#me surrounded by my 20 copies of the oresteia w various translations before sitting down to write the elektra complex: im going to strangle

[filmnoirsbian]

What bothers me the most about these "I've never read the source material" #feminist #queer retellings is that retellings are, at the bare minimum, in conversation with a source material. This is true whether or not you have actually read the story you are attempting to retell. Refusing to read the source just means your conversation is now one-sided, which is detrimental to any hope of furthering the discussion or themes or narrative. So now you've interrupted a conversation with an aside that ultimately adds nothing because it doesn't know enough about what was said previously to be able to respond or build upon it. And I just...don't get it! Why would you want to tell a story that way? Why would you decide to put an addition onto a house without looking at the architectural blueprints?

#me surrounded by my 20 copies of the oresteia w various translations before sitting down to write the elektra complex: im going to strangle #that 'sapphic odyssey' woman w my bare hands #tcp #im not trying to say u HAVE to do what i did to write a retelling btw but like. why would u not want to at least read the baseline #an open window #this also isnt to say that a writer who's read the source can't write a bad retelling. i know mm and ms saint both read their sources...