Aberforth

[hickengruendler]

No: HPFGUIDX 174948

 
> 
> Alla:
> 
> I already briefly confessed my love  for Aberforth Dumbledore, but 
I 
> am very happy to do so in more details.
> 
> Did I have any expectations about him? Actually none, or should I 
> say almost none, since I did not expect him to be  DE, by virtue of 
> him being DD's brother. 
> 
> Aberforth exceeded my almost non-existant expectations by quite a 
> lot.
> 
> First of all we see him as saving Trio from DE and anybody who 
saves 
> Trio from DE is already a good man in my book.
> 
> We see him not being afraid to stick it to DE and doing a little 
> blackmail of his own. He is street-smart and I like that a lot.
> 
> "You set off Caterwauling Charm?"
> 
> "What if I did? Going to cart me off to Azkaban? Kill me for 
> sticking my nose out my own front door? Do it then if you want to. 
> But I hope for your sakes you haven't pressed your Dark Marks and 
> summoned him. He is not going to  like being called here for me and 
> my old cat, is he, now?"
> ***
> "And where will you lot traffick potions and poisons when my pub's 
> closed down? What'll happen to your little sidelines then?"  - p.558
> ***
> 
> After that tirade I was already in love with the man.
> 
> But JKR just had to make my love stronger and stronger with every 
> word of his and he does not occupy too much page space, doesn't he?
> 
> 
> He was for me the voice of the readers like me who wanted to smack 
> Dumbledore for years for his secrecy thing and just tell Harry to 
> save himself and he does it oh so very well. How many times over 
> last few books I wished that Harry just let WW rot and just 
> disappeared with his friends?
> 
> 
> "My brother Albus wanted a lot of things," said Aberworth, " and 
> people had a habit of getting hurt while he was carrying out his 
> grand plans. You get away from this school, Potter, and out of the 
> country if you can. Forget my brother and his clever schemes" - 
p.559
> 
> And of course my poor Harry despite being angry with Dumbledore 
just 
> determined to do the job. I loved Harry for that. But was I 
thinking 
> that Aberforth is the voice of reason? Oh yes.
> 
> By the way on reread I was not sure if Aberforth was not testing 
> Harry again with all this "Save yourself" stuff.
> 
> Because despite saying that Order is finished, etc, he does not 
> exactly give up the fight in my view. He helps Neville and other 
> fighters, so I don't know.
> 
> On the other hand, he is probably just calls things as he sees 
them  
> in a very blunt way.
> 
> Is he wiser than Dumbledore? I would say in a sense of wiser about 
> life in general, yeah, absolutely and better too, I absolutely 
trust 
> Dumbledore on that one.
> 
> "Reality returned in the form of my rough, unlettered and 
infinitely 
> more admirable brother. I did not want to hear truths he shouted at 
> me" – p.717.
> 
> I also think that he can write and read by the way.
> 
> As to the house, I honestly think that Gryffindor fits him.
> 
> One must be brave to stick his neck with DE like this.
> 
> Aberforth rocks :)
> 
> Alla
>

Hickengruendler:

Indeed he does. And he had one of the best lines of the entire 
book: "With brains like that, you could be a Death Eater."

And he helped making me truly like Albus as a character as well. I 
have no idea how much of the Dumbledore backstory was planned from 
the beginning (in spite of the fact, that we knew since book one, 
that Dumbledore had the Invisibility Cloak), but at least now some of 
Dumbledore's actions in the previous books are meant to be seen as 
flaws. Flaws of a man in a very difficult situation, after all, it 
was not him but Voldemort, who made Harry a marked man, and 
Dumbledore just had to deal with the situation, but still flaws. It 
helps a lot that someone else is critical of Dumbledore's actions as 
well.

I still think that not him but Harry was the voice of reason in this 
chapter, when he told Aberforth that sometimes you have to work for 
the greater good.

The only think I wondered about Aberforth is, that for a man, who 
thought all was lost, he surely helped a lot. Not only saving the 
Trio, but also helping the DA and getting into contact with Percy.

Hickengruendler