Draco...Interesting?

[Katie]

No: HPFGUIDX 176988

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "sistermagpie" 
<sistermagpie at ...> wrote:
>
> Katie:
> > I have noticed that many of the same people who like Snape and 
> find him fascinating also like Draco and deem him a fascinating 
and complex character.
> > 
> > Now, I am a Snape fan, and I DO think he is one of the best 
> > characters in the books. In fact, he reminds me of Falstaff, in 
> that he sort of grows out of the boundaries of his own story. 
> > 
> > However, I do not remotely feel that Draco is that kind of 
> > character. I think he's pretty stiff and one-note, actually. Far 
> > from being fascinating, I think he's a very common little 
ferrety troublemaker, the kind of boring hum-drum bully that appears 
in many  books and films. 
<<SNIP>>
> > So, I guess this is a plea to all those Draco fans - why? Why is 
> he so interesting? I'm not trying to be obnoxious - I really want 
to understand the fascination. Especially since so many other Snape 
 fans seem to be Draco fans, as well. Thanks! Katie
> 
> Magpie:
> Well, it's kind of hard to defend something that's personal taste. 

***KATIE again:
I wasn't asking for a defense, just an illumination. 

<<<MAJOR SNIP>>>
Magpie:
> So why do I find him interesting? I like that he's this hysterical 
> nutter stuck in the situation he's in, which imo is interesting in 
> himself. Not only is he destined to be proven wrong in every way, 
> this dark lord's coming for him--Voldemort's return is worse for 
> Draco than most other characters. I think Draco is a tragic 
> character because he wants to be so much more than he is and 
doesn't  realize he's already more than he wants to be--because he 
aspires to all the wrong things. Not only does he aspire to be 
something that is a bad thing to aspire to be, aspiring to be that 
makes him completely weaken himself so that he's not even as much as 
the person he could be. 

***KATIE again:

Ok, I can see this. I like the idea of Draco aspiring to "all the 
wrong things". That is rather tragic. I never thought of him in that 
light, I guess because I never thought much about him at all. I 
agree that LV's return is especially bad for Draco - actually for 
the whole Malfoy family, and they don't even really realize it.

Magpie:
> I had always hoped for the kind of story we got in HBP so I was 
> pleased with that--I was totally disappointed when I realized that 
> JKR is rather essentialist in the way she writes characters, so 
that putting a character like Draco through the wringer doesn't 
result in the character really growing or getting stronger. To me 
that unfortunately made him seem rather artificial in the last book, 
like all the themes brought up with his story in HBP were a mistake, 
lie a by-product of the elder wand. Or like the natural resolution 
to the story doesn't happen. But up until then--and a lot of the way 
through DH--his story remained totally interesting to me. He's still 
my favorite character. And I didn't think Snape turned out all that 
interesting, frankly, either in the end, so of the two of them I no 
longer automatically think Snape has so much of an edge. They're 
both conflicted--most of Rowling's characters are built around a 
central conflict. I don't know how exactly you see Snape or how you 
find him that interesting, but I'm sure there are plenty of people 
who would disagree.
> 
> -m
>
***KATIE again:
I was disappointed with the Lily/Snape storyline, there's no doubt 
about that. I definitely think it took a lot of Snape's conflict 
away, and I would have been much happier if he had been a man whose 
good side and bad side were in a constant state of struggle against 
each other, instead of him being in love with someone. ICK. I didn't 
find that the least bit appealing. 

However, I guess I see Snape differently than JKR sees Snape - as I 
think many otehr people do. My feeling is that Snape grew from that 
point. While JKR seemed to feel that it was always, and ONLY, his 
love for Lily that kept him on the good side, I disagree. It may 
have begun with Lily, but Snape wasn't stupid. He saw what LV and 
the DE's were really about, and he wasn't about that. Maybe Snape 
sisn't even realize what a good man he had become, but I see it, and 
I think other people do, too. 

As for Draco's lack of growth/artificiality, I agree with you there. 
I expected that Draco's whole breakdown at the end of HBP would have 
resulted in him realizing that he wasn't being true to himself, or 
something along those lines. I can't say I was disappointed in 
Draco's lack of a turnaround, at least personally, but from a 
literary point of view, it really didn't make a lot of sense. 
Everything in HBP pointed us, and many characters, in a very 
different direction from DH. 

Now, I still liked DH very much, because I realize that my 
expectations are just that, MY expectations, and that the story, 
ultimately, doesn't belong to me, so I was able to appreciate JKR's 
story as she wanted it told...BUT, I do think it was pretty flawed, 
simply from literary POV, and I agree that Draco's character was 
strangely unchanged by all the events that had come before. 

Katie