ponderance of the day

[coraa]

I love steampunk, but, contrary to a lot of common steampunk tropes, I'm a lot more fond of Edwardian and Roaring Twenties steampunk than Victorian steampunk. Well, and I think that medieval/renaissance clockpunk is pretty awesome, too.

It may just be that I look better in those clothes -- walking dresses, flapper attire, and cotehardies all suit me better than most Victorian fashion.

This may also play into my fondness for Fullmetal Alchemist.

(I also like anachrotech that isn't completely focused on America and Europe. I remember a fantastic Heian steampunk outfit. And wouldn't that be a great manga -- kids in clockwork giant robots?)

(This is on my mind because I'm attending "Steampunk University" this weekend. Geek geek geek.)

Comments

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I like it in Victorian times, but Edwardian/20s appeals more to me, too. And then Elizabethan-ish.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Elizabethan was my first love, really, back in high school. But yeah -- there's just something about early 20th century that I really like.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

If you like clockpunk you really, really need to learn more about the Mannerist period, and the strangest Mannerist monarch of them all, Rudolph II of Austria. And the strangest musician of all, Gesualdo. And Mannerist art, with its creepily weird hyperrealistic painting only with things like seven fingers on one hand, or an eye that is all pupil, and other creepy tiny details.

The Mannerist period bridged medieval thought and modern, with the odd unified field theories of folks like Melancthon, that included magic.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Wow -- that's fascinating, and I don't think I'd even heard of it. Thank you! Definitely something to look up.

[ceph.livejournal.com]

Hm, yes. I wonder if one could work an alternate-universe Lord Peter Wimsey into some nice 1920s-style steampunk setting.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I think that could be quite easily done!

Indeed, I think that steampunk Peter Wimsey would be kin to Lord Darcy.

[ceph.livejournal.com]

I must get around to reading those books; I have a couple of collections of pastiches by Randall Garrett of which I am quite fond.

[springheel-jack.livejournal.com]

'clockpunk.'

I'm confused now.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Basically, renaissance steampunk. Or to put it another way: if steampunk is 20th-21st century technology powered with 19th century methods, then clockpunk is 20th-21st century technology powered with 16th century methods.