So you and HPFF are fucking done professionally? (Sorry, Bale Out will just never stop being funny).
HP fandom is strange in how canon-obsessed they are. It was weird coming into that from the Buffy fandom where pretty much anything goes. Sure, there were ship wars, but the big pairings (B/A, C/A, B/S) were all canon at some point, so you didn't have anyone flailing about UR WATCHING IT WRONG!
And I've always been of the opinion that JKR tries entirely too hard to have complete control over her work and how fans interpret it. There's a point when you have to let go and realize readers are going to take what they will from your work, and whether it's what you wanted them to see or not, your job as a writer is done. But then, I'd probably the kind of writer who'd love ship wars and purposely write in a way to stir them up, rather than calling half my readership wrong or something. And I'd delight in creating a morally ambiguous character and watching the fandom fight over whether or not he (cos it's always a he) is a woobie or an evil bastard. And then I'd cackle evilly and crack my knuckles. But um, yeah, part of the beauty of literature is all the different interpretations you can take from one work. If authorial intent were the final word--if zombie!Shakespeare could burst into a ninth-grade English class and say definitively, "No, this is what I meant, you illiterate bastards!"--then an entire area of study would cease to exist, and seeing as that's my major, would I ever be up shit creek without a paddle.
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HP fandom is strange in how canon-obsessed they are. It was weird coming into that from the Buffy fandom where pretty much anything goes. Sure, there were ship wars, but the big pairings (B/A, C/A, B/S) were all canon at some point, so you didn't have anyone flailing about UR WATCHING IT WRONG!
And I've always been of the opinion that JKR tries entirely too hard to have complete control over her work and how fans interpret it. There's a point when you have to let go and realize readers are going to take what they will from your work, and whether it's what you wanted them to see or not, your job as a writer is done. But then, I'd probably the kind of writer who'd love ship wars and purposely write in a way to stir them up, rather than calling half my readership wrong or something. And I'd delight in creating a morally ambiguous character and watching the fandom fight over whether or not he (cos it's always a he) is a woobie or an evil bastard. And then I'd cackle evilly and crack my knuckles. But um, yeah, part of the beauty of literature is all the different interpretations you can take from one work. If authorial intent were the final word--if zombie!Shakespeare could burst into a ninth-grade English class and say definitively, "No, this is what I meant, you illiterate bastards!"--then an entire area of study would cease to exist, and seeing as that's my major, would I ever be up shit creek without a paddle.