~~hodgepodge of "purism", ranting & squeeing. gah. catching up.

[reenka]

gah. are there -words- for how much i adored last night's buffy? i don't think there are words. there may be symbols. they include lots of exclamation marks. that episode was nearly -made- for me. the funny thing is, both buffy and smallville were low on the shippiness, and usually everyone's all about the shippiness, but it's good to know we're there for the actual characters, too.

because. OH. MY. GAHD.

just how much do i love andrew??? i adore andrew. adore. adore. ADORE. the three of them are probably the only ot3 i believe in. they are just... and andrew was just... well, let's just say, it couldn't have gotten much better even if spike and buffy had like, a major snog-fest. although, i may retract that if it did happen -.-
    my viewing notes as as follows:
    omg!! how in love am i with tonight's intro to buffy (masterpiece-theatre!andrew killed. me.)?? that was -vintage-, man. just priceless. i *heart* this show to death.
    and just how fucking -gay- are those girls in that "the ring" ad?? god!

anya/andrew!! i'm shipping everyone with andrew, goddamn.
    omg, he is -so- coming onto her! i love andrew -so- much. "they're very ugly and they're very mobile for blind people." hee!
    and. and. SPIKE. andrew/spike. he has a crush on -everybody- doesn't he?? this is -so- fanfic plebe-speak! and did i mention, i LOVE ANDREW??
    o.0
    let's face it. buffy rocks so hard, for the `we are as gods' scene alone, it leaves every other show on television right now in the dust. unless you're into pretty people pouting & fake moral dilemmas.
    i love spike so much i could -die-. and awwww, i think i'm melting over xander/anya, what is the world coming to?? and, <33333 romance-addict!andrew.

    well, let me just say that tonight's buffy was fucking perfect. i mean. the Spike! the Fanservice! the andrew/jonathan Luuuurve!! andrew and jonathan are -so- sleeping together. literally!!
    dorklove!!
    zema!!
    andrew -so- reminds me of like -all- my ex's... oh my -gahd-, my life -sucks- doesn't it -.-

i love buffy so much. so much. see? see? there is simply no -reason- to write fanfic.
    THREESOME!!
    *wants*
    `we are gods' vision coolest thing EVER.
    this is like, one of my favorite eps -ever-.
    SPIKE/PRINCIPAL'S KNIFE!!!
    the UST! seriously. the only actually slash-friendly show on tv, probably -ever- (without being all pc and overbearing and obvious). wow.

whoah. the end. whoah. -fuck-. that was powerful. eek. no words. siiiiigh.
~~
and er. yes. i felt "it". with swann and clark and yes. i was all -there-, believing, and i don't care about superman and i don't -like- superman but at that moment, it had wonder and glory and just-- i was all starry-eyed with it. the sense of wonder. the hushed feeling of imprtance, of that childhood need for heroes, and the seriousness and larger-than-life call of it. this sense of Destiny, of infinity, of possibility-- and just, seeing clark face that head-on, suddenly acquire a sort of confidence, that look in his eye-- like he really -isn't- only clark kent, farmboy-- and not because he can shoot lasers from his eyes. but because of just this sense of -power-, unseen, untapped. the sense of endless possibility and the fear and excitement and the sense that he can handle it, he can do it. he will become it. just, wow.


and, finally we say,
what can i say? i don't know what i can say.

i was afraid. i was so nervous, my heart was beating so fast. this meant a lot to me. i started here. not -literally-, ip wasn't the first hp fanfic i'd read, but figuratively. my passion started here. i fell in love with them here. they mattered, and i suppose, in the end... i can't believe it, quite, now, but somewhere in the back of my mind, this will always be the One True Harry/Draco Fic. it will be -them-. i was afraid, since this is a heavy burden to place on any author, any piece of writing. it's only in retrospect that it even seems that way. but harry & draco were truly -born- for me here, considering there was no canon before fanon. so here i was. very, very, very nervous.

she still has it. the tension, the pauses, the melodrama (*laughs*). hey, i'm there for the melodrama. it's like putting on a pair of glasses. and then you're there. i can say nothing that really matters. it was right. it came full circle. it made me happy, and i felt content, content to close this chapter, this book, this part of my life in the fandom.
     she has a way of writing self-referentially and symbolically and grandly that inspires me to either pay rapt attention or smirk because i can't imagine this actually -happening- or being said, it's like-- it's almost too perfect, too right, too tightly woven. no matter. it is happening, in its own universe, and that's all that matters. it was like one last fling with an old friend, and it was warm, and sweet, and it made my breath catch and then it tucked me off to sleep. i could see all the bits where it worked, and all the bits where, were it anything else, i'd say-- give me more detail! more realism! more... bite!
    but this -is- ip. i feel vaguely content and yet slightly lost, like when sandman ended and dream was sent off on his swan-headed boat. even as it floats away, my memory already weakens, it already passes as if it never was. have i ever been truly-- content and yet not -too- content, awake, alert yet tranquil at an ending, ever?

yah. i've read books like that. i mean, every ending makes me feel weird, simply with the tying up and the sense of... oh.
    but if it's an open ending, it makes me too anxious, too incomplete. there is a balance, but....
    it was good. it was right. if everything got tied together with a ribbon, i still enjoyed seeing it, as in tiny flashbacks at the end of a movie. there was those little bits of humor, and i smiled at a number of points in the narrative. i suppose i wasn't impassioned, excited, on the edge of my seat-- but that wasn't what this chapter was about. the kisses were there to seal things rather than rip at things, and so there is a good explanation for why they weren't all that wild and rather meditative, really, and somehow distant. maybe it's my reaction to schmaltziness when it's not angstful anymore. i don't -dislike- it. honestly, i sat through barbara streisand in "the mirror has two faces", what the hell do you want from me??

is it just me? do i have no passion left?
    i think draco and hermione had more passion in their scene together. *laughs* or maybe there's only passion when things are unresolved? i'm not sure.
    it's like, the reality leaked away midway through. i don't know what it is. i was having this sort of wistful smile, reading him visiting harry in the invisibility cloak. it was so sweet, and so familiar-- it happens so often, after all, in other fics, but it didn't feel like a -cliche-, but almost like it happened for the first time, and i got this sense of deja-vu. isn't that funny?
    it felt a bit weird, them kissing. i mean, it was great and everything, but almost too great. i seriously, seriously heard the violins. no, not the violins. the orchestra. i heard the orchestra!!

it was somehow impersonal. like it wasn't -them- so much as, The Lovers, United For Good Now. does anyone know what i mean? yah.
    anyway, it was ip, and if it was a tangible thing, i'd kiss it goodbye. no, really. i'd kiss it, and close my eyes, and feel all warm and romantic. music would swell, and i would sigh, and dance with my teddybear a little as the golden sunlight wafted through the curtains. *laughs* wah. emotions are funny things. endings are even funnier things. i am trying, actually, to think of a happy ending that i adored, that wasn't funny (ala `princess bride', or something). er. damn. can't think of anything. i can never think of anything when it counts. i can remember -ficlets- that ended really well, but not novel-length things. actually, most things end well, if they are favorites of mine and aren't fanfic. also helps that there's a dearth of novel-length completed fics in hp fandom. but regardless.

like i said, what can i say? none of it matters. harry and draco have ridden off into the sunset. may they always kiss with orchestras swelling, and may they never forget to angst. heh. and though i can't help but smirk at harry's wearing the ring on his finger, well-- they deserve it. i'll toast to them on their wedding, and so on and so forth.
    be happy, ip!harry & draco. i loved you, and if our parting is bittersweet, it is only my own bitterness trying to cut in. <3333
~~

antenora's `simple'. roooowwwwr. old!h/d angst. *melts*

anyway. since you're all desperate to know: the Ultimate Reason, forget all meta and canonical plausibility and meant-to-beness or what have you, that i ship harry/draco......

wait for it......


(reading orphne's fic i realized-- er, again--)

it gets me in the -stomach- and i whimper pitifully, like the sudden sensation of a huge dollop of ice-cream on your tongue when you're feeling anemic, when they kiss. yooooowrr.
    awww, c'mon, at least i admit it. it's not just "in love with their love", now is it. is it. not for most of us, i'd bet. it's also in lust with their lust. oh yah, baby. *clings to the knowledge that she is not alone and at least addictedkitten will share her pervy fate*
    that is all~:)
~~

i've been called a purist!! *bounces* i dunno whether to be gleeful or afraid of myself. i think it's cute being a purist. on the other hand, it's scary, because it makes me sound all closed-minded and stubborn. i am stubborn, of course. heh.
    
    truth is, i have to -care- if i'm going to you know... care. with harry & draco, i care (why is another question entirely). but with some other pairing, i don't. and if i don't care, everything just seems bland and flat and while good writing still makes me shiver, it doesn't have that heady kick in my gut, that feeling of satisfaction that can't be faked. i realize, original fic has to make you care on its own merits, and often enough it does do that. but... 96% of fanfic couldn't pass for original fic in terms of setting up its own characters and universe. there are exceptions. say, amalin. every single goddamn thing that girl ever wrote made me fall in love (mmm, tom/hagrid.... *purrs and giggles*)
    but anyway, the point is: whether i love/lust after the characters (not as in, i want them for myself, but as in... er... i think they're hot together and, in a lesser way, separately) impacts my enjoyment of fic exponentially. i've seen it called "fannish passion" and it is, at that. harry & draco have my passion. i mean, merely picturing them kissing gets me all swoony, just like a 13-year-old girl, yes. reading a really well-written harry/bill (*coughs*) does next to -nothing- for me because bill does absolutely nothing for me. i mean, i don't think he's -squicky-, but i don't particularly want to imagine him naked or in love or any of it. that has a major impact on whether i get into a fic. -that-, more than some idealized "romanticism" is why i read mostly my otp.

how is this for others? do you not get this attachment to characters? or do you get an attachment to -one- character and it doesn't matter who they're with, they're still hot? i imagine there are all sorts of readers (and all sorts of writers). i imagine some people can think -situations- are hot, rather than characters. some people think types of -interactions- between characters are hot, rather than the characters. some people think really good writing and description is hot, period.
    the closest -i- come to a laissez-faire attitude with fiction is, i suppose, with passion. if you can show me true passion-- if you can convince me of the overwhelming raw animal magnetism and chemistry that's going on-- if you can create within the space of the story itself, without relying on my "fannish passion" and familiarity with the world and characters in more than a nominal sort of way-- then it doesn't matter if it's harry/draco or snape/remus or harry/cho or what have you. then it's just a story, and this is, after all, how i got -into- hp fanfic. i read my first fanfic without any prior hp experience. it was mere accident i read h/d first-- it was just there. but the -passion- and the conviction and the life in those first h/d stories completely hooked me. even now, nothing can touch it, nothing else i've read (ie, another pairing) has swept me off my feet like h/d has. and yes, i want to be swept off my feet. i want the fic to woo me. i want the fic to seduce me away from my former love. otherwise, my old passion is what keeps me going-- until it burns away.
~~

lasultrix wrote ....well... i have no words. but mmmm, `salty ambrosia' stands for luuuuurve. oh, i love it. go, colin, go!! ahahahahaha. oh, oh. see, i can like anything, apparently, and this proves it. well, ok, this is sort of right up my alley, but still! still! ahahahaah.
    and wow. `lustre' by calico and julad. sigh. what can i -say-? i'm excited just looking at it~:) mmmm, long and juicy-looking. heh. and you know what? i haven't read it yet. but you know what? it's julad (all it took was `broken bones' and i will -not- believe she could write anything not worth reading). ahahaha. um. yah -.-


i know y'all think i'm all about the meta, but really... really... sometimes i think... what if -i- wrote say, smallville, buffy, harry potter. (bear with me here.) i mean, i write. whether better or worse, it matters not, because people make great extrapolative essays on the worst-written of things, so that's not the important thing, apparently. my point is... sometimes i wonder what the role of author intent is in all of this. are we really talking about the text as intended, as written, or some sort of... er... well, "meta", i guess, has a meaning which points to a transcendence of the text. so are we -not- talking about the text, and rather just using the text to make our own uber-text, when we meta-analyze?
    sometimes i wibble, wondering if the original can possibly -hold- all this subtext and meaning and interweaving people inscribe into it. i write characters too, and they're not... er... well, they really wouldn't stand up to any sort of heavy load of questioning. and ok, i'm just me. but no one has ever claimed that jkr had this amazing genius for characterization. it was always, world-building, plot, etc. but no one -analyzes-, meta or otherwise, the world as much the characters. i mean-- and smallville, too. just how deeply, intricately constructed -are- these characters? i mean... you -can- make their actions be indicative of these over-arching deep personal issues, and reflect on their inner beings, but....

is that just twisting the text, or what? i mean, it's valid, it -works-, sort of in that plug-and-play sort of way that a lot of things "work". you can tailor commentary to fit the evidence. and while that's worthwhile and interesting, often it just feels like a game, equally a game as exploding snap and magic: the gathering. you're taking these givens and you're tying them together and seeing what combinations produce what sense.

what i mean is, there are lots of different "readings" possible of the same text: that's basic literary theory. usually people either squabble over readings (but my canon is better than your canon!!), as if you know, the "canon" is obvious and we know what the author "meant". but what a load of bullshit that is! i mean, even the -author- only has one interpretation (albeit more well-informed that anyone's) as to the text. and why? because while she knows (possibly) everything that's in her head (consciously, mind you, not the unconscious stuff that goes into stories), the fic she produces isn't 100% reflective of what's in her head, as any writer will tell you. i've never heard anyone say that they reproduced their inner vision exactly onto the page. certainly, doing so would constitute genius and no one's claiming genius for any major fandom author, except perhaps tolkien, though i would quibble there, but nevermine. anyway, most people writing lotr aren't really tolkien scholars by any stretch of the imagination, so canonicity is a complete joke. and yes, you'd need to be a scholar, because the man put in enough into those books to write equally much as a -commentary-, i'm sure. if he wanted. i mean, go ahead, read everything he ever wrote in the universe, learn elvish, read his essays, go ahead. maybe you'd be on the road to be possibly "canonically correct" when you write your lotr fanfic. (sour grapes?? ahahaha. oh yes.)

anyway, as we all know, i'm all about the meta. simply because it's instinctual and i can't help myself. but to me, meta isn't analysis of the text, but rather an imagining and transforming of the text, creating it in my own image. i never pretend i do anything else (or, almost never). i am -playing- with the concepts, not in any way trying to -interpret- the facts to -mean- something. is that a clear distinction? i'm never going to tell you, "this is how it is in canon, thus..."
    ok, a big reason is: well, i barely skimmed canon. i've never studied any canon in depth i subsequently wanted to play with, afterwards. it's all about the fanon, to me. not because i -like- fanon characterization or feel like i should/want to stick to it-- simply because there's all this bubbling possibility, so much -story- going on. it's simply because fanon -has- no canon, and it's kind of a free-for-all. there are ideas, memes, floating about, and i can grab one and melt it to my purposes. to me, it's merely a dry literary exercise, going on and on about canon. who the hell -cares-?

i don't mean, who cares about the books/series/whatever. obviously, they're enjoyable and worth reading and paying attention to. what i mean is-- while i internalize and enjoy said source material, i don't see why (unless i'm in class, and let me tell you, lit classes aren't always my favorite thing, believe it or not) i should try to break it down and analyze it and use it as some sort of guidebook for... well, what, i don't know. stories mean things to me, true. to me being the operative words here. i couldn't tell you what stories -mean-, period. i could try approximating, but really, a story really only -exists-, i feel, in the interchange between words and reader.

so here i go. while there's such a thing as "source material", it's iffy to say there's such a thing as "canon", i feel. it's iffy to say there's such a thing as rock-solid "canon characterization". go take a lit class. go tell your professor you know exactly what the "canon" hamlet is. see how everyone would laugh, and laugh, and laugh. ok, who cares, see how i would laugh. that just sounds supremely, almost beautifully idiotic. whoever says they know exactly what shakespeare was trying to portray is the biggest fucking idiot. i would laugh and point and bounce and say, AHAHAHAH! YOU MORON!!!
    why? because i am five, obviously. also, i have repressed aggression, ahahaha.

is literary analysis and meta a "bad, stupid endeavor"? of course not. i'm entertained by it, and even enlightened by it. it's fun seeing what people think, and it's fun to play around with facts and seeing where they fall together. on the other hand, playing `magic: the gathering' is also fun. you know.
    why this rant? well, it's nothing harry potter related. no one really cares about meta here enough for me to er... stand up and notice, too much, except probably me. i mean, other people care, just, other people don't -rant- about it nearly enough to be obvious. so, this is mostly directed at lotr, smallville, buffy, etc. fandoms where people go out and try to take it episode by episode, tying them together and creating meta meaning, something the writers can be seen to be saying about character a, b and c, if you play your cards right. i enjoy it (i -do- it, for god's sake), but it also hurts my head. maybe that's why i can't imagine being in a series-based fandom actively. i can analyze buffy, sure, tell you trends that i see, tell you how the development of the character seems to relate to his earlier behavior and interaction with another character... make commentary just like on a fic. but i couldn't... i couldn't... i dunno, believe it even as i said it. it wouldn't be -true- for me.

my thoughts on harry & draco are true for me-- they're my thoughts. they're not my thoughts on -jkr's- harry and draco at all. they're just thoughts on harry & draco. i -can- have thoughts on jkr's harry and draco, but they'd be different thoughts. does that make any sense? my thoughts on say, buffy & spike are thoughts largely on "buffy", the show, only slightly altered by my own "buffy and spike" in my head. the reason being i read maybe 5 fanfics in that fandom -ever-, tops. i think it's possible that if i got into the buffy fandom, i couldn't tell you as easily, what i think of the show's buffy & spike anymore, since everything would be all meta'd and over-analyzed and tinted with the heavy scent of a thousand fanfics (my own and others).

i mean, right now, when i read jkr or watch the movie, i'm almost incapable of totally dissociating and reading it as if i don't -have- a harry & draco in my head. it's always, "wow, that's weird for harry" or "wow, that's exactly how i think he -should've- acted" or "wow, that's a neat twist and i'd like to appropriate/i like this style of harry behavior" and so on. of course, i didn't read canon before fanon in this case (unlike with buffy or x-files), so it's all moot anyway. but then, when i really dig canon, i don't feel the need for fanon, mostly. just weird little me, i guess. but yah.
~~

    and yes, for your information, i made a site for amalin, since all her fics are pretty much friends-locked on her lj, ~~here~~. go! now! read everything! adore! worship! now! now! (can you tell i'm biased? no?) but seriously. i have no -words- for how talented she is. i can honestly say that while i adore many writers, and many more others make me squee and bounce, amalin-- well, what can i say? amalin makes me faint every single time.

    but the thing about amalin is, she writes very very poetically and emotionally. it's always about the emotions, the intense beauty, the humanity of each and every character, rather than who they are in some sort of abstract, canonical sense. she isn't usually very ic, and i think that's what makes it work for me, actually. i think that's why i adore so many fics that aren't ic. because usually, those fics are very poetic, very lyrical, very emotional.
~~

if anyone cares (or... not) here's me explaining how i react to different sorts feedback, myself. gah. babbled out now.