The Character of Lily Evans
Quote from The Gestalt Prince on August 23, 2023, 2:23 pmQuote from Krystal on August 23, 2023, 2:12 pm@thegestaltprince The movie didn't imply James was a bully to Severus; it was just poorly executed for those who only watched the movies.
From moviegoers understanding, Severus was a friendzoned man who was friends with a saintly Lily and hated James. They were never shown to have stopped their friendship, and from a movie perspective, a middle-aged Severus was obsessed with his friend Lily, hated James for marrying her, and bullied her son in jealousy.
The film version of Order of the Phoenix shows James bullying Snape during the Occlumency lessons, and James's friends and colleagues mention his more unruly behavior.
Based on how that love triangle is framed, Lily is shown to choose James without ending her friendship with Snape and without any evidence that James didn't bully him; perhaps, Lily even chose to date James while the latter was bullying Snape, which is the worst possible scenario and would damage not only Lily as a character, but also Snape.
Was James called a bully in the movies? I don't recall any mention of marauders being bullies, they only commented on unruly behaviour.
He wasn't called one, but the OotP explicitly shows him humiliating Snape in front of a crowd by both assaulting him and calling him Snivelly
Quote from The Gestalt Prince on August 23, 2023, 2:32 pmHe wasn't called one, but the OotP explicitly shows him humiliating Snape in front of a crowd by both assaulting him and calling him Snivelly
Yeah, that's true. Unfortunately, in the movie Lily's character examination often requires brain cells, which Snaters lack. 😉
A piece I wrote as an A/N after receiving the umpthieth hatemail about my characterisation of Lily.
"From time to time, I receive comments (mostly anonymous on FFN) on all my stories that involve Lily, that she’s too OC. But reviewers don’t leave it at that. There are also a lot of comments about her that she’s too naïve. Too emotional. Too picky. Too hot-headed. Too shy. Too unforgiving. Too prideful. Too apologetic. Manipulative. Mean. Rude. Possessive. Bossy. Indecisive. Weak. Undeserving of Severus (excuse me, people are not a prize to be won), and a downright bitch, just to name a few.
Lily was only sixteen when she broke off her friendship with Severus. How much they saw and spoke to each other after that (both in and out of Hogwarts) we can only guess. I made the creative choice in this story for Lily to have used their time apart to reflect, and for her to want him back in her life, hence why we start at the beginning of their 7th year at Hogwarts. It does not negate the fact that canon Lily choosing for her own safety and beliefs, somehow makes her an unforgiving bitch (as she has been called).
Lily is OC, and she is OC because she is OC in everyone’s story. In canon, we only know bits and pieces of her character through the biased stories of others told to Harry. This biased view includes the one from Severus, who held her on a high pedestal all the way up to his death.
Rowling loved using symbolism throughout her magical story, and I personally believe that Lily as a character was more symbolic than she was real. She’s a martyr, who sacrificed herself for something of importance on a much grander scale. Lilies, the flower, are associated with death and with the virgin Mary. It's mainly about the loss of innocence, which also applies to Severus after losing Lily. Lily is the symbol for love and sacrifice, but as a character we, fanfic writers, can take her wherever we want to take her, because she was never a well-rounded character to begin with.
My Severus has also been called OC, but never by any of the names mentioned in the first paragraph. This problem stems from a misogynistic place.
It’s sad to see that people are still looking at girls and women and feel the need to point out every single flaw they might have. It’s as if women are not allowed to have irrationally based emotions, or say the wrong things, or be ignorant on certain matters, or stand firmly behind their own opinions, even if they stand stark in contrast with the opinions of all others. The behaviour of women lies under a constant magnifying glass, and something will get pointed out and ridiculed the moment a woman does something that one does not consider appropriate or right.
It is okay, to not be entirely okay. It is okay to be that way in real life, and it is okay for fictional characters (which mind you, are reflections of the workings of our inner world) to be that way. My Lily is a proud OC, because she is little bits of me."
Quote from CypressWand on December 17, 2023, 2:43 pmMy Severus has also been called OC, but never by any of the names mentioned in the first paragraph. This problem stems from a misogynistic place.
It’s sad to see that people are still looking at girls and women and feel the need to point out every single flaw they might have. It’s as if women are not allowed to have irrationally based emotions, or say the wrong things, or be ignorant on certain matters, or stand firmly behind their own opinions, even if they stand stark in contrast with the opinions of all others. The behaviour of women lies under a constant magnifying glass, and something will get pointed out and ridiculed the moment a woman does something that one does not consider appropriate or right.
It is okay, to not be entirely okay. It is okay to be that way in real life, and it is okay for fictional characters (which mind you, are reflections of the workings of our inner world) to be that way. My Lily is a proud OC, because she is little bits of me."
Eloquently put and 100% true! Women and girls are held to different standards, both in fiction and in real life. This is especially apparent with a character like Lily, who receives an unbelievable amount of vitriol while Severus (who objectively did worse things) gets a free pass. It makes me sad that they can't see the double standard, that they don't seem to understand that she had valid reasons to feel/act the way she did. All that seems to matter (at least to them) is that she hurt Severus… the fact that he also hurt her is irrelevant.
Sadly, this is a common thing with male characters, especially fan favorites. Female characters (especially love interests) are held to impossibly high standards, judged solely on how they interact with that male character. It's all about how her words, her actions, her choices affect him… she's supposed to prioritize his needs/feelings above all else.
Needless to say, this dynamic is deeply sexist. It's also rampant in the whole "Lily was a terrible friend/person" debate. She's blamed for every damn thing that goes wrong in their relationship, every word, action, and even facial expression portrayed in the worst possible light. She's condemned for all of this, vilified for behavior that is perfectly normal for a teenage girl, all because it affects Severus negatively in some way.
The most egregious example (at least to me) is when people blame her for ending their friendship, especially when they insist that it was her fault he became a Death Eater. Apparently, she was supposed to give him another chance, ignoring those pesky feelings of betrayal and fears for her safety. His needs/feelings were the only ones that mattered, after all… how dare she prioritize her own well-being?
Point is, women (or girls in this case) do not exist as props for male growth. It's not fair to blame Lily for not saying/doing the right thing at every possible moment, and it sure as hell wasn't her job to save Severus from his own bad judgment. She tried to warn him about Voldemort; he didn't listen. Likewise, he tried to warn her about James, though in the end, she only saw what she wanted to see.
To me, this is the craziest thing about loving one while hating the other. If you look at it objectively, their flaws, mistakes, and blind spots were remarkably similar.
My Lily is a proud OC, because she is little bits of me.
I feel the same way, which is why I'm so defensive of her. In a way, I'm defending myself, knowing I would've made similar decisions were I in her shoes. Hell, I have made those choices, forced to walk away from friendships or relationships that were no longer healthy for me. I know what it's like to try and hold on while those relationships gradually unravel, how painful it is when trust is replaced by doubt and suspicion. I don't know if those relationships could've been salvaged if I'd stuck around, but… that's kind of the point. Lily, like all women (and especially young girls), didn't have the benefit of hindsight. She did what felt best for her at the time, based on the information she had.
I wish more people would recognize that, give her the benefit of the doubt, admit that she and Severus both made mistakes. Yes, I know they're just fictional characters, but double standards hurt real women, too.
Thank you for that lengthy response @heatherlly
The whole reason why I started writing Kémya is because I wanted to give Lily more personal growth and work with her character individually. I made sure that when they 'arrived' in Middle-earth they ended up in vastly different places, just for the sake of being able to write seperate chapters where they would have the space to grow into their own personhood. Art of War was written entirely from Severus' perspective, and in hindsight it made Lily as much more one-dimentional character than I intended her to be.
They were both horrible to each other, and yet it is completely in character for two teenagers to let their emotions get the best of them. For them to own up to both of their faults was a big thing for me, and it marks the beginning of a process into the healing of their relationship.
Originally posted in discord but feel it's something that needs to be posted here.
Lily liked James Potter because she's the type of person who'd ignore the faults of the people she likes
She did it with Petunia, she did it with Snape until he called her mudblood, she did it with James bullying Snape behind her back as long as he was not doing it in front of her, she did it when Bathilda told Lily Dumbledore used to be friends with Grindelwald and she refused to accept it and even called Bathilda Batty.
Sirius said she didn't know much, he meant she didn't know all but knew enough because Snape was a special case for Potter. He didn't say Lily didn't know anything.
And yeah, she didn't like his behaviour during SWM but back then, he was a crush and not the person she liked. He was also being obnoxious and arrogant about it.
And she was friends with Snape at that point, no matter how much their friendship sucked. She felt obligated to halfheartedly defend him against her crush.
My interpretation of Lily is based on her analysis through her other relationships. With Petunia, she tried all the time to make up with her even if Petunia was being horrible to her, she defended Petunia to Snape.
With Snape, she was content to ignore his dark leanings and his calling others mudblood until he called her one.
With Dumbledore, she was firm in her belief that Dumbledore couldn't have been dark, that Bathilda was senile batty woman making it all up.
You see, it establishes a pattern. So my interpretation is she had a feeling or knew that Potter was bullying Snape despite having stopped doing it to others. And she was willing to ignore it, as long as Potter wasn't doing it publicly or in front of her. She, again is acting based on her established pattern, willful ignoring faults of people she likes despite knowing of them.
As Remus said (movie verse), she Lily tried to see the best in people. You can call that a flaw and it's certainly naive, but it doesn't make her a bad person or deserving of the (often misogynistic) vitriol that these type of reviewers mete out. She's held to different, unfair standards, especially as compared to Severus. Both have blind spots and are guilty of only seeing what they wanted to see despite numerous red flags. The only difference is that Severus's behavior is excused, while Lily is scrutinized and demonized for hers.
My slightly controversial opinion, however late it may be. Personally, I have noticed that most hatred for Lily is from those specifically pairing Marauders with Severus. I am not saying that Severus fans are exempt from any hatred, because that's not true. Though, I would argue it has less to do with misogyny rather than the perceived less than stellar representation of being a best friend that more often than not just nagged rather than taking any action. Obviously, you need both hands to clap so the blame isn't entirely on her, and it wasn't her responsibility to save Severus or anything. But her flaws do exist and are aplenty. We should be aware that our favourite characters often times do have flaws, even if we wish they didn't.
Their little friendship was flawed from the very beginning, and the power dynamic wasn't on equal terms. Their environment and other factors didn't help much either. Though it can be definitely argued who was worse to whom and by how much. The comments from J.K Rowling herself don't help either, because of her questionable views but she wrote the franchise based on her views so that is something to be considered. Personally, I dislike most characters if not all, and Severus is my only favourite character in the entire franchise. Maybe, I am just the odd one out. Ultimately, they're fictional characters so the point is moot. People should just write their own stories and write the way they interpreted the characters instead of fighting with each other.
