Wormtail's Name In the Confession (WAS: Spying Game...)

[ssk7882]

No: HPFGUIDX 40370

Snazzzybird wrote:

> In GoF when Barty Crouch Jr. is confessing under Veritaserum, he 
> says that Voldemort came to his house to free him from his father's 
> Imperius Curse – in the arms of his servant, Wormtail. I may not 
> have the wording exactly right; don't have the book in front of 
> me – but Crouch definitely refers to Pettigrew as "Wormtail". 

Welcome, Snazzzybird! (Is it really spelled with those three z's, or 
am I just faithfully adhering to a typo?)

Yes, Crouch does refer to Pettigrew as "Wormtail," not only that once
("He arrived at our house late one night in the arms of his servant 
Wormtail"), but throughout the entirety of his confession.  For that 
matter, Dumbledore also falls into line with Crouch's usage in his 
questioning: "And what became of Wormtail after you attacked Moody?"


Snazzzybird:

> That wasn't his "Death-Eater Name", it was his "Marauder Name". 

"Wormtail" might very well have been his "Death-Eater Name," 
actually.  We just don't know.  When Sirius talks about the 
imprisoned DEs crying out in their sleep over Pettigrew's role 
in their master's downfall, he never once specifies precisely *how* 
they refer to him.  If in fact those imprisoned DEs have only been 
moaning and gibbering about somebody named "Wormtail," then that 
would explain why none of the guards (are there human governors as 
well as dementors at Azkaban?) or visitors to the prison had ever 
once noticed this and come to suspect from it that perhaps Pettigrew 
might really be alive after all.  The only person hearing them with 
the proper background to know that "Wormtail" must have been Peter 
Pettigrew would have been Sirius himself -- and he was already hip to 
that little plot twist, now, wasn't he?

In fact, it has been suggested that perhaps Snape's reaction to the 
Marauder's Map might have been due to the fact that while he didn't 
actually know the schoolboy nick-names of Potters' crowd, he *did* 
recognize the name "Wormtail" as the handle of one of his erstwhile 
DE colleagues -- possibly even as the DE colleague he knew to be 
responsible for the Potters' deaths.  In other words, Snape might 
have thought that "Wormtail" was *Sirius.*  

I can never quite manage to believe that one, myself.  But it's 
certainly a neat theory.


> Why Wouldn't Crouch call him "Peter" or "Pettigrew"? Wouldn't he 
> know his real name? 

Quite likely not.  The DEs wear masks to their meetings, and 
Karkaroff claimed at his plea bargain that they were not always aware 
of each others' identities.  Voldemort never once addresses Pettigrew 
as anything other than "Wormtail" in the course of GoF.

So even if Crouch had known that there had once been a Death Eater 
named "Peter Pettigrew" (which he quite likely would have: 
Pettigrew's role as the Potters' betrayers seems to have been fairly 
common knowledge among the DEs, and even if Crouch hadn't known it 
before his imprisonment, he would have had ample opportunity to learn 
it from all of those prisoners moaning in their sleep), he still 
likely never met him in person.  He wouldn't know what he had looked 
like.  And I very much doubt that it would occur to him to identify 
Wormtail, his master's cringing servant, with Peter Pettigrew, the DE 
known for having betrayed Voldemort to his doom at Godric's Hollow.  


Snazzzybird:

> Well, possibly Voldemort always called him "Wormtail". But even if 
> so – *why*?

There are two ways of approaching this question: one of them focused 
on the internal logic of the fictive world, and the other on the 
manipulations of the authorial voice.

Looking at it from within the constraints of the fictional reality, I 
would say that Voldemort calls Pettigrew "Wormtail" because it is a 
degrading-sounding name *and* one that Voldemort knows full well was 
originally bestowed upon him as a mark of affection from the people 
that he later betrayed.  Voldemort is both a sadist and a corrupter.
He likes reminding people of that sort of thing.

In terms of authorial technique, though...

Snazzzybird suggested:

> I think the reason is exactly as stated by Davewitley. JKR doesn't 
> want Crouch to provide backup for Harry's story that Pettigrew is 
> alive – therefore Sirius is innocent.

But JKR herself would already knows that Crouch is never going to get 
that chance, wouldn't she?  

As the author, she is perfectly well aware that Crouch isn't going to 
have any opportunity to testify to the ministry, or even to blab to 
Cornelius Fudge, because she's already laid her plans in place for 
young Barty, hasn't she?  Ooooh, yes.  Ruthless Rowling isn't about 
to let the likes of little Barty Crouch mess up her plotline.  Loose 
Lips Sink Plotlines, and so she's already got Fudge's Dementor 
waiting in the wings to take care of *that* little problem.  Because 
you know, when it comes to that whole ends/means debate, there is 
absolutely *no one* quite as slanted toward the ends as a bestselling 
author protecting her plotline.  In comparison, even LeCarresque 
Spymaster!Dumbledore begins to turn a whiter shade of pale.  JKR may 
like to think that she belongs in Gryffindor, but the instant that 
she sits down to that keyboard, she is Slytherin to the core. 

So.  If the reason that nobody refers to Pettigrew by any name other 
than "Wormtail" in the confession scene is really the author's desire 
to keep Sirius' innocence a secret, then what we can deduce from that 
is that JKR is concerned with one (or both) of two characters: 
McGonagall and Winky.  Those are only two characters in the scene 
whose ignorance might require special authorial effort to maintain.  
Every other character present for the confessional either already 
knows that Pettigrew is guilty (Dumbledore, Harry), or will shortly 
be forced to accept Sirius' freedom, if not necessarily his innocence 
(Snape).  

If the real reason for the naming convention is to protect the
plot, then McGonagall and Winky are the characters whose ignorance of 
Sirius' innocence are relevant and important.  And indeed, it's 
certainly possible that JKR was working there to keep McGonagall 
and/or Winky in the dark.  I can think of a number of reasons why she 
might wish to do so.  Primarily, though, I think that the reason for 
Pettigrew's effective name change in Book Four is less one of plot 
than of *theme.*

It is not only the characters who refer to Pettigrew as "Wormtail" 
throughout GoF.  The narration does so as well.  On a very 
fundamental level, this character's name *changes* between the end of 
PoA and the beginning of GoF.  It changes not only in terms of how 
other characters address him, but also in terms of how the very 
narrative voice refers to him.  This, I believe, is at heart a matter 
of thematic emphasis.  Pettigrew/Wormtail's change in name reflects 
his fundamental degradation of identity.  

At the end of PoA, I believe that we are meant to understand that 
Pettigrew has in some sense voluntarily forfefited his own humanity.  
Of the three characters (Sirius, Remus and Peter) who revert to their 
animal forms on the way back from the Shrieking Shack at the end of 
PoA, Peter is the only one who does so *voluntarily.*  Remus is a 
victim of lycanthropy.  Sirius is trying to protect himself from the 
dementors; it is not even clear to what extent he has any conscious 
control over his reversion to dog form.  Peter, on the other hand, 
reverts to rat form only to facilitate his own escape from justice.  
He reverts out of pure self-interest, to save himself from 
prosecution and imprisonment, and he breaks his word in the bargain.

So I think that we can in some sense read Pettigrew's dehumanization 
in Book Four as not only self-inflicted, but also to a certain degree 
essential.  He has forfeited his humanity and with it his right to a 
human name; the text reflects this by showing us not only sadistic 
characters like Voldemort or injured parties like Harry (both of whom 
might have their own reasons for wanting to go out of their way to 
dehumanize him), but even the narration itself referring to him only 
as "Wormtail."  Post-PoA, that simply *is* this character's name.

If we are indeed, as has often been hypothesized, eventually going to 
see a worm(tail) turn, thus saving Harry's bacon at some point late 
in the series, then I'd lay odds that at the exact same point in the 
story, we will also see the narration grant him the dignity of 
restoring his human name.  Probably just before (or just after) he 
dies.


-- Elkins