Draco = Evil?(was: Elkins' Draco Malfoy Is Ever So Lame. )

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 125013


>>SSSusan:
<snip>
>Draco is not the underdog of the HP books any more than he makes 
himself one by his own behaviors.  *Harry* has the awesome burden of 
having to take on Voldemort & his DEs repeatedly, hence *Harry* is 
the underdog of the HP books.<

Betsy:
I agree that in the overall theme of the books, Harry is the 
underdog.  He's facing an overwhelming evil, and he's just a school-
boy.  But in the story as it is at Hogwarts, school-boy vs. school-
boy, Harry is *not* an underdog.  Not by any stretch.  He's well 
known, he's rich, he's sporty, the majority of his teachers like 
him, his headmaster loves him, and even when he breaks school rules, 
he usually winds up winning house points.

In an essay on Narrator vs. Authorial Voice, No Remorse wrote, 
almost as an aside:

"Now while an omniscient narrator would manage to get across the 
idea of Harry as shy and only accidentally elitist, while keeping a 
lot of his angst intact, Harry would be less sympathetic anyway. 
Harry's self-image is very important to the tone of the books. 
Because Harry sees himself as this poor, marginalised orphan, we see 
him that way. If Harry's self-image had to compete with the image 
everyone else has of him, we could find ourselves sympathising with 
someone else; and consequently with this character's image of Harry. 
We don't. We are supposed to side with Harry and we tend to just do 
that."

(If anyone's interested in the rest of the essay, you can find it 
here: http://www.livejournal.com/users/no_remorse/48210.html )

Of course, I'm not trying to argue that Harry is a bad kid and that 
we as readers shouldn't feel any sympathy towards him.  But as far 
as life at school goes (and this is the only life of Harry's that 
Draco is aware of) Harry is the big man on campus.  When the yule 
ball was held in GoF, Harry had older women throwing themselves at 
him, and ending up going with one of the prettier girls of his year 
(as per Dean anyway, IIRC).  Harry gets to be Seeker his first year -
 something Draco really wanted.  Harry has the better broom.  After 
Harry's arrival, and directly because of his actions, Gryffindor 
starts winning the house cup each year. 

I agree that Draco brings a lot of his grief on himself.  He so 
wants to beat Harry and it always ends in failure.  He should 
probably write defeating Harry off as a lost cause and slink off 
down to the dungeons.  But he's a tenacious little bastard (love 
Nora's "Energizer Bunny of Schoolboy Nasties" btw <g>) and so he'll 
keep trying and trying.  Weirdly enough, this is one of the things I 
like about Draco.  For all that we describe him as cowardly and 
pathetic and weak, he will not give up, no matter how badly he's 
been hit before.  (As an aside, I think if JKR would let Draco win 
now and again, I'd have less sympathy for him as a reader.)

>>SSSusan:
<snip>
>Draco's father has brought these things upon himself & his family 
by his own choices & actions; the things didn't happen *to* him.  
One reaps what one sows, no?  And while Draco was not involved in 
the actions directly, don't all signs indicate that he approves of 
his father's choices & actions?    
>As for the mature response being to separate Draco from his 
father's sins in order to feel compassion for Draco, well, how `bout 
the reverse?  Should Draco be able to separate Harry from who/what 
his parents were [Draco's dad's boss's enemies] and feel compassion 
for this boy who TRULY lost his father... AND his mother... and not 
just to prison, but forever?<

Betsy:
This is where folks got confused last time.  Let me try and be 
clearer.  *I* feel sympathy for Harry.  *I* feel sympathy for 
Draco.  I do not, however, expect either boy to feel sympathy for 
*each other*.  Not in this situation.  Draco won't care that his 
father was trying to kill Harry.  He just cares that his beloved 
father was taken away and by that spoiled brat Potter, who always 
gets what he wants.  Harry won't care that Draco is now fatherless.  
He just cares that Lucius is evil, part of the reason Sirius died, 
and Draco is just a spoiled little Malfoy, and probably as bad as 
his father.

Same with the "compassion" argument.  I do not expect to see a 
Gryffindor showing compassion towards a Slytherin.  Nor do I expect 
to see the reverse.  Those two houses have been enemies for so long 
(something that I think has been forshadowed to change) that it 
would be wildly out of character and widely disapproved of within 
each house for one to show compassion towards another. And because 
these books are being told from a Gryffindor's point of view, we 
have yet to have an opportunity to see a Slytherin show compassion, 
be it Draco or Pansy or Flint or Nott.  I doubt, however, that it 
means that Slytherins (or Draco) are completely unable to show 
compassion.

That's the only point I'm trying to make.  That we will not see 
Slytherin house or a Slytherin character in a complete three 
dimensional way until Harry allows one into his inner circle.  
Whether that Slytherin will be Draco, I don't know.  I really 
don't.  

I *hope* he will be.  He's a nasty little kid, but he is just a kid, 
still. There have been hints that his home life is not as happy as 
Harry et al believe it to be, or as Draco says it is.  Draco 
definitely marches to his father's drum, and if he keeps doing so, 
he'll end up a Death Eater and most likely dead (I think he'd be a 
dismal failure as a Death Eater). I think the deck has been stacked 
against him, and so I hope to see Draco catch a break.  

There are a few contradictions that *I've* seen in the text.  A lot 
of folks disagree, and I do recognize that I'm grasping at straws 
(throws a wink at Magda), which is why I'm not comfortable putting 
my money on a "good" Draco in the end.  But I'm still crossing my 
fingers. :)

Betsy, who not only snipped SSSusan fairly ruthlessly but also 
quoted her out of order.