Epilogue (was Re: Ron and Parseltongue)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 183612

> Carol responds:
> 
> Which does not change the fact that *modern critics* in general
> consider the deus ex machina (not the literal device but the
> figurative application of the term) to be a flaw in a modern work of
> literature.

Pippin:
JKR is not writing a novel in the modern style. This is a tale about
wizards, dragons and heroes. It is not a flaw when Beowulf finds the
very sword he needs in the lair of the monster; it's psychological
truth. The lair is a "real inside your head" place -- it makes sense
that the tool you need to get out  is in your head as well. We can't
always keep ourselves from imagining monsters, but we can always
imagine that we have the power to defeat them.

 The dungeons of Malfoy Manor are not a real place either -- JKR is
not examining how someone might escape if they were actually captured
by terrorists.  

Thematically, the mirror shard is one of a number of apparently
useless items that Harry kept only for sentiment's sake. Like the
fraudulent locket and the broken pieces of his wand, he did not expect
it  to be any good. 

In the course of the story, Harry discovers there is worth in each of
these "treasures." But if it had not been for the power of love, he
wouldn't have kept those things, and he never would have discovered
the good in them. Hmmmm.



Carol:
 And I read JKR's epigraph not as the invocation Aeschylus
> intended but as an indication that "the children" (HRH) are her
heroes and avengers (even though they shed no blood in the process of
> avenging the WW).

Pippin:
There are lots of quotes about children. Why choose one that also
invokes divine powers if that is extraneous to her message?

> > 
> Carol earlier: 
> > > Her failure to define Dark magic clearly and consistently is,
IMO, one such failure. 

Pippin:
Unless dark magic is exactly what it is in the real world: a
superstition. Let's see if that works. 

The dark creatures are the ones which wizards (and Muggles, in former
times) regarded with superstitious fear. The dark wizards are the ones
who use the fear of dark magic to gain power, and the dark spells are
the ones associated with those wizards. Simple, really. 

The dark arts are not magic which is intrinsically evil, they are
magic which wizards fear above all else and which dark wizards use to
extend their power. But there doesn't have to be a reasonable basis
for the fear. Saying "Voldemort" was not actually dangerous until DH. 


That is the power that Dumbledore is too noble to  use: he tries not
use fear to gain power, in fact he sometimes bends over backwards to
avoid it. Crouch Sr. can be very anti-Dark Arts and still authorize
the use of the Unforgivable Curses because (IMO) he doesn't see
himself as creating an atmosphere of fear and terror (even though he
is.) As far as he's concerned, he's using magic to punish and avenge.
 

James is anti-Dark Arts, meaning he's against the kind of magic dark
wizards use to terrify the helpless. That he's able to torture people
with household spells doesn't signify to his immature mind. Nobody's
that afraid of scurgify and schoolyard jinxes, so they can't be that bad. 

  Snape, OTOH, invents a spell that terrifies as well as wounds his
enemies: he *wants* people to be superstitiously afraid of him. Not
just afraid of what they know he can do, but of what they *don't* know
he can do, as Harry usually is. 

We don't learn what magic Mulciber tried to use on Mary,
and  JKR doesn't give us rules for what dark magic is. There are no
rules for superstitions, and it's scarier if we don't know exactly
what it is dark wizards are supposed to be capable of doing.

In sum, people are afraid of certain  magic,  the word for that magic
is "dark"  and because they're afraid, they think it's evil, quite
apart from what harm the magic can actually do. It's no different than
the way they look at Giants or werewolves.

Harry should not be proud of channeling Bella, IMO. You have to enjoy
causing pain to use crucio, and that's possibly not something an
emotionally healthy person would feel. But I don't think it's more
evil than if Harry had brutalized Amycus with his fists. We would
probably still be having the same argument over whether he'd done the
right thing and whether JKR expected people to have mixed feelings
about it. 

In fairy tales, the reader very often isn't told what the hero or
heroine is thinking. They are not about the hero's character, they are
a way that you, the reader, can discover your own character. What
would you do, and how would you feel, if a hated enemy was at your mercy?


Carol:
The problem, for me, is that *Harry* didn't feel it, and neither did
anyone else in the scene that we know of. 

Pippin:
Well, I'm sure Amycus wasn't happy about it. <g> But if JKR wants us
to sort out our mixed feelings for ourselves, it isn't going to serve
her purpose to say how Harry feels. The point is not a touching
description of Harry's remorse, or Harry's triumph for that matter. It
is for us to see how easily righteous anger can tip into sadism,
something JKR already described when Harry was considering turning
Dudley into something with feelers in OOP.

> Carol responds:
) Or take wands. Yes, she's trying to build on what Ollivander
> told Harry in SS/PS, that the wand chooses the Wizard (it was, of
> course, Lily wand that chose her and not the other way around) and
> that a Wizard will never have such good results with another
Wizard's wand, an idea that's partially borne out by Neville's
experience with his father's wand and Harry's with the Snatcher's wand
and Hermione's with Bellatrix's in DH but only partially elsewhere
(Ron has no particular difficulties with Charlie's wand until it gets
broken). 

In DH we get the new information about wand loyalty, but we're also
told by Ollivander that any wizard can use any wand if he's any wizard
at all. 

Pippin:
It's lore, not law. Wand lore isn't science, it's a collection of
stuff that (usually) works. More like engineering. There's no reason
the wizards themselves have to understand this stuff, or that Rowling
has to think up a set of coherent technical rules for it which Harry
wouldn't understand, being a layperson, even if Ollivander did.

We don't understand how memory works, we have conflicting theories,
and yet there are memory experts and all kinds of hints, tricks and
even drugs for improving it. My impression was that Ollivander was
explaining something he himself didn't understand very well to someone
whom he was sure would understand it even less.

The wands are sentient, but they don't have human characteristics like
love. We can understand why the wizards are so reluctant to share them
with other races. Where will they be if all their wands desert them?
The wands' attraction to power  reminds me of something a
martial arts master told me once: "The first thing you need to know
about a sword is that it has no loyalty."

It doesn't matter whether Harry was bluffing on a thin hand or
absolutely certain that the Elder Wand was his when he faced
Voldemort. It wasn't his understanding of wand lore but his faith in
himself and the power of love that empowered him to do it. 

The convoluted Elder Wand plot  directs us back to Draco's story and
to the Tale of the Three Brothers. Obviously they are important. The
two "wrong" choices in the Tale turned out to be just as important as
the "right" one. What seems evil may be good that has not yet found
its purpose -- which is, if I understand what JKR has been saying, the
reason that Slytherin House was kept. 

Pippin
who hopes JKR can forgive me if she ever finds out I'm the one who
started calling errors Flints