Harry Potter reread open thread, book one

[avawatson]

So Rowan MacBean (@macbean221b on twitter) was looking to do a reread of all the Harry Potter books. This was late June or early July. I jumped on it, since I'm that heathen who never got past the slog of book five, and a few others signed on, but since we're all reading it at (probably) different times and at different paces, we were looking for a common space for a conversation. And because tumblr utterly sucks for threaded comments...well, we're utilizing my LJ space. *ta da*

Some notes: I just turned on anon commenting on my whole blog for this. If you don't have an LJ account and are commenting anon, just sign off so we know who's saying what. Also, captcha is turned on at the moment, but if that gets to be super annoying then I can turn it off. LJ comment threading works just like ao3 comment threading basically, so it shouldn't be entirely too foreign.

@the twitter people who signed on to do the readalong -- you don't have to use these threads, and livetweeting is of course still useful if we're on at similar times. I personally tend to be on way late in the nights and don't nearly get to catch up on day tweets. Personally, if you do livetweet, bringing your comments back here would be lovely, but of course not necessary. This is mainly just for conversation if you like it! And if you wanna use this space for live-commenting, you are very welcome to. (It would basically be you making a comment and then replying to that comment over and over again. It sends a million emails to me but I don't mind!)

@the non-twitter people who responded positively to the reread, you're free to look in on here as well, assuming we get a conversation going!

@Rowan, I don't know if we're going to do one big open thread or one post per book, but I've gone ahead and named this one the "book one" thread obviously. Anything's amenable for change though, so just...lemme know!

P.S. I'm making this thread slightly early so that anyone (looking at you, Chelsea) can get comfortable with the threading/commenting system here. This isn't the most official thing ever, but we were thinking maybe starting the reread on Harry's birthday -- July 31, which is this Friday.

Edit: P.S.S. I forgot one more thing! Introductions are in order, since we definitely won't all know each other. Please also feel free to make introductions in the comments below, including your HP fannish history, your house, OTP, sensitive spots, and whatever else pops into your head. <3

Comments

Intro

[headcumbernerd.livejournal.com]

I am Chelsea, the one Caroline refers to as having no idea what's going on. HeadCumbernerd on twitter (and here now, too) and intricatearticulation on tumblr. Guess which one fit within the character limit for LJ.

- Ravenclaw to my core

- I'm basically Luna with a dash of Hermione.

- I have a thing for Tom Riddle? He's a total dickhead, but the actor who played him in...Chamber of Secrets I think? Fucked me up.

- I really, really do not like Snape. Never did, and especially didn't like the whole "redeeming twist" at the end of the series. I've only ever been able to like him in fic. Speaking of, I just finished "Stealing Harry" per B's encouragement, and I adore that Snape. *shrug* Lily/Snape = NoTP

- I feel like I should write a note to the above, cuz I didn't like Irene all that much until I listened to the passionate, emotional meta drinkingcocoa laid on me in some TPP episode at least a year ago...and my mind changed completely. Here's an official challenge to you, then, to change my mind about that greasy bro.

- I picked up the first HP in 3rd grade when I had read all of the books in our tiny little "box" in the classroom within the first week. Twice. So my teacher gave me the book she was reading to us since it was too much to read on our own... I was hooked immediately. Like, reading past my bedtime with a flashlight under the covers - hooked. I went to all of the midnight premieres of the books in my pajamas, and all of the movie releases as well. Mostly in regular clothes, though.

- I'm rambling. Ummmm Drarry is really great, I also love Hermione/Draco. I've heard Dean/Seamus is a thing and I would like to mark myself as extremely intrigued.

Re: Intro

[thewlisian-afer.livejournal.com]

I recommend EVERY SINGLE THING COPPERBADGE HAS EVER WRITTEN ABOUT ANYTHING. Holy crap. I haven't read him in yeeeeears but he was my favorite fanfic writer before I met mydwynter. XD He'll convince you of any ship he feels like convincing you of. He beta read for me once and I almost died of ecstatic glee.

(Caroline was asking earlier on Twitter how we defined BNF. Copperbadge was a BNF. Like, there should be a fandom dictionary with a picture of him in ~2004.)

(P.S. I AM SO JAZZED ABOUT USING MY LJ ICONS AGAIN)

Re: Intro

[drinkingcocoa.livejournal.com]

"Redeeming twist"? Heh. My guess is that those who did not see that one coming are those who have never been as mean to people as Snape has been. *shifty eyes* His behavior is exactly the guilty behavior of someone who has no one to blame but himself and knows it, not that it makes the dunderheads around him any more tolerable. *very shifty eyes* *hides*

Re: Intro

[drinkingcocoa.livejournal.com]

P.S. If it helps, read Snape as JKR's image of herself. The arrogant, intellectually gifted, young-adult abuse survivor who made a terrible mistake about love, back when she was arguably too young or inexperienced to know any better, that had catastrophic consequences for a defenseless infant.

In an earlier draft, she wrote Harry-on-the-doorstep to be three months old, as her baby Jessica was when she took the baby and went into hiding from her abusive first husband. (Jessica's birthday is late July and they fled the home in late October.) She later revised baby Harry to be a year older than that, but you can see tiny hints of the infant version, most notably in the oddness of Harry-on-the-doorstep being treated as an infant who wouldn't be able to walk or talk. Harry at 15 months would most certainly have been able to walk -- and climb and run -- considering that he's a natural-born athlete of the small-and-speedy type.

So Snape spends the second half of his life living with the consequences of the inexcusable, idiotic bigotry of his late teens, trying to counter as much of the damage as one person can while still loathing the people he originally loathed.

Snape's trajectory is not a story for people who have always managed to stay on the good side of the line between kindness and hate, even if by inches (e.g., Narcissa with no Dark Mark). It's for people who've already committed a crime, wish they hadn't, can't undo it, don't think that way anymore, but still have time left to do on this earth. What then?

Well, for one thing, he can do everything in his power to prevent others from crossing that line as he did ("Expelliarmus!" is the only thing the kids learn in Defense second year). And for kids who do it anyway, he does everything in his power to prevent them from splitting their souls further, retaining as much hope as possible that they still get to live out their lives better than he did.

Ha, hitting post without even re-reading because my own kids will start bursting in any second!