The effects of the Dursleys on Harry

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 151113

Carol:
> I agree that there are essentialist elements in the HP books
> (notably the character traits of the young Tom Riddle and DD's
> statement that our choices *show* who we are rather than make us
> who we are) that I find rather disturbing. But the books emphasize
> the theme of choice, and choice would be meaningless if it were
> predetermined by the underlying "innate" nature of the characters.

Jen: I'm going off on a couple of tangents in this post, but they 
are relevant to the thread in general. Several times now I've seen 
Dumbledore's quote referred to as 'our choices show who we are' 
which does sound essentialist, but that's not quite what he said. He 
said: "It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far 
more than our abilities."  To me this quote is saying that everyone 
has innate abilities or talents, certain features a person is born 
with, but what you choose to do with yourself is far more important. 
That is, *what* you are--the things you stand for and believe in, 
the actions you take--are far more important than *who* you are--who 
a person is born. 

That seems to be an interpretation consistent with Dumbledore's 
quote in GOF when he is railing on Fudge and tells him, "you fail to 
recognize that it matters not what someone is born, but what they 
grow to be!" (p. 708, Scholastic, chap. 36)
  


Carol:
> (I'll grant you that Tom Riddle seems to have been born
> evil--his upbringing at the orphanage seems to have been neutral,
> not pushing him in either direction--but he's the exception, not
> the rule. And surely even he had choices--should I or shouldn't I
> hang Billy's rabbit from the rafters--and he chose to do evil. 
> Perhaps, after awhile, the choice became authomatic, but still, it 
> was there. He could have refrained from evil and he chose not to
> do so.)


Jen: JKR clearly said Riddle was not born evil, but that he has 
never known love. In Potterverse that is the greatest evil of all 
from what I can tell. She emphasizes this by saying in some ways 
Snape is more culpable [for his actions?] than Voldemort because he 
has been loved. That was a wallop of a statement to me--Snape *more 
culpable* even if just in certain ways, after everything 
Riddle/Voldemort has done. Whew. 

I often wonder why JKR presented boy Riddle the way she did, as not 
only unloved but unlovable from the start. Even as a baby he didn't 
ask for or likely receive much attention because he was 'odd'. 
Merope abandoning him may have started the process of Tom being 
unloved, but it didn't end there. The fault for being unloved as a 
baby cannot lie with a baby any more than Petunia finding Harry 
unlovable lies with him as a 15-month old. I'm not sure where JKR is 
headed, if anywhere, but it seems significant to me in the universe 
she's created where we expect love (magic) to triumph over 
Voldemort's kind of magic.

Carol:
> And my second question is, do you really think that he was born 
> with these traits [upthread] and did not develop them through
> interaction with his environment? If they are indeed innate, then
> no credit can go to Harry for developing them, and fate is 
> determined solely by who we are born to be. 


Jen: From your original post on the subject, my best guess is JKR is 
going for the idea that Harry became who he is in spite of the 
Dursleys rather than because of them. That was one of the options 
you mentioned. I think saying otherwise would actually be more of an 
essentialist statement because it would make Harry seem almost 
genetically superior to endure years of deprivation and be able 
to 'grow' in that environment. So JKR gave him a trait of 
resiliency, and to follow her theme of love that resiliency likely 
came from the experience of bonding with and being loved by his 
parents as Alla said, but JKR also showed the negative effects of 
living with the Durlseys: Not asking questions, not trusting adults 
readily, low estimation of his own capabilites, feeling burdened by 
guilt and shame at times. 

It's hard for me to think she's going for the idea that Harry's 
traits grew out of living with the Dursleys so much as the coping 
skills Harry developed to survive there. Maybe that's what you are 
saying in the end Carol, although it sounded more like you were 
arguing Harry developed his character traits *because* of the 
Dursley's treatment.

Jen