We came, we read, we wept
Jun. 22nd, 2003 11:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jlhI don't think it's spoiling anyone to say, Hey, Padma DIDN'T die. So my Ron/Padma epic? Safe as houses.
So, yeah. Took the day off, chatted with tons of friends in anticipation.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
epicyclical came over and helped me shop and clean, and then we waited for gehenna1, ali_wildgoose blackholly, and rubydebrazier to come by. Then off we went to dinner and to the bookstore. evil_erato and I were texting each other like crazy people, and I spoke to nmalfoy a couple of times. Also, very much, to my friend Sarah, who introduced me to the books in the first place. Then gehenna1 and her pal went back to her place and the rest of us sat here, at my apartment, and read like fiends.
Sarah is off on Monday on a business trip, and will read GoF on the plane out, and OotP on the plane back. I very much look forward to talking to her on Thursday, as she is not in the fandom. This might also be the best time to introduce her to my fandom friends, as we will all have the same level of knowledge. It will make a good conversation. I think I'll have better thoughts after that.
A few things about other people's reactions:
—If you find yourself getting annoyed, please readmaybethemoon's about this. She's 100% right—our reactions are our own, they are personal, they have to be knee jerk at this point, and therefore are not right or wrong.
—A parable: Right after September 11, Graydon Carter, the editor of Vanity Fair, famously said that "Irony is dead." Boy howdy, was he wrong. We all knew the fandom was going to change in a big way; that's why we made all those 'goodbye' posts, and why they seem anything but silly now. We are on the other side. We don't know what that means. And I don't think we will know until at least after Nimbus, if not Christmas. (That said, my initial reaction is pretty close to Ali's.)
—I really really hope that this divergent opinion will be able to be contained within one fandom. I would hate to have one side in denial-land and one side in the throes of darkness. Neither are that interesting to me. Besides, I don't want to be on the other side fromnothingbutfic because he is just too much, isn't he?
—Speaking of which, I think that this really will bring the disaffected, like David, and the bored, likealexmalfoy, back into being hard-core members. That is nothing but good.
—I had been talking to David about whether someone like me, who writes comedy, has a place writing in the post-OotP fandom, and he expressed shock that I would think of doing anything but continuing EWFS as an AU. If he thinks it's a good idea, maybe it is. I'll see.
Ruby, Holly, Cassie and I finsihed the book well ahead of Ali and were heading back to the Avocado so Ali could read on my couch in peace. We were pretty glum. And then Holly said what we were all thinking but didn't dare say.
"I feel betrayed"
I do feel betrayed. I think that at the end of the day, HP is genre fiction. This book took an unexpected left turn into literary fiction, and I'm really not sure that JKR will be able to pull it off. It was sprawling but in a sloppy way. It had internal contradictions that didn't seem to hold any meaning. It was unrelentingly bleak. And as Cassie said, that isn't why I read HP. Call us shallow, go ahead. But when I want to read Faulkner, I'll read Faulkner. I know Faulkner. And you, Ms. Rowling, are not Faulkner.
I also agree with Alex. I was loving, LOVING the darkness and even the bleakness of the book, and then in the last 5 chapters the whole thing just collapsed in on itself like a white dwarf. I'm worried now, not so much for the characters but for the series.
And please, let me mourn Sirius. Sirius Black was an amazing character with 25 ways to go. Hagrid? Hagrid hasn't changed at all. I agree with those who suspect that she originally meant to kill Hagrid and changed her mind. The Hagrid subplot is pointless and uninteresting. Talk about someone who never learns from his mistakes. It was vaguely interesting to see the other students say to Harry, well, Hagrid never was a good teacher. He wasn't. But Sirius? It isn't just that he was "there for Harry" but that he had a journey of his own and now it's just over, and in a very, for me, unsatisfactory way, and I'm amazingly disappointed.
However, please, Sirius/Remus? Their love WAS so canon. Oh my god, there are things that can only be explained thus. And oh my god, Remus. I am looking forward very much to where she takes him. I love him more now than I ever did, and he was one of my three favorite characters in the book.
Okay, Seamus. Because I'm sure you all know what I will say about that. Well, I was initially upset, of course, but logically, he was the only character who could have filled that purpose, and someone had to do it. But hey, he came back around in the end, didn't he? And wow, Seamus and Dean were much more in evidence here than in previous books. Harry was unhappy at the loss of Seamus, and was clearly around Dean a lot. There is also more implication that Seamus' parents are split up. And there is even more S/D subtext, even with Ginny's final comment. I mean, people, slash is conter-textual, it is subversive. So you really can't kill it.
I loved Ginny's development; I loved Angry!Harry; I think Hermione is way too perfect; I think Ron was marginalized; I think that Neville is much in evidence which is great. I will have more to say about all of them later.
And now I am off to a picnic.
So, yeah. Took the day off, chatted with tons of friends in anticipation.
epicyclical came over and helped me shop and clean, and then we waited for gehenna1, ali_wildgoose blackholly, and rubydebrazier to come by. Then off we went to dinner and to the bookstore. evil_erato and I were texting each other like crazy people, and I spoke to nmalfoy a couple of times. Also, very much, to my friend Sarah, who introduced me to the books in the first place. Then gehenna1 and her pal went back to her place and the rest of us sat here, at my apartment, and read like fiends.Sarah is off on Monday on a business trip, and will read GoF on the plane out, and OotP on the plane back. I very much look forward to talking to her on Thursday, as she is not in the fandom. This might also be the best time to introduce her to my fandom friends, as we will all have the same level of knowledge. It will make a good conversation. I think I'll have better thoughts after that.
A few things about other people's reactions:
—If you find yourself getting annoyed, please read
maybethemoon's about this. She's 100% right—our reactions are our own, they are personal, they have to be knee jerk at this point, and therefore are not right or wrong.—A parable: Right after September 11, Graydon Carter, the editor of Vanity Fair, famously said that "Irony is dead." Boy howdy, was he wrong. We all knew the fandom was going to change in a big way; that's why we made all those 'goodbye' posts, and why they seem anything but silly now. We are on the other side. We don't know what that means. And I don't think we will know until at least after Nimbus, if not Christmas. (That said, my initial reaction is pretty close to Ali's.)
—I really really hope that this divergent opinion will be able to be contained within one fandom. I would hate to have one side in denial-land and one side in the throes of darkness. Neither are that interesting to me. Besides, I don't want to be on the other side from
nothingbutfic because he is just too much, isn't he? —Speaking of which, I think that this really will bring the disaffected, like David, and the bored, like
alexmalfoy, back into being hard-core members. That is nothing but good.—I had been talking to David about whether someone like me, who writes comedy, has a place writing in the post-OotP fandom, and he expressed shock that I would think of doing anything but continuing EWFS as an AU. If he thinks it's a good idea, maybe it is. I'll see.
Ruby, Holly, Cassie and I finsihed the book well ahead of Ali and were heading back to the Avocado so Ali could read on my couch in peace. We were pretty glum. And then Holly said what we were all thinking but didn't dare say.
"I feel betrayed"
I do feel betrayed. I think that at the end of the day, HP is genre fiction. This book took an unexpected left turn into literary fiction, and I'm really not sure that JKR will be able to pull it off. It was sprawling but in a sloppy way. It had internal contradictions that didn't seem to hold any meaning. It was unrelentingly bleak. And as Cassie said, that isn't why I read HP. Call us shallow, go ahead. But when I want to read Faulkner, I'll read Faulkner. I know Faulkner. And you, Ms. Rowling, are not Faulkner.
I also agree with Alex. I was loving, LOVING the darkness and even the bleakness of the book, and then in the last 5 chapters the whole thing just collapsed in on itself like a white dwarf. I'm worried now, not so much for the characters but for the series.
And please, let me mourn Sirius. Sirius Black was an amazing character with 25 ways to go. Hagrid? Hagrid hasn't changed at all. I agree with those who suspect that she originally meant to kill Hagrid and changed her mind. The Hagrid subplot is pointless and uninteresting. Talk about someone who never learns from his mistakes. It was vaguely interesting to see the other students say to Harry, well, Hagrid never was a good teacher. He wasn't. But Sirius? It isn't just that he was "there for Harry" but that he had a journey of his own and now it's just over, and in a very, for me, unsatisfactory way, and I'm amazingly disappointed.
However, please, Sirius/Remus? Their love WAS so canon. Oh my god, there are things that can only be explained thus. And oh my god, Remus. I am looking forward very much to where she takes him. I love him more now than I ever did, and he was one of my three favorite characters in the book.
Okay, Seamus. Because I'm sure you all know what I will say about that. Well, I was initially upset, of course, but logically, he was the only character who could have filled that purpose, and someone had to do it. But hey, he came back around in the end, didn't he? And wow, Seamus and Dean were much more in evidence here than in previous books. Harry was unhappy at the loss of Seamus, and was clearly around Dean a lot. There is also more implication that Seamus' parents are split up. And there is even more S/D subtext, even with Ginny's final comment. I mean, people, slash is conter-textual, it is subversive. So you really can't kill it.
I loved Ginny's development; I loved Angry!Harry; I think Hermione is way too perfect; I think Ron was marginalized; I think that Neville is much in evidence which is great. I will have more to say about all of them later.
And now I am off to a picnic.
