[HPforGrownups] Re: Lupin = James: not so STAGgering (sorry)

[Sherry Gomes]

No: HPFGUIDX 132398


Thanks for the thoughtful response. It turns out that I am slightly 
obsessed with this theory, and so I am really familiar with JKR's 
responses on this matter. Maybe I am a whacko "true believer", but I 
think it is pretty easy to read all of JKR's responses and still 
believe that James could be Lupin. The key is to know that it was 
neither James nor Lupin who did the switch: it was Lily, perhaps 
with the help of McGonagal, on the night of the LV attack. I believe 
this was done without James or Lupin's knowledge, and against their 
will. Lily didn't intend for Lupin to die, either. She had a plan 
that she thought would work perfectly, and it almost did. I believe 
we will learn about that plan in HBP.

And of course I agree completely with JKR: James did not intend to 
save himself, and has been completely tortured by the turn of events 
for all these years. But he has accepted his duty of watching out 
for his son, nonetheless.

Jake

Sherry now:

I have two objections to this theory.  First of all, JKR has said on more
than one occasion that James and Lily are dead, and that the dead don't come
back.  This is why I don't hope for Sirius to return, even though I so don't
want him to be really dead.

But for me, an even bigger objection to this theory being true is the
incredible cruelty to Harry.  If James is alive in the body of Lupin, he
must be a monster to have let his son live with the abusive Dursleys all
these years, suffer the pain of having no parents, go through learning to
love Sirius only to lose him again, repeatedly be faced with being alone in
the worst times of his life, longing for a parent that he does not have.  In
spite of what we saw in the pensive about James, I just can't believe that
James was that much of a fiend, to do that to his son.  If it ends up being
true, Harry would be understandable if he hated his father forever for being
abandoned so terribly.  To me, there is no excuse, unless James doesn't know
he is James, that could justify this.  Lily would be a monster too.

Sherry