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 Posted: Wed Nov 18, 2009 5:37 pm
Giselle was in the library, which was not unusual for Giselle. Much like an old cat, it was pretty easy to find her in her favourite lurking places, and if she wasn't in her room or a class somewhere, checking in the library was the next best bet.
She was there for research, brushing up on Danton for the project before the work was parceled out. She might as well get a head start while she had time, after all, and though she knew plenty about him already, a reminder never hurt. She had gathered all the books with information on him that she could find and stacked them up to be a sort of fortified wall against distractions while she fervently copied notes into her laptop. Eyes scanning over pages, she copied some passages, presumably the ones she found most important, directly, and from others she just took brief notes. All of the books that she decided to use, she marked down the information for the bibliography, just in case. She wanted to be ready for the next meeting. Because of their friendly rivalry, when Hero and Giselle were working on a history project together, Giselle tried even harder than usual to keep ahead of things.
She marked a passage with her finger, muttering "Revolution which France never recovered from..." before going on to another source. "Could Danton have changed it?"
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Posted: Wed Nov 18, 2009 5:48 pm
Sébastien, too, was in the library, though his appearance wasn't quite as welcome as Giselle's. After holding onto some French literature for longer than the due date he'd been severely ostracized by the librarian (much to his displeasure) and had the number of books he could take out cut down to two. No amount of rage had been able to convince her otherwise. In fact, the moment he looked like he was about to open his mouth to explode and ruin the silence, the librarian had threatened to only let him take one book out. That had put an end to that, and the French boy had made a show of storming out of the library.
But, of course, he couldn't avoid the room forever, and within a week he'd come back for more books. The librarian had eyed him warily upon his return, but he'd turned up his nose at her and headed straight for the back corner. No doubt, the shelves had been reorganized again, and Sébastien spent a good few minutes glaring at the books as though they would return to the way he wanted them formatted. When they did no such thing he gave a dramatic sigh, and set about putting all the French books back together. His progress was halted, however, when he found something that didn't belong.
An English book? What was it doing back here? Sullying his wonderful French books, that's what! Oh this meant war! With a huff, he picked up the book and headed towards the nearest set of shelves, intent on just putting wherever he wanted. That would show the librarian. As he passed a girl surrounded by stacks of books, a murmured name caught his attention and he looked over at her.
"Danton? Georges Danton?" Sébastien asked, clearly not caring that he was interrupting her work.
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Posted: Wed Nov 18, 2009 10:07 pm
On April 7, 1793, Danton became a member of the first Committee of-
"Danton? Georges Danton?"
Giselle looked up from her reading, less irritated than startled to hear someone say Danton's full name. As far as she and Hero had been aware of, few of their classmates had really been clear on who he was. Looking up to find the disruption, she found herself face to face with a blonde boy with excellent French pronunciation.
She thought she recognized him from her class, but she was no good with people like Hero and Elke were. People who were not noteworthy or dead or both rarely stuck out in her mind, and though she was good with names, if she didn't consider a person interesting or useful enough to know, she didn't bother to remember. "Giselle, actually." she said, trying to hide her confusion. "Giselle Petrova." She gestured at the books, adding, "But these? Yes, Danton."
She frowned at him like if she looked at him hard enough, she could read his name and identifying information on his face. "...Sébastien," she said slowly, ending the statement in a questioning tone in case she was wrong. If she recalled correctly, he had been quite active in class since they had started on the Reign of Terror. It had garnered her attention, but not enough to bring his name directly to mind, especially not since she had been distracted by the partner project.
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Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 4:34 pm
Giselle Petrova? Well, that was why he didn't recognize her immediately. She wasn't French. Still, her face looked vaguely familiar, though whether that was because she'd glowered at him for causing a ruckus in the library or sat with him at lunch he didn't remember. It was likely she was in a class of his. History? English? Maybe Science? Who could be sure. He wished Elke was here with him. She would have known instantly.
Pushing the thoughts aside, he nodded his head when she said his name. "Zhat is me, yes." Sébastien was more interested, however, in the fact that Giselle was researching Danton. The name had set off his French-radar, and it was only natural that he came over to visit. He'd talked to people for less. All you had to do was sneeze in a vaguely French accent and you would have caught Sébastien's attention.
"You are reading zhe books on Danton? Why?" He picked the top book up and flipped it open. Hrmph. English. What could you learn about the French Revolution from English authors?
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Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 10:18 pm
Ah. His French accent was excellent because he was, indeed, French. That made him a bit less intriguing, as this made his English accent terrible. Elke's accent was much better.
"I'm doing a project," she said, watching him as he touched her book and twitching her hand to keep herself from pulling it back to her. She didn't like people touching her things, even when she wasn't using them, even when they were only hers for as long as she took them out. "Just brushing up a bit on Danton, and later I may read up some on Desmoulins."
And with that, she went back to notetaking while she spoke, having given him her full attention for long enough. "I'm quite interested in what Theodore English has to say on Danton. He's excellent at presenting straight facts, and he seems little moved by the romanticism of the Revolution."
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Posted: Mon Nov 23, 2009 7:04 pm
A project? As in, their class's history project? "Zhe project we are to be doing in 'istory class?" She'd managed to snag the French Revolution? Arg! How come he hadn't been able to get that? He would have been able to do such a good job! No doubt their history teacher thought he should broaden his horizons and research something he didn't know intimately. As if he needed to broaden his horizons. France was clearly more important than everything else!
"You 'ave found much to read. I am glad zhere are many books for the learning about French history." It was so nice to hear lovely French names like Danton and Desmoulins, even if they were said by someone who did not speak French. Her accent was good enough, but it definitely needed some work if she wanted to be among the true elite. She had a workable name. Sébastien had hope for her yet.
At the mention of removing the romanticism from the Revolution, the teen made a face. "It is just zhe different points of view, no? Zhis euh… romanticism or whatever you call it is part of zhe French way. To look at revolutions from only zhe point of view of zhe English is a mistake indeed." Clearly they knew nothing about how France was at the time of the revolution. Who wanted plain English facts when you could have the idealism of French prose?
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