Elkins' Draco Malfoy Is Ever So Lame. Yet Sympathetic. And Dead, Too.

[lupinlore]

No: HPFGUIDX 124438



> Well, I'll try, Alla.  I think the root of the phenomenon that Elkins
> is getting at is a drive (I hesitate to use the loaded word
> "instinct") that many females have for care and development.  That is,
> they are attracted to male characters that suffer because these males
> evince the need for their care.  However, along with the need to care
> is the need to develop and change the person being cared for.  I
> suppose it all goes along with the loaded word "nurturance."  To
> nurture someone is to care for them and help them develop and change.
> 
> Male characters who suffer need care.  Male characters who suffer and
> deal with it to an extent show the strength to develop and change,
> i.e. to respond to nurturance.  This gets the female drives going.
> 
> Males who don't suffer have no need of care and thus don't evoke the
> drives.  Males who suffer but collapse under don't show the strength
> to respond to nurture.  Thus they evoke perhaps sympathy, but not the
> full reaction.
> 
> I think the reason you don't respond to Draco, Alla, is that you don't
> see in him potential to change, i.e. to respond to nurturance.  In
> this case not so much because of the way he responds to suffering, but
> because of the full presentation of the character.  That is, you
> probably see nothing in Draco's actions, background, etc. that
> instinctively (that word) makes you think he would change under female
> nurturing, and therefore you don't feel those drives toward him.
> 
> I'm hazarding a guess that JKR is puzzled by female reactions to Snape
> because she knows too much about him.  Witness her statements that "he
> is a deeply horrible person," etc.  She feels no female drives toward
> Snape, I'm guessing, because SHE knows he's incapable of change, i.e.
> that he won't respond to nuturing.  However, that is not obvious (at
> least to most readers) from what she has written in her books.  Hence
> female readers often think Snape CAN change, i.e. would respond to
> nuturing, and this they become attracted to him on a mistaken (albeit
> unconscious) premise.
> 
> Anyway, my attempt to answer you.
> 
> 
> Lupinlore


To answer and expand on my own post (and to get myself into even
deeper hot water with a lot of the women on the list) I just
remembered JKR's interview where she warned her female readers to
(paraphrase) "beware the Bad Boy."

The instinct for nurture often leads women into disaster.  I've seen
it time and again among family and friends as women become involved
with totally inappropriate men based on (I believe) the unconscious or
semi-conscious belief that they can nurture and heal and change him in
some important way. In other words they want to make the Bad Boy, if
not a Good Boy, at least Their Bad Boy.  The problem is most Bad Boys
won't be anybody's boy but their own, and thus the relationship is
doomed from the start.

I'm guessing that JKR had some experience of this phenomenon in her
first marriage, and that is what she is trying to warn her readers off
of when she tells them it's a bad idea to be attracted to Draco or
Snape or males like them.  Essentially she's saying:

"Look, these men (or this boy) aren't the kind of people you think
they are.  They won't respond to your nuturing as you, deep in your
heart, believe they will.  There isn't (oh am I going to get into
trouble here) a little boy inside of them that needs you to take him
by the hand and lead him out of darkness.  These are human beings with
deep character flaws that won't change because you love them, care for
them, and try to nurture them.  They are destructive personalities
that will eventually probably destroy themselves, and they'll drag you
down too if you persist in thinking you can make them be something
they aren't."

This I think is also the root of her comment about (paraphrase) "Why
would anybody want to love/be loved by Snape?"  She knows that he
won't change, and that the deep and destructive tendancies of his
character aren't because (here I go again) there is a scared little
boy inside that needs to be loved and nurtured.  Rather he is a deeply
flawed man who persists in self-destructive behavior and who would
almost surely drag any woman involved with him down with him.


Lupinlore