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thomas_rowlingAlthough the Harry Potter series has officially been over since 2007, or 2011, depending on how you look at it, the Harry Potter “fandom” is alive and well — or more accurately, has awoken from its slumber.

It all started Saturday, when fan site Hypable published a piece about author J.K. Rowling’s feelings about the love life of one of her most beloved characters.

For reasons that have very little to do with literature and far more to do with me clinging to the plot as I first imagined it, Hermione ended up with Ron,” she said, according to a piece running in The Sunday Times with the headline: “JK admits Hermione should have wed Harry.”  

  Rowling seemed worried about the effect her pronouncement would have on Harry Potter fans.

“Am I breaking people’s hearts by saying this? I hope not,” she said.

Far from breaking people’s hearts, Rowling’s comments (if not a hoax) about a fictional character from a book series that’s been completed for nearly seven years have ignited the fury of a fandom scorned.

Fandom culture is an altogether foreign world for the casual Harry Potter fan. If you were particularly impatient during the two to three years between each book, you might started reading other fantasy series. If you were impatient and a particularly ardent fan, you might have turned to amateur authors writing in a pre-established fantasy world. Yes, I'm talking about fan fiction.

Harry Potter fan fiction exploded between 2000 and 2007, when the fourth and seventh novels were released, respectively. FanFiction.net, one of the Internet's primary forums for fan fiction of any cultural work, hosts more than 600,000 stories derived from the Harry Potter series.

As everyone knows, online communities aren't necessarily the most conducive to nuanced, cordial debate, so one of the defining features of fan fiction communities was intense disagreement over the romantic pairings of Harry Potter characters.

Preferring one romantic pairing of fictional characters is known as "shipping," a term that comes from "relationship" — you can "ship" people together in real life, too, but people don't usually get upset about that.

In 2005, after "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" came out, Rowling sat down with fan site Webmasters Melissa Anelli and Emerson Spartz (of The Leaky Cauldron and MuggleNet, respectively) for a comprehensive interview. When asked about the prospect of Hermione and Ron getting together, Rowling said she thought she'd dropped some "anvil-sized hints" that a relationship between Ron and Hermione was endgame.

Spartz then quipped that readers who shipped Hermione with Harry were "delusional," and that's when the fandom exploded.

Fan fiction forums dedicated to one ship over the other proliferated. Those who disagreed with the prevailing ship at a particular website were harangued and ostracized. It was a dark time to be a Harry Potter fan.

With all this fandom drama in the not-too-distant past, many are now flashing back to their dewy Harry Potter-obsessed youth only to find they aren't haunted by fandom drama caused by "shipping wars" — they missed it.

There's nothing wrong with fan fiction or shipping fictional characters together.

If you've never watched a TV show or read a work of fiction and thought, "Hey, those two characters would make a great couple," you are one of the few.

Harry Potter may just be a work of fiction, but it is a work that clearly resonates with its fans to this day.

The strength of J.K. Rowling's series lies in its brilliantly written characters who, despite flaws, are good role models. The fury within the fandoms ignores most of Harry, Ron and Hermione's traits as well rounded characters.

Hermione Granger is one of the best role models for young girls — and young boys. She is a hard-working and dedicated student. She's tough, but she's also empathetic. She's cautious when she needs to be but she's courageous in the face of danger.

In short, we should all aspire to be like her — but rather than admiring Hermione for her qualities, members of the fandom are reducing the character down to romantic prospects.

Reach the columnist at skthoma4@asu.edu or follow her on Twitter @savannahkthomas


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