Ever so evil ? was Dumbledore's role in Sirius' death

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 99031

Pippin:
>  In real life your beloved friends, family and teachers can let 
you 
> down. They can, though they honestly care about you and vice 
> versa, knowingly and deliberately act against your interests. And 
> ironically enough,  because they do value the relationship, they 
> may do it behind your back. 
> 
>  Of course that's what Ron thought Harry had done in GoF.  
> Some readers thought Ron had violated some sort of code by 
> even suspecting Harry. They've been expecting ESE!Ron ever 
> since. 
> 
> But what Ron really did was violate the reader's expectations by 
> accusing  Harry of something no idealized friend would ever do.  
> Ron understands that even in the magical world just caring 
> about someone doesn't make you a saint. Harry has yet to learn 
> it.

Jen: I thought that was the whole point of OOTP, that Harry saw all 
the previous fairy-tale elements of the WW in a new light: His once 
beloved Sirius took a nose-dive long before he fell through the 
veil; James & Sirius were depicted as bullies; Dumbledore shows 
signs of weakness and admits he made mistakes; Molly's once welcome 
ministrations were seen as mollycoddling; the MOM & Fudge were found 
to be corrupt and guilty of censorship at the highest levels. Why 
does JKR have to go further to make the point that Harry no longer 
idealizes the WW?

She said in her recent chat that Harry will begin to master his 
emotions and make a contribution, since the war is on. To me, that 
means Harry's downhill slide will curve back up in the final two 
books. 

Pipin: 
>  The question of course, is what will happen when he does.  I 
> don't expect Harry, or the books, to descend all the way from 
> romantic idealism   to  nihilism, though it could happen, and that 
> would give us ESE!Harry, I suppose. But I suspect the books will 
> lend themselves to the conclusion that ideals exist and have 
> value, even if none of us can live up to them
> 
> "It is only by preserving faith in human dreams that we may, after 
> all, perhaps some day make them come true." — James Branch 
> Cabel.

Jen: Harry already understands how many ways there are for people to 
let him down, and he still finds hope when he's by the lake, when he 
talks to Luna, and in the last sentence of OOTP:

"He somehow could not find words to tell them what it meant to him, 
to see them all ranged there, on his side. Instead, he smiled, 
raised a hand in farewell, turned around, and led the way out of the 
station toward the sunlit street, with Unlce Vernon, Aunt Petunia, 
and Dudley hurrying along in his wake."

I love that scene, Harry walking toward the sunlight, the imperfect 
people he loves most in the world supporting him, and the 
Durlsey's 'following in his wake'. I'd say he's arrived.