reenka

probably :))
BUT IT IS STILL WEEPINESS INDUCING EVEN OUT OF CONTEXT... not that I would know since... well :)) BUT STILL :((

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-cocks head- That's a scene from DT, innit?

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Yesh! :((
That, in the end, is prolly the only fic where I feel really 100% sold that Harry OMG WUVS DRACO. Sad but true.

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Haha! That's awesome. Yes, I agree. Whatever Cassie does with the end of that fic, it will always be representative to me of their Great and T00by Love.

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*misses the days their love was T00by & Great and the ~~world~~ fandom was young*

I'm almost tempted to go reread Protective Bonds or something ^^;;; But it's just not the same!
...Oh, what have I come to -.-

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I feel almost like an oldbie too. I think I've read that. I think I've read a LOT of the fic in this fandom, and it always shocks me when I realise that. Hmm.

-looks up Protective Bonds-

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Hee, Protective Bonds and Irresistible Poison and Origins and the now-gone Tower with a View and The Losing Side and The Shining Prince and The Silver Chain and Love Under Will and The Marks We Bear and How Harry Potter Got His Groove Back... those were all the fics I read in the very beginning that made me love H/D <3<3<3<3<3<3

Now, though, the concepts and characterizations will prolly seem silly, so I try not to reread them. Heh. But the love remains ♥

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IP, yup, and Checkmate and Transfigurations and Tissue of Silver and LUW and Resolutions and then a whole pile of really terrible ones that I have blocked out of my memory due to embarrassment. Funny how at first everything in fandom is pure-gold crack and then after a while you stop and think: Er, some of these fics are kind of bad.

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Dude, most of those fics are kinda bad ^^;;;
...And some are sappy. *staggers back in horror* :>

But yeah, I think it's typical to have a honeymoon period. It's really almost heroic that I manage to read H/D at all anymore. Or possibly just sad. Yeah... sad -.-

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I feel a bit like H/D is the honeymoon period.

Hee, but I have such a romantic attachment to some of those that even as I reread them I'm all "this is bad, man, but YUM." I can still get the honeymoon feeling back, sometimes. And it's nice.

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Ahaha, that's so true!! Omg, yeah, it's like, then you wake up and go, 'omg, he doesn't even BRUSH HIS TEETH' and 'OMG HE JUST FALLS ASLEEP AFTERWARDS AND I CAN'T TAKE HIM ANYWHERE' and so on >:D

But then he sort of looks at you with those puppy eyes and you think 'okay, still got a hot arse' and it's like... yeah, he's still got it sometimes, especially when he shuts up :))

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especially when he shuts up Haha. Exactly. I have this affection for fics that do this--that suppose that Harry and Draco manage to stay together longer than .466 of a millisecond (long enough for them to be all WTF why am I with this guy). And then of course one of them shuts up.

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Though I am still in my happy place where DV!Harry and Draco (when they're not angsting about how OMG HE DOESN'T WANT ME) know they're, er, friends 'cause they're like, well, obsessed, and mindbonded, but also they make each other laugh and Harry thinks Draco's so cute even when he's being all regal and 'get me that sandwich, Potter' and it doesn't matter if they're totally different because their hearts are the same ♥♥♥

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Go ahead, remind me why I love DV, why don't you? Even though the suspense of it all is an advanced form of torture. I will not read the rest 'til it's done, I will not read the rest 'til it's done...

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Yeah, I feel the same way! I stoped when the suspense got to the point where I'd start shaking a little when I thought about it :))
Even in the beginning of the 'breakup' arc I was so overwhelmed I wrote a fanfic thingie just to feel better. And then the next chapter with the kiss, it -again- killed me and I wrote a fanfic -again-. It's just... bad for my health :)) So if someone dies or there's happy het endings, I just wanna know first ^^;;;

See, see, I think in DV it's just visible, but it's always possible. It just takes a really long while, but.... I dunno, mebbe I'm just deluded and wanna believe they're cuter and more intense and funny than they are :-? But if I'm wrong I don't wanna be right :>

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It's funny that we're talking about this now, because my sister just finished reading everything Cassie's posted and I let her tell me all of the major plot points over dinner. Temporary insanity; I usually don't let people spoil me. But I told her she has to read the end before me and if it isn't Harry/Draco or if it is too angsty she has to warn me away from ever reading it.

She nodded solemnly, of course.

No, you're right. No delusions there. :D

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I deeply suspect it won't be H/D as in, 'and then they kissed and Hermione gritted her teeth' and such, but if there's more laughing at jokes and being happy together and affectionate and 'oh Draco' and 'yes, Potter?', I will be happy, because that is enough. ♥

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Right well. -grinning- That's pretty much what I mean.

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(And also, you can tell from the ones I listed how awful the ones I can't remember are. -amusement-)

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Hee!! Oh man, I was never able to like Checkmate (NOOOO, NOT THE KISSES LIKE CARAMEL AND EYES LIKE VELVET, NOOOOO), and I've just never had any interested in post-Hogwarts and ToS just came out too late into my fandom career... but the rest... yeah, I've liked them all at one point.

And torturously, I remember all the worst ones, too. *facepalm* NO WONDER I'M SO BITTER, SEE :))

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Wow, your brain hasn't imploded?

Checkmate was my first and it is like crack, man, because it is my first. And so I still am all adflhn about it because it IS honeymoon for me. Despite how much I dislike the style. -laughs-

ToS, on the other hand. I love the way FD writes and would follow her most places. Like the Star Wars universe, see how much I like her? :D:D

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I think this journal itself is a chronicle of the slow implosion of my brain from fandom ^^;;; It's... a close thing :>

Haha, I can't talk, 'cause really, I still have a great fondness for IP and... uh... well, I'm not about to defend the writing :> :> I just haven't even -read- ToS-- it was so famous & popular and I put it off and off and off... just like I put off Transfigurations, but I read that even though it was post-Hogwarts and loved it and blew my post-Hogwarts fanon!Draco load entirely, I think :))

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Hahaha.

Wow, you haven't read it? Clearly I love it, so. But it's on the Transfigurations level with me -- smart, funny, not cliche, characters different than we know them but still fascinating. The post-Hogwarts thing is really just an excuse to slightly Sue-ify the characters, of course, but when the writing is good I am all for it. :">

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The post-Hogwarts thing is really just an excuse to slightly Sue-ify the characters
I love how you just... say that so casually :))

But yeah, that's why I said it came out too late in my fandom career, when I was already bitter and resentful and WHY IS NO ONE WRITING IC!H/D LONGFIC, WHY WHY WHY YOU INFIDELS??! etc. I liked Transfig so much 'cause even though there were OOC characterizations all around, Harry rung true to me and that made me hold on. I was just... so happy he didn't like Draco's sudden coolness. I was like, YOU GO HARRY!!1 (Wish-fulfillment, I guess, hee).

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-admires own irreverence- :D

I really loved the ToS Snape, I think. Also there is a thing with a chair that is just so great. Ahh, I love it like a person, imperfect and wonderful. I shall never ever be objective and should cross literary criticism off of my list of potential careers.

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should cross literary criticism off of my list of potential careers

I probably should too, before the bitterness drives me to biting ears off small ~~children~~ ~~fangirls~~ dogs ^^;;

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Though I do think The Shining Prince (and sequels) and probably Origins stand the test of time, writing-wise (though I dunno, the characterizations...). And you just can't beat IP for angsty-yet-lovelorn!H/D, heheh, or Protective Bonds for mindbond fic or The Silver Chain for lots and lots of boysex, etcetc :))

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I'll make sure I haven't missed any of those, then. Because after all, the end of summer is for reading crackhd!fic, right? Not finishing my summer reading. -scoffs-

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H&D are such little assholish archetypes of luv that they just work anyway. Who needs context? Not me.
It's all so American Gods. Except it's Fandom Gods.

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Without context, it's not a real story, to me.

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woah, what happened?
without context, they're still archetypes.

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Archetypes are great and I love them, obviously, but the concept or idea alone isn't a real story, meaning-- it's like the idea of the color blue rather than .

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so write a story.
more freedome if it's the colour blue, no?
i meant that they're no longer two characters, fandom made them archetypes.
"the draco malfoy" "the harry potter" "the h/d romance"
lighten up!

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I'm not saying they're not archetypes, that's irrelevant to my point. I said 'I need context' and you said 'archetypes mean you don't need context' and I said 'yes you do, otherwise it's not a real story' and now you said 'so write a story'-- but that brings me back to my original point, which is that I've never seen a story other than DV that makes me truly *see* that blue is , or in other words, Harry loves Draco in context, or 'for real'.

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*headdesk*

the trilogy doesn't work for me, but my world isn't shattered.

i'll write my own solution.

i don't see the "bad" in this picture.

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I wasn't implying it was an objective judgment and 'you infidels, don't you all think only DV!Harry truly loves Draco'... 'cause, clearly not.

Well, write your own solution, I'm not trying to stop that. I'm just saying I haven't seen it yet and I've been waiting quite a while.

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Let me rephrase... I meant that maybe you expect any writer's truth about H&D to be the same as yours, and that's impossible, but you don't suspend your disbelief as required anymore. :/ I know I do on some level.

Transformation worked for me. Jigsaw too.

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I dunno, I always had this shtick where I said 'no H/D fic ever convinced me', blah blah-- it's my... shtick. I always said that :))

With DV, it works for me so well because it's friendship-based and not lust-based :> I cannot say that for any other fic except `And I Get By', which also sold me, and also `Eclipse', which is -also- friendship-based (UL comes close for the same reason but... no cigar because Draco isn't fully reciprocatory). Anyway, the point is very few people write H/D resentment-to-friendship-to-lust stories ^^;;;;;; Okay, like, and even the ones that do stop once they get to the first kiss. It's a harsh world out there.

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That's because it's not H/R. It's not about being friends. I mean, it's one thing to want H/D to be friends, another thing to say it's necessary to make it work. :P

I mean, to me Trilogy!Draco isn't Draco, and the big declaration you quoted down there leaves me cold. I won't even say it's not Draco-like (or human-like, even), I just mean it's not necessary to H/D - or any love story - to work.

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Oh, it's obviously not necessary to have them be friends in order for it to work (otherwise everyone would be out of luck)-- but remember, I wasn't saying 'work' in any remotely objective sense of 'this is how the pairing has to happen'-- I was just talking about myself & what makes me feel 100% confident in love in general.... I wasn't generalizing beyond myself at all, it's just that you keep saying 'but I don't need it' or 'but it's not need to be generally valid', etc, when that's not relevant to how things work in my head, I guess...? I was never talking about general validity in the first place. I was never talking about anything but my own reactions.

Anyway, I didn't even mean -I- needed H/D to be friends before I believed they were a couple (....), since that doesn't even make sense. I -know- it's not about being friends, all I ever said was that I think there's a difference between 'this works as a romance story' and 'this is love for these two people' and 'this is TRUE LOVE as -I- want to see it'.

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To explain to you what I mean by 'true love as I want to see it', I'll refer you to this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/pandarus/196231.html?style=mine), and it basically has to do with my ambivalence about romantic love in general, as with this quote:
Because I think romantic love, erotic love, is inherently selfish. Not only selfish, but selfish nevertheless. It can't be disinterested. Desire precludes that.

It's not that H&D -need- to be friends, but that I worry about the inherent possessiveness and selfishness of romantic love, even as I'm addicted to it. That's why DV!H/D touches me, and why I love H/D friendship stories so much-- because that's Agape, that's selfless love, that's what it's all about, basically. And it's not H/D, I know that, and yet a part of me just -wants- it to be H/D anyway, because I always want to have my cake and eat it too. I want both the amazing omg-passion-crazy-sex-need-lust and also the selfless trust and ability to let go and ability to believe in the other person and give of yourself until there's nothing left to give. And I don't know how to reconcile that.

I don't actually even -like- sexualizing canon Agape-type friendships in the first place, so I don't know why I have this hang-up... I just think they could have an even more interesting friendship than a romance. I dunno why I think that, but I do.

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Though the funny thing is, really, that I always liked shipping/eroticizing H/D precisely -because- I feel weird eroticizing Agape-type love, and since Harry & Draco didn't have it, any passionate/lust-type thing felt additive rather than subtractive...

However, then I'm like, WAH! NO AGAPE :((
heh.

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