GNxDDD Does Bootcamp!

Greensleeves Analysis

Analysis

I was writing this down to the seconds for the time limit. I hope I actually made it. I'm not sure it was literally down to the seconds. I'm going to make this analysis short for the sake of getting into a regular sleep pattern. It won't be as mind-boggling inconsistent as the Maximum Ride analysis.

I knew that me writing a Hetalia fanfic was inevitable for this contest. I didn't expect it to happen so soon, but I knew it would happen. Seeing as I've been writing a Hetalia song-fic for the past year, I think for me it was sort of hard to step away from that fandom and attempt to write another song-fic. So, I wrote about the same to characters I have been writing about for over a year now; Francis Bonnefoy the personification of France and Lisa, the Hetalia-canon reincarnation of Joan of Arc.

At times, I often forget that Lisa is not my character. Having written about her for over a year, I feel like I have fleshed her out so much more than the rather irrelevant character she canonically is in the Hetalia canon universe. For this entry, I had to take her back to the basics of her one and only appearance in the canonical universe as a tourist who is cautious but curious about Francis Bonnefoy and his eccentrics. I recreated that one and only canon appearance of Lisa for this entry. I retold her and Francis' initial meeting (something I have done very recently elsewhere too). What is different this time? The whole song element... but then it's not really all that unfamiliar.

Greensleeves! GREENSLEEVES!

Am I right to assume I am the only person who has ever used the song, 'Greensleeves' as a song for a song-fic/fanfic?

When I was 12, we had this whole Middle Ages festival and during the festival the orchestra was asked to play and sing 'Greensleeves' to everyone as they ate at a banquet of KFC off-cuts. So being part of the orchestra, I played it all whilst I was dressed as a medieval princess in a long tight-fitted dress which was not really ideal for playing instruments in. I really liked learning to play that song; it sounded so soft and old and it has never really left my head (a common trope apparently; a lot of people have it stuck in their heads).

I always laugh though, that a semi-strict Catholic primary school made as play 'Greensleeves' despite what the subject matter of 'Greensleeves' alludes to. From memory we only played and sang the first two verses, so I suppose that is alright.

Anyway, why did I choose 'Greensleeves'?

It's an old medieval song (admittedly English and approximately coming about 100 years after the death of Joan of Arc), which if you take for face-value is really quite lovely. Ignoring the sexual connotations, the song really is just about a guy singing about how there is only one woman (Greensleeves) who he will love forever, even if she doesn't love him back. I think if you analyse that episode in Hetalia, you get the feeling Francis genuinely did love Joan, but her life's journey was son a different path to his and so his love to her was unrequited which fits nicely with the general gist of 'Greensleeves'. Furthermore, if we do consider the apparent sexual connotations of the song, it is not a shocking stretch in being representative of the canonical character of Francis Bonnefoy (and I am treading on eggshells here because it's sort of controversial given that some Hetalia fans manipulate Francis Bonnefoy's comfortableness with such things as something ENTIREY DIFFERENT) and him being open about sex and beauty etc.

'Greensleeves' also has a loose connection to the Maiden of Orleans, given that Shakespeare referenced the song in his play 'The Merry Wives of Windsor' through the character John Falstaff who says, 'Let the sky rain potatoes! Let it thunder to the tune of 'Greensleeves'!'. Shakespeare's character; John Falstaff was based off the real-life knight (dumbass) Sir John Fastolf, the impotent idiot who antagonized Joan.

The song seemed to fit. A song that has stood the test of time.

Signing off,

G.