~~ wherein Reena sees the Draco/Hermione light o_0

[reenka]

...I'm procrastinating. (Big surprise.) And I'm traumatizing myself looking up people's lj calendars and seeing just how -many- entries are filtered. Besides my beta-filter, I've only considered using a filter once, to avoid hurt feelings, and I didn't. I mean, I -knew- I wasn't really close friends with these people so they have no reason to trust me (and who -does- have a reason to trust me? it's not like trust uses reasons), but. Heh. Well, now I know, I guess. Anyway.

I'm also enjoying Ri's `Foe Transfiguration', which is a (gasp!) Draco/Hermione fan-comic. She has a fanart site which I'd found awhile ago, and her art-style is just so cute I can't begrudge her anything she wants to draw. And she draws what's probably my favorite Luna-- a great plus, lemme tell you. (Heeeee! Hermione/Luna!!) The comic itself is really great, adorable, it's everything yummy and squeeful that I look for in romantic comedies (one of my most favorite genres).


The funny thing is-- I realized that type preconceptions seem to play large roles in my opinion of any possible fic with a certain pairing. Like... supposedly, Harry/Draco is Passionate Love-Hate, for instance, and Draco/Hermione is A Meeting Of Minds (which has only ever attracted me in X-Files, and that was more their bickering, rapport and chemistry). People are supposedly drawn to (or repelled from) the "vibe" behind a pairing, as far as whether they seek it out actively or not, badfic be damned.

Reading the Draco/Hermione comic with such relish, I realized that this vibe (which I'm so attracted to) isn't really limited to a -pairing- at all. Generally, I like snarky fumbly bickering in-spite-of-yourself romance. If you see the characters a certain way, you can do that with almost -any- two people (within reason), and you can certainly do it with any two people who don't really get along at the beginning (which describes a -lot- of couples).

It's so obvious, really. Everyone has a different take on H/D in their fic, and I've never really seen the overwhelming "fanon" playing that much of a role in even somewhat well-written stories. Any remotely decent fic has its own take on the canon characters, so you're basically getting a new dynamic to some extent, every time. Personally, it's only my own general mental image of these characters that ties it all together for me and lets me read about "Harry" and "Draco" every time. I don't really see a "Harry/Draco fic" mold except in a meta sense, which is obviously a step removed from actuality.

This isn't related to someone saying they'd enjoy any pairing if it's well-written. I still don't want to read `Lust Over Pendle', because I -know- it's not a "romance" among other reasons. It's just that I realized that this often referred-to pairing "vibe" is apparently flexible. You -can- write a bouncy snarky Draco/Hermione that mimics the appeal of many a bouncy snarky Harry/Draco fic while remaining different. You -can- write passion between a supposedly "tame and fluffy" couple-- you can basically choose which aspect of a character to emphasize. You don't -have- to base everything on Hermione's brains or Harry's "hero thing" or Ron's jealousy and loyalty or whatever. People are multifaceted and there are many different ways for them to connect, hopefully.

I'm sure there are things you can't do with two particular people, but there's still a range, and romance in general will include certain common elements if you allow it to. That's why movies & books about entirely different characters, times and places which feature two people in love have so much in common, right? This concept that a certain pairing only explores this clearly defined set of issues seems rather silly to me now. I always thought that H/D was great partly because it could explore so many facets of both their characters. What I didn't realize was that in the right hands, any romance will explore all those facets, depending on the emotional leanings, range and insight of the author.

That's probably why I always feel a bit differently about a squicky or `alien' pairing after I write it myself. I inject my own emotional range into it, I feel out the characters and allow them to be seen through my sort of filter. I think one can always find something about any two people that will speak to you, that you will enjoy exploring, simply because of a universality of the basic themes of love & trust & self-discovery and so on.

It was always a bit funny to me that some people can't stand Harry/Draco, because the way -I- saw it, it was so universal, it encompasses everything I feel is vital about love. I think I've made posts about this sort of thing before, but enjoying a D/Hr comic just brought it home to me, I guess. I really never liked D/Hr (though I've never hated it like I've hated D/G), and the thing is-- I dislike most other people's vision of D/Hr, that's all, and this applies to every other ship/character I can't stand.

It's not that I hate Lucius-- I hate their Lucius. I hate their particular ideals behind such-and-such a pairing. I actually love Amalin's Lucius, but no one else writes him like that and he's not particularly canon, but hey, who cares, I like him. I'm interested in my own Draco/Snape, even if (and especially if) no one else sees it like that. In the end, it's about a certain leaning of vision rather than the original source, when it comes to relationships and characters not really filled out in canon. That's why I don't actually adore Sirius-and-Remus-- I adore Ailei and Khirsah's Sirius-and-Remus-- and for a long while, that's really confused me. Shouldn't that S&R have more in common with other people's? But they don't, and that's that.

I think it's merely good look when you find you really like a popular characterization of a pairing, and it's sad when people then decide they can't stand the couple on principle. Like there's something wrong with those two people ever being in love in any universe. How can love be wrong, though?

I know I'm way too obsessed with my little vision of universality, but I really feel it. I really respond in a similar way to a certain dynamic no matter where it manifests, and it does manifest between more than one pairing, especially if you have a decent sample size.

I've seen a number of people keep comparing Harry/Draco and Hermione/Draco. I never saw any evidence of that similarity, because I'd never seen any hint that people really see Hermione and Harry at all similarly, or even Draco when he's with them. And in this comic, for the first time, I saw Draco acting in a way he'd act if he was falling for Harry, too. And it was such a light-bulb moment, it really was. The vibe, man! The -vibe-!! The all-important vibe was there (in Draco, at least, since it's Draco pov so far-- and I realize that Hermione thinks pretty differently from Harry and Draco is the constant in these two pairings, so maybe it's not that shocking, but hey).
    Am pleased, for some reason.

...Though on second thought, I realize that there are plenty of other reasons people seek out/avoid particular pairings other than vibe. I mean, some people just lust after certain characters and not others. Some people actively hate certain characters and won't read anything with them. Then there's `eeewww het'. And so on. I'm just... as usual, believe it or not, talking about mememememe, eheheheh.

Comments

[pinkfinity.livejournal.com]

I realize that Hermione thinks pretty differently from Harry and Draco is the constant in these two pairings, so maybe it's not that shocking

Actually, that's one of the reasons I ship Draco/Hermione. If you go through canon, she's never been as prone to jumping to conclusions about him as Harry and Ron have, and technically, in GoF in the forrest after the World Cup, his actions are specifically to protect her. I mean, here he has the chance to hand Harry Potter over to the Death Eaters and what does he do?

He says exactly what's needed to protect Hermione.

Both Harry and Hermione have attributes that Draco somehow respects/needs/wonders about despite the fact that he's also clearly, on some level, disturbed by his own interest/intrigue, and hates that about himself. And now, of course, he has other reasons to hate Harry as well, given the whole Lucius situation.

But apart from all that, I think that if there were ever ties to be made between Gryffindors & Slytherins, it would be Hermione who first attempts to create them.

Of course, at this point, I fear JKR is going to take the easy road and skip the whole plotpoint, and I for one hopes she doesn't.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Heh. When I said they think differently, I meant in general, not in terms of how they perceive Malfoy (though I mean, that's different too). But they difference in "being" would prolly necessitate it being a different dynamic, I suppose.

I always thought that it was funny how the R/Hr-ers and the H/Hr-ers and so on (well, the non-slashers) often rush to justify their preference through canon "evidence", whereas that has never really influenced whether or not I myself ship a couple. All that really affects me -emotionally- (and I'm all obsessed with emotional impact, I guess), is whether the couple works for me intuitively. Like, in Smallvile, the most canonically plausible (heh) pairing is Clark/Lana, but that doesn't make it -work- for me 'cause I don't see the -chemistry-. And any reference to "things in common" and "understanding" again avoids this major point of "but what about the chemistry".

I guess I'm just militantly intuitive about love-related things, and so I tend to wind up with the most unlikely pairings (even if H/D is popular, it's still probably one of the most unlikely), because just somehow magically it works in my head. With the help of a bunch of fics to inspire me, of course~:)

I can see what you mean, of course, because Hermione -is- the reasonable one-- and that's what's always turned me off Hermione/Draco, actually :> Reasonableness and open-mindedness doesn't seem like the stuff fiery romance is made off. Heeee. It's the stuff nice friendships are made of, though. I actually use this Hermione-feels-the-need-to-create-ties plot-point in a fic that's currently being edited. But I think she might push Harry to do it, or they'd do it together or something. I doubt she'd undertake this herself. House-elves are one thing, but this is big, and Harry & Ron wouldn't just nod their heads and pat her hand on it. So yeah, she'd try harder to push them or be pushed herself like Remus was, in terms of canonical plausibility. Probably.

I think while Hermione would -see- the solution, she wouldn't necessarily forge ahead with enough force. Harry's like the rushing river, and she's more like the actual river-bank, the muddy canal that routes it. Or something. The direction.
Harry is the crux, the one that events turn around, it seems to me. If Harry does something, things follow. If Hermione does something, she might -inspire- or precipitate Harry's own reaction. Well, I mean. Sidekicks have it rough :>

I do think that Draco could use both Harry's and Hermione's brand of insight, and it's an interesting perspective, 'cause -really- few fics (besides Cassie's) try to make a threesome or a group-dynamic with them. I do think Hermione has a lot to contribute, but I mean... Ron. Yeah.
Though now I'm all interested because yeah! Hermione -is- important in terms of enlightening herself, Harry -and- Draco. Hmmm. Like... Harry & Draco or Hermione & Draco might muddle through just together, but all three of them seem complete in some weird way. *laughs* oh man. I don't mean a Ron&Hermione&Harry Trio-type way, either. Or a romantic way.

Like... they'd be something else. She could....
I dunno. She could bring more balance, but I'm not sure how. I think maybe you could start with Draco & Hermione's friendship leading to H/D, is all I can think of. Heeeeeee, that'd be great~:)))

Oh man. All excited and no place to go -.-

[verstehen.livejournal.com]

The all-important vibe was there (in Draco, at least, since it's Draco pov so far-- and I realize that Hermione thinks pretty differently from Harry and Draco is the constant in these two pairings, so maybe it's not that shocking, but hey).

Well, she does. I mean, in my head, Hermione is the epitome of what a Slytherin is. And Draco is a Gryffindor. (Or... Hufflepuff.) I'm not sure how it's any sort of meeting of minds. She thinks he's a stupid annoying fly of a bully, he sees her as Potter's lackey and a Mudblood. There's no equality in those views. There's no equality in their personalities, frankly. Hermione is about five times the person Draco is in canon.

I never understood any of the fanon notions of pairings at all. It's like, what books you reading, foo'?

(Fear my Mr. T impression.)

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

*giggles herself silly*
Dude, totally. That was definitely why I couldn't see Hermione/Draco (canonically-characterized). And I dislike the fanonish "Oh, but see, Draco's so intellectual and they can bond like that". That just makes me laugh. A lot. I see Hermione being more open-minded than Harry, but to me it's more important that Harry will easily enough leave his better judgement behind and he makes spur-of-the-moment decisions and goes with his gut more, which is more important when you're making a choice as monumentally clueless as getting involved with Malfoy, ahahaha.

I think people always have different readings of books (I mean, that's what they say in lit-crit class, anyway, heh), so it's not that surprising that they're all living in their own little worlds, is it? People generally see what they want to see, filter it through their own experiences and expectations.

Also, I love Hufflepuff!Draco, ahahaha. You should write that. In fact, I dunno who else -could- write that :D :D

I do think that Harry's more "Slytherin" than Hermione, though all of the Trio definitely have Slytherin traits (ahahah, more than any of the Slytherins seem to except for Snape).
But then, if the Slytherins were actually cunning & resourceful, they wouldn't be laughable and easily defeatable, so. Can't have that :/

*fears* :>

[verstehen.livejournal.com]

Actually, I don't see Hermione as open-minded at all. She's the most rigid of the three. At least Ron changes when he's proven wrong (ala PoA and werewolves). Hermione, on the other hand, insists that everyone conform to her ideas of the way things should be whether they like it not (S.P.E.W. anyone?) She's almost the epitome of British colonialism.

The thing about multiple readings is that people seem to bring in wild fantasies or things that are not canon at all in order justify what they want to believe. Like the debate about women in the HP world. If you look closely enough at the books, men and women have been equal for at least a thousand years. You can't make assumptions based on your own experiences when "in" a world so diametrically opposite.

Also, the movies are not canon. Fuck you very much Chris Columbus for "liking Hermione," thus fucking things up to make her look better.

Yeah... I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. If I manage to scrape some spare time tonight at work, I'll see what I can do about Hufflepuff!Draco. If only because I know I'd be killed.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. She's rather rabid, I guess, moreso than either of the other two, but it does seem like she considers the facts. It's only when she feels she's seen enough facts to pursue their "logical" conclusion that she becomes a nightmare of fanaticism & colonialism and such. The others just don't -think-. Hermione is just misguided. So I mean, there's inherently more possibility for change if someone thinks through their position, it's just that no one's challenged Hermione's presumptions on her own level. No one's come to her with a valid counter-argument that I've seen. Whereas Ron just goes by "well, this doesn't seem to work anymore" when it's not emotionally important to him one way or another (it's not like he's changing his mind about Slytherins no matter -what- happens). Harry is a weird case, because he seems to have certain people he picks out to be unreasonable about and the rest of the time he just goes with wherever his gut takes him at the moment. He does appear to hold grudges, but he can be emotionally swayed. At least, it feels like that to me.

And well, I know that it's unreasonable for people to project themselves onto the books, but to some extent it's probably an inevitable result of being "only human" and not very analytically-minded, generally :>

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I think I see Hermione in a similar way, actually. It always strikes me as odd when people call her the moral conscience of the books etc.--even if she is in JKR's mind, she's not a moral conscience I would want. When I think of Hermione after OotP I mostly think of her saying, "I got the idea from the Death Eaters!" for the DA alert coins.

I also agree that the meeting-of-the-minds thing with Hermione/Draco is very fanon oriented. If I were going to pick a place that Draco operated from it certainly wouldn't be his mind, but his gut (as opposed to his heart). He's totally emotional and his emotions screw up his mind all the time. I do believe he's probably got an interesting mind in his own way--he could be creative and I've always assumed he was an okay of even good student, but I don't see much similarity between him and Hermione in the way they think. (I never think of Hermione as being all that much of an intellectual either, actually. She's very intelligent, of course, but she doesn't seem driven by an intellectual curiosity so much as a desire for knowledge that gains her more practical things.) I can totally see what you mean by Hufflepuff Draco--so far one of the few consistent things about him in canon is a fanatical loyalty to his father. Much of his brain power must go to finding ways to deny evidence that Pureblood superiority is a myth. And flinging himself at Harry Potter? Seems pretty bold to me.

If Hermione was the one to decide to build a bridge to Slytherin I just don't see it working. Or if it did work it would eventually backfire. To me it seems she would approach it like SPEW--the Slytherins are needed for her plan thus they should be able to be manipulated. What people see as evidence that she's more open-minded is, to me, evidence of her practicality. Like when she hesitates to believe Draco is the Heir of Slytherin it's not because she's giving him a chance.

Finally, I must second the disgust at Chris Columbus' "nicer" Hermione. That scene in Hagrid's hut in CoS made me want to throw things at the screen. When Draco said "I hope it's Granger," I found myself for the first time saying, "So do I."

:-?

[eleveninches.livejournal.com]

And I'm traumatizing myself looking up people's lj calendars and seeing just how -many- entries are filtered. Besides my beta-filter, I've only considered using a filter once, to avoid hurt feelings, and I didn't. I mean, I -knew- I wasn't really close friends with these people so they have no reason to trust me (and who -does- have a reason to trust me? it's not like trust uses reasons), but. Heh. Well, now I know, I guess. Anyway.

If you were looking at mine I really only use one filter, and it's for mostly putting in-jokes. Don't be offended!

Re: :-?

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

heeeee :> nahhh, it was just, the first three people i looked at and they all had all these filtered entries and i was like...... -.-
peculiarly, the people i myself would trust, i wouldn't feel paranoid about not seeing the entries of :>
if i'm a bit uncertain as to why they even have me friend, then i'd look at it and go OMG THEY DON'T REALLY WANT ME THERE AT ALL. um.

i was more wibbly than offended, and mostly surprised. i'd really never have guessed about some people, but i was just being naive, i think. *giggles*

Re: :-?

[eleveninches.livejournal.com]

It's probably just personal stuffs, man.

Re: :-?

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

True :>
I mean, if I think of it as a personal journal, it's fine. But on lj, there are these dreaded -degrees- of "personal", where some people are trusted with some pieces of information but not other. And it's not so much that I need to be "in the know" at all as it kinda brings me up short to realize I'm outside this circle of trust. I mean, one may never expect it, but it's a different thing to know one isn't. Trusted, that is. Then it inevitably looks like an inherent judgement of some sort, I guess, like, "you're one of them" vs "you're one of -us-". Heh. Oh yeah, overthink much? Oh yeah.

That said, this is all just basically going to prove that ignorance is indeed bliss :>

[http://users.livejournal.com/_ri/]

O_o Um, wow... didn't think a little comic'd evoke such a debate of sorts. ^_^
But really, I'm happy to hear you enjoy it so much! *bows*

I'm drawn to Draco/Hermione for quite some reasons, but also because of the subject of rascism, which I've always found interesting... admittedly, this topic does not have very much weight in D/Hr stories than it could have (or at least in those I've read so far, with exception of maybe one or two), and I will also not go much into that in Foe Trans, since it is pretty serious and my story is, after all, in first line a a Romantic Comedy.

dammit, I should leave the computer now, I could've added bit more, but basically wanted to say thank you, I'm flattered ;)

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

You're so welcome! I just really really really love your style, and if I'd known you'd find this, I'd have gone on and on about i more, since I tend to wax rhapsodic about these things~:)
I tend to like pairings just 'cause something ineffable appeals to me in them rather than some "theme" they're exploring (which is a part of the attraction, but I wouldn't pursue fics with that couple if that was all). So I really loved your comic 'cause it did hit upon that simple universality of dorky teenage crushing, which is yeay! What I tend to get addicted to reading/writing about :>

Oh, and have you considered posting your art to hpart? It's a community for general HP fanart, and I'd love to be able to keep up with anything you'd draw (whether D/Hr or not) in the future. Also, heeee, I loved the Marauder pic ~:) So many people drew that scene, and this is probably the only one that got the OoTP dorky James right :D

[http://users.livejournal.com/_ri/]

Well of course I don't just like D/Hr just because of that "theme" thing I mentioned; just like you said, that's just part of the attraction ;) though I thought about it this week, and maybe I will do more with it... um, but if yes, it'll take awhile anyway till I get there... whatever. Anyway, two new are pages up.

hpart? I'll go check it out! :)