The 'Seeming' Reality

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 155567

> Neri:
> IIRC, no character in Emma turns out to be ESE, and no seemingly evil
> person turns out to be good <g>.
> 
> OK, so lets take P&P instead (JKR has it in her bookshelf too,
> according to her website). Here we seem to have much better parallels:
> Wickham is ESE (well, he is in Austen's standards) and Darcy seems to
> be evil but is really good. Or are they?
> 
> In fact Elizabeth isn't much duped. True, she believes Wickham's story
> about Darcy in the beginning, because she doesn't have any data to the
> contrary. But she never falls for Wickham. She realizes herself that
> he's not a very admirable person, even before she finds out the true
> story about him. And she has respect for Darcy almost from the
> beginning. She only thinks she hates him because he's proud, which is
> true, and because she suspects he ruined the engagements of her
> sister, which is also true. So in fact, the only things that Elizabeth
> is really duped about are Darcy's feelings about her and her own
> feelings about him.

Pippin:
Um, no. In Elizabeth's culture pride is a deadly sin. She does think 
Darcy is evil, not on the epic, world-destroying scale of a Voldemort,
of course, but certainly she believes he is purposefully ruining lives. 
This prejudice colors her observations of Darcy and so compels her
to deny her feelings for him. Or at least that's the book I remember.

Neri:
> 
> Like Austen, I think JKR doesn't believe that a character can dupe the
> hero for long about his/her true nature. Motivations yes. Personal
> history yes. Real nature no. 
> 
Pippin:
Are we reading the same books? Harry was duped about his own true
nature for ten years running. He still does not understand what it is
about himself that made Dumbledore think he was capable of 
overcoming Voldemort. He is trusts Dumbledore to be
right in this, and yet he thinks Dumbledore has overlooked very
obvious faults in Snape. So one way or another, Harry is being duped.
He either has a very wrong opinon of Snape's nature  or a very 
wrong opinion of Dumbledore's. 

Pippin