#fleur delacour: unbothered queen who learns to be a little bit more bothered with age and maturity

[whinlatter]

Any headcanons about Fleur? I feel she’s very underrated…

Fleur is underrated, it's true! For me, what makes her interesting to think about, though, are all the ways in which she's flawed, complex, and elusive as a character and also, frankly, a bit of a dickhead with some room to grow. In some fandom spaces, there's a tendency to sanctify Fleur (coming particularly from the anti-Weasley sides of the fandom), and portray her as a victim of horrible bullying that she never deserved, which I don't agree with. Do Molly, Hermione and Ginny cover themselves in glory in their initial approach to Fleur? Of course not. But for all her many strengths, Fleur gets off on the wrong foot with Bill's family in part because she can be a bit of a rude and inconsiderate houseguest, thoughtless in her remarks, and occasionally vain in ways that make sense but that do demand a bit of introspection and self-improvement.

I do think it's clear that Fleur's experience coming of age in a world that sexualised her from a young age was both formative and deeply harmful in ways I think she would have to unpack and unlearn as an adult. Patriarchy conditions Fleur's worldview: it also shapes how other female characters respond to her. Everyone's losing. Whenever I've written Fleur, I've tried to give her lines that portray her as someone disarmingly honest, rarely meaning to wound, but certainly a bit tactless and bearing the unexamined scars of a childhood and adolescence that sexualised her young, hardened her and made her feel like appearance and looks are a currency. In Orchards, it's the line about Fleur giving Ginny her an expensive-looking French conditioner for her birthday. (‘It will help with – how do you say - ah, split-ends' - like, kind to give Ginny a present, but comes off as patronising and a criticism of Ginny's appearance, especially to an already unimpressed and unforgiving audience). The bit I just put in Beasts is me trying to flag this sense I work with her of her as a character: ''You are very pretty, even if you do not try,’ Fleur had said, that afternoon. (Her sister-in-law always did like her compliments backhanded.)' ‘Boys will like your ’air, if you do it nicely. Remember, if you take care of your looks, zey will take care of you.’'

A only have a couple of headcanons for ya, none of which are very ground-breaking, forgive me!

I think of Fleur as a solitary person, with a strong sense of self and little interest in explaining her inner life to others. I think Bill and Fleur's relationship is the meeting of two similarly self-sufficient people who find a sort of calm together, but that isn't defined by emotional co-dependency.

I like to think Fleur moved back to England for work as an adult because the Triwizard Tournament was both emotionally and politically formative for her. The circumstances in which the tournament ended struck at her own strong sense of justice, but she also felt drawn to a place where she had been changed, in some way. I think there's something in going back to places that changed you but that you feel you have unfinished business with. Her crush on Bill was secondary to her pursuing that more elusive feeling, following up on a question mark

I like to think Fleur benefits a lot from her relationship with her sisters-in-law as an adult, albeit slowly and quietly. While I love the idea of her and Ginny being able to talk about why they clashed years later, I don't ever really imagine Fleur as being best mates with Ginny, but I think both come to a place of mutual respect, unspoken but deeply felt, and that they admire each other as parents a great deal. I think a more mature and reflective adult Fleur would be intensely sympathetic to the ways Ginny was almost certainly harassed and sexualised in the wizarding press as a figure in the public eye.

#another one for my 'let female characters be dickheads' campaign #women can fall out both sides can have points and the conflict can be rich multifaceted interesting and productive #but sure yeah fleur's a saint and hermione/molly/ginny are monsters whatever whatever #fleur delacour: unbothered queen who learns to be a little bit more bothered with age and maturity #fleur delacour #thanks anon! #headcanon #headcanons #ask