Was Dumbledore the Puppetmaster I Never Suspected He Was?

[Barry Arrowsmith]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, "entropymail" <entropymail at ...> wrote:
>
> The backstory of his shady associations with Grindelwald...
> Aberforth's take on DD's secretive personality... and don't even get
> me started on the weakness of character which lead DD to try on that
> cursed ring! But the revelation of DD's true motives during Harry's
> viewing of Snape's memory-file takes the cake. If anything could ever
> back up the "Dumbledore as puppetmaster" theory for me, that was it.
>
> Snape finally realizes that he's simply kept Harry alive only long
> enough to be slaughtered by Voldie at the "proper time". Dumbledore's
> answer is a remorseless yes. YIKES! And, unless I read too much into
> it, Dumbledore's remark that he's "touched" by Severus' affection for
> Harry is simply dripping with sarcasm.
>
> Far and away, most characters throughout the series were not what they
> seemed. Always felt that Snape was a good guy in Death Eaters'
> clothing. But Dumbledore was the one character whose motives were
> (seemingly) crystal clear: to protect Harry and allow him to live long
> enough to defeat Voldemort. Close, but no cigar! Apparently, it was to
> protect Harry and allow him to live long enough to be the sacrificial
> lamb in the defeat of Voldemort. Big difference.
>

I fear that you have too trusting a nature.
Not a bad fault to have, but it's just asking to get a smack in the 
mazzard when confronted with a series swarming with ambiguous 
characters.

The kids - well, they where more or less as described; apart from 
Marietta I can't remember one of 'em not being as depicted on debut.

The adults though, were a very different kettle of fish. To be honest, 
that's what kept me glued to the series, the obvious and possibly not so
obvious adult manoeuverings, deceptions, hidden agendas and 
motivations. Lots of other fans enjoyed it too. Dip into the archives - 
a high proportion of the fan input is concerned with who can be trusted,
who can't and what the bloody hell is so-and-so up to? ESE started as 
a bit of light-hearted 'what if?', it ended as a full-blown industry.

Now everybody can't be up-to-something, there just has to be at least
a few scattered around that are immutable among the shifting sands. In
HP these were the Weasley parents - sensible, slightly odd, but straight
as a die; substitute parents for Harry with a home that offers security,
comfort, unquestioning loyalty to, and having the best of intentions for,
a growing lad in a very dangerous world.

But DD? He's something else. Harry sees him as his saviour from a 
life of misery, but some fans suspected ulterior motives might be 
playing a part from very early on, mostly because he seemed too good 
to be true. 

We learn that DD has a plan (details never provided) to cast down Voldy
and that Harry is integral and probably pivotal in bringing it to fruition.
( Ha! Suspicions confirmed!) And since this was a WW problem, any 
resolution would be cast in terms magical. But DD had made damn 
sure that Harry's early years were spent as far away from the realm of 
the WW as he could arrange. Harry has a lot of catching up to do; he 
also has to learn very quickly that the WW is a lot more than a respite 
from the petty punishments of the Dursleys.

Given these premises, for a cynical old sod who's just panting for a tale
that's darker than Disney (spit) it's but a short step to Puppetmaster!DD
and Weapon!Harry. Admittedly, to start with it was more in hope than in
expectation, but as the books progressed the expectation level rose.
The adventures that Harry experienced could easily have been truncated
or avoided all together if DD had wished. But he seemed to be subtly or
not so subtly encouraging Harry and there were hints that he knew 
exactly what Harry was doing all along. 
Our hero was being trained - and tested.

Snape was part of the training. He's Mr Nasty to DD's Mr Nice, a 
necessary input to Harry - it wouldn't do for Harry to be mollycoddled 
at Hogwarts and spend the holidays back at Privet Drive, or he'd learn 
nothing about himself or how to cope with the more inimical sections 
of the WW. My prediction that SS/DD were the best double-act in the 
business wasn't so far off.

The crunch comes at the end of OoP when he tells Harry point blank - 
it's kill or be killed. Of course, being DD, that isn't quite accurate; it 
turns out it should have been "I believe you both need to die in the final
showdown". Mind you, he had given Harry a clue - that Prophesy, but 
Harry's more into action than thought and while DD figured out the 
nitty-gritty, Harry didn't.

Could have been worse - my bet was that the Prophesy was a DD fake 
intended to lure Voldy to GH were he would be destroyed by the 
Protective magic, but it enjoyed only partial success. Seems Jo wasn't 
prepared to make DD that devious. Pity. In hindsight and with the 
knowledge that it actually was an AK Voldy threw at Harry (mutter, 
mutter), what're the odds that it was then that DD realised that to 
survive the bounce Voldy must have invested in Hxs or something 
very similar? And how much thought had he given to the nature of
that strange scar on Harry's head?

Still, at this point DD has had about 16 years to brood on this 
Prophecy whereas Harry gets the immediate info-dump, with no time
to assimilate its implications. It was intended to shock and it did. 
Harry was all wound up about Sirius, how it wasn't fair, it was 
somebody else's fault, nobody cares, etc, etc. So DD hits Harry 
between the eyes - and there's a sub-text. "This is your fight, boy, 
only you can do it, I can only help so much, I can't do it for you. 
So get a grip."

The plot arc leads us ineluctably to the conclusion that Harry is it; 
he's Voldy's nemesis just as Voldy is his. Either or both can die - this
has been accepted by most fans for a long time. The newish twist is 
that DD reckons it *must* be both, killing Voldy is not enough, Harry 
is Voldy's Hx and if he doesn't die too, Voldy will come back yet again
and it will all have been for nothing.

Given the situation, how else (in plot terms) could DD have acted? 
Tell Potter straight up "You're a deader, son."? Be a bit of a downer 
on Harry's part, I'd think (though I did predict - wrongly - that Harry 
would try to avoid his destiny, would try to opt out of the situation 
entirely, at least until an unspecified number of deaths forced him to 
realise it wouldn't work). But you don't prepare a fighter by telling him
he's going to lose, and Harry does have to believe that with a bit of 
luck he can match Voldy, otherwise it'll be a massacre. Not an option 
then. Hide Harry away and hope Voldy  trips over the cat? Not realistic.

Nope. Train him as well as possible so he might have a chance and 
hope that you've read it wrong and that his death is not inevitable. But 
in the meantime, don't bank on hope, be prepared for, plan for, the 
worst - to save the world Harry's death may be necessary.

IMO DD is more to be pitied than castigated. 
There's this kid he obviously feels affection for, yet he sees no option 
but to send him off to die.
I don't really see what he needs to be redeemed for, not where Harry is 
concerned, anyway.
The mistakes of his youth?
I doubt he expects or wishes for redemption - nobody blames him 
more than he blames himself, and himself he will never forgive.

Kneasy