The question I would now ask...

[heidi]

Ms Rowling - you've now slammed on people who think draco is redeemable and those who think Snape has layers and/or hidden depths. How do Snape and Draco differ, personality- and attitude-wise, from James Potter in his fifth year, or Sirius who was busy being a rebel?

And can anyone come up with other words for personality-wise and attitude-wise?

Comments

[noblerot.livejournal.com]

And can anyone come up with other words for personality-wise and attitude-wise?

How about rephrasing it to read: How do Snape and Draco differ, in personality and attitude...

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

yeah..that was bit blackandwhite-ish to mee too. I've seen it before and also the thign of beign abit discomforted/unsettled with peopel calign themselves slytherins.


'how do they differ in behavioru and character?"

[anjenue.livejournal.com]

I thought she'd said that Draco doesn't become a DE?

[mmichelle.livejournal.com]

James and Sirius weren't up to their ears in the Dark Arts. :)

And I still think Draco's a bigger prat than James and Sirius ever were (or Snape, for that matter). And remember, I'm speaking as someone who thought Draco was redeemable. Besides, Draco's just a flat character. No depth whatsoever (and I wish so much that there was depth to Draco, because he would be so interesting-- that's why I like writing him). We don't know much about Sirius and James at that age-- all we know is what we've glimpsed through the pensieve. There was probably a lot more to them than we know.

[moony]

Well, Sirius was up to is ears in it, even if it were involuntarily, and I would bet money that he knows as much if not more about the Dark Arts as Snape does.

[mmichelle.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. True, but it was made very clear in Book 5 that he didn't like his family and their connections to the Dark Arts. He didn't take pride in the Dark Arts and didn't support them the way Draco does and Snape did.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

What exactly does that mean, that someone is "up to their ears in the Dark Arts?" What are the Dark Arts and what makes them different from anything else? Seems to me the good guys have no problem with any art, dark or otherwise, either.

[moony]

I suppose if you show an interest in it, you are 'up to your ears in it,' so to speak. And really, how on earth can anyone expect to defend themselves from the Dark Arts if they know nothing about them, I ask you?

[moony]

How in the world can she expect us to believe that Snape has redeemed himself and is a trustworthy member of the Order if she continues to enforce the notion that all Slytherin are evil? Are we supposed to buy that a hat dictates a person's true nature? Are we supposed to dismiss someone based on the House they were Sorted into? Because I was under the impression that it is action, and a person's choices, that reveals who they are, truly.

How can she put Snape in the position he is in and then act surprised that people might like him? We're not all idiot ten-year-old girls, Joanne, and we don't all judge books by their covers.

Lucky for her, eh? -.-

[anjenue.livejournal.com]

Hence the reason Peter and Percy were in Gryffindor and yet turned into Slytherinesque beings, mm?

That aside, when I was reading the transcript, I got the impression that she was just saying Snape is not a nice man. That doesn't mean he's EVIL, just that he's mean. I don't equate the two. But that's my personal opinion.

[casirafics.livejournal.com]

Consider it this way.

She's coming at this from a different perspective than her readers are, yes, and it's a perspective pretty much closed to the kind of endless debates and ponderings and analysis we do, because she knows what's going to happen. It's her story, not ours. And I'm not saying that what we're doing isn't legit or fun or whatever, but it's our own thing, not hers. And as a person who (this is just me personally, I'm not knocking anyone else here) would really rather stick as close to canon as possible (teh Rampant and Explicit Gay Sex Fics notwithstanding *grin*) and not overanalyze everything to death, I sorta sympathize with her on the whole "why is everyone so fascinated with this character I made out to be an evil git?" thing.

Clearly she meant for James and Sirius to turn out all right (but still flawed), and we've already seen that progress accordingly, even if they had their obnoxious (or worse) phases. Clearly Snape's still something of an enigma to the readers, but JKR knows what his progression over that same span of years was even if we don't, and so as far as she's concerned, there probably isn't much to plumb with Snape, per se, just to reveal. Draco -- we're still following him along, but she's given no canon evidence I can see that he's going anywhere but worse, her reaction in interviews seems to indicate the same, and I sorta wish people were willing to take her at face value on that, because she knows what she's talking about -- he's her character, after all.

The basic fact is, the story is what she writes, and if she doesn't intend for Draco to be redeemed, etc, and KNOWS HE WON'T BE, even if we haven't read the endpoint yet, I'd start sounding like this in interviews too.

She's got all the facts. We don't. That's why the analysis and so forth is fun -- but from her perspective, we're probably bewildering sometimes. ;)

[casirafics.livejournal.com]

...or, y'know, you could just look at the whole thing as one big fat red herring.

*grin*

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

I've always thought that was basically where she was coming from as well. She knows things we don't, and furthermore she cannot divorce herself from them and look at these characters objectively from the outside because the information is saturating her brain. So if she knows, for example, that Draco is going to turn out an evil bastard then she's going to have trouble figuring out why people keep thinking he can/should/might turn out to be a fabulous guy.

The comparison between Snape and/or Draco and Sirius and/or James never quite made sense to me, though. James and Sirius were assholes at 15, but so are a lot of people who turn out fine. Snape, on the other hand, is now in his late 30's and not only still picking on people but still picking on children. There's a world of difference between a 15 year old picking on another 15 year old and a 37 year old picking on an 11-15 year old. Even Sirius didn't do that, although it could be argued that he never had a chance. Then again it could also be argued that he was, realistically, still 15 until the day he died for obvious reasons.

Draco is a better comparison, but I think her judgement of him falls under the category of playing to theme. One of the strongest themes in HP is that the quality of one's intentions and heart are what counts: Voldemort has never cared for anything or anyone, or he couldn't turn out the way he did. Lily's love protects Harry. Remus does bad things but is forgivable because he means well... and most explicitly, crucio doesn't work unless you want to make someone hurt and like the idea.

So with Draco vs. Sirius or James, I think what's happening is that she's basing her statements on her knowledge of the "quality" of Draco's metaphorical heart. James and Sirius were gits as teenagers (well, Sirius kept right on being a git) and caused behaved like one, but they had good hearts under all that rubbish. Draco, presumably, doesn't, and is therefore irredeemable even though he hasn't actually DONE all that much.

[thistlerose.livejournal.com]

James and Sirius were both jerks at fifteen, but James at least antagonized his equals whereas adult!Snape torments children. And Sirius recognized that his family was wrong and rebelled against them, whereas Draco appears to hero-worship his father and seems to do very little independent thinking. James and Sirius also went very far out of their way to help Remus Lupin. Their hearts were always in the right place, even if they did some pretty rotten things when they were younger. I'm not sure we can say the same for Snape or Draco.

[ackonrad.livejournal.com]

James and Sirius also went very far out of their way to help Remus Lupin.Their hearts were always in the right place, even if they did some pretty rotten things when they were younger.

Hm, I'm not sure I agree with this. Sirius tried to feed Snape to his best friend, which doesn't sound like 'having your heart in the right place' to me. He not just tried to kill another person, but he also put his friends' life in danger. I'm not trying to justify that Snape's been right for joining the DE, but if Sirius could get another chance, why shouldn't Snape? Trying to kill people for whatever reason doesn't justify it. And we don't know whether Snape's killed anyone as a Death Eater.

As for Draco, he is young. What exactly makes him undeserving of a second chance? He may be spoilt rotten and a git, but he hasn't killed anyone.

[untiemybinds.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry but I have a hard time thinking of James, Sirius and Snape as "equals" in the first place. Maybe in intelligence and age, but I'm really not thinking they were in confidence and self-esteem which is mainly what Sirius and James picked on him using; things that wouldn't make him either of those.

And you know, I know Snape is a bastard but he really didn't seem to be taught anything different by others (that we've seen). Also, no one else but him favours Slytherin at all, and when he was in school a Gryffindor wasn't expelled even after trying to kill him (whether he knew it or not); I think he's sort of just trying to take up the slack, but it could just be because he was treated unfairly. Or he just hates the other Houses.

[kmai.livejournal.com]

i think what she is saying is that from what we have seen of the characters, they are not "dateable"(nice, friendly, kind) guys (neither was james at 15. lily has the sense to brush him off). I think she expresses concern over people wanting to date them/loving them/etc. when they are clearly not nice people. (whether they have layers or whatnot does not cancel out their bad qualities). This is probably from her own past experience of dating jerkish guys and doesnt want people following that example.

Liking them as characters is another thing, JKR expresses that Snape is one of her favorite characters to write (probably because he is complex, who knows).

[thistlerose.livejournal.com]

I think you're right. I think that's what she means.

[psychic-serpent.livejournal.com]

I think that what she's saying about Draco is that she planned for him to be a two-dimensional bully all along and doesn't really care to do more than that with him, whereas she planned to give Snape 'hidden depths' all along. Really, she has shown absolutely no inclination toward making Draco even remotely realistic. She was also alarmed about the idea of people (a friend of hers, for a start) finding Lucius attractive as well, because, like Draco, he is a 'bad boy.' Despite the fun she has writing Snape she also finds people's affection for him alarming, and he's being fleshed out a bit more. She insists that people's attractions to the characters are based on Alan Rickman and Tom Felton (and probably Jason Isaacs), despite the fact that people were redeeming Draco and Lucius in fics before the first film was ever released.

She just doesn't seem to understand readers' need for Draco's nastiness and enmity toward Harry to have a reason and purpose. For her, it's enough for him to be a 2-D Evil Guy. She doesn't seem to understand why readers find that vaguely dissatisfactory and unsettling. When it comes to her Draco, it's like there's no there there. How are we supposed to buy his motivation when he technically HAS none, he just IS a bad boy, and that's her whole story?

And while I find that somewhat irksome, that she intentionally creates 2-D characters who are just playing stock roles, what I find more alarming, personally, is her saying that neither Tom Riddle nor Voldemort ever loved ANYONE. I find that rather hard to believe, for at the very least it seemed in CoS that he MUST have loved his dead mother to have reacted so strongly to what his dad did to her and kill his own father and grandparents in retaliation. Sometimes I think she's this really deep thinker and sometimes, when I read stuff like that, I think she hasn't a clue.

[malachan.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I think she's this really deep thinker and sometimes, when I read stuff like that, I think she hasn't a clue.

Both! She puts a lot of effort and thought into some issues and characters, and they are interesting. She puts very little into Draco (for example) and so he is 2D and uninteresting.

[kmai.livejournal.com]

i think he hated living in an orphanage and he probably liked his mother, although that is not the same thing as loving his mother. I dont think he MUST have loved his mother. many people dont love their mothers, people who lose them at a young age definitely miss them and are sad to see them gone, but they dont necessarily know them well enough to love them.

I dont know, i think she does have alot of background on lots of seemingly minor characters and not that much on others. (like dean thomas, theodore nott, etc.) And sometimes you just need background characters. :/

Also, a character might not be reedemable,/nice yet still not be 2-d. maybe JKR knows draco has a fetish for rubber duckies, and maybe he is a spoiled brat who collects 13th century wands. maybe he cries when he has sex, and really loves pansy. Who knows? He might still be a racist, classist, jerk/bully, and despite how much depth he has, he might still be not a nice guy.

If you are asking for depth in slytherin, well, snape might be nasty, but he is not evil. He reedeemed himself, at least in the eyes of dumbledore.

and Nigellus black was also not evil, at least he doesn't seem evil. Just because the only slytherins we have seen have been evil, doesn't mean they all are. or maybe they just all currently are? i mean, family heritage plays into what house you get, death eaters might have been friends before graduating, so likely they were from the same house, and because of the sorting system, all their children are in that house now, and since right now is the time that the Death Eater children would have been of hogwarts age...

Before that, slytherin used to win the house cup alot (six years running according to PS), and since good behavior plays a role in that, they could not have all been bullies.

[malachan.livejournal.com]

I don't see her saying that Snape has no hidden depths. I see her saying that he is an unpleasant character (hard to argue with), but not that he has no depth or layers. He certainly does have layers, from his experience of being bullied as a youth and it seems, his childhood in an abusive household.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

And can anyone come up with other words for personality-wise and attitude-wise?

"temperamentally"

[verstehen.livejournal.com]

You mean people actually listen to what she says when it isn't directly in the books? (c.f. your lovely "don't do math" icon for a perfect example).

[siyahsaclikiz.livejournal.com]

Snape, as many people pointed out, is an adult. You're not supposed to be bullying children when you're a grown up man and a teacher. Draco on the other hand, is still a child, but he is a racist. Which, in my mind, makes him worse than James and Sirius. I mean, James and Sirius were obnoxious bullies as well, but their dislike and bullying wasn't based on race.

I have no problem with Draco being 2D, and I don't agree with people who say it makes him unreal. No, he is very real. There are 2D people in real life, and there are people who like being a bully and treating people badly just for the sake of it. They don't have motives for it, they don't have to, and Draco doesn't have to either. It makes him uninteresting as a character, and yes it is throwing away lots of delicious potential, it is a waste of a character who could be extremely interesting, but he is real.

Still, I don't like the way she just assumes that everyone who likes Draco and/or Snape must do so because of the actors. Snape is an unlikeable man to me, but I love him as a character, Draco I have no fondness of but I can see where all the Draco love is coming from. What Rowling did was too presumptuous.