~~ the labors of love <3

[reenka]

So why do you love the things you love? Why do you love the pairing(s) you love? Why do you write the pairings you love?

After switchknife asked me in my poll from the day before yesterday to write some Harry/Snape (or Snape/Draco as Ish asked), I was thinking yeah, maybe I should branch out (more). You know, broadening horizons = a good thing, whatever. And I like broadening horizons-- my mind likes stretching. I mean, most people don't realize I -have- written plenty of things besides H/D (ahahaha 'cause they don't read those things), but only Harry/Ron as far as Harry-slashed-with-someone-else. I've never slashed Draco with anyone else, either. Just a bunch of weird het, incest and Harry/Ron/Hermione, I guess o_0

But anyway. I was reading TromboneBorges's `A Suitable Preparation', which is a good fic, nothing flashy or breathtaking, but solid-- and then Harry & Draco kissed, just like that. And suddenly, I saw stars. I flushed and I think I even got a little breathless. No, seriously. Dude. This is why I write (and read) this pairing. This is why. It's the only pairing that does this to me, in -any- fandom, man.

Am I just a freak? I dunno (well, I know I am, but). It's like, when Harry kisses Draco, I feel kissed. I feel infatuated all over again. I'm all wobbly knees and stupid grins and OMG HE REALLY LIKES HIM and. Dude, it's the good crack, yo.

So yeah, my mind likes stretching, but there's no passion in it. I don't write fanfic because it's an intellectual exercise, mostly-- then again, I don't write -anything- because it's purely an intellectual exercise, unless it's a gift for a friend, in which case it's also a labor of love. That's why writing really obscure pairings no one's written before baffles me-- I mean-- what's to be fannish about, there? Only the world, and the world doesn't motivate me like that. I mean, that's why I -began- writing fic-- because I was just so full of wow and guh and morepleaseohgodkisshimagainHarry.

I'm not even an H/D "shipper" in the plebey sense-- I don't buy into the "accepted fanon" of sexiness or whatever. I don't agree with a lot of shippers' interpretations of the pairing, I don't like a lot of fic, etc. But. Harry/Snape is hot sometimes, but in a very base way, and only when it hits those certain kinks. Medium-grade Harry/Draco slays me with a little kiss, man. I guess that's why I don't really identify with people who have heavy kinks they wanna see explored in fanfic of a specific pairing, say-- like, a certain sort of sex, interaction, what have you. I just. I'm not in lust. I'm in love.

Man, I (still) swoon at a smile.

EDIT -
Reading this article in the NYTimes about our ability (or really, lack thereof) to predict what will make us happiest, I realized that the thing in operation here is that H/D makes me happy. Now, this might seem simple and obvious, but the truth is-- don't we all seek out the things that make us happy? And maybe for some people, it's not the -H/D- that makes them happy in particular, but the slash, or the community, or the newness, or the-- whatever. And it doesn't make them happy after a while because we overestimate how long happiness lasts given any particular new and happy shiny thing.

And then there's the why I -write- H/D thing, and there's this quote from one of the psychologists in the article (George Leowenstein): ''Happiness is a signal that our brains use to motivate us to do certain things. And in the same way that our eye adapts to different levels of illumination, we're designed to kind of go back to the happiness set point. Our brains are not trying to be happy. Our brains are trying to regulate us.''

And yes-- I mean. Happiness is the signal, here. I am made happy, thus I write: it motivates me. I don't know, I think states of high emotion are the overall motivators for a lot of people's writing, but it's really very interesting how that works, psychologically speaking. And then we adapt to new and shiny things over time, yes. But what if we can find a shiny that keeps on giving? Wouldn't we cling to that shiny? I mean. That's what -I'm- doing, right? I'm clinging to my shiny~:))
~~

EDIT#2 - sigh. I'd forgotten how good Aja's smut was :(( waaah. Want moooore :((

Comments

[mark356.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the explanation.

I have to say that I see Harry and Draco very differently. For the first four books, I felt that a Harry/Draco relationship in canon was likely, and therefore the best or most logical H/D fanfic was the fanfic that anticipated such a relationship. Of course, there are lots of other H/D fanfics as well, but if you're trying to write your own story instead of expanding on canon, it's not H/D. Now, after OoTP, I'm more tired of H/D anyway, so H/D fics have to be either even more canonical or more adorable for me to read them at all. If someone is writing about a dark-haired boy with a scar and a light-haired boy whose names happen to be Harry and Draco, it's not H/D and I would need much more reason than that it's supposedly H/D for me to read it or enjoy it. I agree with your identification for the best H/D, but that is only a small portion of all H/D.

About writing obscure pairings no-one's head of: well, part of it is the smugness you can enjoy having done so. (Clio made a poll a while ago that confirms this, and I wish I could link to it!) And you have said that just taking any two characters and writing them together is a valid method of shipping. For characters that have little or no interaction in canon, you can find places that they could have met, or ways they could meet up in the future; for pairings where the characters have met one or more times in canon, you take elements of the pre-existing relationship and expand on them. Part of it is the hotness factor, if you like both of your random characters; it may be that the two characters already have something of a relationship in canon and it's not a big ship because no-one likes Rita ( ;-) ); and another part of it is that in a fandom so big, we can get tired of reading the same certain number of ships over and over! Of course, you could get tired reading formulaic pairing fic, too, and you could even get tired of gen (which I don't read nearly enough of), but there's something nice about taking two characters who you wouldn't necesserily think of together and seeing what can be done with them. I wish I would explain it more clearly!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Oh I think I understand, actually, just not from the viewpoint of why -I- write fanfic, does that make sense? Like... I'm not naturally a fanfic-writing person-- I can't really imagine other people's characters all that well at -all- and -especially- if there's not a lot to go on. It's funny 'cause that should be -easier- to write, being largely an original-fic writer, but it's not, because I don't have boundaries and that leaves me with nothing to guide me. Or, little. So I'm all... "eh" and not sure where the passion is coming from. Because for me it's all about the passion and the understanding being entwined-- feeling like I -understand- these characters and have something to say about them, which -really- doesn't happen often. I mean, reading & writing pairings are two very different things, and I'd prolly have different things to say were I merely a reader, y'know?

Plus, I don't much care about canon as it relates to fanon, necessarily. What I mean is-- as a reader of the books, I want to see what happens & I enjoy them. As a writer of fanfic, I am merely using the canon and have to separate my interest in the writers' vision in order to form my own. Of course, I started with fanon, so all of this is weird anyway. I -have- become more picky about canonicity since reading OoTP but. Eh. In the end, I just want some basic adherence to realism.

I realize there's a lot of crap in any pairing and in any fandom-- and I've even read a bunch of it. H/D may seem like it has more crap merely 'cause it's larger than most things, but honestly, a large percentage of -everything- (original fic included) is crap and recycled formulaic crap at that, so. I've often said that I think most H/D fic sucks, in fact, so I don't ship it 'cause everyone's writing is so brilliant. It's all about the Harry&Draco living in my head, man, and the passion I feel about their story. And while I understand translating intellectual fascination into storytelling, for me that's much too dry and flat to motivate me to finish more than a paragraph, usually. But then, I have the attention span of a gnat when I'm not motivated -.-