I was reading a missing moments Romione fanfic, and it was on the part of HBP where Hermione’s just reconciled with Ron after his poisoning, and has left the hospital while Ron feigned sleep to avoid talking to Lavender.
Hermione then thinks something along the lines of ‘while she was glad that Ron was friends with her again, she hadn’t quite forgiven him just yet, and decided to let him stew in the mess he’d made with Lavender.’
I honestly yelled at my computer screen ‘YOU ARROGANT LITTLE JERK! FORGIVEN HIM? YOU SET A FLOCK OF RAVENOUS BIRDS ON HIM! IF ANYONE NEEDS TO BE FORGIVEN, IT’S YOU!’.
This is one downside of Romione fanfiction. A lot of it is often written from Hermione’s POV, and, as a result, tends to fall into the ‘Hermione did nothing wrong even when she has, and Ron is always at fault’ narrative style that JK Rowling suffered with during the last few books.
On the one hand, it’s nice reading Hermione POV stuff because you see just how much she loves Ron. On the other hand, you get this messed-up logic that absolves Hermione of any blame, and ignores the negative repercussions of her actions.
The truth is out there – spoken…
There are a few fanfics that adress Hermione’s responsability in the whole mess – but they are so few and far between. And most of them either picture Hermione as ~the poor soft heartbroken victim~ and make her act way sweeter than she is in canon, or as ~that clever girl who’s totally in control all the time and so mature~.
It’s actually why I don’t like
the Hermione Granger series of Ann Margaret; during her version of Order of the Phoenix, Hermione is 1, presented as though she’s completely sorted out her emotions and understands totally what love is, and “waiting” for Ron to “mature”; 2, presented as though she knew exactly what she was doing during most of the school year. To be perfectly clear: she had no goddamn idea what she was doing when she brought Umbridge in the Forbidden Forest. She was winging it. Her “plan”, I think, was to bring her to Grawp and pray for the giant to deal with the toad.Lots of Romione fanfics make Hermione much smarter or emotionally aware than she actually is, or show her to be totally perfect and without flaws.
Also…
while she was glad that Ron was friends with her again, she hadn’t quite forgiven him just yet
Oh sure, you won’t forgive him just yet… despite the fact that he literally almost died. Add this to the canaries and you’ll understand why I mostly want to throttle Hermione instead of sympathizing with her.
@vivithefolle That is one thing about the ‘Hermione Granger’ series that I don’t like. I like a lot of that series, but I find it difficult to believe that Hermione was simply waiting for Ron to catch up with her. I mean, he gives her perfume for Christmas, and she still doesn’t grasp that he is trying his best, and wants to date her, but his insecurities and self-doubts are holding him back (not to mention Hermione’s lack of obvious affection for him. He’s constantly complimenting her, and yet she rarely-if ever- shows him the same affection openly).
Hermione didn’t have a clue about romance. She goes on about Ron having the stunted emotional capacity, but he’s far better at emotions than she is. If she actually had a clue, she would have realised that he needed concrete evidence that she fancied him before he would try to make a move.
I find it so irritating when fanfics gloss over Hermione’s culpability in the Lavender debacle, and (especially) the canaries incident. Hermione displays violent, borderline-sociopathic behaviour towards her best friend whilst in a jealous rage, but barely anyone seems to think she was at fault. That’s a pretty messed-up way of thinking.
I don’t hate Hermione as a character, but I find myself very irritated by Rowling’s (and, by extension, the fandom’s) habit of making Hermione infallible. She’s a human being with flaws just like everyone-else, and one of Hermione’s main flaws is that she has great difficulty in seeing what other people need emotionally.
Headcanonsandmore 