[HPforGrownups] Draco, perspective, Why Ask Why?

[Pen Robinson]

No: HPFGUIDX 38849

heidi (replying to me) wrote:
>Has there been such talk? I hadn't noticed. I've been talking about
>Draco being something other than evil, possibly becoming a three
>dimensional character in canon, and the reasons why I don't think a
>relationship between him and Hermione in canon would necessarily be
>impossible but none of those things make him into a romantic hero.

Hmm.  Obviously I was misled by the comparison of Draco to Fitzwilliam Darcy.

>Pen also wrote:
>>  what are these fertile signs
>> that Draco Malfoy is
>> going to be a reformed character Real Soon Now? 

>I also haven't seen anyone who argues that Draco might end up
>something other than evil say it'll happen Real Soon Now - I certainly
>don't expect it to be obvious before Book 7, and perhaps towards the
>end of that (although I expect him to move toward something other than
>evil during book 6, if not book 5, but I don't think the reader will
>learn about it until Book 7). 

All right, let's leave that Real Soon Now in the irony box where it belongs.

However, I think if Draco is to be redeemed/redeemable, he certainly ought
to start to show signs of the possibility in book six at the very latest,
otherwise it is going to be very hard to believe.  I don't mean that he has
to do Good Things vis a vis Harry, necessarily, but we need to perceive him
behaving in a manner that can be understood as something other than mean,
spiteful and cowardly.   [NB: Snape was introduced as perfectly horrid in
PS, but by the end of that book we had learnt that he was not completely
vile, because he had undoubtedly saved Harry's life.  Thus the subsequent
discovery that Snape is actually working for Dumbledore's cause is
believable, even though Snape is still unpleasant.]

>Absolutely true, and I think that's because Snape is *now* on the side
>of good. But clearly he wasn't always - Dumbledore even says that
>Snape *was* a Death Eater but by the time Voldemort fell, he was a
>spy. In other words, he had chosen to become a Death Eater, but made a
>subsequent choice to spy - not that he had joined the Death Eaters
>*as* a spy. To state it another way, he was once on the side of Not
>Good, and changed his mind.

My point is that we have been *shown* Snape's complexities, his good side
as well as his bad.  If the stories were about James Potter instead of
Harry, we would (presumably) have seen Snape as a bad guy who redeemed
himself at some point towards the end of the story - but if there were no
hints early on that he had the potential to be redeemed, it would be
unsatisfactory.

At this point in Harry Potter's story, we haven't had hints of Draco Malfoy
behaving in a way that would hint at his redeemability.  Perhaps they will
come - perhaps at some point Draco will reveal that he had sound,
understandable reasons for, say, not turning up for his duel with Harry,
for trying to get rid of Hagrid, and for calling Hermione a 'mudblood'.  At
such a point, we can re-read his previous actions and reinterpret them,
just as the revelations about Moody/Crouch make it possible to understand
his behaviour in a new light.

However, as things stand, there doesn't seem to me to be any way to
understand Malfoy except as a nasty, mean-spirited boy, who shows promise
of turning into a nasty, mean-spirited man.  (What do we think Vernon
Dursley was like as a schoolboy?)

>And I can point again to Draco's warning the Trio to get out of the
>area during the World Cup. That action can certainly show good intent.
>How could it show malicious intent? It's possible that it shows
>cowardace (if he was unwilling to take on Ron and Harry at the same
>time to call the Death Eaters' attention to Hermione) but that doesn't
>mean it also showed malice.

Umm...  I suppose it could show good intent.  I read it as a sneer.  [Pause
while I attempt to look up the scene.  Can't find the book, drat.]  But if
a 'Reinterpretation Of Draco's Actions' is coming, that could be a
candidate.  Is it the only one?

>I think it's important, now, to go back to the first of my recent
>posts on this matter:
><<And if he follows in the footsteps of Fitzwilliam Darcy, he'll be a
>better match for Hermione, as Elizabeth Bennett, than anyone else
>could be. Yes, I admit it's a big if... but they've both got a bit of
>growing up to do, and it could happen. >>

A better match than anyone else?  How about Ron or Harry, who have been
flawed but consistently on the side of Good, and are thus far more
convincingly like Darcy than a reformed Draco could possibly be?

<much snipped as I have no useful comments>

Pen