Prediction/Verisimilitude Was: Correct forecasts (long)

[msbeadsley]

No: HPFGUIDX 80296

> Take Snape.

Iieeeee!! No, thanks! <g>

> It wasn't until OOP that I felt I had the handle on him. He was an 
> isolated, socially phobic, picked on kid.  He started out filled 
> with negative energy over his home life and filled himself with
> rage over his treatment at Hogwarts.  Every couple holding hands is 
> a taunt aimed directly at him, every set of friends is an affront, 
> and every visible manifestation of love in any form is a knife in 
> the heart to a guy whose heart was starved until it died.  Cruise 
> on over to alt.support.loneliness or alt.support.shyness and you'll 
> get an eyeful of more rage than you can imagine. Snape probably 
> posts there.

Yes!  I especially like how you said "filled himself with rage"--that 
pain-(or fear-) to anger alchemy (Harry in OoP, anyone?) is something 
one can do with little or no training at all.  And here we have 
another facet of why Snape hated Harry right off:  Harry showed up, 
first week of school, with a good buddy in tow, Ron.  Snape must have 
taken that as one more example of life spitting in his eye.  And 
Snape had probably observed Harry even earlier, in the Great Hall, 
happily surrounded by many chattering fellow students with whom he 
seemed to have achieved an instant rapport.  "Our new--*celebrity*."  
Nope, just a kid who showed up openhearted and hoping for the best.

> > Sandy:" What anyone who posts a prediction here is doing is 
> > virtual continuation of the story; a hint of fanfic in our heads. 
> > Can we imagine the story playing out thus?"
 
> There's other kinds. The little pieces I wrote were intended to be 
> as believable as I could make them, imagining events that could 
> happen or explaining things as "accurately" as possible.  Other 
> kinds of fics do something very different, imagining Harry/Hermione/
> Ron/Ginny/Draco as very different people than the ones walking 
> around in canon; in other words, an alternative universe to JKR's 
> alternative universe.  Some are so far out it's like some 
> doppelganger took over the characters' bodies.

I was referring to predictions *themselves* as (at least implied) 
prophetic fanfic; even saying, "Harry will end up paired off with 
Moaning Myrtle" inspires a scenario in the reader's imagination akin 
to a snippet of fanfic. <gak! not a genuine prediction!>

I don't read fanfic; I'm afraid to, because I'm too easily confused 
(to read the stuff which follows canon without confusing it later 
*with* canon.  A couple months after Book 7 hits, I will voraciously 
consume it *all*!)  As for the alternate universe versions, I just, 
well, think my philosophy as someone who has done some writing is, ah 
<hiding *under* soapbox and peering out cautiously>, go whittle your 
own wood.  No, no, that's not right--do what you want; just don't cry 
over my empty seat in the theater.  Yeah, that's closer.  My posts 
about Sirius's "Death-Journal" are grief therapy, and while not 
opposed to canon, unlikely, IMO, to have any bearing on what will 
follow, so I'm safe (and completely at the mercy of my Animagination).

> <snip a bunch of true wisdom> If JKR did that, it would be the 
> worst betrayal of young readers ever, and I could never forgive her 
> for it <snip>
> I don't believe for a minute JKR's doing it. She's been the opposite
> of all those loathsome qualities.

Just young readers?  When I open a Harry Potter book, I *am* a child 
(again).  And furthermore, hear, hear!

Sandy, aka "msbeadsley"