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reenkai was reading yet again, about unhappy!draco. and basically, it wasn't that he was -shown- to be unhappy but rather, he just was -said- to be unhappy. i began to swallow it, but then it occurred to me that draco is -always- unhappy. everyone assumes draco is unhappy, his family life sucks, his mother is never really "there", his father's strictness makes him lonely and untrusting of emotions. why?
often enough, harry is also unhappy. this isn't played up as much, but enough. the dursleys left deep grooves on his soul so that he's desperate for friendship and belonging like a gift from god. the dursleys, voldemort, draco, his status as "the boy who lived", his fans, fame, his "destiny", cedric-- all of it is making him sad. his responsibilities make him sad because he sees no way out and he's aware of that. as is draco, also aware of his own responsibilities, and also sees no way out.
now, it's not that i want "happy", but this cult of sadness is weird, is it not? hermione is like, -never- all that sad, and neither is ron, in h/d fics anyway. for all i know, in hermione or ron-centric fics, they're v. v. sad. *laughs*
of course, the well known alternative to being sad is being listless, apathetic, or angry. furious, even. furious at the world, at oneself, at one's "really secret" crush. of course, it's not like i know "the answer". but i resent being told someone is aware of their sad, trapped state of long-standing loneliness. please. please, don't ask the reader for pity. i am begging any h/d writer who'll listen. come on. please? i don't want to hear about their Great Tooby Existential Sorrow, okay?
Happiness had nothing to do with being a Malfoy.
*stares at sentence*
mostly, it's the narrative, blunt way i get told these things, most of the time, that bothers me. you get loads of third-person limited narrators, who seem so introspective and self-aware, i would be awed if i wasn't scoffing like mad. aww, hell, i write self-aware third-person limited myself. it's why i notice. i mean. can i be hit over the head with their Need For One Another a little bit -harder- please? i think i'm missing the picture, here. i think i need to be told in plain -english- that they have to discover capacity for happiness and ability to feel.
right now, all i can hear is, "you make me feel/ you make me feel/ like a natural woman/ woman....."
er. yah.
maybe i just want to see one fic where draco is content with his inane dorky meanness and subtly discontent. that's subtly. and harry is content with being a hero and wants to fight and while not -happy- to be "the boy who lived", -resigned- to it and willing to live up to it, and not being broken by the same old pressures he used to weather rather easily before. maybe give him -new- pressures. harder pressures. just not the pressure of being himself suddenly becoming too much for him.
people are rather good at figuring out -events-, but not themselves. funny thing, how most authors have their characters figure out -themselves-, but not events. i dunno. often, of course, they're in denial about their feelings about -one another-, but when it comes to their feelings, -period-, they tend to be quite up-to-date. ack. maybe i'm just deluded. that's always true.
and yes, i'm trying to read `playing the game, living the lie' over again because i thought i may have had a wrong impression, since i read it months and months ago, and yes, it's just as bad (in the beginning) as abaddon says it is. ahem. as in, it's really. really. bad. gah. almost classic in its mistakes as it ritually makes them, especially with draco. almost beautiful in its execution of all the wrong turns (or at least ones that make me smirk).
i know it's difficult to make h/d work. i know, because just like so many others, they don't always quite "work" in my own head. i mean, i believe, i want, i need-- but i can't always "do"-- can't make it happen. of course, i dig my own grave, in this respect. i won't let them have a pre-existing infatuation. i won't let it be "just a crush" (seems a bit like cheating). i won't have draco become nice, and i won't have harry realize that draco is really "not all that bad". i won't use sex as a plot-substitute, and i won't use the characters to propagate my own personal beliefs about them, most of all.
that's not so radical, now is it. but just because it's difficult and i can't "just do it", i don't see why one should be ok with embracing such painful levels of cliche. there is only one solution, according to my criteria, for a novel-length how-they-got-together story. they have to get to know each other, faults and all. they do not immediately get infatuated, though the ust is there. slowly, they change their attitudes-- not because of a revelation or a mystical "knowledge" that the other is "worthy", but rather the way things sneak up on you, and people change through interaction.
(and yes, i'm thinking of maya and ali and cassie claire, ahahah, and awwww, my beautiful friendship ficlet by silvia). harry would -not- just fuck him. he might love him but he would -not- do anything unless things happened first. even ip had harry and draco slowly, painfully come to terms with themselves liking one another, even with a love potion. anything else is sheer mockery. the answer has been staring me in the face all this time:
it is simple. copious, heavy amounts of pre-slash. a -lot- of pre-slash. a lot of build-up. a lot of ground-work. and yes, ust-- and yes, crushing. just because you're crushing does -not- mean you like someone, really need someone or are ready to go -after- someone. it just means they make you feel "funny".
crushing fics are adorable and i love them, but if you're writing a "serious" h/d romance where you are truly trying to make some sort of statement about them, you can't use that, really. eh. i -knew- i didn't like this fic back when i liked almost -every- fic. guh. should stop reading it.....
right now, it occurs to me that it's ridiculous to suppose that draco seriously thinks that he has to torture/make fun of people and be an obvious "bad guy" to please his father. that's ridiculous. lucius may be "bad" but he's not stupid. he's told draco to be politic, to be -nicer-, less obvious. that is right -there-, in the dialogue. if draco wanted to please lucius, he'd act more polite and try to gain favor with harry and dumbledore and so on. that's the way to power, not tormenting hufflepuffs and beating up harry, haha.
~~
occurs to me how strange it is to find so many people saying "oh yah, this is my first fic ever" about well-written stories (if they're badly written, i guess it's obvious why/how it's their first fic ever). i mean, especially if you're over 16 (though that's an arbitrary number). how does something just "click" in someone's head like that? do you wake up one day and realize, "hey, i can write! wow!"
i mean... i suppose it seems a little hard to swallow for me, but then i've always had continuity, and the idea of waking up "different" one day really sort of scares me. also, it's just never happened. i mean, in stories, when you get characters waking up gay, that's largely considered of questionable realism (though i'm starting to wonder). but suddenly becoming a writer is just as great of a shift, isn't it? it's not like suddenly starting to knit, is it?
like, what do you -do- all those other years? for fun? what do you do with your imagination? have the majority of those people just-- never felt the urge to write or create anything, and instead played video games?
to explain a little.... to me, being a writer or an artist is a state of mind, a state of -being-. i couldn't just -stop- or -start-. it's not even about -writing-, though naturally writing is how it expresses itself. i always write/draw/sing in my head. even if i don't put it down on paper, i'm there, thinking about things in a different way, seeing stories where other people just see mundane events. i'm like andrew, from the last buffy, all the way. well, except for the deluded murderer part. ahem.
but anyway, andrew, to me, is a storyteller-- which is just another word for writer. isaac bashevis singer said that all writers are liars, and that he was a writer because he was a liar. i dig that. i was a liar as a child. i don't lie as much these days-- or maybe lie more creatively, i dunno. the truth became as interesting to me, if not more, at some point, that's all.
so is it not a state of mind for those people? or did they write in their head but not on paper? sort of like... accumulating stories that never left them? isn't that painful? i mean, who -are- you, as a writer, before you were a writer? i mean, i am my creativity to such an extent that i can't even imagine who i'd -be- without it. i'd be empty, like a null set. i would have no beginning or end or middle. is it like anyone, who doesn't know who they are and still exist? or is it like, you're a different person, then, and then one day you change radically?
or does it not matter, can one stay the same, and write? to me, it's a huge difference. it's like writers/artists are wizards and non-artists are muggles. and like with magic, you kind of know early on that you have it. it's sort of the way you can make things levitate and blow up small objects. but maybe some people just "dabble". maybe to some it's just something that comes with experience, with learning, with having something to "say". i mean, do i need to have something to say? some style to follow? some character to give voice to, before i write?
no.
but that's just me. i write like i breathe. i imagine for some, it's not so instinctual, and more of a gradual skill sort of behavior. you try, discover you can do it, continue doing it because it's fun. you acquire experience, become better, and so on. i have no clue, really, what this does to your identity as a person. do you just relegate it to the realm of "things you can do", like cooking good lasagna and being a wiz at pokemon??
there are so many people writing something or other, if you just look at the amount of stuff online, fanfic and not. they're all writing. i imagine they all have slightly different reasons for writing-- and for some, it's merely something to pass the time, and they don't need a reason beyond "well, everyone's doing it".
there is a popular school of thought that says anyone who writes is a writer. and i suppose that's true, for obvious reasons (as in, anyone who walks is a walker). but human identity is trickier than that. for a number of people such as myself, their identity is all tied up with this seemingly random act of scribbling things down. i'm not, a writer and a walker and a dancer and a talker and a student and a daughter and a girl, etc. if you asked me to pick one thing i am, it wouldn't be girl or white girl or slasher freak fangirl, or anything. i would say i'm a writer. words define me, consume me, possess me. i am theirs, they are not mine. am i on the same playing field as someone who casually scribbles a pokemon fanfic because they want to see their favorite characters snog? certainly, when i was 12, i wrote a bad poem about beverly hills, 90210. inspiration sources don't matter. i'm just not sure.
sigh. i guess i feel vaguely better, having articulated my "issues", but i get this feeling i'm going around in circles, trying to understand every angle. maybe i should stick to what i do best. whatever that is. ahahaha. writing? gah -.-
~~
and no need to tell me how lame i am. wrote this at 1am, take pity on me, ahahahah.
-draco's lament-
i'm unhappy but i'm gay (yah)
and i don't care what i say (yah)
oh. i just can't stay away (yah)
can't stay away from you, boy.
you-- you're my sunshine and my rain
(heavy on the rain.) you're one huge aching pain
you'll make me go insane (yah)
but i don't wanna play the same old game
i'm angsting now that i'm in lust
and you know i'm evil and you're just--
i hate you 'cause you make me angst!
oh i hate you, how i hate your guts--
how i hate your cock and mouth and arse!
oh i just want to beat you now
to give some meaning to my life
i know you think i'm too high-brow
but i just want to beat you now.
it'll make me happy, somehow!
i know you think that i'm a git--
well, let me tell you-- i'm SICK OF IT!!
~~
thank you, thank you. *bows* :D
~~
often enough, harry is also unhappy. this isn't played up as much, but enough. the dursleys left deep grooves on his soul so that he's desperate for friendship and belonging like a gift from god. the dursleys, voldemort, draco, his status as "the boy who lived", his fans, fame, his "destiny", cedric-- all of it is making him sad. his responsibilities make him sad because he sees no way out and he's aware of that. as is draco, also aware of his own responsibilities, and also sees no way out.
now, it's not that i want "happy", but this cult of sadness is weird, is it not? hermione is like, -never- all that sad, and neither is ron, in h/d fics anyway. for all i know, in hermione or ron-centric fics, they're v. v. sad. *laughs*
of course, the well known alternative to being sad is being listless, apathetic, or angry. furious, even. furious at the world, at oneself, at one's "really secret" crush. of course, it's not like i know "the answer". but i resent being told someone is aware of their sad, trapped state of long-standing loneliness. please. please, don't ask the reader for pity. i am begging any h/d writer who'll listen. come on. please? i don't want to hear about their Great Tooby Existential Sorrow, okay?
Happiness had nothing to do with being a Malfoy.
*stares at sentence*
mostly, it's the narrative, blunt way i get told these things, most of the time, that bothers me. you get loads of third-person limited narrators, who seem so introspective and self-aware, i would be awed if i wasn't scoffing like mad. aww, hell, i write self-aware third-person limited myself. it's why i notice. i mean. can i be hit over the head with their Need For One Another a little bit -harder- please? i think i'm missing the picture, here. i think i need to be told in plain -english- that they have to discover capacity for happiness and ability to feel.
right now, all i can hear is, "you make me feel/ you make me feel/ like a natural woman/ woman....."
er. yah.
maybe i just want to see one fic where draco is content with his inane dorky meanness and subtly discontent. that's subtly. and harry is content with being a hero and wants to fight and while not -happy- to be "the boy who lived", -resigned- to it and willing to live up to it, and not being broken by the same old pressures he used to weather rather easily before. maybe give him -new- pressures. harder pressures. just not the pressure of being himself suddenly becoming too much for him.
people are rather good at figuring out -events-, but not themselves. funny thing, how most authors have their characters figure out -themselves-, but not events. i dunno. often, of course, they're in denial about their feelings about -one another-, but when it comes to their feelings, -period-, they tend to be quite up-to-date. ack. maybe i'm just deluded. that's always true.
and yes, i'm trying to read `playing the game, living the lie' over again because i thought i may have had a wrong impression, since i read it months and months ago, and yes, it's just as bad (in the beginning) as abaddon says it is. ahem. as in, it's really. really. bad. gah. almost classic in its mistakes as it ritually makes them, especially with draco. almost beautiful in its execution of all the wrong turns (or at least ones that make me smirk).
i know it's difficult to make h/d work. i know, because just like so many others, they don't always quite "work" in my own head. i mean, i believe, i want, i need-- but i can't always "do"-- can't make it happen. of course, i dig my own grave, in this respect. i won't let them have a pre-existing infatuation. i won't let it be "just a crush" (seems a bit like cheating). i won't have draco become nice, and i won't have harry realize that draco is really "not all that bad". i won't use sex as a plot-substitute, and i won't use the characters to propagate my own personal beliefs about them, most of all.
that's not so radical, now is it. but just because it's difficult and i can't "just do it", i don't see why one should be ok with embracing such painful levels of cliche. there is only one solution, according to my criteria, for a novel-length how-they-got-together story. they have to get to know each other, faults and all. they do not immediately get infatuated, though the ust is there. slowly, they change their attitudes-- not because of a revelation or a mystical "knowledge" that the other is "worthy", but rather the way things sneak up on you, and people change through interaction.
(and yes, i'm thinking of maya and ali and cassie claire, ahahah, and awwww, my beautiful friendship ficlet by silvia). harry would -not- just fuck him. he might love him but he would -not- do anything unless things happened first. even ip had harry and draco slowly, painfully come to terms with themselves liking one another, even with a love potion. anything else is sheer mockery. the answer has been staring me in the face all this time:
it is simple. copious, heavy amounts of pre-slash. a -lot- of pre-slash. a lot of build-up. a lot of ground-work. and yes, ust-- and yes, crushing. just because you're crushing does -not- mean you like someone, really need someone or are ready to go -after- someone. it just means they make you feel "funny".
crushing fics are adorable and i love them, but if you're writing a "serious" h/d romance where you are truly trying to make some sort of statement about them, you can't use that, really. eh. i -knew- i didn't like this fic back when i liked almost -every- fic. guh. should stop reading it.....
right now, it occurs to me that it's ridiculous to suppose that draco seriously thinks that he has to torture/make fun of people and be an obvious "bad guy" to please his father. that's ridiculous. lucius may be "bad" but he's not stupid. he's told draco to be politic, to be -nicer-, less obvious. that is right -there-, in the dialogue. if draco wanted to please lucius, he'd act more polite and try to gain favor with harry and dumbledore and so on. that's the way to power, not tormenting hufflepuffs and beating up harry, haha.
~~
occurs to me how strange it is to find so many people saying "oh yah, this is my first fic ever" about well-written stories (if they're badly written, i guess it's obvious why/how it's their first fic ever). i mean, especially if you're over 16 (though that's an arbitrary number). how does something just "click" in someone's head like that? do you wake up one day and realize, "hey, i can write! wow!"
i mean... i suppose it seems a little hard to swallow for me, but then i've always had continuity, and the idea of waking up "different" one day really sort of scares me. also, it's just never happened. i mean, in stories, when you get characters waking up gay, that's largely considered of questionable realism (though i'm starting to wonder). but suddenly becoming a writer is just as great of a shift, isn't it? it's not like suddenly starting to knit, is it?
like, what do you -do- all those other years? for fun? what do you do with your imagination? have the majority of those people just-- never felt the urge to write or create anything, and instead played video games?
to explain a little.... to me, being a writer or an artist is a state of mind, a state of -being-. i couldn't just -stop- or -start-. it's not even about -writing-, though naturally writing is how it expresses itself. i always write/draw/sing in my head. even if i don't put it down on paper, i'm there, thinking about things in a different way, seeing stories where other people just see mundane events. i'm like andrew, from the last buffy, all the way. well, except for the deluded murderer part. ahem.
but anyway, andrew, to me, is a storyteller-- which is just another word for writer. isaac bashevis singer said that all writers are liars, and that he was a writer because he was a liar. i dig that. i was a liar as a child. i don't lie as much these days-- or maybe lie more creatively, i dunno. the truth became as interesting to me, if not more, at some point, that's all.
so is it not a state of mind for those people? or did they write in their head but not on paper? sort of like... accumulating stories that never left them? isn't that painful? i mean, who -are- you, as a writer, before you were a writer? i mean, i am my creativity to such an extent that i can't even imagine who i'd -be- without it. i'd be empty, like a null set. i would have no beginning or end or middle. is it like anyone, who doesn't know who they are and still exist? or is it like, you're a different person, then, and then one day you change radically?
or does it not matter, can one stay the same, and write? to me, it's a huge difference. it's like writers/artists are wizards and non-artists are muggles. and like with magic, you kind of know early on that you have it. it's sort of the way you can make things levitate and blow up small objects. but maybe some people just "dabble". maybe to some it's just something that comes with experience, with learning, with having something to "say". i mean, do i need to have something to say? some style to follow? some character to give voice to, before i write?
no.
but that's just me. i write like i breathe. i imagine for some, it's not so instinctual, and more of a gradual skill sort of behavior. you try, discover you can do it, continue doing it because it's fun. you acquire experience, become better, and so on. i have no clue, really, what this does to your identity as a person. do you just relegate it to the realm of "things you can do", like cooking good lasagna and being a wiz at pokemon??
there are so many people writing something or other, if you just look at the amount of stuff online, fanfic and not. they're all writing. i imagine they all have slightly different reasons for writing-- and for some, it's merely something to pass the time, and they don't need a reason beyond "well, everyone's doing it".
there is a popular school of thought that says anyone who writes is a writer. and i suppose that's true, for obvious reasons (as in, anyone who walks is a walker). but human identity is trickier than that. for a number of people such as myself, their identity is all tied up with this seemingly random act of scribbling things down. i'm not, a writer and a walker and a dancer and a talker and a student and a daughter and a girl, etc. if you asked me to pick one thing i am, it wouldn't be girl or white girl or slasher freak fangirl, or anything. i would say i'm a writer. words define me, consume me, possess me. i am theirs, they are not mine. am i on the same playing field as someone who casually scribbles a pokemon fanfic because they want to see their favorite characters snog? certainly, when i was 12, i wrote a bad poem about beverly hills, 90210. inspiration sources don't matter. i'm just not sure.
sigh. i guess i feel vaguely better, having articulated my "issues", but i get this feeling i'm going around in circles, trying to understand every angle. maybe i should stick to what i do best. whatever that is. ahahaha. writing? gah -.-
~~
and no need to tell me how lame i am. wrote this at 1am, take pity on me, ahahahah.
-draco's lament-
i'm unhappy but i'm gay (yah)
and i don't care what i say (yah)
oh. i just can't stay away (yah)
can't stay away from you, boy.
you-- you're my sunshine and my rain
(heavy on the rain.) you're one huge aching pain
you'll make me go insane (yah)
but i don't wanna play the same old game
i'm angsting now that i'm in lust
and you know i'm evil and you're just--
i hate you 'cause you make me angst!
oh i hate you, how i hate your guts--
how i hate your cock and mouth and arse!
oh i just want to beat you now
to give some meaning to my life
i know you think i'm too high-brow
but i just want to beat you now.
it'll make me happy, somehow!
i know you think that i'm a git--
well, let me tell you-- i'm SICK OF IT!!
~~
thank you, thank you. *bows* :D
~~
