Savior complex? (was "Harry and Tom")

[Matt]

No: HPFGUIDX 110762

--- Neisha Saxena wrote:
>
> What is it with Harry and his "saving people thing"? 
> This is just as extreme, IMHO, as LV's reaction to his
> very similar childhood.  There is a
> super-hero/super-villan dichotomy between Harry and
> Voldemort that is extremely interesting.  They are
> mirror images of each other.  
> 
> I have two theories as to why Harry is so hell-bent on
> saving people (or "heroics" as Lucius Malfoy put it):
> 
> <snip>
>
> 2) ... some sort of deep-seated psychological
> reaction to being an orphan and being raised by the
> Dursleys....

Do you really think it is all that odd for a person to go out of his
way to help others?  You refer to the scene on the Hogwarts Express in
SS where Harry buys all the sweets as an example.  That scene has
always struck me as a perfect natural reaction by a kind, empathetic
kid who knows what it's like to be made to do without while others lap
up the good life, and who has never had any money to treat others. 
Sure he's still learning the bounds of propriety, but sharing the
candy is just a genuine, honest reaching out for friendship.

More generally, most of the adventures in the books begin when Harry
is put in a situation in which he feels that if he does not stick his
neck out to help someone (or solve a problem), no one will:

* Draco and Neville's Remembrall
* Hermione and the troll
* Getting Norbert to Charlie and his friends
* Going after the stone
* The polyjuice impersonations in CS
* Following the spiders into the forest
* Going to Lockhart about the Chamber, and then entering it
...all the way down to...
* Setting out to rescue Sirius in the Department of Mysteries

Of course we, as readers, can see ways out of the situations that
Harry cannot see -- that makes for good drama -- but from Harry's
position, as a pre-teen/young teen who is constantly being thrust into
unfamiliar situations with little in the way of a support network, it
legitimately looks as though everything is left up to him.  I don't
think it's a sign of some deep-seated psychological problem that Harry
wants to help Neville or Hermione or Hagrid or Ginny or Gabrielle or
Cedric or Arthur or Sirius.  Rather, it's a sign of a young man who
knows right from wrong, and is willing to stand up for what is right. 

--Matt