Dark Magic WAS: Re:help with JKR quote/ Children's reactions

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 176780

Mike wrote:
> <snip> I suppose if you believe the Gryffindors are bad and the
Slytherins  are good, then you would also believe you are receiving a
"biased" POV in the worse sense of the word. In this case, I would say
we truly are not reading the same books. JKR wrote from the Gryff POV
because she also designated the Gryffs as the "Good Guys". <snip>

Carol responds:
Yes and no. We start out with the pov of a good (but not perfect)
eleven-year-old newcomer to the WW, a wizard who didn't know that he
was a wizard, much less the Boy Who Lived and all that. The whole
Snape arc, and to some extent, the Draco arc, depends on our seeing
the Slytherins as Harry sees them. Even in HBP, when we first see
Snape as he is among the DEs, he is an ambiguous figure. We aren't
privy to his thoughts. From the end of HBP until "The Prince's Tale,"
which constitutes an epiphany for Harry and, I would guess, for many
readers, Snape is presented as evil (with clues to the contrary that
Harry misses because he "knows" the truth). With Draco, whose father
is a DE and who really is after both revenge and "glory," along with
genuinely believing in the pure-blood agenda, his perception is a bit
more accurate. But Draco changes in HBP as he learns what being a
DE--and death--are really about, and Harry, who nearly kills him
accidentally in the Sectumsempra incident and then witnesses Draco's
fear and hseitation on the tower, the fractionally lowered wand in
particular, begins to feel pity mixed with his contempt. By the end of
DH, during which he has glimpses of Draco's plight (and the
opportunity to contrast Draco's behavior with his father's), he not
only understands Draco but saves his life (and Goyle's) at, to borrow
a phrase, great personal risk.

I won't go into Narcissa and Slughorn and Phineas Nigellus and
Regulus, but all of them in the end help Harry, and through him, the
reader, to see that the simplistic equation Slytherin = evil is not
accurate, nor is its corollary, Gryffindor = good. Courage is not the
sole property of Gryffindors; the Slytherin Snape is "probably the
bravest man [Harry] ever knew" and the Gryffindor Wormtail is
"Voldemort's most cowardly servant."

The view of Slytherin that the books have presented from SS/PS onward
(always with hints that Snape may not be the man Harry thinks he is)
is subtly undermined from the Pensieve scene in OoP onward and
overthrown completely by "The Prince's Tale." Even Bellatrix turns out
to have a touch of humanity, concern and affection for her sister,
even if they are countered and outweighed by her fanatical loyalty to
the Dark Lord. (Is Bellatrix yet another instance of the dangers of
obsessive love pointed out by Slughorn in his first Potions lesson in
HBP)? We are meant, I think, to pity Draco, to forgive and admire
Snape, to be proud of Slughorn for coming through in the end. The
defeat of Voldemort does not come about solely through the efforts of
Gryffindor (and its unsung allies, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff.) "And let
it be noted that Slytherin House played its part! Let our contribution
not be forgotten!" says Phineas Nigellus after the battle (DH Am ed. 747).

Amen, Phineas.

Harry's perception of Slytherin House has been distorted from the
beginning by his first and second encounters with Draco, along with
Hagrid's inaccurate remark about all DEs coming with Slytherin and the
coincidence of feeling his scar hurt as Snape looks at him. It does
not help that four of the five Slytherin boys in Harry's year are
Death Eaters' sons (though we get only glimpses of Theo Nott, who does
not become a Death Eater despite his father's being one), or that
Harry's knowledge of Slytherin is confined almost solely to Draco and
his thuggish cronies, Crabbe and Goyle, and to Snape, whose attempts
to force him to follow directions and school rules through deducted
points and detentions come across to Harry and the reader as bullying.

This view of Slytherin in general and of Snape and Draco in particular
is deliberate on JKR's part; she is setting up Harry and the reader
for a reversal in "The Prince's Tale." Other indications of
Slytherin's human face have already appeared in the flawed but
generally likeable Slughorn, Narcissa's fears for her son, and Snape's
gentlemanly handling of her distress in contrast to his sarcastic
handling of Bellatrix and Wormtail even as he maintains his ambiguity
by taking the Unbreakable Vow.

My point is that Harry's view of Gryffindor as good and Slytherin as
evil has been overturned by the end of the books. At least some
Slytherins are good; others, perhaps the majority, if we look at the
Slytherin students, are morally neutral. Even people like Lucius
Malfoy, whom we have seen saying and doing evil things since CoS, has
some good in him (he loves his son). Slughorn, who would rather hide
than fight, chooses to fight. And Gryffindor is also imperfect, as
Dumbledore's history amply illustrates (as does Harry's Crucio and
Ron's and Hermione's temptation by the Elder Wand).

Throughout the books, from Snape "causing" Harry's scar to hurt to
Harry supposedly urging the snake to attack Justin Finch-Fletchley to
Sirius Black "murdering" thirteen people to Snape "murdering"
Dumbledore, things are not as they seem. In the last two books, and
particularly in "The Prince's Tale," the veil has been lifted from
Slytherin. It isn't perfect, by any means. Many of the students of
Voldemort's generation and their sons became Death Eaters, as did even
more Slytherin students of Snape's generation. But Snape himself is
fully redeemed; Lucius Malfoy, perhaps, partially redeemed and
certainly humbled. And, of Harry's generation, only three students
become DEs or DE wannabes, and the most important of the three, Draco,
learns that he is not a killer and does not enjoy coercion and
torture. There will be no more Death Eaters. And cunning, as we see
with Snape and Phineas Nigellus and Harry himself, can be used for good.

Carol, who thinks that Harry's ability to see others clearly rather
than judging by appearances is the chief lesson he learns in the books