What's With All The Bloodlust?

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 167017

Eggplant wrote:
> <SNIP>
> If Harry lives happily ever after you'll smile as you  read the last
page of the last book, but 48 hours later Harry will be completely out
of your thoughts.
> 
> Alla:
> 
> I am sorry, but you can only be sure that this holds true for you, 
> **not** for me.
> 
> I read Odyssey many many years ago. The character is with me, alive
as he is at the end of his quest, triumphant in returning to wife and
his son.
> 
> Heroic quest more often than not brings us tragic ending. But it
does not always brings us tragic ending and it can be done really,
really well.
> 
> And the fact that it is not just a heroic quest, but also coming of
age story gives me hopes for not tragic ending for Harry.

Carol responds:

I agree with Alla here, not only because I share her hope of a happy
ending (which I'm quite likely to cry over) and because a happy ending
by no means deters me from reading a book again and again, but also
because I think that the Odyssey, which focuses on a single hero and
has a happy ending, is probably closer to the model that JKR is
working from, to the extent that she's dealing with epic conventions
at all.

I think what we're dealing with here is the difference between a comic
epic (not comic in the sense that all of Odysseus's companions die but
comic in the sense of a happy ending) and tragic epic. Most of the
heroic quests we're familiar with, Beowulf, for example, also follow
the tragic convention of the hero's death after performing great
deeds. Not all of them do so, however. As I said in another post, Sir
Gawain, that "parfit, gentil knyght," comes home (after an adventure
with the Green Knight that I don't want to spoil for those who haven't
read it) having learned an important lesson in chivalric virtues.

I came across a passage on the comic vs. the tragic vision of the hero
that may or may not be of interest to anyone but me, but I'll quote it
just in case:

"Tragic heroism . . . involves absolute dedication to causes and the
clash of contending forces: good vs. evil, truth against error. It
embraces the warrior virtues of courage, duty and honor. It is
consonant with unquestioning obedience, the fight to the death, and
kudos for the champion."

This sounds to me like what Eggplant is looking for, more or less.
Forgive me and correct me if I'm mistaken.

"The comic vision, on the other hand, is intolerant of pride and
pretension, of self-righteousness, of all finite claims to the
infinite; it endorses humor, humility, child-likeness and the
willingness to negotiate and settle differences. It is deeply
suspicious of dividing the human family into the lowly and the lofty,
the unrighteous and the righteous, the cowardly and the courageous.
Its loyalty to the ultimate prompts the rejection of all human
professions of goodness and claims to greatness as vanity, and enjoins
acknowledgment of the dignity and worth each creature before God."

I'm not sure whether this is the vision that we see of humanity in the
Odyssey, but it resembles what I see in "Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight," in which King Arthur's greatest knight is humbled and brought
to contrition (without any humiliation; it's a happy ending). And it
seems to me that JKR, knowingly or otherwise, is operating in this
same tradition. Humor, childlike humility as a virtue, the unification
of the Houses and the schools, reconciliation of all but the worst,
most unredeemable characters (Voldemort), second chances, the dignity
and worth of house-elves and goblins and Muggles as well as wizards,
the irrelevance of bloodlines."

It's not a perfect parallel, of course. But it might be worth thinking
about. And certainly, if JKR is writing in the comic tradition (which
is different, of course, from comedy and tragedy as dramatic genres
and has nothing to do with tragic flaws) then I think we can
confidently expect a happy ending and at least the beginnings of an
effort to reform the too-evident flaws and mend the rifts within the
Wizarding World.

Carol, who will, of course, abandon this idea completely if Harry dies