Greek love (221B)
BBC Sherlock
Rating: PG (preslash)
Summary: A prequel to David with a snippet of back story. Inspired by the translation class scene in Maurice, so thanks to Fengirl for introducing me to that film.
David had spent seventeen years feeling alone. The subtle disappointment of his parents that their son might be precocious, but was also awkward, timid. Melissa was a wonderful big sister, but she didn't see the point of writing poetry. Even the others doing classics at school couldn't understand why he was so obsessed with the Greeks.
People understood obsession at Oxford. At the Principal's sherry party, he'd met a tall, solid boy, with a fancy waistcoat and an odd name: Mycroft.
"I'm doing PPE," Mycroft said. "Mainly for the politics. The economics is straightforward, but tedious, and I've never really seen the point of philosophy."
"To show you how to lead a good life," he'd replied, all his diffidence vanishing. "How can you achieve anything in politics unless you know what's ultimately important?"
"Greatest good of the greatest number."
"That presumes you know what 'good' means."
They'd spent most of the afternoon arguing in David's tiny room, with the small wall heater that could barely heat a small wall. It didn't matter, in their absorption with ideas they struggled clumsily to express: the social contract, truth and beauty, democracy, what happiness really was.
"Friendship," said David. "The meeting of minds, souls. It's all in Plato." And wondered, daringly, whether some day he could tell Mycroft what Plato said about the beloved.
Rating: PG (preslash)
Summary: A prequel to David with a snippet of back story. Inspired by the translation class scene in Maurice, so thanks to Fengirl for introducing me to that film.
David had spent seventeen years feeling alone. The subtle disappointment of his parents that their son might be precocious, but was also awkward, timid. Melissa was a wonderful big sister, but she didn't see the point of writing poetry. Even the others doing classics at school couldn't understand why he was so obsessed with the Greeks.
People understood obsession at Oxford. At the Principal's sherry party, he'd met a tall, solid boy, with a fancy waistcoat and an odd name: Mycroft.
"I'm doing PPE," Mycroft said. "Mainly for the politics. The economics is straightforward, but tedious, and I've never really seen the point of philosophy."
"To show you how to lead a good life," he'd replied, all his diffidence vanishing. "How can you achieve anything in politics unless you know what's ultimately important?"
"Greatest good of the greatest number."
"That presumes you know what 'good' means."
They'd spent most of the afternoon arguing in David's tiny room, with the small wall heater that could barely heat a small wall. It didn't matter, in their absorption with ideas they struggled clumsily to express: the social contract, truth and beauty, democracy, what happiness really was.
"Friendship," said David. "The meeting of minds, souls. It's all in Plato." And wondered, daringly, whether some day he could tell Mycroft what Plato said about the beloved.