Voldemort's 25 missing years & Dumbledore's motives

[Grey Wolf]

No: HPFGUIDX 59229

Alex Cukier wrote:
> Does anyone have any theories (not full funfiction, please!) about 
> Voldemort 25 missing years (1945-1970)? 
> 
> Of course we do know that "(Tom Riddle) disappeared after leaving the 
> school...travel far and wide... sank so deeply into the Dark Arts, 
> consorted with the very worst of our kind, underwent so many 
> dangerous, magical transformations..." - Albus Dumbledore, Chamber of 
> Secrets, last chapter.

There is more canon than that. Particularly, we know what those 25 
years involved: finding methods to achive immortality. He consorted 
with the powers of darkness, looking for ways to live forever, and he 
must have found several methods that promised such thing - all 
experimental, or at least hints that gave him ideas. From the GG 
(Graveyard Gathering): "I, who have gone further than anybody along the 
path that leads to immortality. You know my goal - to conquer death. 
Andd now, I was tested, and it appeared that one or more of my 
experiments had worked... for I had not been killed, thought the curse 
should have done it." Voldemort, GoF, Br. Ed.

It seems that Voldemort made many experiments, and he himself didn't 
know how effective they would prove to be. In fact, he still doesn't 
know (or doesn't tell) which of his experiments was the one that 
protected him from the (rebounded) AK.

> But:
> 
> -Did Tom had any contact with the Muggle world? Did he live a muggle 
> life and bought Riddle's House with a different name? Was he involved 
> in any profit (illegal) activity in order to be rich and change 
> muggle's money into wizard's money?

Depending on how you define "contact", Tom Riddle did indeed have one: 
after school, he made a quick visit to his parent's family and killed 
them (the murder of the Riddles). It is doubtful that he could've kept 
the house, or that he would've gone into muggle commerce to get money. 
What for? He's a wizard, and what he wants is immortality, so he needs 
to travel to find magical ways of achieving this. Playing with the 
stock market won't accomplish this.

And if he did have any way to generate profit, why do it in the muggle 
world at all? If he's good at finances, he can make money in the WW and 
there is no need to give part of his profits to the goblins so they 
will turn it into wizard money.

> -What about Grindelwald followers? Tom joined them after G's defeat?

It has been suggested that Grindelwald could in some way be connected 
to Tom - maybe they met during one summer, or even Tom was one of his 
followers. But there is no canon one way or the other. About as much as 
I am willing to go at this point is that Grindelwald gave Tom ideas of 
dominion.

> -Was Dumbledore following his steps with his informants?

We know from canon that Dumbledore kept an eye on Tom after the events 
surrounding the CoS incident of Tom's times, so it is not impossible 
that Dumbledore attempted to continue to keep an eye on him. However, 
keeping an eye on a boy that travels the world looking for dark wizards 
to learn Dark Arts is risky, and somewhat unjustified - while Tom, at 
the time, was obviously someone to keep an eye on, the same could be 
said about many other students, and it seems Dumbledore did not trust 
anyone with the information of Riddle's untrustworthyness (maybe 
because he was such a well-liked student). What I'm getting at is that 
at the time he wasn't a pressing issue, and unless Dumbledore had spare 
spies, he wouldn't have been able to deploy his net just to keep an eye 
on a 17 year old boy.
 
> -Why in the hell someone would like to be missing 25 years!!! It's 
> too long, even for wizards standards! It's a generation!

No, it is not that long. Particularly if the goal of those 25 years is 
to live for the next 25 eons and more. How long did it take Flannel to 
come up with the Philosopher's Stone? One wizard life, at the most, but 
even that long is irrelevant when compared to the fruits collected. 
Besides, he wasn't missing - he knew exactly where he was. The ones who 
didn't were the other wizards, but that would hardly matter to someone 
as self-involved as Voldemort.
 
> I have a feeling that beyond the evil x good, prejudice x friendship, 
> one of the most important motivations for Dumbledore is that HE FEELS 
> GUILTY about actual scenario in the Wizard World. Maybe because:

Ummm... while it seems a nice theory, do you have any canon to back it 
up? I myself have never seen Dumbledore as a guilty consciense, just as 
someone that is fighting yet another war against yet another evil 
wizard, and is getting tired of it all. But as I say, it's a good 
theory, let's see what we can milk from it.

> a) He didn't stop Tom Riddle at CoS events.

I asume you mean the CoS incident 50 years back, and not the ones in 
the book CoS. True, he didn't stop Riddle then especifically, but 
Diary!Tom implies that he didn't open the chamber again because 
Dumbledore was watching him closely, so Dumbledore was more or less 
responsible for the lack of further incidents.

> b) He didn't accept The Ministery after defeating Grindelwald and 
> choose educate wizards focusing large term peace (and he fails until 
> 1981)

We are not told that he was offered the Ministry after the Grindewald 
events. According to Hagrid, that only happened after Voldemort's fall, 
when Crouch Sr. lost his popularity due to his son's actions. But even 
if he did, I think that Dumbledore has never wanted the position of 
MoM, since it would put him in the public eye, and in a very exposed 
position, while he can be defended in Hogwarts, where he can lead 
generation after generation of school chidren down the correct path (as 
much as possibe).

> c) He doesn't want to use Voldemort terms to defeat him (maybe Dark 
> Magic)

This is indeed true, and canonically so, but I doubt this is origin of 
guilt - I have theorized that it is expressed as fear, but not as 
guilt. He knows he's powerful enough to destroy Voldemort, but only if 
he goes down to his level, and since he won't do it, a fight between 
him and Voldemort might end in his death (and since he's the one, so 
far, keeping Voldemort in check, his death would mean the death of 
countless people. That's enough to make anyone afraid).

> d) There was some cumplicity/non-agression pact between Dumbledore 
> and Tom Riddle in the past (mainly 1945-1970)

No canon about this whatsoever, I'm afraid, and seems OOC for 
Dumbledore (and probably for Riddle as well). Dumbledore isn't the sort 
to agree to non-agression pacts with someone who drove a basilisk 
against a schools population.

Hope that helps,

Grey Wolf