URGENT!!!: Our landlord is saying we owe for last month, and we can't find evidence of us doing so though we're sure we did.
We need h.e|p, please. I don't want to be homeless again. I don't want to lose my animals. Please share this where you can and if possible, donate.
And YES there are already huge problems going on that require funding. I'm aware. But just because your neighbors house is on fire doesn't mean yours isn't sinking.
Please don't ignore us.
20/950
Pp@|: Here
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Urgent!!!
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maybe this is a kind of obvious answer but can you talk about the symbolism of the silent princess flower in botw?
YEAH. i can <3 <3 <3 <3
so the silent princess. this flower which is so pervasive as a symbol throughout this game. most of what we are told about it comes directly from zelda in the memory where she talks about it. in the english version of the game, she says "This one here is called the silent princess. It's a rare, endangered species. Despite our efforts, we can't get them to grow domestically yet. The princess can only thrive out here in the wild. All that we can hope... is that the species will be strong enough to prosper, on its own." in japanese, she (more or less) says, "this is... it's called the silent princess, and it's an endangered flower. I started artificial cultivation [of the silent princess] a while ago, but it's not going well. it's... a princess that might become extinct." that discrepancy is interesting, i think, with the english version being altered to give zelda a slightly more hopeful outlook on the fate of the flower, musing about its potential for survival instead of thinking more negatively about the prospect of its extinction.
So. the flower's actual symbolism. It's honestly kind of heavyhanded imo, but sometimes a heavyhanded symbol still works really well. consider the flower's name, the "silent princess." consider, then, the two characters who are most obviously tied to it--zelda, the princess, who is actually named in the flower's compendium description, and link, the silent knight who seems to find the flower at every important location throughout his journey. On a certain level, the flower is representative of these characters, hence why its name evokes aspects of both of them. more specifically, though, the flower is representative of the internal struggle these two characters undergo as pieces of the bigger puzzle that is the calamity.
both zelda and link suffer "in captivity" as zelda puts it--they find themselves struggling under the weight of their destinies, zelda unable to perform to the standards of her father, link terrified to fall short of the kingdom's expectations. neither of them are able to reach their full potential when "cultivated artificially" as it were; link is mute and subdued, never showing even the slightest hint of his true personality underneath the hardened exterior, and zelda is frustrated and depressed, convinced she will never be enough to win the love and praise of her father. On a certain level, being "cultivated in captivity," being forced to live under careful observation, with a clear purpose and clear, unshakeable expectations, killed both link and zelda. link literally died at the hands of the calamity, and zelda killed her adventurous spirit and scientific curiosity in an attempt to conform to her father's expectations. when zelda, in the japanese version of the game, muses that the princess may be destined to become extinct, she is expressing kinship with the flower, believing that she, too, has no meaningful future since she can't conform to the expectations her father and her kingdom have for her. She essentially feels that if she can't be useful "in captivity" there is no way for her to live in this world, and that the only other option is "extinction."
Her more optimistic english monologue, however, is closer to the truth of the silent princess's resilience. While we know that the princess was in dire straits a hundred years ago, post-calamity hyrule sees many of the flowers taking root, often in places that were once highly-populated but have since been abandoned. what we find in a post-calamity landscape is that the silent princess, once thought to be unsavable, is THRIVING in this new world, having been released from the expectations and interference of the people trying to cultivate it. Again, this is symbolic of link and zelda: in a post-calamity landscape, we see link begin to find his voice. we see his personality begin to return--he cracks jokes, he laughs, he cooks, he takes photos, he makes connections, he buys a house and decorates it. He thrives in a world where he is not confined by the pressure to be perfect, to grow in the way that others expect of him. the silent princess can't grow in captivity, but it CAN thrive in the wild, free of outside influence, allowed to just BE.
Also worth noting that there's a side quest in botw which involves a legend that if you swear your love on a freshly-picked silent princess, you and your partner will "live a charmed life." there's definitely something to be said about The Zelink Flower being the subject of a romantic legend. but that's not actually the point of this post. anyway
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