sistermagpie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sistermagpie) wrote2007-07-21 06:35 pm
sistermagpie) wrote2007-07-21 06:35 pm
Deathly Hallows
I feel weird writing this post, because I don't really feel like posting, yet it seems like I should, and then I think--what, do you imagine the public is waiting on pins and needles for your words? Get over yourself!:-D
Anyway, I didn't much like it. Perhaps my feelings will change, but stop here if you don’t want to read any negative stuff. I don't have any rants prepared or anything or want to harsh anybody's buzz. (But misery also loves company!) I was talking to someone who's asked me what I needed from the book, what I wanted to happen or what would have made me satisfied, and the truth is, I don't have an answer. I don't have a list of prescriptive criticism, or think things were done badly, or should have been done a different way.
Well, except one little thing, which couldn't be helped. When that white doe showed up I never doubted for a second it was Snape's Lily!Patronus (cause she's a lady!James!). We'd seen Arthur's and Kingsley's Patronuses talk, and oh, how I wanted that beautiful sparkly stag to come up to Harry and tell him to get this Quest going already in Snape's sarcastic voice.
I've never loved these books the way some do--which should not be taken as a criticism of people who do. I just mean that I know there are people who re-read the books over and over as comfort, and that's not something I ever did. I didn't ever want to re-read to spend time with these people or in this world. There are other books I do feel that way about, books that other people find meh. Basically, I felt like JKR was writing a story of good and evil, and life and death, that resonated with her and satisfied her, and felt like a triumph for her--just not me. So I was a bit left out of the story, objectively even seeing characters doing good, brave things, and just not sharing much in the emotions. More than once I felt like I was seeing more story outline/structure than story so that it seemed very contrived (a couple of times Harry himself seemed to admit it) and made it feel like nothing was building to anything.
What it mostly made me do is go over all the ways I was reading it wrong, making my issues more central than the author really considered them. I don't think I was ever so off as, say, a Harmonian banking on the Hippogriff o'love or anything like that, and some things that happened I did predict (Snape/Lily, obviously, and DDM!Snape). But in general I think I was reading Rowling a bit too much like a Tolkien fan, and maybe too much as a Jungian (not that I'm any expert on Jung, but I was reading from my own idea of his stuff). And I think when JKR said that she was Christian and if she talked about her faith we'd know the ending, I immediately began interrogating from the *wrong* Christian perspective and got that wrong too.
Contrary to what some may have thought at times-or not-I don't hate the good guys. Still don't hate them, just still would not want to spend time with them or re-read the books to spend time with them. The characters I liked the most I think less of now or am just kind of confused by, which is unfortunate. I find Harry affectionately naming his child Albus Severus downright creepy--but that wasn't the first time in the book where that kind of thing happened.
Not sure what I predict fanfic-wise. I wonder if people might not start writing some interesting stuff. I did at one point think how I wanted to take a favorite character and put him in a different story.
Oh, also I've been dreading the epilogue for years, because I've always hated epilogues. Even when I was too young to know the name for them I hated them. Some books I guess can make a case for them being appropriate. HP is really not one of them that I can see. There was no reason I could see for needing to see these people married with children. The one good thing I read about it was after it was leaked, before I read it, and I read a comment where someone said the epilogue read like any cliché H/G fic...or any cliché post-war H/D fic.;-)
Anyway, I didn't much like it. Perhaps my feelings will change, but stop here if you don’t want to read any negative stuff. I don't have any rants prepared or anything or want to harsh anybody's buzz. (But misery also loves company!) I was talking to someone who's asked me what I needed from the book, what I wanted to happen or what would have made me satisfied, and the truth is, I don't have an answer. I don't have a list of prescriptive criticism, or think things were done badly, or should have been done a different way.
Well, except one little thing, which couldn't be helped. When that white doe showed up I never doubted for a second it was Snape's Lily!Patronus (cause she's a lady!James!). We'd seen Arthur's and Kingsley's Patronuses talk, and oh, how I wanted that beautiful sparkly stag to come up to Harry and tell him to get this Quest going already in Snape's sarcastic voice.
I've never loved these books the way some do--which should not be taken as a criticism of people who do. I just mean that I know there are people who re-read the books over and over as comfort, and that's not something I ever did. I didn't ever want to re-read to spend time with these people or in this world. There are other books I do feel that way about, books that other people find meh. Basically, I felt like JKR was writing a story of good and evil, and life and death, that resonated with her and satisfied her, and felt like a triumph for her--just not me. So I was a bit left out of the story, objectively even seeing characters doing good, brave things, and just not sharing much in the emotions. More than once I felt like I was seeing more story outline/structure than story so that it seemed very contrived (a couple of times Harry himself seemed to admit it) and made it feel like nothing was building to anything.
What it mostly made me do is go over all the ways I was reading it wrong, making my issues more central than the author really considered them. I don't think I was ever so off as, say, a Harmonian banking on the Hippogriff o'love or anything like that, and some things that happened I did predict (Snape/Lily, obviously, and DDM!Snape). But in general I think I was reading Rowling a bit too much like a Tolkien fan, and maybe too much as a Jungian (not that I'm any expert on Jung, but I was reading from my own idea of his stuff). And I think when JKR said that she was Christian and if she talked about her faith we'd know the ending, I immediately began interrogating from the *wrong* Christian perspective and got that wrong too.
Contrary to what some may have thought at times-or not-I don't hate the good guys. Still don't hate them, just still would not want to spend time with them or re-read the books to spend time with them. The characters I liked the most I think less of now or am just kind of confused by, which is unfortunate. I find Harry affectionately naming his child Albus Severus downright creepy--but that wasn't the first time in the book where that kind of thing happened.
Not sure what I predict fanfic-wise. I wonder if people might not start writing some interesting stuff. I did at one point think how I wanted to take a favorite character and put him in a different story.
Oh, also I've been dreading the epilogue for years, because I've always hated epilogues. Even when I was too young to know the name for them I hated them. Some books I guess can make a case for them being appropriate. HP is really not one of them that I can see. There was no reason I could see for needing to see these people married with children. The one good thing I read about it was after it was leaked, before I read it, and I read a comment where someone said the epilogue read like any cliché H/G fic...or any cliché post-war H/D fic.;-)
no subject
I do believe that if *you'd* liked it I would have felt even more alone than I've been feeling since Friday night.
As an admitted Snape fan I really expected there to be more of a ...protest...from my corner of fandom. I was shocked to the core by the positive reactions to the book. Okay, I confess I have never been a fan of this universe and it's true I cannot see the appeal of the books.
I stumbled into fandom, found I liked it there, and have simply sat and watched my fellow fen go nuts for each successive tome. Fanfic is my thing , meta my other thing, but I'm a little afraid to express my opinions in this fandom because I get the impression - forgive me if I'm wrong about this - that the majority of the highly, highly intelligent people reading these books do not even begin to see what I see as issues here.
As I said in response to another reaction post I feel like I've been the victim of a confidence trick - not just with Snape, though for sure he is actually a VERY good illustration of what I mean - but the entire series!
It seems to me (and yeah people will scoff and say 'duh!' to this) that she set up the story to be a certain way and never deviated from this over the course of the 20 odd years writing. I suppose for some people that not only seems self-evident, but also only right and proper. Whereas for me it illustrates the very thing that I see as being the central problem here - writing to an agenda, an agenda that may have been huge for you when you were a single mum in her twenties but even a few years later isn't nearly quite as...large anymore. I am hesitant to say that I think the author has issues that come across clearly in her books, but the author has issues which come across clearly in her books! And I think that it's really, really weird to STILL be eagerly illustrating these issues 20 some years later. It's like when she won't allow Snape to let go of his Lily obsession it's because she too can't let go of certain things. Insert here that I suspect that Snape/Lily was a stand -in for the author and her own issues with revenge and love. ( I have my theories about this, but won't bore you with them - also they might be offensive to people who'll assume I'm author bashing. But if I see an author's hand obscuring my view of the goings on well then I'm going to *notice* it and most likely ask for my money back!) And please to forgive me Ms Rowling but how can I help but psychoanalyse you when you practically *hand* me the tools so to do? And I don't *want* to get personal here, but sheesh Harry Potter *is* personal. I feel like I've been given a front row seat on this woman's personal fantasies and thanks, but no thanks. Do. Not. Want.
Harry Potter is the creation of someone with an obvious agenda and it shows - really shows. Clearly she must have struck a real nerve judging by the popularity of the books, but it strikes a different sort of nerve for me.
It's pretty obvious that the story could easily have been told in one book (except fantasy seems to require a trio of volumes, doesn't it?) and still be a pretty good story. I think so anyway. The fact that she chose to spread it out over 7 books is where it begins to fail for me. I can honestly well imagine enjoying the book(s) more if there were fewer books to enjoy (!) (The message may or may not have been palatable but at least it would have been digested - or spat out - in one sitting!
I said more than I meant to and far less too. But with this thing it's almost a case of both where do you start and how can you stop once you've started!!!
no subject
I'm surprised at the Snape response too. I've talked to different ones--some, like me, think that he was basically really shrunken. He was a DE obsessed with Lily Potter, and that gave Dumbledore leverage to use him as a double agent. But it didn't do much to change him, and he didn't care about anybody else but Lily and his chosen way to love her after death through helping Harry. Some feel that once he switched sides he got better, but I thought I thought it was only marginally so. I think it improved his behavior, definitely, but it was more like training him into different habits rather than really changing him. Meanwhile he was probably encouraging the rest of Slytherin in all the areas he himself could no longer feel free to just indulge.
I would be interested in seeing your psycho-analytical take, even knowing it's pretty unfair. But I know stuff I've written has turned out to be really revealing that way, and in a book like this where it's such a hodge-podge with the one thing tying it all together being the author's ideas, it's hard not to see patterns.
But I know from fandom that a lot of people don't have the problems I do. Those people who for years have been telling me my issues were kind of stupid really do seem to have been on the same page as the author. Signs I thought were there telling me that I was supposed to be thinking about them mostly turned out to just be pointing to plot points.
The message may or may not have been palatable but at least it would have been digested - or spat out - in one sitting!
Oh yeah--no years going by to put more into it before you find out you don't want to do that!
no subject
Now be fair. I mean, those kids had already been sorted into Slytherin, so it was too late for them.
*headdesk*
no subject
*headdesk*
You're right. My mushy headedness is just helping Voldemort.
no subject
Yes. Thank you.
When I first came into the fandom and heard the Gospel of JKR (notice, not the Gospel According to JKR), I was afraid that the last book would be written to complement a twenty-year-old last chapter that an inexperienced, unproven, twenty-something beginning author dreamed up, along with a vision, on a train. She stunted the story, herself, and her characters by doing this, IMO, and I love seeing someone else saying something along those lines.
Oh, my. She did stunt Snape. Such a "gift of a character", and she never utilized his potential! She didn't utilize what she did with Draco at the end of HBP. She stuck stubbornly to this agenda, made up when she was a very different person on top of everything else, and ruined... I hate saying that... the end.