Dark Magic (+ a little Marietta)

[muscatel1988]

No: HPFGUIDX 176800

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "dumbledore11214" 
<dumbledore11214 at ...> wrote:
> I had argued in the past that JKR intended Marietta to be mini 
> Pettigrew of the sort - not AS serious, but in essense the same. I 
> happen to think that it is so. Do I think Pettigrew deserved what 
he 
> got? Most definitely. Same with Marietta for me. I do not buy that 
> JKR intended for DA to be kids' game.

Mus responds: 

But Pettigrew was an adult.  Marietta, in OotP, was not.  We know 
that 
she was in a position where her loyalties were likely to be torn, and 
we know that because we're told it in a book which features a 
teenaged, 
SHOUTY!1! immature Harry, sulking when Ron is made Prefect, smashing 
Dumbledore's gadgets and generally lapsing into spoilt-child 
behaviour. 

We believed that Harry because it made sense at his age - that's why 
we 
all applauded how she was portraying Our Hero growing up 
realistically.  It fitted because teenagers make stupid choices - 
after 
all one of those stupid choices led to Sirius getting killed.  It's 
not 
fair at the same time to judge Marietta as if she were an adult.  

When Cho tries to get Harry to be a little more understanding of her 
friend, he responds that "Ron's dad works for the Ministry too" 
[OotP, 
UK hb: 561].  He's being singularly undiscriminating here.  Ron has a 
rather different history to Marietta.  He's been through some pretty 
hairy stuff with Harry, his father is an Order member and has been 
attacked for it, he's been privy to the same information from trusted 
Order members about what is going on that Harry has, his uncles were 
killed in the last war.  His loyalties are *not* torn as Marietta's 
are.  

I'm not saying that Marietta was right.  I'm saying that we're given 
a 
portrait of a teenager who makes the wrong choice - albeit one her 
mother would have wanted her to make - and gets scarred for life by 
Hermione.  It's a pretty mean way to treat a child.

Compare Percy.  He's older, and he is a willing collaborator, with no 
suggestion that he's trying to do what his parents would want.  He 
emerges unblemished.

Mus