So I'm watching The Sword and the Brocade, a show I figured I'd try bc some friends had recommended it, but I honestly wasn't expecting to get hooked; I was more thinking I'd give it a go, get bored, and cross it off my list of c-dramas. And instead, I am INVESTED.
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The setup: concubine's daughter marries a marquis bc her elder (legitimate) sister, his first wife, who knew she was dying, made him promise to marry her sister so that her son would continue to be looked after in the family. Cue Big Drama with his three other concubines.
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This is not a premise I thought I'd go for, bc as much as I love soft power narratives, a lot of the family dynamics hinge on women covertly (and not so covertly) battling each other for their husband and MIL's favor in the household. AND YET:
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What's become super compelling is how the show takes the supposedly insular, "domestic" politics of the household and consistently shows how much they matter to the "masculine," external politics of the marquis and the nobility - because the two are fundamentally the same thing.
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The bit I'm up to right now involves a plot around a charity kitchen feeding refugees. The most powerful concubine was in charge of it for the family, but bad rice was used thanks to schemes from the marquis's rival, and now they have to think their way out of it.
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The characterisation is awesome and I love how complicated the interpersonal dynamics are, but the political stuff is *so goddamn good,* bc unlike so much western historical (or fantasy for that matter) media, centering the wives *acknowledges that women are the supply chain*.
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It's a functional inversion of the kinds of western historicals where we see all the tough manly stuff in courts and on the battlefield and only remember the women when they're giving birth or being conveniently sexy: it shows the same trajectories from the inside out.
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All the big political events are still happening, but our primary lens for them is the women in the household and the women in their extended families. We see how sexism & custom constrain them, but also how goddamn *vital* their actions & responsibilities are regardless.
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Just. I am forever thumping the drum of The Personal Is Political And The Political Personal bc that's literally what it is, but so many stories fool us into thinking that actually, politics is Serious Man Stuff, or at least Very Removed From Domestic Stuff, and it's NOT.
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Replying to @fozmeadows
I was about to reply with the personal is political by your 2nd or 3rd tweet! Despite complaints about gender and censorship in CDramas the radical critiques on patriarchy and gender norms are simply lit! Meant to sharehttp://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/reviews/nirvana-in-fire-langya-bang/ …
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man, I loved Nirvana in Fire SO MUCH
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Replying to @fozmeadows
🟣BL Lovers’ Link 🍒 Retweeted 🟣BL Lovers’ Link 🍒
No idea how this tweet floated off somewhere else
https://twitter.com/BLLoversLink/status/1393811377265983498?s=20 …🟣BL Lovers’ Link 🍒 added,
🟣BL Lovers’ Link 🍒 @BLLoversLinkIkr! Article is one of the best things I’ve read on www. Innovating around restrictions are, paradoxically, why CDramas are a force to be reckoned with in gender-aware, queer-coded, epic narratives. What is visually obscured by censorship is forcefully revealed in the politics pic.twitter.com/DyLmtRYjuy0 replies 0 retweets 0 likesThanks. Twitter will use this to make your timeline better. UndoUndo
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