#Hermione's backstory

[fantasticalleigh]

where did you come from, and why was i not with you?

inspired by the glen sleeping beauty scene but i was way too tired to try for a similar background aesthetic like in the film

[greenerteacups]

This is ofc very random but I absolutely love how you wrote Harry and his reactions to people arguing loudly or just generally arguing around him. SO that being said, do you make a written sheet keeping track of each characters personalities and traits and maybe even background stories? I really think all of your side characters are well written and isn't two dimensional at all and thats one of the MANY reasons why this fic is one of the best Ive read ((maybe not just fic but books in general))

This is really lovely, thank you so much! I don't keep a spreadsheet, though I do have a section of my outline doc that's basically a mini-bible for misc. characters — eye color, hair color, what their parents do, where they live, trivia that I can't remember on command. When it comes to characterization, I keep consistency through voice. If a character sounds the same, they'll feel the same, and inversely, if I can't imagine a character's voice saying something, then it's a good sign I need to stop and figure out what I'm actually trying to have them say. Or just restructure the story! Sometimes I throw something down in my outline, get around to writing the scene weeks later, and realize that the character went somewhere different, and I like the new direction better. Some authors describe this as characters having "lives of their own," but I think it's just ... authors having fun. You explored a new direction, you liked it more, you went with it.

Voice is much easier to get right when you've been working with the same cast as long as I have — Draco's voice has become so easy it's sort of like slipping into a second skin, though that's probably not helpful (like, "try writing 300,000 words from your character's POV, really helps you nail the cadence!" is not exactly Hemingway-grade advice). But even when you only have someone for three lines, it's crazy how much information you can fit in. Accents, slang, forms of address, level of formality, how fast are they talking, how long do they talk, do they gesture, how much — answering those questions requires you to think about where they come from, and how they approach a situation, and once you do that, you have a person. Even if you don't have a story arc, you still have a person.

[curawrites]

Potter

Slytherin boys (separate) x fem! Potter!reader

Slytherin boys: Draco Malfoy, Mattheo Riddle, Theodore Nott, Lorenzo Berkshire, and Blaise Zabini.

Warnings: forbidden romance?, swearing, smoking, alcohol, partying, horny teens, probably incorrect body shots.

Note: got back into Harry Potter and fell into the Slytherin boy rabbithole hole💚

Backstory:

You used to be very close to your twin brother. But your relationship changed for the worst during your first year at Hogwarts.

While Harry had been sorted into Griffindor, you had been sorted into Slytherin.

The both of you had tried to keep your relationship intact, but the rivalry between your two houses made it practically impossible.

By fourth year, you and Harry were practically strangers, and uninvolved with each other’s lives…

Draco Malfoy

In fourth year, Draco decided to ask you out to the Yule Ball. Mainly to piss off Harry.

He swaggered up to you in the courtyard and asked you very loudly in front of a lot of people, including Harry, of course!

“Heard you didn’t have a date for the ball, Potter.” He said with a smirk, “You want to be my date?”

You eyed him suspiciously before answering, “Sure, why not Malfoy.”

Didn’t expect for you to actually accept.

Low key freaking out internally.

Thought you’d just tell him to piss off.

He’s very smug about it on the outside tho.

Especially when he sees Harry fuming on the side lines with Ron and Hermione.

He then escorts you to class like the gentleman he was taught to be.

“Don’t get an ideas Malfoy. I’m only going with you to piss off my brother.” You told him as you entered potions.

“Same here, Potter.” He rolls his eyes a bit.

Glad you have the same idea but also a bit disappointed that you’re only using him.

But he’s also using you so-

When it came time for the ball, Draco was waiting for you by the stairs. Mattheo and Blaise were waiting with him.

He couldn’t lie, he was a tad nervous. Fixing his hair every 2.5 seconds to the annoyance of his friends.

“Does my hair look good?” He asked for the billionth time.

“Your hair is fine mate! Why do you even care so much it’s just Potter.” Mattheo rolled his eyes at the blond.

“It’s not about her!” Draco hissed, “..I just want to look good!” He answered semi confidently.

A few moments later you appeared and began walking down the stairs.

Draco looked at you in awe. You looked stunning all dolled up, your hair was curled and pinned up in an intricate hairdo, and the dark green dress you were wearing fitted you perfectly.

You glanced at Draco every few steps as you descended the stairs, admiring him from afar. You couldn’t lie, he looked dashing in his suit.

Blaise and Mattheo snickered behind him, shoving him forward to make him help you down the stairs.

“You look nice.” Draco said awkwardly.

“Thank you, you don’t look half bad yourself.” You responded, taking his hand as you walked down the rest of the steps.

“You cleaned up nice, Potter.” Mattheo teased.

“Shut it, Riddle.” You rolled your eyes at him.

Draco escorted you to the punch table to have a drink before you had your first dance.

When you started dancing you were both very stiff and awkward, but as the night went on you became much more natural with each other.

You and Draco went on to have a nice evening. Making show of your “relationship” by calling each other by your first names and dancing together for the majority of the evening.

When the ball finally ended, you and Draco returned to the Slytherin common room together.

“I actually enjoyed myself tonight Draco.” You admitted with a smile.

“I did to, Y/n. We should do it more often.” He smirked.

You rolled your eyes, “In your dreams, Draco.” You chuckled before to go to your dorm.

Leaving him standing in the common room, with his heart beating a few beats faster…

Mattheo Riddle

FORBIDDEN ROMANCE OMG

You both kept your distance from each other for a long while.

You didn’t want to associate with the son of the man who killed your parents.

And Mattheo didn’t give a crap about you.

You only began to associate with each other in fifth year when you became friends with Lorenzo.

Which lead to you being included into the Slytherin gang.

You decided to put your differences aside for the sake of your friend.

You’re not super close with many of them, Mattheo included.

But you have a sort of playful relationship.

You guys banter SO MUCH!

Whether it’s insulting each other or sometimes being flirty.

Harry is SIDE EYEING y’all from across the great hall.

You find Mattheo insufferable in a weird endearing way.

Sixth year hit and you’ve decided to start living it up by attending parties with the gang.

Ravenclaw had beat Hufflepuff in quidditch which made the perfect excuse to throw a party.

You and Pansy had spent the evening getting ready together in your dorm.

“We look hot~” you commented while admiring her and yourself in your full body mirror.

“We do~ Now let’s go-“ Pansy grabbed your hand and dragged you out of the dorm.

Once at the party, you had a drink to ease your nerves before you decided to join the growing circle of people playing spin the bottle. Many of your friends were sat, including Lorenzo, Mattheo, and Theo.

You sat yourself beside Lorenzo, “What are we spinning the bottle for?” You asked, almost yelling over the music.

“Body shots!” Lorenzo smirked at you playfully.

“Fun!” You grinned.

Eventually Mattheo’s turn came and the bottle landed on you. Gasps and ooos filled the circle, making you scoff. Mattheo only grinned as he grabbed the bottle of fire whiskey and a shot glass.

Ron and Hermione had to hold back Harry from causing a scene.

“C’mere, Y/n~” Mattheo smirked, motioning you over.

You rolled your eyes and walked over to him, all while he unbuttoned his shirt.

You got on your knees in front of him, squeezing your thighs together as you cunt throbbed at the sight of his bare chest.

Mattheo smirked down, “Ready?” Once you nodded he poured the alcohol down his bare torso.

You didn’t hesitate to begin licking all of the liquor off his torso, savouring the way the fire whiskey burned down your throat.

Mattheo couldn’t stop himself from getting hard at the sight of you on your knees for him staring up at him with lusty half lidded eyes. It made him feel things he knew he shouldn’t feel towards.

The crowd wooed and whistled as you finished licking his chest having made sure to not miss a drop.

“Thanks for the shot, Matty~” you purred, winking at him, your cheeks equally as red as his.

You got up from your knees and returned to your spot beside Lorenzo. Once sat, you took a deep breath to calm yourself down.

You hadn’t expected to have gotten so turned on. It felt so wrong to be attracted to Mattheo.. but you couldn’t help yourself when all you could think about was his dark lustful gaze…

Theodore Nott

You and Theodore became friends in first year.

Theodore was a bit of a loner, like yourself so you got along right away.

Because of this, you always paired up together in your classes.

Especially in potions which you both excel at. Unlike your brother, you inherited your mother’s potions skills.

You guys have definitely have bonded over dead moms/parents.

In fifth year you both became more acquainted with Draco and his gang.

It brought you guys out of your shells.

And further ruined your relationship with your brother but you didn’t really care.

You had Theo by your side and that’s all that mattered.

Although you’re “just friends” there’s definitely feelings at play.

Seeing everyone around you get into relationships made you yearn for one yourself.

Since you’re so close with Theo already you couldn’t help but think about being with him.

He’s such a pretty boy, with his hazel eyes, dirty blond hair and Italian accent.

Theodore had a little thing for you phase in third year.

He considers it a phase but the feelings never truly left.

The both of you are way to afraid to confess to each other in fear of ruining your friendship and of the retaliation from your families.

It was a Friday night and the gang had decided to sneak out of the castle to go swimming in the Black Lake.

Somehow the whole gang managed to bypass Filch and Mrs. Norris, even though the lot of you were giggling loudly at each other.

Once out of the main doors, you all ran to the rocky shores of the lake and spread out all of your towels.

Theo sat down and lit up a cigarette with Mattheo, while you took off your (Theo’s) shirt and your pj pants. Revealing your tiny bikini.

Mattheo wolf whistled at you, “Looking good Potter~” he teased.

“Fuck off Riddle-“ you said playfully and rolled your eyes at him.

“Shut it.” Theo muttered to Mattheo as he took a drag of his cigarette.

Mattheo looked at him, a grin spreading on his face, “What was that, Theo? You jealous or something? Don’t like me talking to your girl?”

“I’m not.” Theo denied as he watched you get into the water with Lorenzo, Pansy, and Draco.

He avoided Mattheo’s gaze to look at you and the others in the water.

Theo clenched his jaw as he observed you and Draco play in the water. Jealousy bubbled in the pit of his stomach.

“Sure you are.” Mattheo scoffed unconvinced.

“Fuck off-“ Theo shoved Mattheo lightly.

He took another deep drag of his cigarette in an attempt to ease his nerves.

“Theo!” You called from the water, “Stop smoking and get in the water!” You grinned joyfully at him.

Theo could feel his heart skip a beat at your radiant smile.

“Theo come on!” You called out again.

“Alright alright, bella-“ He chuckled before putting out his cigarette and getting up.

He took off his shirt and jogged towards the water.

You giggled and grabbed his arm to pull him the rest of the way.

There was no way he could let Draco have you…

Lorenzo Berkshire

Lorenzo has prided himself in his academics.

He has good grades in all of his classes.

Except in history of magic. He’s actually failing the class.

Look it isn’t his fault! Professor Binns is just such a bore.

Seeing as Lorenzo was failing, Professor Binns assigned you, Y/n Potter as his tutor.

Lorenzo was pretty happy about having a cute girl tutoring him.

You’ve intrigued him since first year but he’s never had the chance to talk to you.

But now he sees you twice a week for tutoring.

And honestly you don’t get much tutoring done.

Lorenzo is just so engaging and interesting that you just forget about what you’re there to do.

“Merlin, Lorenzo! We need to focus!” You giggled as you realized how much time you spent conversing.

“Oops!” He giggled.

You found yourself easily charmed by the boy. He was very refreshing to hang out with.

He wasn’t like the other Slytherins who gave you the cold shoulder and looked at you sideways.

Exams were in a week and Lorenzo desperately needed your tutoring if he wanted to pass history of magic.

You both decided to increase the amount of tutoring you’d be doing per week in preparation.

It was the day before exams started and your last day of tutoring.

You made the plan to study in his dorm instead of the library as you found the latter to busy. Lorenzo made sure to kick out his roommates and clean up his area in preparation.

You met up in his dorm after class and wasted no time in taking out all of your notes and textbooks out.

“Ok, Lorenzo.” You said sternly. “No more funny business we need to focus.” You sat on his bed.

He sat in front of you, nodding in agreement, “I really need to pass this exam or my dad will kill me.” He said and got his own notes out.

“Alright. I’m going to quiz you on some stuff. Look over your notes and tell me when you’re ready.” You instructed as you organized a few papers.

Lorenzo nodded and began looking over his notes, desperately trying to not get distracted at the thought that you, a cute girl was in his dorm and sitting on his bed.

“Okay I think I’m ready.” He announces after a few minutes and put his notes to the side.

“Okay… question one..” you began.

You quizzed Lorenzo for the next half hour. He was truly trying his best. What motivated him the most was the praise you gave him after each right answer.

“Good job!” “Atta boy!” “You’re doing great!” “That’s right!”

Every single one gave him butterflies.

Eventually he managed to get all of them right.

“You got every single question right!” You exclaimed with a big grin, “ Well done! I’m sure you’re going to pass!”

“You really think?” He smiled shyly.

“Of course!” You said reassuringly.

You checked your watch, you had finished your quizzing just on time.

You began to pack up your stuff, ready to head back to your dorm to do some studying of your own.

“Thank you, for all of the tutoring.” Lorenzo thanked as he helped you.

“It’s no problem at all, you’re fun to tutor.” You admit shyly, “Good luck on your exam.” You bided him before leaving.

Lorenzo watched you leave, making a note to himself to ask you out on a date after exams..

Blaise Zabini

You and Blaise got paired up for a project in potions once.

You both weren’t thrilled because you didn’t really get along.

At least you weren’t paired up with Seamus.

And in a way it worked out well for Blaise because he didn’t have to partner up with any of his idiot friends and have to do all of the work.

You did so well on the project together that Professor Slughorn decided to continue paring you guys up.

Hanging out with Blaise was now unavoidable.

Your interactions went from uninterested, cold and limited to being much more frequent and nicer.

Being much friendlier to each other also helped you work even better together.

“Hey, Zabini? How do you cut these roots again?” You asked quietly, glancing over at him.

“Oh you cut them in half and then..” he leaned over to help you.

You couldn’t help but be shy about the close proximity between you two.

He was close enough that you could smell his piney aftershave and his minty breath.

Not to mention his voice was so deep and smooth as he talked.

You snapped quickly out of it and focused back on what he was saying.

“Oh right. Thanks.” You thanked him and proceeded to cut the ingredient as he instructed.

“S’no prob.” He said, hesitating before leaving your side.

Since you were already doing so much work together, it was easier to just study together as well.

This resulted in you two spending more time together.

The library became you main hangout spot.

Away from his annoying friends who always burst into his dorm asking stupid questions just for the sake of bothering you two.

“Do you understand what question 8 means? I completely forgot what Professor Bins said about it.” Blaise asked, furrowing his brows with a sigh.

“Uh let me see..” you leaned over to read his parchment.

While you muttered the question to yourself, Blaise couldn’t help but stare at your focused face.

You looked cute, bitting your cheeks as you played with a strand of your curly hair. He could tell you had just washed it because you smelled strongly of lavender.

“Um I just wrote down this…” you sat up and grabbed your parchment.

You guys only considered yourselves acquaintances.

Yeah you found each other attractive.

You’re both attractive people after all and you were just acknowledging the obvious ok?

You two truly were oblivious idiots who couldn’t realize you had crushes on each other.

You were headed to what you thought would be another ordinary potions class.

You sat down beside Blaise and took out all your supplies, ready for whatever Professor Slughorn was going to make you guys brew.

After a bit of waiting, Slughorn began his lesson. “Today, we will be learning about Amortentia. Can anyone tell me what this potion does?”

Hermione shot up her hand eager to answer.

“Yes, Miss Granger?” Slughorn picked her.

“It’s a love potion sir.” She answered

“Corrected, ten points for Griffindor!” Professor Slughorn grinned.

He went on about the lesson, talking about the potion’s history and the risk involved with brewing it and its results.

“Now that we’re done with the lesson, I invite you all to come up and smell this batch of Amortentia I brewed just for this class.” Slughorn said enthusiastically.

You watched as your classmates went up and smelled the potion.

It was amusing seeing how many answered with a stutter and returned to their seats with reddened cheeks.

Finally it was your turn and you had no idea what you would smell.

You leaned down to take a deep inhale of the potion and the overhwhelming sent of Pine and mint flooded your senses.

“And what do you smell Miss Potter?” Your Professor asked.

You hesitated before speaking, “Pine and mint sir.” You answered.

Then the realization hit you and your eyes grew wide.

You smelled Blaise.

You blushed in embarrassment and kept your head down as you walked back to your desk.

“Who did you smell?” Blaise asked you curiously.

Before you could give him a half assed answer you were interrupted.

“Mr Zabini! Your turn!” Professor Slughorn announced.

Blaise got up from his seat and approached the potion.

It took a few smells for him to realize what he was smelling wasn’t your scent lingering on him. The potion itself smelled like lavender.

The gears in his head began to turn and it all began to fit. He smelled your shampoo.

He felt his cheeks heat up a bit from embarrassment and he quickly glanced at you.

Class was going to be very interesting…

[ihatehomework]

yall i miss jily😭😭😭 not like its gone but like the marauders used to be so happy sunshine gryffindor vibes. but also i feel like we collectively all forget how much james potter HATED slytherin. idk i also think that yes death eaters were humans BUT they also killed so many people like are we forgetting that barty crouch jr literally tortured alice and frank longbottom he is at fault for neville growing up without his parents😭 i genuinely think that people forget that evan, barty etc. actually killed people and killed people who were probably friends with the marauders. ik that everyone deserves a second chance but seriously???? do you actually think that the rosiers were good people and didn't hate and discriminate against muggleborns??? NOT EVERYONE HAS A TRAGIC BACKSTORY IDK SOME OF THEM ARE JUST EVIL. the way everyone defends evan rosier (love his character but i have beef with the way he gets away with being a death eater later on) but snape, who i absolutely detest, hate and think should have died earlier, who also actually did something that was not evil in his lifetime, is the most hated marauders character like????? and the black sisters???? yes love a complex female character but are we seriously trying to redeem bellatrix? do we not remember WHAT SHE SCARED ON HERMIONE LIKE WHAT. and love the newer marauders fandom but everyones so emo and depressed this is supposed to be FUN. also the characters feel so ooc. everytime i see casanova remus lupin im like 'huh thats supposed to be sirius and james???' love remus but my boy aint rizzing anyone up hes a shy af introvert. and jegulus is so cute but remember that james is #no.1slytherinhater and he was absolutely smitten with lily evans FROM THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. REMEMBER WHEN JILY WAS THE BACKBONE OF THE MARAUDERS? like they ate fr. this became a whole ass paragraph damn i did not know i had so much to say about this. i can lowkey already sniff the comments or thoughts saying 'oh let us have our fun its just a story' im not stopping you this is just my opinion. 'oh none of this is actually proven' please give me a break😭🙏 like most of the source material goes against the fandoms perception of the marauders. 'fuck jkr we'll do what we want' youve basically just made 10 million ocs and give them names of characters like im eating up all the marauders content but genuinely can we go back to the happier times??

[loserboyfriendrjl]

list of things that the marauders fandom made up: a summary

the marauders naming themselves the marauders. there is no evidence for it, and on the map, it is written the marauder's map. the marauder is a synonym of some sorts to rascal, raider

james "fleamont" potter and sirius "orion" black. remus (john) is the only one who has a canon middle name, actually

on that note, lily's middle name. jean, jane, jolene. the only (canon) thing we know about it is that it starts with a j

the personalities of sirius black, james potter, peter pettigrew, remus lupin, lily evans, (characters that have been given little backstory), barty crouch, mary macdonald, (characters that have been mentioned once or twice or, on barty's case, given almost little to no backstory) marlene mckinnon, dorcas meadowes, regulus black, pandora lovegood (literally dead when the series started)

their relationships with each other and the ways that they interact (enemies to lovers dorlene, best friends to lovers marylily, the very exact dynamics between the marauders and other characters, even the dynamic between the black brothers)

grant chapman

all the other marauders era character ocs

almost all of the ships (besides jily and fralice): wolfstar, jegulus, jegulily, nobleflower, marylily, marylene, dorlene, dorlily, pandorcas, rosekiller the list goes on and on

the idea that the prank has been something dramatic that had put a strain on their relationship. sirius seems to be showing no remorse about it whatsoever, remus seems very unbothered

the fact that sirius had long hair before azkaban, too. (he canonically has short hair. moody, in the order picture, described him as "sirius, before he had long hair.")

remus' scars. they are, not once, mentioned or described in canon

remus being a casanova. once again, no canon evidence. the only one of them who seems to have been interesting to the hogwarts population was sirius, who seemed "uninterested"

james and sirius being "dumb". they're one of the only characters in the series, along with hermione granger and a few others, who are described as "exceptionally bright" and "exceptionally smart"

pretty much the whole lore

[lokilaufeysonslove]

𝐌𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐞 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐄𝐧𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐞𝐬

𝐃𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐨 𝐌𝐚𝐥𝐟𝐨𝐲 𝐱 𝐟𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐥𝐞!𝐩𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐛𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐝!𝐚𝐛𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝!𝐠𝐫𝐲𝐟𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐫!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

// Summary // your parents were never kind and sweet type of people, but in your sixth year things got out of hand. To put a cherry on top, a certain platinum blond haired Slytherin Prince decided to be Sherlock Holmes and found out your secrets, ones nobody is supposed to know.

// Warnings // mentions of violence, both physical and verbal violence, abusive parents, bullying, hate towards reader, ignorance, name calling (princess in a mocking way, shame, disgrace, disappointment, waste of time), reader has a backstory, suicidal thoughts, reader has an attempt of suicide, crying, talk about past.

// Author’s Note // please pay attention to warnings! I don’t write about Draco usually, but I couldn’t get idea out of my mind, so I just went with it. This is enemies to lovers. Also, I have mentioned once that reader is 16, but for the sake of this plot, since every sixth year is 16. This is a part two, please read part one first! / divider by the amazing @saradika-graphics / gif by @talesfromthecrypts

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 in progress

Few months had passed since the first day of Hogwarts. Things with your family were getting worse each day. You received letters from them on a daily basis, all of them saying how much of a disappointment and waste of time you were. You felt as if you were a piece of trash. Your mother made sure of it.

You became lonely, quite literally. You were studying during the day, and sleeping or just thinking at nights. Sometimes you would even sneak out in the Astronomy Tower late at nights, just to be alone.

Hermione, Harry and Ron became concerned, but you were shrugging them off and keeping your distance. Harry, being the Sherlock Holmes he was, became suspicious and tried everything to get you to say something, but you were mastered in hiding and keeping secrets.

Little did you know that a certain platinum blond haired boy was growing suspicious as well.

One day, you were sitting in the library, pretending to read, but all you could think of, was a letter your mother has sent you earlier that day, which was laying innocently on the table in front of you. Shame, disgrace, disappointment, waste of time. You were sick and tired of those words, you just wanted to get rid of them, but they kept wandering inside your head, never leaving.

You heard footsteps approaching you, pulling you out of your train of thoughts. You looked up to be met with Malfoy, Goyle and Zabini. Again, something was wrong with the Slytherin Prince. He was quiet, it seemed like he wasn’t the one who was leading the latter two.

Goyle walked forward and leaned on the table with his elbows. He looked at the letter and took it in his hands. He opened his mouth to say something, but you interrupted by standing up and snatching the letter out of his hands harshly.

“If you’re going to tell me how much of a shame and disgrace I am, don’t waste your time. Believe me, you don’t have to. I have already been told that more than enough times.” You said without thinking and immediately regretted it. Your voice was quiet, but firm. You turned around and walked out of the library.

The three boys looked at each other with the same expression that said ‘what the hell did just happen’. Neither understood what happened. This only caused one of them to grow even more suspicious.

Christmas was approaching. Everyone was happy, happy to spend time with their families, happy to spend time with their loved ones. Everyone except you. You didn’t want to go home, no, not home, your parents’ manor. You wanted to stay at Hogwarts, but you would get into a huge trouble, and getting in trouble with your parents wasn’t very… pleasant.

You were sitting in the Great Hall, at the Gryffindor house table, when Harry approached you, a little hesitantly.

“Hey,” he started softly, “Are you sure you’re fine?”

You were fighting the urge to roll your eyes, “Yes Harry, I am fine, really. Don’t worry.” You gave him the fakest smile ever, and he bought it.

But Malfoy didn’t… he was watching from afar.

The letters your parents sent you every day and night were very shitty. That’s how you ended up in Moaning Myrtle’s lavatory, sobbing your eyeballs out. You were leaning against the sink, looking in the mirror and sobbing uncontrollably while Myrtle told you that everything would be fine.

“No Myrtle, nothing will be fine. Ever.” You said in the middle of sobs.

“Talk to your parents then.” Myrtle said in her dreamy, high-pitched voice.

You laughed bitterly at her statement, your voice coming out loud and harsh, a maniacal sound that would make a person wince. “Talk to my parents? Oh, but they are the very reason why I am sobbing the shit out of myself right now Myrtle. Do you know how they treat me? Can you even imagine the pain they put me through? Let me guess. No! You don’t! You can’t! Has your father ever beat you until you were bleeding?! Has your mother ever used Cruciatus curse on you?! And that’s because of this whole pureblood supremacy shit! Because of the house you are put in! I am tired Myrtle, tired of standing strong for 16 goddamn years! I deserve some break.” You said, rising your voice every time you would swear.

It was crystal clear that Myrtle was shocked, “Talk to your friends, or your headmaster then. That is abuse, it needs to stop.”

“I can’t! If I say a word about this, they will most definitely kill me. I don’t give two shits if I die, no. I just don’t want to be killed by them! And about friends, I do not have any. And do you know why? Because I can’t have any! I don’t want to put any of my friends in danger or be put in danger because of them!” You looked in the mirror, then lowered your head once again and started crying.

After few minutes of brutal silence and your quiet sobs, you looked up and wiped away your tears with the palms of your hands.

“You know what,” you started, looking at Myrtle, “do you know how high the Astronomy Tower is?”

Myrtle looked really confused now, “Why?”

“Oh, just wanted to go up there, gaze at the sky, but I have a terrible fear of highs, you see…”

It was a lie, of course, but Myrtle bought it. After all, parents like yours were good at rising flawless liars.

“It’s high, indeed, but I don’t think you will be scared. Platform is huge.”

You faked a sad smile and thanked her, “Thank you, I’ll see you soon.” You walked out of the bathroom. “Or not.” You mumbled to yourself, thinking nobody heard you. But someone did. This someone being very annoying Draco Lucius Malfoy.

He spied on you the whole time and to make matters even worse, he heard every single word you said. So, obviously, he followed you.

When you reached the Astronomy Tower, you headed straight towards the edge and looked out.

“Oh my god, what am I doing?!” You asked yourself out loud.

You slightly leaned forward, when two strong arms cuffed your wrists and turned you around. A soft gasp escaped from your mouth at this sudden action. However, you were shocked when you saw who did this.

Draco Fucking Malfoy

“What the hell?! Were you actually planning to jump out of there?!” He asked. But what confused you more was the anger latched on his face.

“Why do you care?” You asked in a quiet tone.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because you were going to commit suicide!” his voice was firm and stern, but dripping with sarcasm at the same time.

“Yeah, but why do you care?! Not that we’re friends or anything. You have been making my life miserable since the day I stepped my foot in the Great Hall for the first time, and now you care all of a sudden?!” You hissed through gritted teeth, your voice coming out venomous, a bit louder this time. You didn’t know why, but him being angry at you for attempting to end your life, for attempting to end all this pain and leave this hell forever, made you angry too. He was one of the people who made you hate your life, made you hate yourself, and now he was suddenly scolding you for trying to end it all. You didn’t know why, but it made you boil with anger.

What made you even angrier was that he didn’t say anything, he just stood there, looking down at the cold floor of the tower, completely silent. Why do you care?! Your voice echoed in his head, sounding louder and louder every second. Why did he care? You were right. He had been making your life a living hell since the day one, he had been the one to approach you for no reason and call you the most insulting, disgusting, and horrible words ever. He had been the one to make fun of you in front of everyone and make you feel insanely insecure. After all the things he did, why did he care? Maybe it was guilt eating him out, maybe he didn’t ever realize how much you were hurting, how much you were going through, until very now. But for some reason, he felt bad, he felt defeated, and he hated every second of it.

You were tired, exhausted by stress, crying and all the emotions. You were feeling nauseous. You wanted to drop down and pass out for hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries. You didn’t care, you just wanted to disappear, vanish. You were weak, too weak, but you still stood there, watching at young man in front of you, who was staring down at his shoes like a child who broke a vase, waiting for him to look up. Under any other circumstances it would be almost cute, but not now. Not when you were about to end your life, not when the boy in front of you was a boy who played a big part in your decision.

Silence was brutal. None of you saying a word, waiting for the other to speak up. Waiting for the other to say something, anything. You stood there, glaring at him like a mother glares at her son when she grounds him.

You couldn’t take it anymore, so you broke the silence by chuckling. But it was not the funny type of chuckle. No, it was bitter, venomous, painful chuckle. Anyone would hear the pain in your voice, anyone would see the pain in your eyes, pain was the only thing that radiated from you. It always had been.

“That’s what I thought.” You said and sighed deeply, “Listen Malfoy, forget about everything, and I mean everything you heard and witnessed today. And don’t you dare say a word about this to anyone.” You said and walked past him and down the stairs, your shoulder brushing against his.

He still didn’t move. He didn’t know what to do. He knew he couldn’t tell anyone, anyway. This was the pureblood family you were talking about. Rules are different there. Finally, he shook himself out of his trance and walked down the steps, trying to be as quiet as possible, since it was already past curfew and the last thing he wanted was Filch catching him.

Slytherin common room was expectedly empty. He was positive he would fall into a deep sleep the moment his head would hit the pillow, but he couldn’t go to his dorm just yet. He was still thinking about what happened just few minutes ago. As much as he wanted to forget it, he couldn’t. Can you even imagine the pain they put me through? He could never have imagined that you were going through this much. Let me guess. No! You don’t! You can’t! Yes, he couldn’t. Has your father ever beat you until you were bleeding?! And here he thought his father was the most horrible person. Has your mother ever used Cruciatus curse on you?! He could never even think of his mother being that brutal. And that’s because of this whole pureblood supremacy shit! Because of the house you are put in! I am tired, tired of standing strong for 16 goddamn years! I deserve some break. You were right, you really did deserve some break.

He felt horrible, he felt disgusted by your parents, he felt bad for you. Oh, come on Draco! Why do you feel bad?! She probably deserves that.

His brain said all of this rubbish, but his heart seemed to disagree. It screamed loudly, louder than his brain, You pathetic little idiot! How can you say that?! No live being deserves that, not even a cockroach!

Lost in his thoughts, he didn’t realize how he ended up on the emerald green couch in front of a lit fireplace. He dropped his head in his hands, elbows resting on his knees. Taking deep breaths, he began to relax a little. He looked up and stared down at fire, warm and welcoming, yet roaring and dangerous. He didn’t know how long he had been sitting there. Maybe for few minutes, maybe even hours. But he didn’t care. All he could think of right now were you.

He didn’t know why he had a sudden urge to help you, he didn’t know why he had the sudden urge to just hold you until your sobs would calm down. He had never felt this way. It confused him. He never cared about you, but for some reason, hearing your cries made his heart shatter into many pieces. If it were any other person, he would feel sorry for them, he would pity them, but this was definitely not pity. This was… he didn’t know either. But it felt strange.

Standing up, he took one last deep breath and headed towards his dorm room, where he could finally get his long awaited sleep.

[marauderstars]

Ways J.K Rowling did poc dirty in canon:

Making the last name of one of her most powerful black characters “Shacklebolt” - a crude af reference to slavery and just in very poor taste.

Naming her only east Asian character “Cho Chang” - a Korean surname as a first name for a Chinese character - proving she did no research whatsoever into Chinese naming traditions.

Cho’s characterization also leans in to the trope of tragic Asian female characters being defined by their romantic connections to white men, as in “Miss Saigon” or “A Quiet American.” Cho’s storyline centers on her romantic involvement with Cedric, Harry and Roger Davies. She gets no meaningful arc of her own.

The sidekick-ification of Lee Jordan.

Michael Corner being referred to as “the dark one” which is bad enough, and then him being whitewashed in the films.

Pansy Parkinson’s comment about Angelina Johnson’s braided hair looking like “worms” goes completely unpunished. Rowling treats this as standard bullying instead of a racially-charged comment. Rowling clearly didn’t understand the serious implications of this comment and its rooting in deeply-ingrained discrimination against black hairstyles, or she would have written a similar reaction to this as she did to that of Hermione being called a “Mudblood.”

House Elves as a metaphor for slaves is highly problematic because they are depicted as “liking” their enslavement and being complicit in it, much like the black slaves in “Gone With The Wind.” Despite Dobby being a beloved character, he is also seen as an anomaly for desiring freedom, and many other House Elves are depicted as grotesque, fawning, ridiculous or sinister. Pretty garbage metaphor for black slaves.

In Goblet of Fire Rowling describes a group of “African” wizards wearing “long white robes” and “roasting what looked like a rabbit on a bright purple fire.” This is just… *sigh* The way this is worded is very clearly just token exoticism and includes no genuine detail about their clothing, cultural food or nationality. It’s just “wow those zany rabbit-eating Africans and their purple fire.” Once again black characters are being used as examples of otherness rather than shown as human beings.

Rowling has openly admitted that she created a detailed backstory for Dean Thomas, one of the series’ few black characters, but did not include it in the books and included the backstory of Neville Longbottom, a white character, instead.

Approving the casting of a white actress in the role of Lavender Brown in the films, a character the majority of readers assumed was black.

The portrayal of Blaise Zabini’s “famously beautiful” black mother who was known for offing her husbands and taking their money. Like. Come on. Tbh she sounds like a queen but violent woc gold digger is still a shit trope.

Just the entire treatment of the Patil twins at the Yule Ball, the way Harry and Ron treated them and Rowling’s garbage attempt at describing their traditional clothing.

Padma Patil’s portrayal in Cursed Child as the stereotypical controlling Indian wife. The idea of ending up with her instead of Hermione being positioned as some kind of horrible alternate reality for Ron had very xenophobic undertones, and while Hermione is portrayed as black in the play, I don’t believe that Rowling originally intended her to be a black character nor that casting directors deliberately set out to cast a black actress as Hermione in Cursed Child initially.

[iamnmbr3]

jk rowling: ok let's create a scene in which ginny is talked even by slytherins and that can be a build up for hinny. Such a hinny scene!!

Also jk rowling: ends up writing a drarry scene in which not only harry feels uncomfortable watching pansy stroking draco's hair, BUT ALSO DRACO SAYS GINNY IS NOT SPECIAL(can we talk about this??????!) *giggles*

I hate how suddenly in book 6 random characters who have no reason to say good things about her are suddenly acting like she's the Bestest Ever TM in order to tell the readers to like her - which really shows how weak as a character she is (in the later books - I think pre book 6 she was actually a good character).

We don't need all the Slytherins to go on and on about how awesome Hermione or Neville are. We don't need the Death Eaters to stage a conversation where they're all like 'dang! that Luna Lovegood sure is quirky and fun but also super good hearted and insightful and totally awesome!" or Arthur and Molly to be like 'you know that Snape sure is interesting and morally ambiguous. And don't even get me started on Voldemort - say what you will about the man, but he's got charisma! And what a fascinating backstory!" That would be ridiculous. And unnecessary. Because all those characters can stand on their own. Ginny can't and JKR over-compensates by trying to have other characters tell us how great she is but that actually just undermines her.

Which is a shame. Because Ginny had a ton of potential and I liked her way more in book 5 (and the previous books) when she actually had an arc and JKR wasn't flattening her out and trying to push her as the Love Interest TM at the expense of her character.

And yeah that whole scene is accidentally such drarry fodder. Here's the relevant passage.

I mean, Pansy mentions that people like Ginny and immediately looks at Draco but she can't be worried about Draco liking Ginny because Draco has literally just dismissed her. In fact, it's Blaise that she seems to be more worried about. And as soon as Blaise insults Ginny Pansy relaxes and looks happy. (So does Draco, incidentally). So Pansy looking at Draco seems more like she knows he might care about boys liking Ginny...boys like Harry Potter for example. Pansy's been hanging around with Draco for 5 years by this point. She's definitely noticed how he is about Harry. And yeah I know she's stroking Draco's hair but they don't seem to actually be dating. I think that's just Harry projecting.

And we know if they actually got together ever Harry would've mentioned it. So clearly Draco at least wasn't interested. And Pansy does end up marrying Blaise. So I read this scene as Pansy crushing on Blaise, Draco possibly lowkey crushing on Blaise and highkey crushing on Harry and also being super jealous of Ginny (bc he immediately clocked her fancying Harry...and Collin Creevey too tbh - just like Harry clocks everyone who even looks at Draco lol) and Pansy knowing it.

AND THEN after all this we get Harry hating on Pansy for looking like she's enjoying stroking Draco's hair followed by him getting hit directly on the head by a piece of luggage because he got distracted by the sight of Draco changing. And THEN he ends up immobilized and alone, entirely at Draco's mercy, while believing Draco to be a Death Eater (and being correct!) and he doesn't even feel worried that Draco will hurt him or hand him over to Voldemort...and he's right, because Draco doesn't. Absolutely wild. Book 6 is the drarry fic of all time. JKR did not intend or want it to be. But it is.

[reggieslocket]

so i was watching harry potter and the half-blood prince with my cousin and when hermione and harry opened the fake locket she went "wait, who was r.a.b again?" and the urge to pause the movie and explain in detail regulus's whole backstory was so strong that i had to take a deep breath before responding "oh he was sirius’s brother, he died in the cave after replacing the horcrux" but that urge was still there because i wanted to tell her how tragic was sirius’s and regulus's relationship and how sirius never discovered how his brother died...

sometimes i can't even remember how it was like to watch the harry potter movies as a "potterhead" and not as a marauders stan

[artemisia-black]

Phineas Nigellus and Sirius’s similarities

Re-reading the camping scene, I noticed a parallel between Sirius and Phineas Nigellus. Both of them are cutting and contemptuous when they perceive someone to either be stupid or having said something stupid. 

During the tent scene, Phineas chides both Harry and Hermione in a very dismissive manner: 

“...Goblin-made armor does not require cleaning, simple girl….” DH

“.....Phineas Nigellus turned his face in the direction of Harry’s voice.

“Evidently it is not only Muggle-borns who are ignorant, Potter” “  DH

These echo Sirius’s comments about both Bertha Jorkins and his insults towards Peter: 

“And she was an idiot. Very nosy, but no brains, none at all. It’s not a good combination…” GoF

“would never dream they’d use a weak, talentless thing like you” PoA

I’ve also noticed that they both seem bored/feign boredom. 

Cornelius Fudge describes visiting Sirius in Azkaban and how he seemed bored. In the SWM flashback, Sirius is described by Harry as: 

“…Sirius stared around at the students milling over the grass, looking rather haughty and bored..”  OoTP

This is similar to the descriptions of Phineas Nigellus, 

“.. Idly examining his silk gloves.”  OoTP

And Phineas is frequently seen pretending to be asleep and speaking in a bored voice: 

“He says he’ll be delighted,” said a bored voice behind Dumbledore; the wizard called Phineas had reappeared in front of his Slytherin banner. “My great-great-grandson has always had odd taste in houseguests...” OoTP

Also the always had odd taste in houseguests, clearly has a backstory because Sirius has only been back at Grimmauld for less than a year. 

Furthermore, both Sirius and Phineas use insults related to cleanliness (so does Walburga’s portrait).

“That mangy old half-blood has been stealing Black heirlooms?” said Phineas Nigellus, incensed” DH

Which is similar to: 

“There’s enough filth on my robes without you touching them,” said Black.” PoA

[thatlittlefangirl]

When I first read the books I already loved Snape

I was 12 when I read the books for the first time, I had been forbidden to watch anything related to Harry Potter but my sister brought the 1st book and let me read it while she read the 3rd (she never read the first, don't ask why, she's weird). I approached the Wizarding World knowing only Harry, Hermione, Voldemort, Dumbledore, Hagrid and McGonagall, then again I barely knew them (I thought Hermione was that one female character who exists only for the MC to be seen as cool, I also thought she was dating Harry. I also thought that Dumbledore was married to McGonagall and taught a subject while also being a headmaster. SO yeah I didn't know shit). At first I loved the twins already (still do) and had a... crush on Hagrid (IDK WHY DON'T ASK) and didn't like Snape much since Harry hated him and thought he wanted to kill him but I didn't hate him either but I also accused him at first. Then as soon as the plot twist happened and Snape was innocent this whole time and Dumbledore assured Harry that Snape was just angry because James was his enemy and still saved him (which is a weird simplification of what really happened), I started liking Snape, I then started reading some fics about him and found out about his backstory, I did some more researches about him, and it's then that I started loving him. And then I watched some movies but I don't really care about movies and I prefer reading the books, I already read the 1st and 4th but I can't read more because my library closed.

[katsitsiyo]

All my love to @swottydoodler for taking on this comm! It’s a mashup of my current brainrots: Dramione and Baldur’s Gate 3 😅🥰

Tiefling Wizard/Cleric Hermione (bc obvs, the best dnd race for the best girl) and human Paladin Draco go on adventures together to weed out the lingering oppression after the defeat of Voldemort (and fall in love in the process 🤭😘)

Check out this twt thread with the AU backstory I made for these two. 🥰

[childotkw]

Ever thought about the idea of Harry, Ron and Hermione starting their work as Aurors, trying to avoid the whole conflict between Dumbledore and Riddle (or the Light and the Dark side) but still getting caught up in it?

I'd probably spin it as a time travel-esque story where Harry, Ron and Hermione (intentionally or not) end up back during the first war with Voldemort, or perhaps when he's still first rising to power.

They wouldn't be aurors, not with their lack of papers and backstories and the general distrust people would have towards each other back then meaning they wouldn't get passed the first level of screening without setting off alarms.

But I could see them becoming their own version of vigilantes or something. The three of them have a year of running and living rough under their belts, they're all riddled with some form of PTSD, and they're more determined than ever to take out the horcruxes and end Voldemort once and for all.

Only problem is - the three of them have never been subtle. They attract attention from both the Light and Dark sides pretty quickly. They're hard to track, mysterious, and dangerous; and that makes them intriguing.

Harry, Ron and Hermione have to deal with the increasing pressure from all around them, as well as hunting down the horcruxes that aren't all in the same spots they remember from their time.

It would likely eventually get to the point where Harry - because of course it's him - yeets himself into the spotlight to keep the very unwelcome attention of Voldemort and Dumbledore on him rather than Ron and Hermione.

Harry is out there, metaphorically dancing with giant feather fans to distract their allies and enemies alike, while his friends work in the shadows to complete their goal.

It's...messy.

[severus-snaps]

'Mudblood' and Muggle-borns

back again with some late-to-the-party observations that I want to talk about (ah, the perils of becoming obsessed with snape in 2024)

So, I think by now that most people are aware of this tweet and/or the idea that it wasn't just Muggle-borns, but half-bloods as well, who were called 'Mudbloods' by blood supremacists:

And I don't know about anyone else, but I took this with a grain of salt because JKR is known to... make statements sometimes, some more realistic within her own canon than others.

I know that some people (on Quora especially, but probably elsewhere) outright claim that JKR said this to make Snape's use of 'Mudblood' in SWM 'more acceptable' or less bad or something because the term applied to him, too, and not just Muggle-borns - and literally until today, I thought the same. Now don't get me wrong, I love Snape and will usually jump at any chance to make his backstory and characterisation more complicated and sympathetic. I felt almost that JK was sort of... backtracking, because in the series we only see people use 'Mudblood' against Muggle-borns, with Hermione and Draco the most frequently seen Muggle-born and blood supremacist (respectively) in the series.

So I've rounded up a few examples where Mudblood is arguably used against people who are not Muggle-born.

We're first introduced to the term "Mudblood" in CoS:

The smug look on Malfoy’s face flickered. “No one asked your opinion, you filthy little Mudblood,” he spat.

Ron describes the term shortly afterwards as follows:

"Mudblood's a really foul name for someone who is Muggle-born — you know, non-magic parents"

And that is how we see Draco use it most often, to refer to Muggle-borns (most notably Hermione). But it has been used on others who are probably not Muggleborn.

Exhibit A: Bob Ogden

Over to Potter-Search I go, searching 'Mudblood' - only to find someone called Bob Ogden. Now, having not read the later books in quite some time I had no idea initially who Bob Ogden was, so I head over to the wiki page. For those of you like me who haven't read the later books in a while, Ogden appeared in one of Dumbledore and Harry's trips into the Pensieve:

Bob Ogden (fl. 1925) was a British wizard who worked in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, a department of the Ministry of Magic, and led the Magical Law Enforcement Squad in the 1920s. As part of his duties, he once visited the Gaunt Shack, as the Department believed that Morfin Gaunt had not only performed magic in front of a Muggle but also accosted that Muggle, Tom Riddle Snr, and performed a dark charm on him.

Marvolo Gaunt, Morfin's father, asks him this:

“Are you pure-blood?” [Gaunt] asked, suddenly aggressive. “That’s neither here nor there,” said Ogden coldly, and Harry felt his respect for Ogden rise. Apparently Gaunt felt rather differently. He squinted into Ogden’s face and muttered, in what was clearly supposed to be an offensive tone, “Now I come to think about it, I’ve seen noses like yours down in the village.” “I don’t doubt it, if your son’s been let loose on them,” said Ogden.

Harry I think interprets this interaction as a Pureblood/Half-Blood Ogden rejecting Pureblood/blood supremacist ideology. Personally, I'm more inclined to think he's being cagey because he has definite Muggle ancestry, but we just don't know. I suppose it doesn't really matter. And then:

“So!” said Gaunt triumphantly, as though he had just proved a complicated point beyond all possible dispute. “Don’t you go talking to us as if we’re dirt on your shoes! Generations of purebloods, wizards all — more than you can say, I don’t doubt!” ... “Mr. Gaunt,” said Ogden doggedly, “I am afraid that neither your ancestors nor mine have anything to do with the matter in hand. I am here because of Morfin, Morfin and the Muggle he accosted late last night.

And finally:

“And you think we’re scum, do you?” screamed Gaunt, advancing on Ogden now, with a dirty yellow-nailed finger pointing at his chest. “Scum who’ll come running when the Ministry tells ’em to? Do you know who you’re talking to, you filthy little Mudblood, do you?” “I was under the impression that I was speaking to Mr. Gaunt,” said Ogden, looking wary, but standing his ground.

On the Wiki page, under Ogden's blood status, I find this interesting note:

In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 10 (The House of Gaunt) Ogden is shown wearing "the strange assortment of clothes so often chosen by inexperienced wizards trying to look like Muggles," which indicates that he was not Muggle-born, as a Muggle-born would have at least some experience with putting together a Muggle outfit.

The outfit in question was described as a "frock coat and spats over a striped one-piece bathing costume". I know shit all about clothes, so I had to google a frock coat, and here's some examples (conveniently also featuring spats on the feet in the first image); and also a one-piece bathing suit (vintage, since it was the 1920s and I'm assuming a men's):

[Images from Lily Absinthe, State Library of Victoria and vintag.es]

What a look. Deliberate in its farcicality. So... no, even the most out-of-touch Muggleborn in the 1920s probably wouldn't put that together in combination, because even assuming he was like 100 or something (seeing as he died at some stage before the events of HBP), I don't think a Muggleborn with two Muggle parents could've been that out of the loop on Muggle clothing to confuse swimwear for casual daywear.

Ogden is, obviously then, of magical enough heritage not to have any idea how to dress like a Muggle. And yet here he was, in my 'Mudblood' search. Admittedly, that might only be a generation or so removed; Tonks is also clearly clueless:

“Very clean, aren’t they, these Muggles?” said the witch called Tonks, who was looking around the kitchen with great interest. “My dad’s Muggle-born and he’s a right old slob. I suppose it varies, just like with wizards?”

Marvolo's comment about Ogden's nose also can be taken several ways; a jab/joke about the pus nose curse that Ogden's just had put on him by Morfin, or a real, thinly veiled accusation of Ogden having Muggle heritage (possibly the same as those in the surrounding villages). For his own safety, if Ogden was indeed Pureblood, he probably should've said so (for all the good it might have done him).

At any rate, Ogden obviously, whatever his family history, is 'wizard' enough to not know how to blend with Muggles - he's definitely not Muggleborn himself. If he did have Muggle heritage, which makes him a dubiously-named half-blood (dubious in that "half-blood" more or less refers to anyone who isn't 'Pureblood' or 'Muggleborn' rather than indicating a half-and-half split), it's likely to have been a grandparent or something, if not further removed (do we see Tonks struggle to wear Muggle clothes? I can't remember. I vaguely remember McGonagall wearing a Muggle dress, and she's supposed to be half-blood - but she's not described as looking odd for what she's wearing but I got more of the impression that Harry found it odd to see her out of the ususal robes she wears at Hogwarts).

Anyway, the real point of it is that it doesn't matter how magical Ogden is, because he is marked out as not Muggle-born by his clothes, and yet he still gets called a Mudblood. Gaunt wasn't necessarily suggesting Ogden's parents hadn't been a witch and a wizard, but that overall he had a bit more Muggle in him than a wizard should have (which, according to Gaunt, is none).

It's worth noting that the Gaunts were a family "noted for a vein of instability", possibly as a result of consistently marrying their cousins, so perhaps only their view on 'Mudblood' is anyone who isn't a Pureblood. And, of course, they are the proud, cousin-marrying descendents of Salazar Slytherin, who "started all this pure-blood stuff", and so were likely especially zealous about who 'counted' as Pure:

"They [Hogwarts founders] built this castle together, far from prying Muggle eyes, for it was an age when magic was feared by common people, and witches and wizards suffered much persecution." (Binns, CoS) "Slytherin wished to be more selective about the students admitted to Hogwarts. He believed that magical learning should be kept within all-magic families. He disliked taking students of Muggle parentage, believing them to be untrustworthy." (Binns, CoS)

Said Slytherin, "We'll teach just those Whose ancestry is purest." (Sorting Hat, OotP)

In any case, this is the strongest example of a dedicated blood supremacist calling someone with any suspected (real or otherwise) Muggle heritage a Mudblood.

Exhibit B: Walburga Black

Walburga Black was Sirius Black's mother, a proud pureblood supremacist, and she thought that Voldemort had the 'right idea' about things. Her portrait at Grimmauld Place calls the inhabitants of her house "filth" "creatures of dirt*", "scum", "stains of dishonour", and "mudbloods".

"MUDBLOODS! SCUM! CREATURES OF DIRT*!" “Filth! Scum! By-products of dirt and vileness! Half-breeds, mutants, freaks, begone from this place! How dare you befoul the house of my fathers — ” "Mudbloods, filth, stains of dishonor, taint of shame on the house of my fathers!"

* Creatures of dirt is apparently another word/turn of phrase for Mudblood, according to the wiki.

Obviously the portrait is screaming and overexcited, and not especially prone to nuance, but it does seem to be calling multiple people in the house Mudbloods - when, in theory, only Hermione would fit that description. Walburga is also capable of distinguishing between different people and offering specific insults, such as to Sirius:

“Yoooou!” she howled, her eyes popping at the sight of the man. “Blood traitor, abomination, shame of my flesh!”

Andromeda Tonks (nee Black) was blasted off of the Black family tapestry by Walburga for marrying a Muggleborn:

[Sirius] pointed to another small round burn mark between two names, Bellatrix and Narcissa. “Andromeda’s sisters are still here because they made lovely, respectable pure-blood marriages, but Andromeda married a Muggle-born, Ted Tonks, so — ” Sirius mimed blasting the tapestry with a wand and laughed sourly.

I expect having an actual Muggle in the family (aka an actual half-and-half Half-Blood) would've been seen as just as bad, if not worse, than marrying a Muggleborn to dedicated blood purists.

But in any case, with an Order primarily made up of Pureblood blood traitors (e.g. Weasleys, Sirius, Moody) and Half-Bloods (generally consisting of at least two magical parents like Harry, Tonks, and Dumbledore), and one Muggleborn (Hermione), Walburga just calls them all Mudbloods.

I'm also curious, as Hagrid wasn't there at 12 Grimmauld Place and a werewolf isn't technically a half-breed (but is sometimes conceptualised as such e.g. by Umbridge and her ilk), whether Walburga calls half-bloods "half-breeds", or whether she was yelling more generally at Lupin. Perhaps Muggles are "a different creature" in her eyes. We know that this line of thinking isn't uncommon:

"We’ve all got to listen to [whichever DE was in charge of Muggle Studies in DH] explain how Muggles are like animals, stupid and dirty..." (Neville, DH)

Exhibit C: Penelope Clearwater

Examples start to get a bit more sparse and interpretive from here on out.

In Chamber of Secrets, Voldemort describes the people petrified as Mudbloods:

“Haven’t you guessed yet, Harry Potter?” said Riddle softly. “Ginny Weasley opened the Chamber of Secrets. She strangled the school roosters and daubed threatening messages on the walls. She set the Serpent of Slytherin on four Mudbloods, and the Squib’s cat.”

The "four Mudbloods" in question were:

Colin Creevy

Justin Finch-Fletchley (with Nearly-Headless Nick as collatoral damage)

Hermione Granger, and

Penelope Clearwater

But we're not certain that they're all Muggleborn. In CoS, Justin is confirmed; he was headed to Eton and was waiting for Harry (the supposed Heir of Slytherin) to attack him in CoS for being Muggleborn. Colin is confirmed; "I never knew all the odd stuff I could do was magic till I got the letter from Hogwarts. My dad’s a milkman...", and Hermione is obvious.

And then there's Penelope. Unlike the other confirmed Muggle-borns, we don't hear much about her, apart from the fact that she's Percy's girlfriend and probably likes Quidditch; but Hermione uses her as her 'cover' when the Trio gets caught by Snatchers in Deathly Hallows:

“Penelope Clearwater,” said Hermione. She sounded terrified, but convincing. “What’s your blood status?” “Half-blood,” said Hermione.

And the note about it on the Wiki says:

However, it is possible that the fourth Muggle-born in addition to Colin, Hermione, and Justin (who are all definitively identified as Muggle-borns at some point) was Nearly-Headless Nick, and that Penelope was simply petrified because she was with Hermione when she encountered the Basilisk. In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 23 (Malfoy Manor), Hermione posed as Penelope when under interrogation by Snatchers, and claimed to be half-blood. Although, Hermione may have only lied about Penelope's blood status because mentioning she's Muggle-born would have possibly made things worse.

To me it seems unlikely that Voldemort would set the Basilisk on a ghost. It also seems unlikely that, after Harry has offered up "Vernon Dudley" as his name (more on that in a moment), and Ron has called himself first Stan Shunpike and then Barney Weasley, that Hermione would choose someone who she knew wasn't going to be a safe bet. Snatchers are "gangs trying to earn gold by rounding up Muggle-borns and blood traitors", so why offer a name that's likely to be on their list of Muggle-borns? It's also possible that it was just the first name she thought of, then lied about the blood status; but given that Hermione and Penelope would have woken up in the hospital wing together at the end of the events of CoS, it may well have come up in discussion.

And then there's this:

“You checked their names on the list yet, Scabior?” he roared. “Yeah. There’s no Vernon Dudley on ’ere, Greyback.”

So, the list is being checked by the Snatchers to see if the 'disguised' Trio are "wanted" - aka if they are Muggleborns/blood traitors/truants. I doubt they even checked Ron's name since the Weasleys are well-known blood traitors, but they picked up on Vernon Dudley not being a real name, and their list certainly seems to include Muggleborns, since they say they've captured a "Mudblood (presumably Dean Thomas), a runaway goblin, and three truants (the Trio)". Yet they don't mention Penelope.

So, Penelope was not on their list, and if it hadn't been for the Snatchers recognising Hermione in the paper, they might have gotten away with it. Maybe Penelope was Muggleborn and "presented herself for interrogation", which is something that Ron mentions Hermione hasn't done earlier in the book, and therefore that's why Penelope wasn't on the list - or that Penelope is not Muggleborn, but Half-Blood, and she got called a Mudblood in CoS anyway.

(Yes, JK probably forgot - but I'm sticking in-universe).

Exhibit D: The Muggle-Born Registration Commission

“Will the old hag [Umbridge] be interrogating Mudbloods all day, does anyone know?”

Shortly followed by:

“No, no, I’m half-blood, I’m half-blood, I tell you! My father was a wizard, he was, look him up, Arkie Alderton, he’s a well-known broomstick designer, look him up, I tell you — get your hands off me, get your hands off—” “This is your final warning,” said Umbridge’s soft voice, magically magnified so that it sounded clearly over the man’s desperate screams. “If you struggle, you will be subjected to the Dementor’s Kiss.” The man’s screams subsided, but dry sobs echoed through the corridor. “Take him away,” said Umbridge. Two dementors appeared in the doorway of the courtroom, their rotting, scabbed hands clutching the upper arms of a wizard who appeared to be fainting. They glided away down the corridor with him, and the darkness they trailed behind them swallowed him from sight.

So, the Muggle-Born Registration Commission was supposed to be rounding up, interrogating and imprisoning Muggle-borns, but arguably was also rounding up (and referring to) possible half-bloods, too. The same possibly happened to Dean Thomas, a half-blood (according to his official page) mistaken for a Muggle-born, as he had no record of his wizard father.

“Muggle-born, eh?” asked the first man. “Not sure,” said Dean. “My dad left my mum when I was a kid. I’ve got no proof he was a wizard, though.”

Summary of Exhibits

So, we've seen half-blood-or-more Bob Ogden and potentially half-blood Penelope Clearwater be referred to as Mudbloods by Gaunts/Voldemort. We've seen an entire house of people of different magical heritage between them, all collectively called Mudbloods by Walburga Black. And we've seen some random Ministry witch call a whole collection of (assumed but not confirmed) Muggle-born wizards and witches Mudbloods.

I think what we can gather from this is that the distinction between half-blood and Muggle-born hardly matters to some blood supremacists. If you're a Pureblood supremacist, anyone who isn't Pure is, obviously, impure. Arguably, "Mudblood" wasn't always strictly about being Muggleborn; it's about 'impure' heritage. The stronger examples (Bob Ogden, Walburga Black) are older examples; Voldemort and Walburga's generation (born ~1920s) and even before (Marvolo's generation had an even more ambiguous use). I think it's safe to say that the meaning of the word may have evolved or tightened by the time Harry is in school to primarily refer to Muggleborns, but obviously that's a matter of opinion;

Silent Half-Bloods in the Hierarchy of Pureblood Supremacy

Wizarding society is sort of divided into Pureblood, Half-blood, Muggle-borns, Muggles, and... Squibs, somewhere.

Obviously, in an ideal pureblood society, Purebloods are at the top:

[Sirius' parents] "thought Voldemort had the right idea, they were all for the purification of the Wizarding race, getting rid of Muggle-borns and having purebloods in charge." (Sirius, OotP) "For years [Regulus] talked of the Dark Lord, who was going to bring the wizards out of hiding to rule the Muggles and the Muggle-borns..." (Kreacher, DH)

Setting aside the knowledge for a moment that Voldemort was half-blood, and instead perceiving him as the Pureblood he pretended to be, this is what he touted, and this is what his Pureblood followers from the "ancient and noble" families like the Malfoys and the Blacks aspired to.

So indisputably, here excluding for brevity's sake the complexities of intelligent nonhumans/magical beings and 'half-breeds' (being its own meta that's probably been written somewhere), Muggles are at the bottom of a blood supremacist's list. Muggles and Muggle-borns are seen as a threat to Wizarding society, and as (potentially dangerous) outsiders. We can see it in the explanation given (quoted somewhere way, way above) about Salazar Slytherin's reasonings; it started with mistrust, as Muggles in the early days were persecuting wizards.

This mistrust (and disgust) obviously was kept alive and well in Tom/Voldemort/blood supremacists: "I, keep the name of a foul, common Muggle, who abandoned me even before I was born, just because he found out his wife was a witch?" (Voldemort, CoS).

But it's also an element of exclusionary attitude; Muggle-borns have grown up outside of magical culture, which we can see reflected in the first interaction between Draco and Harry in PS:

“But they were our kind, weren’t they?” “They were a witch and wizard, if that’s what you mean.” “I really don’t think they should let the other sort in, do you? They’re just not the same, they’ve never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What’s your surname, anyway?”

It'll come as a surprise to literally nobody that the problem as blood supremacists see it is that Muggles, and by extension Muggle-borns, as well as being outsiders, are viewed as dirty/disgusting, and common. In CoS, post slug-heaving, Ron describes "Mudblood" as meaning:

"Dirty blood, see. Common blood".

We see these descriptors a lot in the series. Gaunt describes Merope as a "dirty Squib", "disgusting little Squib" and a "filthy little blood traitor" (and she's a Pureblood witch, albeit struggling with her powers); and in CoS of course Voldemort calls his father "a foul, common Muggle". We also see throughout the books "Mudblood filth", and "filthy little Mudblood" in particular reference to Muggle-borns such as Hermione and Lily (and to Bob Ogden).

[Side note: I have seen some arguments that say 'filthy' is sometimes used in the series instead of the word 'fucking', e.g. "that fucking Mudblood" - but obviously it's a kid's series, so the word was replaced. I think it could work in terms of this replacement in some contexts, but I'm not sure that was the purpose. Filthy just means disgustingly dirty, and has an interesting extra context from the etymology I just found out:

filthy (adj.) late 12c., fulthe, "corrupt, sinful," from filth + -y (2). Meaning "physically unclean, dirty, noisome" is from late 14c. Meaning "morally dirty, obscene" is from 1530s.

You can get a sense of a more 'moral' objection in the later books, e.g. Neville discussing their Muggle Studies during the events of DH:

We’ve all got to listen to her explain how Muggles are like animals, stupid and dirty, and how they drove wizards into hiding by being vicious toward them, and how the natural order is being reestablished.

And especially this, from Voldemort:

"Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of Wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defense of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet. Wizards, she says, must accept these thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods is, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstance. … She would have us all mate with Muggles …"

I feel like there's a few points to be made about this quote.

First, obviously Voldemort has the DEs convinced that he's also Pureblood; he's the Heir of Slytherin after all, the Dark Lord, greatest wizard of all time, etc. Even Harry telling Bellatrix that Voldemort was half-blood at the end of OotP hasn't made a difference. (And why would it? Question or defy him and he'll kill your whole family and make you watch, probably).

Second, we can see also in the Muggle-Born Registration Commission chapter, where Umbridge asks Mary Cattermole where she stole her wand from, that Muggle-borns are accused of somehow... stealing magic?

"Nevertheless, unless you can prove that you have at least one close Wizarding relative, you are now deemed to have obtained your magical power illegally and must suffer the punishment."

Anyway, I think there's another point here, one I can't quite reach with my brain. The quote starts with viewing ostensibly only Muggleborns as the issue; as the thieves of knowledge. But Voldemort's point ends up with the disparaging of half-bloods (as they're the wizarding 'type' to arise from Muggle-Magical Mating™️). That's nothing to do with Muggle-borns at all.

But we hear next to nothing about half-bloods, despite their having Muggle and/or Muggle-born heritage; the same heritage described so often as dirty, disgusting, and filthy. We hear more outrage about blood traitors, Pureblood families who sympathise with Muggles or Muggle-borns: "blood traitors are as bad as the Mudbloods", "Blood traitor is next to Mudblood in my book", and wizards/witches who are tolerant of Muggles are called "Muggle-lovers". (I hesitate even to say that 'Muggle-tolerant wizards' like, support, or even accept Muggles - because even Muggle 'tolerant' wizards (e.g. like Hagrid and the Weasleys), the Order and the like, the allies to the "champion of commoners, of Mudbloods and Muggles, Albus Dumbledore", also look down on Muggles to an extent, but I digress again).

The only disparaging references I could find to half-bloods were Bellatrix to Harry:

"You dare speak his name with your unworthy lips, you dare besmirch it with your half-blood’s tongue, you dare -" " — He stands there — filthy half-blood —"

And one about Mundungus:

“That mangy old half-blood has been stealing Black heirlooms?” said Phineas Nigellus, incensed.

In the few examples we see, they're subject to the same dehumanising, dirty/disgusting and animal comparisons as "Mudbloods" and Squibs.

But there are few examples. The lack of attention paid to half-bloods is probably, in part because of the dwindling population of Purebloods:

"Most wizards these days are half-blood anyway. If we hadn’t married Muggles we’d’ve died out." (Ron, CoS) “If you’re only going to let your sons and daughters marry purebloods your choice is very limited, there are hardly any of us left.” (Sirius, OotP)

Half-bloods are accepted purely by necessity, because unlike Muggle-borns they do have magical lineage to draw on, and because there aren't enough Purebloods left. It's for the same reason that blood traitors are allowed to keep on being traitors but aren't punished to the same degree as Muggle-borns, per this note from the wiki:

"They don’t want to spill too much pure blood, so they’ll torture us a bit if we’re mouthy but they won’t actually kill us.” Given this statement, as well as the fact that the Weasleys were only in direct danger after Ron Weasley's help of Harry Potter was revealed to the Death Eaters, it seems that they were hesitant to kill blood traitors unless they were very rebellious.

Half-bloods sort of escape the Pureblood rhetoric entirely, between these reasons and being the most common type of witch or wizard. The term “half-blood” is ambiguous, and practically meaningless, after all; it refers to anyone with one Muggle parent (like Seamus Finnegan; Severus Snape), or anyone with one Muggle-born parent (like Harry, Tonks), and (I'm not sure if we learn this in the books, but) it also applies if you have a Muggle or Muggle-born grandparent, and presumably any recent traceable Muggle or Muggle-born lineage.

While half-bloods do have 'impure' Muggle ancestry, they are often viewed through the lens of their magical parentage, which can sometimes afford them a degree of acceptance or a different (almost nonexistant) level of scrutiny. In the hierarchy of blood purity, they are less offensive to purists compared to Muggle-borns, but not as esteemed as pure-bloods.

Sort of absent but for different reasons are Squibs. In broad terms, Squibs are generally more likely to be straight up ignored or disregarded, in contrast to the outright hatred and contempt directed toward Muggleborns and Muggles - the issue is a relation to non-magical Muggles, rather than magical skill itself. Because Squibs have magical ancestry, perhaps they fare slightly 'better' within this belief system. Of course, I expect it's all interrelated and decidedly more nuanced (as are all systems of prejudice/oppression), but as I say - in broad terms. Filch liked to help Umbridge, after all - like so many others in wizarding society (and wider, real-life society), his acceptance was conditional, and arguably based on either pity or what he could bring to the table.

In a similar way, being half-blood is only 'advantageous' when magical heritage can be proven and played upon - like Voldemort; like Umbridge:

“That’s — that’s pretty, Dolores,” she said, pointing at the pendant gleaming in the ruffled folds of Umbridge’s blouse. “What?” snapped Umbridge, glancing down. “Oh yes — an old family heirloom,” she said, patting the locket lying on her large bosom. “The S stands for Selwyn. … I am related to the Selwyns. … Indeed, there are few pure-blood families to whom I am not related...”

"It was Umbridge's lie that brought the blood surging into Harry's brain and obliterated his sense of caution; that [Slytherin's/Voldemort's] locket she had taken as a bribe from a petty criminal [Mundungus] was being used to bolster her own pure-blood credentials."

... and even like some Death Eaters probably do:

"The Death Eaters can’t all be pure-blood, there aren’t enough pure-blood wizards left," said Hermione stubbornly. "I expect most of them are half-bloods pretending to be pure." "I got this one," [Neville] indicated another slash to his face, "for asking [Carrow] how much Muggle blood she and her brother have got."

... and unlike the son of Arkie Alderton, the well-known broomstick designer, who got carted away by Dementors. Purebloods could and would just as easily turn on half-bloods.

"First they came for the Socialists…" as the poem goes. Muggles and Muggle-borns will be the first witches and wizards targeted, face the worst discrimination, but half-bloods too are only safe so long as they can prove themselves as 'magical enough', dedicated enough, or useful enough; and they'll never be magical enough for the likes of true believers.

Severus Snape: Mudblood?

I don't think it's a stretch, then, to say that some Purebloods did use the term "Mudblood" for people other than Muggle-borns. Unlike most of the half-bloods we see in the series, with two magical parents, Snape was actually the son of Tobias Snape, a Muggle, with a clearly Muggle name that sets him apart from the well-known and interconnected Pureblood families. As a student, and sometimes as an adult, Snape to some extent 'fit' the stereotypes of Muggles in that he would be perceived as common, dirty, and disgusting; throughout the series he's described as "greasy", with "yellow, uneven teeth"; he hails from Cokeworth, likely from a two-up-two-down house, described as though set in a Northern industrial area; he is scrawny, skinny, as a child wears mismatched clothes, and is likely neglected and grew up in poverty. (Contrast with Purebloods Sirius, who is regularly described as handsome, James, who had the "indefinable air of having been well cared for and even adored that Snape so conspicuously lacked", and the Malfoy family, who are also regularly described as being attractive).

If we use Draco as a benchmark for Slytherin Pureblood behaviour, then imagine how much worse Snape would be received; he's poorer than a Weasley, more Muggle than Harry Potter (and absolutely not the chosen one), and at least half as Muggle as Hermione. It's questionable whether Eileen Prince/Snape was herself even a Pureblood; whilst I was traversing for all the quotes here, Hermione talks about reading through Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy, that "lists the pure-blood families that are now extinct in the male line" - which, if Prince was a Pureblood name, might have crept up in passing conversation since Hermione seemed to struggle to find anything out about the HBP in the previous book.

During a war in which Voldemort rose to power, with an identifiably Muggle name and not one of the vastly interconnected and still-powerful Pureblood families, Snape would be noticed for being different. He was about a year apart from Regulus after all, who had a whole collage on his wall of Voldemort's press cuttings, favoured son of enthusiastic blood supremacist Walburga Black - so I find it hard to believe that Slytherins were... fully accepting.

In CoS, when a basilisk was going around attempting to kill Muggle-borns on behalf of the Heir of Slytherin, the Slytherin common room password was pureblood. I feel like there's a whole point there, but it's nearly 4am here, so I can't brain it right now. (But like... did Snape set the passwords? Did the entrance do it magically?? Did a Head Boy/Prefect do it?? Either way, there's a strong sense of pureblood supremacy communicated in that password that's only strengthened by the timing, echoing the Heir's agenda). In any case, it speaks to the entrenched nature of pure-blood ideology of Slytherin as a house.

"my parents, with their pure-blood mania, convinced that to be a Black made you practically royal . . . my idiot brother, soft enough to believe them" (Sirius, OotP) "as far as [Marvolo] was concerned, having pure blood made you practically royal" (Harry, DH)

The Purebloods of Slytherin house in any generation - who considered themselves "practically royal" in their superiority - would surely ridicule a self-styled, half-blood Prince.

[the-phoenix-heart]

okay so I've been spending a lot of time thinking about Harry Potter recently and trolling the wiki for reasons and I have the weirdest observation about the series.

What is JKR's deal with Ravenclaw women?

I mean consider our main Ravenclaw girls: Luna Lovegood and Cho Chang (and Marietta Edgecombe). Luna in the movies is portrayed as whimsically queer, and that's not inaccurate to the books, but in the books she is more often a punchline than anything. She's a parody of the Ravenclaw ideals of creativity and openminded-ness to the point where she believes crazy conspiracy theories.

But she's our most positively portrayed Ravenclaw. Which is more than I can say for Cho and Marietta. Cho is portrayed as a pitiable character, someone so emotional and loyal that she is sympathetic, but the narrative portrays her overemotional nature and loyalty as bad traits. She's so emotional she'll blow up over perceived threats, and dwells on trauma, and it makes her a drag to talk to. And her loyalty is a bad thing because she chooses to be loyal to Marietta. Marietta is ESPECIALLY treated awfully. Marietta is scared for her mother's job that she rats out the DA and for her choice she is forever branded a traitor at 16, and this is completely justifiable. Like, if Hermione can jinx a paper to disfigure a person's face than couldn't she just jinx the paper to make it physically impossible to reveal the DA, except perhaps under the influence of veritaserum? Like the film did? But no, Hermione is instead more preoccupied with punishing than preventing (an insane thing for me to say, I'm sorry Hermione it's not your fault that your author is kinda insane about women).

(And just as a sidebar but Marietta is also given an illustration that makes it clear she was kinda ugly before the pimples which is so rude, but also so like JKR.)

Then you have very minor characters like Padma who are just generally portrayed as kinda bitchy. Padma gets off better than her sister in terms of being treated as bitchy, but it seems like Padma always carries the stigma of being disappointed by Ron at the Yule Ball.

But this goes back even FURTHER, to the oldest Ravenclaw student we are introduced to, Helena Ravenclaw.

In the films, again, Helena's scene with Harry is haunting. She's treated with respect and tragedy (almost all of the dialogue in the film is original). But in the books, yes we actually get her tragic backstory, but she is portrayed as haughty, vain, and prideful.

You can also add in Trelawney there as a Ravenclaw who is treated like a joke (crazy* and alcoholic).

And consider that the two women we know were almost in Ravenclaw, Hermione and McGonagall, end up going to Gryffindor and are portrayed as better off for it.

And like there is more to explore here. The four Ravenclaw men we really get to know are Filius, Ollivander, Xenophilius, and Lockhart. Xenpohilius is a conspiracy theorist (and a death eater sympathizer I just know it) and Lockhart is a buffoon who only really upholds the Ravenclaw wit and is skilled at memory charms.

(There's this crazy part of the Ravenclaw wiki page that actually compares Lockhart to Cho Chang because they both wanted to be popular. WHAT.)

Meanwhile you have Ollivander who is a positive Ravenclaw character, but is also barely in the books and Filius Flitwick. And Filius is a positive character but it is also canon that the Sorting Hat almost put him in Gryffindor, which seems like a pointed attempt to make it clear he's better than most Ravenclaws. Because he's got something of a Gryffindor edge to him.

I don't really know what the whole point of me going on this rant was about, other than just to point out that JKR is weird about Ravenclaws and the women in general. Almost all of them aren't allowed to actually uphold the actual values of their house: Wisdom, Intelligence, Learning. The only traits they ever really uphold is Wit if they are popular and Creativity, which seems to be a nice way of saying they're crazy conspiracy theorists. The only characters that really get anything good out of the house are Minerva and Hermione, and them being hatstalls is only meant to emphasize their intelligence in comparison to their Gryffindor peers. Otherwise Ravenclaw seems to just be JKR's go to bitchy/we need a villain who isn't Slytherin house.

*When I say "crazy" in this post I am referring to how JKR treats the characters. Babbling, loony, conspiratorial, and not in their right minds.

[vivithefolle]

You seem to be really against Hermione for the bird incident, but don’t seem to care much about Harry sending Hedwig to claw at Ron and Hermione during the summer preceding fifth year, why is that?(/gen) You also seem to ship Ronarry. Is it just because she’s the canon love interest that you’re so upset? I know Harry regretted telling Hedwig to do what she did afterwards, but I don’t remember him ever apologizing to Ron and Hermione. How can we know that Hermione didn’t apologize to Ron after he came back in Deathly Hallows but before the battle of hogwarts?(I agree with your opinions on Hermione in general, I’m just curious.)

If you don't know, I've made some jokes about how Harmony shippers are right about Harry and Hermione having something in common, which is that they both sent birds to attack Ron.

Harry doesn't interest me nearly as much as Hermione because to be frank he's pretty much just... the most boring character in the series to me. I like him for his Ron-loving potential which is pretty off the charts when Rowling isn't actively using Ron as a stepping stone for Harry and Hermione to look better.

I'm actually a pretty big Romione shipper even if I myself get confused about what I'm mad about sometimes. Honestly, it's just that I've kinda had it with people constantly writing Ron fucking up and having to make it up to Hermione, I want her to be fucking up and making it up to him and it not being considered a Crime Against Women Everywhere because yeah, women fuck up and hurt men too, men also get abused or shat on by women, it happens. Hermione as she is has a pretty toxic mentality, what with her often using violence completely casually (her first "big heroic moment" in the series is to set a man on fire) coupled with that shitty tendency of Rowling to use "Hermione on the verge of tears" as a kind of sedative to make the average reader go "who cares what Hermione did before, she's crying NOW and that's UNFORGIVABLE, PROTECT HER".

But, Harry himself also has a system like that, by virtue of being Our Poor Orphan Protagonist. Honestly, I hate to say it but Potterheads read another book because yes, Harry is nothing new, when an author wants you to root for their protagonist they give them a backstory that makes you want good things for them, yes Harry's suffering is just all destined to make you attached to him and meant to make you think everything that ever happens to HIM personally is automatically The Most Horrible Thing Ever To Happen To Anyone Ever and I'm kinda done with that as a whole because of fandom experience. I can only tell people to pay attention to what Ron goes through only to be rebuked by a "but look how hard Harry had it, in comparison Ron is a baby" so many times before I get completely soured and decide that the character they feel so sad for doesn't need any more people to feel sorry for.

... I don't know if I'm being clear. But yeah I function mostly through pure spite nowadays.

I know Harry regretted telling Hedwig to do what she did afterwards, but I don’t remember him ever apologizing to Ron and Hermione.

He did say a token sorry to Ron specifically:

He showed Harry the index finger of his right hand, which sported a half-healed but clearly deep cut. ‘Oh, yeah,’ Harry said. ‘Sorry about that, but I wanted answers, you know –’

(I say "token" because yeah it's not really an apology given how it's immediately followed by a justification.)

Hermione however?

‘He seemed to think it was best,’ said Hermione rather breathlessly. ‘Dumbledore, I mean.’ ‘Right,’ said Harry. He noticed that her hands, too, bore the marks of Hedwig’s beak and found that he was not at all sorry.

WOOP WOOP FEEL THE HARMONY YET

How can we know that Hermione didn’t apologize to Ron after he came back in Deathly Hallows but before the battle of hogwarts?

Honestly she can have apologized anytime, I'd just like it to be shown to me, and I'd like it to mean something.

While for example @divagonzo believes that after Malfoy Manor Hermione realizes her own mortality and blunts her sharper edges, I still remember the scene where Ron isn't sure they can trust Griphook and Hermione immediately insult him for being racist. Yeah, if that's blunting her sharp edges then I sure hope she's got other ways to do it otherwise she's gonna need a lot more Malfoy Manors.

As it stands, Harry and Hermione are really underdeveloped and bare-bones. If Harry has a character arc then I've missed it entirely because while he does realize that Snape has reasons and shit he's still kinda hating on him all through OOTP, HBP and DH until the Epilogue pulls the rug from beneath our feet. Hermione has moments indicating there's some things happening - her arc with Luna in OOTP is neat, in DH she finally learned to thank Ron for complimenting her - but aside from that she never is confronted to actual failure, to actual dilemnas, to actual problems without a true "I'm right you're wrong" solution - we only see her "being right" without anything exploring what she COULD be beyond "being right".

Which leaves Ron to shoulder the burden of having to do character development for two static characters that amount to "male role model" and "female role model". Ron IS confronted with failure, with actual dilemnas to which there's no easy answer or solution, Ron IS confronted with his personal character flaws... in pretty much every book, he's kept in a loop of "complete character arc" -> "oh no JKR needs drama to happen and she can't have Role Model 1 & 2 do it because they're supposed to be Above Mere Mortals" -> "backtrack on Ron's character arc so he can cause the drama so she doesn't have to strain her brain too hard", which is pretty obviously a disservice to Ron's character. And sadly, the fandom picks up on it but takes the wrong message from it: instead of realizing "wait, Rowling is violating the rules of good storytelling by constantly backtracking on her one good and complex character's development all so she doesn't have to risk Harry and Hermione's popularity by using their character flaws to create conflict", the fandom instead goes "ugh Ron is always causing messes while Harry and Hermione always have their hearts in the right place and always want what's best and anyway if they ever did something bad it's because they were forced by the situation".

It's... upsetting.