What if? (my very last post about the Potterverse - I hope)

[mary_j_59]

As I expect all of my friends know, I was deeply disappointed in Deathly Hallows, and therefore in the Potterverse as a whole. It seemed to me meanspirited, full of contradictory messages, and poorly written. In many ways, after two years, it still does. But, as a result of a couple of conversations, something just occurred to me. What if the Potterverse is not exactly what it seems to be? Or, rather, what if Rowling actually achieved her goal with these books - but that goal wasn't exactly what we (or at least I ) thought it was?

There are two ways in which I think this could be so, one likely, and one perhaps unintentional. I'll start with the unintentional one.

I expect those of us on the lookout for Christian symbolism saw Harry as a Christ figure. I certainly did, and I was disgusted. But someone (was it Jodel?) pointed out that:
1. Snape's reaching out to Harry, rather than trying to save himself, was a choice - and a sacrifice. A deliberate one.
2. If anything was going to confer protection on the school and its inhabitants, the deliberate sacrifice of an acting headmaster doing his duty would be much more likely to confer that protection than the death of a boy who happened to be a walking horcrux.

I was not the person who had this insight, but it's pretty brilliant! From this, it follows that-
If there is a Christ figure in these books, it is Snape (imperfect as he is). And Harry's virtue, and his heroism, lies in his recognition of Snape and his sacrifice. Ron and most of the wizarding world don't achieve this recognition, but we are supposed to see that Harry does.

That is possible. As I said, I don't think it's intentional, but it is quite definitely there; it's a part of what I (and others) have been calling the shadow reading, and it hangs together much better than the surface reading of the books. But I think there is a reading that is intentional, and Rowling herself gave us plently of warning about what, exactly, that reading is.

She said that she didn't like fantasy. She said that she didn't think she was writing a fantasy. She said that she intended to subvert the fantasy genre.

When I read this, back in the Time magazine interview, my reaction was like Terry Pratchett's - "what do you think you're writing? You have unicorns in your story!" And I didn't take Rowling's statement seriously. Now I think I should have.

Because one of the effects of these books, at least on me, was: "Gosh, now I hate magic." I didn't want to pick up, or think about, any book with magic in it. I was thoroughly disgusted with Rowling's magical world and disliked almost everyone and everything in it - with the notable exceptions of Severus Snape, Neville Longbottom, and Luna Lovegood. I even began asking myself why I liked fantasy, anyway. Magic simply corrupted those who had it, didn't it? It took me a long time, and a lot of analysis, to come back to the fantasies I truly loved and to see the difference between those works and Rowling's. But I still have a knee-jerk reaction against fantasy and magic, as a result of these books.

I now think my reaction was exactly what Rowling was after. Jodel and Marionros remarked, in a conversation, that Rowling seemed to be out to subvert the school story. Not so - in many ways, at least according to C.S. Lewis's definition of the school story (see my essay on Eustace and Harry for more about that), Rowling simply follows the pattern slavishly. But fantasy? She does actually subvert it, and that is just what she aimed to do.

And that's brilliant, in a way. I still don't especially like what Rowling did, but she did in fact fulfill a stated goal with these books. Which means that they are a good deal more coherent and purposeful than I had initially thought.

Just a thought.

Comments

[hope-24.livejournal.com]

To be blunt, I just think that Rowling needed a very honest editor who would tell her when something was incoherent or illogical - and wouldn't hold back with the red pen. A great deal of the stuff I have problems with: the failure to follow through on the four element/balance thing of the four houses, Ginny the fembot, etc - would have been jumped on, ordinarily. I wonder whether the sheer success of the novels meant that critique became a no-no?

I think your idea is cleverer than what Rowling was probably going for. :)

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

I can see where you are coming from, especially because things Rowling has said in interviews indicate she thinks she wrote things she just didn't write. The most egregious examples are Slughorn leading the Slytherins into battle against Voldemort (that's just not in the book), and the redemption of Severus Snape, which isn't in the book, ether. She doesn't really seem to know what she actually wrote. And, heaven knows, she dropped the ball on house unity, the horcruxes, the power of love, and many other things that mattered to many of her readers. So I don't think you're wrong.

Still, she did say she intended to subvert the fantasy genre, and she did get me to hate fantasy, however briefly. That's an achievement, of sorts. It's not one I particularly like, but it is an achievement.

[professor-mum.livejournal.com]

I pray that M1 of DH will explain the Horcrux --- both Regulus' knowledge of and why the hell he turned against the DE's. It simply cannot be because he objected to the way Voldy mistreated Kreacher in the Cave. Why?

Kreacher's mistreatment

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

But actually, in canon, every Slytherin Voldemort supporter we see turns against Voldie when s/he realizes Voldie is a direct threat to a loved one:
Snape/Lily
Narcissa/Draco
even, to an extent, Lucius/Draco- the last battle of H.
Draco/his parents(?) - trying to avoid identifying Harry to the Snatchers, trying to keep Crabbe from killing or hurting Harry in the Room of Requirement

So the only objection to Regulus/Kreacher being a part of the pattern is that you don't credit Regulus with caring that much about the house elf who may well have been his nanny and/or pre-Hogwarts primary playmate....

[hope-24.livejournal.com]

The interviews drive me crazy. It reminds me of when I have to hand a graded essay back to a student. It's fine to talk about all the extra stuff you know in our interview, and where you had planned to go with the essay - but if it's not *in* the essay, then I can't give you marks for it. She did it quite a bit post DH, didn't she? About Hermione's career, and things like that?

The house unity thing is a particular bugbear of mine, because it's like she simply forgot about it. I'd have thought that, in a children's book, the notions of integration, tolerance, unity, etc. would have been some important ideas to put across. Not to mention that it would have made the plot make more sense! Gah!