laliandra | An interview, yes, that meme...

The lovely

vegablack62provided me with some (cool but difficult!) interview questions.

1. What's the best part about where you live?
The best part about Leeds is that it's a really diverse and vibrant city, with great music, but you can drive for 15 minutes and be in the coutryside and be in the Yorkshire Dales in about 25...

2. I'm asking everyone who does the 101 list this question. Which item from your list would you absolutely want to guarantee achieving?
I guess the one to achieve a 2.1 is the most important. Because that would enable me to get a lot of the other stuff done, get a good job and raise money etc.

3. (I'm asking all the Potter fans this question.) What would be the one thing you would change in the Harry Potter books?
Oh God! Only one?! Is saying The Epilogue cheating? If I'm allowed just a little thing, I'd say Hermione jinxing Marietta. But if I'm allowed a big thing I'd say the Slytherins. Mainly the Malfoys, cos I'm biased, but the whole lot, the villains of the piece could be so more than one dimensional.

4. If you could sit down and talk with one person alive or dead and tell them something you've never said before, to whom would you talk and what would you say?
I think maybe Terry Pratchett. I wouls tell him that I find him a genuinely inspiring person and writer. His books are a serires of true brilliance that only get better each time you read them, and his work for people with neural illnesses is incredible. And probably squeal like a total fangirl, because I am.

5. You write Draco very well. Why does he interest you?

He interests me because there’s just so much potential in him, wasted potential, in so many senses. In terms of his actual self, he’s clearly bright and resourceful; he does well at school and fixes the Cabinet amongst other things. But he was forced into following someone else, and he was just broken by it. The rest of his life will be blighted by those terrible experiences, haunted by all those terrible acts he had to do and judged for the decisions he made. He will forever be defined by the choices he made when he was 16, and who didn’t make some really bad decisions when they were 16… He also seems a waste in terms of a literary character. There is SO MUCH that JK Rowling could have done with him, and she just… didn’t. There were these occasional glimpses of something more than a one-dimensional villain, like when he doesn’t identify Harry at the Manor, but in the end he’s just a coward who gets punched in the face.
There are so many sides to him, he is clearly capeable of deep love and loyalty, which he displays to both his family and house. He is an only child (which I get), spoilt but always under judgement. He is sarcastic and mean, but also able to be hurt easily.

There are just some characters I get into, once I write them or portray them in a play I just can’t help taking their side (don’t get me started on why Stella is justified in her decision at the end of A Streetcar Named Desire or why Helena is the real heroine of A Midummer Night’s Dream). I feel for Draco, and I think that the people who aren’t so clear cut, who struggle to make the right choice and who actually are affected by consequences are just so much more interesting than the straightforward hero types.

If anyone else has questions I'd be more than happy to answer them, or would like questions from me. This was fun!