[HPforGrownups] Love as a spell component

[Amy Z]

No: HPFGUIDX 39318

Amanda wrote:

>I
>mentioned to Jan that the (accurate) distinction had been made that Lily's
>love was not, after all, identified as what kept off Voldemort, but as what
>kept off *Quirrell.*

I always love it when Amanda's beloved weighs in.  Here he is making sense 
of threads he's read only secondhand, *plus* he's helping resolve a problem 
that's been niggling at me for two years (and will likely do so until the 
series is finished, and possibly beyond).

His theory does indeed reduce the aggravation from the "didn't *anyone* else 
dive in front of a bullet, uh, an AK, during Voldemort's reign of terror?" 
factor.  I will quibble on Quirrell, however.  The passage in which 
Dumbledore explains the love dynamic, as much as that cryptic so-and-so ever 
explains anything, certainly leaves open the possibility that it is 
Voldemort's presence within Quirrell that makes the latter unable to touch 
Harry (emphases added):

  "But why couldn't Quirrell touch me?"
  "Your mother died to save you.  If there is one thing *Voldemort* cannot 
understand, it is love.  He didn't realize that love as powerfl as your 
mother's for you leaves its own mark.  Not a scar, no visible sign . . . to 
have been loved so deeply, even thoughthe person who loved us is gone, will 
give us some protection forever.  It is in your very skin.  Quirrell, full 
of hatred, greed and ambition, *sharing his soul with Voldemort*, could not 
touch you for this reason.  It was agony to touch a person marked by 
something so good."

Furthermore, Quirrell is already full of hatred, greed and ambition and has 
become Voldemort's servant at the Leaky Cauldron, but he can touch Harry 
then.  It is only later, when he is merged with Voldemort, that he's burned 
by Harry's skin.

Voldemort gives pretty much the same assessment, minus Dumbledore's 
sentimental claptrap <g>, in GF 22:  "His mother died in the attempt to save 
him -- and unwittingly provided him with a protection I admit I had not 
foreseen . . . I could not touch the boy."

As for whether Lily's sacrificial love kept off the curse back in 1981 . . . 
well, Harry thinks that's the explanation.  It's what he gives to Riddle in 
CS 17 (emphasis JKR's):  "No one knows why you lost your powers when you 
attacked me," Harry said abruptly.  "I don't know myself.  But I know why 
you couldn't *kill* me.  Because my mother died to save me."  Voldemort also 
says in GF 33 that his "curse was deflected by the woman's foolish 
sacrifice."

Why deflected instead of just stopped?  Who knows.  That part doesn't seem 
to be terribly unusual; we know that other curses, physical objects, etc. 
can act to deflect (not just block) curses, so it stands to reason that some 
kinds of shield charms have the same effect.

Amy Z

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