[HPforGrownups] Characterizations: Rowling vs. Steele

[Caius Marcius]

No: HPFGUIDX 8037


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Jim Flanagan 
  To: HPforGrownups at egroups.com 
  Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2000 6:04 PM
  Subject: [HPforGrownups] Characterizations: Rowling vs. Steele


  Dumbledore, for me, remains one-dimensional in his role of providing 
  the polar "good" in the story, just as Voldemort provides the 
  polar "evil." Dumbledore is quirky and he makes mistakes, but he has 
  *no* vices. Even the charge of moral relativism for allowing Harry et 
  al to violate school rules can be dismissed because "it's for the 
  good," an old fairy tale standby. Maybe a mild dose of Danielle would 
  pep him up a little.
   
  I think you fail to do Dumbledore justice: sure, there are times - usually at the end of each book - in which he seems to be little more than JKR's mouthpiece, issuing forth the moral of the story  - but we must also keep in mind 

  (1)   His rather perverse sense of whimsy , which is perpetually on display - from his initial appearance in SS/PS, in which he claims to have a scar that is a perfect map of the London, to the outlandish jokes  that he uses to greet new Hogwarts arrivals, and on to such claims to have discovered  "a beautifully proportioned room  I have never seen before, containing a really rather magnificent collection of chamber pots (GoF, Ch. 22 -  a "chamber of secrets, " indeed!).  His description of himself before the Mirror of Erised is surely to be interpreted likewise.

  (2)   A critic once described PG Wodehouse's Jeeves as "Iago in a sort of benign retirement."  Could not the same thing be said of Dumbledore?  There is a certain feeling I get that he  is manipulating Harry like a chess-piece in his renewed campaign against Voldemort  - that he is using Harry in a just cause, a cause that Harry willingly aligns himself with, makes it no less manipulative.  Note how Dumbledore uses Harry to get back the Philosopher's Stone  - or how the Invisibility Cloak just "happens" to fall into Harry's hands  - or how he all but forces Hermione to reveal her secret time-turner to Ron and Harry, and then send them out with it on an extraordinarily dangerous mission.  Does anyone really believe that Harry came across Dumbledore's Pensieve only because he failed to lock it up properly? (If so, see me for some great deals on Privet Drive condos I'm being forced to part with).  The marvelously subversive passage in GoF Chap. 36, in which Harry notes the gleam of triumph in Dumbledore's eyes surely does not mean that Dumbledore is a hidden ally of Evil  - but, just as disturbingly, it may mean that as an agent of Good, he must  be willing to sacrifice others he truly cares about in order to achieve Evil's defeat.....

  And please keep even a mild does of Danielle far far distant from us all....................



               -  CMC




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