Did Harry Notice?

[Mike]

No: HPFGUIDX 182921

I wrote this yesterday, got all finished when my computer decided it 
didn't like what I wrote and forced me to shut down. I hope my 
computer likes this version and let's me post it. ;(


> Pippin:
> We should have already learned, from Harry's adventures, that the
> hero's one true accomplishment is his choice to face the enemy 
> against the odds.  All the rest he owes to providence.

Mike:
I thought we were supposed to learn that Harry's one true virtue was 
his extrodinary ability to love and all the ways in which that 
manifests itself. Harry made true and loving friends, put the welfare 
of others above himself, would do anything for the ones he loved 
(which in the end included giving up his life for the rest of the 
WW), and fought the entire fight to validate the love of his parents.

Though the hero often has the odds stacked against him, I always 
thought that the one true test was his/her selfless adherence to the 
cause that elevated him/her to the status of hero.

 
> Pippin:
> This is our final exam, our chance to find out if we've
> internalized what we've been told. Are we ready to think the same
> of James' bravery knowing how easily he was beaten? I guess for
> some of us the answer is 'no'. <g> But in that case, IMO, JKR
> would like us to see that we weren't really admiring heroism. 

Mike:
I don't think James bravery was ever in question. Nor do I think 
bravery is all that is required to be pronounced a hero. But why 
shouldn't I think differently of James based on how he performed? 

Let me compare and contrast him with Perseus. James gave up his 
helmut of invisibility (his IC to DD) willingly, lost his shield 
(broken Fidelius) unwillingly, which only left him his sword (his 
wand). James then stepped into the Gorgon's chamber without his last 
weapon. It's no wonder he was turned to stone (AKed).

This isn't a Greek tragedy nor epic poem, but what would you have 
thought of Perseus if he had performed like James? Why shouldn't I 
take the same approach to James as I would any hero? I think it was 
James that failed to internalize the teachings of his youth. He saw 
what happened when leaving Sirius up to his own devices (the Prank). 
If he wasn't aware of Peter's lack of fortitude, he should have been. 
And for goodness sake, he proved himself what happens to someone 
taken unawares if they don't have their wand at the ready (SWM).

Would it have made a difference in the battle, of course not. But it 
would have made a difference in James legacy.



> Pippin:
> But that's just backwards, IMO.  No one in canon has to be a
> responsible adult to be a hero -- <snip>

Mike:
James does, imo. We were shown all the ways James behaved 
irresponsibly in his youth. He was still picking on Severus, two on 
one mind you, as late as his fifth year O.W.L.s (and after he had 
saved him from the Prank). Yet somehow he was made Head Boy in his 
seventh year. Why? In what way did he mature enough to deserve that 
honor?


> Pippin:
> Harry was a hero in his own right at the age of eleven. You have
> to be a responsible adult to be a kind and loving father, to find
> it more important and more rewarding to sit on the sofa and play
> with your child than to slay a legion of dragons or to save the
> world from Voldemort. Yes, we need heroes to fight the Voldemorts
> of this world, but canon seems to imply there might be fewer 
> Voldemorts if we valued men less for their heroic prowess and
> more for their love and dedication to fathering.

Mike:
James was never going to be the kind of hero that Harry was, I agree 
with this premise. I certainly don't deny that love of family was an 
important theme and rightly so. Heaven knows, without Lily's love of 
Harry we wouldn't have a story. 

But what part was James supposed to play in this theme. I submit it 
was loving father, adoring husband, and *protector of hearth and 
home*. It was in this last role that James falls short, not by a lot. 
However, in the one role that differentiates him from Lily, he 
doesn't give his best performance possible. Doesn't this in a small 
way point to James' dedication to fathering?


> Pippin:
> Sorry for the misquote  --  And thanks for the compliments! 
> I don't think your desire for a meaningful progression is
> misguided, but I think we're supposed to look at *all* the
> characters to see a meaningful progression. It's our desire to
> see progress demonstrated in our particular favorites that's
> frustrated.

Mike:
I think you're right, both about character progression and my 
frustration regarding James' portrayal. But I also think I'm right in 
pointing out James failure to perform. Further, I think it was poor 
penmanship for JKR to make James Head Boy without giving us any real 
reason to believe that he earned that position.

Yes, this was Harry's story and we were supposed to see that Harry 
transcended his father's looks and deeds. We were also supposed to 
see how Harry transcended and forgave the man that treated him like 
dirt and could never forgive Harry for being born or looking like his 
father. Yet Snape was shown to have progressed, to have realized the 
errors of his ways and repented. He did this while James was still 
alive. So why couldn't we have been given just one example of how 
James progressed?

It's not just that James was one of *my* favorites. He was Harry's 
father, Harry looked up to him. We knew that Harry was going to 
exceed James' accomplishments. But shouldn't that have required Harry 
to go a little farther down the hero's path? Instead, Harry barely 
had to do anything to exceed the meager accomplishments of his 
father, and that's just not right imo. Harry was given a raised bar 
early on, and then the bar was lowered by the end, at least as far as 
his father was concerned.


> Pippin:
> We don't see how James grows out of hexing people for fun,
> but we see how Harry does -- nothing dramatic, no realization that
> he'd even done it. He just stopped as he developed a taste for more
> mature activities, such as snogging Ginny and took on a man's job
> (in the colloquial sense) of hunting for horcruxes. 

Mike:
Montavilla already responded to this point, so I shant. But thanks 
for your colloquial response. ;-)



> Pippin:
> Besides which, if he'd had a chance to fight and still failed,
> wouldn't we see inferior magical skills rather than betrayal as the
> cause of his death?  Perhaps that is why people are so reluctant to
> abandon the idea of James falling with his wand in hand -- it's too
> uncomfortable to think that his trust in his friends betrayed him.

Mike:
I know I wouldn't have thought less of James if he had fought and 
lost. I didn't expect anyone besides Dumbledore to be able to 
withstand a Voldemort assault. It was the effort that counted, imo.

Harry quashes the idea of not trusting each other early on in DH. 
This despite the knowledge that it was one of his father's *friends* 
that betrayed him. Since that position didn't come back and bite him 
in the ass, I don't think we should be uncomfortable to think that 
James had done the same thing all those years previous. In fact, 
isn't that a typical theme in a hero's journey, that of betrayal of 
trust that leads to the lesser hero's downfall? The only thing 
missing is that Harry doesn't really have to deal with his own 
betrayal of trust, Marrietta notwithstanding.

 
> Pippin:
> IMO, the epic is not one of sin and redemption but of moral and
> emotional growth, from Voldemort and his fellow baby-heads, who
> never get the better of their aggressive impulses and are
> eventually doomed by them, to Harry who learns the full power of
> love at Dobby's grave, and thus  can choose to offer a second
> chance to the man who killed his parents even after years of
> seeking revenge on him, and who can choose to return good for evil
> in giving honor to the memory of a man who never honored him in
> life.

Mike:
As Magpie phrased it, this is certainly the land that redemption 
forgot. :D Yet that man that Harry honored got his redemption badge, 
didn't he? But yeah, this was a Bildungsroman not a Greek epic. Harry 
was already a hero in the WW before he stepped into the WW.

Still, the two most disappointing characters for me were Draco and 
James. Neither of their story arcs were completed. For Draco we were 
left guessing what there may be to come and for James we were left 
lamenting what might have been.


> > > Pippin previously:
> > > I think JKR knew exactly what she was doing in DH, 
> > > foreshadowed it with the scene from PS/SS, and always
> > > intended to show James facing Voldemort without his wand. 
> > > <snip>
> > 
> > Mike previously:
> > <snip> 
> > Facing him without your wand, is resignation to your fate.

Mike:
I've had a further thought. Was JKR forshadowing Harry's resignation 
to his fate in the forest by James responding to Voldemort's 
intrusion without his wand? 


> > Mike previously:
> > Not bringing your wand in the first place is foolish,
> 
> Pippin:
> Foolish? Or just tired and accident prone? 

Mike:
It really doesn't matter, does it? James was both hero to Harry and 
failure to the reader. At least to this reader.