question from a tourist in the land of hp fandom

[lobelia321]

So, hm. After having visited a few of the (truly spectacular) sights in the land of HP, I'm wondering:

Is Harry/Draco the Dom/Orli of HP? (As in: same age and equal?)

And is Sirius/Remus the Viggobean of HP? (As in: older men? Or is Bean angstier?)

And is there a Viggorli in HP? Man/boy love?

And how about the truly weird and rare -- who are they in HP? (the Kiran/Viggos and Bern/Johns?)

Can these pairings be equivalentised at all? Is there a finite number of pairings that pops up in different guises in all fandoms? Is Kirk/Spock the Viggobean of Star Trek???

And Billy? Is he Ron?

Comments

[buffonia.livejournal.com]

Take this with a grain of salt because I am so very not involved in HP fandom. But what I have observed from LJ and through friends and such, I'd say Harry/Draco is more of a Dom/Lijah. Although we may be talking about different aspects of the ship. Age-wise, I guess the Dorli thing could work, but it makes me itchy seeing Harry/Draco compared to Dom/Orli.

... That probably didn't help.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

How is Harry/Draco like Domlijah, then?

And why does the comparison to D'orli make you itch??

*is curious*

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Are your reasons for comparing Harry/Draco to Domlijah the same ones as blythely's? She wrote below:

H/D is Dom/Lij. The most popular, makes the most sense, is hard to do well without inducing vomiting.

[blithesea.livejournal.com]

I would never have thought of categorizing Draco/Harry in the same age and equal slot, even though they technically are. But fandom emphasizes their being enemies so much, whether it be that they are still enemies or have just through circumstances overcome their differences. So this pairing, in my head, is more about emotional development than equal standing in regard to age.

Samples for the Boy/Man pairing would be Snape/Harry, or Lucius/Harry, both very popular.

Truly rare, in my opinion (though perhaps not as rare in numbers as Viggo/Kiran fic), are pairings like Percy/Draco, Ron/Neville, anything that brings a bit of an unusual quirk to how the side characters are perceived. I read an excellent Colin Creevey/Mad-Eye Moody once.

As for the question whether these pairings can be equalized at all, I'm not sure if they can. The Kirk/Spock example you gave, for instance: I think within the Trek fandom, Kirk/Spock qualifies almost as the OTP for most. That would probably correlate more to Viggorli than Viggobean, if judged by fandom popularity. But within fics, those pairings have completely different dynamics.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Yes, what you say seems to give the lie to my idea that there are *structural* pairings. Although maybe there are, and I just haven't hit upon the right way to describe them yet, *g*. (I don't want to get slapped by vladimir_propp here...)

I see the enemy/enemy dynamics of Harry/Draco and how that doesn't map onto D'orli (or Domlijah, for that matter; buffonia thought Harry/Draco was like Domlijah). But then enemy/enemy never *does* map onto anyone in Lotrips; it's one of the dynamics that is lacking in this particular rps (or maybe in any rps?) and people have to inject it artificially. On the other hand, Harry and Draco (to me) are very equal: they're both princes in their own right (one of them the pureblood, the other the boy wonder), they're both suffering from inner demons, and (in the kind of post-apocalyptic fanon I've read) they both bear similar battle scars and have made similar sacrifices, and neither of them has had a real childhood.

[blythely.livejournal.com]

Is Harry/Draco the Dom/Orli of HP? (As in: same age and equal?)
Nah. H/D is Dom/Lij. The most popular, makes the most sense, is hard to do well without inducing vomiting.

And is Sirius/Remus the Viggobean of HP? (As in: older men? Or is Bean angstier?)
I would probably concur with that. Except, Sirius/Remus is totally canon and way hotter.

And is there a Viggorli in HP? Man/boy love?
This cracks me up, because Viggorli is Jaq's OTP and she tries so hard not to be a Snape/Harry fetishist BUT SHE IS THE PERVERT OMG.

And how about the truly weird and rare -- who are they in HP? (the Kiran/Viggos and Bern/Johns?)
SQUID/DOBBY
MRS NORRIS/CROOKSHANKS
FAT LADY/WORMTAIL

Can these pairings be equivalentised at all? Is there a finite number of pairings that pops up in different guises in all fandoms? Is Kirk/Spock the Viggobean of Star Trek???

Is equivalentised a real word, Lobelia?

And Billy? Is he Ron?
I think Billy may be Hermione, actually.

I once sorted the Fellowship for my own amusement.
Care to see?

[lazulus]

This cracks me up, because Viggorli is Jaq's OTP and she tries so hard not to be a Snape/Harry fetishist BUT SHE IS THE PERVERT OMG.

*whines*

You know how hard I try to fight it, but the pairing keeps worming its way into my fic reading.

And stop calling me a pervert, dammit!

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

H/D is Dom/Lij. The most popular, makes the most sense, is hard to do well without inducing vomiting.
I wonder if that's the same reason buffonia had in mind.

I have no idea of the vomit-induction. I have read about 7 to 10 HP fics; 4 of those were outstanding and 1 was very, very good, and of the outstanding/very good ones, 3 were Harry/Draco... So I haven't vomited. Small samples r us!

Except, Sirius/Remus is totally canon and way hotter.

What, Viggobean aren't canon????!!!

SQUID/DOBBY
Does this exist, or did you just make it up? And are you *dissing John/Bern*??? *makes fist*

Is equivalentised a real word, Lobelia?
No, Blythely.

I think Billy may be Hermione, actually.
*bursts out laughing*

How do you mean, "sorted" the Fellowship?

[lazulus]

SQUID/DOBBY
Does this exist, or did you just make it up? And are you *dissing John/Bern*??? *makes fist*

I think you'll find she isn't making it up. *sniggers*

There are also numerous Hagrid/someothercharacterofyourchoice fics around as well, which -- as there are more than one would think -- may not be considered that rare. Of course, until A J Hall wrote Lust Over Pendle, Draco/Neville was a very rare pairing indeed.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

She did not make up squid/Dobby?? Crack!fic, right? If someone pulled that one off to make it convincing: hats off is all I can say.

I suspected that Draco/Neville might be rare but I wasn't sure because then I read helenish's Draco/Neville and I thought, well, maybe it's some sort of unfathomable minority kink in HP fandom, what do I know. But you reckon it's all in the wake of ajhalluk? It is incredibly impressive when people manage to *imprint* an entire fandom with their OTP. And how did she *get* this idea?

[blythely.livejournal.com]

How do you mean, "sorted" the Fellowship?

er. Sorted.

As in put into houses a la the sorting hat.

nowifeelsillyomg.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

*screams*

Sorted as in sorting hat??? Ahahahhahha.

And I thought you meant 'sorted' as in the poms saying 'sor'ed, mate'.

And, no, I don't think I can cope with reading that.

*shields eyes*

[cupiscent.livejournal.com]

Harry/Draco is definitely the Domlijah. (Much as that pains me, because I'm a mad-keen H/D-fan.) Basically, Harry/Draco is that pairing you get in every fandom that everyone does, and everyone does over and over again, reusing the same elements and just putting them in a different order, or with a slight alteration. Every possible permutation of these pairings has been done to death. Plus, because they're so popular, you get a lot more crap writing involved with them, and mostly it's shoddy characterisation, dribbling stupidity and ridiculous angst/schmoop.

Sirius/Remus might make a good correlation to Viggo/Bean.

There are man/boy (teacher/student - eek!) 'ships in HP. But the dynamic is very different because of that teacher/student thing. I don't think Snape/Harry really correlates in any way to Viggorli, though I get the feeling it is quite popular amongst a certain demographic of the fandom. But I don't think any of those sort of pairings have the raging popularity of Viggorli.

(A better Dom/Orli comparison might be twincest, but I'm going to get shot for suggesting that, aren't I? It's the dynamic - the larrikin aspect. Forget I said anything.)

Billy might just be Ron. Because that gives you Harry/Ron/Draco as a fucksome trio, and that kinda works. *G*

For me, Ginny is absolutely and definitely Miranda, but that's just because they are my kick-arse female muses and I love them to bits. (Hermione is obviously Liv, the girl usually hanging around with the boys.)

Dumbledore is PJ, and thus never gets any, unless someone's really being whimsical.

I could probably extrapolate all day, but it'd just get weirder and weirder. *G*

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

I'm starting to think that devising a *structure* of 'pairings' is going to be more difficult than I had at first thought. Because it's not so much about who these people are but what the fandom makes of them. As you say, H/D = Domlijah because of *popularity*, not necessarily because of any structural similarities of character -- perhaps.

Now that leads me back to Lotrips. Is Domlijah *really* the pairing everyone does? I've never done it. I thought Viggorli was, plus Dorli or Dombilly for the boy/boy ones. I suppose I just associate Domlijah with tinhattery so firmly that erm, I hardly ever read it... But have you quantified this? Is there really simply *more* of it?

[cupiscent.livejournal.com]

There's a few things to consider - or at least that I was considering. The dynamic in the pairing, and the dynamic of fandom to the pairing. So yes, popularity comes into that last one, in the link between H/D and Domlijah (on that note, I don't know if there still is a lot of it, or if it's been euthanised by the tinhattery, but way back when, it was one of the Big Pairings, like Viggorli and Dom/Billy. After Orlijah was huge and before Dom/Billy really hit its stride). Also controversy - there's miles of bandwidth taken up by "Harry is not gay!" or "Harry loves Ron!" or "Draco would never sully himself with a Gryffindor" or "They hate each other, you weirdos, OMG, you make JKR cry!"

Harry/Draco is an example, I think, of the most common form of slash pairing - the hero/enemy pairing, where that on-screen chemistry and tension must have a sexual element. (Yeah, sure, they hate each other, but leave them in a room for ten minutes and beating each other up will turn into ripping off clothes.) The Antagonism = UST pairing. Doesn't even have to be an enemy; things like Cyclops/Wolverine slash would fit in here. Although they're on the same side, they have biiiig antagonism. Perhaps this should be called the Alpha-Male slash pairing.

Lotrips doesn't have antagonism, it has fellowship. So that shoots that one. (You still see occasional glimpses of it, like those stories where Dom (or someone) just can't stand Astin, but that's because he's in denial about how much he wants to shag him. But it's rare, and side-lined, and you really have to work at it.)

Getting away from theory, I think DomBilly correlates pretty well to Harry/Ron. Quite popular, and one party (Dom/Harry) gets slashed all over the place while the other's afficiandos are begging for people to see his worth and give him more action. *G* (Of course, I might just be making this up. But it sounds good, yeah?)

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

After Orlijah was huge and before Dom/Billy really hit its stride
You need to write a History of Lotrips, you!

the most common form of slash pairing - the hero/enemy pairing,
Oh yes! This is it, this is a structural pairing-type! I can smell it! And it's imported straight from romantic Mills and Boon type fiction. (Or should I be saying that Mills and Boon gacked it from slash??) That whole Scarlett O'Hara/Rhett Butler I-hate-you-I-fuck-you-I'm-smitten-by-you dynamic. And evil pirates kidnapping feisty damsels and falling in love with them blah blah blah.

Well, that particular pairing type certainly presses my buttons. Which perhaps explains my helpless enslavement to Harry/Draco??

Yeah, sure, they hate each other, but leave them in a room for ten minutes and beating each other up will turn into ripping off clothes.
Absolutely! Fighting/fucking -- even the groans and grunts are the same, and the sweat-soaked faces.

Antagonism = UST pairing.
Yes! And you hardly even need to set up a narrative: it just spools itself out onto the screen. Endless, endless delicious foreplay until finally, finally, they *kiss* or *confess their love*. I have to say, a few ust writers get the foreplay absolutely perfectly right, but the final orgasm of kissing/confessing/ whatever is very, very tricky to pull off and extremely rare. Do you know a 100 percent satisfactory example??

Lotrips doesn't have antagonism, it has fellowship.
Omg, yes! You're brilliant at this!

[shinysparkly.livejournal.com]

However, Weasleycest does not equal Woodcest. Possibly a bit, but not really. It's an entire sub-genre with it's own 'otp' pairing, older men, twincest (*gahbibbledroolYES!), etc..

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

HP fandom is such a *huge* fandom, that's what intrigues me, too. There's a niche for everyone, and rare pairings are not so rare simply because of the law of averages and critical mass and all that.

I mean, a fandom in which you can have such an arcane thing as 'twincest' form an entire sub-fandom... now that's something!

[shinysparkly.livejournal.com]

Also, on the finite point...I'd have to think so. I've seen it in Duran Duran RPS and Gundam Wing fandoms as well. (somehow I always wind up being a fan/writer of the rarer pairings...not as rare as you, but still rare ;) )

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

So you think there is, a finite number of pairing-types, I mean? *hops up and down* Oh, fandom-experienced-one, spill!