Pearlette to Duj
(Anonymous)
Sorry, but that defense doesn't hold. There's a lot of HP that isn't written very well, but the story and its interpretation stands or falls on what's written, not what we'd like to see written.
Don't patronise me, please. 'That defence doesn't hold' my foot. All interpretation of canon is subjective. And saying that a passage could have been written better doesn't cancel out author intent. I tend towards the Doyalist view when it comes to literary analysis, i.e. the bigger picture, the out-of-universe perspective. That is just naturally the way I read a book. ANY book.
Each reader interprets the text in relation to their own experience of life, and naturally that leads to many differing explanations.
Of course it does. Which makes your interpretation of the text just as subjective as mine.
James is an arrogant bully in the text, and if Hagrid's wrong about James can we trust him about Lily?
Are no shades of shades of grey? If Severus could change from being a paid-up DE to a reformed man, then why is a different standard held for an admittedly more minor character – James? James was certainly guilty of bullying Severus during their school years and then became a dedicated Order fighter and family man. If that's difficult to believe, then the reformed Severus in his misguided youth was a member of a genocidal cult and an accessory to murder (the Potters) – OK, he’s not as culpable as Peter and Voldy but if Severus had never gone running to Voldemort with the Prophecy in the first place, the Potters wouldn’t have been targeted. If that was payback for James, it was terrible indeed. Since Severus never shows any remorse in canon for James’s death (only Lily’s), I can only assume something that the author NEVER shows me in the text. What were you saying about what we’d like to see written? Well, I’d have liked Rowling to write Severus showing some remorse about James and not just Lily (I don’t require that Severus LIKE James) just as I would have liked her to write a reconciliation scene between Severus and Harry.
Petunia remembers Lily as a spoiled pampered princess who played nasty tricks like turning a teacup into a rat.
And you don’t think Petunia’s POV on Lily is somewhat … jaundiced?
Later, while still nominally friends, she flirts with James while Snape chokes and seems to find his sexual assault amusing.
The real threat of sexual assault happens after Lily walks away, when James threatens to take off Sev’s underpants. She’s not there for the worst part of Sev’s ordeal (assuming James went ahead with it) and the reason she isn’t is that Severus called her a racial insult, which is no small potatoes.
I find in her letter that she was a silly and negligent parent
Negligent? How? You mean because she was letting a one year old Harry zoom about on a broomstick and she made a humorous remark about him nearly killing the cat?
You might find Rowling’s humour lame but that’s what it is: HUMOUR. Lighten up!
and when her shade appears in the forest, *encouraging* Harry to go die, she seems even more unsavoury.
Severus also went along with the plan for Harry to die. Against his initial protestations, sure (and I was as appalled at Dumbledore as he was!) but he went along with it.
See, I really don’t want to argue like this about Severus, because I think he rocks. But if you drag Lily down to this level, then Severus comes too. Because he knew Harry had to die. For a whole YEAR. No, he didn’t like it, but he went along with it. So that makes him better than Lily’s shade … how, exactly? And Harry accepts it and doesn’t get angry at any of them, only has doubts about Dumbledore (which he then resolves). That’s why he welcomes his family of shades in the Forest and why he honours Severus at the end of the book.
To me she seems like a prettier, perkier, more talented Petunia.
Fine. I see her differently.
-- Pearlette
Don't patronise me, please. 'That defence doesn't hold' my foot. All interpretation of canon is subjective. And saying that a passage could have been written better doesn't cancel out author intent. I tend towards the Doyalist view when it comes to literary analysis, i.e. the bigger picture, the out-of-universe perspective. That is just naturally the way I read a book. ANY book.
Each reader interprets the text in relation to their own experience of life, and naturally that leads to many differing explanations.
Of course it does. Which makes your interpretation of the text just as subjective as mine.
James is an arrogant bully in the text, and if Hagrid's wrong about James can we trust him about Lily?
Are no shades of shades of grey? If Severus could change from being a paid-up DE to a reformed man, then why is a different standard held for an admittedly more minor character – James? James was certainly guilty of bullying Severus during their school years and then became a dedicated Order fighter and family man. If that's difficult to believe, then the reformed Severus in his misguided youth was a member of a genocidal cult and an accessory to murder (the Potters) – OK, he’s not as culpable as Peter and Voldy but if Severus had never gone running to Voldemort with the Prophecy in the first place, the Potters wouldn’t have been targeted. If that was payback for James, it was terrible indeed. Since Severus never shows any remorse in canon for James’s death (only Lily’s), I can only assume something that the author NEVER shows me in the text. What were you saying about what we’d like to see written? Well, I’d have liked Rowling to write Severus showing some remorse about James and not just Lily (I don’t require that Severus LIKE James) just as I would have liked her to write a reconciliation scene between Severus and Harry.
Petunia remembers Lily as a spoiled pampered princess who played nasty tricks like turning a teacup into a rat.
And you don’t think Petunia’s POV on Lily is somewhat … jaundiced?
Later, while still nominally friends, she flirts with James while Snape chokes and seems to find his sexual assault amusing.
The real threat of sexual assault happens after Lily walks away, when James threatens to take off Sev’s underpants. She’s not there for the worst part of Sev’s ordeal (assuming James went ahead with it) and the reason she isn’t is that Severus called her a racial insult, which is no small potatoes.
I find in her letter that she was a silly and negligent parent
Negligent? How? You mean because she was letting a one year old Harry zoom about on a broomstick and she made a humorous remark about him nearly killing the cat?
You might find Rowling’s humour lame but that’s what it is: HUMOUR. Lighten up!
and when her shade appears in the forest, *encouraging* Harry to go die, she seems even more unsavoury.
Severus also went along with the plan for Harry to die. Against his initial protestations, sure (and I was as appalled at Dumbledore as he was!) but he went along with it.
See, I really don’t want to argue like this about Severus, because I think he rocks. But if you drag Lily down to this level, then Severus comes too. Because he knew Harry had to die. For a whole YEAR. No, he didn’t like it, but he went along with it. So that makes him better than Lily’s shade … how, exactly? And Harry accepts it and doesn’t get angry at any of them, only has doubts about Dumbledore (which he then resolves). That’s why he welcomes his family of shades in the Forest and why he honours Severus at the end of the book.
To me she seems like a prettier, perkier, more talented Petunia.
Fine. I see her differently.
-- Pearlette