What Makes Myrtle Moan?
I found myself thinking about Moaning Myrtle today and wondering why the girl doesn't get more porn written about her, at least where I can see it. Because you know, Myrtle is probably the most blatantly sexual--that is to say, lascivious--character in canon.
In that Mugglenet interview JKR revealed that yes, the houses correspond to the four elements, and Slytherin, of course, was water. I'd actually say that Slytherin is the house most closely associated with its element. I instinctively get that Ravenclaw is air and Hufflepuff is earth, but the two Slytherin books are so waterlogged it's funny (or liquid-logged: the Slytherin bathrooms spew forth not only water but tears, urine and blood while sherry, fire whisky and mead abound). I believe when asked why Slytherin wasn't just destroyed since they're the "evil" house JKR said something about how it's important to accept all parts of yourself or all parts of the school, and that's certainly a healthy sentiment, but it also makes me think how interesting it is that the "water" part of yourself is the "bad" house that has to be accepted in spite of itself. From everything I've ever read about the elements water is the element of emotion, dreams, imagination, prophesy and depth. HBP, being the book of ships, deals with romantic love more than any other book. It also deals most frankly with the vague but we-get-it idea of "snogging." Not just the nervous mistletoe kiss of OotP (which Harry found unappealingly "wet") or the embarrassing PDA at the next table in the same book. This is just plain sensuality all over the place--one wonders how JKR could have introduced Blaise earlier, actually. He fits so well with Draco draped over Pansy, who's stroking his hair, it's hard to imagine Blaise at 11. I remember getting into an interesting conversation on black_dog's lj about the fanon-becoming-canon connection between Slytherin and sex, with references to the Fanon Gryffindor sex manual "Quidditch in Bed."
Which brings me back to Myrtle. I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but these are some things I've noticed about her in three books so far. I've often been a little disturbed by the attitude the books take with regards to female characters and I admit Myrtle doesn't make me feel much better about it--she is rather a grotesque of a very specific kind. She is, along with Hepzibah Smith and possibly Merope Gaunt, a letch. She, like those women (I am not including Romilda Vane, because I think Romilda's supposed to be more interested in Harry's name and status than his body, tattoos aside--a slightly different kind of bad woman), is openly interested in the male body while being physically unattractive herself. Tom Jr. allows himself to be fawned over to get his hands on Hepzibah's ample...cup. Tom Sr. is potion-ed into sex with Merope and then seems to come to his senses. anna_milton really has a point when she notes that the Tom/Merope story is an old one, only usually it's the handsome, wealthy gentleman, not the poor but noble-blooded wretch who's the villain. Tom sleeps with her and then leaves her, pregnant. Obviously there must be a love potion at work. Surely a gentleman would never have taken advantage of a young woman's love otherwise, just for the sex. Never happen. Nyuh-uh.
So, Myrtle. She appears in three books. Although, being dead, Myrtle is hardly able to grow, she actually does seem to grow in each book. Or at least, her lines reflect Harry's own maturity level back at him. In CoS it's Hermione who first tells us about Myrtle, explaining how she haunts the girl's bathroom and makes it go out of order. "I never went in there anyway if I could avoid it; it's awful trying to have a pee with her wailing at you -" she says. Hermione, as a girl, is annoyed by Myrtle when she's trying to have a pee, but her discomfort is manageable. It's not *that* different from having a girl at the next toilet talking to her. In general girls don't seem to have much to do with Myrtle, besides being annoyed by her. Myrtle is angered by Ginny throwing the diary through her, and laughs at Hermione's polyjuice predicament, but it's Harry who really draws her interest:
"Oh, well ... I'd just been thinking ... if you had died, you'd
have been welcome to share my toilet," said Myrtle, blushing silver.
"Urgh!" said Ron as they left the bathroom for the dark,
deserted corridor outside. "Harry! I think Myrtle's grown fond of
you! You've got competition, Ginny!"
Myrtle has begun to develop a crush on Harry, though it's not like Ginny's, since Ginny presumably likes Harry and wants what's best for him while Myrtle just wants him for herself (even if he has to be dead). Myrtle in this book is often prim about boys coming into the girl's bathroom, though it's more of a territorial thing. She opened the door to the stall before her death to tell Tom to "use his own toilet."
Jump ahead two books to GoF and Myrtle appears again, showing for the first time that she can visit all the bathrooms of the school:
"I'd try putting it in the water, if I were you."
Harry had swallowed a considerable amount of bubbles in shock. He
stood up, sputtering, and saw the ghost of a very glum-looking girl
sitting cross-legged on top of one of the taps. It was Moaning
Myrtle, who was usually to be heard sobbing in the S-bend of a
toilet three floors below.
"Myrtle!" Harry said in outrage, "I'm - I'm not wearing
anything!"
The foam was so dense that this hardly mattered, but he had a
nasty feeling that Myrtle had been spying on him from out of one
of the taps ever since he had arrived.
GoF contains the first hints of romance for the characters, but Harry himself is still at the stage of just not wanting to be seen by any girl naked, thank you. It's a nasty feeling to think a girl's ogling him. He's not at the age when the potential sex of such a situation is a perk. He's quite shocked at what he sees of Myrtle's hobbies, but he doesn't seem mistaken:
"Have you been spying on him too?" said Harry indignantly. "What
d'you do, sneak up here in the evenings to watch the prefects
take baths?"
"Sometimes," said Myrtle, rather slyly, "but I've never come
out to speak to anyone before."
We don't know what kind of sex drive Myrtle had before she died, but she honestly does seem to enjoy spying on fit young Prefects in the bath. Harry notices in this scene that Myrtle seems to enjoy "bossing him around" in showing him how to make his egg sing (not a euphemism for orgasm, but sure sounds like one). Myrtle has the upper hand here more than she ever did since Harry is naked, and, I think, because Myrtle's rather comfortable about her ogling-she's, dare I say, experienced. I can't help but read something a little naughty into this line, too:
"Well, that’s what Diggory thought," she said. "He lay there
talking to himself for ages about it. Ages and ages . . . nearly
all the bubbles had gone. ..."
Nearly all the bubbles had gone, huh? So Cedric was pretty much on display. And Myrtle was annoyed the pretty mermaid was "flashing her fins." This prefects bath is beginning to seem like Castle Anthrax. This is also the scene where we learn that Myrtle was confined to Hogwarts for the offense of stalking someone--Olive Hornby, whom she was tormenting. (I don't think I can read anything sexual into her hatred of Olive, but "stalking" is still something Myrtle seems to do in general.)
Harry leaves the bathroom promising to try to visit Myrtle, without meaning it. Whereas in CoS Myrtle was more like a drippy girl who wanted a friend and someone to whine to, GoF absolutely adds a sexual element to it--as sexual as a ghost can be.
Flash ahead again two books and Myrtle is not only shipping along with the main characters, she appears to feel she's got herself a boyfriend. Many people mistakenly think of Myrtle's scenes in HBP as taking place in her toilet, but of course really Myrtle has just begun haunting the boy's toilet, hoping to meet Draco there again. When she meets Harry she makes sure to remind him of their previous encounter, quite bluntly: "I came and saw you in your bath once, remember?" She even speaks of Harry's neglect in romantic terms: "I've learned not to expect much from boys."
Myrtle's talk about Draco is a romantic cliché: "I thought he liked me...Maybe if you two left he'd come back again...we had lots in common...I'm sure he felt it..." (it being the connection between them). Now, there's a lot of funny things about Myrtle focusing on Malfoy. He laughed at her death in CoS, he's helping the guy who killed her. But the other thing is, and this is hard to explain, but Myrtle's interest doesn't really work for me without the sexual component. That is, I can't imagine Myrtle crooning to 12-year-old Malfoy, offering to help, or telling people he's "sensitive" and not afraid to "show his feelings and cry." But now Malfoy has grown and caught up with Myrtle. It works because she's the parody of a swooning teenager--and Myrtle's definitely got a thing for hurt/comfort. She yells at the boys to stop dueling but enjoys her wails after Draco's taken away (her own interest outweighs the boy she's focused on, still, though at least she doesn't say she hopes Draco's dead). I just don't think their relationship works the way it does if you don't factor in Myrtle wanting a boyfriend, and putting a romantic spin on Malfoy to do it. I know drop-dead gorgeous Draco is fanon, but I think it's enough that he's sixteen and probably not bad looking.
Myrtle gets away with being letch, either in spite of or because of her own repulsiveness. She snivels. She wears glasses (apparently not as well as Harry). Most importantly, in every single book she's picking a spot on her chin. Pimples, those things that signal sexual maturation even as they are sexual turn-offs. Myrtle is also squat, with lank hair. I think, sadly, that she really joins Merope and Hepzibah in being a rather cruel caricature: the sexually aggressive but physically repulsive woman. Makes you wonder which comes first, the physical or the sexual. Whatever it is, there is something repulsive in the sexual aggression of these women. Harry is sure it must be in Hepzibah's house elf's contract to lie when asked how her mistress looks, because she is "a long way from lovely" in his opinion. When Tom appears on the scene Harry thinks he looks more handsome than ever (Seriously. His hair's a bit longer and his cheeks are hollowed, but it suits him--he's so handsome clearly he can't be interested in this monster). Hepzibah bats her eyelashes and "simpers" and pouts and giggles. Unbelievably, she almost comes out more of a villain in the scene than Tom Riddle, though his "greedy" expression when looking at the cup matches her greedy expression looking at Tom "handsome features." (One wonders what Harry looks like when he's staring at those features.)
I think we're supposed to know Tom Sr. could never have loved Merope, him being so handsome and her being so plain. The love potion really does seem to be felt to be needed to explain why he'd even look in her direction. It's hard to tell whether DD's idea that Merope probably used a love potion because it "seemed more romantic" makes her more ugly or less so. It's almost like she gets a little sympathy for hankering after actual love, rather than just wanting to have her way with Tom.
It's interesting, because I don't think you could say these girls are aggressive where others aren't, since on the contrary all the girls in canon seem very aggressive romantically. They just don't usually throw themselves at guys. Rather they plot, wait, strategize, trap, either for themselves or for others. The men are surprisingly passive in their way, even if eventually they must make the first move (I wouldn't be so sure Lily didn't fancy James before he fancied her, for instance. We know that while it might look like Harry grabbed Ginny for himself in fact Ginny had been working on him for years.) Sirius, the "sexiest" of the Marauders, doesn't notice all the girls trying to get his attention. Harry and Remus both nobly break off from their girlfriends for their own good. It takes Cho and Hermione together to squeeze what little romance that can be squeezed out of that encounter. Hermione's been working on Ron for what, 3 years now? Molly and Tonks plot to get Remus back with Tonks throughout HBP.
In that Mugglenet interview JKR revealed that yes, the houses correspond to the four elements, and Slytherin, of course, was water. I'd actually say that Slytherin is the house most closely associated with its element. I instinctively get that Ravenclaw is air and Hufflepuff is earth, but the two Slytherin books are so waterlogged it's funny (or liquid-logged: the Slytherin bathrooms spew forth not only water but tears, urine and blood while sherry, fire whisky and mead abound). I believe when asked why Slytherin wasn't just destroyed since they're the "evil" house JKR said something about how it's important to accept all parts of yourself or all parts of the school, and that's certainly a healthy sentiment, but it also makes me think how interesting it is that the "water" part of yourself is the "bad" house that has to be accepted in spite of itself. From everything I've ever read about the elements water is the element of emotion, dreams, imagination, prophesy and depth. HBP, being the book of ships, deals with romantic love more than any other book. It also deals most frankly with the vague but we-get-it idea of "snogging." Not just the nervous mistletoe kiss of OotP (which Harry found unappealingly "wet") or the embarrassing PDA at the next table in the same book. This is just plain sensuality all over the place--one wonders how JKR could have introduced Blaise earlier, actually. He fits so well with Draco draped over Pansy, who's stroking his hair, it's hard to imagine Blaise at 11. I remember getting into an interesting conversation on black_dog's lj about the fanon-becoming-canon connection between Slytherin and sex, with references to the Fanon Gryffindor sex manual "Quidditch in Bed."
Which brings me back to Myrtle. I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but these are some things I've noticed about her in three books so far. I've often been a little disturbed by the attitude the books take with regards to female characters and I admit Myrtle doesn't make me feel much better about it--she is rather a grotesque of a very specific kind. She is, along with Hepzibah Smith and possibly Merope Gaunt, a letch. She, like those women (I am not including Romilda Vane, because I think Romilda's supposed to be more interested in Harry's name and status than his body, tattoos aside--a slightly different kind of bad woman), is openly interested in the male body while being physically unattractive herself. Tom Jr. allows himself to be fawned over to get his hands on Hepzibah's ample...cup. Tom Sr. is potion-ed into sex with Merope and then seems to come to his senses. anna_milton really has a point when she notes that the Tom/Merope story is an old one, only usually it's the handsome, wealthy gentleman, not the poor but noble-blooded wretch who's the villain. Tom sleeps with her and then leaves her, pregnant. Obviously there must be a love potion at work. Surely a gentleman would never have taken advantage of a young woman's love otherwise, just for the sex. Never happen. Nyuh-uh.
So, Myrtle. She appears in three books. Although, being dead, Myrtle is hardly able to grow, she actually does seem to grow in each book. Or at least, her lines reflect Harry's own maturity level back at him. In CoS it's Hermione who first tells us about Myrtle, explaining how she haunts the girl's bathroom and makes it go out of order. "I never went in there anyway if I could avoid it; it's awful trying to have a pee with her wailing at you -" she says. Hermione, as a girl, is annoyed by Myrtle when she's trying to have a pee, but her discomfort is manageable. It's not *that* different from having a girl at the next toilet talking to her. In general girls don't seem to have much to do with Myrtle, besides being annoyed by her. Myrtle is angered by Ginny throwing the diary through her, and laughs at Hermione's polyjuice predicament, but it's Harry who really draws her interest:
"Oh, well ... I'd just been thinking ... if you had died, you'd
have been welcome to share my toilet," said Myrtle, blushing silver.
"Urgh!" said Ron as they left the bathroom for the dark,
deserted corridor outside. "Harry! I think Myrtle's grown fond of
you! You've got competition, Ginny!"
Myrtle has begun to develop a crush on Harry, though it's not like Ginny's, since Ginny presumably likes Harry and wants what's best for him while Myrtle just wants him for herself (even if he has to be dead). Myrtle in this book is often prim about boys coming into the girl's bathroom, though it's more of a territorial thing. She opened the door to the stall before her death to tell Tom to "use his own toilet."
Jump ahead two books to GoF and Myrtle appears again, showing for the first time that she can visit all the bathrooms of the school:
"I'd try putting it in the water, if I were you."
Harry had swallowed a considerable amount of bubbles in shock. He
stood up, sputtering, and saw the ghost of a very glum-looking girl
sitting cross-legged on top of one of the taps. It was Moaning
Myrtle, who was usually to be heard sobbing in the S-bend of a
toilet three floors below.
"Myrtle!" Harry said in outrage, "I'm - I'm not wearing
anything!"
The foam was so dense that this hardly mattered, but he had a
nasty feeling that Myrtle had been spying on him from out of one
of the taps ever since he had arrived.
GoF contains the first hints of romance for the characters, but Harry himself is still at the stage of just not wanting to be seen by any girl naked, thank you. It's a nasty feeling to think a girl's ogling him. He's not at the age when the potential sex of such a situation is a perk. He's quite shocked at what he sees of Myrtle's hobbies, but he doesn't seem mistaken:
"Have you been spying on him too?" said Harry indignantly. "What
d'you do, sneak up here in the evenings to watch the prefects
take baths?"
"Sometimes," said Myrtle, rather slyly, "but I've never come
out to speak to anyone before."
We don't know what kind of sex drive Myrtle had before she died, but she honestly does seem to enjoy spying on fit young Prefects in the bath. Harry notices in this scene that Myrtle seems to enjoy "bossing him around" in showing him how to make his egg sing (not a euphemism for orgasm, but sure sounds like one). Myrtle has the upper hand here more than she ever did since Harry is naked, and, I think, because Myrtle's rather comfortable about her ogling-she's, dare I say, experienced. I can't help but read something a little naughty into this line, too:
"Well, that’s what Diggory thought," she said. "He lay there
talking to himself for ages about it. Ages and ages . . . nearly
all the bubbles had gone. ..."
Nearly all the bubbles had gone, huh? So Cedric was pretty much on display. And Myrtle was annoyed the pretty mermaid was "flashing her fins." This prefects bath is beginning to seem like Castle Anthrax. This is also the scene where we learn that Myrtle was confined to Hogwarts for the offense of stalking someone--Olive Hornby, whom she was tormenting. (I don't think I can read anything sexual into her hatred of Olive, but "stalking" is still something Myrtle seems to do in general.)
Harry leaves the bathroom promising to try to visit Myrtle, without meaning it. Whereas in CoS Myrtle was more like a drippy girl who wanted a friend and someone to whine to, GoF absolutely adds a sexual element to it--as sexual as a ghost can be.
Flash ahead again two books and Myrtle is not only shipping along with the main characters, she appears to feel she's got herself a boyfriend. Many people mistakenly think of Myrtle's scenes in HBP as taking place in her toilet, but of course really Myrtle has just begun haunting the boy's toilet, hoping to meet Draco there again. When she meets Harry she makes sure to remind him of their previous encounter, quite bluntly: "I came and saw you in your bath once, remember?" She even speaks of Harry's neglect in romantic terms: "I've learned not to expect much from boys."
Myrtle's talk about Draco is a romantic cliché: "I thought he liked me...Maybe if you two left he'd come back again...we had lots in common...I'm sure he felt it..." (it being the connection between them). Now, there's a lot of funny things about Myrtle focusing on Malfoy. He laughed at her death in CoS, he's helping the guy who killed her. But the other thing is, and this is hard to explain, but Myrtle's interest doesn't really work for me without the sexual component. That is, I can't imagine Myrtle crooning to 12-year-old Malfoy, offering to help, or telling people he's "sensitive" and not afraid to "show his feelings and cry." But now Malfoy has grown and caught up with Myrtle. It works because she's the parody of a swooning teenager--and Myrtle's definitely got a thing for hurt/comfort. She yells at the boys to stop dueling but enjoys her wails after Draco's taken away (her own interest outweighs the boy she's focused on, still, though at least she doesn't say she hopes Draco's dead). I just don't think their relationship works the way it does if you don't factor in Myrtle wanting a boyfriend, and putting a romantic spin on Malfoy to do it. I know drop-dead gorgeous Draco is fanon, but I think it's enough that he's sixteen and probably not bad looking.
Myrtle gets away with being letch, either in spite of or because of her own repulsiveness. She snivels. She wears glasses (apparently not as well as Harry). Most importantly, in every single book she's picking a spot on her chin. Pimples, those things that signal sexual maturation even as they are sexual turn-offs. Myrtle is also squat, with lank hair. I think, sadly, that she really joins Merope and Hepzibah in being a rather cruel caricature: the sexually aggressive but physically repulsive woman. Makes you wonder which comes first, the physical or the sexual. Whatever it is, there is something repulsive in the sexual aggression of these women. Harry is sure it must be in Hepzibah's house elf's contract to lie when asked how her mistress looks, because she is "a long way from lovely" in his opinion. When Tom appears on the scene Harry thinks he looks more handsome than ever (Seriously. His hair's a bit longer and his cheeks are hollowed, but it suits him--he's so handsome clearly he can't be interested in this monster). Hepzibah bats her eyelashes and "simpers" and pouts and giggles. Unbelievably, she almost comes out more of a villain in the scene than Tom Riddle, though his "greedy" expression when looking at the cup matches her greedy expression looking at Tom "handsome features." (One wonders what Harry looks like when he's staring at those features.)
I think we're supposed to know Tom Sr. could never have loved Merope, him being so handsome and her being so plain. The love potion really does seem to be felt to be needed to explain why he'd even look in her direction. It's hard to tell whether DD's idea that Merope probably used a love potion because it "seemed more romantic" makes her more ugly or less so. It's almost like she gets a little sympathy for hankering after actual love, rather than just wanting to have her way with Tom.
It's interesting, because I don't think you could say these girls are aggressive where others aren't, since on the contrary all the girls in canon seem very aggressive romantically. They just don't usually throw themselves at guys. Rather they plot, wait, strategize, trap, either for themselves or for others. The men are surprisingly passive in their way, even if eventually they must make the first move (I wouldn't be so sure Lily didn't fancy James before he fancied her, for instance. We know that while it might look like Harry grabbed Ginny for himself in fact Ginny had been working on him for years.) Sirius, the "sexiest" of the Marauders, doesn't notice all the girls trying to get his attention. Harry and Remus both nobly break off from their girlfriends for their own good. It takes Cho and Hermione together to squeeze what little romance that can be squeezed out of that encounter. Hermione's been working on Ron for what, 3 years now? Molly and Tonks plot to get Remus back with Tonks throughout HBP.