The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (a thread for Potterheads)

That's some really interesting meta! And I kind of like the idea of it being subtly cursed, lol. But...

This, I kind of have to... disagree with, almost? Or, at least... okay, so, I'm in a somewhat similar situation to Harry in that I've got a friend whose mom basically wants to adopt me (she even reminds me a lot of Molly Weasley, lol) but I cannot bring myself to think of them as my family. Some of the circumstances are different--my parents are still alive, for one, though they're kind of assholes--and so therefore I don't have that sort of fixation on my parents, but

basically it just doesn't seem that unusual to me for Harry to be unable to truly accept the Weasleys as family? I mean, who knows, maybe he really wants to, like I do, but he just can't bring himself to finally make that connection--and not necessarily because of a curse or anything

that being said, I do think that maybe the Mirror could have still contributed to his fixation on his parents? But then again that may be a common-ish thing for orphans, I don't know

*SHRUGS*

 

That's a fair point! It just seemed odd to me that Harry went from rather envying Ron's family to basically not returning any of the affection given to him by them, honestly. I think it's more - Harry never goes "hey, I'm in trouble, I should write to the Weasleys and ask for help, they'll support me and look after me" on any of his summer misadventures. Not once. He goes and hides in the Leaky Cauldron after he accidentally inflates Aunt Marge, and stays there up until Fudge finds him; he doesn't once write to Ron and go "hey, can I come stay at your place, I got angry and lost control of my magic and there was an accident".

My main point, I think, although I'm pretty sure I didn't clearly state it at all (which is my own fault), is that Harry rarely reaches out for help at all, and almost never does so when it would require getting an adult involved. It's something that can easily enough be explained by a lot of other causes, though - like I said, I don't really have anything solid to hang this theory on! It just seems to nicely explain, to me, why Harry never really gets close to any of the adults in his life who could be regarded as parent-figures (not even just the Weasleys; Dumbledore's the only exception here) and why Ron is so very unambitious, despite clearly wanting to be noticed and lauded, and not exactly being short on ways of getting that attention or people he could ask for help if he wanted it.

 

i like the cursed mirror idea!! wow that's... really good. i like it.

my thoughts on harry and parental figures is that it's easy to fixate on the spectres of your dead parents, because they can't disappoint you. (the cursed mirror theory could also work with this i think?)

molly tries to make it clear to him that he is a son to her, but harry has already been let down so many times. first, his parents die -- not something they could control, obviously, but they still die. they leave him. then the dursleys, the people who were supposed to take him in and care for him, were abusive and cruel. then sirius died, without even really having the oportunity to care for harry as a son (sirius was living in hogsmede as a dog for like 1/2 of their relationship, and spent the other 1/2 locked up in grimuld place). then dumbeldore dies willingly, in a planned event, without having given harry the slightest clue that he would die.

i think harry doesnt let himself accept others' offers of family because it hurts too much when they (to him) inevitably leave/fail him.

in general he doesn't have to worry about lily and james leaving or failing him, because they're dead. he can create his own picture of who his parents were, shining perfect spectres. the best parents, the best people. this is facilitated by pretty much everyone else holding lily and james up as The Best. they weren't, they were human and flawed like the rest of us, but harry has the liberty of ignoring that. it's not like they're here to complain about it. and they're dead and gone, but in that sense they're also always with him because his own imagination and memories won't abandon him. and they weren't able to raise him, but because of that they also weren't able to fail him like the dursleys, or sirius, or dumbeldore.

as we see in order of the phoenix when harry gets into snape's memories and how harry is very, very disturbed to realize that his parents weren't the saints he had painted them to be. until that moment he clashes with snape on several occasions because he just.... couldn't believe that anything negative snape said about his parents was true (not excusing snape's behavior, but he did bring up james being an asshole and harry argued with him about this several times iirc). and harry also gets into a fight with lupin, i think? i dont remember when but i think i remember harry disagreeing with some of lupin's criticisms of his parents. most of the stuff people say about his parents is like, "you look like them" "you're brave like them" "they were so brave" "your mother was great at charms", etc. kind of... superficial anecdotes? imo he doesnt seek out detailed stories of his parents because he doesn't really want to know them at all, he just wants to confirm the people he has created in his head. knowing them opens the door to them failing him again, and that possibility is to dangerous to entertain

 

But Ron was in Egypt that summer, so that could also be an explanation :)

I have problems with how everything in that entire book series seems to be focused on the men. Lily got a raw deal if you ask me. We don't get to learn anything of substance about her until the end, really, and none of Lily's friends ever show up to talk about her. Despite the fact that by at least book five we know she had five or six whole years that she practically despised the marauders, and she must have had other friends. And yet, none of them every make an appearance. I want to know more about Lily, dammit.

 

but we learn about her through snape, and even though she's there it isn't really about her at all... it's about snape and his pain and how he got to where he is >:/

 

And again, it's all about the freaking men. Why do we only learn about the women in this series through the men?

 

@turtleDove That's some really top-notch meta right there. Nice. (No sarcasm. Seriously beautiful thinking.)

I like the cursed mirror idea, but from a psychology point of view... the mirror doesn't need to be cursed to have that effect. That means it won't work the same on everyone, but you can get the same effect. Plenty of adolescents in Ron's position feel like there's no point in trying, because they already implicitly assume they aren't going to get anywhere; sometimes, having examples to the contrary (all his older brothers) doesn't actually inspire people, it makes them feel inadequate. Some people, when they see others being praised, feel (perhaps subconsciously) like they're not praiseworthy; it lowers their self-esteem.

(Also, it's pretty normal for teenagers to feel eyerolly and disinterested about school.)

Dumbledore is a pretty cold and calculating motherfucker, but also has some extremely clever ideas that end up working out for him, so even if there's no curse on the mirror Dumbledore could still have thought it would be a useful way of preparing him for his sacrificial-lamb role. And he was right.

(sudden possibly-ridiculous-but-i-only-just-woke-up thought: is dumbledore supposed to be judas??)

 

A possibly-relevant aside:
When I was a kid, my big sister and I both loved to read, and we both tried to write our own fictional stories too. I always defaulted to female characters but my sister said it was kind of lazy (not the exact word, but that was the implication) to write from the POV of a character of the same gender as you, because where was the challenge in that? So for most of my adolescence, if I had a story idea, I'd make the protagonist male because I thought that if I could pull it off it would be a sign that I was a better writer than if I'd just written about a girl. Applying Child Logic to this, I also noted that JKR is female and writes from a male protag's POV -> JKR is the best writer ever because I like her books the best!!! -> I want to be a good writer -> writing boy characters will make me a better writer and/or make me seem like a better writer in other people's opinions.

Another indirectly-relevant aside:

Spoiler: BBC Sherlock spoilers

It's interesting to note how much better Steven Moffat is able to write Mary's character when he's explicitly portraying her as a vessel to express John's thoughts.

 

I like the cursed mirror idea, but I think

has less to do with that than the whole... ten solid years of plus regular seasonal re-exposure to abuse. He's not used to being able to reach out to a support system, let alone any of the adults in his life; just because there actually are nicer people than the Dursleys in the world doesn't mean Harry realizes he's actually allowed to ask them for help, or that they'd respond favorably if he did, especially since we... never really see him working through all that trauma (never mind all the fancy new wizarding-world-spawned trauma).

 

This! For people who have somehow gotten it into their heads that under no circumstance are they allowed to ask for help, because they should be able to go it all by themselves, asking for help is actually quite difficult.

ETA: See also at the beginning of DH when Harry emphasizes to Ron and Hermione that ofcourse they are under no obligation to come with him to help, because it's his cross to bear, and why should they get caught in the crossfire?

(Also, why couldn't we do this kind of literary analysis in high school in stead of stupid 1984 and Brave New World where the only proper answers were the answers that the teachers had thought of ahead of time.)

 

On my first readthrough of the books, it literally did not occur to me to consider that Harry not asking for help from adults was unusual because I'd grown up getting the message that I was 'too smart' to ask for help/I shouldn't need help/I was a failure if I needed help so I shouldn't ask/no one would help, anyway. Even though I was in my 20s when I read the books I still hadn't started unlearning all that, so him not asking for help was perfectly reasonable to me.

I wish the books unpacked that, but at least they show people ready, willing, and able to help who give it when they see Harry needs it - even if they are largely other kids.

 

@Mercury Same here though! It's taken me a while to learn that I could ask for help if I got stuck with something. And that's just from people who are in anyway supposed to help me (people whose job it is). I still have a really hard time asking for help from friends, even though I always offer help myself :P

 

samehat.jpg
(Though admittedly I was eight when I read the first three, so it's perhaps more telling to say I didn't notice it until someone pointed it out.) Harry's in an abusive home and an abusive school until age 11, then goes to Hogwarts, where Dumbledore tacitly encourages him to break rules but is distant and unavailable and all the other staff aside from Hagrid are Authority Figure Who Will Punish You If They Catch You Breaking Rules, which did nothing to break that thought process for him that there's no point asking adults for help because you'll just get yelled at.

 

Isn't it also true that a lot of kids books have these problems that the kids work out themselves without asking help from adults? That's what I remember most about kids books really. They sort shit out for themselves.

 

That too, though Harry is often pretty extreme about it. In a lot of those books the kids will make some effort to ask the adults for help and get laughed off, or there will be some other explicit reason they can't, even if it's just "they wouldn't believe us." Harry never even considers it.

 

in the first book they try to get dumbeldore's help, only to be rebuffed because dumble is away on business and no one believes the stone could actually be in danger. harry tries to get sirius' help in order of the phoenix but is foiled by kreature.

like harry isnt good at reaching out to adults, but it's not like he never does it. plus a lot of the stuff they do is against the rules, so if they told adults harry probably assumed they'd likely get punished for rulebreaking instead of getting help for the problem :/

 

In the second book they go to Lockhart's room to tell him where the chamber of secrets is.

 

Oh, right, I forgot about those two. (Can you tell I haven't reread the books in ages?)

 

yeah a lot of their attempts to get help end up failing because of adult incompetence/oversight/assuming they're Just Kids and don't know anything

 

Which does not give Harry any more reason to think adults are likely to help him if he asks for it. (Plus sometimes when he gets offered Adult Help without asking, it turns out to have not had his best interests at heart. See: Moody.) Harry's life is really not a recipe for trusting adults.