Voldy's "Great" Accomplishments (Was: Re: James' House and Voldy's Great Doings)

[josieraven2002]

No: HPFGUIDX 41732

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "fyredriftwood" <fyredriftwood at y...> wrote:
> When Olivander goes into detail about all the "great" things Voldy 
> has done, i think he's looking at the perspective at what he did, 
not 
> who he did it to. (sorta hard to explain, sorry--it sounds good in 
my 
> head though).
> 
> Think about it: Voldy was able to come up with ways to defy death, 
he 
> influenced people to share his beliefs, he had wizards performing 
> spells that were at one time almost impossible. THe amount of 
> distruction he created was probably a lot (too hard to describe). 
So 
> yes, this was a great accomplishment, just not "great" as in 
> stupendious or excellent. 
> 
> --Fyre WOod

I agree with the idea that what Voldemort did in his time was 
not "great" in the sense of being good, but great in the sense of 
accomplishing a lot.  As Ollivander stated, "...He-Who-Must-Not-Be-
Named did great things--terrible, yes, but great." (SS, ch. 5)  I 
think it goes further than that though.  I think this interpretation 
of great means much more than just his knack for causing destruction 
and chaos, which indeed are terrible and great. It is giving the 
reader information about Voldemort, but saying a lot about Harry as 
well. 

Ollivander in this comment is comparing Harry to Voldy, although he 
does not know a lot about Harry's abilities (as far as we know).  He 
is comparing Voldy, a person who creates fear and paranoia by the 
simple mention of his name, to the very person in which the wizarding 
world looks as Voldy's downfall.  How can Ollivander compare the two 
who are seemingly so different at this point in the story?  (This is 
under the assumption that Ollivander does not know the similarities 
of the two that appear in CoS.)  It seems to me that he is assuming 
Harry will be similar to Voldemort, not because he will do dark 
magic, but because Ollivander believes Harry will be *powerful* like 
Voldy.  Voldy was not simply great because of all that he caused but 
also because he had such immense power to do it. This not only 
demonstrates Harry's ties to Voldemort in subsequent books, it may 
also show how powerful Harry himself will become. (sorry for the 
lengthy paragraph.)

This part in the story could just be foreshadowing future events such 
as the ending of GoF, but IMHO it seems very important to all the 
books.

- Josie 
(Very new to the group and trying not to sound like an idiot. I 
apologize if this has already been commented on.)