[HPforGrownups] Re: Remus and Tonks

[Kathryn Cawte]

No: HPFGUIDX 70241

 
 
<Atropos G.> Random, this theory is quite old, and not my original 
work. Credit goes to the Ultimate Unofficial Guide to the Mysteries 
of Harry Potter book. The theory: Probably because they had doubts 
about Black (the supposed Secret Keeper for the Fidelius Charm) there 
are speculations that the back up precaution was for James and Remus 
to switch identiites using a Switching Spell. This was probably done 
in secret by Lily and kept secret from even Dumbledore. Voldemort 
attacked and Lupin (looking like James) was killed. James was now 
stuck inside Remus' body. So, as Lupin, James is safe (for the 
moment) from Voldemort who thinks he's dead.
 

Me -

I was going to go through the points that you included but a couple of other
people have already done so in reasonable detail and I'd mainly have been
saying me too so I'm going to attack the whole basic premise of the theory
instead. You (and by you I mean proponents of this theory in general not
just the person who brought this up again) say that this was a back up
precaution but from OoP we know that Voldemort wasn't after James per se,
except in the fact that he was in the way, but Harry. Harry was the child
that he needed to kill, if James had been somewhere else when he attacked
the house I seriously doubt he'd have gone after him. James and Lily would
presumably have known about the prophecy and why Voldemort was hunting them
- I assume even Dumbledore would have considered this a piece of information
worth sharing. So the basic premise has James (a brave Gryffindor) being
willing to leave his wife and one of his best friends in his home (which
while it was supposedly safe if he hadn't had his doubt there wouldn't have
been a need for a back up plan anyway) to try and defend his son while he
impersonated said best friend. Frankly if this turns out to be true my
respect for the 'real' Remus Lupin will increase a thousandfold (and I'm a
fan to start with) since he gave his life to try and give his friend's
family time to escape and to keep up an impersonation of James, while my
opinion of James will sink. How sad for Harry if his father turns out to
have saved his own skin at the cost of that of a friend, while abandoning
his wife and child and then, having allowed his son to live in an
emotionally if not physically abusive householf for 13 years when he finally
gets to see him in person again he doesn't spend as much time with him as he
could and keeps his own identity secret rather than talk to the boy.

This makes the Snape/Lily shippers seem much more plausible to me - poor Sev
to lose Lily to such a total waste of space.

I thought this theory was way out there before OoP but knowing who Voldemort
s target actually was makes this, imo, utterly impossible.

K