Thoughts

[rynne]

Public, as I want opinions, and not just from people on my flist.

So. I was just rereading a few fics, namely thistlerose's Midnight Conversation #6, copperbadge's Alive, lupercali's Seven Things That Didn't Happen At Hogwarts On Valentine's Day, Or Maybe They Did and a myriad of other fics, and I was thinking, and I noticed something that they all have in common.

They all have Sirius more in love with Remus than Remus is with Sirius.

Like in "Alive", Sam writes, "Remus had never felt so entirely tied up in a single person, the way Sirius had been. He had loved Sirius, of course he had loved Sirius, but his happiness and his life had not been dependent on Sirius loving him."

MC#6 is pretty much about how Sirius loves Remus more than Remus loves him (at that time).

Seventh year of "Seven Things..." also seems to be pretty much that, as is Pru's Levityverse.

I've also gotten that same impression from a few of musesfool's fics.

Four of the most highly-respected authors (at least according to me) in the R/S subfandom have the same sort of theme on how the R/S relationship works. And, I was just wondering why. Is it because Sirius is passionate and Remus is controlled? Something along those lines?

All opinions are very much appreciated. Especially if they turn into debates :).

Comments

yes and no... (Part II)

[gwendolyngrace.livejournal.com]

Now, I will be the first one to say that I plan to divorce my opinions about the plot of OoP and beyond in canon from how I choose to participate in fandom. Like copperbadge, I think canon is a nice place to visit, but I don't want to live there. However, the basic understanding of their characters remains the same. Now that Sirius is gone (or "gone", if you think he might be back), the obvious question is: Will Remus be able to live with it? Will he heal? Will he (eventually) take another lover? If he can, does that mean he didn't love Sirius the way he loved Remus?

The answer is: of course not. People lose loved ones and they find new people to love. Loving someone else - either in the interim, or after death - does not discount the other relationship, it doesn't mean that Remus "replaced" Sirius. But I can see how sometimes it might turn into, or be perceived as, a more "shallow" attitude toward their partnership.

In my version of Remus, he tried to put his life back together and move on. He took lovers, but always wound up comparing them to Sirius. They came up wanting, so he'd break things off. He'd put himself out there, but always decide that it wasn't worth it. Sirius had no such opportunity, of course, but I think that he had played the field enough to know, when he realized it was Remus, that that was it. He was the only one from that point on. (Note: I don't think Sirius was the Hogwarts resident slut, but I do think he dated quite a bit. AjesBlue and I also determined that they didn't get together until after Hogwarts.)

After OoP, we'll never know whether Sirius could have picked himself up the way Remus (we think) did and tried once more to find another partner. He may have had no more success than (IMO) Remus, and he may grow resigned, as Remus (IMO) did, to never quite finding anyone who would measure up to the love he lost. But I don't think that the willingness to try means that either one loves, or didn't love, as deeply or as passionately as the other.

Gah. It's late and I hope this makes sense.