Working mothers, was Did the Slytherins come back

[montavilla47]

No: HPFGUIDX 181841

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Jen Reese" <stevejjen at ...> wrote:
>
> Montavilla:
> > And I'm not trying to bash JKR about her portrayal of
> > either mothers or non-mothers.  I'm just pointing
> > out that she seems to be a lot of power into mother
> > love--the other side of which is that women without
> > children tend end looking inconsequential and those
> > who divide their attention between work and children
> > end up with bad kids.
> 
> Jen: I wanted to add Alice Longbottom to the list of working moms.  
> 
> I was pleased that JKR didn't decide to cast only moms who got paid 
> for their work as the powerful ones in the story, including leaving 
> some ambiguous such as Luna's mom.  It also struck a positive note 
> for me to have mother love portrayed as something powerful and 
> important, since there are plenty of negative portrayls of the 
> suffocating mothers who wound with their 'love.' 
> 
> As for inconsequential women without children, McGonagall, Bellatrix, 
> Trelawney & Umbridge all played consequential roles in the story.

Montavilla47:
Thanks, Jen, for Alice.  I had forgotten that she was an honest-to-
goodness Auror.  

I am also glad that non-working mothers were powerful in the 
story.  Any objection I have to Molly's moment of triumph over
Bellatrix is not that she suddeny acquires mad dueling skillz, but
that she unwittingly (she is, after all, ignorant of Muggle culture),
starts quoting Ripley in Aliens.  It's just jarring is all.

But, I dunno.  I still think that McGonagall is just sort of shunted
aside in the story, when the readers were all ready to embrace her
as Dumbledore's replacement.  Trelawney is depicted as a fool,
and Umbridge and Bellatrix are hateful hags.


> Montavilla:
> > But, one can't help noticing a disturbing trend in HPB, in which the
> > female characters tend to fall apart if romantically thwarted, or
> > that throughout the series, motherhood is shown as the most 
> > powerful, ideal state for a woman. 
> 
> Jen: Hehe, I thought they were all falling apart in their various 
> ways.  The guys looked a little different doing it, but Ron got all 
> manly because he'd never kissed anyone, and Dean was down after Ginny 
> broke up with him (didn't he shatter his glass when she & Harry 
> kiss?).  Cormac turns lecherous when Hermione rebuffs him.  Harry's 
> got his roaring monster, lol.  I'm not sure anyone got a pass in HBP 
> when it came to being thwarted by romance, much as I wish JKR would 
> have canned about 3/4's of it.
> 
> Jen, glad that JKR didn't explain Slughorn's two perfect Felix days.
>

Montavilla47:
I gotta say, Jen, that I almost put in an earlier post that it's *men*
who should be offended at gender treatment in the series, because
all of them are seriously wanting in some way.

And yeah, Lupin unthwarted in love is even worse than Tonks when
she's depressed.  So go figure. :)

A slight correction.  It's not explicit, but I always thought that Cormac
became lecherous and *then* Hermione rebuffed him.