Brava, Lee! There are so many things that I like about this story--where to start?
First off, I love the concept. It's not just that you've fleshed out a minor character, but you've turned our assumptions about her inside out and asked us why we ever overlooked her in the first place. Rosmerta's there at crucial points in canon, and she was probably there for conversations and meetings we don't know about, and she was Draco's instrument in a *murder* attempt, for heaven's sake, no matter how half-hearted. She's a compelling character who probably has something valuable to offer, if we only asked her what she knew, and yet no one has done so and probably no one will. There's a lot of class bias in this assumption that she's just the bar keep--both on our part and on the characters'--and I love the way this story thematizes this problem, with character after character treating her advice lightly.
I also love the way the story takes seriously the pressures and social constraints that people--especially women--in the wizarding world face. I know not everyone agrees with the emphasis you place on the sexism of this world, and that's quite fine. But I'm very sympathetic to the way you see things; even if canon is occasionally, superficially egalitarian, there are a lot of underlying assumptions about gender that make your take on things entirely plausible. Ginny's section is a particularly effective commentary on JKR's underlying biases--"you go save the world, Ginevra!" Rosmerta says, except that as readers we all know that someone else has been designated for this task, and it's not coincidental that he's a boy.
The five sections *do* sound very different from one another, which I know you've worried about, and that's quite a lovely, writerly accomplishment--all the more so because the plotlines of the segments are so different you could have simply depended on that and not worked further on the different voices. And the characters are quite well-drawn, distinctive and vividly described.
It's only my deadline preventing further praise! Well done, Lee! Maggie
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Date: 2006-09-16 12:08 pm (UTC)First off, I love the concept. It's not just that you've fleshed out a minor character, but you've turned our assumptions about her inside out and asked us why we ever overlooked her in the first place. Rosmerta's there at crucial points in canon, and she was probably there for conversations and meetings we don't know about, and she was Draco's instrument in a *murder* attempt, for heaven's sake, no matter how half-hearted. She's a compelling character who probably has something valuable to offer, if we only asked her what she knew, and yet no one has done so and probably no one will. There's a lot of class bias in this assumption that she's just the bar keep--both on our part and on the characters'--and I love the way this story thematizes this problem, with character after character treating her advice lightly.
I also love the way the story takes seriously the pressures and social constraints that people--especially women--in the wizarding world face. I know not everyone agrees with the emphasis you place on the sexism of this world, and that's quite fine. But I'm very sympathetic to the way you see things; even if canon is occasionally, superficially egalitarian, there are a lot of underlying assumptions about gender that make your take on things entirely plausible. Ginny's section is a particularly effective commentary on JKR's underlying biases--"you go save the world, Ginevra!" Rosmerta says, except that as readers we all know that someone else has been designated for this task, and it's not coincidental that he's a boy.
The five sections *do* sound very different from one another, which I know you've worried about, and that's quite a lovely, writerly accomplishment--all the more so because the plotlines of the segments are so different you could have simply depended on that and not worked further on the different voices. And the characters are quite well-drawn, distinctive and vividly described.
It's only my deadline preventing further praise! Well done, Lee! Maggie