[HPforGrownups] Children's Literature -- Draco Thoughts

[tillrules at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 25207

In a message dated 8/30/2001 3:00:40 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
pennylin at swbell.net writes:

<< DRACO -- Tillrules asserts that all the characters know how important 
 Hagrid's job is to him (sorry, I upgraded my browser, and Netscape is no 
 longer allowing me to cut & paste into emails -- gotta figure that out). 
 Anyway ... I would say that this is a stretch.  To say that all 
 characters must know of the importance of the job to him is to impute a 
 certain degree of perception, knowledge & sensitivity to all the 
 characters that they can't possibly all possess.  Draco likely has no 
 idea how important Hagrid's job is to him on a personal level, because 
 Draco hasn't in all likelihood paid any attention to Hagrid or given any 
 thought to how Hagrid might feel about anything.  Make sense?
 
In theory, it does, but again you have to consider Hagrid's unique history 
and Draco's knowledge of it, through his father.  I think it pretty likely 
that Draco at very least knows the surface reasons for Hagrid's dismissal 
from Hogwarts (if not Riddle's involvement and real identity) and Hagrid's 
devotion to Dumbledore for allowing him to stay on at Hogwarts is so obvious 
and so often portrayed, he'd have to know that as well, it would seem.   In 
fact, I'm sure that Draco knows that Hagrid supports Dumbledore and the 
reasons why he does (I htink he mentionsi ti in some fashioon, I could be 
wrong).

All of this seems to lead tot he fact that Draco knows how much the job means 
to Hagrid and takes his actions beyond simple prank to maliciousness.  Also, 
that he continues the ruse when the effects on Hagrid are evident (again I 
think its commented on), htis certainly shows malice on his part.

 You must consider perception & POV also.  So far, our perception of 
 Draco is entirely colored by Harry's POV.

This is a very good point.  Of course perception of the antagonist is colored 
by the protagonist.  If this were Draco's point of view, maybe Harry woudl be 
a publicity seeking opportunist.   But even if viewed objectively, there is 
no motivation for calling someone by a racial eptithet or to try to cost 
someone their job by way of a ruse.

 I'm following the Draco discussions with great interest.  Some of you 
 are so cynical!  My goodness -- no hope for redemption for anyone who 
 has been guilty of voicing racist sentiments?  I guess I hold a more 
 optimistic view of society at large than that. >>

I'm actually not at all cynical.  I'm hoping for a happy ending here, with 
eveyrone happy and properly shipped and singing Kumbaya.  But I do view 
Draco's acitons as being unredeemable.  

Again, there is far more to his actions than a bit of name calling.  He's 
basically condoned and accepting deaths (Cedric's) as a due right to the 
return of Voldemort.  If he were redeemable, the death of an innocent may be 
enough to start that process of growth, but instead, he exults in the return 
of Voldemort.