Lupin the brave, Lupin the mentor

[lupinesque]

No: HPFGUIDX 41872

Pippin wrote:

> If Lupin did think that Sirius might  be dangerous,
> was it really 
> brave to confront him alone? He could have summoned
> the 
> other teachers, or Dumbledore himself. 

This may qualify him as foolhardy, but it doesn't diminish his 
courage.  Do we say Harry is less brave for going into the Chamber 
alone instead of fetching a professor?

> Was Lupin
> also risking 
> Harry, Ron and Hermione's lives, just so he could
> keep on 
> covering up his past? 

Why do you think this is the reason he goes to the Shack?

He says he was watching the Map because he thought the trio might 
sneak down to Hagrid's hut.  He sees them do so.  Then he sees two 
new things, one stunning, the other terrifying:  Peter and Sirius are 
on the Map as well.  He doesn't know what to make of the former, and 
he doesn't stop to sort it out.  He just knows that Sirius, who as 
far as he knows is a deranged mass murderer intent on killing Harry, 
is racing towards the trio.  Lupin drops everything (including the 
Map and potion--oops.  At least he remembered his wand) and runs as 
fast as he can to the Willow and then the Shack.  You really think 
he's moving so fast so as to stop Sirius from telling the trio 
Lupin's secret?  What has that to do with anything?  He's trying to 
save their lives.

> Real bravery in the Potterverse means risking
> yourself  for 
> someone else's sake. Have we ever seen Lupin do
> that?

See above.

Sophineclaire wrote:

> Dumbledore has more of a connection/semi-positive
> mentorish 
> relationship with Harry then any of the other adults
> do.
> 
> Harry's relationship with Lupin really seemed really
> to be based on 
> Lupin acting as the friend of Harry's parents; Lupin
> just struck me 
> as being fairly distant with Harry.

*rubs hands together, causing unprepared listies to be badly bruised 
by overly energetic elbows*  Thanks, Sophineclaire, for providing 
this lovely soapbox!  Ooh, it's one of my favorites, too.  All-
Natural Wolfsbane Soap with Tea Tree Oil (not tested on animals!).  
It is my considered opinion that Lupin is indeed Harry's Mentor, one 
might even say Harry's Anti-De- Mentor or even, in the butterbeer-
sharing scene, Harry's Fur Mentor.

Where was I?  Oh right.  Let's see if I can do this without my 
books.  I'll give chapters when I can remember them. 

First, Lupin's take on the relationship.  I suspect there is a lot of 
friend-of-the-parents responsibility behind it at first, with a good 
dose of guilt for his imagined crimes of the past.  After all, if 
only he'd been more perceptive about Sirius, James might not have 
chosen him as Secret-Keeper and Harry would still have parents . . . 
such is the twisted logic of guilt.  As he says to Harry, he hadn't 
known Sirius as well as he'd thought; the subtext seems to me to 
be "and look what it cost me, and you."  Vis-a-vis the recent thread 
on Halloween, the first time Lupin initiates a private conversation 
with Harry is Halloween, and I never read it without wondering 
whether he, at least, is sharply aware that it is the 12th 
anniversary of James's and Lily's murder--whether his sympathy for 
Harry is about more than his being alone while his friends go to 
Hogsmeade.  Maybe Lupin even wants the company of someone who looks 
so much like his dead friend.

Then there's the guilt about his present silence; is he endangering 
Harry by keeping the old secret about their Animagical romps from 
Dumbledore?  He probably thinks that the least he can do for Harry is 
give him the extra help he asks for.

By the middle of the book I think there are factors at work that are 
much more related to Harry himself.  Lupin feels sorry for him 
because he has lost his broomstick, nearly been killed, and had a 
horrific experience at the hands (lungs?) of the Dementors; that's 
the conversation in which he agrees to teach him the Patronus Charm.  
By the end of several Patronus lessons, he's feeling enough affection 
toward Harry to bring the butterbeers; this may just be a reward for 
a hard-working student, which is all he says it is, but it's a very 
friendly gesture, and that image of them drinking butterbeer together 
is a very companionable one.  It seems to me that their relationship 
has moved beyond an obligatory friend-of-parents one, and clearly 
beyond his obligations as a teacher.

On to Harry's take.  Harry, like Lupin, is pretty reserved, and he 
has every reason to mistrust adults on principle.  He trusts Hagrid 
and Dumbledore, but even so, he has never said so aloud.  So when he 
says "I trusted you!" in the Shrieking Shack it is very meaningful.  
He really did--and it took a lot for him to get to that point, and 
even more (pure fury and disappointment) for him to say it.  And 
then, of course, he's so upset by the thought of Lupin leaving that 
he rushes and asks him to stay.  But then the whole year has been 
like that.  Harry has entrusted Lupin with very painful and intimate 
things such as the fact that he hears his mother's death (notice he 
tells no one else this, not even, for a few weeks, Ron and Hermione), 
the new things he hears when they start practicing, his fears that he 
won't be able to conjure a strong enough Patronus ("Gryffindor vs. 
Ravenclaw").  These aren't the kinds of things Harry shares readily, 
and the fact that he's open with Lupin speaks to the depth of this 
relationship.  Little wonder:  the bond between a student and his 
favorite teacher is strong as it is, but to this one is added 
extracurricular coaching, and not just any old coaching at that, but 
an intensely emotional ordeal.

I don't know who's going to die, but if we're going by the intensity 
of their relationship with Harry, Lupin has to be up there with 
Dumbledore (and Sirius and Hagrid).

Amy Z

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Ern jerked the wheel so hard that a whole
farmhouse had to jump aside to avoid the bus.
	-HP and the Prisoner of Azkaban
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