Enshule Feminist
Apr. 2nd, 2011 03:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skull_bearerStill haven't written anything for Enshule yet :( Boo. The plot's still jammed and I can't get it unstuck, so I'm playing for time and having fun with my second character, Kuen. She's the no-nonsense fighter type, and came from my wanting to shake up the hideously sexist world of ancient China (shut up, it is). That and her story rather tickled me.
She comes from a very poor background, her parents are peasants, and saved up what little money they had in the hopes they would have a son, and they could send him to take examinations, get a good position as an officer or official, and allow them a way out of poverty. They had all girls. So they thought 'fuck it, let's dress our Kuen as a boy, she's smart and tough enough.'
And she was. She managed to hide her gender well enough until her principality sided with the wizards, who didn't really care what gender you were as long as you were good (magic is non-gender discriminatory) and she was a pretty damn good officer throughout the civil war (now known as the Unification War). Now the war's over, and old prejudices are starting to assert themselves again. So Kuen decides, as she needs the cash, to head south and serve as a semi-mercenary on the border with the Klell (constant exposure to the matriarchal Klell means gender roles are more relaxed down there).
Now I'm thinking of why Enshule would have been patriarchal to begin with. They couldn't really be as bad as ancient China, if only because they have a large and very powerful Empire to the south which is run by women. Grunting on about soft-headed women only lasted long enough for the Klell to snatch quite a bit of southern territory, and a healthy respect followed. Maybe they justify it through horror stories, that these women are aided by demons, or that they suck the minds out of their boy-children and feed on them to enhance their feeble female minds (actually, I might keep that one). Maybe it's fear, people with privilege never want to give it up.
I could potentially say the same for the misandrist Klell, but to be honest Enshule haven't exactly been impressive with their centuries of infighting, princelings and petty warlords.
Maybe the Klell are quite a recent arrival and have been chewing up Enshule ever since? After all, united millitaristic kingdom v squabbling bunch of principalities = not much fight. hey, maybe that's why the wizards decided to act. Klell is big on the whole 'no magic' thing, and if they were going to snap up the country the wizards wouldn't be allowed to practise magic any more (my wizards are coming across as magic junkies right now), which might be one of the reasons they decided to act (that and 2 good wizard leaders, they aren't named, because I don't want Weis and Hickman to sue ;)
...Which still doesn't resolve the total lack of plot. It's hard to have a war when both sides are dead against the idea. Even the Klell, and they migth win. Maybe there a religious putsch and the current pretty reasonable lot of politicians will be outsted by my dear foaming at the mouth propetress bad guy. That could be interesting. Klell is somewhat democratic (in the ancient greek model, eg, hardly anyone can vote) and my prophetress has quite a lot of popular backing. She's a skilled speaker and knows how to appeal to fear and fuck me, how did the nazis get in here? Shoo, the lot of you!
Ahem.
Anyhoo, having a democratic uprising could be fun, although suddenly my characters diminish in importance. I'm in bad habits after AIoM, because I'm used to characters not really having much power. I'm not sure how to put Kuen and Temur in positions they can do a lot of good. Temur's the son of a pretty important noble family, so maybe that's the key. Or maybe the whole thing's off the record and Kuen wants Temur to take her to prophetress and kill her before she does spark off a war. Hmm, a search and kill assasination mission in the middle of a recoving civil war, democratic uprising, and brewing cataclysmic war.
To avoid accidentally parodying 1933 with the uprising, I'll try and model it on more religious lines. Klell is a very religious place, but the set up of the country is fairly secular, so the urge to 'push out those ungodly politicians who care nothing for (insert god here) and play their mind-games while the earth bleeds dry.'
One of the things I am really looking forward to is writing religion in a situation where people still know very little about the world. The Klell's deity might exist, it might not. The wizards' magic might be bleeding the world dry, it might not. The only point, as Kuen says, is that the war would be a disaster beyond anything imagined, and that's not worth risking on a 'maybe'.
Klell deity ideas:
She of Ten Thousand Faces, one face for each of her worshippers. The truely holy can see the face she turns to them, each different. kinda fits into the whole matriarchal Islam thing, because there would be no art of Her, as she would look different to everyone. Hence all the lovely carving and mosaics and scrollwork to honour Her. Maybe dance as well. I'm liking the idea. maybe the truely holy give up their names after they see Her, and take that of Her face.
A bit uncertain of having an civil war and an uprising so close together. Maybe some kind of other influence? Major upheavals are usually due to other factors too. Maybe Klell had a bad harvest. The part of the The Klell in southern Enshule is kind of the Empire breadbasket, as much of the southern state is desert (it is said that wizards bled it dry), and having a bad harvest just after a major magic civil war would seem conclusive (nope, nothing to do with all the women being drafted out to man the borders; refugees, out of work mercenaries and bandits crossing over the border to attack the much richer Klell, general all-round chaos knows no borders).
And of course Enshule would be rather short of food, despite a motion by the wizard cabal to put their powers at work feeding to population (the main danger is that an uprising could topple the still-fragile new power structure, and a fed populace is a happy populace). And they would have their own problems with the surviving families of the old principalities stirring up trouble and making rebel raids against the powers that be.
The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of keeping Kuen and Temur out of the limelight. Their plot to reach prophetress (she needs a name now too. She of the Falcon?) is going to be pretty quiet, taking place within the political jockeying without directly affecting it until the end. It also pushes Kuen further forward, because as she studied in the Enshule universities (and they had damn good ones in her principality) she's going to have an idea of the repercussions of a war between Enshule and the Klell (one word: BAD), and she's experienced war, and knows what a shitty experience that is.
I'm thinking of maybe working a romance in there too, as a subplot, although it would matter how the story pans out. I think Kuen has come to a moment where she's starting to think about going home and starting her own family, now her parents are living well and happy and own their own farm. So maybe she's starting to look for a guy who'd be good husband material (not Temur, spirits no! Too young by half). I think she'd like to be more grounded, she's been moving around for years, it's time for a little domestic bliss. Nice house close to her parents' farm (she hasn't seen it yet, there's been no time, although she's religiously sent money home, and lights incense for them on every Hearth Day [a day honouring the spirit protector of the village]), a nice fellow, a few children, and maybe a job as head of the local guards.
I really like Kuen. I'm liking most of these characters in fact.
She comes from a very poor background, her parents are peasants, and saved up what little money they had in the hopes they would have a son, and they could send him to take examinations, get a good position as an officer or official, and allow them a way out of poverty. They had all girls. So they thought 'fuck it, let's dress our Kuen as a boy, she's smart and tough enough.'
And she was. She managed to hide her gender well enough until her principality sided with the wizards, who didn't really care what gender you were as long as you were good (magic is non-gender discriminatory) and she was a pretty damn good officer throughout the civil war (now known as the Unification War). Now the war's over, and old prejudices are starting to assert themselves again. So Kuen decides, as she needs the cash, to head south and serve as a semi-mercenary on the border with the Klell (constant exposure to the matriarchal Klell means gender roles are more relaxed down there).
Now I'm thinking of why Enshule would have been patriarchal to begin with. They couldn't really be as bad as ancient China, if only because they have a large and very powerful Empire to the south which is run by women. Grunting on about soft-headed women only lasted long enough for the Klell to snatch quite a bit of southern territory, and a healthy respect followed. Maybe they justify it through horror stories, that these women are aided by demons, or that they suck the minds out of their boy-children and feed on them to enhance their feeble female minds (actually, I might keep that one). Maybe it's fear, people with privilege never want to give it up.
I could potentially say the same for the misandrist Klell, but to be honest Enshule haven't exactly been impressive with their centuries of infighting, princelings and petty warlords.
Maybe the Klell are quite a recent arrival and have been chewing up Enshule ever since? After all, united millitaristic kingdom v squabbling bunch of principalities = not much fight. hey, maybe that's why the wizards decided to act. Klell is big on the whole 'no magic' thing, and if they were going to snap up the country the wizards wouldn't be allowed to practise magic any more (my wizards are coming across as magic junkies right now), which might be one of the reasons they decided to act (that and 2 good wizard leaders, they aren't named, because I don't want Weis and Hickman to sue ;)
...Which still doesn't resolve the total lack of plot. It's hard to have a war when both sides are dead against the idea. Even the Klell, and they migth win. Maybe there a religious putsch and the current pretty reasonable lot of politicians will be outsted by my dear foaming at the mouth propetress bad guy. That could be interesting. Klell is somewhat democratic (in the ancient greek model, eg, hardly anyone can vote) and my prophetress has quite a lot of popular backing. She's a skilled speaker and knows how to appeal to fear and fuck me, how did the nazis get in here? Shoo, the lot of you!
Ahem.
Anyhoo, having a democratic uprising could be fun, although suddenly my characters diminish in importance. I'm in bad habits after AIoM, because I'm used to characters not really having much power. I'm not sure how to put Kuen and Temur in positions they can do a lot of good. Temur's the son of a pretty important noble family, so maybe that's the key. Or maybe the whole thing's off the record and Kuen wants Temur to take her to prophetress and kill her before she does spark off a war. Hmm, a search and kill assasination mission in the middle of a recoving civil war, democratic uprising, and brewing cataclysmic war.
To avoid accidentally parodying 1933 with the uprising, I'll try and model it on more religious lines. Klell is a very religious place, but the set up of the country is fairly secular, so the urge to 'push out those ungodly politicians who care nothing for (insert god here) and play their mind-games while the earth bleeds dry.'
One of the things I am really looking forward to is writing religion in a situation where people still know very little about the world. The Klell's deity might exist, it might not. The wizards' magic might be bleeding the world dry, it might not. The only point, as Kuen says, is that the war would be a disaster beyond anything imagined, and that's not worth risking on a 'maybe'.
Klell deity ideas:
She of Ten Thousand Faces, one face for each of her worshippers. The truely holy can see the face she turns to them, each different. kinda fits into the whole matriarchal Islam thing, because there would be no art of Her, as she would look different to everyone. Hence all the lovely carving and mosaics and scrollwork to honour Her. Maybe dance as well. I'm liking the idea. maybe the truely holy give up their names after they see Her, and take that of Her face.
A bit uncertain of having an civil war and an uprising so close together. Maybe some kind of other influence? Major upheavals are usually due to other factors too. Maybe Klell had a bad harvest. The part of the The Klell in southern Enshule is kind of the Empire breadbasket, as much of the southern state is desert (it is said that wizards bled it dry), and having a bad harvest just after a major magic civil war would seem conclusive (nope, nothing to do with all the women being drafted out to man the borders; refugees, out of work mercenaries and bandits crossing over the border to attack the much richer Klell, general all-round chaos knows no borders).
And of course Enshule would be rather short of food, despite a motion by the wizard cabal to put their powers at work feeding to population (the main danger is that an uprising could topple the still-fragile new power structure, and a fed populace is a happy populace). And they would have their own problems with the surviving families of the old principalities stirring up trouble and making rebel raids against the powers that be.
The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of keeping Kuen and Temur out of the limelight. Their plot to reach prophetress (she needs a name now too. She of the Falcon?) is going to be pretty quiet, taking place within the political jockeying without directly affecting it until the end. It also pushes Kuen further forward, because as she studied in the Enshule universities (and they had damn good ones in her principality) she's going to have an idea of the repercussions of a war between Enshule and the Klell (one word: BAD), and she's experienced war, and knows what a shitty experience that is.
I'm thinking of maybe working a romance in there too, as a subplot, although it would matter how the story pans out. I think Kuen has come to a moment where she's starting to think about going home and starting her own family, now her parents are living well and happy and own their own farm. So maybe she's starting to look for a guy who'd be good husband material (not Temur, spirits no! Too young by half). I think she'd like to be more grounded, she's been moving around for years, it's time for a little domestic bliss. Nice house close to her parents' farm (she hasn't seen it yet, there's been no time, although she's religiously sent money home, and lights incense for them on every Hearth Day [a day honouring the spirit protector of the village]), a nice fellow, a few children, and maybe a job as head of the local guards.
I really like Kuen. I'm liking most of these characters in fact.