[HPforGrownups] Re: JKR, Harry Potter, and the Nature of Evil

[Amanda Lewanski]

No: HPFGUIDX 19709

What happened to your third strand? I was hoping it would be evil by
self-absorption, which would cover Lockhart and the Dursleys--those who
are not evil by nature, necessarily (by that I mean, not consciously
evil), but who do evil things.

Sorry, quick post on a complex topic. Great discussion, David!

--Amanda, whose best friend is married to a David Frank and so has
trouble shaking a mental association of him with you

dfrankis at dial.pipex.com wrote:

> "If you're choosing to write about evil, you really do have a moral
> obligation to show what that means." --J. K. Rowling
>
> Ebony asked:
> What *is* evil, and how is it expressed in the Harry Potter books?
> Conversely, where's the "good" in the series?
> Is it always diametrically opposed to "evil"... or do they sometimes
> exist in the same context, the same scene... even in the same person?
>
> I'm going to cheat a bit and only answer the question What is the
> meaning of evil in the Harry Potter books.  The open question, What
> is evil?, I will not attempt.
>
> I would say there are three main strands to evil in the books.
> The first strand is Voldemort's personal motivation and actions.  At
> first sight, he is almost a cartoon figure of evil.  A number of
> people have remarked that he has in effect lost his humanity, and
> this makes him especially evil.  I'm not sure I agree.  First I think
> that Jo Rowling has introduced the idea that he is not human, (`dunno
> if he had enough human left in him to be killed' – Hagrid, and `I am
> more than a man' – Voldemort himself) but she has done this in a very
> finely balanced way, using unreliable witnesses, and insisting on
> essentially human elements (bone, flesh, and blood) in the
> resurrection (or, rather, re-incorporation) spell.  Second, I think
> that to deny Voldemort's humanity may actually reduce the degree of
> his evil.  Isn't it the fact that Voldemort is actually a human that
> makes him so especially evil?  Which is worse, a sort of natural
> force that goes round destroying all good things, or someone who
> still has an inkling left of what they are doing, who still knows on
> the inside what the pain he is inflicting must be like?
>
> The roots of Voldemort's development have been fairly fully discussed
> on the group in terms of childhood abuse.  Note that one negative
> statement we can venture here is that there is apparently no inherent
> Star Wars style attraction to the `Dark Side' for its own sake, and
> so no Manichean view of evil.  The only other point I want to make
> here is that he was abandoned (through death) by his wizard mother
> and rejected by his Muggle father, so that his relationship to both
> sides of his ancestry is deeply fractured.
>
> The second strand is the devotion of the Death Eaters to Voldemort.
> I have not checked all the back-posts, but I don't believe this has
> been very heavily discussed.  Barty Crouch Jr. is a curious mixture
> of vindictiveness and selfless devotion.  He clearly loves Voldemort
> and has enormous faith in him.  In another cause, his singleminded
> pursuit of his goal and willingness to sacrifice for the sake of
> another would be regarded as exemplary.  It is clear that Voldemort's
> hold on him is not one of fear alone.  Of course, he is an unusual
> case among the Death Eaters, but it is still worth asking what it was
> that Tom Riddle was able to offer his followers in the first place.
> We don't yet really know, but two possibilities spring to mind:
> immortality, and a new relationship to Muggles (and mudbloods).
>
> The offer of immortality implicit in the name Death Eater, together
> with Voldemort's apparent resurrection (but he was never really
> dead), his unique claims for himself, his absolute demands for
> devotion, his promises to honour his faithful followers, and the
> acceptance of all these by the Death Eaters gives a strongly
> religious atmosphere to the Death Eaters chapter of GOF.  I believe
> that they are susceptible to all this because they are uncertain of
> who they are, and this brings me to my third strand: wizarding
> identity in relation to Muggles.
>
> It is apparent that the wizarding community is very insecure, and
> subject to many prejudices and fears. Wizards have an apparently
> unreasoning fear of, for example, giants and Parselmouths.  I believe
> their view of house-elves is coloured by fear too.  But their deepest
> fear is of their own powers and how they play out in relation to the
> Muggle world.  When some particularly powerful feat such as opening
> the Chamber of Secrets is envisaged, it is assumed that this requires
> dark magic.  At one point the Hogwarts pupils infer that Harry's
> ability as a baby to defeat Voldemort must mean that he is a powerful
> dark wizard – nothing good could be that strong.  This is a very
> negative outlook indeed.  Likewise, only the horrible Dementors are
> regarded as having the capability to keep Voldemort's remaining
> supporters in check.
>
> The root of this fear is the fragility of wizarding identity.  They
> believe, not without reason, that if they declare themselves to the
> Muggles, they will be rejected and persecuted.  To justify their
> separation from the rest of humanity they try to give themselves a
> separate identity as `purebloods' – Fudge's `wizarding pride'.  The
> existence of wizards with Muggle parents however negates this, unless
> they too can be characterised as `mudbloods' and excluded from the
> community (represented in the books by Hogwarts).  They then
> underscore their special identity by demonising the giants,
> rationalising house-elf enslavement, and putting Merpeople and
> centaurs at a distance.  Although most ordinary wizards can be
> assumed, for example, not to go along with the extreme views that
> Muggles should be reclassified as Beasts, they still take comfort in
> the easy assumptions of a Rita Skeeter.
>
> But none of this works.  At bottom they know they *are* human.  But
> the cutting out of a separate `wizarding' identity that tries to deny
> this causes them to fear their own magicality, and to characterise
> unusual powers such as Parseltongue as dark.
>
> I believe that it is this uncertainty of identity that fuels wizard
> prejudice, the devotion of the Death Eaters to Voldemort, and
> ultimately the quest of Voldemort himself to be no longer human.
>
> I would suggest, therefore, that the essence of evil in Harry Potter
> is to refuse to admit to being human, in the case of wizards, to
> being a Muggle who happens to have some interesting and useful gifts.
>
> I'd better stop here, but I'll just point out that the counterpoint
> to all this is Harry's self-discovery, in which his identity starts
> out from his humanity, but embraces his wizarding powers and his
> (extended) family.  Goodness is therefore integrity.
>
> The post is long but big questions require big answers.
>
> David
>
>
>
>                    Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
  [www.debticated.com]

>
> _______ADMIN________ADMIN_______ADMIN__________
>
> All OT (Off-Topic) messages must be posted to the HPFGU-OTChatter
> YahooGroup, to make it easier for everyone to sort through the
> messages they want to read and those they don't.
>
> Therefore...if you want to be able to post and read OT messages, point
> your cyberbroomstick at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter
> to join now! For more details, contact the Moderator Team at
> hpforgrownups-owner at yahoogroups.com.
>
> (To unsubscribe, send a blank email to
> hpforgrownups-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com)
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]