DD and the rat (was:Re: Minerva McGonagall/Dumbledore)

[Nora Renka]

No: HPFGUIDX 115842


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "arrowsmithbt" 
<arrowsmithbt at b...> wrote:
> 
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Nora Renka" <nrenka at y...> 
wrote:
>> 
>> Oh, come now.  You've admitted yourself how much this situation 
>> makes no sense at present, and how we don't really know what's 
>> going on.  WHEN we find out what happened, all my complaints about 
>> this point potentially end in eating crow--but not until then.
>> 
> 
> Kneasy:
> I admit no such thing and never have done.

I was talking about the so-called Prank, which is what I, oddly 
enough, read you as referring to.  I really can't find the post where 
you said "None of this scenario makes sense", but I do remember it.  
Had this great dialogue in it between Snape and Black.

<snip>

> There're clues, red herrings, deliberate deception and all that 
> good stuff scattered throughout the books. Supinely waiting to be 
> told who's good, who's bad and why defeats the object of the site.  
> Similarly, accepting *any* character at face value risks the 
> delivery (express) of a custard pie to the physiognomy. Mind you,  
> so does the alternative, but at least one presents a moving target 
> and a bit of nifty footwork can sometimes work wonders.

True, but not all clues are clues, and not everything is meaningful.  
It's the game of knowing when to take things at face value, and when 
not to...or, rather, even the idea of 'face value' is complicated.

<snip>

> Kneasy:
> Well, Sirius is named from the Greek 'seirios'  hot; scorching. 
> Though it might be as well to remember that Sirius has a hidden 
> companion - Sirius B. Strange tales associated with it, too. 

It's named that in part because of the Mediterranean climate at the 
time of year that it rises.  I think, so far as it goes, JKR is 
playing on two things with it: Dog Star, and brightest in the sky.  
The first is far more of the Big Hint in PoA.

> Kneasy:
> Now play the game.
> When I theorise I'm being fanciful or indulging in character  
> mutilation.  When I list canon I'm into reductionism.
> Could it be, could it possibly be that you're having trouble finding
> sufficiently strong canon refutation and are reduced to debating 
> tactics? I hope not.

No, but I think your character analysis was using a debating tactic--
just omit everything else from the 'pro' side of the column.  I 
quibbled with some canonical points but not with others, because, 
well, they *are* true.  But as you listed them, they were also being 
taken in isolation, which then does not provide a close-to-canon, 
solidly backed, interpretation.  Even if you don't like it, you can't 
leave it out.
 
> What are the good parts of Sirius's character?
> So far as I can see there's just one - he loves, or says he loves 
> James and Harry. And that's it, is it? That makes up for everything 
> else? Not in my book. Loving one person and trying to kill another 
> in revenge (or worse) does not a good person make IMO. Besides, I'm 
> not so sure about him loving Harry as Harry - as JKR says he's 
> transferred his love from James to Harry,  but does he recognise 
> the difference? Could be he loves the 'image', the concept of James 
> and that's been transferred along with his love. In OoP he does say 
> that Harry may be less like his father than he thought.

I think you underestimate the importance of Love to JKR, and its very 
high place in her cosmology (you bitter old cynic, you :).  It *is* 
the most likely candidate for the big scary power behind the door.  
The worst thing one can say of a character in the Potterverse is that 
he lacks love--Voldemort has never loved anyone, and he's certainly 
the most evil thing going.  Loving one person deeply, trying to atone 
for past mistakes, fighting on the side against the black hats even 
though not being allowed to do much--I don't think the balance comes 
out negative.

At least I saw OotP as a book where yes, there was re-examination and 
reconsideration of this--but that really went on for everyone.  It's 
probably not too contentous to argue that almost every character in 
the books showed some of their worst behavior in OotP, and I think 
that's thematic.  One can consider those revelations permanently 
damning, or one can consider the possibility of seeing people work 
through them.

> Let's face it - Sirius *needed* Harry. Without his ties to Harry he 
> was nothing - without Harry he has no credibility and no influence; 
> nobody would cross the road to spit at him. And he plays on it for 
> all he's worth; he wants the final say in what Harry knows, in what 
> Harry does. I can't think of a surer recipe for disaster.

Well, he's also somewhat vindicated re the knowledge thing at the end 
of the book--if they'd listened to him and actually TOLD Harry some 
things, a lot of what went down in OotP probably wouldn't have 
happened.  Harry peeks in the Pensieve out of a desire to know 
something about what is going on; if Harry had been given some 
explicit information about the links, or about *what* those dreams 
were actually of, I don't think the denoument would have happened as 
it did.  But that's a complex point.

-Nora skitters off to the library to study some madrigals