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I was reading a post today which linked to a discussion about H/D that got me thinking. I didn't actually read the discussion; only had time to skim it, so this isn't a real response to that thread. It just got me thinking. I believe the premise of the discussion was on the question of doms and subs in H/D, and which was which and why, but it got me thinking about
The H/D Dynamic in general and how it changes in HBP.
This is the thing that's really exciting about HBP in terms of the ship, though it's also something that makes the whole thing really challenging in a different way than it was before.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lunacy recently mentioned Elkins' classic "Draco Malfoy is ever so lame" post, which though it was written post GoF continues to work, as do its sequel posts like "Draco the Nutter." One of the main points of those essays, of course, was how Draco just didn't work as strictly a villain because he was too weak to ever really score anything off Harry at all, and that weakness has always been a big issue amongst Draco-centric and H/D-centric fans. I'd suggest many fanon!Dracos are a response to it as well, providing the antagonist or equal that canon didn't.
But the thing is, what HBP really finally made explicitly clear was not only that Draco wasn't there as just an obstacle, villain or bully, but that his weakness was partially due to the character's fundamental conflict: what he tries to be is not what he is. Not in the sense that many bad H/D fics did it with Draco being good or nice on the inside and bad on the outside, crying over having to pretend to be mean. It's harder to describe than that, but clearly something the author has always seen as fundamental to the character, which she described as a "natural" Occlumens because of the repression he practices in order to be what he is. He's not "what you see is what you get" bully Dudley, exactly, which is probably also why, as many readers note, we just don't see the same kind of bullying from him. Again, that's not meant as a way of saying he's only weak because he's covering up his good side so feel free to write him as superman now-not at all. I'm saying that as a character we've got a central conflict for sure now-JKR almost always has conflicts at the center of her characters-and that means the character can stand on his own instead of standing only in relation to Harry.
So where this relates to H/D is not about Draco's being repressed (though it's a fun thing to play with, surely!), it's about his function as a character. HBP is really unique in the way it gives a student other than Harry a transformative storyline--and I mean transformative, not just one where he gains strength and confidence, like Ron or Neville. Draco had everything about himself attacked in HBP--the dark night of the soul type stuff I'd always hoped for! And I think to really write the character at this point you have to acknowledge his role as a real protagonist in his own story because of it.
Pre-HBP Meta discussions about Draco were generally about what exactly his function in the narrative was--was he the school bully that Harry should outgrow? A minor lesson in the dangers of resentment and envy? An obstacle Harry would eventually have to kill or work with? Some of those questions are still open, but not in the same way, because the last book suddenly gave Draco this completely independent world to operate in that brought with it motivations that had nothing to do with Harry because they were generated within the character himself. We no longer have to understand him only through how he reflects or can be contrasted to Harry. That's why I think many conversations about roles in H/D are doomed to fail. It's no longer just a case of deciding whether you're going to use Draco one way or the other with regards to Harry, because he now exists more fully and independently of Harry. You can, imo, deal with them both as completely different people instead of just contrasts to each other, or one person obsessed with another who's not interested.
And I do mean completely different people, even if they can have things in common. I'm not describing this well, but think of taking away the context of canon and thinking of both boys as characters in two different books in which he is the protagonist. Instead of it being Harry and Draco in HP, or Harry the hero boy and Draco the bad boy, imagine if they were the stars of two different books. One is a boy marked for death that he survived as a baby with the evil wizard still after him. He must kill him or be killed, so he's growing to be a warrior (even if ultimately his weapon is love). Then there's this other book we have to imagine where the protagonist is the son of a wicked nobleman who pledges himself to uphold the family honor, only comes to see that everything he understood about honor was wrong. As Harry was marked with a scar at birth that forces him to become the man he had to be, this character is “cursed” with the inability to ever be the man he thinks he has to be.
They make an interesting contrast since in some ways they seem like opposites of each other, but they're not quite, or they don't have to be. They can just be two different characters from two different stories that any fic author can explore however s/he wants. I think that can free H/D fans from the compulsion we (me included) often have to slot the two of them into roles: Harry is the X one and Draco is the Y one, because as it turns out neither of them were created to be that static. For instance, it's not, as was very often portrayed especially after GoF, that Harry was the compassionate one and Draco was the cruel one. It's that they're both sometimes compassionate and sometimes cruel but have shown these qualities in different circumstances unique to them-which is not in any way suggesting that they are the same, btw. I'm talking about the potential qualities one could use in a fic, not weighing them against each other on the cosmic scale of good/bad attributes and finding them equal. Draco's “story” in this hypothetical other book depends on his starting at the black end of the scale.
Obviously, what I'm saying it's news to H/D fic-writers. They have been writing this kind of thing for years, where the two characters have different lives. It's just that before they had to create Draco's inner life from hints in canon, and now we've actually got the information from the author (and it's pretty great, imo). We've got the core of the character the way we never could when he his core had to be his feelings towards Harry because we couldn't see anything else. HBP shifted his center to himself, and once that happens the possibilities for putting him together with anyone are multiplied.
The H/D Dynamic in general and how it changes in HBP.
This is the thing that's really exciting about HBP in terms of the ship, though it's also something that makes the whole thing really challenging in a different way than it was before.
lunacy recently mentioned Elkins' classic "Draco Malfoy is ever so lame" post, which though it was written post GoF continues to work, as do its sequel posts like "Draco the Nutter." One of the main points of those essays, of course, was how Draco just didn't work as strictly a villain because he was too weak to ever really score anything off Harry at all, and that weakness has always been a big issue amongst Draco-centric and H/D-centric fans. I'd suggest many fanon!Dracos are a response to it as well, providing the antagonist or equal that canon didn't.But the thing is, what HBP really finally made explicitly clear was not only that Draco wasn't there as just an obstacle, villain or bully, but that his weakness was partially due to the character's fundamental conflict: what he tries to be is not what he is. Not in the sense that many bad H/D fics did it with Draco being good or nice on the inside and bad on the outside, crying over having to pretend to be mean. It's harder to describe than that, but clearly something the author has always seen as fundamental to the character, which she described as a "natural" Occlumens because of the repression he practices in order to be what he is. He's not "what you see is what you get" bully Dudley, exactly, which is probably also why, as many readers note, we just don't see the same kind of bullying from him. Again, that's not meant as a way of saying he's only weak because he's covering up his good side so feel free to write him as superman now-not at all. I'm saying that as a character we've got a central conflict for sure now-JKR almost always has conflicts at the center of her characters-and that means the character can stand on his own instead of standing only in relation to Harry.
So where this relates to H/D is not about Draco's being repressed (though it's a fun thing to play with, surely!), it's about his function as a character. HBP is really unique in the way it gives a student other than Harry a transformative storyline--and I mean transformative, not just one where he gains strength and confidence, like Ron or Neville. Draco had everything about himself attacked in HBP--the dark night of the soul type stuff I'd always hoped for! And I think to really write the character at this point you have to acknowledge his role as a real protagonist in his own story because of it.
Pre-HBP Meta discussions about Draco were generally about what exactly his function in the narrative was--was he the school bully that Harry should outgrow? A minor lesson in the dangers of resentment and envy? An obstacle Harry would eventually have to kill or work with? Some of those questions are still open, but not in the same way, because the last book suddenly gave Draco this completely independent world to operate in that brought with it motivations that had nothing to do with Harry because they were generated within the character himself. We no longer have to understand him only through how he reflects or can be contrasted to Harry. That's why I think many conversations about roles in H/D are doomed to fail. It's no longer just a case of deciding whether you're going to use Draco one way or the other with regards to Harry, because he now exists more fully and independently of Harry. You can, imo, deal with them both as completely different people instead of just contrasts to each other, or one person obsessed with another who's not interested.
And I do mean completely different people, even if they can have things in common. I'm not describing this well, but think of taking away the context of canon and thinking of both boys as characters in two different books in which he is the protagonist. Instead of it being Harry and Draco in HP, or Harry the hero boy and Draco the bad boy, imagine if they were the stars of two different books. One is a boy marked for death that he survived as a baby with the evil wizard still after him. He must kill him or be killed, so he's growing to be a warrior (even if ultimately his weapon is love). Then there's this other book we have to imagine where the protagonist is the son of a wicked nobleman who pledges himself to uphold the family honor, only comes to see that everything he understood about honor was wrong. As Harry was marked with a scar at birth that forces him to become the man he had to be, this character is “cursed” with the inability to ever be the man he thinks he has to be.
They make an interesting contrast since in some ways they seem like opposites of each other, but they're not quite, or they don't have to be. They can just be two different characters from two different stories that any fic author can explore however s/he wants. I think that can free H/D fans from the compulsion we (me included) often have to slot the two of them into roles: Harry is the X one and Draco is the Y one, because as it turns out neither of them were created to be that static. For instance, it's not, as was very often portrayed especially after GoF, that Harry was the compassionate one and Draco was the cruel one. It's that they're both sometimes compassionate and sometimes cruel but have shown these qualities in different circumstances unique to them-which is not in any way suggesting that they are the same, btw. I'm talking about the potential qualities one could use in a fic, not weighing them against each other on the cosmic scale of good/bad attributes and finding them equal. Draco's “story” in this hypothetical other book depends on his starting at the black end of the scale.
Obviously, what I'm saying it's news to H/D fic-writers. They have been writing this kind of thing for years, where the two characters have different lives. It's just that before they had to create Draco's inner life from hints in canon, and now we've actually got the information from the author (and it's pretty great, imo). We've got the core of the character the way we never could when he his core had to be his feelings towards Harry because we couldn't see anything else. HBP shifted his center to himself, and once that happens the possibilities for putting him together with anyone are multiplied.
