Command of the Phoenix?

[m.bockermann at t-online.de]

No: HPFGUIDX 54956


<<<bboy wrote:
> Another thought that I had, but it goes against the theme of the
> titles representing challenges that Harry has to face, is related to
> "The Order of the British Empire" which is an award or honor given 
by
> the British government to citizens who have served the country in 
some
> outstanding way. 


<<<<And Finwitch added
Well, wizards have "Order of Merlin" for award, so Order of Phoenix 
might not be one, as such has not been mentioned yet - Harry and Ron 
gained "special award" for their actions against basilisk and Diary!
Tom Riddle - if it's official award, I don't see why Dumbledore Order 
of Phoenix isn't mentioned in Dumbledore's titles...


Me:
I don't think the the Order of the Phoenix is a reward, just as I doubt that it is something beneficial to Harry . Why? Largely, a matter of timing.

With GOF, we overstepped the middle of the story (if not in booklength, then counted in years). In a classical hero story - and HP counts as such in this regards - before things get better, they have to get desperate yet. In most stories, the main character (hero) will have to face the final struggle alone.

Examps: in the classical Star Wars movies (Episode 4,5,6), Empire strike back is the low point for the hero: one hero is frozen in carbonite, the other severly injured, the empire is very strong and all looks bleak. In the last movie, the hero must face the villain alone while his friends fight their own fights elsewhere.

What does that mean for Harry?

While things are bad after Voldemort's resurrections and Cedric's death, they are not yet desperate - at least for Harry and his closest friends. So things will get worse, before they get better. Books 5 and 6 are the number one candidates for the getting worse part while book 7 will have to work for the getting well part. That is in keeping with what we heard from JFK: the books will get darker and scarier, there will be more deaths. Unless JKR deviates from the classical architecture of a story things will become darker for our friends. And one of the ways to do that is to isolate the hero from outside help. Harry has to proof himself, not Dumbledore or .... . She has adhered to this classical pattern in the past, too. In PS, CoS and GoF - every time he meets Voldemort/Riddle - Harry is alone. In PS he later gets help from Dumbledore, in CoS the sword from Fawkes, yes. But he has to do the battle - either the literal or the battle of wills like in PS - alone.

How can matters get worse for Harry and his friends?

One possibility is a death of somebody who is close to Harry, not somebody that he hardly knows like Cedric. This idea has already been much discussed, and I don't want to add to the discussion. The death of a trustee often serves the function of leaving the hero alone, so he/she can proof him/herself as worthy of defeating the villain. 

To reach that goal (of letting the hero face his challenge alone), there are more possibilities and a story of this scope is likely to employ more than one. One is the enstrangement with his peers... but we already had that when Harry and Ron had their falling out.

Another possibility is the loss of status so noone, or maybe only the closes peers, will stand by the heros side. You might argue that we have seen that as well, when people avoided Harry because they suspected him to the heir of Slytherin. But while the disagreement in GOF only strengthened Harry's and Ron's friendship (by showing them how important it is to them), CoS left Harry with a stain. A small one, but one that can foster and grow. People *are* able to resent Harry, even though for most of his time in the WW, he is everybody's darling. The resentment comes up again, when seemingly everybody but Hermione believed that Harry cheated his way into the tournament. And at the end of GoF, Rita Skeeter clearly questions Harry's sanity. She can't blame him for disloyalty - for that his fate of losing his parents is still to strong in the mind of people and officially Voldemort has *not* returned. But by discrediting his sanity, she also denounces his ability to account his version of Cedric correctly. Those people - and those were a lot - who believed her lies about Hermione, will believe her as well.

So what is the point? I predict that in OotP, Harry will not be everybody's darling any longer and instead be met with strong resentment. That makes it not impossible, but highly unlikely, that Harry would be rewarded with an order, like one in the form of the "Order of the Phoenix". A reward would restore his status and that would be counterproductive to isolating him for the final confrontation that ever draws closer.

Similiarily, the help from a society named Order of the Phoenix would draw attention away from Harry and bereft him of his position in the story, that of the hero. We want to see Harry to succeed, not see him join a group of people who will do his battles for him. Unless that group can teach him something very special, they might be beneficial to him as a person, but it will *not* be beneficial to the overall story.

As for isolating Harry - the height of his isolation would be being alone in the WW without a friend to call his own. considering that we learned in CoS how Hagrid was thrown out of Hogwarts, I wonder, if Harry will be thrown out of school in book 5 or 6. Could *that* be the clue in CoS that we will understand only later? Considering that Snape has tried to get rid of him since year one, that would hardly be surprising and would have been foreshadowed so often, that we don't even notice it anymore. Now: a phoenix can rise again from the ashes. Can a wand with the tail feather of a *phoenix* be made whole again? Throwing Harry out of Hogwarts would also make a great cliffhanger for book 5.

Greetings,
Ethanol, the Voice of Doom - as usual