Child Saviors and realism (was:Re: Harry's assumption VS Everyone's assumption)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 151784


> 
> Betsy Hp:
> It does, and I'm probably just being argumentative (shocking, I know 
> <g>) but in the age of stagecraft and hereditary rule, children 
> *were* trained with the idea that they'd at least be responsible for 
> their world.  And in the cases of a bad ruler, I think children were 
> looked to as the next hope of various philosophers and teachers.  
> Like Harry, the responsibility wasn't placed on the child's 
> shoulders until they become adults.  But also like Harry, most of 
> those children knew what they were being trained for.  So the shadow 
> of the responsibility was there.  (Actually, the knowledge probably 
> came sooner for them than it did for Harry.  Dumbledore expressed 
> some modern sensibilities there. <g>)
>

Pippin:
Children in those times never knew when their parents might die and
the power would pass to them, at least nominally. Sometimes their
regents were wise and caring, but more often  royal children became
pawns in a power struggle. Some famously never lived to rule in their
own right. Dumbledore would have had all that in mind when he chose
to keep the prophecy secret and have Harry raised away from the WW.

Pippin
thinking that Harry at the Dursleys was way better off than the Princes
in the Tower, whatever they died of.