101 Easier Ways to Deliver Harry to the Dark Lord (was New member)

[Amy]

No: HPFGUIDX 9978

Susan wrote:
> 
> > Evil is always melodramatic.

Rita wrote:

> Voldemort is always melodramatic. That's because theatrics and 
> self-glorification are his top priorities, higher even than power, 
> and much much higher than making sensible plans to achieve useful 
> goals.
> 

Your posts put me in mind of the Hitler parallel again and I realized 
that it isn't only in fiction that an evil leader is brought down in 
this way.  Hitler's war effort (so say some historians) was less than 
100% because of his monomania about Jews.  Had he put all his 
resources into winning the war, rather than deflecting so many into 
the huge machinery of genocide, he could have achieved world 
domination and then gone on to wipe out the last of the Jews 
unimpeded.  He was brought down in part by his own obsession.

So I think you're right.  It wasn't just the necessities of dramatic 
fiction that made Voldemort theatrical to the point of undermining his 
larger goal.  Real people really do that kind of thing.

Amy Z