So what are characters anyway?

[sistermagpie]

So there were these big wanks recently, and they got me thinking about the whole process of being a fan, using the examples from my own experiences, especially with The Boy (you know, the one who inspires all that wank).

Here's the exchange. Not angry face! (I have some suspicions about who this is, but that's neither here nor there.)

So I tried to answer exactly why I insist on this analysis and interest of a minor character in a children's series, and the main part of my answer that seems relevant is: "People are drawn to fictional characters for all sorts of reasons." With fictional characters, there almost seems to be two different levels. On the first level, you identify with them as if they were real people: you and people you know. Sometimes people see themselves as the character. Arguing with someone like that is impossible because it's personal. If you say Scully could quit working with Mulder if she wanted you're suggesting Esme could leave her job where she's so unappreciated as well and that would ruin the passive-aggressive martyrdom that is Esme's life. If you say why Draco seems to be doing something, you are suggesting that the person who picked on them in high school was human and not the forces of evil they are continually fighting with their own equally aggressive behavior.

slytherincess, I recall, did a really wonderful post once where she explained how she was very much like the Slytherin characters growing up--and not in some idealized way either. She learned and changed, and this was partly why she did not like people dismissing those characters as unable to do the same. Even though she identified with the characters, she could also look at their faults objectively. It reminded me of Edmund, my favorite character in The Chronicles of Narnia. I love how the narrator tells us that Edmund grew up to be a "graver and quieter" man than Peter and was Just rather than Magnificent (that Peter, still showing off). If someone accepts the parts of himself or herself that are in ugly characters (without romanticizing the ugliness into something else) they can offer a lot of wisdom about them. Even though it's them, it's not always personal, because they're talking about parts of themselves they struggled with and got to know until they weren't afraid of them.

So that's the straightforward way people respond to characters. It's always kind of fun to see that--fun or disturbing. But on another level we know they're fictional characters and are therefore free to live through them in totally different ways. You can, imo, like them because they let you live out parts of yourself you don't show the world, or approve of. It's like I said about the Thief archetype--it's not that I think stealing is cool, it's just that things about this character are very satisfying for me to live out fictionally.

So I'm trying to think about these Slytherin characters--how exactly do I react to them on both those levels? First as real people--well, I'd never be friend with them. Draco reminds me of different people in different ways, but here's two in particular. A girl I knew at camp, D1, and a boy I knew at another summer program, D2. Hated them both. D1 was generally mean, and while I usually stayed off her radar she occasionally would pick on me for no reason (we were in the same tent--imagine being stuck with Draco for rest period). That was awful. D2, for whatever reason, targeted me the first day and went after me whenever I was around--and what was worse was that this was a sailing thing and I had never sailed and had no idea what I was doing there, while he was an expert with his own boat. I seem to recall him locking a younger boy in a locker for several hours--yeah, he was charming.

So I hated both these people. D1 wound up leaving camp a bit early. Her father was a photographer who came to take pictures at the camp. Mysterious drama ensued. Her mother, stepfather and sister came to get her. Her best friend informed us her father was not allowed near her, as there were some sort of abuse charges--either spousal or child--in existence. D2 stayed the whole summer, but I did learn his parents were both psychiatrists, and that his beloved older brother had committed suicide.

My reactions to these revelations was pretty much the same:

1. A pleasant feeling of schadenfreude: You make me miserable, and you are miserable. Good. Be miserable.

2. Firmly deciding that their being hurt did not excuse their hurting me--this is such a strong belief for me it drives me crazy when people accuse me of trying to "excuse" bad behavior in fictional characters. Really, I don't. I would just rather stop it than punish it.

3. Some guilty fantasies about what it would be like if, the next time they taunted me, I said I could certainly understand why D1's father hit her or D2's brother killed himself, because they were such awful people they inspired such actions. This was followed quickly by the thought that if I did say these things the person probably would not collapse in tears, but kick my ass. That was followed by the realization that I really didn't want to say these things anyway, even if it would cause them to collapse in tears, because I didn't want to hurt them, I just wanted them to leave me alone, and saying those things would be a shitty thing.

4. From that moment, everything both of them did I tried to think of from the perspective of their new knowledge. What was D1 like with her older sister and her mother? She was so mean and tough to me, but she cried when she ran out of the mess hall because her father was there. What was her father like? Did he have a creepy, "You love your daddy don't you honey?" air about him? How long had her mother been married to this new guy? Was he like her father at all, but a nice guy? Did she get along with him? Did he have to consciously work on helping her through this trauma? And how about that best friend telling us her secret and probably loving the attention as she did it? Well, what do you expect from a girl who brushed her hair 200 times a day and took 40 minutes to get her pigtails just right.

With D2 it was even weirder, with the psychiatrist parents. Were they workaholics who made a lot of money for boats but didn't spend enough time at home? My mother always said a lot of people became psychologists to fix their own problems (heh--my sister's a psychologist)...did they struggle with suicidal thoughts too? Did D2 really look up to his brother? Were they close? Did he feel betrayed? When did it happen? How did he do it????

I didn't have all these thoughts at once, of course. I've thought about it now and again for 20 years now. Like I said, these incidents didn't make me suddenly like the person or feel sorry for them. But it did make me incapable of seeing them as just D1 the girl who's mean, or just D2 that little shit. They had families and histories and were different people with them. Most of the time you don't get this kind of dramatic information--with D1 even at the time I thought it was almost too after-school-special to be true that her big secret would be revealed to me. But I think you get more than you might think if you pay attention to people. I guess that's why the B&B scene is so significant to me in CoS--if I'd witnessed the scene that Harry did it would have totally changed my view of Draco.

So I do respond to Draco and Pansy as I would if they were real people in terms of wanting to know motivation. Only I like them...but why? I didn't like D1 or D2. I think part of it might be the nature of narrative. I don't really look at any of the kids in this universe and see myself, mostly because this universe seems to clearly come out of the head of someone very different from me. It's very concerned with justice in a way that I just am not--that's why it's so made up of power struggles. There are victims, and bullies, and heroes who protect the victims from bullies. Everyone is supposed to aspire to the hero who protects the victim from bullies--just like in CS Lewis, Peter the Magnificent is elevated above Edmund the Just (where just, imo, refers to wisdom and mercy instead of pardon and punishment).

For people who are more in tune with this personality, I think the differences between the Gryffindors and the Slytherins are more prominent. For me, not so much. I feel out of balance with the world, and that's probably why I often find Draco and Pansy refreshing. Not because they're better people than the main characters, but because they do sometimes say what I'm thinking, like that Hagrid's a menace or Dumbledore is a whacko. Or other times they're just different, not taking things seriously that the heroes take more seriously than I do, or something. Plus they're so obviously vulnerable, walking around announcing their insecurities, getting rejected and screaming about it for five years instead of accepting it and moving on. Screaming for approval and affection and continuing to love passionately and stupidly without it because you can't seem to stop it. Also maybe I think the actions of people all around him are so calculated to make him act even more badly, I am distracted by that. Most importantly, I am drawn to them for all the reasons I outlined in the post a couple down, about what the ultimate judgement on this character "says" about morality, people, etc.

The important thing is, that it's hard to say why you're drawn to a character, and it's a bad idea to assume the answer is so straightforward. It's really not always that this is the character that is like you, or the one you want to date, or the one you'd love to be if you could. I think it's just the character that says something about what you need to work out at any given time. That's why people's characters change. I knew people who read LOTR as a teenager and loved Aragorn, but years later loved Frodo. (One person even referred to coming to identify with Frodo in canon as "growing up") It doesn't mean you "were" Aragorn and now "are" Frodo, or that you used to crush on one and now the other. It can mean those things, but it could also just be that as a teenager you were working on different issues. That's one way fictional characters aren't like real people: they don't change. *We* change, and they look different because of it.

Comments

[moonlitpages.livejournal.com]

Hmm this what I always like about your musings, they make me furiously examine my own *laughs*. I have to agree that on a realistic level, children like Draco Malfoy and the Slytherins are not the sort of children I would have gotten along with. In fact, I knew plenty of snotty little brats who made my life miserable around 11-13 years old, horrible little rich girls who would pick on me relentlessly and screech such things as "nice shirt, where did you buy it, WALMART?". I loathed those children at the time, especially the ring leader who never seemed to like me from the moment we met, and all throughout our school careers, when she could not get her friends to screech insults at me, she would just glare at me. I remember finding out that her parents were divorced, and she was very unhappy at home, and feeling glad because I thought she deserved it.

But what I remember most, is that all save that particular one of the five girls who made my life miserable in middle school, something happened to them. What was it, you ask? They grew up. By the time I graduated highschool, three of those same girls who went to my college stopped to offer me a ride when I was trudging up from the parking pit in the rain, and were friendly and kind to me. Amazing, no? One of the characters themselves said as much in OotP, when Sirius said that _lots_ of people are idiots at the age of fifteen. I hate to think that this only applies to the children who are idiots for the right reasons-- it's alright to be an idiot, so long as you only torment the people who really deserve it anyway. I was a horrible child when I was in elementary school-- I bossed my friends around and made an overweight little girl cry because my friends and I made up juvenile songs about her living in a stable because she was so fat. Why? Because I was a child, and I was selfish, and spoiled, and I grew older, and developed a sense of empathy, and grew out of it, and I remember running into that same girl a few years ago, and we got along famously.

I feel like this has been said an awful lot before, but what I don't like about the way the Slytherin children are depicted in these books, unless there is a new perspective gained in the following books that I am desperately hoping for, is that this is an entire group of children that don't seem to have matured at all over five years, during a period when most every teenager changes dramatically to some extent. And most of all I hate the idea that because Draco Malfoy was a rotten little eleven year old brat from the moment we saw him, with a rotten family, and a rotten attitude, that he is just a throw-away child and there is no reason to show an interest in his character. I don't particularly even want him to be 'redeemed'-- I just want him and the other Slytherins to be fleshed out ,and depicted as real children, as people, like the others are. I suppose that is my investment in wanting something more to be done with our little Draco and the rest; I see so much potential in him as a character, and can't bear the thought that he is just there to be this static little bully, drifting about in the background and throwing taunts. I just want him to do something, to change in some way, for better or worse-- just go somewhere, anywhere. Even as a child, I was always fascinated with characters that change dramatically throughout the course of a story-- 'evil' characters that become 'good', 'good' characters that become 'evil', etc. I suppose it's that mutability of human nature that I've always been fascinated with, which probably says a lot about me, eh? I guess the idea of personal growth as a very fluid, non-static process has always been important to me. Go figure.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

In fact, I knew plenty of snotty little brats who made my life miserable around 11-13 years old, horrible little rich girls who would pick on me relentlessly and screech such things as "nice shirt, where did you buy it, WALMART?".

I can literally hear her even now. LOL!

I read a book called "Odd Girl Out" last year that talked about how girls are horrible to each other--not something that anybody who actually was a girl needs to read about since we have to live through it. But what you're saying is exactly true--it's I think more rare to have the same enemy at 11 as you do when you're older.

I also remember once watching Montel Williams (while I was unemployed!) and he had people confronting their bullies. There was a guy who used to be very fat in high school and this jock picked on him. Once he mooned the fat kid's mother when she came to pick him up for something. So this guy had spent the last 20 years working out and was now the kind of guy who looks like he lives at the gym and they brought on the bully, who was now a normal looking guy with a belly and a receding hairline who owned a couple of restaurants and had a family. He was actually pretty likeable.

So at first the bully couldn't even remember who this guy was. Then he finally did and when he heard the mooning story he was embarassed but laughing because it is a ridiculous story. And he genuinely apologized and said he was an idiot and what else could he say. So the other guy really wanted more satisfaction and kept going on about how he'd won and all, and Montel said to the bully, "So, who's the loser NOW?"

And the bully kind of smiled and shrugged and pointed to the other guy and said, "He is." AND HE WAS RIGHT! The other guy and Montel of course protested but the ex-bully just said, "Dude, you've been thinking of me for 20 years everyday? Because I teased you in high school? Get over it! I haven't given you a moment's thought!" It wasn't even just that this guy really was kind of pathetic for focusing on this for 20 years, but that seeing the guy in purpose you could immediately tell that this was not the evil man he had described.

Now, with Harry and Draco at least there is real bad blood between them...it's not just a case of one being an all-purpose bully who picked on everyone and the other just being a face in the crowd. But still given that they both seem to be leaders in the school it's odd they have no relationship whatsoever, and can't ever see any other sides to each other. Or at least Harry doesn't so far--Draco may very well be paying more attention to Harry and see other things.

And most of all I hate the idea that because Draco Malfoy was a rotten little eleven year old brat from the moment we saw him, with a rotten family, and a rotten attitude, that he is just a throw-away child and there is no reason to show an interest in his character.

Yes, and as you said, there's such a potential for change. Not a big fanfic angst drama, necessarily, but a surprise. As I said to ljash earlier, what's fascinating about Snape is that he seems to be one of the only characters who started out with the wrong ideas and had to learn through experience that this was wrong. It could be far more interesting and satisfying, maybe, if this was the kid that had to be the "new Malfoy," rather than the world rejoicing at the Malfoys disappearing from the face of the earth.

[anehan]

Wow, that 'Montel Williams' story is very interesting. I've had my share of bullies, too. When I was in 1st and 2nd grade, the whole class, my then best friend included, picked at me. I changed school in 3rd grade, and I didn't have to see most of them any more. Only my best friend and one other student changed school too, and although my friend and I grew apart, we get along well in the new school.

So, I didn't meet those ex-classmates of mine until I was 15 and attended a 'confimation school', and I saw that they hasn't changed. They still picked at me and it felt really bad, but I don't hate them for it. I can understand why they did it. I was the intelligent one among the average students. I think they were jealous, and afraid, too. Most people at the village were really narrow-minded, and most of them never left the village to live elsewhere, which was probably the case with the parents of my schoolmates. My parents were different, and I was different, and I think that's why I was picked at. They were children, and it's been quite easy for me to forgive them.

It's completely another thing when the tormentor is a teacher. In 5th and 6th grade I had a teacher who resembled Dolores Umbridge, and I was one of her least favourite students. Her I haven't forgiven.

Slytherin--a united House

[anehan]

Now, this isn't completely in topic, but it is connected to that teacher of mine who resembled Umbridge. I realized just an hour ago, that our class was in fact the Slytherins of our school. So, I proceeded to write my thoughts on how the shunning the Slytherins endure from the other Houses may affect their behaviour and internal relationships. The whole thing is based on my own experiences. If you are interested, you may read it in my journal.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I think I mentioned someplace that I recently read a book called "Odd Girl Out" that was about the secret aggression of girls in schools...it dealt with a lot of that kind of thing, where the whole school ganged up on one girl. That book mostly dealt with girls who had once been very popular, so jealousy was very much a factor in what was going on. With girls it's very strange because they are supposed to be "nice" so they can be horrid to each other and then turn right around and say, "Oh, but I like you. I'm not mad at you."

It's interesting in a thread in Aja's journal, I think, Aza said that she was picked on when she was younger, and then picked on others. She said she thought Draco was probably picked on too and I could definitely believe that. First, because he's totally dominated by Lucius and his mother seems rather cold as well. But more importantly, we're shown that Dudley's size keeps him from getting beaten up. A lot of overweight kids are picked on, but Dudley seems to be described as making his size work for him--this becomes even more symbolically true when Dudley loses weight and just becomes big and brawny as a teenager.

Draco, by contrast, is described as pale and pointy, and Crabbe and Goyle seem to dwarf him. He gets beaten up a lot in canon and he's got a big mouth that just would have to get him into trouble with the big dogs, I'd think. I can definitely imagine him getting into situations as a kid where he was picked on by others...it's funny, but we think of Draco's showing with C&G on the train as purely a sign that he's planning to bully others, but they've never been used that way. His wanting them around may be described as cowardice, but they could be a safety measure he learned he needed not by being a bully himself but by being a small kid who hung out with bigger, meaner kids.

[anehan]

With girls it's very strange because they are supposed to be "nice" so they can be horrid to each other and then turn right around and say, "Oh, but I like you. I'm not mad at you."

I think girls can be very cruel in a more discreet manner than boys. When I was in 1st and 2nd grade the whole class picked on me, both the girls and the boys, but I found it easier to be with the boys, because their bullying was much more straightforward, and was easier to deal with.