things that make you go...wtf?
Remember that post yesterday, about wanting to resign from the human race? Maybe I'll just resign from fandom instead. It's no secret I'm a H/G shipper. Normally I'm a live and let live kinda gal. I don't really get involved in 'shipping debates. I can empathize with the fact that the H/Hr 'shippers are upset because their ship has been sunk. I could empathize with some of them a lot more if they were handling things more gracefully than they are. I've refrained from commenting here too much on the H/Hr situation, out of respect for the H/Hr 'shippers I know who seem to be reasonable, sane people.
However, most of the following questions, which are posted at hermionepotter.net, just made me go...huh? So I figured I would allow myself this one post to spout off about it and be done with it. I think for the most part, I've managed to restrain the worst of my sarcasm.
1-Why didn't you follow up on several plotlines from the Order of the Phoenix, like Harry's grief over Sirius, S.P.E.W., etc. (Some of us feel that things like the DA, grief over Sirius were glossed over).
She's damned if she does, she's damned if she doesn't. People criticized OotP for being too long, having too much dross, too much stuff that wasn't essential to the plotline. Now people are whinging because she didn't spend all the time they thought she should have on SPEW, on Harry's grief over Sirius, over the DA, etc. Maybe she didn't follow up on them because they weren't significant to the plotline of this book. We saw Harry's grief (and anger) over Sirius's death at the end of book five, and it was mentioned in book 6. Exactly how much time did you expect her to spend on it? We know he's sad at losing Sirius. We don't need Jo to drive the point home with paragraph after paragraph of Harry moping and moaning and generally being miserable and suicidal. And here's a thought...people deal with grief in different ways. We already know that Harry internalizes a bunch of stuff. He's not one to share his feelings with others. For that matter, he's really not one to share his feelings with the narrator all that much, either, at least not to the point that we get scads of detail about what Harry is feeling every single second. How, exactly, were we supposed to see his grief play out? In a heartfelt conversation with Hermione?
(Hermione shows up at Harry's door mid-summer)
Hermione: Harry, I'm here to rescue you from your depths of despair.
Harry: I...I can't go on. He's dead. Life is worthless. Here, help me make a noose out of this rope, will you?
Hermione: Oh, Harry, I'm here for you. Let's shag, you can pour all your grief and misery into me in one shattering orgasmic moment.
Harry: (contemplates for a moment) Uh...okay.
(They remove all their clothes and proceed to poke like bunnies on viagra.)
Harry spending much time wailing and wearing sackcloth and ashes would have been melodrama rather than drama, and is more befitting of fanfiction. People are accusing her of writing HBP as if it were fanfiction, but Weepy!Harry is most definitely a fanfiction incarnation and didn't really have a place in this book.
As for SPEW...again, it's just not that important to this story. It was more for comic relief in OotP, and it could have been lifted completely out of the book without any loss to the plot. So she chose not to follow up on it. It's no...big...deal. As for the DA, Harry said it himself, that they didn't really need it with Umbridge gone. And perhaps she used the absence of the DA to show that things went horribly wrong at the end of the book without it. No one listened to the hat, the school still isn't united, and not nearly enough students came to help during the battle at the school. Maybe its absence was more significant for this book than its presence.
2-Why did you spend so long developing Hermione's character and not Ginny's?
Maybe because Jo admits that a large part of Hermione is built upon her own experiences and character as a young girl. And, as part of the trio, it's reasonable to expect that we'd see more characterization of Hermione. Why does that automatically mean she's the heroine of the story? Why does that mean she must be the character Harry winds up with? This is not a romance novel, and there isn't any more time spent characterizing Hermione than there is Ron, but you rarely see anyone (H/Hr 'shippers, anyway) claiming that Ron is a hero as well as Harry. Why not? Why can't a story have two heroes? Why must it have a hero and a heroine? Why is Hermione a heroine? Why do you criticize Jo for writing a formulaic, cliche story, but then wail because she's not sticking with the formula in not making Hermione the heroine to Harry's hero?
3-What exactly do you see WRONG with choosing to ship H/Hr (you made it pretty clear from your interview with Emerson and Melissa that you took issue with people shipping H/Hr. You gave the impression that you thought we were stupid for following this ship, saying you're mystified and making the comment that 'if anyone still ships H/Hr...')
I don't think Jo said there was anything wrong with 'shipping H/Hr. I think she's just genuinely baffled that after reading the first five books (and especially the sixth), anyone could believe that she was aiming for a Harry/Hermione romance. Maybe she doesn't understand why anyone would continue to 'ship a pairing that isn't going to happen in canon. Maybe that's not meant to be an insult, but it's simply a thought born of a mindset that doesn't account for the difference in canon shipping and fanon shipping.
4-How does Ron snogging Lavender suddenly make him worthy of Hermione? That makes no sense.
She explained this to you in the interview.
Because he's had the meaningless physical experience - let’s face it, his emotions were never deeply engaged with Lavender - - and he's realized that that is ultimately not what he wants, which takes him a huge emotional step forward.
In most respects, Ron already was worthy of Hermione (and I could write the essay about it, but I don't have space here). However, Ron, like many teenage boys, is easily swayed by the physical attributes of a girl, which Lavender seems to possess in spades. Ron's romance with Lavender was necessary for him to realize that there is more to a relationship than kissing. He didn't connect with Lavender emotionally...and that connection is what he'll be looking for in a relationship with Hermione. So, no, the act of snogging Lavender in an of itself doesn't make him more worthy of Hermione...but the change it caused in his mindset most certainly does.
5-You said we H/Hr people need to go back and re-read the books, yet you admit you don't re-read your own work. That leads us to ask why don't YOU re-read any of the past five books?
Why should she?
Whoever asked this question...do you write fanfiction? Are your stories complete? If you do and they are, do you regularly go back and re-read them? If and when you do, do you tend to find flaws in them that make you cringe? No author is perfect, and anyone can go back through their own stuff and see stuff that they'd like to change. Jo's books are published...she can't just go and revise them any time she finds an error or something she'd like to fix, which is likely to make re-reading them uncomfortable for her. And, really, the thought of re-reading your own stuff periodically for entertainment is...kind of disturbing. As for keeping things in line with what she's already written, in one of the post HBP interviews and on other occasions, Jo has said that frequently she will look something up in one of the books, or at the Lexicon if there is something she is unsure about.
6-Do you also agree that Hermione equally fits your description of Harry's perfect girl? (We advise you to re-read your comments to Emerson and Melissa so you'll remember what you said. Then think back on the way you've written Hermione in the first five books before you give an answer). I'd like to add this: If the answer is yes, Hermione has all of those qualities, then why would it be unreasonable for people to assume H/Hr are right for one another as a couple?
Let's see: tough, gutsy, funny, warm, compassionate
No, I don't think I'd describe Hermione in quite that manner. I'm certain I wouldn't describe her as funny. Hermione is not known for her sense of humor. She's compassionate to house elves, certainly. She wasn't exactly compassionate towards Luna in book 5. Hermione can be tough, when she needs to be, otherwise she wouldn't have braved going into the forest with Umbridge, or capturing Rita in a jar. But warm? I'd have to see some examples of her being characterized as warm. And as far as gutsy...I'd say Hermione is more cautious than gutsy. Gutsy is defined as "marked by courage or daring, plucky, robust and uninhibited, lusty." Hermione is definitely not uninhibited. She's the member of the trio who thinks before she acts, and weighs the consequences. Courageous...sure. Daring? No. Harry more daring tendencies seem to give her great pause.
7-Why do you have Hermione (and every other character) behaving so out of character in this book?
She's not. Anything that Hermione did in this book, I can give you a precedent for in an earlier book. And probably the other characters, too.
8-Why did you indulge in ridiculing our ship with Emerson and Melissa?
At no point in that interview did Jo ridicule the H/Hr ship or shippers. She refused to use the word delusional and did not use any derogatory words about H/Hr 'shippers.
9-Why did you allow the shipping debate to go on for so many years (and allow so many to be hurt)?
Maybe because you guys refused to listen when she said that Harry and Hermione were very platonic friends? Which she said years ago? Maybe it wasn't a matter of her allowing the debates to go on as much as it was a matter of the debates continuing despite being given evidence that the H/Hr ship wouldn't sail?
And here, I have to ask...if the situation was reversed, and it was the H/G and R/Hr camp screaming about how Jo had led them on and had insulted them and hurt their feelings, blah, blah, blah...what would your reaction be? That they were delusional? That it was funny as hell? That they got what they deserved?
10-Did you deliberately mislead H/Hr shippers by writing a deep and powerful friendship between H/Hr? Adding this: If the answer is yes, you purposefully kept the shipping wars going, why?
How is portraying Harry and Hermione's friendship misleading the 'shippers? How is the friendship between Harry and Hermione any more powerful than the one between Ron and Harry? And just because Harry and Hermione are good friends, does that automatically mean they'll wind up together? I've been involved in deep friendships with guys that were just that...deep friendships.
11-How much thought did you put into symbolism in your books?
Can't answer for her there. But I will say that I think some folks have a tendency to read into certain "symbols" something that isn't really there.
12-What was the symbolic significance of Buckbeak, and the changing of his name? Or was there no significance?
How the hell is changing his name important? Because you think it means the ship is "withered?" Let's break out the dictionary again.
with·ers
pl.n. The high part of the back of a horse or similar animal, located between the shoulder blades.
Did it occur to any of you that Witherwings refers to the placement of Buckbeak's wings? And that maybe she changed his name...just because that's what Hagrid would do so that no one would know it was Buckbeak and thus come and cut his head off?
As far as Buckbeak's significance in the first place...maybe he was just a convenient mode of transportation from the ground to the room where Sirius was held prisoner, as well as a way to show that the Ministry is really run by a bunch of complete gits.
13-What do you think of circular imagry as being significant to continuous movement and evolution in a friendship (as opposed to stagnation)? I noticed in OOTP and HBP you used circular imagry in relation to H/Hr, with Pigwidgeon zooming round H/Hr's head, Hermione's teacup running round Harry's, the canaries flying round Hermione. Did you put thought into writing that, or was that all just a fluke?
I personally think it's bunk. You know what comes to mind with circular imagery? Circular logic. People running around in circles. Dogs chasing their tails. Which is what some of you seem to be doing, which gets you exactly...nowhere. Maybe it was all just innocent detail. And how did the canaries have anything to do with Harry? Hermione was alone when she conjured them, and she later used them to attack Ron. How does that have anything to do with H/Hr?
14-Why didn't Fawkes come to fight with Dumbledore in HBP? He did in OOTP and died for him once, reverting back to baby Fawkes.
Can't answer this, don't really want to. It's likely got something to do with whether or not Dumbledore knew he was going to die.
15-Would you please point out text in books 1-5 that show Ginny maturing to the point that she could seriously be considered Harry's equal and Hermione is not?
I don't think anyone ever said Hermione wasn't Harry's equal. But how, pray tell, is Ginny not also his equal?
16-What happened to the closeness that Hermione and Harry shared in book five? Considering you haven't re-read your own books, you may not understand what I mean by that so I will clarify. Book five is known as the Harry and Hermione show. Hermione was Harry's voice of conscience, the one he depended on more than Ron or Ginny or anyone else to help him get through his fifth year. Where did the trust that they shared go in book six?
It's known as the Harry and Hermione show to you, maybe. Many of the rest of us know it as the CapsLock!Harry show. How is it he depended on Hermione to get him through this year, when the person he most wanted to talk to...was Sirius? And when Hermione didn't believe he was experiencing visions rather than dreams?
And why...WHY do you folks insist on saying that Hermione was Harry's conscience? And even if she is, why you would think this is significant for their romantic relationship? This, more than anything else I read about H/Hr, makes me cringe.
Hi, I'm Delylah. I've been married more than six years now to a man I've known for about 25 years. (I'm 34, not that it matters) He is, without a doubt, my best friend. He hasn't always been my best friend. We were close sometimes, and sometimes we weren't. One thing he is NOT, however, is my conscience. I don't need him to be my conscience...I have my own, thank you very much. My conscience is part of me, it is MY sense of what is right and what is wrong. I am not his conscience either. He also has his own sense of what is right and what is wrong. The only relationship I can think of in which a person serves as another person's conscience is the parental relationship...when kids are young and their parents are still teaching them what is right and what is wrong. It's certainly not something I would say is characteristic of a romantic relationship, or even a friendly one. Yes, friends and partners rely on each other for advice and support, but they don't need each other to tell them what is right and what is wrong. That is something each person must ultimately decide for him-or-herself.
17-Why was Hermione always so quick to believe in Harry in books 1-5 but not book six, when he was so sure of his convictions, and no one else was ready or willing to believe him?
Maybe because that was a defining point in Harry's maturity...learning to rely on himself, not on Ron or Hermione or Dumbledore.
18-Do you believe that relationships built on bickering last and are healthy?
Oh, dear, sweet Lord. No one builds a relationship on bickering. This is just too ridiculous to dignify with an answer. Just because Ron and Hermione bicker doesn't mean that will be the foundation of their relationship.
19-Does Ginny know any other hexes besides the bat-bogey hex? If so, what are they, and why have we never seen her use them?
Maybe it's just her favorite. Who cares what other hexes she can use? It's not particularly relevant to the story, now, is it?
20-Why should we believe that Harry was able to form a relationship with Ginny in only one summer and part of the school year that is deep enough to make her his equal when you'd spent five years building up that kind of bond between Harry and Hermione? Or were you unaware that you were doing that? And how is it that Hermione falls so short of being worthy of Harry?
Newsflash: Lots of people develop deep relationships with or even get married to people they've known for less than five years. Some people get married to people they've known for three weeks, and they stay married 'til they die. Lots of people in different cultures get married to people they've never met before in their lives and have strong, healthy marriages. Forming the relationship with Harry isn't what made Ginny his equal. She was already his equal before they were involved in the relationship.
And when did Jo EVER say that Hermione was not worthy of Harry? Not suited and not worthy are two different things entirely. To be suited means to be appropriate for. To be worthy means to have worth, merit or value. Certainly Hermione may be worthy of Harry...but that doesn't mean she would be suited for him. And did it ever occur to you that this is just the way Jo wants it? It's her book, after all.
21-Why did you invite two admitted R/Hr, H/G fans to interview you, but you did not also invite a representative of H/Hr to interview you?
Maybe because they were the site owners of two of the most popular general Harry Potter fansites out there, and that their ship preferences were incidental? Mugglnet and the Leaky Cauldron more than anything else are newssites, not 'ship sites. They report the latest news on Harry Potter books and movies and whatnot to the fandom in general...it's appropriate that those sites should have first dibs at an interview with Jo. Why not a D/Hr representative? Or D/G? Or Harry/Giant Squid? Because 'shipping wasn't the focus of the interview...the book was.
22-What gives you the impression that all H/Hr fans hate Ron? We do not. I, for one, love him. Just not with Hermione. Do you believe that that means I hate him? What is your take on the venom that Hermione has been subjected to by SOME H/G shippers who, prior to book six, viewed Hermione as a possible threat for Harry's affections? I see you had no issues with believing the worst about H/Hr shippers hating Ron, but what about the H/G shippers showing hatred for Hermione?
I rarely see even H/G shippers express hatred for Hermione, though I'm not going to say it doesn't happen. Many of us are OBHWF 'shippers...and we love Hermione for Ron. I don't think Jo ever said that all H/Hr fans hate Ron. It was Melissa that made the comment about Ron suffering horribly...and he has, at the hands of some H/Hr shippers. Unfortunately, many of them seem to be the loudest voices in the H/Hr camp, and logically, you should realize that negative things that are said about a character are going to jump out at someone much more strongly than positive things that are said about a character. That's just the way of the world. Unfortunately for all our ships, it's the idiots who seem to get most of the attention.
23-Did Dumbledore order Snape to kill him?
Give me a break. Why would she answer this before book 7 is out?
24-Why did we not learn more about Snape's past with the Marauders and Lily?
Maybe because it's not significant to the plot? Or maybe because we'll learn more about it in book 7?
25-Why did we not learn more about Harry's parents?
See above.
26-I realize Umbridge has connections in the Ministry, but sending two dementors out to murder a fifteen year old boy, and also preparing to use the Cruciatus Curse on Harry, would surely earn her a place in Azkaban, if not fired?
Can we say corruption, ladies and gentlemen? Good, I knew you could. I don't think she could have made it any clearer by now that the Ministry is rife with corruption, which is how Umbridge managed to escape any punishment. Not to mention the fact that there were no adults witness to her statements, and that the Slytherins would have contradicted anything the Gryffindors would have said about her, and that Fudge would have believed them.
27-Why all the mention of love potions? It was a very strong element in the story. What were their significance to the characters? With the exception of Ron accidentally eating some of Romilda's love potion, were any of the characters ever under the influence of love potion?
I think Harry would have had to have consumed the love potion to be affected by it. And maybe that was the point of Ron eating the chocolate...to show the difference between his behavior under the influence of the potion, and Harry's behavior.
28-When Harry and Ron come upon Ginny and Dean kissing, there is a little girl who drops a bottle of toad spawn. Harry is then described as feeling sick and dizzy. Is this an effect of the toad spawn? Was that indeed toad spawn or something else? Or was that merely a reaction to Ginny and Dean?
I think the paragraph in question clearly indicates that Harry was already feeling disoriented and dizzy before the bottle was dropped, so much so that he "hardly noticed the glass shattering." Do you think the toad spawn affected him before the bottle broke?
This...this is why the word delusional comes up time and time again. Even faced with the author's own comments about the 'ships in book 6, where she speaks warmly of them and indicates that this is how she's always planned it would be, and says how much she likes Ginny and Ron, some of you never stop reaching for anything...ANYTHING...to explain away the evidence handed to you on a silver platter.
A delusion is a false belief strongly held in spite of invalidating evidence.
All I can say is, if the shoe fits...
29-What the hell IS toad spawn, exactly? What do you do with it? Why would anyone carry bottles of it around?
That little girl was probably either Crabbe or Goyle. And who knows what they might be up to with it? Why the hell would anyone think this was important enough to ask about? Maybe he/she dropped it on purpose, just like the scale was dropped later on...to make noise to warn Malfoy. Stop dwelling on insignificant details!
30-Why did you not reveal more, or go into more detail about the characters feelings on what happened at the DoM? They all nearly died, Sirius was killed there. Why did you not portray lingering psychological/emotional backlash from that in book six?
Again...that would be melodrama, not drama. Jo spent enough time on it in book 5. Just because the fanfic epics of the past two years spent chapters upon chapters waxing poetic about the significant impact of said incident doesn't mean that it's important enough to appear in the book. It's NOT RELEVANT TO THE PLOT LINE.
31-Am I correct in assuming that you believe snogging matures these kids more than having near-death experiences in the DoM?
Not dignifying this with an answer.
Wait a minute, yes, I will, because Jo sort of addresses this in the interview.
But having said that, I disagree inasmuch as mine are very character-driven books, and it’s so important, therefore, that we see these characters fall in love, which is a necessary part of life.
Like it or not, romance, who loves who, who is snogging who, who is breaking up with who, has a lot to do with the daily drama in many teenager's lives. It's been a while, but that doesn't mean I don't remember my experiences as a teenager, and I remember that the subject of romance was one I dwelled upon a good bit. Whether or not the guy I had a crush on replied to my note could either make or break my day sometimes. Like Jo said...love is a necessary part of life, it's a necessary and significant part of growing up. No, I doubt she believes that snogging matures them more than having near death experiences...more that it matures them in a different manner.
32-One last question, about your anvil sized hints. You said that we should go back and re-read your books (something you admittedly won't even do, I, for one, have read your books more than you ever will) because we misinterpreted your writing, you didn't write H/Hr into the books, and you seem to want us to believe that you didn't put H/Hr shipping moments into the books to lead us on. You said that by the time we got to Krum in GoF everyone should have known it would be R/Hr. Got to Krum where? Do you mean the Yule Ball? Fine, I'll accept that.
But I would like to ask you about the Harry/Krum talk about Hermione. Usually, when a girl has a crush on a boy, she is unable to shut up about said boy. Thus it would be logical for Krum to think something was going on between Harry and Hermione because she never shuts up about him. If you were truly looking to leave no doubt in anyone's mind about H/Hr not happening, why didn't you...say...have Krum jealous of Ron? Harry could have overheard a conversation between Ron and Krum, or Ron could have told Harry the kind of questions that Krum asked him about his relationship with Hermione, but no, you had Krum suspicious of Harry. If you TRULY didn't want to egg on the shipping wars, you could have used Harry's dialogue to say this: "She's not my girlfriend, and she never will be." Then, in later interviews, you could have made it clear that no, H/Hr won't happen. Instead, you not only refused to end the shipping wars, but you go on to write H/Hr even closer than before in OOTP, and on top of that you had Cho Chang display jealousy over Hermione instead of Ginny. You had her suspect that something was up between Harry and Hermione, thereby adding fuel to the shipping wars. Not to mention you showed Hermione as reacting somewhat jealously over Harry kissing Cho.
So my question is this: Why did you drop anvil sized H/Hr hints like the ones above, if you were so mystified that H/Hr shippers even existed? If you wanted your readers to know that you were going to go R/Hr, H/G, why not spend books 1-5 building up Harry and Ginny's relationship, instead of deliberately misleading H/Hr shippers with anvil sized red-herrings? Obviously you knew of the Harmony ship, you were aware of what we looked for to support our ship, and you willfully wrote those things into your books. Why?
Maybe it was to portray both Krum and Cho as the wrong people for Harry and Hermione? Cho appeared foolish in her jealousy. The fit she pitched made her seem irrational and begins to lessen the reader's empathy for her so that by the end of the book, we are happy to see Harry break it off with Cho (before OotP I had actually been rooting for H/C). With Krum...pretty much the same reason. He was jealous without a reason to be, because Hermione and Harry are simply good friends. Hermione would never be able to have a relationship with a person who is unwilling to accept her friendship with Harry and would be suspicious of it. Likewise, Harry would never be able to have a relationship with someone who is unable to accept his friendship with Hermione and would be suspicious of it.
In Ron and Ginny, two people who have been observing Harry and Hermione's friendship for the past five years...they don't have to worry about it.
However, most of the following questions, which are posted at hermionepotter.net, just made me go...huh? So I figured I would allow myself this one post to spout off about it and be done with it. I think for the most part, I've managed to restrain the worst of my sarcasm.
1-Why didn't you follow up on several plotlines from the Order of the Phoenix, like Harry's grief over Sirius, S.P.E.W., etc. (Some of us feel that things like the DA, grief over Sirius were glossed over).
She's damned if she does, she's damned if she doesn't. People criticized OotP for being too long, having too much dross, too much stuff that wasn't essential to the plotline. Now people are whinging because she didn't spend all the time they thought she should have on SPEW, on Harry's grief over Sirius, over the DA, etc. Maybe she didn't follow up on them because they weren't significant to the plotline of this book. We saw Harry's grief (and anger) over Sirius's death at the end of book five, and it was mentioned in book 6. Exactly how much time did you expect her to spend on it? We know he's sad at losing Sirius. We don't need Jo to drive the point home with paragraph after paragraph of Harry moping and moaning and generally being miserable and suicidal. And here's a thought...people deal with grief in different ways. We already know that Harry internalizes a bunch of stuff. He's not one to share his feelings with others. For that matter, he's really not one to share his feelings with the narrator all that much, either, at least not to the point that we get scads of detail about what Harry is feeling every single second. How, exactly, were we supposed to see his grief play out? In a heartfelt conversation with Hermione?
(Hermione shows up at Harry's door mid-summer)
Hermione: Harry, I'm here to rescue you from your depths of despair.
Harry: I...I can't go on. He's dead. Life is worthless. Here, help me make a noose out of this rope, will you?
Hermione: Oh, Harry, I'm here for you. Let's shag, you can pour all your grief and misery into me in one shattering orgasmic moment.
Harry: (contemplates for a moment) Uh...okay.
(They remove all their clothes and proceed to poke like bunnies on viagra.)
Harry spending much time wailing and wearing sackcloth and ashes would have been melodrama rather than drama, and is more befitting of fanfiction. People are accusing her of writing HBP as if it were fanfiction, but Weepy!Harry is most definitely a fanfiction incarnation and didn't really have a place in this book.
As for SPEW...again, it's just not that important to this story. It was more for comic relief in OotP, and it could have been lifted completely out of the book without any loss to the plot. So she chose not to follow up on it. It's no...big...deal. As for the DA, Harry said it himself, that they didn't really need it with Umbridge gone. And perhaps she used the absence of the DA to show that things went horribly wrong at the end of the book without it. No one listened to the hat, the school still isn't united, and not nearly enough students came to help during the battle at the school. Maybe its absence was more significant for this book than its presence.
2-Why did you spend so long developing Hermione's character and not Ginny's?
Maybe because Jo admits that a large part of Hermione is built upon her own experiences and character as a young girl. And, as part of the trio, it's reasonable to expect that we'd see more characterization of Hermione. Why does that automatically mean she's the heroine of the story? Why does that mean she must be the character Harry winds up with? This is not a romance novel, and there isn't any more time spent characterizing Hermione than there is Ron, but you rarely see anyone (H/Hr 'shippers, anyway) claiming that Ron is a hero as well as Harry. Why not? Why can't a story have two heroes? Why must it have a hero and a heroine? Why is Hermione a heroine? Why do you criticize Jo for writing a formulaic, cliche story, but then wail because she's not sticking with the formula in not making Hermione the heroine to Harry's hero?
3-What exactly do you see WRONG with choosing to ship H/Hr (you made it pretty clear from your interview with Emerson and Melissa that you took issue with people shipping H/Hr. You gave the impression that you thought we were stupid for following this ship, saying you're mystified and making the comment that 'if anyone still ships H/Hr...')
I don't think Jo said there was anything wrong with 'shipping H/Hr. I think she's just genuinely baffled that after reading the first five books (and especially the sixth), anyone could believe that she was aiming for a Harry/Hermione romance. Maybe she doesn't understand why anyone would continue to 'ship a pairing that isn't going to happen in canon. Maybe that's not meant to be an insult, but it's simply a thought born of a mindset that doesn't account for the difference in canon shipping and fanon shipping.
4-How does Ron snogging Lavender suddenly make him worthy of Hermione? That makes no sense.
She explained this to you in the interview.
Because he's had the meaningless physical experience - let’s face it, his emotions were never deeply engaged with Lavender - - and he's realized that that is ultimately not what he wants, which takes him a huge emotional step forward.
In most respects, Ron already was worthy of Hermione (and I could write the essay about it, but I don't have space here). However, Ron, like many teenage boys, is easily swayed by the physical attributes of a girl, which Lavender seems to possess in spades. Ron's romance with Lavender was necessary for him to realize that there is more to a relationship than kissing. He didn't connect with Lavender emotionally...and that connection is what he'll be looking for in a relationship with Hermione. So, no, the act of snogging Lavender in an of itself doesn't make him more worthy of Hermione...but the change it caused in his mindset most certainly does.
5-You said we H/Hr people need to go back and re-read the books, yet you admit you don't re-read your own work. That leads us to ask why don't YOU re-read any of the past five books?
Why should she?
Whoever asked this question...do you write fanfiction? Are your stories complete? If you do and they are, do you regularly go back and re-read them? If and when you do, do you tend to find flaws in them that make you cringe? No author is perfect, and anyone can go back through their own stuff and see stuff that they'd like to change. Jo's books are published...she can't just go and revise them any time she finds an error or something she'd like to fix, which is likely to make re-reading them uncomfortable for her. And, really, the thought of re-reading your own stuff periodically for entertainment is...kind of disturbing. As for keeping things in line with what she's already written, in one of the post HBP interviews and on other occasions, Jo has said that frequently she will look something up in one of the books, or at the Lexicon if there is something she is unsure about.
6-Do you also agree that Hermione equally fits your description of Harry's perfect girl? (We advise you to re-read your comments to Emerson and Melissa so you'll remember what you said. Then think back on the way you've written Hermione in the first five books before you give an answer). I'd like to add this: If the answer is yes, Hermione has all of those qualities, then why would it be unreasonable for people to assume H/Hr are right for one another as a couple?
Let's see: tough, gutsy, funny, warm, compassionate
No, I don't think I'd describe Hermione in quite that manner. I'm certain I wouldn't describe her as funny. Hermione is not known for her sense of humor. She's compassionate to house elves, certainly. She wasn't exactly compassionate towards Luna in book 5. Hermione can be tough, when she needs to be, otherwise she wouldn't have braved going into the forest with Umbridge, or capturing Rita in a jar. But warm? I'd have to see some examples of her being characterized as warm. And as far as gutsy...I'd say Hermione is more cautious than gutsy. Gutsy is defined as "marked by courage or daring, plucky, robust and uninhibited, lusty." Hermione is definitely not uninhibited. She's the member of the trio who thinks before she acts, and weighs the consequences. Courageous...sure. Daring? No. Harry more daring tendencies seem to give her great pause.
7-Why do you have Hermione (and every other character) behaving so out of character in this book?
She's not. Anything that Hermione did in this book, I can give you a precedent for in an earlier book. And probably the other characters, too.
8-Why did you indulge in ridiculing our ship with Emerson and Melissa?
At no point in that interview did Jo ridicule the H/Hr ship or shippers. She refused to use the word delusional and did not use any derogatory words about H/Hr 'shippers.
9-Why did you allow the shipping debate to go on for so many years (and allow so many to be hurt)?
Maybe because you guys refused to listen when she said that Harry and Hermione were very platonic friends? Which she said years ago? Maybe it wasn't a matter of her allowing the debates to go on as much as it was a matter of the debates continuing despite being given evidence that the H/Hr ship wouldn't sail?
And here, I have to ask...if the situation was reversed, and it was the H/G and R/Hr camp screaming about how Jo had led them on and had insulted them and hurt their feelings, blah, blah, blah...what would your reaction be? That they were delusional? That it was funny as hell? That they got what they deserved?
10-Did you deliberately mislead H/Hr shippers by writing a deep and powerful friendship between H/Hr? Adding this: If the answer is yes, you purposefully kept the shipping wars going, why?
How is portraying Harry and Hermione's friendship misleading the 'shippers? How is the friendship between Harry and Hermione any more powerful than the one between Ron and Harry? And just because Harry and Hermione are good friends, does that automatically mean they'll wind up together? I've been involved in deep friendships with guys that were just that...deep friendships.
11-How much thought did you put into symbolism in your books?
Can't answer for her there. But I will say that I think some folks have a tendency to read into certain "symbols" something that isn't really there.
12-What was the symbolic significance of Buckbeak, and the changing of his name? Or was there no significance?
How the hell is changing his name important? Because you think it means the ship is "withered?" Let's break out the dictionary again.
with·ers
pl.n. The high part of the back of a horse or similar animal, located between the shoulder blades.
Did it occur to any of you that Witherwings refers to the placement of Buckbeak's wings? And that maybe she changed his name...just because that's what Hagrid would do so that no one would know it was Buckbeak and thus come and cut his head off?
As far as Buckbeak's significance in the first place...maybe he was just a convenient mode of transportation from the ground to the room where Sirius was held prisoner, as well as a way to show that the Ministry is really run by a bunch of complete gits.
13-What do you think of circular imagry as being significant to continuous movement and evolution in a friendship (as opposed to stagnation)? I noticed in OOTP and HBP you used circular imagry in relation to H/Hr, with Pigwidgeon zooming round H/Hr's head, Hermione's teacup running round Harry's, the canaries flying round Hermione. Did you put thought into writing that, or was that all just a fluke?
I personally think it's bunk. You know what comes to mind with circular imagery? Circular logic. People running around in circles. Dogs chasing their tails. Which is what some of you seem to be doing, which gets you exactly...nowhere. Maybe it was all just innocent detail. And how did the canaries have anything to do with Harry? Hermione was alone when she conjured them, and she later used them to attack Ron. How does that have anything to do with H/Hr?
14-Why didn't Fawkes come to fight with Dumbledore in HBP? He did in OOTP and died for him once, reverting back to baby Fawkes.
Can't answer this, don't really want to. It's likely got something to do with whether or not Dumbledore knew he was going to die.
15-Would you please point out text in books 1-5 that show Ginny maturing to the point that she could seriously be considered Harry's equal and Hermione is not?
I don't think anyone ever said Hermione wasn't Harry's equal. But how, pray tell, is Ginny not also his equal?
16-What happened to the closeness that Hermione and Harry shared in book five? Considering you haven't re-read your own books, you may not understand what I mean by that so I will clarify. Book five is known as the Harry and Hermione show. Hermione was Harry's voice of conscience, the one he depended on more than Ron or Ginny or anyone else to help him get through his fifth year. Where did the trust that they shared go in book six?
It's known as the Harry and Hermione show to you, maybe. Many of the rest of us know it as the CapsLock!Harry show. How is it he depended on Hermione to get him through this year, when the person he most wanted to talk to...was Sirius? And when Hermione didn't believe he was experiencing visions rather than dreams?
And why...WHY do you folks insist on saying that Hermione was Harry's conscience? And even if she is, why you would think this is significant for their romantic relationship? This, more than anything else I read about H/Hr, makes me cringe.
Hi, I'm Delylah. I've been married more than six years now to a man I've known for about 25 years. (I'm 34, not that it matters) He is, without a doubt, my best friend. He hasn't always been my best friend. We were close sometimes, and sometimes we weren't. One thing he is NOT, however, is my conscience. I don't need him to be my conscience...I have my own, thank you very much. My conscience is part of me, it is MY sense of what is right and what is wrong. I am not his conscience either. He also has his own sense of what is right and what is wrong. The only relationship I can think of in which a person serves as another person's conscience is the parental relationship...when kids are young and their parents are still teaching them what is right and what is wrong. It's certainly not something I would say is characteristic of a romantic relationship, or even a friendly one. Yes, friends and partners rely on each other for advice and support, but they don't need each other to tell them what is right and what is wrong. That is something each person must ultimately decide for him-or-herself.
17-Why was Hermione always so quick to believe in Harry in books 1-5 but not book six, when he was so sure of his convictions, and no one else was ready or willing to believe him?
Maybe because that was a defining point in Harry's maturity...learning to rely on himself, not on Ron or Hermione or Dumbledore.
18-Do you believe that relationships built on bickering last and are healthy?
Oh, dear, sweet Lord. No one builds a relationship on bickering. This is just too ridiculous to dignify with an answer. Just because Ron and Hermione bicker doesn't mean that will be the foundation of their relationship.
19-Does Ginny know any other hexes besides the bat-bogey hex? If so, what are they, and why have we never seen her use them?
Maybe it's just her favorite. Who cares what other hexes she can use? It's not particularly relevant to the story, now, is it?
20-Why should we believe that Harry was able to form a relationship with Ginny in only one summer and part of the school year that is deep enough to make her his equal when you'd spent five years building up that kind of bond between Harry and Hermione? Or were you unaware that you were doing that? And how is it that Hermione falls so short of being worthy of Harry?
Newsflash: Lots of people develop deep relationships with or even get married to people they've known for less than five years. Some people get married to people they've known for three weeks, and they stay married 'til they die. Lots of people in different cultures get married to people they've never met before in their lives and have strong, healthy marriages. Forming the relationship with Harry isn't what made Ginny his equal. She was already his equal before they were involved in the relationship.
And when did Jo EVER say that Hermione was not worthy of Harry? Not suited and not worthy are two different things entirely. To be suited means to be appropriate for. To be worthy means to have worth, merit or value. Certainly Hermione may be worthy of Harry...but that doesn't mean she would be suited for him. And did it ever occur to you that this is just the way Jo wants it? It's her book, after all.
21-Why did you invite two admitted R/Hr, H/G fans to interview you, but you did not also invite a representative of H/Hr to interview you?
Maybe because they were the site owners of two of the most popular general Harry Potter fansites out there, and that their ship preferences were incidental? Mugglnet and the Leaky Cauldron more than anything else are newssites, not 'ship sites. They report the latest news on Harry Potter books and movies and whatnot to the fandom in general...it's appropriate that those sites should have first dibs at an interview with Jo. Why not a D/Hr representative? Or D/G? Or Harry/Giant Squid? Because 'shipping wasn't the focus of the interview...the book was.
22-What gives you the impression that all H/Hr fans hate Ron? We do not. I, for one, love him. Just not with Hermione. Do you believe that that means I hate him? What is your take on the venom that Hermione has been subjected to by SOME H/G shippers who, prior to book six, viewed Hermione as a possible threat for Harry's affections? I see you had no issues with believing the worst about H/Hr shippers hating Ron, but what about the H/G shippers showing hatred for Hermione?
I rarely see even H/G shippers express hatred for Hermione, though I'm not going to say it doesn't happen. Many of us are OBHWF 'shippers...and we love Hermione for Ron. I don't think Jo ever said that all H/Hr fans hate Ron. It was Melissa that made the comment about Ron suffering horribly...and he has, at the hands of some H/Hr shippers. Unfortunately, many of them seem to be the loudest voices in the H/Hr camp, and logically, you should realize that negative things that are said about a character are going to jump out at someone much more strongly than positive things that are said about a character. That's just the way of the world. Unfortunately for all our ships, it's the idiots who seem to get most of the attention.
23-Did Dumbledore order Snape to kill him?
Give me a break. Why would she answer this before book 7 is out?
24-Why did we not learn more about Snape's past with the Marauders and Lily?
Maybe because it's not significant to the plot? Or maybe because we'll learn more about it in book 7?
25-Why did we not learn more about Harry's parents?
See above.
26-I realize Umbridge has connections in the Ministry, but sending two dementors out to murder a fifteen year old boy, and also preparing to use the Cruciatus Curse on Harry, would surely earn her a place in Azkaban, if not fired?
Can we say corruption, ladies and gentlemen? Good, I knew you could. I don't think she could have made it any clearer by now that the Ministry is rife with corruption, which is how Umbridge managed to escape any punishment. Not to mention the fact that there were no adults witness to her statements, and that the Slytherins would have contradicted anything the Gryffindors would have said about her, and that Fudge would have believed them.
27-Why all the mention of love potions? It was a very strong element in the story. What were their significance to the characters? With the exception of Ron accidentally eating some of Romilda's love potion, were any of the characters ever under the influence of love potion?
I think Harry would have had to have consumed the love potion to be affected by it. And maybe that was the point of Ron eating the chocolate...to show the difference between his behavior under the influence of the potion, and Harry's behavior.
28-When Harry and Ron come upon Ginny and Dean kissing, there is a little girl who drops a bottle of toad spawn. Harry is then described as feeling sick and dizzy. Is this an effect of the toad spawn? Was that indeed toad spawn or something else? Or was that merely a reaction to Ginny and Dean?
I think the paragraph in question clearly indicates that Harry was already feeling disoriented and dizzy before the bottle was dropped, so much so that he "hardly noticed the glass shattering." Do you think the toad spawn affected him before the bottle broke?
This...this is why the word delusional comes up time and time again. Even faced with the author's own comments about the 'ships in book 6, where she speaks warmly of them and indicates that this is how she's always planned it would be, and says how much she likes Ginny and Ron, some of you never stop reaching for anything...ANYTHING...to explain away the evidence handed to you on a silver platter.
A delusion is a false belief strongly held in spite of invalidating evidence.
All I can say is, if the shoe fits...
29-What the hell IS toad spawn, exactly? What do you do with it? Why would anyone carry bottles of it around?
That little girl was probably either Crabbe or Goyle. And who knows what they might be up to with it? Why the hell would anyone think this was important enough to ask about? Maybe he/she dropped it on purpose, just like the scale was dropped later on...to make noise to warn Malfoy. Stop dwelling on insignificant details!
30-Why did you not reveal more, or go into more detail about the characters feelings on what happened at the DoM? They all nearly died, Sirius was killed there. Why did you not portray lingering psychological/emotional backlash from that in book six?
Again...that would be melodrama, not drama. Jo spent enough time on it in book 5. Just because the fanfic epics of the past two years spent chapters upon chapters waxing poetic about the significant impact of said incident doesn't mean that it's important enough to appear in the book. It's NOT RELEVANT TO THE PLOT LINE.
31-Am I correct in assuming that you believe snogging matures these kids more than having near-death experiences in the DoM?
Not dignifying this with an answer.
Wait a minute, yes, I will, because Jo sort of addresses this in the interview.
But having said that, I disagree inasmuch as mine are very character-driven books, and it’s so important, therefore, that we see these characters fall in love, which is a necessary part of life.
Like it or not, romance, who loves who, who is snogging who, who is breaking up with who, has a lot to do with the daily drama in many teenager's lives. It's been a while, but that doesn't mean I don't remember my experiences as a teenager, and I remember that the subject of romance was one I dwelled upon a good bit. Whether or not the guy I had a crush on replied to my note could either make or break my day sometimes. Like Jo said...love is a necessary part of life, it's a necessary and significant part of growing up. No, I doubt she believes that snogging matures them more than having near death experiences...more that it matures them in a different manner.
32-One last question, about your anvil sized hints. You said that we should go back and re-read your books (something you admittedly won't even do, I, for one, have read your books more than you ever will) because we misinterpreted your writing, you didn't write H/Hr into the books, and you seem to want us to believe that you didn't put H/Hr shipping moments into the books to lead us on. You said that by the time we got to Krum in GoF everyone should have known it would be R/Hr. Got to Krum where? Do you mean the Yule Ball? Fine, I'll accept that.
But I would like to ask you about the Harry/Krum talk about Hermione. Usually, when a girl has a crush on a boy, she is unable to shut up about said boy. Thus it would be logical for Krum to think something was going on between Harry and Hermione because she never shuts up about him. If you were truly looking to leave no doubt in anyone's mind about H/Hr not happening, why didn't you...say...have Krum jealous of Ron? Harry could have overheard a conversation between Ron and Krum, or Ron could have told Harry the kind of questions that Krum asked him about his relationship with Hermione, but no, you had Krum suspicious of Harry. If you TRULY didn't want to egg on the shipping wars, you could have used Harry's dialogue to say this: "She's not my girlfriend, and she never will be." Then, in later interviews, you could have made it clear that no, H/Hr won't happen. Instead, you not only refused to end the shipping wars, but you go on to write H/Hr even closer than before in OOTP, and on top of that you had Cho Chang display jealousy over Hermione instead of Ginny. You had her suspect that something was up between Harry and Hermione, thereby adding fuel to the shipping wars. Not to mention you showed Hermione as reacting somewhat jealously over Harry kissing Cho.
So my question is this: Why did you drop anvil sized H/Hr hints like the ones above, if you were so mystified that H/Hr shippers even existed? If you wanted your readers to know that you were going to go R/Hr, H/G, why not spend books 1-5 building up Harry and Ginny's relationship, instead of deliberately misleading H/Hr shippers with anvil sized red-herrings? Obviously you knew of the Harmony ship, you were aware of what we looked for to support our ship, and you willfully wrote those things into your books. Why?
Maybe it was to portray both Krum and Cho as the wrong people for Harry and Hermione? Cho appeared foolish in her jealousy. The fit she pitched made her seem irrational and begins to lessen the reader's empathy for her so that by the end of the book, we are happy to see Harry break it off with Cho (before OotP I had actually been rooting for H/C). With Krum...pretty much the same reason. He was jealous without a reason to be, because Hermione and Harry are simply good friends. Hermione would never be able to have a relationship with a person who is unwilling to accept her friendship with Harry and would be suspicious of it. Likewise, Harry would never be able to have a relationship with someone who is unable to accept his friendship with Hermione and would be suspicious of it.
In Ron and Ginny, two people who have been observing Harry and Hermione's friendship for the past five years...they don't have to worry about it.