HP as Morality Play (was Re: Harry learning from Snape )

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 115032


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "dumbledore11214"
<dumbledore11214 at y...> wrote:
> 
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "dzeytoun" <dzeytoun at c...> 
> wrote:
> 
> snip.
> 
> > Actually, I don't think HP really corresponds very well to any 
> fixed 
> > analogy.  Certainly some moral themes wind through the books, 
> > however, and I find, so far, that the themes smack more of a 
> Morality 
> > Play than a Passion of Christ (talking in general terms, not about 
> > the Mel Gibson movie).
> > 
> 
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Thank you very much, Dzeytoun. I do appreciate  the information 
> about morality plays.
> 
> I also think JKR mixes a lot of different genre in the books and she 
> blends it quite well for the most part, at the same time I do see a 
> lot of cristian themes, but the same time as SSS said these themes a 
> re quite similar for many moral systems.

Carol:
Just an additional quick point re medieval morality plays, which most
modern readers find excruciatingly boring: There's no ambiguity or
complexity in a morality play, and the audience knew exactly what to
expect from every character. Unlike the one-dimensional, wholly
unrealistic characters in such a play, JKR's characters, at least the
majority of them, are a mixture of good and evil rather than being
defined by a single trait. (I suppose a rather weak case could be made
that Voldemort "out-herods Herod" in his bombastically villainous
speeches, but I won't go into that.) IMO, JKR shares Tolkien's
"cordial. . . dislike [of] allegory in all its manifestations." 
Here's a link to the morality play "Everyman" if you really want to
sample the genre:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/everyman.html

Carol