On being Lucky (was On lying and cheating)

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 165901

Lupinlore:
> So Snape hates Harry because Harry has that powerful and triumphant
> thing that Snape doesn't have -- luck.  And he hates Neville 
> because Neville is a mirror of himself in the luck arena -- except 
> that Neville rubs salt in the wounds by actually experiencing a 
> change in his luck over time, largely by garnering the good favor
> of people more lucky than himself -- or more accurately and more 
> viscerally, he sticks close enough to God's Favored that some of 
> the luck rubs off.
<snip>
> So, it all comes down to this -- Harry is JKR's favorite 
> character.  He gets the luck, Snape doesn't.  He gets to be the 
> hero, Hermione doesn't.  He gets the girl, Neville doesn't.  He 
> most likely gets to live, Dumbledore doesn't.  

Jen: You've thrown out some interesting thoughts about luck here and 
verbalized something I haven't been able to put into words since 
HBP:  Why does JKR make Snape's life so miserable?  At every critical 
juncture his choices have led to a downturn in his own fortunes and 
personal life even if in the end it turns out he helped the greater 
good.  I don't feel certain JKR is headed in the direction of 'look 
how much Snape has sacrificed for the good of the WW' when his 
motivation is finally revealed.  She could be depicting what can 
happen to a promising life when resentment and hatred are allowed to 
take over a person.  Or perhaps there won't be any message involved 
except what Dumbledore summarized in POA about the consequences of 
our actions being too diverse to really divine the future, that 
choices are made and characters in Potterverse live with the 
consequences.

Magpie:
> And Snape isn't actually as unlucky as he presents himself. He has
> a negative, glum outlook and seems to always by default see himself
> as put-upon, but Snape's hung around way longer than a lot of his 
> contemporaries. Nobody would have doubted back in the 70s that the 
> Marauders were the ones favored by the gods--handsome, cool, 
> popular, talented, smart, getting away with stuff. And how did 
> their lives turn out? <snip> All of them suffered pretty sad fates, 
> sometimes coming right out of their own flaws.

Jen: This section is along the lines of what I've been trying to 
figure out.  I believe JKR is painting the Marauders (minus Peter) as 
tragic and heroic in varying degrees, and don't know if she is going 
to include Snape with this grouping in the end or not.  They've all 
lost their lives literally or figuratively or at least that's how I 
read Snape.  He had much promise despite his social difficulties and 
chose to throw away his future by joining the DE's and he's been 
attempting to make up for that choice ever since at the expense of 
progressing in his own life.

Magpie: 
> It's Snape who turned out to be indispensible, to have power and be 
> needed by Dumbledore and, perhaps, Voldemort. Snape's the one 
> protecting James son, not James, until HBP. Snape's actions are on 
> the whole more important to the outcome of things, at times, than 
> Harry's. Harry is clearly the Chosen One, but the Chosen One isn't 
> always the best one in a narrative in every way. 

Jen: Yes, all true, but Snape also had a hand in being the one to 
protect James' son.  He's indispensible to Dumbledore and perhaps 
Voldemort because he made the wrong choice as a young man and hasn't 
been able to free himself from being ensnared with LV ever since.  
The only reason he's still alive is he has supreme survival skills, 
like learning Occlumency and siding himself with Dumbledore who 
offered him protection in exchange for being a double agent.  Do the 
means matter or only the end?  I'm not sure what JKR is saying about 
that concept yet.  

Magpie:
> I believe it's Charles who gets the girl in Tale of Two Cities, but 
> it's Sydney Carton we remember best and admire most, isn't it? 
> Marius is the lucky one in Les Miserables, but Jean Valjean is, I 
> would guess, more often the favorite (as is Eponine as opposed to 
> Cosette). I've always prefered Edmund to Peter in Narnia. 

Jen: I don't remember Tale of Two Cities well enough to recall 
although do believe it's a very personal and subjective experience 
when it comes to favoring and remembering characters.  (And I can't 
say I favored either Edmund or Peter in Narnia myself).  There are 
people drawn to the dark mystery of a Snape or a Heathcliffe, but I 
find those characters difficult to identify with.  While I care about 
each one's story and why/how each character evolved into the person 
he became, I don't feel emotionally attached to them or their outcome 
for whatever reason.  For that reason I do at least try to understand 
how other people can read a Harry, or a Peter or a Charles and 
think, 'eh, not my type'. 

Magpie:
> Ultimately I don't think it's necessarily wrong if a readers thinks 
> less of--or is just less interested/impressed by--Lucky Harry than 
> Unlucky, sullen DDM!Snape who brought his bad fortune on himself 
> and doggedly sticks to his own ideas about honor to try to make it 
> right to himself while still turning people off with his cloud of 
> unluckiness. I think at least that Rowling has shown an interest in 
> Snape's kind of redemption story. 

Jen: I don't think it's wrong either.  I find it more difficult to 
sympathize with Snape not only because of his actions but for the 
simple reason that JKR won't give us any information about what's 
going on inside his head.  Hearing how Harry makes decisions and 
choices turns off some readers, but having that information helps me 
to identify with him whether I always agree with his actions or not. 
(I'm not exactly sure why, but Harry talking sarcastically to 
Narcissa in HBP bothered me more than anything he's done and 
physically attacking Mundungus was a close second. I wouldn't mind 
discussing those if anyone has thoughts about those two events.)

Magpie: 
> Ironically, in HBP the very question is brought up in terms of
> Felix Felicitas. Slughorn, iirc, warns against using it too much 
> because it leads to reckless behavior. That kind of links back to 
> maybe what others were saying about Harry in general in this case.
> Being favored by the gods can sometimes be an obstacle to personal 
> development.

Jen: I don't see any particular obstacles in his personal development 
due to being the Chosen One as opposed to the normal obstacles of 
growing up in general and living in a permissive environment like 
Hogwarts in addition.  None glaringly different from the rest of the 
kids at Hogwarts at any rate.  Besides Slughorn, who would have 
favored Harry as Lily's son whether he was the Chosen One or not (not 
that it hurt), Harry's status seems to impair his relationships with 
peers and the WW as a whole more than him being exalted above all 
others.  Like narrowly escaping being killed by Voldemort and being 
slandered and libeled for it or the events in COS after Harry spoke 
Parseltongue.  So when has his development been hindered by being the 
Chosen One specifically rather than by being an average teen and 
living in a quasi-supervised living arrangement like Hogwarts?  

Now I do see Harry being favored by Dumbledore and would say he is 
one of several in the castle whom Dumbledore treats as special and 
protects because they are important for his Plan.  If there have been 
advantages for Harry there, such as DD stepping in and keeping Harry 
from being expelled or from failing potions, they are connected with 
Snape in particular and speak to a situation separate from Harry's 
development.  Meaning that Harry is unique in the way Snape treats 
him and that leads to special interventions rather than something 
developmentally flawed in Harry because he is the Chosen One.  
Although ironically I do think the fact that Harry is the Chosen One 
is the main reason why Snape treats him differently, the very thing 
he's supposedly trying to prevent happening with Harry. 

Jen