rthstewart | I think I left my brain in an ancient port city of Rome

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I think I left my brain in an ancient port city of Rome

So happy Tuesday after Happy Cat Sacrifice Day! By whose authority am I back and work?

Easter dinner for 20 was fabulous though I'll assume my jet lagged state was responsible for the gross over-estimation of food (coupled with my epic failure at math). I also had to prepare for 2 readings at the church’s Easter Vigil mass (Moses parting the Red Sea, and all of Pharaoh’s army, his chariots and charioteers and something from the book of Ezekiel I didn’t like much).

econopodder made awesome carrots (gingery and yummy) and salad and

knitress brought massive quantities of cheese and garlic bread and we had 5 desserts. The kids began a gigonormous water fight battle and now there are plastic bottles, nerf guns, and sleds (used as shields) all over the yard. I had jelly beans and the last of my Firenze biscotti for breakfast.

I have been frantically checking for any comment on Rat and Sword. Why yes, I am obsessed. I never sleep well after a posting.

Why am I at work again?

A few more rambling bits of navel gazing about Rat and Sword. Just move along if you aren't interested.

Usually, by the time I post, I am content with what is there. It’s what I want it to be and to say and often the most recent thing I post is my favorite. Not so here. I have felt continuously during this story that for all the work and research, it was a tepid, off the mark work. So thanks to those of you who didn't think, ho hum, gosh that really wasn't worth the build up. Anyway.

I first came up with the idea of writing Peter going to war after reading Ambrose’s book at the recommendation of a colleague who is a retired Major in the US Airborne. When I realized the paras wore the Pegasus shoulder flash (designed by Daphne Du Maurier) and that the Oxs & Bucks had taken “Pegasus Bridge” and that so much of TSG had taken place in Oxfordshire (and that Major Howard had been a police officer there), it all seemed to fit. It was only after I first suggested it in an early chapter of AW that someone said, "OMG and of course D Company is protecting the eastern flank landings at SWORD BEACH! THAT'S PERFECT FOR THE SWORD OF NARNIA!" Oh yeah. I guess it is. I didn't realize until I was writing that the landing zones were King, Queen, and Peter. This kind of thing happens a lot.

Inserting Susan into Normandy came late. I'd read Ambrose's book and so saw a place for Peter but was daunted by the prospect of an original espionage tale for Susan. When I went back and read it and saw the importance of the intelligence work there at the bridges, I decided to put her in there, though there's no support for it at all. Several folks have commented on the instructors' remarks during her training. The records of the SOE training of the women agents are very good and are excerpted in the source material. The style and commentary are I think true to the period. They were also a good story telling device because the alternative was to try to write a whole separate training sequence and that meant writing new characters and a much larger story when the action was all in Normandy. Susan's story actually was to begin in now Chapter 3, when she's jogging around the finishing school and gets the assignment. But, I felt it was too abrupt and so I used the sort of odd, info dumping chapter 1 to get it moving. It doesn't fit really and the scene with Asim and the Colonel will also begin the next chapter of AW.

Speaking of, Greaves had asked about the timing. Chapter 1, with Asim and the Colonel meeting is after Christmas, January or so 1943, following right after the most recent AW Christmas update. Asim has not met Lucy. Some 6 months later, give or take, during the deer kill, Susan tells us that Asim does know and has met all of them. So, there's your timeframe.

I'd struggled with what to do with Edmund during the remainder of the war -- he's a good little student, learning his languages, staying out of trouble, and really, there's nothing in particular to say. I'd never intended to send him to America but once I wrote that scene with Asim and Walker-Smythe, it did fall into place.

And about that -- by the time of D-Day, Peter is 18 and Susan is 17 and Edmund is 15 or so in Washington and yes, I know, they are too young and I've just done a magical paw wave to get the three of them into these insane situations. If you're with me this far, you're OK with it, but I know that I've stretched the boundaries of credulity. At some point I will get a reviewer who says, "aren't they really too young for this?" To which I can only say, yep, they are.

Some small and thematic things that might have gone by you.

Tebbitt's use of the Narnia code underscores just how truly screwed Susan is. Also, if Edmund has been in Washington with Walker-Smythe who has been working on Patton's invented First US Army Group and the obfuscations that made the Germans think the Allies were landing at Calais, that means he knows a lot and probably has a pretty good idea of what his brother and sister are both doing and can't say anything about it to either of them. Silence, lies, and all that.

Peter's got issues with women. He's pretty cynical about them, and it's consistent with what he's experienced in Narnia and it's continued here.

Some of the things I played with in Maenad (or wanted to but couldn't fit in) are lurking here -- the horizontal collaboration, the later abuse of the women who were sleeping with Germans (public humiliation and shaved heads), the concept of terroir, that wine replaced food, and so on.

When I first started TSG, I had these very romantic ideas of Lawrence of Arabia. I abandoned them in my development of Asim as I read more. I had similarly romantic ideas about the women in the SOE. The source material is often scathing in its criticism of the SOE's naivete and epic stupidity. Yes, Asim is very (conveniently) clairvoyant in this regard -- but he's had misgivings about the British intelligence establishment going all the way back to TSG Part 1. The Prosper network blow up referred to in the story was terrible and there were many other enormous and epic failures. Susan (and Tebbitt and Asim) are far more security conscious than many in the establishment they are working for.

What happens to Peter and Susan? The story had initially ended with Susan getting orders to head to Paris and Peter's unit is converted from Commando to common infantry and they are returned to the rest of the Ox and Bucks and go on to the rest of the invasion of France. Instead, the story ends on a high note, and that's fitting.

The humanity of the Germans -- an important point for several reasons. Major Howard becomes very good friends with Von Luck, the commander of the 125th Panzer. I assume (though do not know) that with so many French men conscripted and in hiding, a lot of the babies who were born were probably with German fathers. I assume that this would be handled compassionately, to a point, and there is the whole thing that Susan and Madame Vion are manipulating that goodwill. As Susan points out after she kills Mueller, killing the bad and evil man isn't as hard as killing the good man fighting for the wrong cause.

Peter's journey from Oxbridge middle class shining High King to common, swearing, smoking man of the people grunt. I commented to Adaese that I can't begin to accurately get all of the English class issues. A couple of readers did point out to me during my angsting about Peter's military career (age aside and which I'd never intended to write at all) that of course he would be an officer. I didn't really understand that comment until I really focused on it in Ambrose's book. Instead, Peter eschews all that to be with a very different class of person. This is consistent with my head canon and overall journey but I blundered into it here by accident. It's like the batman relationship -- instantly recognizable to British sensibility and really foreign to American.

There might be more but I guess that's it for now. Thanks so much to those who read. I really, really appreciate it.

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re: the Pevensies being too young to be involved in the war — While in reality, of course they are too young and none of this is credible, I think it's best to keep in mind that this is a fantasy world and the main characters were all children who went to a magical land and grew up there and really ARE adults though their outward appearances do not reflect this. If one is reading stories in this fandom, then to be honest, it's not completely impossible. You've already set up your take on them (as adults in children's bodies) so very long ago and as you said, if we've kept up, none of this is surprising or unbelievable.

Lucy's upcoming meeting with Asim in AW will more than make up for her missing presence here. :-) It really was a shame that she wasn't able to get more "screen time" in this story (and I remember the back and forth we had about her) but there really was no feasible way to get her involved in the type of work her siblings got up to.

As for Edmund knowing what Peter and Susan were up to, I think at one point, it did cross my mind that he would have known where Susan was, and what she'd be up to, though I never thought he'd know about Peter's specific role. And from his view, I suppose that it would have even been more difficult to write letters to any of them and withhold all that information. (And it would have been pointless anyway to write of it, given how heavily censored his letters probably were. With the Colonel knowing about Edmund's involvement in Operation Narnia, his letters were probably given extra scrutiny before they were sent off to England.)

In the scene where he tells Tebbitt and Asim about Liluye, he really was able to provide them with the exact sort of "translation" if you will of how the Gryphon's death could possibly relate to the Allies' invasion plans. With his knowledge from working with the Colonel, I think you managed to convey that he knew more than he ever let on and so was able to really get Susan's message across to the two men.

Now that I think on it, I think Edmund in DC is a lot like Harold the Clerk in the Lone Islands -- so far away from friends and family, and training under a different sort of mentor and in a different guise, before being reunited with all of them again. The only difference of course is that there's no Morgan but there will be a meeting with Agnes, which shall be very interesting to say the least.

I am reconciling myself that the next AW chapter is heavy on Lucy.

Several things occurred to me that tie into this and what you wrote. First, Edmund is very much suited to going undercover as a clerk and it's been fun to go back to the very beginnings of the story, both parts 1 and 2, to pull some of the threads together. Second, while it's not going to be a huge side story, there are some interesting things to play with, including how much Edmund knows, how he feels about working truly solo, and how he feels about concealing what he knows from his siblings -- which has been an issue for him. There's a fair amount of character growth that can occur.

I'm not sure, given the timing, how much he would know -- I don't know the precise timing of the Normandy invasion planning. Having him involved in the FUSAG deception is interesting on its own. I'm not sure at what point it was known that the 6th Airborne would be handling the eastern flank.

Anyway, if I can ever stay up later than 9 PM, I'll actually finish the dang chapter. Something that did occur to me is that Digory and Polly really have no clue about the espionage at all. They don't know what Susan was doing in America, they don't know Rat and Crow in Narnia, or the concert of minds -- I mean, they might, but I just can't see that being something that the Pevensies discussed with them much. In this, Mrs. Pevensie actually knows more than Digory and Polly do.

Hmm. Edmund in DC will definitely be a lot lonelier than Harold the Clerk, not just because there's no romantic interest or distraction. At least on the Lone Islands, he still had his subjects around and they were mostly unnoticeable since they were animals. He will have no one to truly confide to or to ask advice of while working for the Colonel. For all that George will know who and what Edmund is in the way he knows Susan, it's not the same as having Sallowpad or Jina around. I'd like to think Ed would try to talk to Lucy but as I said earlier, it would be hard with the censoring and all the secrets.

Likewise, Lucy will be solo too, just in different ways. And with the addition of being stuck at school, it makes her life that much harder (as Peter reflected in "Rat and Sword"). I think at least, she's not completely alone because she has the wonderful ability to talk to Aslan, or Briony or Aidan. (Oh, and about Lucy's spelling -- it's a lovely trait to give her because it makes her more real. And besides, if Mary Anning Russell [as an adult and well-known woman of science] can have atrocious spelling, why can't Lucy as well?)

I think that Digs and Polly not knowing does make sense. For them and the Pevensies, I'm sure it's Not Relevant in terms of the types of conversation they would have about Narnia. And even so, given how much Digory does not want to know about some of Peter's Narnian experiences, I think he's even less likely to want to know about the darker sides of ruling the kingdom. The interesting thing is that Asim (and I feel in some way, the other members of Russell House) knows and he's very good about keeping Secrets. Digs and Polly not knowing is probably the same as Eustace never knowing as well. (I don't know how much Jill would know, given how her mother offered her old Continental wardrobe to Susan in that chapter of AW.)

I shouldn't worry too much about class issues. There are probably about as many finer gradations of class as there are people in the UK (also known as Most of the English are doing it Wrong!). I happen to be pretty strong on the finer points of Oxbridge Middle Class, but wouldn't dream of commenting on the different shades of working class (rural is quite different from inner-city, for example). Incidentally, Peter is being very, very upper middle class when he chooses to go slumming it with working class troops. It's a common form of rebellion, and never, ever, under any circumstances whatsoever, involves slumming it with lower middle class people. Can be highly amusing, when you spot it and realise what's happening - and the youngster doing the slumming always thinks they're doing something totally original.

Fascinating. Yes, I can see all of that. In this case, with Peter, I've been playing for a long time with his everyman persona, but that he is also one who enjoys his royal prerogatives. Turning him into an anti-Colonial has been part of this whole journey and it was surprising to find that this story played into it as well. I've got a scene written for much later in which Susan really takes him to task for this (in her view) slide where she essentially says, "And here you are, the common man of the people, yet reasserting a most royal prerogative."

I thought about the comment you made about the American swearing which is not surprising given that I pulled it for Patton's D Day speech. General Gale was perhaps more British with his "the German is like the June bride. He knows he's going to get it but doesn't how big it is." I think you are quite right that they've picked up American slang since they've been drinking with and fighting with the Yanks in Wiltshire pubs for nearly a year out of the Bulford base. The books make a point of how really frustrated D Company was, with the whole situation, and there was a lot of fighting. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

And a very good story it is too.

I suspect, frankly, that any narrative problems you see--and if I were to identify any, I would say that the only real structural problem is the way the story winds up, and up, and up, and then you get the big battle, and then it stops--anyway, inasmuch as that's a problem, it's a problem because you're working in a predetermined setting & timeline. You can't really give Susan and Peter a lot of time for an emotional reunion and a comprehensive, leisurely wrapup, because there wasn't time. The real story didn't stop there, and so neither can the Pevensies.

So I can see that there's some disappointment, but I think the other strengths of the story more than make up for that.

And what Autumnia said about the ages: yes, they're both too young and too old, and that's the hazard of writing Narnia.

Bravo again: it's quite well done.

Thanks for the comment, Cofax. I really appreciate the technical view of it -- the big build up and then BAM it's over. The actual assault on the bridges was 17 minutes long. They were relieved 12 hours later and I did hit some of the high points there -- the Number One Gun, the exploding tank, and the snipers. There were a few other things that also happened, but I was limited by Peter's pov or it was hard to figure out what happened -- particularly the street fighting which, frankly, isn't as interesting. And at some point, it gets repetitive -- OH NO another threat to the bridge! it's a plane, it's a boat, it's a frogman! The sequence of events got very muddled too and rather than trying to muddle through what happened when and who did what, I ended it on the high, Hollywood moment of the bagpippers.

Thank you for this insight.

All right, I've just realized that it's going to take me a few days longer than expected to reread Rat & Sword due to that silly little thing I seem to have totally forgotten about (TAXES!), so let me leave a mini comment pile here about my impressions..

Just scrolled through comments below, and dear me, Edmund and Agnes meeting = yes, please.

I love the tale of Peter starting out at the bottom again, and the other comment below about how this kind of slumming is not so uncommon amongst those of a certain class made me go "yeah, all right" as the thing that would hold most people back is the fear of death on the front lines (reminding me strongly of Blackadder Goes Forth, actually), which is not Peter's issue at all. The difficulties with women and the real sense of masculinity that Peter gives off in this story also make me very happy - so many fanfic writers who write male characters, particularly those who spend all/most of their time with other men in dangerous or stressful situations, have a tendency to sort of "erase" many of the male personality traits or common antics that sort of lack romantic appeal (to put it mildly), but I didn't get that sense at all from the Ox & Bucks sections.

Susan also made me very pleased - the instructors' comments very much highlight how much of Narnian training and life is part of her personality, and the line about how the more she immersed herself in the work, the less she could talk about Narnia both settled the great debate of The Last Battle but also felt very real. Susan is in many ways during her training reliving the past in a very visceral way, unlike the less immediate ways that Lucy, Eustace, and Jill remember Narnia, and I can imagine that it doesn't make one eager to have the loss of such close friends rubbed in, despite wanting to remember them (naming herself Lambert, for instance).

Edmund in America I find very nice as well - I think after the schoolmaster incident and with what his mother knows and suspects about her children, it is not too hard to think of how it might work, although I do wonder how it affects Lucy to watch the others be "in the action" while she is working through letters and words, despite her strength of personality. (By the way, I don't think I ever said how much I loved Lucy's terrible spelling skills in the earlier bits - so perfect a detail!)

I also have to mention that due to the post-WW2 stories you've written, I found myself very happy to have attended a series of lectures on Malaysia's development following WW2, wikipedi-ing away details of British colonialism and the Malay wars and the development of a strong Islamic culture in the later years. All of these stories really reignite my love of history and have me dashing from topics (and it is terribly convenient to work in the same building as the history department as I have these urges, haha). Granted, I think the speakers were thinking I was there to pursue scholarly knowledge of Malaysian politics and not further daydreams of Peter and Edmund at war, but these things will happen.

I'm sure I'll find more things to talk at you about after a reread, but I know that new fic deserves fresh comments. :)

Goodness, there's a lot here! Thanks so much! Most of all, how FUN that you are able to enjoy the lectures on Malayan politics and war. That is just terrific. And why yes, it's listening to just those sorts of stories that can so inspire fic!!!

It's funny that you mention Lucy's reaction -- I have a line in the next chapter where she says that everyone else is off and away and she stays, and here of all places at horrid school and that that was not how it used to be. Other readers have not liked how young Lucy seems in some parts (I suppose she is) and that the spelling seems silly. I keep thinking that Lucy was a wonderful correspondent with friends who didn't have hands and dictionaries were simply not a priority in Narnia for her friends who maybe didn't read very well and many of whom probably never had traditional schooling. She spelled phonetically and she's always in a hurry with her letters, firing them off one after another with great enthusiasm.

I've read your comment about Peter in that very masculine environment a couple of times now. The historical accounts talk a lot about the male camaraderie, the swearing, smoking, and the drinking. My colleague, the former Major, whenever he starts talking about jumping out of airplanes, suddenly becomes animated and to put it mildly, cruder in his language. I have generally written Peter as an unabashedly male character. One reader, Clio, has mentioned how much more traditional he is and that there is still some essential moral development that needs to occur. All this is true. Some (younger especially) readers have been uncomfortable with how I've written the male characters -- the characters think about sex and girls in ways that are, well, based on my own experience, male. Men aren't women or girls and they don't think the same way. The fact that in this head canon, Edmund has a successful relationship and Peter does not really does show. Edmund's got his own flaws, but he works very well with women.

Thanks also for the comments about Susan. I've long wrestled with how to reconcile Peter's "Not a friend of Narnia" and even deep into TQSiT, I had readers say, OK, so when is she going to forget Narnia? The conflict is all there and laid out now. She will never forget Narnia, she will always use Narnia, it is fundamental to who she is and is integrated into her many layered selves. But she is constrained and she is choosing a path that 1) she forbids her from talking about Narnia casually and 2) that Peter does not ultimately approve of.

I'm still turning over in my head the Agnes and Edmund meeting and just how lonely he will be in DC. Like so many other things, I'd not intended to do it, but it does give me something to do with him into 1944 and then THANK GAWD I can END THE WAR and get on to finishing.

Thank you and good luck with the taxes!

It was a lovely lovely dinner; food and company and waterblasters and champagne! Plus jellybeans :-) Thank you so much for hosting.

I once again had jelly beans for breakfast. NOM

"I know, they are too young and I've just done a magical paw wave to get the three of them into these insane situations. If you're with me this far, you're OK with it, but I know that I've stretched the boundaries of credulity. At some point I will get a reviewer who says, "aren't they really too young for this?" To which I can only say, yep, they are."

Couldn't the same have been said regarding to C.S. Lewis? ;-)

As I don't mind spoilers, I'm reading all these comments before I have even started on the stories (I think the week-end is when I'll have time to enjoy the stories ...)

I hope you enjoy it when you do read! you and the other readers make excellent points about the ages. I'm certainly fretting too much and being preemptive of something no one has raised yet. Thank you!

I have been thinking about your comments about Peter and women. Things aren't helped by the fact that he has cut himself off from all the young women who are serving as WRENS and WAAFS and in the other services. They would have been considered officers and wouldn't be associating with lowly privates. And Peter spends his time with Parr and the boys, and they would be associating with shop girls and factory workers. This sounds snobbish and class-ridden, but I think it holds true that the field is narrowed for Peter, at least until he leaves the army.

Then I was thinking about Susan who is struggling with four personas (personae?) She is Susan Pevensie, Queen Susan the Gentle, Mrs. Susan Caspian and Jeanne-Louise Lambert. For the last couple of years she has been mostly Susan Caspian and Jeanne-Louise and she has to be them as intensly as possible, since lives are on the line, but they are her fake identities. And no-one, not even her siblings, know her as all four people. This has to be a mental strain. Where does she go from here?

Thanks once again for giving us such great characters to enjoy.
ClaireI

Thank you Clairel for coming by and reading. I've had another reader comment in a PM about what I've suggested here with Peter and his cynical view of women. I've been playing with this at least since BRD and early chapters of Part 1. While at first Peter was always trying to find a spouse and heirs for the greater good of Narnia and never quite fully gave into cynicism, in Spare Oom with the war, I think Peter has come pretty close to outright cynicism. He's got an ideal in his head and his always disappointed that no woman (except Dalia) ever met it. He's mostly come in contact with women aren't very interested in him, alone, as a person.

However, as written, I don't think he's a terrific partner. Considerate lover, sure, and he's never mean. This Peter written is very giving to his family, to his country, to Aslan, and at the end, there's nothing much left that he holds in reserve for himself and for a woman. Noble and self-sacrificing, but not very satisfying either.

Second, and this is a point Clio has made to me, Peter requires a certain moral education. He's certainly really unabashedly male (something Susan calls him on), has enjoyed his male privilege very much, and has avoided a lot of thorny moral dilemmas thus far (at least in part by delegating them to Susan and Edmund). Rat and Sword is, in some ways, beginning to strip some of that privilege away. None of this is to say he is a bad person -- he isn't. But he's got some growing up to do.

Where does Susan go from here? Good question! She obviously needs a long vacation on a beach with Tebbitt and drinks with umbrellas. I do think a part of what makes her more successful as a spy is her ability to juggle those different personas. The lipsticks and nylons, that ability to pretend, that are condemned (by some) in TLB are a strength here.

I just finished your story. Sorry, I do not have livejornal and Big Bang would not accept my comment. Great as usual. I like very much careful recreation of the details of the historical context. I caught myself on a thought at one point that I want to read fan fiction based on your stories, so solid is your writing and there many small details I want to know more about.

I noticed in your comments your concern about age of Susan, Peter and Edmund. Actually, at the time of WWII it was not such an unusual thing or even simply in that time in the history. One of the things I liked in your stories is that you have believable recreation of the atmosphere of the time. Eighteen was quite a lot at by those standards, still is in many places. In US 25 years is still a kid sometimes, but it is not in the most of the world, even Europe. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Army recruitment edge was 16. Also, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recruitment_in_the_British_Army states that “Very large numbers of civilians too old or too young for the Army, or barred from serving if they were in reserved occupations, volunteered for the new force”, which would perfectly fit for Edmund and Lucy. I could give plenty of examples of very young people evolvement from my own family and history, but this would be on the other front. Still, England was bombed on a regular basis, I do not think a single family in the country did not have somebody badly effected by war. This would be motivation and reason enough for very young people to mature fast and get involved in the war.

Thank you for the wonderful story and I hope to see more soon.

Hellen

The Navy took them even younger - as young as 14. In theory this was only for jobs in port or in offices. In practice over a hundred of the sailors killed when the Royal Oak was lost (in the supposedly completely safe haven of Scapa Flow) were boys between 14 and 18. They changed the rules afterwards so that boys under 18 needed either parental or special permission to be on active service (!)

Edited 2012-04-13 11:12 (UTC)

Thank you, Hellen. I'm looking forward to putting this up a chapter at a time so that those who are so inclined can share thoughts on particular things more easily. Clio and Adaese have both echoed your points about age and that I'm obviously over thinking it!

My fretting about the ages comes as much because I assume that at some point, I will have some write, "they are just too young for this, you know that?" And I do. But, there was a point in TQSiT, chapter 5, when Susan convinces Wallker-Smythe to let her manage Tebbitt despite her age. I had manipulated the situation, throwing it into chaos, they're short staffed, Susan presented herself right away as older than she was, her mother seems to be absent, and as we learn later, Walker-Smythe does keep an eye on the situation. But still, you had to buy the story at that point and I'm sure some readers couldn't go that far. What has happened is that readers have gotten in deep enough that they now don't care about the age either. Fine, whatever, just tell the darn story, Ruth. We want to see adult Pevensies in the war so come up with something and we'll just go from there.

I forgot to ask this: why does Peter hate boats? Did I miss something in the previous stories?

Thanks
ClaireI

A lot of authors write Peter as allergic to boats and that he should not get in the water if he can help it. I mentioned that in I love not man the less. I'm not sure where it comes from -- it's very fanon, maybe based on the fact that the boat mentions we do have, Peter isn't there -- the flight from Tashbaan and Dawn Treader. It's not something I've held with much one way or another, but it's a recognizable fandom trope for some readers.

Got it. Thanks. I guess I will have to read more Narnia fandom--not that this is a chore!

ClaireI

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I think I left my brain in an ancient port city of Rome

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Peter and Susan

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Queston about boats

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