(no subject)

[esmenet]

I just realized the reason I'm (very slowly) writing this Zuko-in-Ba-Sing-Se!fic is a) to fulfill my narrative kink of Destined Hero abandoning their destiny for a happy domestic-ish life, b) to write something about the Dai Li, and c) to get Zuko/Li* to go to university. And get all angry about them not having certain scholarly works in their collection, since, seriously, just because you happen to be at war with someone's country is no reason not to have copies of everything they ever wrote. Also maybe he will get offended that they only have the modernist version of Love Amongst the Dragons and spend weeks trying to find someone who has the one written in pre-Reformation Vulgar Fire Nation. Oh gods I am not equipped to be turning Zuko into an academic. Why am I trying? Oh right because I am secretly trying to write the most idfic-y Zuko ever. Okay then. :D


*I don't know if Zuko is the kind of person who thinks of himself by name in his head. But I personally would find if everyone I met knew me as Li and called me such then that would be pretty effectively my name whether I was given it at birth or not.



Also Wade-Giles romanization can go DIAF. *glare*

Comments

[annotated_em]

I...

*sits down at your feet and gives you puppy eyes* I wants academic!Zuko. I wants this like burning. I will be your resident cranky grad student informant if you like, but oh I wants it, precious.

(And I didn't even know I wanted this thing.)

[esmenet]

Yes, yes, please do! *_* All I know about academia is gleaned from other people's journals, and this is definitely one of those things I'll be going "aaaaah is this right? is this right? do people act like this or am I writing it this way just because it's funny? is his courseload too light? this means I have to go actually read Journey to the West now, doesn't it? what kind of clothes should he be wearing? how much of these texts he's reading be in scrolls instead of bound volumes? how am I going to get him from working in a teashop and having no extra cash to actually taking classes? how do I fix things so the Fire Nation doesn't collapse or conquer the world without Zuko there to legitimately take over and fix everything? how many female students would there be?" about.

. . . I hope you're okay with lots of weird questions. ^_^;; (The Earth Kingdom is mostly based off of Qin Dynasty China, right?)

[annotated_em]

*thoughtful* My field is literature and then rhetoric & composition, so I only have a vague sense of how a Chinese-analogue university might function. (Alas that I am not a historian!) But I am willing to let ideas be bounced off me till the cows come home.

[esmenet]

Which is basically what I need. :D Thank you!

Can you help me try and figure out what the various locales of Avatar are like as regards women, disabled people, etc.? (e.g., was that haiku class Sokka stumbled into in Ba Sing Se was part of the university, or was it just for young noblewomen? Were there any female students that we know of?) I mean, we know the Fire Nation has at least some female soldiers, and that Zuko at least grew up surrounded by badass girls, but there don't seem to be a lot of powerful older women around in either the Fire Nation or the Earth Kingdom. Or any female Dai Li.

And while everyone seemed to take Teo pretty much in stride, I doubt the Fire Nation is too kind to citizens who are physically unable to fight in battle. Hmmm. *thoughtful*

[branchandroot]

just because you happen to be at war with someone's country is no reason not to have copies of everything they ever wrote

*laughing a lot* I can totally see him thinking this way! I will be waiting to read this fic, when you're done.

Also Wade-Giles romanization can go DIAF

*holds up a box of matches with a helpful expression* I'm so totally with you. I suppose it's more linguistically consistent, but it's so freaking unintuitive it's nearly useless for anything /but/ linguistic notation.

[dancing_serpent]

Oh...my! Zuko at the Earth Kingdom university? That would be so awesome! Hadn't even thought of that before, didn't know how I much I want this! Pretty please!

[esmenet]

Ahaha, I didn't know I wanted it either until just now. :D My thought process, in more detail than you care about:

Hmm, I want Zuko to stay in Ba Sing Se and get a life there. Let's see: his uncle is there, at least, but what else? Jin (wait, I don't remember very much about her and even though I quite like her I don't think I could get Zuko to give up his quest for one person who likes him but doesn't need him. Drat), the Dai Li (no, at this point they're a reason for him to leave, no matter Embers-verse Zuko's relationship with them), some unknown person who needs him for his sword skills -- hey, wait. Fighting in the city is probably a bad idea with the Dai Li around, but what if one of the University students needed to know about two-sword fighting? For, um, their thesis or something-- waitasec what if Zuko was a student OMG.

[dancing_serpent]

no matter Embers-verse Zuko's relationship with them
*g* Tempting, isn't it? But yeah, different Avatar-verse.

In my head, Zuko would at first want to find out as much about the Avatar as he could - after all, so far he didn't have much success with what he knew about him. That's a good reason for being a student at the university. But after a while it would become gradually less important until it's pretty much pretence - because Zuko likes the academic life and gaining knowledge and maybe he even made friends among the other students.

And Iroh would have noticed a lot earlier than Zuko, but would have kept silent and happily paid for the university fees. Which he can afford now, because his tea shop is running splendidly, especially after they got to serve tea to the Earth King (the invitation to the palace was real and arranged by the noble guy who got Iroh the tea shop in the first place, and now all the other nobles want to try out the tea maker who's favoured by the king), and Iroh already had to hire three more people, and...

ARGH! Help...the bunnies are running away with me!

[esmenet]

Although it's not like you can actually get away from the Dai Li. >.> There's probably a whole swathe of books you can't get access to without permission and supervision from the Dai Li.

You are obviously much better at plotting things than me. *g*

Iroh would totally enroll Zuko in, like, an art class or something and Zuko would put up with it just for access to the university library. And then he would start taking more classes so his professors would get him permits to read the restricted-by-the-Dai-Li books which were the ones he really wanted anyway. :D

Hmm, but what about Azula? Maybe Aang & co. didn't go to Ba Sing Se, Appa never got kidnapped, something like that? So Azula and Mai and Ty Lee would still be chasing them around and Ba Sing Se would be safe. ish. Would the giant drill still be there? How could you take it down fast without waterbenders? *brainstorms*

[quadruplify.livejournal.com]

a) to fulfill my narrative kink of Destined Hero abandoning their destiny for a happy domestic-ish life

I have this kink too. ^_^;

I have a bit of a hard time seeing Zuko as an academic (partly because, at this time at least, he's not one of my favorite characters), but I'd love to see how you pull it off. And I'm curious as to how you came up with Love Amongst the Dragons, and what the contents of that are. XD

Also Wade-Giles romanization can go DIAF. *glare*

Agreed. >_>

[ojuzu.livejournal.com]

It is the BEST kink. :D

Haha, in my mind Love Amongst the Dragons is written by the Fire Nation's equivalent of Sei Shonagan, and is very courtly and dramatic and subtle and hilarious. But Zuko is basically like this (http://wildgoosery.livejournal.com/5804.html).