Pensieves objectivity AND: Dumbledore's integrity

[Kirstini]

No: HPFGUIDX 79440

Naama wrote:

>> To assume that Dumbledore has edited the prophecy, or lied to 
Harry in some other way, makes for a very difficult *storytelling* 
problem, IMO. 
Dumbledore serves at least two narrative functions at the "end of the 
year talks" . One as himself. One as the narrator's voice. At the end 
of OoP, we learn a lot from Dumbledore about his own motivations, 
thoughts, regrets, etc. We learn from him about himself. But also he 
functions as the mystery-unravelling narrator.>>

Yes, but only within a plot of his own composing. Dumbledore is not 
affiliated, as Harry is, with the actual narration of the books. 
Dumbledore unravels the mysteries of the plot events of each book in 
as far as he has been involved in the mechanations of said events.
>> In addition, even within the story Dumbledore is the only one who 
knows the full 
content of the prophecy (we know from the second prophecy that 
Trellawney doesn't remember a thing after she wakes from a true 
trance). So, if he is lying to Harry, neither Harry nor the reader 
can ever realize it. <snip>To have Dumbledore lying to Harry and 
then "taking it back", is just really lame story telling. It's too 
easy a trick for an author to do, because then she can always take 
anything back, right? So, we can count on nothing. Quirrel is still 
alive, Harry staying alive has nothing to do with Lily's love, the 
prophecy never happened?>>

No, we know the prophecy happened because we see the image of Sybil 
Trelawny rising from the smashed shards of the globe. There's proof 
within the story outside of Dumbledore's own, highly subjective 
narrative. Lily's love-sacrifice is borne out by LV's acknowledgement 
of it. I'm not saying that *everything* DD has told Harry is false, 
just advocating that we read it all with a pinch of salt. I said in 
my initial post that the pauses in the prophecy as we have it offer 
the *possibility* that DD is editing it. Which brings me briefly to 
Pip:

>>*However*, the evidence that Pensieves provide objective evidence 
is 
becoming very strong. Both in GoF and OOP Harry is able to wander 
around in the scene and observe things that the person whose memory 
it is could not have seen.
<snip>
In both cases, the Pensieve appears to not so much store the 
person's *memory* as use the memory to access the actual event. <snip>
So, given the evidence that Pensieves provide an objective account 
of the event the 'trigger memory' is evoking; we can almost 
certainly trust the prophecy to be accurate in its wording.>>

Mm, but, as with Bertha Jorkins, DD has not entered the Pensieve, but 
summoned a piece of information appropriate to the point he is 
illustrating *from* the Pensieve. I'm not sure quite how he'd do it, 
but there's still a possibility that what Harry sees *could* be an 
edited version. Anyway, back to Naama, and I'll requote:

>> So, if [DD] is lying to Harry, neither Harry nor the reader can 
ever realize it. <snip>To have Dumbledore lying to Harry and 
then "taking it back", is just really lame story telling.>>
But I was arguing for a situation where Harry *could* realise it, not 
by being told by Dumbledore, but by working it out for himself. I 
predict that over the course of the next two books we'll see him 
becoming increasingly independent of Dumbledore, and perhaps a huge 
test of his loyalties occur when he realises, as we've done, that DD 
isn't working with his own best interests at heart. (I'm getting 
increasingly fond of Ever So Fallible!Dumbledore at the moment, 
spymaster or no spymaster.) The thing about mentor-pupil storylines 
is that there inevitably comes a point where the pupil overtakes, or 
at least is able to function without, the aid of a mentor.  What I 
was trying to get towards was a state where DD's end-of-term 
explanations no longer explain everything satisfactorily either to 
Harry or to the reader, and Harry constructs a new version of the 
narrative for himself, rather than simply allowing himself to be 
written the way DD wants. (I'm working on a chapter about The Prime 
of Miss Jean Brodie and writing oneself into authority at the moment, 
and there may be lots of overspill onto the list. Sorry) 

Naama again:
>>I think that when a thing is told that is obviously part of the 
story's bone structure (if you know what I mean), we can count on 
JKR  to not take it away it later on. In fact, I challenge you to 
look back at the story that we have, and see whether she has done 
anything like that before. I.e., established something as a fact and 
then demolished it later on.>>

Okay
prefect badges are silver – no! prefect badges are scarlet and 
gold
?
I think there are lots of cases of similar occurrences. Perhaps not 
the absolute plot turnabout you suggest, but in the WW things 
frequently turn out to be other than Harry/reader initially 
understood them as. For example – "there wasn't a wizard that didn't 
go bad who wasn't in Slytherin", but then we have Gryffindor Peter 
Pettigrew able to betray his best friends (Lexicon Steve says that 
Sirius was a Gryffindor; and Lupin got "the badge". Of course Peter 
was a Gryff too.). Dolores Umbridge is mean and evil and Harry's scar 
burns around her, but she's not a DE. Our expectations are 
consistently turned on their heads, and JKR was certainly setting us 
up for *something* like this when she had Firenze stress to Harry's 
class that nothing is completely predictable/knowable (sorry, no 
texts). While I don't think that we're going to find out that Lily's 
protection was absolutely irrelevant after all, or that Sirius isn't 
really dead, I'm still not convinced that the OoP denoument was a 
completely straight telling. Pip pointed out areas where DD has 
already mislead Harry, and we have also been offered up evidence that 
DD's version is not necessarily always the most 
authoritative/authentic. Look how different his and Snape's versions 
of the Prank are, and how they each convey their point to Harry by 
shifting emphasis as they describe events. Both are valid versions, 
neither objective.  

Ooh, one more thing.
Pip:
>>When I get to produce my post on MAGIC DISHWASHER with new, 
improved Order of the Phoenix (which at the rate I'm going will be 
about two months before Book Six comes out), I will not be taking 
Dumbledore at face value. >>

Woohoo! That's the best news I've had in quite a wee while.
Kirstini