~~on need and showing vs telling

i can't really believe it took me this long to get to the untold want, though really, i can totally believe it, because it takes me forever to get to anything, actually. *sigh* it's just-- i'm always looking for this. whatever i'm reading, i just want it to be believable, and yet mind-boggling, unbelievable, intense, but true. sometimes that means going slow and hinting at a lot of things and being all coy and developing one aspect of possibility at a time. and sometimes you start off with your neck broken and it just escalates from there. i mean, there are a number of fics where you start off with love as a given-- and in one i bristle and say, "no way" but keep reading because it's so good, and in another i totally, completely feel it and believe it. the difference is simple-- just like with anything else, i believe it because it's shown, proven, because the characters act "under the influence" so to speak, and you suddenly see, as if it was always obvious, the world, under this new light.

here, draco's definitely being "under the influence". in fact, so is harry, in his awkward, messed-up, clueless sort of way. i really don't see why some writers don't like harry, because really, i think his cluelessness and sincerity and innocence are absolutely essential and the base to build things on. like, i love it how in a plague of legends, harry sort of-- runs circles around himself, and he's the one falling, and it's just totally believable because harry can so do a lot of things someplace in his head without admitting it to himself. this is especially useful because, due to this obtuseness of his, a good writer gets to show, not tell.

you get harry's reactions, his unclouded take on everything, his lack of filters, his uncomplicated need for uncomplicatedness. i just love it. i mean, draco usually goes around all tangled up and so does harry, but it's adorable how you can play them off each other, one all repressive and stewing in secret, and the other just trying to break out of his shell and figure out what the heck's going on. one is unsuccessfully trying to close the door, and the other's unsuccessfully trying to open it, until they both get stuck in the doorway, and start, and stare at each other, and snog, maybe.

i like that sense of tension, of each drawing the other out, of the frustration and insanity and the way there's no room for happiness, no room to take a breath even, no room for anything but this wild ride, and even the fear gets swept away, because that's just how powerful it all is. you get draco cursing himself and harry and the world, and yet not being able to fight, and fighting anyway, and blaming his defeat on harry's lack of awareness that the battle is even happening. isn't that adorable?? hee.

and yes, it's not so much angst as-- just-- how it is. i mean, i don't think harry and draco are likely to be stopping to smell the roses, so to speak, anytime soon, and i don't mean that in a doom, doom, gloom sort of way. i am just elated to find this really delicate balance, this push-and-pull dynamic, being written so unflinchingly, so honestly. it's so true, that you can have this breathtaking exhilaration and need and desperation, without any love potion, and only the chemistry going on in one love-addled hormone-riddled teenage brain. and there's not necessarily any -reason-, and you don't need a reason, you just need to show the effects and we can kind of figure out the causes as we go along.

you would think that love at first sight (!) would be mushy and ridiculous-- but then, all love is mushy and ridiculous. everything is ridiculous, and painful, and real, if you make it so. both these fics make such great use of staring. i love that. the transmission of obsession-- how the focusing of one's being, of one's attention and yearning upon a thing can begin to claim it, to make it yours. that has been my experience, this tugging that can definitely be real, just another person's desire acting upon you, binding you, almost making you feel what they feel just because it's so intense.

i suppose both of these are probably going to be considered by some to be "angst", but.... i think it's just, the intensity and burning awkwardness and painful incomplete feeling of all things tangled and requited and unrequited at the same time. you'd think you could only get this tension from unrequited love, but it's not true, is it. so close and yet so far away. i was writing that stupid thing i turned into a poem, thinking of that. how you can both be yearning, and reaching, and talking to each other, and yet never truly -be- there, never connect. like, no matter how close or how far away, the other person is always too far away, and the ache never stops. and it's only in fleeting moments, in tiny instants, that you finally can relax and exhale and feel the release, the feeling that yes, you are not alone, and the other person's really there, and they are really touching you, and you can no longer deny it. even though really, come on, that was always bloody obvious (well to -us- anyway), wasn't it. but it's never, almost never obvious, not when you're in the midst of it, in a way, you're actually too close-- so close everything telescopes and feels far away, i don't know, everything's full of paradoxes.

i just love how penelope_z's harry -and- draco both need each other, need the same things from each other, are almost desperate to give these things away-- so lonely-- so unable to touch even though they're scrambling and trying, and almost, almost achieving. not quite. just like a stare-- can touch you-- and bind you-- and consume you-- and yet the person can be a whole room away from you. *sigh* anyway. yeah, need is a big h/d theme, and the better the story, the better it develops it. and it's impossible to really remain fluffy/sappy, if it really does, just because of the nature of need itself, the hunger and the insatiability and the desperation and pain and burning. i'm reminded, suddenly, of antenora's `the losing side', and draco's one bit of painful honesty there, being an admission of need. for understanding, for more than understanding, for that leap of -- something -- that we all try not to believe in, because it gets too painful -- that need for someone to save us from ourselves, the very impossibility and ingrained yearning for that. yes. *sighs again* that's what i love seeing expressed so vividly, in these latest fics and most others that have really meant something to me.

~~art rambles, etc.

i was saying something about how my state of mind right about now resembled very hyper mice running around in a circle and biting each other's butts, but that's neither here nor there. i doodled draco from LuW again, and he still doesn't look right, but i might be getting better, or i might not. regardless, it only took 5 minutes to do, so i shouldn't expect much. still sort of happy with harry, though.
    when i only compare myself to myself, i feel fine, optimistic even. when i realize there are a gazillion people better than me by about a gazillion times, i want to cry and crawl into a hole and never come out. the only thing i feel confident in is my ability to appreciate it when i am outdrawn, outwritten, and outgunned in general, heh. ah, what a sweet world it would be if powers of perception equalled powers of execution. on the other hand, i would then be semi-omnipotent (well, you know, close enough), so maybe this is all a good safeguard...

i think people who say art now is sucky, people are sucky, talent is rare (now, in the past, things are different, according to those people, usually), and santa claus is a lie made up by evil corporations bent on raping small children's minds (ok i made up that last part), are kooky. wrong. stupid. they've got their heads where the sun don't shine, that much is obvious.

now, i'm not indiscriminate. i can tell the difference between technical ability and actual gift for capturing the ineffable, the mysterious, the beautiful, the painful, the ancient and the real. it is a very clear thing, in art at least. i see a lot of fan-art that is bogged down by lack of spirit, lack of insight. people can draw, but they can't see. i don't cry in horror at my inferior skillz, or in awe at the thunderously gorgeous imagery, when i see those pictures. you've got it or you don't-- same with writing. a bit harder to tell, between technical prowess and actual grasp of Meaning and beauty and such, but still possible. difficult because you're using the very medium your readers are using, when they think. the words are often transparent (unless they're particularly beautiful or stupid, or you're particularly sensitive), and usually, the meaning is either obviously there or obviously not. though yes, a lot of writing is empty too, and you get the feeling the people are only using this medium to clear their minds of junk, much like a good earwax removal. i will refrain from speculating on whether their minds are actually stuffed with earwax, because as we all know, Reena Is Nice (bwahahaha). erm. also, it's entirely possible i have some weird prejudice against over-cutesified-anime!harry-- ok i know i do. minimalism is hard to do well. innocent smiles and huge guileless eyes have to be done really well to be on the other side of the barrier that separates "cute" and "annoying".

pylite's link to an old gundam wing fan-art site (that now has hp, of course), is what made me think of all this, as well as the digital art site, which has more amazing talent concentrated in one spot than all of hollywood put together (but i am just being bitter). i've noticed that a lot of hp fanart (and fanart in general) is beautifully done, but missing that certain something. that reflection of spirit-- that bit of identity, that tells you this is a character you know and love, come to life. it pings that certain section of your brain that has "draco malfoy", or "love", or "harry", or "painful, torn, angry tenderness" (ha!) stamped across it, for example. rings the doorbell, so to speak. it's funny, the way some pieces just don't have a punch to them, and some, just flail miserably, trying to pretend stating the obvious is a grand, beautiful thing.

    on a different note, you'll need to copy and paste this, but this "missing scene" from PoA is just too funny. i am easily amused.

i've never been a self-conscious artist, in terms of, i never -meant- to express anything, and it just kind of came out anyway. but looking at a lot of art, i find that while it is beautiful, it expresses very little, or not enough, or if it does, it has not that much to do with the work it is referencing, if it is fan-art. same with fic. but nevermind that. a lot of things -are- successful, and -are- glorious and i'm all about eliminating the negative and accentuating the positive, as everyone knows.

and anyway, it's much more fun talking about original art anyway, since i don't sound like such a grinch and instead gush and cry and say how i'm a lowly worm, not worthy to live because obviously i can't have anything to contribute now that all this has been created. ahem~:)
( on with the recs, then: )

~~
oh, and btw, this reply to rosenho's post on our common adulation for evil characters and her own reasons for it, made me question myself (yes, again)--

It's faulty logic "I am a good person. I like Spike. Therefore Spike must be a good person."
    ( ...& if you want to see me rant, feel free... )

~~
guh...! guh..! adorableness straight ahead...!
i found nasubionna's fanart way back in june, but i don't remember this...! *dances with glee* oh and btw. she's one of those people who do it right. emotion, spirit, execution, humor, everything..! yeay!

    so. this is from her GoF illustrations (she has pics for all the 4 books), draco & pansy at the ball. oh..my...gahd..! that is pansy...! wah. not all her work is so spot-on, but a lot of it is. like this pic of poor harry cowering next to snape, peering at a veritaserum bottle. harried!harry, heh. adorable. also, she does the best sirius i've seen yet. really.

~~rawr

this is ...a Pointless Public Service Announcement:
making it a PPSA... w00t.

boys with english accents are officially... The Sexiest Thing Ever~>:0

it doesn't matter if they're a) not your type; b) asking you to teach them how to scan (aww yeah baby); c) vaguely preppy-like.
scan me, scan me baby, yeah.

PS. i started acquiring a faux english accent almost immediately. v. v. embarrassing ><;;