James and Intent

[potioncat]

No: HPFGUIDX 186963

 
> jkoney:
> We aren't shown this because it isn't relevent to the story of Harry's journey. We are told it more than once so the author doesn't have to write several scenes (meaningless to the plot) about it. 

Potioncat:
Are we told more than once that James was a great guy? I'm sure we all thought so before OoP. I think McGonagall expessed sadness that James and Lily had died. I think Hagrid said they were good people. Where else? (Hagrid thinks DD is the best Headmaster Hogwarts ever had. I doubt it.)


> jkoney:
> Doesn't this seem like she is telling us one thing in text and people aren't believing it? She seems to make the point quite clear that James grew up and was a good/great guy. So wouldn't this be the readers subjective view overriding what is actually written down? 

Potioncat:
But JKR wrote lots of reversals. And after SWM, many of us wondered if James was another one. Were we set up to believe one thing, but have somehing else be true? The same JKR that wrote Hagrid's and McGonagall's comments, also wrote Snape's memories. And she wrote the memories much more vividly.

We aren't ignoring her canon---we are actually perplexed by it. 

I think she pictured James as being a good adult. That much I get. And I see Pippin's point of view about his simply growing up. It's the writing of it that seems somehow unsettling. We think James is a great guy (but I don't know why we thought that) then we saw him being a jerk--several times---and we never see the transformation between the two moments. So it's unclear why we got the good man/bad boy story without the middle transforming scene.

Except that in a way, it gives us a reversal on Snape. First we see the big jerk teacher, then we see the vulnerable 11 year old. We get to see some of the events in his life that may have colored the man he would become. But we never see that for James. 

Of course, if I had to choose more James for less Severus. I'll keep what we got.