Is Luna Lovegood the anti-Hermione?

[serenadust]

No: HPFGUIDX 113601

I wrote:

> > She does seem to frequently misread Harry's nedds. A fairly 
> trivial, 
> > yet telling example in GoF, was her dismissal of the idea that 
> Harry 
> > would want a game of Quidditch to take his mind off his 
worries.  
> > Another from OOP would be her assumption that Harry wants to ask 
> Cho 
> > out (Ron shrewdly suggests that he doesn't *want* to ask her), 
and 
> > her presuming to vanish his remaining Invigoration Draught after 
> > Snape has destroyed his first sample, causing him to get another 
> > zero.  I think these episodes illustrate that Hermione, while 
> > meaning well, often misreads Harry's wants and needs.

 
> Now Cory:

<snip>

> If she hadn't cleaned up what was left of his draught and Snape 
> hadn't destroyed his sample, those who insist on over-analyzing 
> everything would inevitably say "See, Hermione doesn't understand 
> Harry at all; she never does anything for him -- she wouldn't even 
> help him clean up his draught after class!"  I wouldn't read too 
much 
> into this; as so many others have said before me, sometimes a 
cigar 
> is just a cigar.


Perhaps Hermione's cleaning up of the draught could be more 
accurately called presumtuous, rather than misreading Harry's wants 
and needs.  I don't think that even "those who insist on over-
analyzing everything" ;-) would criticize her for not cleaning up 
after him in Potions class.  It's not really her job, after all, and 
the one time we hear about her doing it, it ends up hurting Harry 
rather than helping him.  My point was that she sometimes misreads 
his needs and sometimes oversteps her "place" (for lack of a better 
word)in his life.  He doesn't seem to like it when she does.


Corey continued:
 
> For me, the bottom line is that, althought Hermione might not 
> *perfectly* understand Harry in all respects, she does understand 
> certain aspects of his psyche better than anyone else.  She 
doesn't 
> understand him in the same way that most girls her age don't 
> understand boys their age in general (i.e. Quiddich and Cho), but 
in 
> some ways, she does understand him better than Ron does (i.e. in 
GOF, 
> understanding how he feels about his fame, and about the 
unfairness 
> of Ron being jealous of him for getting into the tournament).  The 
> reality is, Hermione, Ron, Ginny and Luna each undetstand Harry in 
> different ways, and each has something to offer him.


I agree that each of them understand Harry in different ways, and 
each have something valuable to offer him.  In the case of 
understanding how Harry feels about his fame, I do think that Ron 
and Ginny both understand that as well as Hermione.  As far as the 
rift between Ron and Harry in GoF goes, I don't believe that Ron is 
jealous of Harry (another example of Hermione thinking she 
understands what's going on, but not getting it quite right); I 
think he feels betrayed by him.  The definitive analysis of this 
episode can be found in "Anatomy of a Rift" by the amazing Dicentra, 
part one of which can be found here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/52038 .

I think it's one of the most insightful posts ever on the dynamics 
of the relationship between Ron and Harry, and the one time that 
their friendship falters.

Jo Serenadust, wondering where Dicey is these days