny about a decade ago, when I was still part of the Westeros fandom and Les Misérables seemed like just another prompt for a fusion AU with the characters from Westeros/Game of Thrones. I felt, not long ago, that this story had to be told... moreover, with the songs from the musical adapted to the Westeros universe...

Cosette would be Sansa Stark

Fantine... Catelyn Stark-Tully

The Thénardiers... the Boltons
Éponine... Arya Stark (the Boltons keep her)
Marius... Lancel Lannister
Enjolras... Renly Baratheon

Combeferre... Loras Tyrell
Valjean... Jaime Lannister
Javert... Sandor Clegane
Monsignor... Qyburn

Grantaire.... Brienne of Tarth
and
Random Barmaid in KL... Sandra Dermark

ACT I Riverrun... Jaime on the run
ACT II Winterfell... Self-made Jaime, Cat Laid Off
ACT III Harrenhal/The Dreadfort... FUBAR Extraordinaire
INTERLUDE: The Eyrie... Years of Sanctuary
ACT IV KL... Get ready for the REVOLUTION
ACT V Highgarden... Wedding bells and bidding belles
ACT VI Back to the Eyrie... TOMORROW COMES!

I don't know if this is going to be a filk opera or a longer fic with filk snippets - but it will combine elements of both Westeros canon and Les Mis canon... Like, Brienne will also survive and end up with Jaime. But Sansa will also get Lancel. 

CORAZONES QUE SE ENCUENTRAN

 "Corazones que se encuentran". Esta es la segunda nana popular que Fantine le cantaba a Cosette en El semen de los ahorcados. Valjean también se la regaló como caja de música, dejándole primero la llave bajo la almohada, pero esta vez le había encargado la cajita en el taller de un fabricante del callejón Diagón. No fue un regalo de Navidad, de Pascua ni de cumpleaños: simplemente una sorpresa que ella no se esperaba.

No se sabe la letra completa (no sale en toda la saga), sólo el título y el verso "Esta es la canción del amor que no se va". Es muy probable que Cosette no recordara la letra entera. La melodía es suave y a ritmo de vals. Es una melodía muy similar al Danubio Azul; tal vez Fantine la hubiera adaptado de ese vals de Strauss.

HITLER HAS ONLY GOT ONE BALL

This song is sung by Gavroche Thénardier as a battle song and cheer song in The Seed of Hanged Men Book V, and he was killed while singing it (at "poor old Goebbels" in stanza 2):

Hitler

has only got one ball

Göring

has two but very small

Himmler

has something sim'lar

but poor old Goebbels

has no balls at all

Rommel

has four or five, I guess

No one's

sure about Rudolf Hess

Schmeling

is always yelling

but poor old Goebbels

has no balls at all

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Post-retcon in both the webtoon and the revised fic, Gavroche is killed while singing the Quintilius Varus song (at the first "Sir Quintilius Varus"). He still knows "Hitler Has Only Got One Ball," but it is not his death song. It's this one instead:

When the Romans got the mania,

Sim serim sim sim sim sim,

they marched up north to Germania,

Sim serim sim sim sim sim,

Riding in front, irreparable,

Tan taran tan tan tan tan,

Was their boldest general,

Tan taran tan tan tan tan,

Sir Quintilius Varus,

of course, of course, of course,

Sir Quintilius Varus,

Trallalala, trallalala, trallalala, lala lala!!!

FROM VERNON TO MOJITO

All July long I have been thinking about a rabbit hole comparable to the one around Slughorn and slogans I did for World Book Day (in April on this very blog). This time we will be discussing Vernon Dursley's connections to Les Misérables, the Norman Conquest, even grog and mojito and the slur "Limey" for any British person...

Uncle Vernon Dursley will be our point of departure. That human walrus and bourgeois party pooper who is irate enough to use a fruitcake from the year before as a hammer. Rowling is no stranger to using place names as surnames... Snape, for instance, though it sounds like "snake" (and like "sever his nape," the full name). Which brings us across the Channel to France and to:

Vernon, France, home of Georges Pontmercy. A provincial village in Normandy, where (in Les Misérables), Col. Pontmercy lived and devoted himself to gardening, after leaving little Marius with his hated in-laws. The place looks pretty idyllic, and I cannot fathom the fact that Georges could not take Marius with him to such a wonderland. 

Now how come Vernon Dursley, and the Malfoys, and the Lestranges have French names (whether first names or surnames) in spite of being British? To answer that, we must turn back time to 1066...

The Norman Conquest left a lot of influence from a new French elite in society, vocabulary... Vernon (the village) is in Normandy, moreover, and the surname Lestrange (at least the Muggle surname) dates back to Elizabethan (Shakespeare) times.

But Mr. Dursley is not the only Vernon to have gone down in history...

Meet Admiral Edward Vernon, active in the eighteenth-century Caribbean colonies. He is famous (or rather infamous) for two things, one of them being his defeat at Cartagena de Indias against Blas de Lezo. The other?

The other was his military uniform, made of gros-grain (Fr. "thick-grain") cloth, which caused his men and officers to nickname him Old Grog. And this gave the nickname of "grog" to the cocktail that men and officers in the Royal Navy usually drank, made of:

1. Fresh water (you can't make a cocktail with ocean water)
2. Rum (the most available distilled drink in the Caribbean)
3. Lime (the most available citrus, as a cure against scurvy)
4. Spices

Due to the lime in the grog they drank, members of the Royal Navy were nicknamed Limeys, which then extended to British people in general. Nowadays, "Limey" is more or less a slur (compare "Frog" or "Kraut").

But this is NOT the end of the story...

Using the same recipe and replacing the spices with fresh mint, what have you got?

A MOJITO! That's right, the Spanish enemies of the Brits put their own spin on the drink!

This is a fascinating rabbit hole... we started at Vernon Dursley and ended up drinking a mojito (via Normandy, the Norman Conquest, and the British Caribbean)!

rapsòdia bohèmia en clau de ditiramb

 rapsòdia bohèmia en clau de ditiramb

Per Sandra Dermark – sobre personatges de Victor Hugo,

amb fil musical de Queen

I.

És açò un somni, o és la realitat?

Obre els teus ulls i mira cap a amunt…

Sens escapar, en un racó atrapat…

Del teu despit impossible és fer fum:

calen molts ous i molt d’ibuprofen,

i tu no vols ni sentir ma ferum…

Jo no en tinc d’ous ni en tinc d’ibuprofen;

de simpatia aliena res no me’n cal,

no importa ni la direcció del vent

per a un bohemi fet d’aquest tergal,

que, tan prompte com toca el seté cel,

cau en la desesperació abismal…

*****************************

II.

Vull contar, sense plaer,

en torn al jove Grantaire.

És nat al port de Marsella,

s’acostuma a la botella

i també apren a lluitar.

Un dia mata un català:

d’un colp de peu massa fort

el xiquet li ha donat mort.

De sa mare s’acomiada

i els estalvis li demana:

“Mare, me’n vaig a París,

és urgent i molt precís.

Faré carrera de Dret;

un nou home m’haré fet”.

Una nova vida enceta,

no és precisament d’asceta.

Falta a classes cada dia,

tant en son trellat confia.

I viu, a la capital,

vida com un carnaval.

No creu en res, però heus ací

que descobre el seu destí…

El company més atractiu

desperta en ell desig viu,

però els seus ulls color de glaç

rebutgen besos i jaç

(Mais oui, donc, voilà Enjolras!).

Quant més el company s’aparta,

més vol ell que un llamp el parta.

Per la columna un calfred

li descen: dolor, destret…

I l’ardenta set l’espenta

a ofegar-se en absenta.

“Adéu siau, amant cruel,

de rínxols d’or i ulls de gel:

vaig a una altra realitat,

a enfrontar la veritat.

Tot i que no vull morir,

desitjo mai existir…”

***************************

III.

EL JO.

Veig una petita silueta – un efeb – un donzell…

L’ALLÒ

Chi all’esca ha morso

del ditirambo

spavaldo e strambo,

voglio veder lui

danzare il fandango

e tutto gira intorno alla stanza…

EL JO.

Llamps – trons – gota freda – trombes d’aigua – ensurt que glaça la sang

COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Come on – you boy-child

you winner – and loser

come on you stranger – you legend – you martyr – and…

L’ALLÒ (director del COR DE LES FADES VERDES).

And SHINE!!

EL JO.

Un bohemi fet d’aquest tergal

no té qui l’estime, tots li volen mal…

COR DELS ESPERITS DE SUPERACIÓ.

Només és un bohemi miserable

d’ascendents marsellesos marginals.

Tot i que s’ha escollit en estes Falles

l’únic ninot que va a ser indultat,

deixem viure a aquest xic sa curta vida

i morir lliure d’aquest fred parany…

****************************

IV.

EL JO.

U, tan prompte com toca el seté cel,

cau en la desesperació abismal…

Digueu-me, m’anireu a alliberar?

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Lliure, tu? En absolut, per descomptat!

COR DELS ESPERITS DE SUPERACIÓ.

Tingueu pietat!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Lliure, ell? En absolut, per descomptat!

COR DELS ESPERITS DE SUPERACIÓ.

Tingueu pietat!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Lliure, ell? En absolut, per descomptat!

EL JO.

Tingueu pietat!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Lliure, tu? En absolut, per descomptat!

EL JO.

Tingueu pietat!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Lliure, tu? En absolut, per descomptat!

EL JO.

Tingueu pietat! Tingueu pietat, tingueu pietat…!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!

EL JO.

Si us plau, si’s plau, sisplau, tingueu pietat!

L’ALLÒ, COR DE LES FADES VERDES.

Per mi, l’infern escons buits ha deixat…

ha deixat… ha deixat… 

********************************

V.

aixina que et creus que

el meu cos és massa cairut

la meua ferum a aiguardent

i a suor de lluites al carrer

els teus ulls blaus disparen dards de glaç

els meus foscos ulls són les dianes

sempre encertes enmig del punt negre

aixina que et creus que,

tu, aroma de lavanda i roses

suau pell blanca i vetejada de venes

com el marbre de Carrara

o el sucre de llustre,

que el que dius és ironia, una figura retòrica

i m’estimes de veritat,

res de compassió, sinó vertader amor

per primera vegada

i per darrera vegada

per a nosaltres dos…

i em deixes morir en el meu estupor

mentre estic dormint

i la fuselleria artilleria armes blanques ens envolten

em deixes morir a traïció amb els meus vicis?

No.

Açò mai no m’ho pots fer, amor.

Ets un cabdill de veritat,

i mai gosaries ni tan sols pensar-ho.

En torn al meu jo el silenci, sol amb els meus pensaments

inquietantment sinistre

espero que tu seguisques amb vida

mentre recullo forces per a eixir d’ací…

**************************

VI.

mentre tot calla

despertar, de nou conscient:

EL LÍDER SÓC JO!!

*************************

VII.

Grantaire s’était levé.

L’immense lueur de tout le combat qu’il avait manqué, et dont il n’avait pas été, apparut dans le regard éclatant de l’ivrogne transfiguré.

Il répéta : Vive la République ! traversa la salle d’un pas ferme, et alla se placer devant les fusils debout près d’Enjolras.

— Faites-en deux d’un coup, dit-il.

Et, se tournant vers Enjolras avec douceur, il lui dit :

— Permets-tu ?

Enjolras lui serra la main en souriant.

Ce sourire n’était pas achevé que la détonation éclata.

Enjolras, traversé de huit coups de feu, resta adossé au mur comme si les balles l’y eussent cloué. Seulement il pencha la tête.

Grantaire, foudroyé, s’abattit à ses pieds.

KOНEЦ.