Q... is for Queen of Scots, Mary!

The history of civilisation is bloody and torturous. Death, murder, villainy, and tragedy... Mary's life, like the lives of many women before us, was difficult, and much more than what makes us complain. For one, she became Queen when she was 6 days old! What a joke... anyway, Scotland was ruled by regents while she grew up in France, married the french Dauphin, and came back to reign.
Imagine being 19 - 20, married, and expected to come and rule over a land that she was in for the first time! Anyway, when he died, she was heartbroken. But I don't think there was ever any place for personal emotions for Monarchs. She remarried, and soon after, that man died too or was murdered, but not before she bore him a son.
Following this, she made a mistake in marrying the prime accused of her ex-husband's murder. Two, he had divorced his earlier wife very recently. Three, he was Protestant! The Catholics were outraged, obviously! She was imprisoned and forced to give up her crown in favour of her one-year-old son. She escaped and fled to England, where she sought asylum from their Queen (her first cousin, once removed). But instead, her claim to the English throne politically meant that she was imprisoned, for 19 years! Finally, found guilty of plotting the assassination of the Queen, she was executed! Her son had her exhumed from her initial burial place, though, and re-interred in Westminster Abbey.

Edinburgh Castle: Entry to where the crown jewels of Scotland are kept

Phew! What a life to have led! Her story always makes me somber...

Born: Linlithgow Palace (to go),
Crowned: Stirling Castle (been!),
Gave birth to son: Edinburgh Castle (been!),
Recuperated from illness: Craigmillar Castle (to go),
Married both second and third husbands: Palace of Holyroodhouse (to go),
Imprisonment (Scotland): Loch Level Castle (seen),
Buried: Peterborough Cathedral (seen),
Re-interred: Westminster Abbey (been!)

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This post is part of the ongoing A-to-Z Challenge. Previously, Aye, Berwick, Cramond, Disability, Edinburgh, Forth Bridge, Glasgow, Hamish, Isle of Skye, John o' Groats, Kirk, Loch Lomond and Luss, Mogwai, Necropolis, Old Man of Storr, Portobello.

X

X is for ‘Xenophilius’.
‘Xenos’ and ‘phile’ – the lover of the strange…
He is the father of Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter books. He is the editor of ‘The Quibbler’ and lives in a rock-shaped house. His magazine mostly prints out-of-the-world unbelievable things but as the stories begin to emerge in weirder ways, we find that sometimes, he does print sense. He’s never accepted as normal or mainstream and because of his beliefs, even his daughter Luna is considered to be a weirdo. Although, they both are very courageous, I admit. I’ve always felt that his character was dubious, sometimes good and sometimes not so much. I had not, in fact, even thought of him until a fellow blogger suggested it. Lover of strange things, indeed!

Candyfloss textured hair... seriously?!

So far: Atticus, Beth, Cassius, Dumbledore, Estella, Francesca, Gandalf, Humbert, Ishmael, Jean-Baptiste, Kali, Long John Silver & Lisbeth, Miu, Nancy, Oliver, Piyali, Quentin, Rebecca, Scarlett, Tita, Ursula, Valhalla, Watson

I'm writing every day of April for the A-to-Z April Blogging Challenge 2012. I'm writing of characters of fiction that are immortal and touch hundreds of lives everyday...

W

W is for ‘Watson’.

The dear man, who assisted Holmes like an assistant would, cared for him like a friend, and brought him cases like an agent. Dear Dr. Watson, who was forever overwhelmed, like us readers, by Holmes’ extraordinary powers of observation and deduction. ‘Elementary’ that wasn’t elementary at all. He even saved or almost saved Holmes a few times. But for him, we would never have heard of those brilliant tales. I’ll keep this post till here, it’s been a long day.

Holmes and Watson (Sidney Paget)

So far: Atticus, Beth, Cassius, Dumbledore, Estella, Francesca, Gandalf, Humbert, Ishmael, Jean-Baptiste, Kali, Long John Silver & Lisbeth, Miu, Nancy, Oliver, Piyali, Quentin, Rebecca, Scarlett, Tita, Ursula, Valhalla

I'm writing every day of April for the A-to-Z April Blogging Challenge 2012. I'm writing of characters of fiction that are immortal and touch hundreds of lives everyday...

R

R is for 'Rebecca'.
I never, even for a moment, felt that she was dead and gone. I identified with the second Mrs DeWinters, nameless, faceless. I shivered with her, I despaired with her… Du Maurier struck gold with her intense portrayal of Rebecca. Her presence, like an evil charm, hung on the reader’s head throughout the book. She haunted me right through it all. Manderley, oh Manderley, that fell prey to such dark, gothic forms! My heart bled for it.


I sympathized with Mrs Danvers, even when she was being villainous, at least she had a belief and an existence. The rest of us that the author dragged to Manderley, why we didn’t stand a chance against R at all!

She just overpowered all our senses and took over our lives from us. What a woman, what a book!

O

O is for ‘Oliver’.

I read Oliver Twist a long time ago, when I was a child myself. I was horror-struck by the little orphan’s life in a massive city like London. He endures a miserable existence in a workhouse and is then placed with an undertaker. He also meets the Artful Dodger, leader of a gang of juvenile pickpockets. Oliver is led to the lair of their elderly criminal trainer Fagin, naively unaware of their unlawful activities.

Apparently, in the Dickens era, there were a large number of orphan kids found around London, something that led to The Waif Crisis. Eventually, of course, all is well. The criminals are behind bars and the awful people are reduced to the same sordid conditions that they had subjected little kids to. Dickens is dark, but not the kind of dark that only adults can deal with. Characters like Oliver, David Copperfield, Pip are ones that children should be exposed to. It is a good way to acquaint them to the real world, which has people like Estella, Fagin, and Pegotty.

Oliver in the cruel warehouse

So far: Atticus, Beth, Cassius, Dumbledore, Estella, Francesca, Gandalf, Humbert, Ishmael, Jean-Baptiste, Kali, Long John Silver & Lisbeth, Miu, Nancy

I'm writing every day of April for the A-to-Z April Blogging Challenge 2012. I'm writing of characters of fiction that are immortal and touch hundreds of lives everyday...

N

N is for 'Nancy'.
Nancy Drew, who else!? The smart, intelligent, fantabulous young sleuth from River Heights; the epitome of modern girls. The champ driver, swimmer, actor of a girl that gave rise to one of the most widely sold Young Adult books. The hundreds of books, written by different people, were published under the common pseudonym of Carolyn Keene. Nancy, along with her friends Bess and George, sometimes her boyfriend Ned, nabs some pretty obnoxious criminals.
I spent some 3 - 4 years of middle school devouring these books one after another. And I think all little girls should have wonderful girl inspirations. And Nancy was one such... I loved her intelligence and her wavy blond hair; her powers of deduction and the blue convertible. Good days... simple days...

Nancy Drew, from http://www.nancydrewsleuth.com/

So far: Atticus, Beth, Cassius, Dumbledore, Estella, Francesca, Gandalf, Humbert, Ishmael, Jean-Baptiste, Kali, Long John Silver & Lisbeth, Miu

I'm writing every day of April for the A-to-Z April Blogging Challenge 2012. I'm writing of characters of fiction that are immortal and touch hundreds of lives everyday...