MAGICkal elITE

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 186402

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Carol" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:
>
> Geoff wrote:
> > Looking at the choices which we have been considering in this thread, 
> > on several occasions I have said that I regard Harry as an everyman (with 
> > a small "e"). <snip>
> > 
> > If I may misquote Shakespeare, "Some are born heroes, some achieve  
> > heroism and some have heroism thrust upon them".
> > 
> > Harry, I believe, fits into the last category. He sees himself as a very 
> > ordinary person:
> > `"Hagrid," he said quietly, "I think you must have made a mistake. 
> > I don't think I can be a wizard."'
> 
> > He feels uncomfortable when he is thrown into the limelight:
> > <snip>
> 
> Carol responds:
> 
> I understand your interpretation and in some respects I agree with it.

Geoff: 
I consider Harry as an everyman because I cannot see him as Christ as 
some people do. Although I started this post because I was perturbed 
by Kemper's suggestion about aliens and Superheros. I only hope that 
he wrote that with a po-face and tongue-in-cheek.

I dislike aliens (in this context) and Superheros: X-men or Superman 
or similar; the one I dislike most is the insufferable, immortal and 
apparently omnipotent Q in Star Trek. I dislike them because I always 
find stories where a Superhero acts as a deus ex machina totally 
unsatisfying.

So I seek an everyman with whom I can identify. As I said earlier, 
everyone has the innate ability to be a hero (small 'h') if events demand
it. 

<snip>

Carol:
> But wanting to be Just Harry and being Just Harry are two different things. I agree that in many respects, he's just an ordinary wizard kid. He wears glasses and has unruly hair that not even magic can tame. At least in the first four books, he's small and skinny (like Snape as a child). He suffers unfairness and bullying in varying degrees from a variety of characters. He likes to have fun; he breaks the rules; he cheats on his homework; he has problems dealing with girls. His grades in most subjects are above average rather than exceptional, in part because he lets his mind wander in class. So far, setting aside the fact that he's a wizard, he's a kid that any reader can identify with in one respect or another. This is the Harry that we would have seen, probably, had Voldemort not come to power, killed his parents, and given him that scar.

<Snip>

> It's useful, I think, to contrast him with Neville, who can be viewed as a foil to Harry (that is, a character is a similar situation who can be compared and contrasted with another character). Neville, too, might have been the Boy Who Lived (assuming that his mother had for some reason been given a chance to live). And Neville, too, lost his parents to Voldemort even though they're technically still alive. But Neville, with neither fame nor scar nor special destiny, is unquestionably an everyman. Though he has a talent for Herbology, he has no extraordinary powers (from a Wizarding perspective). His own family worries that he may be a Squib. He does not even recognize his own remarkable courage, which is overshadowed by his self-doubts.
 
Geoff:
You have drawn our attention to Neville; this had also occurred to me. 
I'm not saying that we should not have our own strengths and talents.
As you rightly point out, Harry has his Quidditch. I am hopeless at sports 
but I had the ability to be a successful Maths teacher. I am not arguing 
that we all have to be dunderheads but that events can shape what we do 
and make use of what we may consider to be only ordinary skills.

Carol:
> But in Harry's absence, in the face of danger, Neville emerges as a leader, resourceful and courageous. I was thinking when I read your paraphrase of Shakespeare, that Neville, like Harry, had heroism thrust upon him, but now I think that Neville achieved heroism. He only needed the opportunity to reveal who he was all along. And that, I think, is true of all the everyday heroes that we hear about in real life.

> Harry, in contrast, had heroism thrust upon him. He had choices, certainly, but running away and saving himself as Aberforth suggested was never one of them.
> 
> Harry as Everyman (everyman)? Yes and no, I think. Certainly, he has elements of ordinariness that help the reader to empathize or identify with him on some level. It's also true, as Snape says, that he's helped by luck and by more gifted friends. 

<snip>

>There's no question that he's had heroism (and greatness, if we keep the original wording of the quotation) thrust upon him. But does that make him an everyman like Neville (and Ron and many other characters in the books)? Or does it make him something else (a Christ figure or epic hero or superhero)?

Geoff:
To me, 'yes' to the first and 'no' to the second. If you look at the background 
of many famous people, some of whom you might consider as heroes, many 
of them have been thrust into positions of which they never dreamed. We 
ourselves have probably done things and gone along paths which we never 
even imagined in our early life. 

I believe that you can be an everyman and a hero. How do I see a hero? Not  
one who springs from the womb fully formed wearing a blue jumper with 
a scarlet S emblazoned on it. Not one who puts an advert in the local paper 
"Hero for hire". But an ordinary person suddenly faced with an extraordinary 
situation.

The examples of being a "local hero" which I quoted before are not 
announced in advance. Going back to my misquote, having heroism thrust 
upon you implies that you don't have time to go and brush your teeth and 
think about the meaning of life. To take Lady Macbeth out of context it's a 
case of "Stand not upon the order of your going but go at once."