What is Hermione afraid of?

[greatelderone]

No: HPFGUIDX 80364

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Kirstini" <kirst_inn at y...> 
wrote:
> But this *is* Hermione's fear. They have a practical DADA exam at 
the 
> end of PoA, and Hermione jumps out of the trunk with her face 
white, 
> having seen McGonagall. JKR treats this as a joke in the passage, 
but 
> what I was trying to get at here was whether this might actually 
lead 
> to something more serious. She's afraid of failure, which is far 
more 
> convincing a fear than being scared of - say - a mummy or a Banshee 
> if you ask me.

I think you missed the whole point of the boggart. The boggart brings 
out your most primal and deepest fears in kids. It basically brings 
out the fears that you think is laying under your bed when you are 
asleep at night and what you think is going to kill you and I for one 
certainly don't buy McGonagall telling Hermione that she failed as 
Hermione's biggest fear at that time.  

>  
> Which scene - Hermione/Boggart? In the trunk? At the end of PoA? 
Are 
> you suggesting that she lies about Boggat!McGonagall?

Well Hermione certainly lied by omission about the time turner and 
she is the most mysterious of the trio characterwise since we have a 
window into Harry's thoughts through the books and Ron can be 
generally taken at face valuse while that is not true for Hermione.


> Secondly - all the Boggarts we have seen are related to something 
> intensely personal to the character. It shows, after all, a 
> representation of the most urgent, fear possible for each 
individual 
> to experience. Lupin fears the danger he may put others in at the 
> full moon, fears losing his self-control.

Or he may just fear the full moon since it was on a full moon that he 
encountered a werewolf that scarred him both physically and mentally. 
Or perhaps his boggart isn't a moon at all as others have suggested.

> Molly is the only person whose Boggart 
> relates to directly to harm done to others, but this is because her 
> entire life is devoted to her family. 

Or perhaps Molly is an adult and has a better grasp on her fears 
while the trio and their fellows were kids when they faced the 
boggart and were just afraid of monsters and bogeymen that lurked 
around the corner.
 
> Hermione's number one priority is Hermione, not Harry. Again, not a 
> criticism. She has to be fairly selfish to sustain the level of 
focus 
> required to gain her high marks. 

I certainly disagree. She set aside considerable amounts of time in 
GoF to help Harry in the Tournaments, attacked Snape a teacher in PS, 
mutilated and engaged in dangerous magic all for Harry's sake in CoS. 
Furthermore in Ootp, she went along with Harry into Umbridge's office 
and then proceded to take Umbridge into the forest when she was about 
to put an illegal curse on Harry. Furthermore she also set up the 
whole interview with Rita to try and clear Harry's name.


> Ambition requires selfishness, and Hermione has ambition in droves. 
> As we've seen ("perhaps if I could take SPEW further..."), she     
> doesn't intend to use it to do anything as obvious as climb a       
> particular career ladder, but she wants to employ her talents to    
> the best of her abilities. She's ambitious to 
> be true to herself. 

And how exactly is SPEW selfish? Pushing to free the elves from 
enslavement by the wizards, a very unpopular thing especially with 
the fact that she is a mudblood, is extremely unselfish of her.

> Yes, she cares very, very deeply about her best 
> friends, but I'm not convinced by your theory at all, because there 
> is very little canon in Hermione's character to suggest that she 
saw 
> anything other than Boggart!McGonagall. 

And there is also a lot of canon evidence that Hermione has a habit 
of hiding stuff that bothers her from the rest of the trio. We know 
next to nothing about her parent(in fact we know more about Neville's 
parents) and even more we don't know what her issue with the Imperius 
curse is.