A hell of Houses or Houses from Hell?
Aug. 19th, 2005 05:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flyingskullYay I found the spiffy lj-cut thingy and now this LJ looks a tad more normal.
Alright, that being out of the system, let's rant a bit about HP canon - this will lead to rants about Icness and OOCness in fanfics but not now - and especially two things that drive me insane: the lack of logic and the lack of any form of justice. Yes, life's unfair but fiction shouldn't be.
The most glaring lack of logic to me is the House system as envisioned by JKR. She states there are four Houses in Hogwarts, right? Right. Perfectly Edwardian British public school system having Houses. They take their names from the Founding Four - bit like the Fantastic four, innit? - instead of from their current masters but who cares, those are wizardlings and that's how their own exclusive school works.
That accepted, she lays rules of belonging for each House, and nevermind that one House could be stuffed to the gills and another be almost empty, because it's not practical things like number of beds available that decide who's going where, they're sorted by a failed rhymester transformed into a hat - remember the Hat in Sourcery? *g* - according to their nature. So the Good, Brave and Oblivious go to Gryffindor (emblem being a lion not a griffin God knows why and what's a lion doing in a tower? poor kitty); the Intelligent and Reflective, but not very Practical, go to Ravensclaw; the Practical but not very Brave or Particularly Intelligent, but very Orbservant (? I added that because the poor Puffs not only have an unfortunate name, but are practically absent or cannon fodder) and Loyal go to Hufflepuff (can't figure out the badger, shouldn't it have been a dog?); and all the Bad Slimy Persons Who Will Become Death Eaters go to Slytherin, the House of teh EBUL wizlings.
It always struck me as quite cretinous to have a bad House by definition, many could be taught to be good if nothing else by sheer peer pressure in another House; it also strikes me as eminently unfair, but that's another rant.
So we have the Unholy Trio - ok, ok, I know it's Holy - and the token coetaneous enemy sorted into the Houses. How very nice, not to mention better balanced and logical it would have been to have each of them in a different House. Especially since they break the rules all the time, so it wouldn't have been too hard to meet whenever they felt like it.
So in my logical non-canon HPverse Harry would have got Gryffindor - of course - Hermione, Ravenclaw - she's the brainiest kid in school, isn't she? - Ron, Hufflepuff - loyal and not too bright, good with his hands - and my lil dragonet would still have ended up in Slytherin because, let's face it, that house was expressely created to host him. See? Nicely balanced, instead of this all Gryffindor/Slytherin and... uh? Other Houses? Um... ah... Ah. Yes yes, I'll put a thing here, alright, other Houses who cares booooring...
Star, who's a very intelligent person and fantastic beta, told me it is all about power and the different kinds of power each wizardling will desire or be able to handle when all grown up. It's a very logical theory too. It goes like this. Being a wizard/witch is all about power so Gryffindors are the one willing and able to use brute power, not much finesse but lots of impact; Ravenclaw get brain power, abstract power and its uses, maybe it won't have much impact, but it will always be very well aimed and in the right dose; Hufflepuff - really, whimsy hurts my brain UGH - get nurturing power, healing and restoring and making things work, of course what heals can kill, but the puffs are not aggressive by nature and would only defend; Slytherin get political and social power, their power is all about having power in a society, so they can be either evil or good, but they are necessary too. Sorry Star luv, I mangled your beautiful words.
But then, if we had logic into the HPverse, Voldemort would have been defeated ages ago and so what price 7 books not to mention the utterly game-style horcruxes from the part of Hell where authors go in little circles flapping their hands and screaming 'how can I make this one novelette plot last another damn book'?' (how i laughed at Maya's lovely snarky pun: "Yes, young man, what can I do for you? You're looking for WHAT??? Sodoff you little pervert!" LOLOL)
Right enough parentheses and blatehrings, am off to write a parody.
Alright, that being out of the system, let's rant a bit about HP canon - this will lead to rants about Icness and OOCness in fanfics but not now - and especially two things that drive me insane: the lack of logic and the lack of any form of justice. Yes, life's unfair but fiction shouldn't be.
The most glaring lack of logic to me is the House system as envisioned by JKR. She states there are four Houses in Hogwarts, right? Right. Perfectly Edwardian British public school system having Houses. They take their names from the Founding Four - bit like the Fantastic four, innit? - instead of from their current masters but who cares, those are wizardlings and that's how their own exclusive school works.
That accepted, she lays rules of belonging for each House, and nevermind that one House could be stuffed to the gills and another be almost empty, because it's not practical things like number of beds available that decide who's going where, they're sorted by a failed rhymester transformed into a hat - remember the Hat in Sourcery? *g* - according to their nature. So the Good, Brave and Oblivious go to Gryffindor (emblem being a lion not a griffin God knows why and what's a lion doing in a tower? poor kitty); the Intelligent and Reflective, but not very Practical, go to Ravensclaw; the Practical but not very Brave or Particularly Intelligent, but very Orbservant (? I added that because the poor Puffs not only have an unfortunate name, but are practically absent or cannon fodder) and Loyal go to Hufflepuff (can't figure out the badger, shouldn't it have been a dog?); and all the Bad Slimy Persons Who Will Become Death Eaters go to Slytherin, the House of teh EBUL wizlings.
It always struck me as quite cretinous to have a bad House by definition, many could be taught to be good if nothing else by sheer peer pressure in another House; it also strikes me as eminently unfair, but that's another rant.
So we have the Unholy Trio - ok, ok, I know it's Holy - and the token coetaneous enemy sorted into the Houses. How very nice, not to mention better balanced and logical it would have been to have each of them in a different House. Especially since they break the rules all the time, so it wouldn't have been too hard to meet whenever they felt like it.
So in my logical non-canon HPverse Harry would have got Gryffindor - of course - Hermione, Ravenclaw - she's the brainiest kid in school, isn't she? - Ron, Hufflepuff - loyal and not too bright, good with his hands - and my lil dragonet would still have ended up in Slytherin because, let's face it, that house was expressely created to host him. See? Nicely balanced, instead of this all Gryffindor/Slytherin and... uh? Other Houses? Um... ah... Ah. Yes yes, I'll put a thing here, alright, other Houses who cares booooring...
Star, who's a very intelligent person and fantastic beta, told me it is all about power and the different kinds of power each wizardling will desire or be able to handle when all grown up. It's a very logical theory too. It goes like this. Being a wizard/witch is all about power so Gryffindors are the one willing and able to use brute power, not much finesse but lots of impact; Ravenclaw get brain power, abstract power and its uses, maybe it won't have much impact, but it will always be very well aimed and in the right dose; Hufflepuff - really, whimsy hurts my brain UGH - get nurturing power, healing and restoring and making things work, of course what heals can kill, but the puffs are not aggressive by nature and would only defend; Slytherin get political and social power, their power is all about having power in a society, so they can be either evil or good, but they are necessary too. Sorry Star luv, I mangled your beautiful words.
But then, if we had logic into the HPverse, Voldemort would have been defeated ages ago and so what price 7 books not to mention the utterly game-style horcruxes from the part of Hell where authors go in little circles flapping their hands and screaming 'how can I make this one novelette plot last another damn book'?' (how i laughed at Maya's lovely snarky pun: "Yes, young man, what can I do for you? You're looking for WHAT??? Sodoff you little pervert!" LOLOL)
Right enough parentheses and blatehrings, am off to write a parody.
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Hear, Hear
Date: 2005-08-20 02:46 pm (UTC)Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2005-08-20 09:11 pm (UTC)If there are 1,000 people then it stands to arithmetic that there must be more than 120 students in Puff and Claw. Look, 1,000 divided by 4 is 250. We have how many? 30, and I'm being overoptimistic professors. Actually there seems to be a dearth of teachers in the books, but at least 20 or 15 should be right. Soooo... 1000 - 30 = 970,
So there shoudl be 242.5 students per house. If Gryff and Slyther have only 80 each, then poor Puff and Claw should be bursting at the seams with 405 - count 'em 405!!! - students. Alright Claws wouldn't be so packed as most people are as stupid as JKR, sooo let's say 100 for Claw which leave poor Puffs sleeping all over one another with 305.
This is NOT calculus, you stupid Rowling person! Learn to count or at least to use a calculator!
Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2005-08-20 09:13 pm (UTC)Because I have some sort of mental impairment I forgot to type 'teachers'. GAH
Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2005-08-21 01:51 am (UTC)We have how many (30, and I'm being overoptimistic) professors?
Or something similar at any rate.
Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2005-08-21 01:31 am (UTC)I realised talking to Star last night that JKR has no concept of implicit speech. That's one of the sources of her shoddy math. She appears to honestly believe that explicit statement is the only relevant information. so therefore, the sorting hat and dumbledore going on about personal responsibility means taht is what the books are about, in spite of the fact that implicitly throughout the rest of the books, she sayts that you are what you are born to. It's also why she screwed up the Weasley ages, even after she 'corrected' them, because she cannot understand that "Gryffindor has not won the Quidditch cup since Charlie Weasley's day" implies that Gryffindor always won it in Charlie Weasley's day and therefore a seven year slump in Quidditch makes Bill 13 years older than Ginny, not 9 as originally stated or 10 as 'corrected'.
Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2006-03-12 02:23 am (UTC)rotfl
Have you heard that there are two 13 y.o. fathers in the new expanded Black family tree?
Re: Hear, Hear
Date: 2006-03-18 02:10 pm (UTC)I hadn't heard that one, no. But they're Blacks, y'know? Dark Wizards and all. They marry the males young to older, experienced witches. Sort of like "The trees they do grow high". Bad bad EBUL dark Blacks.
Personally I love Regulus and Narcissa, can't stand Sirius R.I.P. and not too soon. :p