[HPforGrownups] Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Tom Riddle?

[Lee Kaiwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 178095

Katie blessed us with this gem On 12/10/2007 00:47:

 > Are any of us really that scared or intimdated by Voldemort?

Depends on what you mean. I think JK did a pretty decent job of 
demonstrating that LV was a moral monster, so I guess, on an academic or 
philosophical level, I did find his amorality quite frightening.

But I agree that LV seemed to spend most of the seven books tripping 
over himself. Heck, any reasonable guy would figure after going 
oh-for-three perhaps AK *wasn't* the best choice; but LV doesn't seem to 
have had that much imagination.

 > I mean, damn, he could have killed Harry outright so many times.
 > It's almost like he didn't really want to.

On this particular point, I read this rather as his vanity -- he wanted 
it to be a very public death that would allow him maximum gloating 
mileage. Look at the show he made of it in DH when he believed he 
finally had done Harry in. The guy seems to have had all the emotional 
security of a ten-year-old.

--CJ