[Sell your cleverness and purchase bewilderment.]

[reenka]

Man, I just read a quote somewhere about how when you come back & reread your favorite stories [or just good stories], they're always different. You always learn something new from them, or see something you didn't before, or feel things differently because you are at a different place in life & different things ping you. And I was like... yeah. That's why ideas or stories stay interesting to me at all; it's certainly surprising even to me, but I still see new things in like, Harry/Draco all the time or I really -would- have stopped by now. (Honest!) It's weird how that's also especially relevant to me as a writer [who also reads fanfic besides writing it].

    What's actually -more- weird is the concept that other [most?] people -don't- do that... that they have this constant stable response to a fic, or a type of fic, or a pairing, and then they either stop (liking or reading that fic/pairing) or they have a singular revolution, like the person in sistermagpie's latest H/D post who said they only started liking Draco post-HBP [when he went through an abrupt change so it was a shock to the system], whereas he was just "the nasty Slytherin" before. And, I mean... I can't look at a story I like and say any character is "just like that". I mean... really, that's a pretty big insult to JKR, if you think about it. o_0
    Any halfway decent character is going to have at least several faces or facets, and a really good story will have dozens, maybe hundreds. I mean, if you're talkin' Darth Maul or whatever, okay (he's just a nasty Sith lord! yep! fer sure!), but.... Yeah. :>

Okay, so like, I don't have a point, really. :/ But... it's just something I noticed being important for me to enjoy a story or an idea, even. That constant dynamic motion, you know? The sense of discovering myself along with the characters-- having them mean something to me, and not just about my ideals/projections but my emotional realities. I don't want love or stories or anything I spend emotional energy on to be like... too certain, too much like bedrock, maybe.
    Like, there are people who say they like a pairing [or a character] 'because they represent X', and they're fully certain they like X, so they're following some party line & liking whatever little 'x' reminds them of the big 'X', whether or not little 'x' even objectively exists in the narrative [and here we have Harmonians, ladies & gentlemen]. Isn't that just bloody SCARY? (Well, to me anyway.) That's cookie-cutter thinking, right there (even though I'm an idealist so I have to be careful or I'll slip into that sort of thing myself... which is prolly why it's so disturbing to me).
    Possibly it's why I'm so avoidant of fan-think like 'I like X character therefore I shall like any and all fics which mention/contain X character in a starring or positive role', etcetc. I can just feel my brain grinding to a halt & stumbling sloooowly, slowly into a deep dark RUT right there. :/

Right, so I have to disclaimer this & say that I realize that 'purchasing bewilderment' (as per that quote by Rumi) is something that's heavily dependent on one's personality preferences. Some people are 'judgers' & some 'perceivers' (according to the Myers-Briggs Jungian typology thing, anyway), and the judgers will be much more likely to make a snap decision and stick to it, while the perceiver will keep on keeping on gathering new information to use in decision-making till the cows come home. So like... I'm being very typical, saying 'I can never have too much new information!! :O!' while most 'J' types will be like 'just shut up & produce something already!! :O!' hehe :D (Especially considering that yeah, my post-HBP Death Eater!Draco novella keeps on changing depending on every new thought/insight I have about his characterization & H/D... so at this point, it may go on being written like, FOREVER, ahahaha... ha... *coughs*)

Comments

[edido.livejournal.com]

Hi...got to your LJ via a link in hd_prophet to your previous post.

Re: Judgers and Perceivers (LJ isn't letting me copy & paste for some reason??? weird) - That's kind of interesting. I've been enjoying your thoughts on characterization, and I pretty much agree with your take on H & D, but also in general. I'm a typical 'P' too--an INTP to be specific--so maybe that's why. I wonder what the the ratio of J's to P's is, though? 'Cuz fandom seems to hold a lot of J's, if that's the case... XD

I think I've just always assumed that loads of readers and many writers don't tend to respond to the richly characterized. Loads of people read and write in archetypes, not to mention downright stereotypes, in fandom and without (it's a very long-standing element of storytelling after all, and I like it for certain purposes myself). When I read meta discussions people are always talking about character A is this 'type' and character B isn't that 'type', usually with some comparison to groups like 'Mean Girls', 'Nazi's', etc, heroes and anti-heroes, with all the expectations we have for characters whom we can fit into those roles. Maybe the essentialism is facilitated to get a point across in a discussion without getting too complicated, but I'm not convinced it isn't just that people need to simplify in order to understand or like/dislike or identify with characters, period (ha ha... or with RL people as well).

Particularly when it comes to judging characters, I think, we look at what they do and say and reject or fail to see or are plain uninterested in motivations that we don't identify with ourselves. I respond more to characters written with (or in the case of Draco, perhaps, allowing for) lots of complexity, but I'm fairly convinced that this is not the default taste in readership. Maybe it is really the P's. 8)

In terms of writing, I think that a gift for creating complex portrayals is just...rare, isn't it? Even in published fic. And I have heaps of respect for any writer who does it well, because I've been trying my hand at it and am very frustrated with my own efforts so far---can see it so clearly in my head, but... arg. It's so difficult getting things across when the characters themselves aren't particularly self-aware, etc, that it's damn hard not to descend to type. And when you think about it, writing fic with someone else's characters makes it all that much harder (if you care about canon, natch), because it is more difficult to bend them to the needs of your story, which usually, when derived from plot-driven HP canon, has a different focus entirely than the one these characters were created to tell. The HP characters are just not so well fleshed out in the romantic area (even with HBP canon *coughs*), which at once makes it so inviting to ficcers but also so difficult to extrapolate from canon one way or the other. Like, say, who's a top/bottom based on canon... *hides*

Do you mind if I friend? You always have something interesting to say. Mostly I lurk and read, occasionally popping up my head for a comment when something is particularly gripping. 8)

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

I think a 'P' preference alone probably isn't enough to um, account for much except its narrow area of one's response to information-->action... but that -is- a lot, and yeah, I think Js predominate (just as Es and Ss do, with the field being otherwise split between Fs & Ts). I like to think you agree with me because I'm right (haha) but I do think that people who think more alike/along similar pathways can understand each other better & this leads to agreement more often than not. Like, the biggest cause of disagreement is probably misunderstanding based on using different premises (making wide generalizations, but yeah).

I do think it's interesting, 'cause like-- um, I'm drawn to archetypes [like, essences, fairy-tales, manifestations of patterns/ideas like the Endless in Sandman] as well as complexity. I think people -like- complexity but only complexity that's compact-- able to be reduced in resolution without losing necessary definition [...like a jpg! heh] Doing that successfully takes more talent than writing complexly (is that a word--?) -or- stereotypically, so most people settle for stereotypes, yeah :> I do have to say that I'd have to make a conscious effort to write in stereotypes, and I've been trying to train myself to think more like that 'cause I know it'd appeal to readers more & might move the actual -plot- along faster if I didn't spend all my time on character-building & introspection! heh. But I'm weird :> I think judging people in RL based on stereotypes is more precisely related to SJs than just Js... N*Js, especially NTJs, are quite perceptive/aware 'cause of the iNtuition aspect of things :>

But a gift for creating complex/subtle characterizations is definitely rare. For me, it may not be as difficult as for a T (or more precisely, it's difficult but in follow-through rather than conception/beginning) because I write so intuitively and impulsively/emotionally-- it just pours out. Because a lot of my writing is so... subconscious-driven, it ends up sort of soaking up the innate complexity of my unconscious mind. If you consciously, laboriously create things, it's probably a lot harder to be at all unique/subtle, y'know :> Especially if you're trying to project some 'moral message' or some meta 'point' like a J would :> Heh :>

It's true that the HP characters used to be not that well-fleshed-out in terms of romance [though that changed for Harry in OoTP & HBP, which is a lot of the basis I use for his interaction with Draco... and Ron&Hermione always had their romantic dynamic rather constantly from year one or so]. I do freely admit that my insistence against top!Draco isn't so much based on canon as on the prevalence of bad, horrid, awful fanfic with top!Draco being equivalent to smooth-icy-sex-god!Draco and starry-eyed-wibbly-sidekick!Harry. I've yet to read one where they didn't butcher Harry through and through, seriously ^^;;; Well, but most fanfic does that, so really I shouldn't single out top!Draco fics :>

And you're free to friend! :D! Most people lurk rather than comment anyway >.> hehe.

[edido.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I've friended you.

Yeah, I'm with you on the top!Draco fics and for the same reason, though I can think of some exceptions, but they are few. And I won't even click on the ones labeled D/H. *snorfle*

For me, it may not be as difficult as for a T ...because I write so intuitively and impulsively/emotionally-- it just pours out. Because a lot of my writing is so... subconscious-driven, it ends up sort of soaking up the innate complexity of my unconscious mind.

I think you're right about this, speaking as a T. I can't just sit and write like that, I need the whole thing worked and re-worked in my head before I can put it down and I don't write linearly, it sort of comes in scenes. I plot stuff out on paper too! 8) Stuff kind of comes to me in--I think themes would be the right word--characters have themes for me, rather than be types. It's usually how I read too.

Love the Myers-Briggs stuff. What do you think Harry & Draco would be? I'm thinking... INFJ & ESTP?

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I haven't thought of it as themes before! I do think I have a 'feeling' or a vision/idea-feeling hybrid I tend to have characters represent [at least, the pov character]. It also builds on itself-- like, since I don't write linearly either [I suspect that's a 'P' thing!], but the disconnected scenes do evolve naturally, like a slowly developing ecosystem. Well, unless it sputters & dies-- 'cause my fics do that a lot :>

And I think Draco's an ESTP but I agree with the HP character test which said Harry's an ISFP-- besides, I know too many INFJs & he's not like that at all :> Dumbledore's actually much closer to a typical INFJ, ahahahah. And Snape's a typical INTJ, and Remus is the INFP :) I think Voldy was supposed to be the INTP, ahahahah, I can totally see it :D