[HPforGrownups] Re: Draco
Sharon Hayes
s.hayes at qut.edu.au
Wed Sep 26 08:26:23 UTC 2007
No: HPFGUIDX 177421
> Carol responds:
>
> First, I hope you don't mind my leaving in the
> ’s (etc.) rather than
> changing them to apostrophes. I thought you might
> want to see how the
> post actually appears and consider using a different
> program or
> posting directly from the list to avoid the problem.
>
> With regard to Draco, being interested in him as a
> character and
> identifying with him are two different things. Draco
> has a moment or
> two when we can identify with him if we're honest
> with ourselves. Who
> hasn't made a mistake, sometimes a serious one,
> because they weren't
> listening to the teacher's or the boss's directions?
> We may not have
> been foolish enough to insult a hippogriff, but
> we've all been rash or
> foolish and paid the consequences. And I can find a
> number of reasons
> to fault Hagrid's teaching (and Dumbledore's hiring
> practices) in that
> incident as well. None of that means that I identify
> with Draco in
> general or even like him much, but I can understand
> why he acts as he
> does.
>
> Also, however obnoxious he may be, he *is* attacked
> twice by
> Gryffindors and/or DA members without actually
> having done anything.
> The second (OoP) could be considered a preemptive
> strike since his and
> his friends' wands are out, but the first (GoF) is
> an attack with
> wands in retaliation for verbal taunting. However
> you may feel about
> that incident, some of us consider such conduct on
> the part of our
> heroes questionable or at least worthy of
> examination. No one is
> defending Draco's behavior, but some of us are
> trying to understand
> it, to figure out what makes him tick.
>
> On the whole, the Draco we see in the first five
> books is not
> particularly interesting or likeable. It's not his
> fault that he's
> rich (so is Harry and so was James), nor should we
> hold that against
> him. Nor is his upbringing his fault (though we can
> certainly hold it
> against Lucius and Narcissa). But his touting of his
> father's
> influence and his use of it against a teacher he
> doesn't like (Hagrid)
> is unlikely to arouse the reader's sympathy (even if
> we don't much
> care for Hagrid or Buckbeak, either). The pureblood
> ethic (which I
> think harks back to the days of witch-burning by
> Muggles and perhaps
> also reflects a fear of Squib offspring as the
> result of marrying a
> Muggle or Muggleborn) has been indoctrinated into
> him to such an
> extent that he sees Muggleborns as inherently
> inferior and
> contaminated beings who deserve to be exterminated.
> IOW, he's a little
> bigot who would be happy if "the Mudblood Granger"
> were killed by a
> Basilisk.
>
> Unlike Snape, who has a certain mystique and
> ambiguity (and who is
> still disliked by our heroes even after they find
> out that he saved
> Harry's life and was thwarting Quirrell), Draco is
> who he seems to be
> for the first five books, as we discover when
> Polyjuiced Ron and Harry
> talk to him in his own common room. True, they were
> wrong about his
> being the Heir of Slytherin, but they weren't wrong
> about his
> anti-Muggleborn (and anti-Dumbledore) sympathies.
> There's no mystique
> about Draco. He's good at Potions and Quidditch and
> clever at making
> badges and song lyrics and (maybe) at manipulating
> people, but he's
> spiteful, jealous of Harry, and not very brave.
>
> Had it not been for his father's arrest and
> displacement by Snape as
> Voldemort's right-hand man (Snape's true loyalties
> being irrelevant
> here), Draco might have remained as he was, a
> less-than-model Prefect
> (turned Inquisitorial Squad member under Umbridge)
> who nevertheless
> cared about getting good marks on his OWLs and
> beating Gryffindor at
> Quidditch and making a laughingstock of Harry or
> Ron, content to gloat
> that the Dark Lord is back and that he's on the
> winning side but not
> yet ready to become a Death Eater himself. But the
> world is turned
> upside down for Draco when his idolized father is
> sent to Azkaban.
> Quidditch and school no longer matter. Even his
> rivalry (or whatever
> it is) with Harry no longer matters once he gets his
> revenge by
> Petrifying Harry and stomping on his hand--until
> Harry finds him
> crying in a bathroom, at which point their schoolboy
> duels suddenly
> metamorphose into a battle between enemies.
> Something significant has
> happened to Draco, who is experiencing fear and
> failure on a grand
> scale. Harry, seeing Draco lying in his own blood on
> the floor through
> a spell that he foolishly cast, is only dimly aware
> of the change in
> him, but at least he realizes that he doesn't want
> Draco dead,
> especially by his hand. There are more changes to
> come; Draco learns
> that he's not a killer; Harry's contempt for him is
> mingled with pity.
>
> Disappointingly for some readers, realistically for
> others, Draco
> remains in this state of indecisiveness--hating the
> reality of being a
> Death Eater, fearing the consequences to himself and
> his family of
> refusing to obey the Dark Lord--for much of DH. The
> scene in the RoR
> can be differently interpreted, but the echoes of
> Snape's words and
> reasoning suggest that Draco, too, is pretending a
> loyalty he does not
> feel, trying to protect Harry (and the diadem?) from
> his would-be DE
> friends, especially Crabbe (Goyle, perhaps following
> Draco's lead or
> confused by Crabbe's rebellion against Draco, does
> nothing more than
> point his wand at Harry).
>
> Draco may not be the "good Slytherin" that some of
> us hoped for, but
> he's a most reluctant and disillusioned Death Eater
> and much more
> human and pitiable in HBP and DH than he was in the
> earlier books.
> Harry at first thinks that he's going to be thwarted
> by Draco, Crabbe,
> and Goyle in the RoR, but he ends up saving Draco's
> life, while Draco
> and the reluctant Ron save the unconscious Goyle.
> (Harry even regrets
> Crabbe's death; Ron holds the more usual view that
> Crabbe got what he
> deserved.) Even when Draco, now wandless, begs two
> DEs not to hurt him
> and claims (untruthfully, IMO) that he's on their
> side, Harry again
> saves him while Ron punches him and calls him
> two-faced. The reader
> can choose between Ron's and Harry's views or even
> sympathize a bit
> with both. Draco will never be brave (in marked
> contrast to Snape),
> but at least he has no relish for the life of a
> Death Eater, for
> murder and torture and coercion.
>
> If Draco can change so drastically from the arrogant
> bully of OoP and
> the revenge-seeking would-be murderer of early HBP
> to the reluctant DE
> who deflects Crabbe's Unforgiveable Curses, surely
> he has learned some
> valuable and painful lessons(?) If Harry can forgive
> him, surely the
> reader should consider doing the same(?) Draco's
> curt nod to Harry
> stands in marked contrast to Lucius's taunts and
> even fisticuffs with
> Arthur Weasley, his slightly older contemporary and
> schoolfellow. With
> Harry's words to Albus Severus about Slytherin being
> okay and a
> Slytherin headmaster as the bravest man he ever
> knew, chances are that
> Albus and Scorpius won't get off to the same rocky
> start as James and
> Severus or Harry and Draco. And in yet another
> generation, the DE-free
> Slytherin House may be able to put its past behind
> it as Germany has
> put its Nazi past behind it, and old wounds may be
> fully healed.
>
> I'm not arguing for my interpretation. I'm only
> trying to show why I
> consider Draco and his character arc, especially in
> HBP and DH, to be
> interesting and significant, not only for Draco
> himself and for
> Slytherin House, for which he is the chief
> representative of his
> generation, but for Harry as he gains understanding
> and develops
> compassion for a boy he once despised.
>
> Carol, whose sympathy for Draco's plight in HBP and
> DH does not blind
> her to his own responsibility in helping to create
> that predicament
Sharon:
Brilliant analysis Carol. I agree wholeheartedly and do not even have anything to
add!
More information about the HPforGrownups
archive