The Message of DH (WAS: Unforgivables - from a different angle)

[elfundeb]

No: HPFGUIDX 174613

Ceridwen wrote:

> I do not expect the hero to be so unwaveringly right that he or she

> has no moral crisis.   I do not expect that the hero is perfect in

> either the absolute sense of the word, or in the greater scheme of

> things.  This is an unbelievable characterization, and no amount of

> peripheral mistakes will erase the core issue of the hero not needing

> to learn lessons or to change.  The entire point of a story is to

> effect change.  A story is a journey from point A to point B, with

> scenery in between.



Debbie:
Dumbledore said in CoS, "It's our choices that show us who we really are"
(quoted from memory).  JKR's outlook is Calvinistic, at least where Harry is
concerned.  Harry makes the choices he does because of who he is; he doesn't
make bad choices and learn from his mistakes, at least not in large things.

Harry is tempted, but only in a Christ-at-Gethsemane manner.  He obsesses
for a few days over the Hallows, but he makes the right choice.  Likewise,
he engages in a little bit of bad-boy behavior, trying out the Unforgivables
(or more specifically, the Cruciatus, as I'm not too fussed about using
Imperius under the circumstances), but though they knock Harry's halo askew
on his head, such small misdemeanors cannot dislodge it.

 Unfortunately, Harry is a Questor, in a very LotR sense.  Questors are
often driven by their destiny, or by things they cannot control.  In LotR,
the journey may have been interesting, but most of the characters were
boring.  Harry is equally boring.



However, if we're looking for a character who does learn lessons and change
for the better, JKR has written such characters.  Ron, for example.  Ron is
a major character who fights an endless battle against his own insecurities
over six books, sometimes seeming to master them and then backsliding again
and again, before finally conquering them.  As a character, I find Ron much
more interesting, although it is Harry's Quest that drives the action of the
book.



Ceridwen:

> These books did not, in the end, show what we should be trying to

> do.  The message is conflicting.  We should not be like the Bad Guys,

> yet the Good Guys can be as much like the Bad as they like.  There is

> no higher message, no means of rising above.  Everyone is as devious

> as the next person, therefore, Good and Bad must be relevant to who
> is on Our Side and who is Against Us.


Debbie:
What I take from the books is that the character trait that JKR admires most
is not bravery, per se, but loyalty.  By this I mean personal loyalty
(rather than loyalty to a cause).  Loyalty to Lily enabled Snape to do what
he did.  Likewise, Harry showed loyalty to Dumbledore by following his
explicit instructions to pursue the Horcruxes rather than the Hallows.
 Dumbledore
even comments in CoS about the loyalty Harry showed to *him* (emphasis
mine).

What is not explicitly stated, but is implied, is that the Good Guys earn
their loyalty by their deeds in support of a worthy cause, whereas a Bad Guy
like Voldemort demand loyalty to himself, for himself, and will do terrible
things to enforce it.  Thus, the DA (and everyone under the sun) arrives at
Hogwarts when Neville calls them solely based on the knowledge that Harry is
there, rallying around a leader who has earned their loyalty.  It is because
of the Cause that the Good Guys can use otherwise forbidden weapons if they
use them appropriately.

I don't like this message.  I want Good Guys to learn that to win, they must
behave in a morally superior way.  However, this is nothing new.  We have
been having this argument on the list for at least five years about such
episodes as Dudley's tail and the Ton-Tongue Toffees.  Why should we expect
her to take a different view of using Unforgivables?  I should have known
that JKR's idea of purity of heart was different in HBP when Dumbledore
fired Harry up to go on the Horcrux quest so that he could aveng his
parents' deaths.  So I can't complain that she's been inconsistent on this
point.

Ceridwen:
> The books, to me, actually

> say, "If you are not for Harry, you are against him."  Is it

> surprising that people don't care for that message?



Debbie:

I think JKR is sending this message.  Voldemort is Evil.  No one can
possibly doubt this.  Harry is working against Voldemort, which is a Good
Thing.  Thus, her message is simply another expression of the old adage that
all that is necessary for evil to flourish is for good people to do
nothing.   And there is a corollary message:  one does not have to be
perfect to take arms against evil.  Harry's purity of heart is really
another phrase for his selfless devotion to the Cause -- beginning in PS/SS
regardless of personal loss.  It is not general moral superiority.



At that level, the message works.  If we expected JKR to send moral messages
about particular behaviours in DH, or to punish the perpetrators of such
behaviours, then she has failed us.  I'll settle for the message we got.



I snipped your other complaints, as I admit to being unconcerned
generally about flints, plot holes and clumsy deus ex machinas, as long as
JKR delivers on story and character.



Debbie

who has been away from the internet for a week and has not read every post
on this topic


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