Ending WAS : Compassionate hero

[nitalynx]

No: HPFGUIDX 176067

Geoff wrote:

> I was thinking about this on the society level and was struck by a real 
> world parallel.
> 
> The epilogue is set 19 years after the final showdown. It is just 18
years 
> since the amazing events of 1989 when we saw the Communist bloc start 
> to topple down like a house of cards.


Nita:

But don't you think both the historical circumstances and the actual
events are vastly different? In Potterverse, it's Takeover - Some
Resistance - Final Showdown, all in a single year. The Soviet Union
had existed for 70 years or so before it collapsed relatively
peacefully (and it had been moving in that direction for years).


> There was rejoicing and euphoria. We expected that the world would
enter 
> a new era. Well, we did but if, 18 years on, you look around,
expecially at 
> many of the former Communist countries, there are still serious
problems 
> which are slowly, oh so slowly, being tackled.


And there are real, logical reasons for that. I didn't like History at
school, but I can't deny that it's a very useful science. IMO, any
imaginary world which rests on a bunch of real-world analogies thrown
together instead of its own coherent history might not make sense on a
closer look, and it seems like Potterverse it one of those.


> Countries like Romania are still in dire straits with their economies 


Erm, Romania is actually doing pretty well, as far as I know.


> and in 
> many countries, supporters of the old regime lurk just under the
surface, 
> like unregenerate Death Eaters, hoping to try to snatch back some of
the 
> power and prestige of the "good old days". 


Well, a lot of these "supporters" are retired folks who worked hard
their entire lives just to find out that they wouldn't be getting
their well-earned large pensions after all. That does tend to make one
a bit resentful. Some of them actually fought and/or lost loved ones
in a war against real-world Nazis. I will even dare say that many of
them suffered more than Harry did before they got to the "good old
days". For these people, all was well. And then their country ceased
to exist.


<snip rest of Geoff's post>

So, on one hand, I disagree with your parallel. But on the other, it's
led me to some interesting thoughts...

From the inside, the Soviet Union usually looked more like
post-Voldie-era-WW than Voldie-era-WW or Oceania of "1984", or some
such dystopian land. The official ideology was rather
Gryffindor/Hufflepuff, decidedly anti-Slytherin, and ambivalent about
Ravenclaws. Apart from the happily-owning-slaves and
hard-work-is-for-duffers bits, the Harry Potter series would fit in
just right with the other children's stories of the USSR.

I'm not trying to say that the Soviet Union was a fine country, OR
that HP books carry a communist message. But I do think that pointing
fingers at (even genuinely terrible) outside groups, projecting all
imaginable evils on them and fighting them is NOT the kind of thing
that encourages moral growth inside the group. And the same goes for
individuals.

The Soviet Union was genuinely anti-Nazi - ideologically, politically,
militarily. Children were taught the value of courage, hard work,
cooperation, equality. And still, so many people were treated like
cattle or simply killed. Because there was a war, because they were
traitors, because sometimes bad stuff just happens, and it's all the
Bad Guys' fault... You know, the usual reasons.

And I don't see how the Wizarding World is better protected from a
similar fate at the end of the series. What if the next Dark Lord is a
Muggle-lover? :)


Nita