Hello readers! This week I am bringing you a topic that has been on my mind a lot. That is, people writing fanfic of Harry Potter characters, but specifically Dramione, and publishing it traditionally.
There has been a few books in the past inspired by characters in Harry Potter, but the Dramione ship is a really popular one right now. I have a few thoughts that I wasn’t sure if I should share.
I also have some opinions on the pairing of Hermione and Draco that I may go into in another post. Let me know if you guys are interested in seeing that! I might just do another unpopular opinions post soon.
Just to be clear, I am NOT critiquing people who read or enjoy these books, but the ones who are publishing and writing them. Please do not take this as an attack against you if you are reading or have liked the books. The issue I have is that these novels are being inspired by Harry Potter characters, but the authors are not putting in the work to divest from Rowling’s harmful rhetoric.
One book published this month was The Irresistable Urge to Fall For Your Enemy. This book has been heavily marketed as being Dramione inspired. I’m not even sure how they did that without JK Rowling’s permission.
Is there some sort of deal here where they are able to do this?
I’ve wondered for a while now about the legality of even publishing these types of fanfics. Of course, I haven’t read them. I don’t know how similar they are to the original.
You may be thinking, who cares if they steal from J.K. Rowling? But, if publishers and authors are allowed to do that to her, then they can do it to other authors, too.
But if I think back to Fifty Shades of Grey, they weren’t marketing the book as being inspired by Twilight. I can say the same for the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. She never mentioned the connection to Harry Potter. Why wouldn’t the authors want us to just make the connections ourselves like fans of Clare did?
Battle Royale by Lucy Parker is an example I’m thinking of. When reading it, I made the connection that I believe the MMC was heavily inspired by Paul Hollywood from the Great British Baking Show mixed with a bit of Gordon Ramsay’s attitude. It was more fun to come to that conclusion myself and see other people say the same in their reviews on Goodreads.
Knightley was interviewed for a Harper’s Bazaar article where she gave more of her thoughts on J.K. Rowling, which is sort of where my issues are in this topic.
I encourage everyone to go read the article itself. They also interview Julie Soto, who published another Dramione romance this month called Rose in Chains.
Knightley says in the interview that she is trying to ”reclaim” a place for LGBT voices, but as far as I know, there isn’t a single LGBT character in the book. There aren’t any in Soto’s book either. Everything in this article is performative allyship.
If we are to reclaim this fandom for LGBT people, there are a few things that can be done, and none of these authors are doing them.
The first thing the publisher could do is focus on Dramione fanfiction that is LGBT centered. Many people who are in the Harry Potter fanfic community are LGBT, which is mentioned in this article a few times.
The article author, Tyler McCall, even states that Draco and Harry are the most popular fanfic duo. That just proves that the people who are reading these stories are already drawn to LGBT representation.
I mean, look at the success of Carry On by Rainbow Rowell. Carry On has been rated over 300,000 times on Goodreads and has an average rating of 4.16.
These authors could intentionally make these books include covert LGBT characters.
Rowling is creating active harm every single day and it’s important to combat it if they are going to profit off of the LGBT community who they are claiming to write these stories for.
Another thing that JK Rowling has decided to be angry about recently is asexual people.
I have no idea when she decided to wage a war on asexuality or why she even cares about it in the first place.
Another thing authors could do is share and donate to LGBT or trans organizations. If they are really trying to undo harm that JK Rowling has created, this is the perfect way to do it.
JK Rowling has donated to the LGB Alliance in the UK which specifically excludes trans people. She has posted many times online that trans people are a threat to “biological women.” She aligns herself with politicians who are attempting to roll back trans rights in the UK.
In April of this year, the Supreme Court in the UK ruled that trans people may not be recognized anymore, “the only acceptable legal definition of “sex” is the biological sex assigned to a person at birth, and that no adjustments to that legal designation should be recognized by law, even if the person has a gender recognition certificate.”
I am American, but I still care about the rights of LGBT people all over the world. With the current president of the U.S. and both the House and Senate being majority Republican, something like this could happen here any day.
In 2021, JK Rowling accused trans people of doxxing her home address even though it’s publicly known she lives in the Killiechassie House in Scotland. She bought the home in 2001 and has even shared pictures of it online.
This isn’t just a woman who is a TERF. She is actively harming the trans community in every way she can.
In my opinion, it’s extremely important to divest from JK Rowling ideologies not just in words, but in actions if you are going to publish a book marketed with her characters. Change happens when people take action.
Here are some trans and LGBT organizations to donate to or spread around if you cannot donate:
Happy blogging and bookish adventures! 📚🦒✨
This post was created by Allison Wolfe for www.allithebookgiraffe.com and is not permitted to be posted anywhere else.
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