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a-little-slice-of-fandom · 4 years

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In response to the Jane ask, I totally agree! Her song, as vague as it might be in the newer versions, is very much about emotional abuse and her realizing/reflecting on it. In the other versions this is arguably even clearer! Besides the list in the first verse, there’s a line in the student run version that always get me, in the second verse after “with out my son your love will disappear”. Usually in the lastest version it’s “I know it isn't fair, but I don't care”, which can be a sign of even tho she knows that he has hurt her at this point, her love will still be there for her son. But the student run it’s something like “you’ll let us fall apart, try to break my heart” which I think is much more powerful in showing more of her self awareness at what would happen to her. Also that opening monologue before about if she was really loved or just checked all the boxes on a list before she could make him angry, she knew that he would be willing to destroy her if she didn’t do as he wanted (Cause Anne wasn’t some death that would never happen again and that only happened cause Jane was there, he was to said to have threaten Jane with the same fate cause of the pilgrimage of grace incident (also well it did happened gain two queens later). Also just a slight unrelated thing, I can sorta understand why people blame Jane for Anne’s death but also not really. It was a whole campaign against Anne, and we only know that Jane was yeah trying to be queen due to influence from her family and others trying make sure she was but I don’t think it’s her fault Henry (and others) decided the best course of action would be to kill Anne. Though I am not a big Tudor researcher, this is only from multiple weeks and hours of searching and learning cause of curiosity and someone could fact check me but that’s what i interpreted the history as. Random rant over) Also the fact (and I’m pretty sure this is true in the newest version), she says “loved” most of the time. The past tense is important there, cause yeah maybe she did truly think she “loved” him. And he may have been the only one she ever “loved” but that cause she probably didn’t get a chance to love someone else (when Henry says it’s you, it’s you after all). This is just speculation though, I can’t assume what a 500 year old historical figure was truly feeling but a character in a show is different and ready for analysis. For that I say that maybe she did “love” him but it easily could have been out of fear or wanting to just deal with the cards dealt to her. But at the end she realizes where she wants her love to be directed towards, and that’s her son and in “Six” her new found family.

And fun fact about her part in “Six” (I kinda learned from something on tumblr but can’t remember who but either way here it is.) it’s 200% about the queens as her family, with her pun at the end being the main signifier of this. “You could perhaps call us the Tudor Von Trapps” is a reference to the Trapp Family Singers, an Austrian singing family (if you see the wiki for them, they are apparently the inspiration for sound of music, Neat!). So from that you would think “oh she’s talking about Henry and her kids with him having a band” but then she says “Just kidding! We’re called the Royalling Stones!”. A Rolling Stones references and they were made by friends forming a band, so that can be associated that the queens are said friends in this case but also part of family that has grown! Also Rolling Stones have a song called heart of stone, seriously this is the most clever joke Jane had during the show and it makes me, a pun/joke lover, very happy to see this be such a character trait that it’s in the damn description for her character for an auditioning sheet (check out Citadle Theather and Six the Musical in google, i think you’ll find it.)

Anyway sorry about this long ramble, it’s just that even though I totally can see how people view Jane as “weaker” in terms of some writing choices made, I still think there’s a lot to talk about with not just her current incarnation but also the other ones as well. I wish some changes werent made to her song, but she is a still strong character about the effects of emotional abuse and maternity. There’s nothing bad about talking about those things, your right that it doesn’t make her any less feminist. Anyway ramble over and I hope you have a lovely day :)

Hello hun!

Please don’t apologise for rambling! I’m always so interested in hearing other opinions on the queens and I love the opportunity to discuss any queen at any time! Frankly, I’m just impressed you got the whole essay into one message! Have they gotten rid of the character limit? Sorry, not relevant to the question.

(Also sorry for how long this took to answer! Uni happened sort of happened and I didn’t want to half ass my response to such a well thought out ask)

I adore the older versions of Heart of Stone, especially the student run version! I completely agree that Seymour feels so much more aware of her place in Henry’s life in the older versions. In the older version she knows she wasn’t Henry’s true love (even though she loved him) and she knows her worth is completely dependent on her ability to give Henry a son. She literally says “nothing lasts forever, I’ll fade away”. That is such a powerful statement and I wish that line was still in the song! I still think these themes are in the new version, but they’re nowhere near as explicit. Plus the character development in the student run feels much more explicit, with Seymour saying “soon I’ll have to go, I’ll never see you grow” instead of “him grow” in the new versions. She’s clearly speaking to Edward in the older version, so the last half of HOS in the old versions (at least in my eyes) is actually directly speaking to Edward and not Henry as many people think. I still think this is true for the new versions, illustrating Seymour’s character development as she breaks away from Henry and rather concentrates on her son, but again I don’t think it’s obvious in the new version. The older version just felt so much more powerful and I think it presented Seymour as much more as a victim than the newer version...which I argue is true! Seymour was as much of a victim as any other character in the show and I think she deserves more sympathy than the show gives her, and for as much as I love the newer versions of six, you can’t deny that Seymour is reduced to a joke for half of the show. The student version is such a genuine and earnest version of Seymour, and I can’t help but love her. It’s definitely a testament to the actresses from the student run that their characters are still on parr with professional versions of the show!

(Im so sorry I don’t feel like I’m adding anything to your analysis, but you’ve really summed up my feelings perfectly! )

Weirdly, I think that the student run and studio run play with the idea of having a “heart of stone” better than the modern version. I love the contrast between the material things that Henry can buy versus the natural world. Material things can fade, but the natural world (and Seymour’s love) transcends that. It’s a really nice use of juxtapostion in that song and I just don’t feel like the newer versions play with those images as much as the older version.

I do sort of get why they changed it (I think Seymour spends upwards of 10 just listing different objects, which is powerful in its own way but I do think audience members could get bored of those verses) but I wished they had still somehow managed to keep the theme that Seymour as explicit. I still think it’s there in the newer version of the song, but I don’t think it’s anywhere near as obvious as the older version. It would make HOS more like AYWD in a way, and that would be brilliant. Six shouldn’t be afraid to tackle different forms of abuse.

I personally can’t comment on the whole Anne Boleyn vs Jane Seymour thing because I just don’t know enough about the situation. However I don’t think any of the wives should be burdened with the blame of what happened to their predecessors. It wasn’t their fault.

Also I’d never thought of the tudor von trapps vs the royalling stones indicating that it was a found family rather than a blood family, but it’s actually such a neat little detail and I think it makes complete sense! I have always maintained that Seymour’s “family” doesn’t have to be related by blood. Found family is just as meanigful and as important as a bloof family, and Seymour finding her place with the other queens and calling them her family rather than Henry is very powerful in my opinion. I just don’t think the “my family’s grown” lime has to be as literal as people take it. Thanks for bringing that line to my attention though!

Seymour isn’t a “weak” character, both in term of the writing and in terms of character development. As much as I love the older versions of Seymour, I still like the new versions and appreciate that Toby and Lucy decided to allow Seymour to be a motherly character and have that be treated as an equally empowering thing as the other queens. Some women want to be mothers and that’s okay!

Anyway thank you so much for this ask my love! I really enjoyed thinking about Seymour (since she’s not a character I talk about a lot). Sorry again for taking so long to respond ❤️❤️❤️

#six the musical #enya discusses: six #six #sixthemusical #six: student cast #six: studio cast #six: west end cast #ask #ask answered #anon #anonymous ask #heart of stone #anon ask #anonymous

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estefiroberts-blog · 6 years

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The Darkest Fairy Tale

When my husband and I were married for two and a half years, we decided to start trying for a baby. We always knew we wanted kids, but we anticipated having to try for a while before it would actually happen. Much to our surprise, we got pregnant the first time we tried. The Thursday before we found out I was pregnant (about one week after ovulation), I woke up in the middle of the night feeling sick and thought to myself, “What if I am pregnant?" The days passed and I kept googling “pregnancy symptoms days past ovulation”. I was feeling every symptom in the book. On Sunday, May 14th (Mother’s day in the U.S.), we came home from church and I found out my best friend was pregnant. We took it as a sign that maybe I could be pregnant (as my period was not supposed to come until the following week). The pregnancy test confirmed I was pregnant really, really quick. I jumped out of happiness (and shock), my husband cried tears of joy. We both got down on our knees and prayed. What a miracle! We were going to be parents in January, 2018… The pregnancy was amazing, I was feeling a little nauseous, but not too much. I hated avocados, and loved limes. We saw the baby and heard its little heartbeat (165bpm) on June 14th, 2017, at exactly at eight weeks, on my husband's 30th birthday. Best. Birthday. Ever. I had previously been diagnosed with uterine fibroids. The doctor checked them and told me, with confidence, that everything seemed perfect. After 12 weeks, most women start feeling better, I didn't. I was still sick and after the 13th week I was no longer feeling like myself. Now that I know the facts, I know that around the middle of week 13 is when I caught an infection in my uterus. Much like a urinary tract, or a kidney infection, or any type of infection, this was unexpected and unavoidable. The cause is still unknown, just as in any other case of infection. In retrospect, I was feeling a little “under the weather” and had some lower back pain and possibly a low fever. I blamed it on the hormones and my fibroids. The week of July 24th to July 28th was the darkest week of my life. After a rough weekend (I worked on Saturday, and we had a busy Sunday), I started the workweek on a bad note. On Monday (the 24th), I could not sleep all night because I was having lower back pains. I blamed the fibroids. On Tuesday, I woke up from another bad night and had to take a quick warm bath to feel better. I threw up my breakfast and could not keep any food down the rest of the morning. Turns out I was in labor. I pushed through and made it to work on Tuesday (July 25th). I couldn't stand up, I couldn't sit down. I was in a lot of pain. My boss told me to go home, and my husband picked me up at work. Looking back I know now those were all signs my body was going into labor due to the infection. I got home and took a shower, it was the only thing that made me feel better. I put my pjs on and went to bed and took a 1.5 hour nap. My husband woke me up to serve me some lunch, since I wasn't eating and he was concerned. I got up from the dining table because I was feeling uncomfortable. Then my water broke. Just how you would picture it in the movies, a gush of water came out of me and I felt something popped. I was praying it was pee, but I knew it wasn't. My husband froze, looked at me and started crying. I said “Please don't, I need you to be strong for me, I am going to crumble”. We went to the emergency room and had a nightmarish experience. We had to wait, they didn't take me into the labor and delivery triage, because I was “only 14 weeks.” The waiting room was packed and I was desperately calling my doctor’s office and no one picked up. After what felt like an eternity, they finally took me in. They took blood work and a urine sample. At the time I collected the urine sample I did not see any blood, but the liquid kept coming out. The absence of blood kept my hopes up. We saw our baby on the ultrasound, with a heartbeat of 115, the ultrasound technician didn't say anything, but we saw our baby die. We saw our baby's heart stop beating. This was later confirmed by the doctor. After my ultrasound I needed to use the restroom. I went, and saw I was bleeding. It was, at that moment, when I knew my baby was gone. After hours of waiting and going back and forth waiting for the results (even though I knew them), we were taken into a room. They gave me the hospital gown to change into, and immediately started antibiotics. I did not think anything of it. A few minutes later, the doctor came in and said those words no parent wants to hear: “I’m sorry, I do not have good news, we did not find a heartbeat.” We wailed for a few minutes. Then I spoke to my doctor on the phone and she informed me of the infection. She said that was concerning, and that was the priority. She said I was going to be put on antibiotics and the next day the induction process was going to begin. I was not given the option to undergo a procedure called Dilation and Curettage (D&C) given the conditions of my fibroids and how far along I was. However, due to the infection, it was necessary for everything to come out while leaving the uterus intact. I was in a very delicate condition. At that moment, I didn't want to see the baby or find out the gender. However, after talking to my husband and my mother in law, we decided to meet “it”, and find out the gender. We didn't have a name for a boy, as we wanted a girl, and all of the old wives’ tales pointed to a girl. I was confused and sad; I was scared of meeting the baby, of thinking it was ugly or disappointing. The darkest night of my life began. They took me into a room in the Family Birth place (same place where live babies are born). I cried the entire time. It was not fair, why did I have to see all the pictures of the beautiful babies hanging on the wall, while I was going to deliver a 14 week fetus… not fair, just not fair. I was taken into a beautiful, quiet room. My husband crawled into bed with me, as my mom tried to sleep on the couch. No one slept. I was dreading four in the morning, the time I was scheduled to go to the other room and start the laboring process. I remember constantly telling my mom “I am scared, mommy." Now that I am a mom, I can imagine the pain she was going through. Suddenly, it was Wednesday July 26th and four in the morning came faster than expected. I knew we were about to face the hardest moment of our lives, and I was right. I just did not know how much love I was about to experience as well. They wheeled me into the Labor and Delivery room. Yes, just like you picture it, a huge room with two couches, a birthing bed, a neonatal bed, and a picture of a father lovingly holding a newborn. I remember burning with anger and asking the nice nurse, “Are the pictures and the neonatal bed really necessary?” She placed a pillow to my left to block the picture hanging on the wall. The room had a small pillbox window I could directly see from my bed. At around 4:30 in the morning I saw a white dove, perched on a windowsill just outside. I told my husband I wanted to name the baby Noah if it was a boy, in reference to the bible story of Noah. The dove meant God was with us in this storm. At this point we still thought we were having a girl. At five in the morning, they put the first dose of Misoprostol in my cervix to start the dilation and labor process. I had contractions all night. But after the pills, boy, oh boy, the heavy contractions started. I couldn't move for two hours to let the pills dissolve and it was painful. My husband massaged my back, held my hand, passed me ice chips. All the things a father does. My mom did not leave my side. At nine in the morning my doctor came in, told me she was so sorry for what happened, and explained the procedure. I looked at her in the eye and asked “Was it my fibroids?” “Absolutely not”, she answered. She checked me and said, “You are almost ready, it’s going to happen soon.” She ordered another dose of the pills. She was concerned about the placenta not coming out, possibly leading to surgery. At about ten in the morning I felt a gush and some pressure. I called the nurse, she came and asked me if I felt like pushing I said no, but I pushed anyway. The placenta came out first, and then my baby was born. There were fears of the placenta getting stuck and having to undergo a D&C procedure which, with the infection and my fibroids, would have been very dangerous. The fact that the placenta came out so easily was a miracle. They took everything from the bed, and placed it on the neonatal bed, including the baby. I asked, “Is it a boy or a girl?” The nurse asked, “Are you sure you want to know?” My husband--who did not leave my side for one second--and I said yes without hesitation. She replied, “A boy.” We both smiled and said “Noah”. My husband then heard the name "Eliot" and asked me if Noah Eliot was a good name. I loved it. They asked me if I wanted to see him and at this point, I had absolutely no doubt in my mind I wanted and needed to see my son. My doctor said, “Get me a baby blanket.” And I just smiled, as the thought struck me, “I just had a baby.” They carefully wrapped him in the baby blanket, just like a living, full-term baby. They placed him in our arms and everyone left the room. Time stood still. I was holding my son. He looked just like daddy. His shoulders, his bone structure, his nose. He had little feet that looked exactly like his cousins’ on my husband’s side of the family. I opened his little mouth and saw perfectly formed gums. We placed his hand on our finger, we talked to him, I kissed his blanket. My mom came into the room, held him, and fell in love, as any other grandmother does. They placed him on the neonatal bed again and I was in shock. We texted all of our friends and family letting them know everything went better than anticipated, and we had an amazing little boy named Noah Eliot Roberts. We later found out that the name Noah means comfort and Eliot means "God on high". Noah was a fully-formed perfect human the size of my hand. I could recognize my son among other 14 week fetuses. He is and will always be my first born. I don't know what I was thinking when I said I wanted a girl. I would do anything to have my little boy with me, to dress him up in bow ties and do all things boy with him. If God gives us more children, I can honestly say from the bottom of my heart I do not care what we have… We love you Noah Eliot, you made us parents. You came into our lives and left so quick, but you changed our world. I will never be the same, because of you. I never thought I could feel this much love for a tiny human, but I do. Looking back, I would not have had Noah’s birth any other way. He had everything he deserved. I would have gone through the same baby-picture-filled hallway, same maternity room, same labor and delivery room, a thousand times to ensure that I, and the world, knew he was worth it. The experience showed me that his life was as important as any other living baby’s.

#pregnancy #misarriage #fibroids #loss #miscarriage

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