Dumbledore's love life WAS: Canon citation requested

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 178516

> Magpie:
> Dumbledore's never been a teacher during the series--and at the 
point 
> Harry's learning about Grindenwald, he's dead! 

Alla:

Right, I am afraid I see the Headmaster as a teacher all the same. 
And it seems that Dumbledore talks of himself as teacher to Tom, to 
Harry several times during series. Regardless, I see him as teacher, 
Headmaster in charge of the school to me is a teacher all the same. 
IMO of course. But that is why he is Headmaster not a teacher not 
working for me at all.

But sure, Dead part is true. But funny thing is I think it still 
plays out nicely for me. I mean, sure story logic wise, there are no 
constraints now for Harry to learn about their love story ( as in no 
Dumbledore restraining himself not talk to student, etc).

But but who else would know? As in not implications a la Rita 
Skeeter, but the **truth** of one teenager really falling in love 
with another teenager, and suffering over it, etc. Who else would 
know real story but Dumbledore? I mean, would Batilda know 
everything? Would Rita? Or would they only repeat bits and pieces 
that would distort the picture for Harry so badly that JKR may 
consider that it is better for Harry to never learn it at all, since 
Dumbledore is not around to say what was really in his heart.

I mean, I suppose King Cross was a good place to mention it by 
Dumbledore, here I see no reason not to, since Dumbledore went into 
begging forgiveness and all that.

I am just saying it is working for me.

 
> Of course I can see Dumbledore not mentioning his sexual 
preference 
> to Harry, and Harry never seeing him do anything that would show 
it 
> to him. Though I think the Grindelwald relationship, if he was in 
> love with him, would be relevent. Not that I can't make it work 
> character-wise for Dumbledore to not say anything about it, since 
it 
> seems totally in character for him to talk about other peoples' 
> romantic motivations while brushing over his own if he thought it 
> made him look bad. 

Alla:

Right, exactly.


But I don't think JKR was forced to leave it out 
> if she wanted it in there. I think she's the one who made the 
> decision to not give us that reason as part of the mix of 
> Dumbledore's motivations.


Alla:

Really depends to me on what you mean by *was forced*. If you mean 
that somebody **else** forced her to not mention in the story, then 
I agree, I am sure right now she is powerful enough to insist on it 
even if her editors will freak out.

But if by forced one means thinking about the external circumstances 
that can hurt the books, oh yeah, I think that in a sense she may 
have been forced. Metaphorically of course.

To repeat what I said before - in a sense that she may not have 
wanted to give more people reasons to burn the books.

To make a long story short, her not mentioning it in the books for 
me works in any event - I can totally see it storyline and character 
reason wise OR I can see why she just vaguely hinted it and not 
included even if she wanted to. If the second one is correct, 
meaning correct in a sense that she wanted to mention, but changed 
her mind due to external circumstances, I can SO see why and cannot 
judge her for that at all.


 
> It will be interesting to see if she would put it in the 
> encyclopedia, actually.

Alla:

Oh yeah, totally. And if she will, I think it has a much better 
chances of staying at least a footnote of canon, if the books stand 
the test of time. After all, Bests and Quidditch are part of the 
canon, encyclopedia IMO should be too.

Heee, I am thinking of Aragon and Arven - also sort of a footnote, 
no?

JMO,

Alla