Question? Still moot.
Jul. 30th, 2005 10:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jlhIt appears I need to revisit this post from last week to point out the more relevant parts in response to a couple of things that popped up on my flist today. In it, I said:
It's canon. It stands unchanging. It doesn't care what you thought would happen; it simply is.
which I still stand behind. However, I also said:
presuming that what someone chooses to write—be it a ship, or an event, or what have you—is them putting a stake in the ground about canon is a really big leap
So since I'm still, thanks to the icon above, in something of a defensive posture according to some of you, I want to make some things crystal clear:
1. I don't make canon predictions. I'm not interested in other people's canon predictions. I personally find it rather boring to watch people argue over something that we are going to find out about in something like two years. I simply don't think about canon that way--see above; it simply IS. It just isn't the way I interact with canon.
That is not to say that I think that those who do have fun with canon predictions are lame or anything like that. It's just not my bag.
2. However, if you had nailed me to the wall I would have said that I fully thought that canon would be R/Hr and H/G. I hoped that JKR would write those ships better than the fanfic I had found, and this hope was (mostly) fulfilled. So me? An H/H writer who was not wrong. I don't think I have anything to apologize for here.
3. Just because you don't like something about canon doesn't mean that the reason that you want to criticize it is because it interfered with your theories. I'm with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
black_dog about being disappointed that JKR wrote queerness out of canon, but that doesn't mean that the reason I dislike Remus/Tonks is because I didn't see it coming. I don't have a great love for it because I found something lacking in the way it was dealt with. I didn't think that she would have a gay love drama in the background of canon; I just hoped that she'd leave the subtext where it was. (Note that's hoped, not predicted.)
4. I really love these books. However, that doesn't mean that in order to be a good little fan I have to genuflect in JKR's general direction. It amazes me the anger that is generated by other people's disappointment. I don't like Snape and I find him to be generally an uninteresting character; I have no time for his puerile bullshit. I'm not interested in going on and on about it because I have friends who have a great love for Snape so I think to do so would be something less than classy. But I have every right to dislike, or dismiss, any character I want. I don't have to like the books in exactly the way JKR thinks I should like the books, or for the reasons that JKR thinks I should, in order to like the books.
5. On the flip side, I also get to like any of the characters I want in exactly the way I want to. If I want to overidentify with Hermione, or Ginny, or Amelia Bones, I get to do that. I'm actually rather infamous for my love of minor characters like Seamus Finnigan. Just because JKR thinks of him as being little more than an Irish hothead doesn't mean that I can't see something deeper in him without that being evidence of my psychotic break with reality.
Okay, that's canon. Now for a few things about fanon.
6. Every ship has their crazies. I've seen it among S/R, D/G, R/Hr, H/H, Snapeslash, need I go on? Every ship also has their sane supporters, their good writers, their perfectly nice people. Now, if you write a fic that starts out being one ship and then ends up being another, such that the shippers of the original ship climbed on to your fic and then felt a bit of bait and switch, you're going to get some grouchy reviews. Unfair? Absolutely. The province of one ship? Not one bit. The first place I became aware of it was the D/G shippers and their DV anxiety but since then I've seen it in any number of places. The mean-spirited, far-too-shippy reviews are not the province of just one ship, though I would say they are the province of one kind of shipper. So when you bitch about it, as is your right, please try to criticize "the x ship reviewers of my fic" rather than "the x shippers".
That said, if you change ships in the middle of your fic you are playing with fire, my friend. Writer beware.
7. Dumb character hate is the hobgoblin of small-minded shippers. It isn't just the H/D hate of Ginny and/or Hermione, or the H/H hate of Ron, or the D/G hate of Harry, believe me. As many of you know I've been floating around CSI slash, and for my own preferred ship, Gil/Nick, there are not-so-great fics that make one character, Sara, into a raving lunatic. It's lazy. You shouldn't have to assassinate some third character in order to make your ship work, literally or figuratively. Romance is all about showing why one pairing suits.
That said, saying that you think Ginny works better with Draco than Harry, and showing that, doesn't mean you hate Harry. Harry can be "Ralph Bellamy" without being a dick or a moron. Shipping, to my mind, isn't about "reward", but personality.
I'm hoping this is me, done, and I can go back to saying what I think through the stories. Carrie said she'd hold my hand while I read the JKR interview lest I burst into tears of shame or rage, which I'm still thinking is entirely likely, but I really just need to read it and get on with my life without worrying about how mentally unstable she, and others, may or may not assume that I am.
It's canon. It stands unchanging. It doesn't care what you thought would happen; it simply is.
which I still stand behind. However, I also said:
presuming that what someone chooses to write—be it a ship, or an event, or what have you—is them putting a stake in the ground about canon is a really big leap
So since I'm still, thanks to the icon above, in something of a defensive posture according to some of you, I want to make some things crystal clear:
1. I don't make canon predictions. I'm not interested in other people's canon predictions. I personally find it rather boring to watch people argue over something that we are going to find out about in something like two years. I simply don't think about canon that way--see above; it simply IS. It just isn't the way I interact with canon.
That is not to say that I think that those who do have fun with canon predictions are lame or anything like that. It's just not my bag.
2. However, if you had nailed me to the wall I would have said that I fully thought that canon would be R/Hr and H/G. I hoped that JKR would write those ships better than the fanfic I had found, and this hope was (mostly) fulfilled. So me? An H/H writer who was not wrong. I don't think I have anything to apologize for here.
3. Just because you don't like something about canon doesn't mean that the reason that you want to criticize it is because it interfered with your theories. I'm with
black_dog about being disappointed that JKR wrote queerness out of canon, but that doesn't mean that the reason I dislike Remus/Tonks is because I didn't see it coming. I don't have a great love for it because I found something lacking in the way it was dealt with. I didn't think that she would have a gay love drama in the background of canon; I just hoped that she'd leave the subtext where it was. (Note that's hoped, not predicted.)4. I really love these books. However, that doesn't mean that in order to be a good little fan I have to genuflect in JKR's general direction. It amazes me the anger that is generated by other people's disappointment. I don't like Snape and I find him to be generally an uninteresting character; I have no time for his puerile bullshit. I'm not interested in going on and on about it because I have friends who have a great love for Snape so I think to do so would be something less than classy. But I have every right to dislike, or dismiss, any character I want. I don't have to like the books in exactly the way JKR thinks I should like the books, or for the reasons that JKR thinks I should, in order to like the books.
5. On the flip side, I also get to like any of the characters I want in exactly the way I want to. If I want to overidentify with Hermione, or Ginny, or Amelia Bones, I get to do that. I'm actually rather infamous for my love of minor characters like Seamus Finnigan. Just because JKR thinks of him as being little more than an Irish hothead doesn't mean that I can't see something deeper in him without that being evidence of my psychotic break with reality.
Okay, that's canon. Now for a few things about fanon.
6. Every ship has their crazies. I've seen it among S/R, D/G, R/Hr, H/H, Snapeslash, need I go on? Every ship also has their sane supporters, their good writers, their perfectly nice people. Now, if you write a fic that starts out being one ship and then ends up being another, such that the shippers of the original ship climbed on to your fic and then felt a bit of bait and switch, you're going to get some grouchy reviews. Unfair? Absolutely. The province of one ship? Not one bit. The first place I became aware of it was the D/G shippers and their DV anxiety but since then I've seen it in any number of places. The mean-spirited, far-too-shippy reviews are not the province of just one ship, though I would say they are the province of one kind of shipper. So when you bitch about it, as is your right, please try to criticize "the x ship reviewers of my fic" rather than "the x shippers".
That said, if you change ships in the middle of your fic you are playing with fire, my friend. Writer beware.
7. Dumb character hate is the hobgoblin of small-minded shippers. It isn't just the H/D hate of Ginny and/or Hermione, or the H/H hate of Ron, or the D/G hate of Harry, believe me. As many of you know I've been floating around CSI slash, and for my own preferred ship, Gil/Nick, there are not-so-great fics that make one character, Sara, into a raving lunatic. It's lazy. You shouldn't have to assassinate some third character in order to make your ship work, literally or figuratively. Romance is all about showing why one pairing suits.
That said, saying that you think Ginny works better with Draco than Harry, and showing that, doesn't mean you hate Harry. Harry can be "Ralph Bellamy" without being a dick or a moron. Shipping, to my mind, isn't about "reward", but personality.
I'm hoping this is me, done, and I can go back to saying what I think through the stories. Carrie said she'd hold my hand while I read the JKR interview lest I burst into tears of shame or rage, which I'm still thinking is entirely likely, but I really just need to read it and get on with my life without worrying about how mentally unstable she, and others, may or may not assume that I am.
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no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 05:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 05:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 07:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 04:20 pm (UTC)Thanks so much. If you haven't read this post (http://www.livejournal.com/users/black_dog/7760.html) by BD, I really encourage you to do so as it is beyond excellent.
And you put it exactly as I would have--accepting things as canon doesn't mean you have to like them. It doesn't even mean you have to write about them; you can just write around them, and that doesn't mean that apparently feared label "denial fic".
Here by way of random lj hopping
Date: 2005-07-31 12:45 pm (UTC)And this I say as a convinced Ron/Luna shipper previously. I was so sure that, of everybody, Ron would be one of the best when it came to handling her flights of fancy. Well, at least I understood the Ron character.*shrugs*
PS: I think of myself as one of the t00biest Ron lovahs in the land. I think it's perfectly okay for you to be all "meh" about him. I refuse to get defensive and rail in the name of a fictional character. Also, you got him right in your Ron/Padma fics, dammit. *tips hat off*
Re: Here by way of random lj hopping
Date: 2005-07-31 04:34 pm (UTC)I really am in love with the concept of Ron/Ravenclaw and I wish that JKR had pulled through on the Ron/Luna because I thought it was more interesting. I also think Luna has Ron's number in a way that I'm not sure Hermione does, and I really love pairings like that.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 01:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 02:21 pm (UTC)Also, there was an interview?
no subject
Date: 2005-07-31 11:47 pm (UTC)I totally agree that the first step in reacting to all the shipping craziness is just to take a deep breath and do some mental housekeeping: "why this works or fails" goes over here, and "why I personally care" goes over there -- they are two separate issues. A critical reaction to JKR goes on one shelf, and a free appropriation of her characters in fanfic goes on another. Look! Much tidier already. :)
I think you're absolutely right, too, that you can disagree with what JKR does with her characters without being guilty of high treason (or excessive self-involvement). It's all a question of your reasoning, of making an argument for your case rather than getting too worked up over whether JKR is validating one's own personal vision. Anyone who's writing fiction is, after all, pushing a view of what people are like, and the reader is free to see that vision as profound, silly, or some inconsistent mix of the two. So a fic that presents a plausible alternative development, of a character or a romance, is really contributing to a debate that JKR has raised in the first place, and that has significance outside of her books themselves.
I mean, just to take an example, I would have predicted canon H/H and I don't personally see R/H as well matched at all. (Not that I care a whole lot while my hero is really obsessing over Draco, but that's my private delusion, thank you.) The fact that JKR has chosen, in her world, to go with the fireworks over the calm, steady love does nothing to change my ideas about love in general, in the larger world that we're all ultimately making reference to. And it is certainly true that people make the R/H kind of choice in real life all the time (and others make the opposite choice) so if this particular case goes that way, what's to argue with?
Harry/Ginny, I'm sorry to say, is also perfectly plausible as normal teen idiot behavior, though it feels like a very superficial infatuation and in my optimistic moments I think JKR has actually coded it that way, that she sees it as ironically as many of her skeptical readers do.
Remus/Tonks, on the other hand, feels suspect to me, based on the text itself. And in my post (which you way-too-kindly plugged, thanks!) I was sort of getting at why it felt like things couldn't be what they seemed on the surface, and sort of groping for an alternative explanation. One thing that really intrigues me, and that I haven't heard much discussion about, is JKR's comment in her interview that a romantic plot was sometimes, in detective fiction, a misdirection, a way of distorting or hiding what was really going on -- and she said, in kind of a throwaway line, that that applied specifically to Tonks. So, I have to wonder if my suspicions here are well-grounded -- and I hope that's not just a shipper talking, but a critical reader.
Stepping back from the specifics a little, I wonder if the interview isn't looming too large, after all, in this whole debate. In the past, I've always deliberately tried to ignore interviews in interpreting the books, on the theory that I'd take something JKR said as definitive, once she found a way to write it permanently into her text. And it's probably true that a fast, fun, interview with two crazed fans is not the place for subtleties. She's going to simplify, overgeneralize, provoke, tease -- it's anything but the last word. So I'm really looking forward to going back to a second read of HBP, and thinking all this through more carefully, after all the ground that's been turned over in these first couple of weeks has had a chance to settle again.