A Children’s Guide to Arkerra 2 (Annotated)
Original text, which was originally meant to fit into the first installment, side-by-side with my shorter “humans” listing:
“ELVES
A proud people, split into several equally-proud tribes: the sky elves in floating cities, the wood elves in the trees, and the seer winter elves in the snowlands. They know many of the old magics, and if you get them in a talking mood, will usually tell you a tale or three. Elves are a communal race– those who live apart from their people are generally lonely and unhappy.”
After this, I just let Phil do his thing. My original plan was for a three-day sequence, which would have left far too little space for what he wanted to say about the so-called Savage Races.
Best requires little incentive to pose for a drawing. He’s always been a great big poser.
I love how Syr’Nj looks like someone took a photo of her sneaking into the kitchen to steal a cookie.
I enjoy how these descriptions are reminiscent of old encylopedias I’ve looked through, where stereotypes of non-caucasian people are stated as facts, and animals are described with odd characteristics. For instance vultures were described as mean and disgusting (I forget the precise words used but that was the gist of it).
a) Are these illustrations also by Erica? They’re in a different style that’s either the work of a lesser artist or a deliberate attempt at parody.
b) Elongated ears are result of earrings attached to the skull in infancy? Is this the truth (within Arkerra) or just another Gastonian libel? I’m inclined to go with the latter. Stranger fashions have been a reality in our own world, though. (Do a Google search on “elongated skulls”.)
As I said a couple days ago, this sequence is Phil’s main contribution to the series as an artist: he drew the profiles himself while Erica was wrestling with other commitments.
(If this reads annoyed, I don’t mean it that way! I just want to make this extra clear.)
Oh, I’m sorry! I read that, but it didn’t register. There’s some influence of Family Guy in his style, and I wasn’t sure if that was deliberate. (The resemblance would probably be more blatant if it was intentional.)
Oh, and yeah, the “infant earrings” rumor reported as fact here was not accurate.
“feral dogs”
I mean, that’s not just racist. It’s so far from any existing stereotype of elves, it’s like calling native Americans “blueskins” or something. Go home, Gastonian racism, you’re drunk!
Allegations of kinship to animals are definitely a part of real-world racism. It says a lot about racism that one can mistake the real thing for a parody of itself.