The Deathly Hallows: Morality of Mythical Objects

[prep0strus]

No: HPFGUIDX 177404

> va32h:
> I would say the moral is - don't make a deal with the devil (or 
> Death, as he is called in the Three Brothers tale). 
> 
<SNIP>
> Anyway, it's an old, old theme.  As it's used here, I'd say that the 
> idea is that you really can't cheat Death.  Death will always come 
> for you, no matter how cleverly you think you've avoided him and 
> death will always win in the end.  You can act recklessly - as if you 
> are above death (the brother with the wand), or you can wallow in 
> mourning for someone who's already gone (the brother with the stone) 
> or you can accept that Death will be out there somewhere, sometime 
> and live your own life to the fullest, until you have to meet him. 
> 
> va32h
>

Prep0strus:
I agree with you about what her moral probably was supposed to be, and
even about your analysis of the characters and how they relate to the
fable characters... except that third brother. You say, 'live your own
life to the fullest, until you have to meet him'.  That's nice, but
how does an invisibility cloak represent that?  Sure, the third
brother does lead his own life - has kids, and faces death head
high... but what an invisibility cloak represents to me is nothing
like that at all.  Invisibility represents fear and avoidance.  The
third brother lives his entire life hiding from death.  And as a
symbolic device, invisibility appears to be much more about fear,
stealth, or shame, rather than courage or acceptance.  It feels to me
an odd choice to make, other than that Harry already had one at his
disposal.  But if she were planning this from the beginning, I really
don't get it.

It also doesn't make the fable itself work that well for me - I don't
like the inconsistency of one gift being a trick that doesn't work,
one working until you lose it through your own flaws, and one working
perfectly.

Jen: There's sort of a riddle to them as well, only one who doesn't
seek them can find them; only one who doesn't attempt to use them to
defeat death can work them properly or gain any benefit from them.
They remind me of the Stone in the Mirror - only one who wants the
Stone but not to use can get it out.

Prep0strus:
But the first brother doesn’t try to defeat death.  There is no use
for the second gift â€" it simply doesn’t work properly.  And the third
brother DOES try to defeat death with it â€" and he does.

Cel:
He never wins, ever. In the long run, Draco is resigned to the
has-beens pile, those who won in the short term but were ultimately
defeated by the Main-Character-Upon-Whom-All-Blessings-Are-Heaped. But
does he go home and cry to his mummy about Harry? No, he jumps right
back up after a few days (after crying to his mummy?). If nothing
else, we can all silently applaud he can doggedly pursue his own
agenda, even when he ought to have quit long ago.

Prep0strus:
Well, I don't know if he loses in his own head as much as we the
reader think of him as losing.  I guess perseverance can be considered
a positive trait... but when it's perseverance in pursuit of
unpleasant and wrong goals, it kind of makes it a wash for me.

Cel:
And he has not been depicted as a thoroughly hatable character. Low
and unworthy of adoration and petty and arrogant and so on and so
forth, but he has never been Evil. What he did in HBP was admittedly
rather Evil, but it was tempered by the fact he didn't really want it,
he just didn't want to get caught with what would happen if he didn't
do it; his motivation for LV's cause seems to be mostly fear for
himself. And I suppose, in his very, very, very tiny way, he rebels.
Sort of. Just enough to shout out to us that he IS Redeemable!Draco,
and we should not condemn him yet.

Prep0strus:
I agree. I thought, especially after HBP, we would see a true
redemption. I don't, however, feel we've gotten that in DH.  It's not
really my main point - it's not whether or not Draco is truly evil or
able to be redeemed, but why anyone would like him or identify with him.

Still, I guess I will say here that the scene where he doesn't want to
leave Goyle didn't do that much for me.  Just because someone is bad,
doesn't make every single thing they do bad.  Some characters are
drawn as completely one dimensionally evil.  But other characters
could be pretty much evil, and yet still have things they care about.
 Caring for another person does not instantly make you redeemed or
wonderful.  He had friends, and he didn't want them to die.  The
question is whether he would have attempted to save Harry or Ron or
Hermione if the situation were reversed.  Whatever reluctance Harry
might see in Draco there - and it easily could have been because he
wanted to follow voldemorte's instructions, instead of going all
commando like Crabbe - Draco and Goyle were still supporting Crabbe,
who was trying to KILL Harry.  This was not a game.  The good guys
could have died, and I think we see enough to guess that Draco might
have been upset by it, but Crabbe certainly wouldn't be, and I don't
think goyle would be either.  And I don't think any of them would make
even a small effort to help them.  Harry risks his neck for the people
who were trying to destroy him, and that's what makes him the 'hero' -
like Disney's Beast or Simba.  Draco isn't the 'villain' because he
doesn't turn around and stab him after being rescued.  But simply not
wanting a friend to die does not make him suddenly wonderful.  Just as
Ron not mourning the loss of his would be murderer or not wanting to
rescue his would be murderer's accomplices makes him evil.  He's just
not 'the hero'.  Wow. Long tangent.  Sorry.

Anyway, I agree that Draco was redeemable, but I think JKR didn't
really redeem him - she grabbed him back from the cliff of evil,
without really making him good.  And if Voldy had won the battle of
Hogwarts, he may have wound up back on his evil path.

Cel:
You can feel sympathetic to Draco, I think, because you can't really
be angry at him. Or hate him, the way you can Voldemort or Snape if
you were all for Snape the Traitor after HBP. And since he really
never wins enough to be the top dog, and never is evil enough to be
respected, or nice enough to be liked, he just kind of flows to the
middling ground of being someone to sympathize and sort of
patronizingly comfort.

Prep0strus:
Here, I disagree.  I manage to find more hate for him and other
characters more than I do for Voldemorte, because voldemorte is...
he's over the top. He's supreme evil.  Yes, he's horrible, in every
way.  But he's a monster, and you don't really expect humanity out of
him (actually, i don't entirely believe that, because he was a person,
and i think it makes him a more interesting character than some
villains, but picture Sauron from Lord of the Rings or Something).

But with Draco, it's a little more personal.  He's the bully that
preys on weakness. He's the rich kid that gets whatever he wants. 
He's a racist.  He doesn't respect life.  And he's striving to be
worse than he is.  I don't want to comfort him.  I don't want to kill
him either, exactly - just smack some sense into him.

He's more sympathetic towards the end because he's beaten down.  but
he's never earned anything in his life, and doesn't really earn the
right to a good and free life at the end.  Despite doing everything
wrong, things turn out ok for him.  The other characters have truly
earned their peace.  But Draco did everything he could to ruin it for
everyone else, but he wound up having everything be ok - marriage, kid
- both his parents survive, putting him ahead of just about everyone
else.  I don't think he's necessarily the consummate loser.  And I
certainly have the ability to be angry at him when he mocks and taunts
much better people than himself, when he looks for the death of good
creatures and people, when he behaves as the rotten, spoiled, bigot
that he is.

Montavilla47:
In CoS, we get a glimpse of Draco and his father, and see that
Draco isn't actually spoiled. He doesn't get everything he wants
from his parents (in contrast to Dudley, who does), and he had to
live up to some high standards--his father expects him to
outclass every other student in school. (From this moment, a
million fanfics in which Draco is systemically tortured by Lucius
were inspired).
<SNIP>
A character who changes is usually more interesting than
a character who doesn't.


Prep0strus:
Well, he may not be Dudley, but getting those brooms to be on the
team, or getting Buckbeak executed shows how his father his willing to
use his influence.  I don't personally think Draco changed very much.
I thought he was going to, after reading HBP, but DH was immensely
disappointing in that regard.  Draco gets out a good one liner now and
then, but so do many characters - the twins, Ron, and many others. 
And they're not usually making fun of someone's teeth or their hand me
down clothes or because they might be killed by a genocidal sociopath.

I think Draco is an interesting character, and could have been more so
if JKR had gone a different direction in DH.  But it doesn't make me
like him, and certainly doesn't make me identify with him.