Thoughts about Barty Jr (long)

[pigwidgeon37 at yahoo.it]

No: HPFGUIDX 23944

WARNING: The motto of this whole post is IMO, so I didn't bother to 
write it every time I make some conjecture of my own


Finally it has come to my mind who Barty Jr. reminds me of: It's 
Count Dracula's faithful servant Renfield!! The coin fell at the 
moment I reread what he tells Dumbledore under the influence of 
Veritaserum, the key phrase being: „And then- my Master came to me!", 
with a look ob utter insanity in his eyes. There are parallels like 
Renfield being imprisoned and waiting for Dracula's arrival in 
England and his total devotion (ah, how Tom Waits played him....), 
that has more than just a tinge of insanity.
How insane is Barty Jr.? And why? 
He spent one year in Azkaban and left the prison dying (GoF: „They 
sensed one healthy and one dying person enter and one healthy and one 
dying person leave"). What exactly were his symptoms? Was he dying 
because he had stopped eating? Had his Dementor- induced state of 
depression become so bad that he had simply abandoned himself? What 
are the effects of a long- term Imperius Curse? Does it affect the 
mental health?
As I don´t want to only throw out questions, but would like to answer 
some of them myself, so there is my own version of Barty Crouch jr.:

At Voldemort's downfall, Barty is in his late teens (trial in the 
pensieve). We don't know whether he ever took his final exams at 
Hogwarts, but it is ascertained that till his fifth year he was a  
top student and got 12 O.W.L.S. If he is 18/19 after V.'s defeat, his 
first year at Hogwarts and the beginnings of V.'s rise to power more 
or less coincide. (We can only guess which House he was in, maybe it 
will be  revealed in a later book, anyway, my guess would be 
Gryffindor or Ravenclaw.)
Family situation: His father Barty Sr. Seems to have worked for the 
MoM for a very long time, maybe he started directly after his 
graduation. Barty Sr. is ambitious, his ultimate aim being
to become Minister of Magic. To achieve it, he doubtlessly had to 
work very hard, especially during VWI which means that, when Barty 
Jr. started school (and perhaps even before), they lost
contact almost completely. Maybe they saw each other once or twice 
during the holidays.
His mother, from the short glimpse we get at her during the trial, is 
a complete nonentity. OTOH, Barty Sr. loves her very much, at least 
more than he ever loved his son.  Her own love for her son must be 
very deep, as she literally withers away after he has been sent to 
Azkaban, and sacrifices herself to free him. 
So Barty jr. seems to have lived a childhood dominated by an 
ambitious, irascible and doubtlessly very demanding father (last hope 
of an old family) and a loving, but completely subdued mother who 
might have wanted to protect him from his father's rage and 
punishment, but wasn't able to stand up to him.
It is obvious that this boy needs a family substitute and evidently 
he doesn't find it at Hogwarts. Barty is an only child and most 
likely grew up very protected, which doesn't help to develop social 
abilities. He is some kind of super- Hermione, even less inclined to 
break rules, because he is very conscious of the effect an owl from 
Dumbledore might have on his father, and of the consequences for 
himself. He isn't part of any group, his fellow students neither like 
nor dislike him. The teachers appreciate him for his good work, but 
they have authority and give marks and take points from the students, 
therefore neither they qualify as parent substitutes. Barty is 
essentially an "invisible child", the kind no one would miss if he 
suddenly disappeared.

Now how did he become a Death Eater? My instinctive guess would be 
that he didn't go to V. by himself to offer his services- I'd rather 
say somebody (a friend, a friend's father or a stranger)
got him in the right moment. Maybe after his father had been 
particularly horrible and unjust, making him wish to kill him or at 
least hurt him very badly. So he joined Voldemort- what a catch, the 
son of a high MoM official!- maybe passed on some useful bits of 
information he had overheard at home and thus climbed up his way 
through the DE hierarchy, not as high as Lucius Malfoy but high 
enough to be gratified. (It is never made clear what his position 
really was before Voldemort's defeat, anyway he was a Death Eater and 
therefore belonged to the elite.)
Something else I can only guess but believe very plausible: Barty sr. 
was without doubt an abusive father, punishing his son most severely 
for the slightest disobedience or error. Hence, I suppose that Barty 
Jr's potential of violence was very great and he found full 
satisfaction in killing and torturing for Voldemort. Add some 
promises of power („When we'll have caught your father, I'll leave 
him to you, Barty", "Have patience till we don't need to hide any 
more, then you will be duly rewarded"), some responsibility given to 
him for the first time in his life („I will entrust this operation to 
young Barty Crouch, he has proved himself worthy and has my full 
confidence") and he belonged to Voldemort hide and hair. This is my 
reason to believe that the first event to unhinge him was V.'s defeat-
 we could compare it to Harry's feelings (or Tom Riddle's, if it 
comes to that) about Hogwarts being closed because of the killings in 
CoS. Imagine his father strutting around, sure of  becoming the next 
MoM, everybody celebrating, while he himself had lost everything! 
Dire perspectives, to say the least. Therefore, he and the Lestranges 
grabbed a straw of hope and 
made a little visit to the Longbottoms- after this attempt to find 
his Master had failed, I don't think he opposed much resistance to 
the Aurors who captured him. So little, in fact, to make it credible 
(e.g. for Dumbledore) that he had just been at the wrong place in the 
wrong moment.
One year of clinical depression in Azkaban and probably also the 
death of his mother (it's no small burden for a 19 year- old to know 
his mother died for him in Azkaban, he knew how one felt in there) 
gave him the rest: IMO, he took refuge in his own world of phantasy, 
floating on the feeling of lightness that the Imperius Curse conveyed 
to him. The fact that he fired the Dark Mark into
the sky at the QWC ties in very well with this theory. He had made up 
his idea of himself as his master's only faithful servant (which was 
not entirely mistaken, but highly exaggerated) and used the first 
occasion to demonstrate it „to whom it may concern". 
Then "his Master comes to him" and I think it's Barty Sr.'s luck that 
they need him to keep up a façade for the MoM, otherwise I'd rather 
not imagine what his son might have done to him. 

Barty Jr.' s story is a paradigm of  absurdity as much as Cedric's 
death: An intelligent, talented boy, capable of love and devotion, he 
could have joined those who fought Voldemort, if only the 
circumstances had been slightly different. He would have been able to 
do the same for Dumbledore than he did for Voldemort. Calling him an 
evil character would be wrong, IMO, as he joined the Dark Side much 
too young and not because they were evil, but because they were not 
his father. That makes his confession one of the saddest scenes in 
GoF.

End of the rant
Comments welcome

Susanna