InsaneJournal

Application
Who is Your Character?
Full Name: Astoria Iphigenia Greengrass
Nicknames: none
Age/Birthday: 16 October 1981; 21 years old
House and Years Attended: Slytherin (1993-2000)
Blood Status: Pure
Occupation (if applicable): A member of The Committee on the Control of Wizarding Society.
Location: Gingraix Manor - Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
Alliance: Death eaters/purists
Status in Society: living in society
Boggart: corpses
Patronus: cannot cast

Personality (include several weaknesses and strengths): If one was to apply the most mundane description available to Astoria Greengrass, it would run somewhere along the lines of "not a very nice girl." Oh, she seems pleasant enough - charming, eloquent, thoughtful, passive - as well bred a purist girl as one can get, and not irritatingly assertive, to boot; in reality, however, something went wrong in the creation of the youngest Greengrass. Cursed with an unwavering hatred of all things improper, including mudbloods, homosexuals, the French, and insects, Astoria will go to nearly any means to enact her malevolence upon those deserving it. That isn't to say she's outwardly horrible to people - no she left the unsubtle social posturing to Pansy Parkinson and those of her ilk - rather, she preferred to bide her time, to plot and scheme and fester until the precise moment of destruction was ripe. Then, and only then, and only if the possibility of being caught was completely eliminated, did she act. Her potential for malice and cruelty far outstrips her capacity for kindness, but you'd be hard pressed to find a single person aware of that fact.

As to what people are aware of: Astoria is, by all appearances, a dull sort of purist creature with the occasional flash of red-headed temper. She gains no special attentions for her wit or novel ideas, and she is generally dismissed as a passive, 'sweet' girl by those who know her best - until she erupts. As no one is perfect, when she's not watching herself, it is very easy to let the sharp undercurrent of her personality show through in incisive comments and cruel belittlement. She strives each and every day to quash these impulses however, an exercise that seems futile given how easy it is for certain people to spark a tantrum.

Her strengths are few in number, but strong indeed; she has an incredible reign over her emotions - to the point that she can pick out the most suitable for the occasion, like a tailored hat. Astoria's purism and loyalty and generally mild demeanour have kept her socially high in the ranks, and her influence, though a manipulative, passive sort, is profound. Where she struggles, however, is in her familial relationships. Closest to her father and brother, then to her sister, and worst with her mother, Astoria's achilles heel is for maternal figures. She seeks out older, inspirational women as surrogate mothers and is easily poisoned against her own mother by social rivals. Her emotional barriers have little resolve when her family is involved, and she is easiest riled or hurt by them - a vulnerability she despises but is helpless to counter. Her self-importance is another weakness, compounded by the fact that her refusal to acknowledge her self-absorbance creates a self-fulfilling prophecy of selfishness and self-righteousness. Astoria Greengrass can do no wrong in Astoria Greengrass's mind, and she believes wholeheartedly that she not only deserves the attention and admiration that she extracts from others, but has a right to it. A throwback of her mother's disinterest? A sign of secret insecurity? She'd never admit to either.

Family and Friends (list relationships with them):
Parents: Andreus & Celicia Greengrass

Although oftentimes Andreus comes across as a refreshingly uncomplex man to those he associates with, multiple facets shape that plain exterior. He is the diplomat, calm and charming, difficult to rile, easy to associate with, friendly, disarming, and yet with his wife and children he is also the disciplinarian, rigid and inflexible. Flaws are not something Andreus takes kindly to, and the pointing out of his own flaws, mistakes, or shortcomings is something of which he is utterly intolerant. Astoria takes from her relationship with her father a sense of belonging - for he has always been one to indulge her demands for attention: properly formulated - and a sense of entitlement.

Celicia Greengrass is a social climber, petty, snide, and judgemental of any other woman who lives or breathes in her general vicinity. It would be unfair to say that she neglected her children, for she certainly made sure they had a nanny. She's at best absently affectionate and Astoria less attractive social qualities are patently her fault.

Brother: Relationship TBA; prefer 26-28 years old, blond

Sister: Daphne Greengrass; Relationship TBA; prefer blonde

Friends: TBA

Appearance: 5'7; 9 stone; red; blue;

Though Mrs Greengrass insists that all Greengrasses are flawless beauties, her second daughter's inheritance seemed to be no better than a mishmash of distinctive familial characteristics. With full lips, a strong jaw, and her great grandmother's very, very red hair, Astoria Greengrass can best be described as an 'unconventional' beauty. This didn't stop a few of the boys at school calling her a horsey ginger, but even horsey gingers have boys in their thrall that will happily beat up rude peons. And, truth be told, as Astoria grew older, she grew to be something resembling 'lovely.' Her bone structure and hair colour are immutable realities, but she's made the best of it through careful attention to the rest of her appearance, and in most other respects she has cultivated an enviable appearance. Smooth skin, a graceful figure, and a well-kempt sense of style characterise her first impressions on the casual observer.

In demeanour, Astoria comes across as a thoughtful, if sedate, diplomat. Though the occasional wicked smile belies her harmless exterior, it is the rare person who discovers anything about her from appearance alone. Her outside is carefully crafted to disassemble and misdirect the truth, and she happily fosters misconceptions about her nature with her physical attributes. Only when Astoria loses her temper does her inner disastrousness become apparent upon the outside. Her features seem made for sullenness, and every inch of flesh responds to a temper tantrum. As easily as the storm comes, however, it goes again - and she can go from hot to disconcertingly cold in a matter of minutes.

PB: Alison Sudol
Sexuality: heterosexual
Achievements (OWLS, NEWTS, Animagus, Quidditch, etc.):

OWLs
Defence Against the Dark Arts A
Potions E
Transfiguration O
History of Magic A
Charms O
Astronomy E
Herbology A
Arithmancy O

NEWTs
Potions O
Transfiguration O
Charms E
Astronomy E
Arithmancy O

Slytherin prefect 5th-7th years
Founder of the 'Students for the Preservation of Wizarding Culture' club.

Hobbies (Quidditch, Astronomy, Chess, Gob Stones): Secretly tattling, sabotaging classmates' class- and homework, convincing boys to beat other kids up. Nowdays she sticks mostly to violin, piano, and plotting the downfall of the muggle race.

Biography (three paragraphs minimum):

The Greengrass (originally Gingraix) bloodline originated in Aquitaine, France, where it held a decent status and remained relatively uninvolved in political affairs, aside from monetary influences. Eventually, with the distasteful rise of muggle rights in France, its descendants migrated north to Germany, where it made ties with several pureblood lines, then west, to Scotland and England. Daphne's great-grandparents re-established the family's German connections to find a wife for their eldest son, Penley. Asra Hahn, of the Hahn (German) and Addens (Dutch) lines, became Asra Greengrass, and they had several children, the oldest of which was Andreus, who inherited their Cheltenham lands. Celicia Flint was of pureblooded Finnish, English and Welsh descent, and from a specific family line with ties to many purist families in England. She and Andreus met at Hogwarts and discovered a mutual affinity, which continued well after Andreus graduated, and resulted in a favourable arrangement.

Astoria was the couple's third and final child, and contrary to the typical habit of mothers to baby their youngest daughter, Celicia seemed relatively disinterested in her child. Handed off to a nanny, Astoria saw her father infrequently and her mother even more rarely. She grew up closer to her siblings and peers than her parents, which was certainly a shaping factor in her personality - though to what extent remains to be seen.

She wasn't a particularly bright or inquisitive child, but Astoria did have two small gifts that she developed over time: the gift of lying and the gift of manipulating. In both respects, she was an excellent people person - easily winding her way into someone's good graces and manipulating them for what she wanted. It was the way of a proper purist girl, after all; one wasn't ever to ask for things outright, or to be overly assertive or demanding (though Astoria did fail in this last respect and was even prone to the occasional tantrum or three) - the only option left to her was to coerce.

This became a talent of considerable worth to her when she entered school. Immediately sorted into Slytherin for her cunning and deviousness, if not her ambition, Astoria took her place two years beneath her sister and among the children she'd grown up with. She did well in her social circle, slipping into a position of power. If she learned one thing, however, from observing Pansy Parkinson - practically her idol for the control she held over the gaggle of girls in her own year - it was that subtlety yielded far better results than outright disdain.

Academically, Astoria was no shining star, though her marks greatly improved with the ministry takeover and the ascension of the Dark Lord to his rightful place. Though purism had never been one of her most profound tenets - for her father was more interested in self-preservation and wealth than he was about blood purity - she quickly adopted it and incorporated it into her views. The muggleborns were cast out of society, imprisoned alongside their traitorous half-blood allies, and Astoria rejoiced. Upon graduation, she quickly applied to work with Professor Umbridge - who she'd really rather liked during her brief stint at Hogwarts - in The Committee on the Control of Wizarding Society. The name really says it all.

The death eater take over has been, in Astoria's opinion, the greatest triumph of the purist culture in modern history. If she feels any sort of discomfort at slavery and murder, she certainly hasn't shown it - or so much as batted an eyelash at it.