Dumbledore Dilemmas

[jodel at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 54786

"greatlit2003" gives us quite a list of these, but i'm not going to try to 
address them all here. What set me off in particular was one of Serena's 
responses;

>>(greatlit)
7. Why did Dumbledore let Harry face Voldie at the end of Book 1? Harry later 
told Ron and Hermione that he felt that Dumbledore knew everything that was 
going on, and he thought Harry had the right to face Voldie. Isn't it a bit 
risky to allow an 11 year old to face a powerful Dark Wizard?

(Serena)
Which begs another question--why bring the sorcerors stone to Hogwarts in the 
first place?  How did he know that someone (Voldemort) was after it?  Was he 
setting up Harry and Voldemort for their big meeting from the get go?  It 
does certainly seem that way.  Was Dumbldore testing Harry or he's getting 
him ready for everything that happens in the next six books.<<

Now, this is a drum that I've been thumping for the past year or two. I think 
that the adventure of the Philosophers' Stone got out of hand and went a good 
deal farther than Dumbledore ever intended. And what was going on was a good 
deal deeper than Harry and his friends ever figured out (they were only 11-12 
after all). The following is my own interpretation of what was going on that 
year, and Harry's intended part in it was very minor. This was the first time 
Dumbledore had ever really dealt with Harry, and he did not know what to 
expect. 

He got more than he bargained for, Harry has a way of exceeding expectations.

Frankly, since I have been thumping this drum as long as I have, I am not 
sure that most of this hasn't been already posted on this list. But here is a 
revised version.

The Quirrell Debacle

It is clear to the reader of PS/SS that Dumbledore and the staff of Hogwarts 
was on alert throughout the school year for an attempt upon the Stone. Why 
else would there have been a labyrinth of challenges set up to protect it? 
There was obviously more going on than Harry and his friends knew, or than 
they eventually managed to figure out. We probably still do not know all of 
what was going on behind the scenes during Harry's first year. But we can 
make a guess.

The one thing that we do know is that the situation was set in motion by the 
folly of young Professor Quirrell.
 
One of the many things that we do not know about Quirrell is just *how* young 
Professor Quirrell was, or how long he actually was a teacher at Hogwarts 
Academy. Nor do we know how long Quirrell had been the stammering wreck that 
we met when Harry did. Once again much of our confusion is based upon 
statements from Rubeus Hagrid. Hagrid tells us that Quirrell was all right 
while he was *studying out of books*, but then he went off for a year to get 
practical experience, and came back frightened of his subject, frightened of 
his students and all the rest. In contrast, at the end of Goblet of Fire, 
Voldemort paints Quirrell as young, foolish and over-confident. Easily taken 
over. Our only other source of information is Percy Weasley who clearly 
already knows Quirrell from prior to Harry and Ron's first year. Percy is 
also the source of the "Snape wants the DADA job" rumor.

In this case, upon the whole I am more inclined to believe Voldemort's 
version. A wizard whose nerve is already shot is unlikely to have been 
exploring dangerously haunted forests in Albania. Nevertheless, while 
Hagrid's reading of the situation seems likely to be highly inaccurate when 
applied to any detail, it sounds basically true at its heart. Quirrell *was* 
all right when he was still studying out of books. But I think the jumpiness 
he is showing is a very recent development and Hagrid's statement is more in 
the nature of a prediction than an observation of Quirrell's actual behavior 
on the job since he returned from his travels. He has not yet been put to the 
test in the classroom.

The loss of young Professor Quirrell is one of the series's lesser tragedies. 
I suspect that Quirrell was even younger than we've believed so far and that 
Percy (already a 5th year) remembers Quirrell from when Quirrell was still a 
student, himself. From all that we have definitely been told about Quirrell, 
he sounds just the sort of academic high achiever that Percy might have 
admired. And if my theory of there being an informal study group which has 
been holding down a couple of tables in the library for centuries is on 
target, Percy may even have known Quirrell personally from that context. 
Indeed, given that the young man seems to have gone into teaching very soon 
after finishing school himself, the younger members of that study group may 
have known him very well. For he must have had some reason to chose teaching 
as a career, and experience in helping younger students would have made a 
good start.(Side note: Snape does not want the DADA job. He just enjoys 
sneering at whoever happens to have it.)

One suggestion;
Quirrell's DADA position may have been arranged quite a while in advance. 
Anything up to a year or two's worth in advance, or even more. Suppose for a 
minute that the DADA teacher before Quirrell had already announced his 
intention to retire in a year or two. (We've heard nothing about the position 
being jinxed at any point before Harry and Co. showed up.) Top DADA student 
Quirrell was one of the people aware of this. In fact, the old teacher 
regarded young Quirrell as a protege, may have even been grooming him as his 
own replacement. The consensus is that Quirrell might make a fine DADA 
teacher, but that he needs practical experience in the field. 

Or, conversely;
Quirrell finishes Hogwarts, does a year or two of scholarly research on the 
subject, keeps in contact with his old professor who tells him that he 
intends to retire in a year or so. He suggests applying for the position, 
says that he will put in a word for him and recommends taking a year to get 
some practical experience first. 

In either case, Quirrell goes off and performs quite well in the field. So 
well, in fact, that he is distinctly over-confident when he gets to Albania 
and decides to investigate the tales of a forested area where, over the past 
decade, there have been reports of animals, particularly snakes, which 
exhibit ominously unnatural behavior.

I see Quirrell as Percy Weasley's "shadow twin", much in the way that Harry 
and his friends echo the Marauders. Very bright, very upright, very consious 
of his good intentions, very, very good at going by the book and following 
all the rules of how things are "supposed" to work -- and completely out of 
his depth if he comes up against something that doesn't bloody *care* about 
rules. (Perhaps one of the most valuable lessons that Harry and Ron have 
passed on to Hermione is the understanding that sometimes you have to break 
rules.)

What Quirrell did not necessarily know was that Dumbledore has been having 
someone he trusts monitor the area to take note of and report any wizards who 
enter that part of the forest. This watch has been going on for years, and 
when Quirrell went into the forest and came out twitching, Dumbledore was 
informed at once. There was never any mystery on Dumbledore's part as to who 
was serving as Voldemort's agent at Hogwarts. 

The real question regarding the adventure of the Philosophers' Stone is why 
it ever was set up the *way* it was. That the whole charade was set up as a 
trap, is obvious to every reader. But since we see everything from Harry's 
point of view it is not so glaringly obvious that in the normal way of 
things, there was no reason whatsoever for the Philosophers' Stone to have 
been at Hogwarts at all. What, exactly, was being attempted here? 

Dumbledore (and most of the rest of his staff) already knew that Quirrell had 
been gotten at and overpowered by Voldemort. Dumbledore and his closest 
colleagues knew that if Voldemort had actually physically possessed Quirrell, 
rather than simply overcomming and haunting him psychicly, then he was 
engaged in a race against time before the body he was possessing failed. It 
is probably pretty widely known that Voldemort seeks immortality. 
Consequently, waving the Philosophers' Stone under his nose like bait would 
be irresistibly attractive. Getting Quirrell to assist in setting up the 
series of challenges guarding the Stone might give him a false sense of 
security and keep him concentrated on getting at the Stone rather than, say, 
regrouping his followers, or directing too much of his attention to his 
unfinished business with the Potter boy.

And, if they could manage to trap him quickly enough, they might be able to 
effect a rescue of their young colleague. That's something I don't see anyone 
bringing up. The labyrinth of tests was a *rescue attempt*. One that failed. 
Their hopes faded as the school year progressed, and with the death of the 
first unicorn, Dumbledore knew that Voldemort had effectively killed his 
hostage and it was too late. 

Indeed, Dumbledore was waiting for an attempt on the Stone any time after 
Hagrid showed up with that dragon's egg. (Which I am pretty sure that he knew 
about. And if the children hadn't managed to talk Hagrid into sending Norbert 
away, he would sonn have intervened himself.)Voldemort, however, may not be 
sane, but he is not stupid. He knows a trap when he sees one. And, so long as 
he had Quirrell as a hostage, he was confident that he would not be harmed. 
What he did not know was just how far Dumbledore had taken the rest of his 
staff into his confidence. I believe that those members of the staff who had 
also contributed to the protections on the Stone knew the whole of it and 
played dumb in order not to give the game away. (With the exception of Hagrid 
who had only been told that the Stone was being protected from Voldemort and 
honestly knew nothing further.) As the school year progressed, the waiting 
game between the Dumbledore and Voldemort must have been nerve-wracking for 
everyone concerned. Finally Dumbledore was forced to conspicuously leave the 
school in order to tempt Voldemort into making his attempt before the term 
ended, and the School was vacated (which I think is what he had in mind). I 
strongly suspect that either the Ministry owl that "lured" Dumbledore away 
was by pre-arrangement, or, possibly, a fabrication altogether.

Quirrell's alleged run-ins with the vampires and the hag are a cover story, 
which Quirrell was ordered to spread in order to deflect suspicion. And 
Voldemort didn't let Quirrell get anywhere near his old instructor, who would 
probably have tried to do something about the problem.

The certain knowledge that Voldemort was present adds some additional shading 
to those careful ambiguities regarding Snape's words and actions over the 
year. He knew that he was dealing with his old Master, and he was very 
careful to say or do nothing that would unequivocally mark him as being on 
anyone's "side" apart from his own. How successful he was at this is yet 
undetermined, but it is a hopeful note that if it was Snape that Voldemort 
was referring to as the follower who "I think has left me forever" Voldemort 
was even then not able to say it with absolute certainty.

Snape and Dumbledore also clearly had something planned in case there was a 
repeat of the broom hexing incident in the Gryffindor/Hufflepuff match which 
Snape refereed. When Potter "got in the way" and the match ended prematurely 
Snape's disgust was made comically obvious. 

I also believe that Snape took a much more grudging part in yet another of 
Albus's little performances on Harry's behalf. (A clear piece of favoritism, 
one of perhaps several that Harry does not know of, and which go at least a 
small way towards Snape's continuing resentment of the boy.) This particular 
incident was in that odd little scene on the evening of Christmas day wherein 
Snape and Filch effectively herded Harry (in James's invisibility cloak) into 
the room where the Mirror of Erised was set up. Because it is obvious that if 
the Mirror was Dumbledore's final "test" to get to the hidden Stone, then its 
"place" was in the heart of the labyrinth, and *not* in an unused room down 
the hall from the library. So, what was it doing there?

I am convinced that Dumbledore deliberately had the Mirror moved to that room 
(without Quirrell's knowledge) during the Christmas break for a reason. And 
my guess as to this reason was that Dumbledore knew that if Voldemort did not 
manage somehow to capture the Stone, in spite of all their efforts, at the 
end of the adventure, they would need to retrieve it from the Mirror. And, 
given that he now regarded that Stone as a danger to everybody for as long as 
continued to exist, he suspected that he would not be able to retrieve it 
himself. (He would only be able to see himself destroying it.) 

Consequently, a student, whose responsibilities extended no farther that to 
make a good performance in his studies, might more readily be motivated to 
form a desire to simply "find" the Stone rather than to wish to "use" it. 
Almost any student would do. But Albus chose Harry to be that student, 
partially to see what the boy was made of. To this end, Dumbledore gave Harry 
his father's cloak and set Snape and Filch (and Mrs. Norris, who could track 
his location by scent) to keep a watch on the library in expectation of a 
nightime raid on the Restricted Section before the end of the Christmas 
holidays. (Hagrid had no doubt apologized to him earlier for having let the 
Nicholas Flammel cat out of the bag.) I am inclined to think that Filch was 
not filled in on why such a raid was expected to be imminent, but Snape 
certainly knew. (You will also notice in PoA that Snape shows absolutely *no* 
surprise at Malfoy's report of Potter's disembodied head floating around the 
Shrieking Shack. Snape is perfectly well aware of that cloak.)

Harry did not disappoint his expectations, and once Dumbledore had given the 
boy a chance to get a good look at what the Mirror would do, he came forward 
and gave him the necessary coaching to enable him to understand how the 
Mirror worked. After which he had the Mirror moved back into the labyrinth 
before anyone realized that it was missing.

Retrieving the Stone from the Mirror after the shouting was over was the 
extent of Dumbledore's plans for Harry in regards to the adventure of the 
Philosophers' Stone. He never intended for Harry and his friends to risk 
themselves by following Quirrell into the labyrinth. Hagrid's gift of the 
wooden flute was not in his plans, and I doubt that he knew about it. 

Indeed, if Harry and his friends had managed to restrain themselves. 
Dumbledore's plan would still have gone through as intended. Voldemort and 
his victim would have been stuck before the Mirror, ready to be captured 
red-handed, unless they had the presence of mind to abandon the scene without 
the Stone. Which Dumbledore cannily realized was unlikely.

-JOdel, who intends to post this and a number of other personal theories and 
interpretations on a personal site some time before the release of OotP.