nineveh_uk

At first I said, Never! I dislike both fics when the main point is to describe a work of invented art, and those in which the best Muggle achievements turn out to be magical ones. But then I started thinking… was “The Selkie’s Bride” as seen by Bellatrix and the luckless Norwegian lad, an opera? Obviously not; it’s Ibsen wannabe:

Aashild: Your father, Erlend… your father… He was … from the sea.

Erlend: From … the sea?

Aashild: (Defiantly) Yes! Yes!

But my mind had been hopelessly corrupted. All that operatic chaos, disguise and cross-dressing cries out for magical interpretation. Imagine Figaro with polyjuice potion. Then there's the blood vengeance and madness of the tragedies. So there probably won’t be a fic aboutWizarding opera, but I suspect there may have to be one featuring it.

as the Minister said to the Veela. What do I want to know? Even sticking to plot-related questions and ignoring things like the galleon/sterling exchange rate, there’s a lot. Why James and Lily defied Voldemort – how did they get the chance? Why was Wizarding society of the period vulnerable to the Dark Lord? Why did Sirius Black choose to play such a ‘highly amusing practical joke’ on Snape? I’m more interested in knowing the details of what has happened in the past, than speculating on what is to come.

So:

- Andromeda. However JKR imagines her, a Slytherin of her generation who marries a man presumably not such, a woman of a then thriving family connected by blood or marriage to so many other pureblood families, she would surely be able to provide a perspective on events of the past forty years rather lacking from Harry’s narration. If she’s been largely a non-participant, that in a sense is even better as there might be hope of a bit of distance. On the other hand, it’s possibly she was the dull one of the family, and even if not, there are some things I want to know that she just can’t tell, even if she does know which close family member other than Nymphadora is the metamorphmagus and whether Ted is the newsreader at the start of PS who hands over to a weather-forecaster named McGuffin.
- Snape. He really is the one with the answers; not least “whose side is he really on”. He might even be persuaded to talk; I bet he’s bursting to justify himself and have his line accepted. Unfortunately, whilst he might speak the truth I’m afraid that the truth as he perceives it might not give the complete picture. After pouring vodka down his thought, I’d ask him whether he really was in love with Lily (sorry!), and, if the chips were down, which Malfoy would he try to save from certain doom?
- Dumbledore. If the drink contains Veritaserum, Dumbledore is the obvious choice. He does know everything; he knows about Snape, he knows about the Potters, he knows more about Voldemort than he’s told Harry, he know the history of the Ministry’s politics. If I got him really drunk, I’d try to make him swear an Unbreakable Vow to produce back-up plan.
- Alas, Dumbledore is dead. Moreover, I suspect he has planned against Veritaserum. McGonagall would probably be a canny drinker and not succumb. Arthur Weasley would get really enthusiastic about kitchen equipment. This leaves the usual suspect, Lupin. He’s been around long enough, and closely involved enough (on both sides) to know a good deal of the history and personalities. He knows the truth (we may hope) about the mystery of the Werewolf Incident, with its symbolic function as the disaster around which crystallizes the tragedy of the Marauder generation. He knows about James and Lily, he has experience of the Ministry, it’s even reasonable to suppose that he was approached by the Death Eaters/Voldemort’s forces back in the late 1970s. He’s also that rare HP character who seems to be able to present a relatively nuanced narrative, with an appreciation of his own bias and weaknesses. I can’t really see an advantage to getting him drunk, but he’d be a good dinner companion.

That was a long answer, wasn’t it?

For the same reason that I interpret the man who comes hiking down the track in the song “Big Rock Candy Mountain” as the devil, and the final conversation between Lts Chard and Bromhead in Zulu as obviously about sex (“Was it like that for you – the first time?” I swear, you’ll never watch it with a straight face again). It’s because I read English, although Radio 4 comedy in one’s formative years doesn’t help, either.

OK. Starting from scratch, a Sirius whom we never see as sexually active is 9 times out of 10 (or whatever the current bounced about figures are) likely to be straight. But Rowling deals quite a bit with the sexual life of her adult characters. In this context, a lack of heterosexual markers is interesting.We see Fudge flirt with Madam Rosmerta, McGonagall blushes when kissed by Hagrid, Dumbledore is not averse to the odd flirtatious comment. There’s Mollywobbles, an inappropriately charmed goat, Narcissa clutching at Snape’s manly breast, Bella and Voldemort (if you’re that way inclined), even the House Elves. But from Sirius, nothing. From gorgeous, confident, wealthy, teenage Sirius not a flicker of interest in heterosexuality. From GoF Sirius (who is in pretty good humour) likewise nothing. The man is sexy, yet totally uninterested. The post-Azkaban effect is an arguable factor, and so is not looking at the girls when James does simply to be cool, but still… This is not a man who is ever depicted as having any interest in heterosexuality whatsoever. He’s a sex object, but as far as women go, not much of a participant. On the other hand, he does have extremely passionate emotional reactions, positive and negative, towards men. He’s not a Victorian product of a homosocial environment thinking “OMG how do I talk to them, they’ve got breasts” – Sirius gets on with women perfectly well. He just doesn’t seem to get excited by them. So I wouldn’t read Sirius as canonically straight.

Of course, he could be canonically asexual, but considering what else he goes through, that seems a bit tough! There’s nothing definite about him that fundamentally says gay. He’s a screaming drama queen, of course, but that’s because he’s a Black. They all are. I suppose it comes down to a combination of flattering stereotype – attractive young man with everything going for me, but who never once looks like getting up to go – and that as wizarding world sexual mores seem to be reasonably similar to Muggle ones, giving teenage Sirius an area of life in which he is isn’t blazingly confident and publicly better than everyone else opens up potentially interesting avenues of character. Oh, and in the case of my purposes for fic, another useful parallel with his cousin Bellatrix.

I seem to be doing extraordinarily long answers.

Rodolphus… I don’t have much to say about him, really. I made him the thin brother by virtue of the –stan element in Rabastan’s name lending. So he’s very tall, thin, brown haired, with light brown eyes and perhaps in certain lights a similar physical quality to pre-Fall Voldemort. He’s clever, but happy to follow other people’s plans if they seem reasonable, a little-weak-willed on the big questions – not really the sort to question – a personable dinner companion with a decent sense of humour, a good friend of Lucius Malfoy. He has a kind streak and could have been more of a man than he is, had he made the effort. He and Bellatrix rub along quite nicely, in a fond sort of way.

There’s HP/Aubrey-Maturin? Mind you, I’ve read some quite decent A-M/Star Trek ::blushes for shame::. Let me think. PDBW does wear a sailor suit in the Sherlock Holmes kitten story, and I can certainly see Saint-George contemplating running away to sea, but that’s not quite enough.

No, hang on, if we’re talking about dreaming this up and not actually writing it – writing POB being too frightening - and not worrying about time-travel logistics, there can only be one winner: Wimsey/Diana Villiers, with Diana as one of the “scores of women! All across Europe!” mentioned by Miss Hillyard. I don’t see it having much potential for a long-term relationship, but there would surely be fireworks, of one kind or another.

Speaking of crossovers, I am working on a post for talboys of ‘all the Wimsey fanfic I can find’, which includes a Chalet School crossover...