Unforgiveable Concepts
Jan. 30th, 2008 09:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stuttermoanIt's been a few months since I've posted in this journal. In that time, I have fully grown apart from my username. I no longer like it, although I still recall why I chose it. And frankly, after all the ridiculous stuff that happened last year, I don't feel compelled to give LJ fifteen of my (or anyone else's) hard-earned dollars. So, the name stays. But, randomly, and in spite of the username, I suddenly have more to say about Harry Potter.
After several months of nothing particularly fannish on my mind, I woke up this morning thinking about Dumbledore. After JKR let us know he was gay, I remember some religious blogger (who, for the life of me, I cannot remember the name of) writing specifically about the audience reaction to this fact. If I'm remembering this correctly, he basically stated that the crowd was cheering at JKR's honesty with them, not at the fact that one of her characters was homosexual. At some point, the audience laughed/cheered, and this blogger seemed to think it was a reaction based on previous crowd/speaker interplay. They were happy not because a character was gay, but because the author trusted them with new information. Personally, I don't buy that at all, but I remember this being a much more measured response than those in many other religious blogs I had seen.
I think they (and many of us) were cheering because she went there. After the denial of Remus/Sirius, I think a lot of people figured she wouldn't. There seemed to be a lot of arrows in the direction of that pairing: their reactions to one another, Remus as a character related to the concept of tolerance. And yet, she never went there with them. It was easy to assume that she didn't do so because it was a children's series. It is now easier to see that she didn't go there simply because she didn't see them as gay. And of course Dumbledore, who flew right under my gaydar, was. Perhaps it was unintentional, but it comes off to me now as another one of her red herrings. Well played, JKR.
Dumbledore's homosexuality was enough for me to see as obvious once it was pointed out to me, but subtle enough that I, and many folks, probably would never have seriously guessed. In my opinion, that's the right way to use a character's sexuality - something that can influence them, but not completely overshadow them. She used it with a lot more restraint than many of her other characters' traits.
An aspect that she did rely upon heavily with most of the characters was family conflict or death. Harry's childhood is strongly defined by his parents' death. Many other characters in the series, like Neville, Luna, and Dumbledore, have family deaths as defining moments. Also, the concept of blood status and alignment have a strong presence. In focusing on family relationships alone, we have death, betrayal, bigotry, and many other heavy concepts. However, one concept never mentioned was one that strongly defines family relationships of reality: divorce. JKR was willing to (eventually) address homosexuality in her series, but not divorce. That really stands out to me.
But wait, she did make mention of Harry Potter and divorce more recently. She described her parting with the series as more painful than getting divorced. And yet, I'm racking my brain and coming up negative for even one offhand mention of someone's parents being divorced in the series. Even the bad guys had lasting marriages. The Malfoys in particular are displayed as a family unit, especially in Book 7. The only marriage I can recall in the series that might be on the rocks in that of the Lestranges, due to Bellatrix's infatuation with Voldemort. And thankfully, they never had children. (And, thanks to Makani, I have an image of my head of Bellatrix tossing her children into a volcano at Voldy's command.)
There are rarely even instances where one parent isn't present. Luna's mother died in an accident, and because of this, Luna is better able to relate to Harry in Book 5. Dean's father died, and according to JKR, he died because he wouldn't become a Death Eater. Blaise, who has always seemed to me like a sort of anti-Dean, most likely lost his father to his mother's murderous greed, in the reverse-Henry-the-Eighth thing she had going. Death of one parent is explored, but very little is shown in the way of clear marital strife.
Considering that JKR went through a divorce sometime in between thinking up the concept of the first book and actually getting it published, writing about it may have hit too close to home. Or maybe it, more than homosexuality, was a concept she didn't feel right addressing in a children's book. Overall, being a child of divorce myself, her sidestepping of the issue just puzzles me.
After several months of nothing particularly fannish on my mind, I woke up this morning thinking about Dumbledore. After JKR let us know he was gay, I remember some religious blogger (who, for the life of me, I cannot remember the name of) writing specifically about the audience reaction to this fact. If I'm remembering this correctly, he basically stated that the crowd was cheering at JKR's honesty with them, not at the fact that one of her characters was homosexual. At some point, the audience laughed/cheered, and this blogger seemed to think it was a reaction based on previous crowd/speaker interplay. They were happy not because a character was gay, but because the author trusted them with new information. Personally, I don't buy that at all, but I remember this being a much more measured response than those in many other religious blogs I had seen.
I think they (and many of us) were cheering because she went there. After the denial of Remus/Sirius, I think a lot of people figured she wouldn't. There seemed to be a lot of arrows in the direction of that pairing: their reactions to one another, Remus as a character related to the concept of tolerance. And yet, she never went there with them. It was easy to assume that she didn't do so because it was a children's series. It is now easier to see that she didn't go there simply because she didn't see them as gay. And of course Dumbledore, who flew right under my gaydar, was. Perhaps it was unintentional, but it comes off to me now as another one of her red herrings. Well played, JKR.
Dumbledore's homosexuality was enough for me to see as obvious once it was pointed out to me, but subtle enough that I, and many folks, probably would never have seriously guessed. In my opinion, that's the right way to use a character's sexuality - something that can influence them, but not completely overshadow them. She used it with a lot more restraint than many of her other characters' traits.
An aspect that she did rely upon heavily with most of the characters was family conflict or death. Harry's childhood is strongly defined by his parents' death. Many other characters in the series, like Neville, Luna, and Dumbledore, have family deaths as defining moments. Also, the concept of blood status and alignment have a strong presence. In focusing on family relationships alone, we have death, betrayal, bigotry, and many other heavy concepts. However, one concept never mentioned was one that strongly defines family relationships of reality: divorce. JKR was willing to (eventually) address homosexuality in her series, but not divorce. That really stands out to me.
But wait, she did make mention of Harry Potter and divorce more recently. She described her parting with the series as more painful than getting divorced. And yet, I'm racking my brain and coming up negative for even one offhand mention of someone's parents being divorced in the series. Even the bad guys had lasting marriages. The Malfoys in particular are displayed as a family unit, especially in Book 7. The only marriage I can recall in the series that might be on the rocks in that of the Lestranges, due to Bellatrix's infatuation with Voldemort. And thankfully, they never had children. (And, thanks to Makani, I have an image of my head of Bellatrix tossing her children into a volcano at Voldy's command.)
There are rarely even instances where one parent isn't present. Luna's mother died in an accident, and because of this, Luna is better able to relate to Harry in Book 5. Dean's father died, and according to JKR, he died because he wouldn't become a Death Eater. Blaise, who has always seemed to me like a sort of anti-Dean, most likely lost his father to his mother's murderous greed, in the reverse-Henry-the-Eighth thing she had going. Death of one parent is explored, but very little is shown in the way of clear marital strife.
Considering that JKR went through a divorce sometime in between thinking up the concept of the first book and actually getting it published, writing about it may have hit too close to home. Or maybe it, more than homosexuality, was a concept she didn't feel right addressing in a children's book. Overall, being a child of divorce myself, her sidestepping of the issue just puzzles me.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-31 08:47 pm (UTC)Also, people growing up with overbearing strong grandmothers, like Neville does, are normally the product of teen-pregnancy or something, but Rowling can say "Well, unfortunately his heroic parents were tortured into insanity by Bellatrix Psychotic Bitch Lestrange - that's why he lives with his granny!" Everything has to be larger than life and "Sometimes people start a family but things don't work out and maybe there is some tension then, but it can work pretty well in he end with shared custody, new relationships etc. :/" doesn't fit in there.
Albus heart could have been broken when his first boyfriend cheated on him, the week after his little sister died on tuberculosis - but that's not what we read fantasy books for. In fantasy we want and get huge catalysts for normal emotions.
Note, Rowling deals with her mother dying when she is an adult woman by making Harry an orphan who later loses his godfather and more and more and more people - She is completely exaggerating the normal tragedies and problems most people deal with every day. The negative feeling children have when their parents get divorced is also very easy to exaggerate into "being an orphan and completely alone in the world".
That could maybe be the reason, idk.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-22 08:46 am (UTC)