Harsh Morality - Combined answers

[hickengruendler]

No: HPFGUIDX 121258


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "delwynmarch" 
<delwynmarch at y...> wrote:
 
> 
> Carol wrote:
> "We have to look beyond the narrator to the characters themselves, 
the
> actions and words of the characters without the filter of Harry's
> perspective and judge for ourselves."
> 
> Del replies:
> I disagree. Simply put, we don't *have* to do anything. We *can* do
> it, we can encourage other people (especially the younger readers) 
to
> do it, but no reader has any obligation to do it. Readers are 
entitled
> to stick to the "whoever Harry likes is OK, whoever he doesn't like 
is
> bad" measure as much as they want. For that matter, they are even
> entitled to have their own highly prejudiced, totally unfounded,
> absolutely contrary to canon, preferences if they so wish. For
> example, anyone is entitled to loving LV because they love the name
> Tom, or to cheer on Draco because he has blond hair, or to hate 
Harry
> because he wears glasses.

Hickengruendler:

That's true, but JKR has given us reasons in the books to feel some 
sympathy for the characters. She has shown us how Snape was teased by 
the Marauders and gave us informations how he risked his life in the 
fight against Voldemort. She has told us (via Dumbledore) that Aunt 
Petunia helped saving Harry's life, she has shown us Percy's reaction 
during the second task and Sybill Trelawney's breakdown after 
Umbridge sacked her. And for example the Snape-Pensieve, the Percy 
and the Trelawney scene are not essential for the plot. In these 
scenes, said characters are for a moment the center of the plot, 
instead of Harry. If we are not meant, to feel some sympathy with 
those characters or to understand them a bit better, why would JKR 
have written it at all?
> 
> Readers have no obligation whatsoever, and many of them might not be
> willing to, or might not see the point of, trying and looking at 
facts
> and people from a more objective point of view. When all is said and
> done, if the series once completed support the "whoever Harry likes 
is
> good, whoever Harry dislikes is bad" morality, then any reader who
> doesn't care about looking for something more elaborate won't have 
to.

Hickengruendler:

But more than often Harry realizes that he was mistaken. I won't even 
mention all the secret villains from the first four books, who 
clearly were able to fool Harry and the readers (and were supposed to 
do so), but will concentrate on the recurring characters. In book 3, 
once he learned that Sirius didn't betray James and Lily, Harry was 
perfectly willing to ignore every bad characteristic about Sirius and 
to see him as a semi-god. He even didn't react when Snape mentioned 
the infamous break. And in book 5, he saw with his own eyes that 
Snape had some reasons to dislike the Marauders, in a scene, that was 
(bad enough as it was) much more harmless than the werewolf-prank. 
Harry (and the readers who share every opinion with him) have to 
realize, that some of their earlier judgement was wrong. At the 
beginning of OotP, Harry was ashamed to be seen with Luna ans 
Neville, because they weren't exactly helpful to impress Cho Chang. 
And many readers, especially those in Harry's age who can identify 
with him, probably agreed with him. At the end of the book, Harry has 
come to realize Neville's and Luna's value and is not ashamed anymore 
to be seen with them. In many PoA, quite a few readers (and I was not 
necessarily one of them) thought that Trelawney was a pitiful woman, 
who has found her own niche in Hogwarts to go on, because she doesn't 
know where else to go, and look how they were confirmed in OotP. 
Fudge was very nice towards Harry in the first books. From Harry's 
point of view, he was quite okay. Of course the facts presented 
another Fudge, who wanted to send Hagrid to Azkaban without a prove, 
and who decided to sentence Sirius to Death, while completely 
ignoring the account of three eye-witnesses. But because he helped 
Harry, Harry and some reasers thought him to be okay. And look how 
clearly JKR presented his faults, that were hidden in CoS and PoA, in 
GoF and OotP. Harry is not perfect, he judges people unfairly (and 
what else can you expect from a teenager, infact, most of the adults 
do so well), but he is still developing, and he has already changed 
some opinions about some characters. Not all, but he's still 
developing and the series is not yet over.
> 
> Carol wrote:
> "Remember Percy wading out into the water to hug Ron after the 
Second
> Task in GoF? That, I think, was the real Percy, and I hope we'll see
> him again."
> 
> Del replies:
> I agree. But what if we never see that Percy again? We will still be
> able to imagine that this Percy is still there somewhere, but that
> won't be what the books say.

Hickengruendler:

Why do you think we'll never see that Percy again? It's JKR who 
writes these characters. If she shows us that Percy in GoF, than she 
surely has a reason to do so. And I doubt the reason is that we will 
never see that Percy again, because in this case there wouldn't be 
any need to show us that Percy at all, from the point of view of the 
storyline. It's the same as with Snape. We saw a not so evil Snape at 
the end of PS, when we learned that he saved Harry. Than we saw only 
hints and only when we looked beyond Harry's point of view in the 
next books, until the end of GoF, where Snape was shown on a very 
positive side. 
> 
> Carol wrote:
> "I think we're meant to see the contrast between Harry's (and the
> narrator's) perspective and "reality" as we, the readers, construct 
it
> based on our reading."
> 
> Del replies:
> I disagree that we are "meant" to see this contrast, and I'm not 
even
> sure JKR hopes we do that. Do you remember her comments about Snape
> and Draco being bad guys that girls shouldn't fall for just because
> the actors playing them are cute? That's not a way to encourage 
people
> to look at her characters from a different angle, IMO.

Hickengruendler:

I might be mistaken, but I think here she's speaking about something 
else than to like characters or not. She basically felt for such a 
bad-boy type and married him, and look how it turned out to be. I 
always read some worries from someone who has made bad experiences in 
this statement, because she fears that those are the guys the Draco-
fangirls fall in love with in real life as well. Of course I can't 
climb into her head to see her thoughts, but that was definitely how 
those quotes seem to me.
> 
> Carol wrote:
> "I'm hoping that those two perspectives (the reader's and the
> narrator's) will come closer together in the sixth and seventh books
> as Harry starts to look more closely at other people's needs,
> feelings, and values rather than always thinking about his own needs
> and burdens."
> 
> Del replies:
> I *hope* so too, but what if this never happens? This is what I'm
> afraid of. Harry will still be a teenager by the end of Book 7, so 
it
> is very possible that he won't truly start looking outside of 
himself
> before the series is over, in which case all we will be left with 
will
> be his side of the story. It's a real possibility, that would be
> consistent with the books written so far IMO.

Hickengruendler:

I disagree. These books are a coming-of-age story. Therefore Harry's 
development has to be finished by the end of the book. It might not 
be realistic in real life to expect philosophical insights from a 
seventeen-years old, but since these books tell Harry's story, he has 
to come full term at the end of book 7. Besides, even in real life, 
it's when they are around sixteen and seventeen, that teenagers left 
their most problematic phase behind.
> 
> Carol wrote:
> "And I also think we're meant to see certain characters, notably
> Sirius Black and Severus Snape, as "gray" rather than "white" or
> "black" (in the sense of Good and Evil)."
> 
> Del replies:
> And yet OoP leaves us with a Harry who hates Snape more than ever 
and
> a Sirius turned into a martyred saint because he fell for the cause.

Hickengruendler:

Order of the Phoenix is not the end of the story. And OotP may leave 
us with Harry hating Snape more than ever, but there is a moment 
where he admits to himself, that it's easy blaming Snape, since he 
doesn't have to think of his own guilt this way. Therefore Harry has 
some insight at the end of the book, he just doesn't want to admit it 
to himself. And I don't think Sirius was turned into a martyred 
Saint. Dumbledore was pretty critical towards him at the end of the 
book.