Neville and the boggart

[porphyria at mindspring.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 36236

Elkins said:

"I'll even let you in on a little secret here.  I thought that Lupin's oh-so-blatant "let's bolster Neville's confidence" was kind of condescending too, to tell you the truth."  

David answered:

"Surely it had to be blatant, because Snape was blatant.  Lupin's remarks, while serving the function of bolstering Neville's confidence, were primarily a rebuke to Snape, which therefore had to be administered before the same people who were witnesses to Snape's remarks." 

Elkins replied:

"I agree with you both that it served as an excellent rebuke to Snape, and that this was its primary intent. 

<snip Harry's estimation that Lupin was tactful>

"But it does strain my suspension of disbelief somewhat to think that Neville does *not* notice the pity and the condescension, or that these things do not, on some level, bother him."

OK, this is me, Porphyria:

Personally I don't see Lupin's handling of the boggart incident to contain even the tiniest bit of pity or condescension towards Neville. David is right in that Lupin had to take a stand after Snape's remark, otherwise he'd be sort of tacitly agreeing with it.

But I don't see Lupin as primarily rebuking Snape per se -- OK he *is*, but I don't think you can separate the act of responding to Snape's remark and the act of taking some sort of position regarding Neville. Lupin can either coddle Neville by not forcing him to confront the Boggart if he doesn't want to, and thus implicitly agree with Snape, or he can assume that Neville is competent enough to fire off a good Riddikulus charm. He does the latter, and more.

Neville is terrified of the boggart. He gives Lupin a look of "pure terror" as soon as the being is mentioned by name and Lupin ignores Neville's "small sputter of terror" several seconds later. The Lupin *royally* puts Neville on the spot by forcing him to confront the boggart first. Now I'm guessing here, but my conjecture is that going first in a class demonstration is the *second* most terrifying thing in the world for Neville. If not, I bet it's still near the top. Neville quivers and shakes and looks about wildly for help all throughout Lupin's coaching. 

But when the boggart finally comes out of the closet Neville pulls it off on the first try. He squeaks out a perfectly adequate Riddikulus charm and thus proves that he is up to the task, in spite of his own fears and Snape's low estimation of him. 

Lupin forces Neville to act braver than he feels. He assumes that Neville is competent and obliges him to act up to that high estimation. He's almost cruel to him in that he unhesitatingly makes the kid sweat, but despite his hardly surpressed smile, he seems to know that Neville will rise to the occasion. To me this is the opposite of condescension; condescension and pity involve *assuming* that a person isn't capable of much; that they are inferior to you. This is what Snape does, not Lupin. 

Maybe it depends on how you see things personally, but I think this is a brilliant way to handle Neville at this point. The kid *really* is afraid and Lupin teaches him a way to confront his fears -- both through the technique of imagining a specific fear, in this case, in drag, but also by forcing him to realize that he's capable of taking an active stand against his fear of failure and humiliation in general; now Neville knows he can cast a useful charm in front of a whole class and make it look easy. 

~~Porphyria, who thinks teaching is very hard and wishes she had Lupin's knack