Storytelling
Oct. 29th, 2010 11:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nellacittaI read Julad's Night-blooming Heartease yesterday, and it stirred up a few thoughts about fanfiction and how much I love it. Spoilers for the story (which you should read) under the cut.
So, the story is a kind of prequel to resonant's Transfigurations, and it's about Neville and Snape, working together to creating a Dementor-killing potion during the war. And from the very beginning, the very idea for the story, really, came from a line in Transfigurations that references Snape being dead.
And yet when the moment of his death comes, tears poured down my face. And I read it again and again until I fell asleep and came back home and read it again. And in this last re-read, I was really struck by one part in particular. It's the scene where Lupin is talking to Neville just after Snape has died. And he says this:
You have more courage than you can ever know. Grieve honestly for what you've lost, because you have the strength to do it. Your heart has survived blows that would cripple lesser men, and there is nothing it cannot withstand.
And I just...I want to give this story to everyone I know, to everyone who has been through something so shattering that you don't know how to move forward and say: "You are this strong too. There is nothing your heart cannot withstand. This. Here. Yes."
...
But, it's Harry Potter fanfic, and tragically I'm just not confident enough to pass it around. So I tried to think what fiction I've read that gets to that same point. That builds up a love story knowing it's over, that the point of the story is that there are no happy endings. And I'm sure it exists, somewhere. But I can't think of one that's sitting on my book shelf.
A large part of why, is that I like happy endings. This is also true in fanfic, where I may shy away from stories tagged with major character death and partner betrayl. But then there are stories like Julad's. Or like synecdochic's classic Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left to Lose. Where the point isn't the love story, though that's integral. But the point of the story is the loss and how it's not the end. For both these stories, this gut-wrenching, heartbreaking loss is a huge event, but at the same time, it's an interlude. The characters had lives before and after, and they are not diminished, in a negative sense. Different, yes, hugely changed, but not less.
I LOVE these stories. And I love that fandom, where I can read only fluffy stories for the next week if need be, where these characters lead a million different lives with a million different kinds of endings, gave them to me. I'm not sure if I could love them as much as I do outside of fandom. So this is just a post saying how incredibly grateful I am that I discovered this place. The weather really is lovely here.
So, the story is a kind of prequel to resonant's Transfigurations, and it's about Neville and Snape, working together to creating a Dementor-killing potion during the war. And from the very beginning, the very idea for the story, really, came from a line in Transfigurations that references Snape being dead.
And yet when the moment of his death comes, tears poured down my face. And I read it again and again until I fell asleep and came back home and read it again. And in this last re-read, I was really struck by one part in particular. It's the scene where Lupin is talking to Neville just after Snape has died. And he says this:
You have more courage than you can ever know. Grieve honestly for what you've lost, because you have the strength to do it. Your heart has survived blows that would cripple lesser men, and there is nothing it cannot withstand.
And I just...I want to give this story to everyone I know, to everyone who has been through something so shattering that you don't know how to move forward and say: "You are this strong too. There is nothing your heart cannot withstand. This. Here. Yes."
...
But, it's Harry Potter fanfic, and tragically I'm just not confident enough to pass it around. So I tried to think what fiction I've read that gets to that same point. That builds up a love story knowing it's over, that the point of the story is that there are no happy endings. And I'm sure it exists, somewhere. But I can't think of one that's sitting on my book shelf.
A large part of why, is that I like happy endings. This is also true in fanfic, where I may shy away from stories tagged with major character death and partner betrayl. But then there are stories like Julad's. Or like synecdochic's classic Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left to Lose. Where the point isn't the love story, though that's integral. But the point of the story is the loss and how it's not the end. For both these stories, this gut-wrenching, heartbreaking loss is a huge event, but at the same time, it's an interlude. The characters had lives before and after, and they are not diminished, in a negative sense. Different, yes, hugely changed, but not less.
I LOVE these stories. And I love that fandom, where I can read only fluffy stories for the next week if need be, where these characters lead a million different lives with a million different kinds of endings, gave them to me. I'm not sure if I could love them as much as I do outside of fandom. So this is just a post saying how incredibly grateful I am that I discovered this place. The weather really is lovely here.
