More musings on staying spoiler-free.

[amanuensis1]

I know I don't have to write a post on why I don't want spoilers for most books and films and especially HBP--no one's asking me, "But why don't you want spoilers? OMG you're a total skank if you don't want them"--not wanting spoilers is assumed to be the default, y'know. It's not like anyone has to defend their position.

But just so it's said, the reasons I really don't want them is because spoilers are by definition taking the surprises out of context, and it's the context that makes the story work or not work. I trust Rowling. I was all ready to 'ship Harry/Cho halfway through OotP, and was also satisfied to abandon that same 'ship as soon as the two parted ways with a "never-to-be" finality at the end of the book. If you'd told me that the twins would leave school or that Harry would be banned from Quidditch before the book's release, I'd have been screeching, "NOOOO! That effing sucks; the twins should stay in school and get their bloody education and grounding Harry like that is just WRONG." But as the book unfolded, it worked. And when Sirius fell through the veil, my heart was torn right out with Harry's in horror and shock a way it couldn't have if I'd known it was coming. Which was awful but was the intention of Rowling's story.

If you tell me [NOTE: NOT spoilers here, just supposings] that Sirius will never play another part in Harry's life, or that Remus dies, or that Draco will never gain any more significant role than he has to date, or that Ginny is Harry's great love...tell me any of those things right now [please don't] and I'll be all "Oh, bollocks," and on the hateful defensive for the unfolding of each of these things. But show them to me in context and I just may buy them hooklineandsinkerkthanxbai.

And that's what, as Shivering Jemmy said to the Dream King.

Comments

[reseh.livejournal.com]

Exactly!

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I think it must be this way for many (or most), but I'm sure there are other reasons too. But those are mine! ^_^

[mefeather.livejournal.com]

I think you're reasons are mine as well. Probably when I think longer about it I might come up with something else as well. But right now. I see your post and say to myself 'that's exactly how I feel about it'. :D

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Figure a lot of us feel this way. ^_^

[kaiz.livejournal.com]

On the flip side...

spoilers are by definition taking the surprises out of context, and it's the context that makes the story work or not work

Oddly enough, that one of the reasons I love them! I tend to read the ends of books/stories first (esp. pro stuff, to decide if I want to waste $10 on the book or not) and frequently skip around in the text, back and forth. So the out-of-context thing is its own suspense and reward for me. Sometimes I hit the 'surprise' in Chapter 40, then race back to reread chapters 15-25 because that's where the 'surprise' got set up.

It's like getting the answer to a gnarly geometry proof up-front. You still have all the excitement of speculating on all the myriad of niftycool ways that you could arrive at the solution, but you know what the solution actually is so you're not on tenterhooks for hours wondering. The fun is in watching how the author arrives at the solution! And sometimes, the author throws you a delightful curve. (Like Robert Ludlum did in 'The Bourne Identity' -- I was *sure* I knew what the 'proof' was going to be after reading the last couple of chapters. Wrong!!!)

Either way, it's cool because you can prepare for traumatic events and look forward to happy events. So being spoiled is especially a good deal if you have a suspense squick!

But hey, viva la difference! It's all good, imo. :-)

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

That's the way I feel about spoilers and book reading. I'm not a very linear reader.

For some reason, though, even though I'm hooked up to a couple of spoiler filters, I haven't wanted to read any of them at all. I don't know if I'll stay that way for the rest of the week. It all depends how I feel.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

You know, I can do that with, for example, fanfiction, where there's just so much of the stuff that I have to use some criteria about what to read and what to let pass. I need to know if it's got my favorite characters, pairings, kinks. But with things I'm going to read anyway,for sure, I want to go in cold. But I love what you have to say about seeing it as a "how" of it rather than a "what"! I suppose I should look at that in a book or film in which I don't have so much emotional investment. I've done it for films where there were ending spoilers available and I didn't think I would see the films unless I knew the ending were worth it.

[simmysim.livejournal.com]

If you'd told me that the twins would leave school or that Harry would be banned from Quidditch before the book's release, I'd have been screeching, "NOOOO!

Mwah, yes. Perfect way of putting it.

There's so much I like about the series already. If she changes nothing, I'll be pleased, if she changes everything, I'll be pleased. I'll have Neville or Draco either way. X3

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Bwah! I'm awfully selfish. I want it all to go--great. Whatever great is. Just great.

[sciencegeek.livejournal.com]

Exactly!
Just FYI

I'm not sure if this person is one your flist but...maeglinyedi said their was someone on her flist that posted spoilers sans Lj cut. Or not working cut. Just so you have the heads up.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Criminy! Well, I'll check out Maeglin's lj and I'll avoid running my friendslist until I'm sure they've locked it up.

(Ooh, just saw Maeglin's post. God, I don't want to stay away from lj for a whole week! It was bad enough that I went offline about 36 hours before OotP's release--not a whole week, now! Arrgh!)

I think I found it...

[sciencegeek.livejournal.com]

Um. There was a link to the journal from emmagrant01 in a comment. God, I'm so glad I'm going to be away.
*scurries off to read new fic*

[tartanshell.livejournal.com]

*purr* Yep. Same way exactly.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

*grabs your hand, clasps*

[tartanshell.livejournal.com]

*clings* I'm scared of my friendslist.

[kingzgurl.livejournal.com]

if remus dies, i'll cry more than i did when sirius died. i've grown extremely attached to remus over the years.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if I'll cry harder; if he dies, I think I will have been set up by Sirius's death to say, "Well, what did you expect, after that." But, oh, I won't like it. Of course, we won't be supposed to like it. We'll be supposed to hate it, for just that reason.

[ariadneelda.livejournal.com]

Word to everything you said. I'm so worried that I won't manage to stay spoiler-free until Saturday! Everybody's talking today about that uncut spoiler post. I'm terrified at the thought I could have come across it. Thank goodness my flist is rather small and I'm certain all the people I've friended are considerate and responsible. But you never know... *bites nails* I was half-spoiled before OotP (I knew about the death but not that it was Sirius, although I somehow expected it'd be him) and it was horrible! Aghh, I don't want to stay away from LJ for a whole week!

(And OMG you posted new fic, yay! *is off to read*)

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I really don't want to abandon 'net browsing this early, but, man, I'm trying to be extra careful. And, yes, I didn't want to know that there WAS a death for OotP, much less who it was. I hate those kinds of confirmations.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_hannelore/]

I found out that someone recently got spoiled, so the way I'm getting my LJ fix is only checking journals of people I know have sworn to be spoiler-free (and reading your most recent fic made it so, so, so worth it. *gibbers*).

I guess I want to be spoiler-free because I want to see it in the book first. But at the same time, I don't want to miss out on the incoherent excitement from the flist as we get closer and closer (*pants*). It's a hard thing.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I'm in exactly the same predicament, wah! Don't want to go away just yet.

[ex-ella-bane358.livejournal.com]

I feel the same way! I want to be here getting all giddy with excitement with other fans over the new book coming out, but I don't want to know anything that's going to happen. It's so frustrating. I'm just tiptoeing around LJ right now -- only reading fics, but not others' comments to those fics (that's how someone else got spoiled btw). I'm avoiding discussions except ones like these where all the spoiler-haters can congregate.

[cluegirl.livejournal.com]

I just wanted to stop by and drop a giggle at your closing line.

"THAT'S what!"

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

You have to know--when I wrote that last line, my next thought was, "If anybody gets that, it'll be Clue." HA!! I love being right. And love you. &hearts

[the_con_cept.livejournal.com]

You know, I did like the way she worked some of the stuff in, but I felt that OotP was by far her least well written book. The Sirius death...so didn't do it for me. My big problem with it was that in OotP, we got more information on Sirius as an adolescent, and I didn't like him. He never had a chance to really redeem himself in my eyes, and we just didn't get to know him well enough for me to be emotionally invested. He died, and I thought, "Eh." I could still understand Harry's POV, but I really felt the death scene was too quick, and rather anti-climatic. So for me, spoilers are good. They give me a chance to get into that mindset I'll need later to actually find certain things acceptable. And as much as I hate to say it, I think she's been building up to a Ginny/Harry pairing for a long time. She's just cool enough to slowly mature them to that point, first. But I'll still cry at the final death of my Snarry. *sniff*

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I honestly believe that if it's Harry/Ginny, she can make me like it. But I still retain belief that if she were going that way, we'd have seen more of them together in the Department of Mysteries. I'll guess I have more of a clue soon, won't I? (To be honest, I hope after Book 6 it's STILL ambiguous and the H/Hr and R/Hr camps are STILL bickering like two-year-olds. Ha.)

[aiji-yuywell.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean. My sister took OoTP from me while I was reading, flipped random and read:
"Am I to understand," said Phineas Nigellus slowly from Harry's left," that my great-great grandson - the last of the blacks - is dead?"
After which she promptly dropped the book and I screamed a lot. Then took the book. Then hit her with it.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

There would have been BEATINGS and BEATINGS. Gnyah!

[lycoris.livejournal.com]

You just voiced how I feel about spoilers only SO MUCH BETTER. I've always known that in theory, if JKR writes it, I'll probably love it. But if someone SAYS something, it often just sounds crap. Thank you for voicing my feelings neatly. :) *snuggles*

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

It's like a hive-mind--what I can't get into words, I know someone else will. *snuggles happily*