The Crescent Classics 101 & the Book That Started It All

Posted 9th May 2021 by Sia in Blogathons, Crescent Classics, Let's Dig In: Thoughts, Analysis, Essays, Queer Lit, Recommendations, Thoughts & Essays / 2 Comments

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When I was a young teen, I was not impressed with the books we were made to read for school. When my teachers tried to explain that they were all classics, I declared that I’d make a new set of classics. And they would all be Fantasy, because that is Obviously The Best.

I called them the Crescent Classics, because I have loved alliteration from day one, okay?

What started as a protest in my English Literature classes (yes, I was that kid, be glad you never had to share a classroom with me) has grown into a deeply personal, deeply meaningful project over the years. I’m a queer, disabled, neurodivergent person: I love Fantasy with all my heart, but my genre doesn’t always make me feel welcome. Writers like Tolkien and Lewis and Brooks and Eddings? They weren’t writing for me, or people like me.

The Crescent Classics are meant to be a collection of books for people like me.

In choosing a book to dub a Crescent Classic, I like to go through Italo Calvino’s criteria for classics, a 14-point list that is beautiful to read and think about. But most important is point 11;

‘Your’ classic is a book to which you cannot remain indifferent, and which helps you define yourself in relation or even in opposition to it.

Italo Calvino, Why Read the Classics?

It’s that your‘ classic bit that’s important. My classics may not be your classics, and that’s okay. But for Wyrd & Wonder, I’m going to write a series of posts sharing a few of mine, and explain why they are CCs. And I’d really love to hear what you think, and what your classics are!

Now enough rambling: allow me to introduce the first of the Crescent Classics!

Kushiel's Dart (Phèdre's Trilogy, #1) by Jacqueline Carey
Genres: Epic Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Queernorm world, bisexual MC, bisexual love interest, secondary M/M or mlm
ISBN: 0330493744
Goodreads

The land of Terre d'Ange is a place of unsurpassing beauty and grace. It is said that angels found the land and saw it was good... and the ensuing race that rose from the seed of angels and men live by one simple rule: Love as thou wilt.

Phèdre nó Delaunay is a young woman who was born with a scarlet mote in her left eye. Sold into indentured servitude as a child, her bond is purchased by Anafiel Delaunay, a nobleman with very a special mission... and the first one to recognize who and what she is: one pricked by Kushiel's Dart, chosen to forever experience pain and pleasure as one.

Phèdre is trained equally in the courtly arts and the talents of the bedchamber, but, above all, the ability to observe, remember, and analyze. Almost as talented a spy as she is courtesan, Phèdre stumbles upon a plot that threatens the very foundations of her homeland. Treachery sets her on her path; love and honor goad her further. And in the doing, it will take her to the edge of despair... and beyond. Hateful friend, loving enemy, beloved assassin; they can all wear the same glittering mask in this world, and Phèdre will get but one chance to save all that she holds dear.

Set in a world of cunning poets, deadly courtiers, heroic traitors, and a truly Machiavellian villainess, this is a novel of grandeur, luxuriance, sacrifice, betrayal, and deeply laid conspiracies. Not since Dune has there been an epic on the scale of Kushiel's Dart-a massive tale about the violent death of an old age, and the birth of a new.

Anyone who’s known me for approximately 0.7 seconds knew it could only be this book. This series, really. But I started this project with Kushiel’s Dart way back when I was just 14, and it will always be the first.

I could write you an essay on why Kushiel’s Dart should be considered is a classic, but I’ll try to keep this reasonably short. It’s a Crescent Classic because it quietly, calmly, and totally upends conventional Western views on sexuality: it is sex-positive in a way I’ve never seen any other book manage, regardless of genre. In a way, it normalises sex; in another way, it exalts it. And it does this for sex that is not just between two people who romantically love each other – and who preferably are married – but for any consenting adults, in any combination of genders or numbers or kinks. It’s a book (series) that says that sex is natural, that it should be enjoyed without shame – and that consensual sex is beautiful, always, even if it might look strange to someone outside the relationship. We live in a world where sex is either something dirty or commercialised or trivial – sometimes all three. Kushiel’s Dart portrays sex as something sacred and joyful, where there is no way to make consensual sex dirty or trivial. In the world we live in, that…is pretty gamechanging.

And I say all of that as someone who’s asexual, for the record. I don’t want to have sex, myself. But I still want to live in a world where sex is viewed the way Carey writes it.

It’s also a series that doesn’t pretend humans are more – or less – than we are. Even those most full of grace can have their moments of pettiness. Even the quietest of mice can unleash glory. It deconstructs traditional views of evil; invaders and enemies are people too, not monsters. Just because someone is on the other side of the line from you doesn’t make them sub-human. There are no nameless, faceless hordes of orcs here who can be cut down without thought or guilt; these are people, with their own songs and favourite foods and children and hopes. And their own cultures: one of the most beautiful aspects of this series is the way in which all gods, all myths, all pantheons co-exist and deserve respect. Your religion is precious: so is your neighbour’s, and neither of you are wrong. But these books also redefine heroism, exploring and featuring the kind of strength that is still not talked about very much: the strength of the survivor, the strength of mind and soul rather than body. The kind of strength that is often called ‘women’s strength’, and which I use here for lack of a better term: undramatic and unflashy and quiet, and which can accomplish things no warrior’s sword could.

And I could write a whole manifesto on the single precept Carey introduces via her D’Angelines: Love as thou wilt. It seems like it should be such a simple law to follow, but it isn’t, and the entire series is an exploration of that precept, in its different interpretations and repercussions. Again: it’s a gamechanger. It’s something that is genuinely mindblowing as the full meaning of it unfolds for the reader, page by page, changing the way you think forever. You never look at the world quite the same way again, after.

There is always some new layer to uncover in these books. The joy of reading them never fades, no matter how many times I reread them. There is always something else to think about, something new to discuss with the others who have read it. It never stops being meaningful or beautiful or inspiring. It never stops being breathtaking, in scope and story and significance.

In a genre that often portrays women as playthings for men, and where sex-workers are there to be abused at best, this is Epic Fantasy that puts a woman, a bisexual courtesan front and centre, placing the fates of kingdoms and even worlds in her hands. This series is a classic because it subverts The Classics wholly and exquisitely.

This series is a classic because how could it not be?

What Fantasy book is one of ‘your’ classics?

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2 responses to “The Crescent Classics 101 & the Book That Started It All

  1. I love the idea of your Crescent Classics – and I adore the books of Terre d’Ange for all the reasons you enumerate. Hell yes it’s a classic, and I’m very curious to find out what else makes your list!

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