GUEST POST - DAMARIS OSBORNE ON WRITING PARODIES AND LOVING RICHARD ARMITAGE

Richard Armitage as John Thornton in North and South

Richard Armitage fans who are familiar with C19 will not need any introduction for today's guest at FLY HIGH! Damaris Osborne is well known to them. For all the others dropping by and reading, I'll   invite them to read her guest post and welcome her to our little corner of the blogosphere. She loves writing parodies and spoofs inspired byi the works of our favourite British actor and would like to share her passions with us.

I began writing parody when at university, but I have to say it has rather a bad press as a genre, being treated like puns as rather ‘cringe worthy’.  I think that one needs to like the work being parodied, otherwise it becomes unsympathetic and snide.. It can also be seen as ‘jumping on the bandwagon’ of other people’s success.  However, I believe it can be more ‘original’ and draw in a multitude of threads to make it stand alone fiction, although the sort one dips in and out of for five minutes at a coffee break rather than become absorbed in for three hours solid. Like rich chocolates, parody is best sampled, and savoured, not scoffed.I am a member of the C19 forum, which sprang from the  2004 television adaptation of North  & South, and where discussion of nineteenth century literature rubs shoulders with admiration for the work of Mr Richard Armitage. He is an actor of wonderful nuance, and has the ability, first said about Greta Garbo, to drag you into the soul of the character through the eyes.

READING THE HOBBIT IN SEARCH FOR THORIN - PART IV

Richard Armitage as Thorin  smiling at his Lego alter ego

The hammering press campaign of these days, the several premieres all over the world, the many interviews and the huge amount of new pictures must have involved fans in an incredible  whirlpool of frenzy,  leading to the long-waited-for moment: the release of The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey,  film I in the new trilogy by Peter Jackson. It's time to close the book and get ready to watch the adaptation, the result of  almost two years  of detailed, talented, thoughtful,  creative work.

My reading of the book in search for Thorin must be completed, then,  in a couple of days, I too will see the film. 
I want to be clear again with any Tolkien fan  who might find themselves to drop by and read this: I undertook this journey through the book as a complete Tolkien newbie and only in order to follow the career of my favourite actor, Richard Armitage,  who is now  for many Thorin Oakenshield in The Hobbit, but will always remain Mr Thornton for me. 

This is my final post about the book, written leafing through chapters XI - XIX in  search for Thorin Oakenshield.  My previous posts are HERE, HERE and HERE. 
Time to get ready to compare the book with the movie. It's just a matter of hours for the majority of us now. 
For Thorin and his warrior dwarves it is instead time to meet the terrifying dragon Smaug. Is Bilbo ready to face him and steal the treasure Thorin claims back?

Warning!!! Huge spoilers ahead

READING THE HOBBIT IN SEARCH FOR THORIN - PART III & A NEW TRAILER!

Part III in the series “Reading the Hobbit in search for Thorin” focuses on chapters VII - X (Click HERE  for Part I and HERE for Part II).  I’m posting this third part on a very special day (the second magnificent trailer of the first movie has just been released - you can watch it at the end of the post) in a very special week, dedicated by Tolkien’s fans to the celebration of the 55th anniversary of the book (21st September 1937) and to Frodo and Bilbo’s birthday (22nd September). Here we go, then! 

READING THE HOBBIT IN SEARCH FOR THORIN - PART II

Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield in The Hobbit upcoming movie

This is my second post in the series “Reading the Hobbit in search for Thorin”.       (Click HERE for Part I)

The second part of my reading has been influenced by one of  Richard Armitage’s recent statements in  an interview related to the upcoming Hobbit movies. When asked how he tried to update a classical Lord figure like his Thorin Oakenshield  for  a contemporary audience, he answered:

I never really thought of updating it. I actually did the opposite. I thought of it as more kind of Greek tragedy. I looked at Shakespeare, a lot of my preparation I was looking at Henry V and bits of Richard III, just to find roots in British literature that were deeper. But I think making it feel contemporary the big themes of the story — loyalty and trust and camaraderie — I think those things are contemporary (transcript from http://io9.com/5929748/the-hobbits-thorin-oakenshield-tells-us-what-happens-when-you-get-a-tolkien-dwarf-drunk . See interview following the same link).

I  wonder  if  the bits Richard Armitage mentions are really of Shakespeare’s iconic wicked king or if he had  the ideal of the fair king,  which the Ricardian historians  rediscovered through documents,  in his mind. So I went on reading The Hobbit in search for Thorin and a bit also of  Richard III or Henry V.  I can anticipate I didn’t find much of them in Tolkien’s Thorin. So, as usual, this means that  Richard Armitage has been giving his own very personal interpretation to the character. Under the direction of Tolkien expert,  Peter Jackson, of course.

N.B. Don’t go on reading if you mind spoilers!

READING THE HOBBIT IN SEARCH FOR THORIN - PART I

It's time to wrap up for cast and crew led by Peter Jackson in New Zealand, for a few of them to present The Hobbit first movie at San Diego Comic-con  2012 , and it's rather time for me to start my personal journey into The Hobbit  by J.R.R. Tolkien. December 2012 is not that distant anymore. 
This reading is something I planned as soon as I heard Richard Armitage was going to play Thorin Oakenshield.  As it has already happened in the latest years, I'm going to approach  a genre I've never been interested in , as a total newbie, to follow Mr Armitage's career with due background information and knowledge  to be able to enjoy and appreciate every little aspect of his detailed acting. 

If it is not totally clear yet, I've just confessed I've never read Tolkien's books nor been interested in them so far. You can't imagine how many times my teenage students have asked me to read and teach Tolkien to them, but I've always had to answer  : how can I teach something I don't know anything about? They could have taught me much about Tolkien and the world he created on the reverse.

However, it's never too late to start.

RA-NDOM THOUGHTS : ... AND THE LEADER OF OUR COMPANY, THORIN OAKENSHIELD.

I haven't written much about "The Hobbit" on Fly High!, have I? I haven't written much about Richard Armitage recently, either.  Who knows me pretty well also knows nothing has changed in my interests and Mr Armitage can still count on my complete,  loyal support for what it counts. As I promised, to myself more than to others, I only wanted to write about "my one weakness" when I actually had something to say. So here I am, at last. And on a very special day. His Thorin Oakenshield has been  introduced to the world, in action and in an official presentation of the movie: the first trailer of "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" has been released today.

I've read a great deal  of enthusiastic comments all over the Net, facebook is overcrowded with links to the Utube video,  and  twitter has gone trending #hobbittrailer all day long. Many Hobbit fans - and lots of RA fans among them- woke up in the middle of the  night to wait and see the longed-for Christmas gift from Peter Jackson as soon as it was online. What I want to contribute is only my personal reaction to today's news. Nothing special, I mean.