The Mirror and the Heart

[davewitley]

No: HPFGUIDX 105252

Iris_ft wrote:

> `Erised stra  ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi'; `I show not your 
> face but your heart's desire': how could Harry learn better than 
> facing the Mirror of Erised? 

Nifty post, Iris, and I'm sure Hans enjoyed his Knuts!

Just a few thoughts at random here.

Rather than stepping through the mirror to read the inscription from 
the other side, another way of looking at it would be that you turn 
your back on the mirror to use it as then the inscription is then 
the 'right way round', even though you cannot actually see it.

I'm thinking that the meaning of this is not that you suppress our 
heart's desire (that is represented by leaving the mirror entirely) 
but that you put it in its proper place.  To face the mirror is to 
obsess over the things you want and maybe cannot have; to turn your 
back on it ('I show not your face...' is a clue?) is to accept your 
heart's desire and face the world in that knowledge.

Another thought about Harry's scar.  It is easy to think of it as a 
disfiguring thing, the visible sign of a lurking inner Voldemort, 
but that's not true.  Harry got the scar, not because Voldemort 
cursed him, but because Harry, with Lily's protection, repelled that 
curse.  So the scar is in some way connected to Harry's strength, 
and if he focuses on it, despite it being a source of pain and a 
conduit (seemingly) for evil, he will understand his power.  In 
effect, the scar stands for those things you mention that Harry is 
afraid of in himself.  Christians will make the connection that a 
perfect body can yet be scarred.

We never find out *how* Dumbledore set the mirror so that you could 
only get the stone if you didn't want to use it.  I had assumed that 
it was just a piece of magic, but perhaps it is in some way a use of 
the intrinsic operation of the mirror.  In effect, the mirror *will* 
give you your heart's desire, but only if that desire is in itself a 
form of renunciation, a form of selflessness.  Not sure what I mean 
here.  If, for example, at the end, Harry's desire was not to 
destroy Voldemort but to see him restored to what he could have 
been, the mirror might be able to grant it?  That sort of thing, 
though that sounds a little facile as stated.

David, who always does a double take when his phone shows that his 
messages are 'Erased'