So I'm not going to go too much deeper into Lupin's Fatherly role toward Harry right now, but I love the scene Jenna references in her post:
Lupin manages what Snape never could have done: he makes Harry feel guilty for
breaking the rules. I'm not sure there's a more successful punishment in any of the
books than Lupin's few, well-chosen words here. It's quite a powerful little
scene—it manages to make me feel like I took a deserved kick to the stomach,
and I didn't go sneaking off to Hogsmeade.
Lupin does manage that, doesn't he? And you know, I think part of the reason is that, as much as he does have obvious affection for Harry, and as much as he does sort of step into that father-role with Harry, he doesn't really treat Harry as special. We actually see him in this book relating with other students in a similar, affectionate, personal way. Snape treats Harry as special (especially awful, true, but singled out), Dumbledore, Hagrid, McGonagall, even Trelawney single him out. The Dursley's singled him out for mistreatment, and even Molly Weasley singles him out for the lion's share of her nurturing. But Lupin - even while giving him the extra lessons he needs - doesn't really treat Harry as special. He treats him very much like he treats Neville: as a boy in need of some extra help, a student that he as a teacher is trying to guide and help. It's refreshing to me, and it must be refreshing to Harry as well. To see an adult that is neither hostile nor indulgent reprimand him..Thank you professor Lupin!
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And I wonder with Jenna "whether Snape knew who the mapmakers were. Obviously he didn't know what the map was, but did he recognize the names?" She guesses that even if he didn't recognize the names, the personalities that came through were easily discernible..and I have to agree..even if he wasn't certain, he must have suspected - and having someone easily available who did know must have made him even more frustrated.. Poor Snape, everyone has a breaking point! It must have been a stress-filled year for him all things together.
I'm also left feeling just a little badly for Malfoy. Not only does Harry win the match, not only does the fake dementor attack fail, not only does he lose 50 points in one afternoon, but he has to be the too-short guy, perched on his friend's shoulders and then knocked over by a huge, scary spell in front of the whole school! When you're in Slytherin, and you know everyone hates you anyway, it stings even more.
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| this one's for you, Jenna ;) |
I can't feel too bad for Malfoy most of the time, because he's established himself as one of the reasons everyone hates Slytherin -- a proud paragon of Racism and Bullying. I feel bad for the wizards we never see, who were Sorted into Slytherin because of family ties or tendencies they were trying to overcome, or because they were "ambitious" about marketing their magic-enhanced tabletop RPG and their parents were idealistic enough not to tell them what Slytherin was all about, and now they live in a dungeon which would be cool except now they're supposed to hate wizards with non-wizard parents? But that doesn't make any sense; isn't that most people? And maybe Slytherin House has a lot of hilarious old traditions and secret societies and they help each other out on exams, and everyone is SO ANGRY with them all the time because of the Salazar Slytherin giant child-eating snake thing maybe, but not all of them are like that! So they begin to feel that they like being Slytherins and there's something maybe really special about being pure-blood after all, even though there's still a weird feeling in their stomachs when they think that, but you know, when they're down in the basement doing the Circle of Sorcery with Air Supply playing in the background, it's like this huge ancient unbroken family that you're all connected to, and isn't it appropriate that you're all WIZARDS and your parents were WIZARDS and so you UNDERSTAND THINGS that those mudborns, I mean mugglebloods, I mean, I don't call them that, but sometimes, you know, they ACT so muddy and muggleish, they couldn't really understand, you know? It all starts to make sense, and even the parts that don't make sense, well, these are your friends, your brothers and sisters, and you're one of them, one of the rare true breed of magical people, and that's so important.
ReplyDeleteAnd when you come home for the summer, your parents don't understand; it's like they feel guilty for not being muggles or something, which is just so sick and sad you can't even stand it, and one day there's a huge fight because you use the M word in front of them and you know, you don't even use that word because it's stupid and gross, but you sure aren't going to take it back just because your parents can't understand how stupid it is to want to throw away their own amazing heritage. They overreact SO MUCH and there's a big stupid fight, and at some point they start naming off all your old friends who were Muggle-born and all the Muggles in your old neighborhood you used to play with and your Muggle-born godmother and all the Muggle-borns on the 7-8 Ground Quiddich Junior League, just pelting you with name after name as if that was even the point.
Maybe later they'll talk to you calmly and you'll pull away from Slytherin for the summer, with a knot of mixed loyalties in your gut, and maybe you'll hang out with your old friends from Ground Q. while you're at home and feel like you can do both, maybe, celebrate your blood inheritance without discriminating too much against Muggle-borns, because you both have your own way of being special, and maybe that's fine?
Or maybe you send an Owl to Pansy and her creepy butler comes to pick you up and you spend the rest of the summer at her crumbling old manor house getting madder and madder at your parents and worrying that your old friends are going to hate you now just because you have something they don't have. And Pansy combs your hair with a singing silver comb that was her great-great grandmother's and tells you, "Some people just always have to hate what they can't understand."
That's who I feel bad for. Ok, I guess I feel bad for Malfoy, too -- but because he was raised to be a bad person, and getting knocked down by strong spells hurts. Not so much because everyone hates Slytherin, though.
hahaha! I LOVED this Laura! :)
Deletep. s.
ReplyDeleteHipster!Voldemort is correct and the glasses compliment his face surprisingly well. I did like Cedric, though. Shame the minute we get a heroic Hufflepuff character, he gets unceremoniously disposed of :(
Also, Snape HAD to have recognized the mapmakers; oily emo sinking feelings ahoy.
Pretty sure Lupin is the best teacher in the whole series. <3
ReplyDeleteESPRESSO PATRONUM. I want some. Maybe I should go make myself an Americano with my last little bit of half and half. Yay Carnival!!!!
Ah, Slytherin. Only when I start thinking specifically about it do I realize what an insupportable construct that House really is, outside of the everything-in-Potter-is-caricature paradigm, where it works well enough. I got a kick out of the "Circle of Sorcery with Air Supply playing in the background" mental image, Laura!
For myself, I tend to not feel very badly for Malfoy for being hated as a Slytherin in general, especially in these early books, because Slytherins seem to form an identity out of being set apart, which for a little while can be experienced as empowering rather than hurtful (rightfully or--as in this case--wrongfully). How much they think of themselves as hated, and how much it matters to them, probably depends on how personal and intimate the hatred gets, how exactly the Slytherin is exposed to said hatred, and how sensitive the Slytherin is.
In Malfoy's case, I see him as starting off trying to be his father without really knowing what that means--but he has more of his mother's spirit, and ultimately this costs him. It seems to me like it takes several years at Hogwarts for this to sink in, that SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD
...that in some ways he doesn't get it till the end of the series, and even then he still has Narcissa's pride. It never lets him soften all the way, but it makes a human out of him. Wait till book six... that's when Malfoy really gets my heart all twisted up with anger and sympathy.
Hipster Voldemort... HAHAHAHAHA!
In Malfoy's case, I see him as starting off trying to be his father without really knowing what that means--but he has more of his mother's spirit, and ultimately this costs him. It seems to me like it takes several years at Hogwarts for this to sink in, that SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD
Delete...that in some ways he doesn't get it till the end of the series, and even then he still has Narcissa's pride. It never lets him soften all the way, but it makes a human out of him. Wait till book six... that's when Malfoy really gets my heart all twisted up with anger and sympathy.
I Know! though I kind of feel like (once again) Rowling sort of neglects his father when all the complex emotions start running through him (book six onward) and switches to Narcissa because she's maybe uncomfortable showing fatherly love and sacrifice??? I wanted to see more of Lucius' growth, instead of having him just sort of recede!!