[HPforGrownups] Re: JKR and the boys (and girls)

[k12listmomma]

No: HPFGUIDX 162363

>> Magpie:
>>  I've no doubt she'd
>> look nice in a dress but yes, I think there's a little author magic
>> turning her allegedly ordinary looking heroine into somebody who
>> seems to show all the other girls up--other girls who actually are
>> interested in fashion.
>
> Pippin:
> Who, exactly, did Hermione surpass, aside from her usual unadorned
> self?
>
> This seems to be one of those instances where popular myth hijacks
> the readers' imagination and substitutes another narrative for what
> Rowling actually wrote. The Mary Sue moment is mostly in the eyes
> of the beholder, IMO. There's nothing on the page to say
> that Hermione has a nicer dress, lovelier makeup, or a more elegant
> hairdo than any other girl at the ball.


This is along my point. I think people are polarizing Hermione. On one end 
to say that she's got "no girl friends", and even to marginalize the one 
that clearly IS in Canon (between Hermione and Ginny), and on the other end 
to suddenly make Hermione to be "one hottie" at the Ball. If you take those 
two extremes, then indeed you have a point to lose faith in JKR as a writer. 
My point was, I don't see this "polarization" or "extremes" in the books at 
all, not even slightly or stereotypically. Harry just isn't privileged to 
see what goes on in the girl's bathroom; he can't see into the girl's common 
room. That's all. It doesn't mean it "didn't happen". And besides, we have 
young Harry's prospective of not even really looking at girls until suddenly 
there's this ball, and he's awakened to the fact "hey, there are girls all 
around me!" He doesn't think of Hermione as a girl potential for a date, and 
I think that is Rowling planning that on purpose, to show that Harry is 
growing up, so that Hermione's beauty is a slight shock to our two boys 
(Harry and Ron), who have been taking her for granted all along as the book 
worm. She's been there all along, I believe every bit as pretty as she was 
at the ball, but once you dress someone up, the transformation can be quite 
an experience in itself, as other guys have mentioned in this thread. She 
didn't change- the boy's prospective of her changed. That's the canon that 
Rowling wrote.

In the other post, one person mentioned a writer who said "I am not 
responsible for what the characters do between chapters" is exactly the 
point here- Rowling doesn't have to show every move Hermione makes when 
she's not with Harry. In the same way that we can reasonably assume Harry is 
reading books, we can assume Hermione is talking to girls. The organizing of 
DA is something that was solely Hermione's doing. You don't suddenly go from 
"no friends" to organizing a large group in one shot, any more than you take 
a frump and make her a beauty queen. Rowling didn't write those extremes, 
and I think I fully agree with you that there is a lot of "popular myth 
hijacking the readers' imagination and substituting another narrative for 
what the author actually wrote". All too often in fan fiction, I see a lot 
of Hermione coming into her own with regard to sex, assuming that she was 
just frigid (even with Krum!) or some inept social creature before, or way 
too busy getting all her PhD's in various subjects to even consider boys. It 
may work to create a emotionally charged (or sexual scene charged) short 
story, but it's just not the Hermione as Rowling wrote her.

Shelley