the next time I create the universe I'll make sure we communicate (at length)
Okay, this is becoming fun!
Day Two: Favourite Supporting Female Character
and the theme of the day is Sharp and Compassionate Brunettes Who Bring Clarity And Perspective To An Isolated Community.
4. Hermione Granger from, obviously, Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling
Hermione is the humanist skeptic in these books. Whereas Ron is there to introduce Harry to the wizarding world, Hermione is the one who questions it. And she can't really do that without constantly questioning herself.
On the edges of Harry's perception, Hermione keeps sculpting her identity. It's a conscious, complex process. In the first book, she honors friendship above cleverness. In the second book, she sneaks around and breaks rules for truth and justice. In the third, she seeks and finds the limits of her academic potential. Throughout the whole series, she keeps embracing and discarding bits of feminity - sometimes she stands up for other girls, sometimes she feels superior, sometimes inferior to them, sometimes she washes everyone's socks and most time she is the most rational and heroic person around.
But what I love most is the genesis of her identity as a Muggle-born witch. The wizarding world is REALLY DIFFERENT - different mores and expectations, different power structures. It takes her a while to understand them enough to be able to change them, but she definitely gets there.
[I find it kind of sad that the things she's most criticised for in fandom are her SPEW efforts (in which she tries applying Muggle methods to a magical problem and it doesn't work) and her jinxing an official document and endangering Umbridge (in which she does exactly what is expected of a witch - because, you know, the magical world is batshit and misdeeds get punished disproportionately all the time - and readers feel betrayed).]
So, what I need in my life is a story about Hermione taking all she learned and changing the world in a grand, lasting manner, with her lover and her best friend supporting her this time.
5. Shae from Game of Thrones
Shae is by far the show's greatest success. Like in the books, she is a camp prostitute who follows Tyrion to the capital and gets threatened by his evil father. Unlike in the books, she is an adult who is capable of making choices - and is, at any point, free to leave without having to sacrifice her entire financial security. Also unlike the books, she has a strong sense of identity - she is an immigrant, and it's implied that she'd lost someone.
From her very first wry one-liner, Shae's thing is her sarcastic plain-spokenness. It is part of her charm, her sex worker persona - but it is also her defiance against power and etiquette and destructive hypocrisy. She rolls her eyes at the queen's all-women-are-whores melodrama, and she adopts adorable lost listless Sansa and tries to keep her safe by bossing her around. She yells at Tyrion when she thinks yelling is called for (which is often) and definitely doesn't consent to sex unless she feels like it.
Basically, while Shae doesn't forget about power differences, and doesn't let Tyrion forget about them either, she builds microcosms where they don't matter. It's partly refuge in audacity, and partly that she is a human being who has emotions and chooses to love people who are worthy of them. (Which is rare among the women of GoT - so many of them suppress all their feelings, to achieve safety or power or both. I understand why this is necessary, but also tire easily of robotic mysteriousness.)
None of it would work without her strong sense of identity, and her constant awareness of how hilariously dangerous and harmful the society she'd entered is.
"But I am Lord of Casterly Rock," Tyrion says, when she points out that they should flee while they can.
"And I am Shae, the funny whore," she says, because titles don't actually matter, because equality is where you make it, and because it is still possible to escape the looming doom overhead - and I really wish/hope the show will acknowledge that she's right.
6. Ekaterin Vorsoisson Vorkosigan from The Broken Sword by hedda62, Vorkosigan fic
In which the Emperor comes to Ekaterin with a confession, weeds her garden and endangers her life. I love the trust and warmth and hilariousness between Gregor and Ekaterin (and they're so delightfully platonic too!), but mostly I love that the fic examines Ekaterin's role as an outsider to the Vorkosigan/Vorbarra conglomeration - someone who is analytical and unbiased and compassionate enough to help without being overwhelming.
Day Two: Favourite Supporting Female Character
and the theme of the day is Sharp and Compassionate Brunettes Who Bring Clarity And Perspective To An Isolated Community.
4. Hermione Granger from, obviously, Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling
Hermione is the humanist skeptic in these books. Whereas Ron is there to introduce Harry to the wizarding world, Hermione is the one who questions it. And she can't really do that without constantly questioning herself.
On the edges of Harry's perception, Hermione keeps sculpting her identity. It's a conscious, complex process. In the first book, she honors friendship above cleverness. In the second book, she sneaks around and breaks rules for truth and justice. In the third, she seeks and finds the limits of her academic potential. Throughout the whole series, she keeps embracing and discarding bits of feminity - sometimes she stands up for other girls, sometimes she feels superior, sometimes inferior to them, sometimes she washes everyone's socks and most time she is the most rational and heroic person around.
But what I love most is the genesis of her identity as a Muggle-born witch. The wizarding world is REALLY DIFFERENT - different mores and expectations, different power structures. It takes her a while to understand them enough to be able to change them, but she definitely gets there.
[I find it kind of sad that the things she's most criticised for in fandom are her SPEW efforts (in which she tries applying Muggle methods to a magical problem and it doesn't work) and her jinxing an official document and endangering Umbridge (in which she does exactly what is expected of a witch - because, you know, the magical world is batshit and misdeeds get punished disproportionately all the time - and readers feel betrayed).]
So, what I need in my life is a story about Hermione taking all she learned and changing the world in a grand, lasting manner, with her lover and her best friend supporting her this time.
5. Shae from Game of Thrones
Shae is by far the show's greatest success. Like in the books, she is a camp prostitute who follows Tyrion to the capital and gets threatened by his evil father. Unlike in the books, she is an adult who is capable of making choices - and is, at any point, free to leave without having to sacrifice her entire financial security. Also unlike the books, she has a strong sense of identity - she is an immigrant, and it's implied that she'd lost someone.
From her very first wry one-liner, Shae's thing is her sarcastic plain-spokenness. It is part of her charm, her sex worker persona - but it is also her defiance against power and etiquette and destructive hypocrisy. She rolls her eyes at the queen's all-women-are-whores melodrama, and she adopts adorable lost listless Sansa and tries to keep her safe by bossing her around. She yells at Tyrion when she thinks yelling is called for (which is often) and definitely doesn't consent to sex unless she feels like it.
Basically, while Shae doesn't forget about power differences, and doesn't let Tyrion forget about them either, she builds microcosms where they don't matter. It's partly refuge in audacity, and partly that she is a human being who has emotions and chooses to love people who are worthy of them. (Which is rare among the women of GoT - so many of them suppress all their feelings, to achieve safety or power or both. I understand why this is necessary, but also tire easily of robotic mysteriousness.)
None of it would work without her strong sense of identity, and her constant awareness of how hilariously dangerous and harmful the society she'd entered is.
"But I am Lord of Casterly Rock," Tyrion says, when she points out that they should flee while they can.
"And I am Shae, the funny whore," she says, because titles don't actually matter, because equality is where you make it, and because it is still possible to escape the looming doom overhead - and I really wish/hope the show will acknowledge that she's right.
6. Ekaterin Vorsoisson Vorkosigan from The Broken Sword by hedda62, Vorkosigan fic
In which the Emperor comes to Ekaterin with a confession, weeds her garden and endangers her life. I love the trust and warmth and hilariousness between Gregor and Ekaterin (and they're so delightfully platonic too!), but mostly I love that the fic examines Ekaterin's role as an outsider to the Vorkosigan/Vorbarra conglomeration - someone who is analytical and unbiased and compassionate enough to help without being overwhelming.