The Return of Yuletide Hell

[nineveh_uk]

It’s that time of year again! The cards creep into the shops. Mince pies and whatever “Ecclefachan”* pies are start to appear on the shelves. Far, far away the attentive ear catches the sound of reindeer bells, and on a screen near you the first signs of Yuletide start to be seen. Which means that it is time for the return of How Will You Ruin Yuletide?

I first ruined Yuletide in 2009.

I did it in 2010 with a poll.

And again in 2011, on both LJ and DW.

In 2012 and 2013 I ruined Yuletide by not Ruining Yuletide. That is worst of all.

And now it is 2014, the nominations are in, the fandoms are being sorted, people are are having arguments about what should go in Yuletide letters, and whether saying you don’t want cannibalism in Flower Fairies fandom is kinkshaming.

So I have two choices. I could Ruin Yuletide by write a very long post about how to do everything right that is actually accurate and quite reasonable (except that it is 20,000 words long and starts a flamewar on yuletide_coal that spills over into civil war in Quebec), and then break the spirit of every rule in my own fic.

Or I could do a Yuletide Hell game post. I choose the latter.

The rules are simple: write in comments the Yuletide prompt that you would hate to get. Others are then invited to try and write a sentence of it.

Like every other facet of Yuletide, it is of course more complicated. To be true to the spirit of Yuletide Hell, there is no possible degree by which your prompt could be too entitled, self-contradictory, and generally batshit. While optional details are entirely optional I nonetheless expect that all prompters on this page will have many optional details that they will fully expect their writers to cover, and will also be dreadfully, mortally offended if writers do not merely cover the prompt, but fail to intuit what the requester wanted but forgot to write down.

Here are mine to start off with...

(1) Measure for Measure. Angelo/Isabella. Thanks so much for writing this for me, Yuletider! I know that you’ll do something true to the spirit of Shakespeare’s play! Though don’t do iambic pentameter unless you can really measure up to the standard set by Will as I find bad poetry triggering. Angelo and Isabella are my OTP, so it’s such a pity that Isabella’s internalised misogyny and Vienna’s slut-shaming culture make her unable to respond in a sex-positive way to Angelo’s proposal. I’d love some fix-it fic that has Angelo teaching Isabella to respect her identity as a sexual being. Also, it’s so stupid that Juliet and Claudio don’t practice responsible contraception. I know it’s 1603, but NFP was available then and they should have educated themselves more responsibly, so no babyfic. Bloodplay and BDSM are canonical, so don’t leave them out.

(2) 17 Moments of Spring. Stirlitz/Schellenberg. Omegaverse. I just think that the confluence of the last days of the Third Reich and A/B/O could lend a really fascinating dimension to the story. Obviously in order to respect the very serious setting of the canon complete historical accuracy is a must. It is particularly important that you get the uniforms right.**

(3) Lord Peter Wimsey. Bunter. Bunter isn’t actually in the list of characters, because I didn't nominate the fandoms I planned to request because the Spirit of Yuletide means other people should nominate them for me while I nominate for things I want to write experimentally but actually hate, so I selected Any, but that doesn’t matter, he is still the main one you should write about. I have a very, very specific story in mind, and if you don’t write about this then obviously you are going to ruin Yuletide forever and also possibly cause me to go on the rampage and destroy all Christmas trees within a hundred miles. I’d like a post-war story that has Bunter start by wanting to help Peter to overcome his shell-shock, but he gets to like Peter being dependent on him and when he realizes that Peter doesn’t remember what happens during his nightmares, starts to coerce him into acting as his sex slave. But Bunter’s got an enormous sex drive (and that’s not the only enormous thing, lol!) and wants more sex, so he tricks Peter into thinking that hypnotherapy will help him, so that he can force him to have sex whenever he wants. Please respect Bunter’s demisexual identity.

BTW, I know that the Wimsey canon can be intimidating for a first-time writer, but don’t worry. As long as you avoid the most egregrious Americanisms and make sure you say things like “settee” instead of sofa, couch, or Chesterfield, and stick closely to Strunk and White, I’m sure you’ll be fine.

*Some sort of cross between Lancashire and Wales?

**Note in 2015. The recipient was lucky enough to receive an absolutely masterful fic for this prompt, in which Stirlitz’s cover is blown when he screamed in Russian during childbirth.

Comments

[ankaret]

L. Ron Hubbard RPF. Any.

[perennialanna]

I know nothing of Yuletide, but Ecclefechan tarts are from the Scottish borders (and not particularly associated with Christmas).

[oursin]

Rasselas/Imlac, Omegaverse with mpreg, in Johnsonian prose, I am very fussy about stylistic authenticity, a single word that is not authentic C18th and verifiable in Johnson's Dictionary will ruin Yuletide for me. (And Imlac is the alpha, right?)

[legionseagle]

Slings and Arrows Darren Nichols, Richard Smith-Jones and Oliver Wells during the run of Macbeth. Please handle the witches in a sensitive, historically accurate, inter-faith manner which emphasises the positives. Try to link so-called "superstitions" to their origins in pagan practices in a positive and constructive spirit. No references to character death, please! Also, no camp.

[quillori]

Voyná i mir | War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy - [fandom nominated without characters]

Optional Details - [left blank]

Sign up name - [unrelated to name used on other social media]

References on LJ/DW/Tumblr/etc when finally tracked down - [single reference to deeply held belief all 19th C Russian literature actually expresses esoteric Masonic philosophy, written in Kabbalist code]

[moetushie]

The Charioteer - Mary Renault, Ralph Lanyon, Alec Deacon, Laurie Odell -- I know it's a teensy-weensy not allowed, but I would love it if you could include the character of Captain Jack Harkness, as well as the other nominated characters I've requested? Perhaps he gives a stirring eulogy at Bim Taylor's funeral. Or maybe he's Alec Deacon's previously completely unmentioned American friend. I think he and Ralph would get along very well, don't you?

If you can't write Jack, I'd rather you try the other canons, please.

20th Century RPF RPF, Any -- I hope this isn't too broad a category! But I'm fascinated by the the people who are fascinated by who prominent historical figures in the 20th century were boning.

Hamlet - COULD BE ANYONE REALLY , The Pirates, Gravedigger #1 and 2, Fortinbras -- No doubt I've made it obvious by my character choices, I'm an ardent Anti-Stratfordian. Please don't ruin my Yuletide by implying in any way that the vile Pretender, William Shakespeare, wrote the genius that is Hamlet.

[antisoppist]

Fandom: Guardian newspaper columnists RPF
Mariella Frostrup and Captain Awkward combine to give joint marital advice to Lucy Mangan and the wife of that man in the band whose name I can't remember, oops, sorry! I know Captain Awkward is not a Guardian newspaper columnist and wasn't in the character list but that doesn't matter and by the way I don't like people writing fic about real people and I love these characters and don't want to upset them.

[taelle]

17 Moments of Spring. Stirlitz/Schellenberg. Omegaverse.

Congratulations, you've ruined not only Yuletide but my brain.

[serriadh]

Antonia Forest's Marlowverse/My Little Pony:Friendship is magic
I really love the olde worldy pony things they do at Trennels, so I'd love to see it combined with MLP. I'm a keen rider, so accuracy in that is really important - you might need to find a horse-picker if you don't know much about it all. I think it might be really cool if they were doing a sort of Gondal with their MLPs and then it turned real and they went into the MLP-verse. I haven't specified characters but my favourite is Patrick so please don't write him as arrogant or opinionated!! I am triggered by OOC writing after a bad incident in my teens where someone said Fred and George were bullies. I also really hate animal cruelty so no hunting!!

I know the canon is hard to get hold of so don't worry if you haven't seen all the series of MLP.

[fallingtowers]

Aubrey-Maturin, modern coffeeshop AU. – Sophie is an asexual cupcake baker; Diana is her awesome bisexual polyamorous cross-dressing cousin, who’s a barista by day and a glamorous fashion blogger by night. There’s this couple of clueless customers who keep showing up in their fancy beach town coffeeshop and keep hitting on them.

Obviously, Stephen is a non-neurotypical nerd and animal rights activist, and Jack is his fratboy friend. Somebody should totally unpack Jack’s privilege as a cishet white guy with a rich father and a military career. But things get so much better when he finally owns up to being into furry kink, and Stephen starts leading him round by a collar while wearing a bear suit.

Babbington should show up too, he’s such a trashy little man slut! LOL. But he shouldn’t be sex-shamed and get STDs for his promiscuity as he does in canon. And NO UNDERAGE!!!!

Please include references to 18th century natural history as well, just without any speciesism. And you’d really, really make my Yuletide for accurately quoting the Aeneid in there (only in Latin), but just if you read it as a fundamentally anti-imperialist, innately post-colonial text.

PS. Movie canon ONLY.

[el_staplador]

Biggles series – W. E. Johns (Ginger Hebblethwaite)

I’m convinced that Ginger is a Weasley. How does he get on at Hogwarts? No need to include Biggles or Algy.



Just William series – Richmal Crompton (Ginger Merridew)

I’m convinced that Ginger is a Weasley. How does he get on at Hogwarts? No need to include William, Douglas or Henry.



1950s Actor RPF (Ginger Rogers)

I’m convinced that Ginger is a Weasley. How does she get on at Hogwarts? No need to include Fred. (Fred Astaire, I mean! Obviously include Fred Weasley!)

[sam-t.livejournal.com]

(3)

As you may be aware, large areas of Scotland are suffering from a lack of woodland diversity as a result of commercial conifer plantations, so it would be environmentally irresponsible of me not to pass up the opportunity for a low-carbon ground-clearance operation. As such, I will not be able to follow your prompt in full. However, as it's Christmas, I have kept Bunter, the shell-shock and the settee.

His Lordship had recently expressed an interest in the cuisine of the Indian subcontinent, and as, in Mr Bunter's opinion, any interest, however slight, should be nurtured as being beneficial to his Lordship's delicate mental state, Bunter had undertaken to transform the delivery of a note to an elderly Anglo-Indian civil servant (retired) into an invitation to spend an afternoon aiding his manservant Mr. Chatterjee in the preparation of various pickles and chutneys.

The brass ornaments on the hall table next to the elephant's-foot umbrella stand were quite outside Mr Bunter's experience and not entirely to his taste but he observed with approval that they all showed signs of conscientious polishing. At the appearance of a dark-skinned figure from the direction of the kitchen, Bunter rose from the mauve-draped rosewood settee upon which he had been desired to wait and followed his guide into a cloud of intriguingly fragrant steam.

can we still play?

[lilliburlero]

David Blaize/Violet Grey/her fiancé love triangle. I'd love a bakery AU! No cousincest, please, that really squicks me. I find cricket really boring: please don't include extended descriptions of cricket matches! No piffle: I just can't stand it when people use that word (pet peeve ha ha).

[azdak.livejournal.com]

It is particularly important that you get the uniforms right.

Right with respect to canon, obviously, rather than historically accurate. I mean, who wants to imagine one member (hee!) of the SS being rogered by another while wearing a grey uniform*, talk about squicky!

*Although if it resulted in Stirlitz screaming out in Russian while giving birth, I might just be able to endure the trauma.

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

Ecclefechan is a town in Dumfries and Galloway. I've never been there but it's signposted from the main A road into Glasgow and the route we take to visit my folks down south and for some reason the name of it always amuses me :)

[daegaer.livejournal.com]

I . . . sort of want cannibalistic flower fairies now.

So, so traumatised by your 17 Moments note. Traumatised with LAUGHTER.

[tudorpot.livejournal.com]

Loves this. I so wanted to comment on the oh so precious kink-shaming post, restrained myself by reading the various comments which were split between overweening attempts to "unpack" the post (shudders), support OP, direct and indirect allusions to 2013 fic which I gather totally ruined OP's life.

[adina-atl.livejournal.com]

Measure for Measure

Author's note: Don't worry, dear recipient, I too find bad poetry triggering. I don't think I could do good Will's iambic pentameter justice, alas, so I chose another verse form.

***

My gentle reader
I so hope you will enjoy
eighty-eight haikus.

Our best belov'd duke
to Angelo hath giveth
Viennese command.

Dressed in friar's smock
He watches Angelo teach
frozen heart to love.

Or if it be not love
then burgeoning* manhood
and her clitoris.

***

* Remember that this has to be pronounced with all four Elizabethan syllables, burg-e-O-ning!

[sam-t.livejournal.com]

Oh, gosh, now you've got me reading back through fandom history. File under People Are Strange...

In The Thick Of It, 1930s AU. Politics is politics any time, right? But I'd like the 1930s because I like the clothes. Any characters, in any combinations - just remember that no-one swore like that back then, so watch the language! Oh, and I've only seen Series 1. NO SPOILERS!