Uplifting Things #3

You thought I ran out of uplifting things last Monday, didn't you?

Music video: "This Corrosion" by The Sisters of Mercy

Yeah, the music video is waaaay shorter than the song. But there's something particularly energizing about watching Andrew Eldritch strutting around playing with his mic stand XD.

Novel: Alice's Adventures Under Ground by Lewis Carrol

I got my hands on a facsimile of the original manuscript that Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was based off of, which has the entire story as it was first written out (by hand!) as a gift to Alice Liddel. It's much easier to imagine Dodgson telling Alice this story when looking at his own handwriting and drawings, and the extra dimension it (not to mention Dodgson's drawing of Alice Liddel at the end, which is considerably different from the blonde, long-haired Alice we know that appears throughout the rest of the book) adds to the story makes it an especially uplifting version.

Comics: Zankoku na Kami gaShihaisuru by Moto Hagio (current scanlator can be found here)

Due to the subject matter, this really oughtn't be categorized under "uplifting things". In fact, it's probably triggering for a fair number of readers. It's about a teenage boy who is repeatedly raped by his stepfather (he puts up with it for awhile for the sake of the guy's marriage to his mother, but eventually tries to escape the situation by screwing around with the brakes on his stepfather's car. A plan which works, but goes terribly wrong and kills his mother, too). So a number of horrible, horrible things happen in this story. And yet whenever another chapter gets translated I get so excited because Moto Hagio has such a delicious sense of drama o__o.

Place: Alter St-Matthäus-Kirchhof, Berlin

This place has an oddly calm vibe for being in the middle of a city. It's especially surreal when the nearby market is taking place or if an emergency vehicle drives down a nearby street. Nonetheless, the cemetery itself feels very quiet. There are a number of gorgeous structures and sculptures, as well as plentiful vegetation. Also a cat. Or at least, I saw a cat wandering around there once--dunno if it actually lives there.

Albums: Raven in the Grave by The Raveonettes

First and last songs aside (which are more like bright morning sunlight), this album is kind of energizing in the same way as a mild thunderstorm. Beautiful and haunting is a clichéd way to describe music, but it really fits in this case (and I think I've already covered not being able to do music justice with words. Go listen already XD.)