[HPforGrownups] Courtesy and ambition

[summers.65 at osu.edu]

No: HPFGUIDX 1210


Ambition, in the history of literature, is always a sticking point.  It is
something that is valued in the real world and yet always seems to signal a
fictional character's doom.

I think it is not the ambition that is the crucial point, but rather what
the ambition makes the person do.  If ambition leads you to study hard and
apply yourself, your rewards are just.  If ambition leads you to cheat,
trample on others and do anything to get to your goal then any victory you
achieve will be Pyrrhic at best...more often than not no victory is
achieved at all.

Snape's ambition to be the DaDA professor turned him bitter and leads him
to cut down those who get the job.  Harry's ambition led him to expand his
knowledge, engage in teamwork with his friends, and test his own limits.

Ambition is nothing without means to achieves its ends.  Those means are
what distinguishes the characters.

Lori


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Lori   "Could Have Had a V-8"  Summers

        I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass.
        And I'm all out of bubble gum.

Last movie seen:  "The Cider House Rules"
Reigning car-CD:  "Strictly Ballroom" soundtrack
Current book: "A Walk in the Woods" by Bill Bryson
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