moss-trolling again

[truepenny]

(I realize that every time I talk about this, my exempla are sexual. This--and my use of the word "exempla"--probably tells you everything about my books you need to know.)

I'm currently wrestling with a very neatly nutshelled moss-troll problem. Mehitabel is giving the reader a thumbnail sketch of Felix, and I could use to have a simile along the lines of gay as a barrel of monkeys on nitrous oxide, camp as a row of pink tents, queer as Dick's hatband (parenthetically: Dick's hatband? Why should Dick's hatband be so much queerer than Tom's or Harry's?).

But, of course, secondary world. Gay, camp, and queer are all off-limits. This problem I've already solved, the analogous word in Mélusine being molly. (People who have read The Virtu will have noticed that Felix doesn't use the word molly to describe himself--he prefers the Troian ganumedes, because, yes, he is a pretentious geek like that.) So now I need the analogy.

Molly as a ...

The moss-trolls and I are sitting around making faces at each other.

(N.b., you're welcome to make suggestions if the spirit moves you. I, however, am also welcome not to take them. Although if somebody comes up with something really good, I will steal it shamelessly.)

Comments

[kelliem.livejournal.com]

Erm-- tree sprite? Harem guard?

[sam-t.livejournal.com]

Interesting problem. Could you do anything with maypoles, maybe? Or is there another gaudy phallic fertility thing that could be inverted somehow?

Does 'molly' also have a secondary meaning to do with female prostitutes (as in Moll Flanders et al.) or is it a relatively specialised term?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I don't have your calendar in my head (THANK GOD -- er, sorry, but -- really), but for some reason my brain is producing the format "[clergybeing of some religion] on [day of rest]."

Sorry I am fuzzy and not much use.

[sterling-sara.livejournal.com]

Huh. The only thing 'molly' is used to describe is the mollies themselves, so that's tricky, isn't it? I nearly said 'molly as a fancy birdcage' but that probably only makes sense to me. And your secondary world doesn't have a Birdcage Walk.

Maybe Dick's hatband was pink.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I think, actually, that a molly (as opposed to a moll, which is the noun form for a gay man--I haven't needed a word for lesbians yet, although there are lesbians in the books, but I suspect it's sapphires*) is a child's doll.

Which would get me molly as a dolly, where we are NOT going, no matter how appropriate it might be. Yech.


---
*Yes, I'm every bit as much a pretentious geek as Felix.

[sovay]

he prefers the Troian ganumedes, because, yes, he is a pretentious geek like that.

Does the word have the same mythological derivation as here?

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Er.

Not exactly?

Let me see if I can explain. In our world (and you know this bit, but I need it for set-up), it's the name of a boy who is used as code-by-example for being gay.

In Meduse, it's the word for being gay.

So, you know, it's the word for being gay because of my mythology. Not theirs.

(I have no compunction about being metatextual and self-deconstructive in my world-building.)

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

Maybe as molly as [insert name of famous queer in Kekropian history]. Because context should make clear that whoever [famous queer in Kekropian history] was, they were pretty lavender.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

That's not bad.

Would it please you if I made him [famous queer in Kekropian history] de Fidelio?

(I can't name him Fidelio because Kekropian naming patterns are all wrong for it. But cities in the Grasslands have all kinds of weird names: Julip, Yehergod, Aiaia. Sticking Fidelio in will not bother me. It would be in the very southwest of the Grasslands, where Cymellunar tradition is still strong.)

And if it would not please you, I won't do it.

[oracne.livejournal.com]

Something with alliteration?

"molly as mama's pretty boy," as a weak example.

[larryhammer]

As molly as a marmot in a molehill?

Okay, maybe not quite. I want something to suggest something in the shape of a small harmless animal, though. Not snail -- a snail-shell would be a code/symbol for sapphires, of course. As molly as a yearling stag has a bit too much antler for what I'm thinking, for all it's biologically accurate -- and young bison are too lumbering and may not even exist in Meduse.

Maybe something botanical. As molly as a lily in a rose garden.

---L.

[larryhammer]

Or if the thorn/prick pun is used, the reverse: as molly as a rose in a lily garden.

As molly as mullein.

---L.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Actually, Meduse has buffalo. Mildmay finds them very unexciting (Mélusine 318).




God, I am so geeky today I should be wearing a propellor beanie.

[aranel.livejournal.com]

I googled "queer as a" and got "plaid rabbit," which amused me. I suppose you can't use "molly as a [denomination in which the currency is generally not available]" because the point of "queer as a three-dollar bill" is that three-dollar bills are odd and unusual, hence, queer.

For some reason I thought "as a tomcat in heat," because of course it's girl cats who go into heat, so that gets you sexual urgency and gender confusion, as well as feline-ness, but I don't know enough about Felix to know whether sexual urgency is particularly wanted. So consider it a shot in the dark.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Felix is over-sexed, to put it politely. The problem with the cat simile--and I do like it--is that I use cat imagery a lot, especially for Felix. There's a point where you go past over-determined and into an unedifying muddle, and I fear very much that that would be it.

[panjianlien.livejournal.com]

Molly as a [name of very remote ranchland area] sheep. Or ram, as you prefer it, bonus points for alliteration.

Molly as a mule (since as we all know, no matter how much mules rut, they do not produce offspring).

Molly as a catamite's beau. (Straightforward much?)

Any of those help at all?

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Molly as a Myrian ram isn't bad.

Oooh, I could even have two similes. Sweet!

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

I tend to use the term 'gay as a maypole', and 'molly as a maypole' does have a nice alliteration to it...

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

No maypoles. No month of May.

(This is why I had to work so hard to get a back-formation of Mildmay.)

Not that a maypole isn't the perfect simile for Felix, who is tall and likes very bright colors.

He's as molly as...

[dakiwiboid.livejournal.com]

my sister's old doll?

[pabba.livejournal.com]

Molly as a mossy mongoose!

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Ooh! A third!

Molly as...

[jamjar.livejournal.com]

Molly as a sailor's bird? Possibly, I'm getting a little random, since mollymawk is another name for albatross, and sailors are... well, sailors, and a sailor's bird... Practically anything works with sailors. Molly as a pirate's monk! Molly as a sailor, seven months at sea!

Molly as a midwife's husband! Molly as a sparrow in spring! Molly as two jays in a nest!

Gaunamedes as the gods' own waitor! Ganumedes as the first flower of spring!

(Me, I'm hoping for an "As the actress said to the Lord Protector...")

Re: Molly as...

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I did not know mollymawk was a word for albatross. Thank you!

Speaking of words you shouldn't use

[dakiwiboid.livejournal.com]

Have you seen this (http://www.twolumps.net/comics/20061011.jpg)?

Re: Speaking of words you shouldn't use

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I hadn't. Thank you!

[ginger-blue.livejournal.com]

Alliteration being the shameless opportunist it is, I am now stuck on molly as a moss-troll.

[cassiphone.livejournal.com]

I did the same, only I put the moss-troll in a dress. :)

Molly as a moss-troll in his aunt's favourite hat? (I wanted to say Sunday hat, but there's no Sunday)

[davidlevine]

I'm pretty sure "queer as Dick's hatband" refers to Richard III's crown, which was generally believed to be, at best, irregularly obtained.

And I'm amazed I posted this before matociquala.

[hackerguitar.livejournal.com]

"Molly as a box of dolls"??

Good luck....