(no subject)

[selene_13]

In my last posts I've been ranting about the crapilogue and the JKR interviews (which I've dubbed The Death of Imagination), and this review manages to capture exactly what I've been meaning to say in a far better (and calmer) fashion:

http://ferretbrain.com/articles/article-160.html

(courtesy of sienna291973, who I thank for pointing this out).

I chose to become a lit major because I love speculation and interpretation of fiction and mythology. I wrote a thesis on a topic (homosexual subtext in 19th century Gothic novels) that could not be approachable if we weren't meant to read between the lines or able to take certain literary constructs and explore them further. My professors taught me to psychoanalyse! The debate, the openness and the possibilities of the text are exactly what I love about reading.

JKR, however, would rather rob me of the ability to make up my own mind about what is obviously HER text and hers alone. I, as the reader with my own mind and opinions, am obsolete with my wishes for or interpretation of her world. Whatever happened to sending your children/books out into the world to make their own way and become their own person?

Honestly, she should have kept her mouth shut and said to all those useless questions: "I've brought you this far. The rest is for you to figure out."

Comments

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Some interesting stuff there, thanks for the reference.

Yes, sometimes when I'm participating in a debate which is particularly telling - exposing weaknesses in the books - as it drags Dumbledore and the wizarding world into the harsh light of reality I take a step back and wonder "hold on, are we really supposed to be treating these books *this seriously*?". They were supposed to be *children's books*, after all!

I enjoyed the author's commentry on JKR's "simplistic worldview", and what seems to me to be JKR's inability to leave her favourite characters as flawed, or gray; instead she bends believability by pronouncing them "perfect after all" in the last few seconds of the closing act. I never ever EVER understood or appreciated why Harry described himself so proudly as "Dumbledore's Man" in HBP, when it seemed clear that Dumbledore was a patronising, smug and arrogant man who was refusing to do what he promised and let Harry know what was happening. So when Harry - at long last! - starting seeing Dumbledore the same way in the first half of DH I was cheering!!! And then we had Dumbledore himself confirm that he had intended Harry to be a martyr all along! Plus string Harry along on that stupid 'quest', instead of just simply telling the lad what to do. So I was flabbergasted, along with everyone else, when the epilogue showed that Harry had reverted to his 'simplistic' adoration of the headmaster.

Ditto Snape, as per the article. A thoroughly nasty piece of work, no doubt murdered people as a Death Eater (was that confirmed in the book?), was instrumental in causing the deaths of Harry's parents ... but Harry forgives him just like that. He *was* brave, I guess ... but also a thoroughly nasty piece of work as well.

I never realised it before, but reading this article shows that JKR's "listen to me, so you know what to think!" attitude from her interviews is really in evidence in the epilogue as well, isn't it? I had been smarting from the smack-down that the epilogue implemented in terms of the 'shipping' outcomes that were set in stone - OBHWF thank you very much, let naught else be allowed - *nothing* irritates me as much as those OBHWF fangirl zombies who can only bleat 'Because JKR said so!' when asked for their reasons on why they put Harry with Ginny, etc - but I can see how JKR's personal (and 'simplistic') opinions of Dumbledore and Snape came shone through as well.

Bah.