CHAPDISC: DH3, The Dursleys Departing

[kneazlecat54]

No: HPFGUIDX 177336

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Laura Lynn Walsh <lwalsh at ...>
wrote:
 Harry came when Dudley was around a year and a half.  Part of
Petunia's neglect of Harry could have been overcompensating Dudley
for the analogous loss of importance she felt when Lily came along.
She is bound and determined that Dudley won't feel like she did.

Kneazlecat:
It often seems that if we are hurt or act in a way we are unhappy
with, we try to compensate for the lack in future situations or
relationships.  But because the new people or situations are not the
old ones, the books can never satisfactorily be balanced, and we
just frustrate ourselves trying.  And often the people in the new
situation don't know what's motivating us, so they're confused by
behavior that doesn't seem to be consistent with what they perceive
as reality, and on and on it goes.

It sounds like that's what's going on with Petunia, according to
your very insightful analysis.  She was hurt as a child, and instead
of figuring out why and who was responsible, she carried the hurt
with her into adulthood and punished someone who wasn't in any way
responsible for her anger.  And did her treatment of Harry make her
feel better?  No, of course not, because it was directed at the
wrong person.

I wonder if on some level, Petunia knew that she was being grossly
unfair to Harry, and if that made her feel guilty, but not so guilty
that she stopped being unfair to him.  If so, that might account for
her silence when they parted in DH.  Petunia was so full of
conflicting emotions, many of them carried from her childhood, that
she was emotionally paralyzed in that moment.

It would be interesting to think about the adult characters in canon
who spend the entire time reacting inappropriately to memories of
painful episodes in their pasts.  One could argue that Molly does
that, never having gotten over the deaths of her brothers.  She
becomes permantley fearful, instilling that fear in  her children
even during a time when there appears to be nothing particular to
fear.  And yet, she has the ability to pull herself together and get
tough when she has to, so it's not as though that part of herself
never existed.  But her grief for her brothers overwhelms the brave
part of her, until she has to bring it back to life.

<snip>
Laura wrote:
<snip> I think she [Petunia} would feel relieved to have Harry out
of her life.  She doesn't want to relive that part of her life.
<snip>

Kneazlecat:
So she'll continue to carry her anger and resentment around for the
rest of her life.  But if Dudders establishes a relationship with
Harry, maybe Petunia would feel forced to do so as well.

<snip>
Laura:
> We know for certain that they tried to instill in Dudley a hate
> and fear of everything magical.  <snip> His fears are confirmed
and expanded when he meets Hagrid and gets a tail.  Harry's powers
terrify Dudley - he can deal with muscle and insults; he is falls
apart when trying to deal with powers that he has been taught to fear
and doesn't understand.

Kneazlecat:
And there's the tragedy of the magic/Muggle intersection in
miniature.  Each has painful experiences with the other, no
constructive communication takes place and since neither side
understands how the other feels, things continue to deteriorate.
Harry is now estranged from the world in which he grew up, and the
Petunia has cut off the possibility of a relationship with her
sister's only child.  Sigh.