Support for the ESE Lupin theory (not)

[nkafkafi]

No: HPFGUIDX 123810


> Pippin:
> Goodness, she doesn't like him because he might change. 

Neri:
My apologies. I thought that in your previous post you were answering
why she likes him.


> Pippin:
> She 
> likes him because he's clever and kind and gives good lessons.
> JKR could love him like a mom who recognizes her grownup 
> son has become a criminal, but still loves him and wishes he 
> could change. 
> 

Neri:
All of JKR's characters are her "sons" and daughters in this sense.
But my question is, why does she like some of them more than others.
The very fact that she chose to answer a question like this, out of
the thousands of questions she gets, shows that she doesn't think of
her characters as her children. You can imagine what any mother would
say if you'd ask her which of her children she likes best. The
difference is that a mother has only a limited effect on the
personality of her son, and she must accept him and love him the way
he is. JKR doesn't have to wish Lupin could change. She can give him
the power to change. And if she decided he is evil and won't change,
she doesn't have to like him. 

> Pippin:
> Give some credit to JKR's creativity. Anybody can imagine a 
> cruel, stupid sadistic person doing evil things. But how dull! How 
> much more challenging to create a wonderful man who, 
> because of one failing, being too cowardly to stand up to his 
> friends, is entrapped in a secret life  that eventually destroys him. 
> 

Neri:
I certainly appreciate three-dimensional arch-villains who have good
qualities, deep motives and superficially nice personality. But this
is not the question. My question is why would JKR *like* such an
arch-villain the same way she likes Harry or Hermione. I'm sure there
are authors who could like their arch-villains that way, but I doubt
JKR is such an author. One of JKR's main themes seems to be
crystallized in the sentence (and forgive me for repeating myself):

"It is our choices that shows what we truly are, far more than our
abilities"

JKR invested a lot of effort in showing us that Harry is very similar
to Voldemort in his abilities, to the point of carrying a bit of Voldy
in him, and yet he is very different from Voldy, in fact he is the
anti-Voldy, *only* because he has made the opposite choices.

This view of JKR does not fit well with your image of ESE!Lupin as a
wonderful person who ontologically *is* kind, clever, likable and a
good teacher, but because he was tragically trapped in his secret
life, he just *happened* to betray his best friends to death, murder
12 innocent people, trick another innocent friend into life in jail,
murder another innocent boy, and finally murder the friend who had
recently managed to break out of jail (and sorry if I missed any
additional crimes). JKR's view of ESE!Lupin would be exactly the
opposite of this image. Being nice, clever, likable and a good teacher
are all abilities. In JKR's view they are very secondary. Murdering
and betraying all these people were ESE!Lupin choices, and according
to JKR's view, they show what he truly, ontologically *is*. So in
JKR's view ESE!Lupin would *be* a heinous mass murderer and traitor
who, very superficially, has some good abilities. He certainly cannot
be described as a "wonderful" person. She might write such a
character, but *liking* him seems out of the question. In fact, it is
probably not a coincidence that JKR is bad at writing
three-dimensional, likable arch-villains. They don't go very well with
one of her most fundamental themes. But she's certainly not "dull"
with many other kinds of characters.

> Neri (previously):
> > Also, according to this argument, can I assume that Snape, 
> who is now having his second chance, also may have murdered 
> 12 innocent muggles or something similar when he was a DE? 
> But still, since he has now changed, why isn't he included in the 
> list of characters JKR likes?<
> 
> Pippin:
> 'Cause he's nasty. But again, it's no great challenge to make a 
> nasty guy, who has all the qualities one happens to dislike in a 
> person,  a baddie. How much more interesting to imagine that 
> because he has one strength, (what it is, we don't know yet and 
> JKR is decidedly not telling) he was able to find redemption.

Neri:
We indeed don't know yet about Snape, and I can only guess here. My
guess is that Snape is not just a nasty person who makes the right
choices. He is not "a good guy even if he is not the nice guy". If he
were, then JKR would have liked him without any qualms, because it is
his choices that would be important, not his nasty disposition. So my
guess is that Snape must have made some very bad choices in the past
(and keeps doing some not very good choices in the present), but he
"redeems" himself by also making some good and very brave choices.
This conflict is why JKR enjoys writing him, but also why she won't
like him very much as a person. It is the conflict between good and
bad choices that is really interesting in Snape's character, not the
conflict between choices and abilities. 

And regarding second chances, the reason JKR and DD uphold them is
precisely because of this choice business. If you *are* what you
choose, it means you can change what you are by changing your choices.
Even a murderer may choose to reform. This does not eliminate his
choice to murder. A person died and this cannot be undone (there's a
good reason why JKR is adamant that no magic can bring you back from
the dead). But a true decision to reform *is* a new choice. So perhaps
a murderer who was reformed, according to JKR's view, does not stop
being a murderer, but he is a *reformed* murderer.

Neri