About Dumbledore & Hxs

[carolynwhite2]

I was just re-reading the Slughorn memory of the conversation with 
Tom (Ch 23), and was struck by two comments he made:

'Not at all, not at all, not offended,' said Slughorn gruffly. 'It's 
natural to feel some curiosity about these things..wizards of a 
certain calibre have always been drawn to that aspect of magic.'

and:

'People wouldn't like to think we've been chatting about Horcruxes. 
It's a banned subject at Hogwarts, you know..Dumbledore's 
particularly fierce about it.'

Why would DD feel so strongly about the topic, and who else might 
have been drawn to investigate Hxs? Sluggy's remark is strongly 
reminiscent of Ollivander's comment: 'After all, He Who Must Not Be 
Named did great things - terrible, yes, but great.'

I once wrote a long post about how admiration/respect for magic power 
was a powerful driving force in the WW 
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/108963 if 
anyone's interested)
and it seems to me that Sluggy's reproving, yet obvious fascination 
is yet more evidence for it.

JKR has flagged up repeatedly that DD's family and background are 
probably important to the mystery. It could be that he's lost someone 
close to him to the Dark Arts, and refusing to go that route himself 
is what's driven him all these years. 

Further thought - maybe the Dark Wizard Grindewald was a brother, 
cousin, whatever, who had also experimented with Hxs, but only made 
just the one. If DD chose to destroy Grindewald's Hx rather than 
outright kill him, it would explain the oft-commented on 'defeated' 
description on the Chocolate Frog card.

Carolyn
..who was really disappointed that the images of DD on the cards were 
not the secret way in which the Order communicated with each other. I 
was sure that was why he wasn't bothered about losing any of his 
titles, but did care if they took him off the frog cards...oh well.