(Untitled)

Oct 20, 2004 02:21

This is something that came from that "Rain" story I wrote a few weeks back. It's been hanging around since then bugging me to write it, so I did. It may be different from the conventional view of events, but hey, like I've said before - that's fiction for you ( Read more... )

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granamyr December 7 2004, 01:42:17 UTC
I've been looking for this fic for some time. I was wondering when somebody would tell this part of the story, since there's so much dramatic potential. It was really very well done.

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3scoremiles_10 December 7 2004, 03:45:49 UTC
Looking for it for some time? Yikes, that's pressure! I'm only glad you were not horribly disappointed. I have always had a fondness for Philip, and he tends to get so slated over the incident with Pausanias. Generally, he's presented as not giving a stuff. But then he goes and keeps Pausanias right with him, eventually as commander of his bodyguard, which doesn't seem like something you'd do with a man who has a good reason to carry a grudge unless there was something else beneath it. Ah, well, it's all supposition of course, but I'll give Philip the benefit of the doubt.

Thanks for reading and commenting, and I'm pleased if on some level this story helped fill a gap.

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granamyr December 9 2004, 05:00:59 UTC
It's really impossible to know what Philip thought or felt about the incident. I always wondered why Pausanias' Orestid kinsmen didn't come to his aid--or maybe they did and promoting him to commander of the bodyguard was Philip's way of appeasing them. But I've always had the scene from Fire From Heaven in my mind, where on the way back from Chaeronea Philip's army stops at Attalus' estate and Philip--unlike Alexander, who notices everything--seems completely oblivious to the fact that Pausanias refuses to eat or drink anything while they're there, and that it's a horrible ordeal to put him through.

I was quite shocked at the way the film handled the incident, because it looks like Philip actually participates in the rape.

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3scoremiles_10 December 9 2004, 05:46:16 UTC
I always wondered why Pausanias' Orestid kinsmen didn't come to his aid ...Perhaps with Pausanias having sought justice from Philip and having been refused, it may have seemed to Pausanias' kin there was no way they could intercede without angering the king. Philip had put a stop to the old system of blood feuds, perhaps it was deemed more than the clan's collective hide was worth to be seen to be going against that. Maybe the promotion was just a sop to shut them all up and soothe over the loss of honour, and had nothing to do with Philip's feelings at all. Obviously you're quite right, we can't tell what Philip thought of the whole affair, but I wanted to provide a more sympathetic light here for both of them. Philip is most often cast as being the sort of lecher who didn't care for his conquests at all, and to an extent that's probably true if his reputation is anything to go by. But that's not to say that he did not on some level care for Pausanias ... and in any case, it makes for decent drama ( ... )

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furius June 15 2005, 07:38:56 UTC
This story hurts as bad as accounts of Heph's death.

I've been reading and re-reading all these fics, and this one hurts the *most* I think, precisely because there's no reassurance of everlasting love between these two from other stories. Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, I see parallels of character between Alexander and Philip in this. This incident reminds me of the Eumenes incident in ways more than the conflict between personal loyalty and duties of kingship. Alexander and Philip both tend toward a stubborness that may seem a bit cold....Good thing Hephaistion's understanding. As for Pausanias, what's been done to him and Philip's reaction perhaps a demonstration of the problem between two lovers of vastly unequal social status....

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3scoremiles_10 June 15 2005, 11:58:27 UTC
I see parallels of character between Alexander and Philip in this.

Absolutely. I quite like Philip, and I tend to think that a man who could drag Macedon up by the bootstraps would have to have a fair streak of the bloodyminded about him. Obviously Alexander shared a few of his father's virtues in that department. He learned about kingship from somewhere, after all. They're both men with strong minds and strong wills, and they both have a demanding bitch of a kingdom for a mistress. The diffence when it comes to their personal relationships (at least in my work) is that Philip chooses his kingdom, but Alexander sometimes chooses himself.

With regards to the problems of differing social status, that has its own issues. Clearly being the king's lover comes with its share of hassles - any man with powerful friends is bound to attract powerful enemies. Pausanias seems to have paid the price of that ... and we all know how that ended.

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