Mary Sue Magpie

[sistermagpie]

I had such a girlie day yesterday. Did all the things I needed to do to my hair at once, which meant sitting in a salon reading Glamour. Finally did laundry and went grocery shopping. Then I went somewhere I've never gone before. I live really close to a "world-famous" bra store and have never set foot inside because, well, I don't really have much in the way of breasts. So I've never really had a grown-up bra. Yesterday, though, I got up my nerve and went up to the no-nonsense businesswoman who seems to be in charge since the 90-year-old bra goddess who ran the place for almost a century died. I said, shyly, "Um, I've never had a proper bra fitting before." "Well," she said, looking like somebody who would be running a secretarial agency in a 40s movie, "you are about to."

I'm very excited with my purchases.:-)

And since I was being girlie, I was in the mood to play with dolls and do the

This is the meme where you go to this dollmaker here.

Here is the "normal" me doll. Because yeah, I totally look like this. Not. There were not enough blond choices for hair, so it's still too dark and red. But, disturbingly, from the neck down it kind of could be me.



And here's me as a Mary Sue.





Speaking of Mary Sues, I've been thinking also about fanfic and a few posts I've read recently about whether or not JKR reads it. It seems like there are more than one ways to

...to turn canon into fanfic.

There's been a lot of posts recently about people saying that HBP reminded them of fanfic, often in ways I don't think is a problem. Maybe it's just that we get so used to fanfic being different or badly written that we forget it is, after all, a response to the text. Many of the things we consider cliches are cliches because they're logical. If JKR was forced to make sure canon never did anything fanfic did the books would probably be incoherent. Take Ron being Keeper for instance. That was something I'd seen in a number of fics, because I think it just worked and seemed instinctually right--which is, I'm sure, why it wound up that way in canon. I was completely tickled by all the specifically H/D cliches in HBP, but then I've always thought that H/D, while being subversive in its own way, was responding to themes in canon just as much as, say, H/G fics were.

What I was thinking about, though, are the posts where people are reading canon as proof that JKR reads fanfic. Some people seem to even go so far as to think she's stealing things from stories, but others just see nods to things throughout the books. Nods that, imo, imply a far greater familiarity with fandom on JKR's part than I think exist. I don't think she reads fanfic--perhaps she's looked at a story here and there, but I just don't think she's aware of all the different patterns that are so familiar to us.

What interested me about this reading of canon, though, was that people seemed to confidently feel that these things were nods to extra-canon ideas. Take, for instance, Slughorn calling Ron "Rupert." That was supposed to be a shout-out to Rupert Grint. Now, I think she could very well have chosen that name for the extra level of humor, since the book was written long after Rupert had become part of the HP experience. But I don't think JKR would have chosen the name if Rupert did not also begin with the same letter as Ron. She would not, for instance, have had someone mistakenly call Hermione "Emma" in the same way. Because I just don't think the woman is going to use her story, the story that she's been planning and writing for years and years about characters that are important to her, to jump out and make jokes about her real life. That's a dangerous thing, breaking the fourth wall that way. Do it too often and you destroy the illusion. So what I mean is, I think Slughorn called Ron Rupert to show Ron didn't interest him at all--it was just the same as Crouch, Sr. referring to Percy as "Weatherby." There is the extra joke for us if we're aware of it, but only because Slughorn could have used the same name if there were no movies.

So I was just surprised seeing *how many* things people were reading as some sort of response to fandom. Off the top of my head I think I remember R/T being a response to Puppyshippers, Romilda being a nod to girls who love Dan Radcliffe, Hermione's line about all the Time Turners being destroyed (and thus, presumably, the fact that they were destroyed) being a response to K2K and other theories involving time travel. I know I saw more than that as well (should have written them down as I saw them). I, myself, couldn't help but think of all of JKR's warnings about girls liking Draco when Myrtle was waxing rhapsodic on how sensitive he was too. But I didn't think Myrtle was supposed to *be* those girls in any sense.

It just surprised me to hear people really reading these things into the books, actually using that as part of the analysis and I realized that, in a way, that was another way of blurring the lines between canon and fanon. Fanfic is our way of "talking back" to the story. Through it we can interact with the characters and the author. So I couldn't help hearing these ideas about HBP and thinking people were just seeing canon as fanfic in reverse: as we use fanfic to "talk" to the author and her characters, the author is now using canon to "talk" to us, the fans. Canon thus becomes more like fanfic in that we are interacting with the characters through fictional representatives, in-jokes and plot devices.

Now, I'm not saying JKR can't be aware of some of the things going on in canon--obviously she is, and anything going on in her life is going to influence her writing. But I think there's a different between that and what's being described here.

Comments

[hagia-sophia.livejournal.com]

Thank you for saying these things. I'm really puzzled as to why people are so sure JKR reads fanfic. Fanfic authors come up with interesting theories about canon; some of these theories turn out to be correct; and for some reason, it is taken as proof that Rowling reads fanfic! I don't understand this. Ultimately, it's all about interpretation of canon. If somebody's interpretation happens to coincide with Rowling's, it doesn't mean she stole it from them.
In short, I agree with everything you say, only I could never say it that well. :)

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

It really just makes perfect sense that a lot of fanfic ideas would coincide with what ultimately happened-there's only so many possibilities, after all. In fact, fanon has covered so many of them JKR could probably do things exactly the opposite way and *still* wind up doing things that had been done in fanfic!

[musesfool.livejournal.com]

I don't think she's actually responding to fandom/reading fanfic etc., but she *does* interact with fans a lot more than most authors do. You see that kind of give and take between fans and the PTB far more in television fandoms - Joss Whedon and his writing staff appearing at the Bronze board or on atbvs or ata back in the day, the Babylon 5 guy doing the same, Aaron Sorkin getting booted from Mighty Big TV and then bashing online fans in (more than one really) an episode of West Wing. The turnaround time is so much shorter in television, and tv writers can stick things in that they pick up online - my contribution to the Great Porn Name THread of Summer 1998 appeared on ER because David Mills was reading alt.tv.homicide. I know someone who had demons in the Angelverse named after her by Tim Minear, etc.

So I wonder if people are applying that... Joss-model to JKR when it really doesn't fit.

However, I stand by my assertion that "I'm too old... too poor... too dangerous" reads like bad fanfic. ;p

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I think she does interact with fans, definitely. And with TV writers I think there's always a chance they *are* responding to fans, because that medium is more about that. I would say that JKR absolutely interacts with fandom and uses the things she knows about it--her interviews will probably be fascinating to analyze once the series is over.

What I don't think she ever does, though, is to put that interaction above the story she intended to tell, so I think there's only so far you can use it to analyze the texts. To take the most obvious kerfuffle after HBP, shipping, people have talked about JKR teasing H/Hr shippers with the idea their ship could happen, and I think that any hints she gave in that direction come from interviews--her not coming straight out and saying R/Hr was going to be canon, for instance. But I don't think, for instance, that the Daily Prophet articles linking H/Hr together in GoF or Cho's jealousy in OotP was supposed to refer to H/Hr shippers.

[violaswamp.livejournal.com]

I think people just expect a higher standard from canon--e.g., freedom from clichés and/or melodrama--than they do from fanon. When people talk about "bad fanfics," what they're really talking about is bad writing, since fanfic is just writing after all and original authors can be just as guilty of poor writing as fanfic authors.

I do think JKR has shaped some of her later books in response to fans, though--like the influx of Strong Female Characters (tm) in OotP, for instance. Thanks to the internet and improved communication in general, authors in the middle of writing a series can get immediate feedback, especially if that series is as popular as HP. Sometimes this can be a bad thing.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

She could definitely be responding to feedback-sometimes an audience probably says things the author hadn't even thought about, so they might be more likely to address it, for instance.

What's sometimes funny about the bad cliches is that it is sometimes used to apply to things that are just irresistably dramatic so you can see why everybody is drawn to it. There's a reason people want to read it over and over in fanfic, for instance.

[pinkfinity.livejournal.com]

I pretty much do agree with you. I think the references are more to things relating to the actors than to the fans - the Rupert bit and Demelza of the quidditch team being named after Dan's pet charity. But she's always done inclusions of things from other sources - the cockroach clusters are directly from Monty Python and I think one of her childhood friends owned a blue Anglia. She can't pay that much attention to fandom, and enough to her kids, and still travel, yet write with any speed. Not enough hours in the day.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Heh--I thought that too. Where would she find the time? But yeah, I think these things also are just in her head and she's always drawn from life. With names especially, this is obviously somebody who's going to be on the lookout for things that sound right. These books have always put a sort of skewed mirror up to the real world--see the Sliggy/Slughorn post, after all. So I do think that names and things especially can be read as nods to real things.

[ackonrad.livejournal.com]

*giggles* This Mary Sue meme is addictive. I just spent an embarrassing amount of time with it.

I think that the fact that HBP appeared like fanfic to some people is based on the fact that the fandom is just so big that I'm certain that some fans have posted theories which are very close to canon somewhere in the Internet, and if certain people stumble across them and realise later that this had been exactly what JKR had had in mind all the time, they are disappointed and decide that JKR reads theories/fanfic.

I agree with you - it is true that there are no limits for the fantasy of a person, but JKR has placed hints in these books, and as the fandom is so big, there are and will be inevitably people who will pick up the correct hints and guess correctly that JKR has always had in mind to kill Dumbledore off or make Bill's family dislike Fleur. I don't see why some people have to be surprised by this, especially when it comes to the so-called 'canon' writers or readers (people who try to write or read only fics that resemble JKR's style and include characterizations and ships she's more likely to follow). I mean, if you've spent the last two years reading fics about Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts, there's no wonder that some authors have guessed correctly that Harry will be the new Quidditch Captain or Snape the new DADA teacher. JKR can't surprise everyone, after all.

But I don't think JKR would have chosen the name if Rupert did not also begin with the same letter as Ron.

Yes, considering that this was the second time Slughorn said Ron's name false - once, he called him 'Ralph' before coming up with the Rupert bit.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

You know, what we should probably appreciate is that JKR managed to get fanon ideas from people *other* than the canon focused people. I doubt many of them had Draco crying in the bathroom, for instance!

And then there's Cuaron, whom JKR said gave her chills by accidentally foreshadowing stuff. I've begun to wonder if she wasn't referring to Lupin's movie scars foreshadowing Bill.

[althea_valara]

She would not, for instance, have had someone mistakenly call Hermione "Emma" in the same way. Because I just don't think the woman is going to use her story, the story that she's been planning and writing for years and years about characters that are important to her, to jump out and make jokes about her real life. That's a dangerous thing, breaking the fourth wall that way.

Yeah. I think the "Rupert" was well done. I say this because I didn't even notice it--this is the first I'm hearing of it. But I would have been jarred if he called Hermione "Emma", because yeah, they are just too different.

Anytime I read about people complaining that stories are too similar, I think back to the Folklore class I took in college, and how we learned that there's motifs that have been repeated in stories throughout all time. So in essence, every story that can be written, already has--the trick is to the tell the same old story we all know in a new way. I agree that JKR is probably aware of fandom, but I don't think she reads fanfic; any similarities between canon and fanon are coincidental. Or, like you said, it's a logical turn for the story, like Ron becoming Keeper.

There WERE some things in HBP that reminded me of various fic, but I was just amused by it (or, in some cases, impressed that the fanfic writers interpreted canon so well). I very much don't think that JKR was stealing anything from fanfic. Why would she even need to? She's obviously got a very creative mind and is capable of producing good stories.

Another reason calling Hermione "Emma" would not be smart: it's just *too* obvious. Too big. Too many people would get it. A shout-out works best, I think, when it's subtle, and when the average person is not going to realise it's a shoutout. I'm thinking of all the Buffy & Firefly shoutouts. The Polgara demon was named after a fan. So was Ita Moon on Firefly. The line about beagles on Firefly was kind of a shoutout to fans, and kind of a joke amongst the writers, as writer Tim Minear has two beagles. And speaking of Tim, on his recent show "The Inside", one of a serial killer's victims was named Allyson, after a fan (and friend of Tim's). These were all fun for me and the fandom, because we got the jokes, but at the same time, the average viewer sitting at home watching the shows is not going to realise it was a shoutout at all, so it won't throw them out of the story. Whereas something like "Emma" would.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Yes, and so much of HP canon is classic--somebody seeing those early scenes at the Dursleys would hardly be surprised to learn that Harry, not Dudley, is the "special" one! Names are a nice, neutral way of acknowledging life outside the universe, I think, and JKR can easily do that since she's always riffing on something. But she's probably going to be careful about letting her feelings for fandom get into the story. Chris Carter, for instance, seemed to completely screw that up and start using The X-files to vent his frustrations about things, and it sucked.

[tinderblast.livejournal.com]

10000001 fanfic writers can't all be wrong!

I liked the bra story - the saleslady sounded like a total hoot.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

She totally was! And the girl who fitted me totally sympathized with my lack of cleavage. It's all about the demi-bra!

[arwencordelia.livejournal.com]

Omg, we have the same Mary Sue outfit! :-D

I've been more amused than anything else about all the things in the books that are supposed to be nods to fandom, though I do think some are more believeable than others. The Time-Turners being destroyed, I can buy - we know from an interview before HBP came out that JKR is aware of the K2K theory. And I completely agree that she would only go so far ("Rupert", but not "Emma").

The thing about cannon sounding like fanfic, though... There are only so many logical ways this story can progress. I agree it's that the sheer volume of different fanfic out there pretty much guarantees that someone guessed something correctly. Like Dumbledore, for example. Dumbledore dies at some point in many, many of the longer fics I've read. I don't think that it happened in cannon was a real surprise to anyone who has either read the books, or is familiar with this particular genre (this is the whole thing about the mentor having to die, or go away, in order for the young hero to fully develop into his own person).

And JKR can still write her own plot twists and surprises, imo, without any need to "steal" from fanfic. After all, a good majority of fandom had an idea Dumbledore would die in this book. But, to my knowledge, no one guessed he would die by Snape's hand. I was very, very glad for my decision not to read any spoilers when I got to that part of the book!

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

We are well-dressed Mary Sues!

I think the thing with Time Turners too is that they point to a plot hole in canon. If Time Turners exist they *should* be able to use them. It's always been a problem since PoA. Explanations for why they couldn't go back in time to save Sirius make no sense at all--there's no reason whatsoever why they couldn't. So getting rid of the Time Turners is a good idea to answer that question, not to mention a thematic one: they can only move forward now.

[q-spade.livejournal.com]

I realized that, in a way, that was another way of blurring the lines between canon and fanon. Fanfic is our way of "talking back" to the story. Through it we can interact with the characters and the author. So I couldn't help hearing these ideas about HBP and thinking people were just seeing canon as fanfic in reverse: as we use fanfic to "talk" to the author and her characters, the author is now using canon to "talk" to us, the fans. Canon thus becomes more like fanfic in that we are interacting with the characters through fictional representatives, in-jokes and plot devices.

I think that a great many fans would like to imagine that the phenomenon of fandom IS powerful enough to effect such a two-way communication via text; that JKR would not only allow but encourage feedback and critique of her work in such a manner. But of course it isn't, and she doesn't; this is her story, she supposedly has had it all planned out from the start and what she writes is what you get. Yes, she interacts with the fandom by way of interviews & such, but that's part of the business of selling books – I can't really see it affecting the text per se.

Interestingly, the "Rupert" mention isn't the only (presumed) reminder of the movie franchise in HPB: there is also reference to Hermione "punching" Draco back in third year when in the original text of POA it was a slap. Is that lazy editing, a shout-out to the bigwigs at Warner Brothers, a red herring, or something else? We can guess, but only JKR knows. (My vote's for lazy editing!)

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I vote for lazy editing too. And I really wish they'd fix it--though I'd fear they'd go back and edit PoA, making that scene make even less sense. It's a great example of why this kind of thing doesn't work. The scene in the movie is pure movies. It's cartoony and over the top. It's unrealistic. I used to find the book scene borderling unrealistic in the way Malfoy had no reaction whatsoever, but compared to the movie it's fine.

[slinkhard.livejournal.com]

(My vote's for lazy editing!)

I don't know, but it makes me feel awfully smug, what with JKR's interviews on how Draco fans can't tell the difference between the movies and the books, so for the sake of my meanspirited pleasure, I'm gonna vote for lazy editing too! ;)

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

I vote for lazy editing.

We got a double dose of the downside of writing from an outline that was hammered together over a decade ago this time out. The infill between the headigs has shifted, even though the headings themselves haven't changed at all. As a result we had all sorts of continuity glitches surfacing and if you're a theorist you find youself stubbing your toes on bits of flotsam which were telegraphed as clues - that never went anywhere.

[strangemuses.livejournal.com]

JKR is not reading fanfic to troll for fanon ideas to put into her stories. Some fans may have correctly reflected back themes and ideas that JKR has already put into her story, but that's hardly surprising as JKR telegraphs her themes and clues pretty clearly. JKR plotted out this story years ago. Fans who think that she is now tailoring her story to suit them are forgetting that she's known the fates of all of these characters for years. She's got this story so tightly scripted that it would blow her story apart if she tried to start playing to her fans instead of to her outline.

Sure, she can do funny shout-outs to the overall HP phenomena like having Slughorn call Ron "Rupert" but that is merely a happy coincidence that has more to do with echoing the fact that Crouch called Percy "Weatherby." Oh, hahahaha! Everyone took great glee with the fact that Percy got humiliated like that, but here it is again happening to Ron. She was merely personalizing the point about character identity and importance that she'd made earlier. It was cute and convenient that the actor who plays Ron has a name that starts with the letter 'r' but that's all. She could just as easily have used the name Reggie or Randell or whatever.

I think that some fans are so vested in this story and fandom that they need to feel validated in some way for their effort and time. I'm willing to bet you good money that JKR honestly, truly, deeply does not care one bit about the HP 'fandom.' She is not writing for 'fandom.' She doesn't care what fandom thinks, except in a vaguely marketing sort of way,as when she steps in to quash some fannish ideas that run counter to her plans because "it's unproductive" for fans to continue to speculate down that route. She always gives fans other clues to go and speculate about, such as her recent declaration that fans should go forth and speculate about Dumbledore's family ties. She is manipulating fandom when it suits her and when fandom gets too loud or too insistent about ideas that she doesn't like, not the other way around.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

JKR is not reading fanfic to troll for fanon ideas to put into her stories. Some fans may have correctly reflected back themes and ideas that JKR has already put into her story, but that's hardly surprising as JKR telegraphs her themes and clues pretty clearly. JKR plotted out this story years ago. Fans who think that she is now tailoring her story to suit them are forgetting that she's known the fates of all of these characters for years. She's got this story so tightly scripted that it would blow her story apart if she tried to start playing to her fans instead of to her outline.

Just had to quote that paragraph because that's exactly what I see happening. It's like a post I wrote right before HBP; I think the clues for what will happen are usually found in what has happened before. I think she's even stressed how planning is important to her. Using one name over another I can see her doing, but writing entire storylines as a response to stuff in fandom? Talk about throwing a monkey wrench into things!

But what you've described is very much how I think she interacts with fandom. Very carefully. I said I thought her interviews would make for great study once the books are all out just to see just how she was throwing people off track while seizing on things she could throw them. But that in itself supports your first paragraph--her interviews are completely controlled by the story she is writing, not the other way around.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Oh God, yes. It's one of those things that makes me twitchy every time I read another HBP discussion. When I was reading hbp_chapters there would be several comments for each chapter about how such and such was just like fanfic, and oh, JKR's been reading too much fanfic again. And I'm like...no, I'm sorry. It's the stupidest stuff, too. Like they're saying oh, I saw this in a million fanfics...well then it's obviously not very original, is it! I think Fudge being sacked and Sirius's name being cleared was one of the first ones I saw. People saying "so many post-OotP fics I read started out this way..." well, duh, it's a logical step! And it just got worse the more discussion I read. People are just so stupid. Argh.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

LOL! Exactly. So many post-OotP fics start out this way, what with the events of OotP having just happened and the loose ends being tied up. You'd think JKR would do something different, like introduce an entirely new cast of people or something. Sirius is going to be cleared or no; Fudge is going to be sacked or not (and I think JKR even told us there was a new MoM). You don't exactly need a crystal ball there.

[malafede.livejournal.com]

But you can't deny the magpie thing with Tom was a shot-out to you... YOU'RE VOLDEMORT NOW, MAGPIE!

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

ROTFL!

Well, yeah, cuz me and JKR are like this (crosses fingers).

That whole Draco storyline in HBP? She got that from reading my meta essays.

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

Heh. Actually, I kind of feel like the "it's like a fanfic!" is a backhanded compliment to some of the fanfic authors out there.

Sure, there are fanfic-ish elements in there. Can we all say "Regulus"? But like you say, it's the authors getting it RIGHT, not JKR stealing ideas. If someone had written a full-fledged fic about someone named Regulus who stole a piece of Voldemort's soul and was killed before OotP came out, then you could say that it was JKR stealing. But otherwise.... I just remember this one line from a fic nimori wrote about Snape finding Harry Potter slash on-line, and in saying that the author had given him lines that were so "Snape" he filed them away for future use. Sometimes the authors just nail the characters perfectly.

A couple other possible shoutouts though:

I've wondered about Slughorn's name being something of an homage to Roald Dahl, and Slugworth in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Given that that's who JKR's style always reminded me of, it wouldn't surprise me.

JKR admitted in the Mugglenet/TLC interview she is a HUGE West Wing fan. I'm wondering if that isn't where she got the name Tobias for Snape's father. (Of course, I'm just ticked at her for using Tobias because I promised no Harry Potter names for our kid and Tobias is my current number one pick, and I got Toby from The West Wing (I'm breaking that promise- Tobias Snape's not exactly a major character), but I do wonder, given Toby's personality and Snape's personality, if it's not a little homage.)

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Hee! I didn't know that about Tobias--but I like the name in general so I approve.:-)

I do think that shout-outs like that are probably all over the place. With all the names the woman has to come up with it's not surprising she's going to keep her ear open for things that sound good. I had thought about Slugworth as well--right after HBP I read, like, 5 essays that all got his name wrong. He was Slughard, Slugworth--I had to go back and check I was right about Slughorn.

But word on authors getting it right--and why shouldn't they? The books probably wouldn't be half so enjoyable if we couldn't have some idea of what was coming!

[aithopa.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, the Mary Sue! :D

There were enough of those things you mentioned that they gave me pause while I was reading the story, thinking, she can't really know about fanon, can she? I'm not sure. (There's always been something weirdly meta to me about things like Harry's fame, for instance, you know? "...there will be books written about Harry - every child in our world will know his name!" (PS) )

Fanfic is our way of "talking back" to the story. Through it we can interact with the characters and the author. So I couldn't help hearing these ideas about HBP and thinking people were just seeing canon as fanfic in reverse: as we use fanfic to "talk" to the author and her characters, the author is now using canon to "talk" to us, the fans. Canon thus becomes more like fanfic in that we are interacting with the characters through fictional representatives, in-jokes and plot devices.

This is so true. You always manage to say these things that make me feel like, oh yeah, I *knew* that all along, I just needed somebody to explain it to me. :D On the one hand, you don't want to believe that, for instance, JKR is writing Remus/Tonks just to spite R/S people, because that's really lame...and yet on the other hand, you sort of want to believe she cares enough.