Learned Sock Challenge

[daisyninjagirl]

 I've noticed some enthusiastic souls collecting lists of nominations for particular genres that appeal to them.  In this post I want to give a shout out to nominations that need a bit of specialty knowledge - maybe the source is pre-20th century or particularly obscure, or there's a lot of scholarship about it, or a lot of historical research would help when writing it.  For people who love a good meaty challenge, basically.    I'm omitting individual fairy tales and nursery rhymes because these are often very accessible through 20th/21st century retellings, but kept in the big collections like Kitaab 'alf layla wa-layla | One Thousand and One Nights.  

 

What makes a Learned Sock nomination?  It's very much in the eye of the beholder - if you've spotted some research heavy nominations not already listed, please mention them in the comments and I will add them.

Mythology, Religion and Fairy Tale Collections

Ancient Egyptian Religion
Arthurian Mythology

كتاب ألف ليلة وليلة | Kitaab 'alf layla wa-layla | One Thousand and One Nights
Norse Religion & Lore
תלמוד | Talmud

Ancient, Classical and Medieval Literature

Beowulf (Poem)

Decameron - Giovanni Boccaccio
La Chanson de Roland | The Song of Roland
Mahabharata - Vyasa
The Aeneid - Virgil
The Epic of Gilgamesh
The Iliad - Homer
Theogony - Hesiod

 

18th and 19th Century Western Literature

Der schweizerische Robinson | Swiss Family Robinson - Johann David Wyss
Dolores (Notre-Dame des Sept Douleurs) - Algernon Charles Swinburne (Poem)
Dracula - Bram Stoker

Emma - Jane Austen

Far from the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy

Goblin Market - Christina Rossetti

Heidi - Johanna Spyri

Mansfield Park - Jane Austen

Middlemarch - George Eliot
Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen

Persuasion - Jane Austen

Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen

Ivanhoe - Sir Walter Scott
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
Kim - Rudyard Kipling

La Comédie Humaine - Honoré de Balzac

La Cousine Bette | Cousin Bette - Honoré de Balzac

Le Comte de Monte-Cristo | Count of Monte Cristo

Les liaisons dangereuses | Dangerous Liaisons

Les Trois Mousquetaires | The Three Musketeers

Little Women Series - Louisa May Alcott
The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins
The Tay Bridge Disaster - William McGonagall

Rappaccini's Daughter - Nathanial Hawthorne

Shirley - Charlotte Brontë
Stalky and Co - Rudyard Kipling
Vingt mille lieues sous les mers | Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne

Voyná i mir | War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy

The Professor - Charlotte Brontë
The War of the Worlds - H. G. Wells

The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
Villette - Charlotte Brontë

Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë

Eastern Literature
Liáo zhâi zhì yì | Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio - Pú Sônglíng
Xī yóu jì | Journey to the West - Wú Cheng'en

Plays and Opera

As You Like It - Shakespeare
Der Ring des Nibelungen | The Ring of the Nibelung

Don Carlos (Schiller)

Don Carlos | Don Carlo - Verdi/du Locle/Méry

Eugene Onegin - Tchaikovsky/Pushkin/Shilovsky

Hamlet - Shakespeare

Il barbiere di Siviglia | The Barber of Seville - Rossini/Sterbini

La Clemenza di Tito - Mozart

La Donna del Lago - Rossini/Tottola

Le Comte Ory (Met Opera 2011)

Le Misanthrope ou l'Atrabilaire amoureux | The Misanthrope or the Cantankerous Lover - Molière

Les pêcheurs de perles | The Pearl Fishers

Macbeth - Shakespeare

Merchant of Venice - Shakespeare

Midsummer Night's Dream - Shakespeare

Much Ado About Nothing - Shakespeare

Norma - Bellini/Romani
Peer Gynt - Henrik Ibsen

Romeo And Juliet - Shakespeare

Romeo & Juliet - Takarazuka Revue 

Turandot - Puccini

Twelfth Night (National Theatre 2017)

Twelfth Night - Shakespeare

Un Ballo in Maschera | A Masked Ball - Verdi/Somma

Historical RPF Fandoms
(courtesy of SaidItAllBefore who posted this in the comments)
12 Century Christians
14th Century CE Royalty RPF
17th Century British Army RPF
1850s London Cholera Epidemic RPF
18th Century British Royal Navy RPF
18th Century CE Prussia RPF
18th Century CE Russia RPF
19th Century American Medicine
19th Century CE German Literature RPF
19th Century Paleontology RPF
American Revolution RPF
Aviation Pioneers RPF
Battle of Hastings (Bayeux Tapestry) RPF
Battle of Tollense River c. 1250 ice
Carthaginian Historical RPF
Classical Music RPF
Djekhy & Son RPF
Early Environmentalist RPF
French Revolution RPF
Great Northern War/Carolean Army RPF
Heian Jidai | Heian Period RPF
Julio-Claudian Dynasty RPF
Kamakura Era Japanese History RPF
Machiavelli & Friends RPF
Mongolian Royalty RPF
Political RPF - France 19th c.
Qing Dynasty RPF
Roman Poets RPF
Romantic Poets RPF
Sengoku Jidai | Sengoku Period RPF
Shakespeare RPF | Elizabethan & Jacobean Theater RPF
Stuart Dynasty RPF
Táng Cháo | Tang Dynasty RPF
Third Crusade RPF
Tudor Dynasty RPF
Wars of the Roses RPF

20th/21st Century but very research heavy
(entries in here will be from people commenting as it's a fuzzy opinion specific thing)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Who the Heck Knows?
Voynich Manuscript (Book)

Comments

[larryhammer]

I've been meaning to throw up a post that lists all poem fandoms. Here's the list I've compiled so far:

Gilgamesh - Anonymous
Iliad - Homer
Theogony - Hesiod
Mahabharata - Vyasa
Beowulf - Anonymous
The Song of Roland - Anonymous
Goblin Market - Christina Rossetti
Dolores - A.C. Swinburne
The Tay Bridge Disaster - William McGonagall
An Irish Airman Foresees His Death - W.B. Yeats
Hell Gate - A.E. Housman
The Hollow Men - T.S. Eliot

[daisyninjagirl]

Thanks, you spotted some I hadn't.

[larryhammer]

As did you - I’d missed Roland.

[saiditallbefore]

All the historical RPF fandoms! How much research you want to do for these really depends, but if anyone is interested, here’s a list of all pre-20th century historical RPF canons in the tagset:

12 Century Christians
14th Century CE Royalty RPF
17th Century British Army RPF
1850s London Cholera Epidemic RPF
18th Century British Royal Navy RPF
18th Century CE Prussia RPF
18th Century CE Russia RPF
19th Century American Medicine
19th Century CE German Literature RPF
19th Century Paleontology RPF
American Revolution RPF
Aviation Pioneers RPF
Battle of Hastings (Bayeux Tapestry) RPF
Battle of Tollense River c. 1250 ice
Carthaginian Historical RPF
Classical Music RPF
Djekhy & Son RPF
Early Environmentalist RPF
French Revolution RPF
Great Northern War/Carolean Army RPF
Heian Jidai | Heian Period RPF
Julio-Claudian Dynasty RPF
Kamakura Era Japanese History RPF
Machiavelli & Friends RPF
Mongolian Royalty RPF
Political RPF - France 19th c.
Qing Dynasty RPF
Roman Poets RPF
Romantic Poets RPF
Sengoku Jidai | Sengoku Period RPF
Shakespeare RPF | Elizabethan & Jacobean Theater RPF
Stuart Dynasty RPF
Táng Cháo | Tang Dynasty RPF
Third Crusade RPF
Tudor Dynasty RPF
Wars of the Roses RPF


(If I’ve missed one, please correct me!)

[fawatson]

I suggest adding Kim - Rudyard Kipling to the list of 18th and 19th C Western Lit.

[daisyninjagirl]

Ta

[(Anonymous)]

Not sure if this quite fits in, but Lawrence of Arabia is a fandom that can involve a lot of research and specialty knowledge of WWI and politics of the time/region(s). Wasn't nominated as RPF, but since the movie is fairly accurate, things end up being muddled between fiction and reality anyway.

[daisyninjagirl]

Sure thing, I've added it in.

[arcanetrivia]

Who the Heck Knows?

*snerk* indeed.

[(Anonymous)]

Not sure where it fits in, but The Pied Piper of Hamelin (part mysterious medieval event with you most details unknown, part fairy tale inspired by that event).

[daisyninjagirl]

I don't really want to put in individual fairy tales? It's a well known story, and you wouldn't need a lot of period knowledge to write a satisfying fanfic of it I reckon. Thanks for the comment.