The Tempting of Harry

[kiricat2001]

No: HPFGUIDX 95625


Kneasy wrote:

> This is where I could get some posters stirred up.
> 
> There's an old proverb, "The road to hell is paved with good 
intentions."
> 
> Starting with that as a basis for this putative thread I've been 
scanning 
> the horizon for someone who is liable to offer simplistic remedies 
to
> complex problems -  and it wouldn't be a Slytherin;  Harry wouldn't
> touch them with a barge-pole.
> 
> Prime candidate: Luna Lovegood.
> 
> At  the end of  OoP Harry seems to see her almost as a sympathetic
> fellow-sufferer. This could be very dodgy. She has her own little 
world,
> apparently constructed from the remnants of 60s hippiedom and
> weird conspiracy  theories. (Sounds like me on a bad day.) Not too
> tightly wrapped, is our Luna.
> 
> If she becomes the repository for young Potter's woes, I dread to 
think
> what advice she might come up with. And that's assuming that her 
> intentions are benign - not something that can be taken for granted.
> Her mother died in a potions explosion or back-firing spell or 
something
> (what the hell was it? A recipe from the WW version of the 
Anarchist's 
> Cookbook?) and her father is the local gutter-press sleaze 
merchant. 
> Not the sort of background to inspire confidence.
> 
> Her appearance in OoP seemed a bit puzzling despite the cries of joy
> from serial SHIPpers. What effect is she intended to have on the
> plot arc? Can't see her transforming from the ugly duckling into 
the 
> graceful swan that is the general progression of the hero's love 
interest.
> A bird of ill-omen is more like it.
> 
> Not totally committed to this - yet. Other suspects to be pored 
over,
> other favourite characters to malign before finally nailing the 
colours to
> the mast, but she leads the pack at the moment.
> 

Marianne:

On the general thread of Harry-Tempting, let's recall the brief 
flurry of posts a while back that placed the darkly disturbing 
Bellatrix in this role.  <<shudders>>

Okay, I've thrown Bella onto the temptress trash heap.  Can't see it 
happening at all.

But, to continue with Kneasy's "road to hell" proverb, let's toss in 
Hermione. She has been touted as the brains of the outfit, the one 
who studies magic the hardest.  She's also the one who steadfastly 
defends Dumbledore and Snape. She accepts, apparently without any 
questioning, whatever she's told by people she respects.

She also, in OoP, was used to give us pithy insights into the  
motivations, emotional and psycological states of several characters.
(Cho and Sirius come immediately to my mind.) Never mind that 
sometimes her analysis had a jarring undertone that simply didn't 
seem to fit (to me, anyway).  What she said had enough probability of 
being correct, and her delivery of these statements was always so 
definitive, that the boys rarely questioned her.  Hermione has 
spoken, thus it must be so!

And, at least once that I can remember, Harry reflects that the inner 
voice of his conscience reminds him of Hermione.  

 I beleive she has said in interviews that she uses DD and Hermione 
to tell the readers things they ned to know.  But, does that mean 
that every statement that falls out of Herminone's mouth is the 
utter, unvarnished truth that we are to accept as gospel?  I've got 
problems with that.

I can see Hermione leading Harry astray, in all innocence.  By again 
falling back on her book knowledge and combining that with her over-
confident assessments of other's characters, I can see her pursuading 
Harry to take a course of action that ends up in disaster.

Marianne