I think Dumbledore is as intriguing in this chapter as young Tom Riddle, Jr. is. I’ve written much about our budding sociopath in my book and on this site, so I’ll leave commentary about him to you all in the comments. I want to focus primarily on Dumbledore.
Dumbledore makes an interesting comment prior to jumping into the Pensieve once again. Noting that the memory is his own, he says to Harry, “I think you will find it both rich in detail and satisfyingly accurate.”
The question is, knowing what we know about Dumbledore, and knowing what we know about tampering with memories, is it accurate? I can’t, off the top of my head, think of anything about Dumbledore’s memory that he could be hiding. And there is no fog or evidence of tampered memory like there is in Slughorn’s. But then again, Dumbledore might know how to do fog-free memory modification, and, as evidenced by his commentary on “The Tale of the Three Brothers,” he’s very willing to hide information when he thinks people will be better off without it. Just a thought.
If nothing else, we certainly learned by the end of book 7 that Dumbledore sincerely believed what he told Harry in book 1: “The truth is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution.” (PS17)
At the beginning of the chapter, we get his little exchange with Phineas Nigellus Black, who thinks Harry is quite out of line to be questioning how the school is run; Dumbledore thinks opposite. This is typical of Dumbledore, who seems to believe the freedom to question, develop, and challenge ideas is important to education and to human growth.
And yet freedom is not something he’s always willing to give a person. In the memory, Mrs. Cole is easily manipulated by Dumbledore, who confunds her into thinking a blank piece of paper is a legal form and gets her drunk enough to loosen her lips about young Riddle. This, of course, foreshadows Harry’s use of the same trick on Slughorn to retrieve the memory; “foreshadows” is not strong enough a word, really – it gives Harry the very idea! Let debate ensue on whether or not any of this is ethical or necessary.
But then, in the interview with Tom, we’re back to Dumbledore, full of grace. There is a mix of sternness and mercy in his interaction – making sure justice is done in the returning of stolen objects and strictly warning him of the consequences of thievery and bullying at Hogwarts, while at the same time, verbally giving Tom the benefit of the doubt, telling him he was using his powers in an intorable way “inadvertantly, I am sure.” Riddle, of course, was quite sure of just the opposite, while Dumbledore certainly suspected Riddle of gross misconduct. But he gives Riddle room for choosing a different path, by mixing mercy with sternness, giving him the benefit of the doubt about his past actions, and explaining what the future at Hogwarts would be like.
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{ 33 comments… read them below or add one }
It is a very interesting chapter, especially if we focus on DD, as you do here.
Is he hiding anything in this memory? Probably not. But as you say, knowing what we know about DD, there’s always got to be a question.
You say, “This is typical of Dumbledore, who seems to believe the freedom to question, develop, and challenge ideas is important to education and to human growth.”
To a point this is what DD believes. But we also see that he knows how to use authority as well & that there’s a time for questioning & a time for letting a matter drop or a time to obey orders, as we see later when he gets quite testy with Harry regarding Draco’s activities.
You also mention DD rather cavalier use of manipulation both of magic, like a Jedi mind trick, & then trying to get Mrs. Cole drunk. I’d say it is morally questionable. But the wizarding excuse would probably be that Riddle or any magical child for that matter needs to be gotten away from the Muggles, both for the child’s safety, the Muggles’ safety, & to uphold the statute of secrecy.
DD perhaps underestimates Mrs. Cole, for she is uncommonly sharp & even after being manipulated & gotten on the sauce still maintains her reasoning & her ability to quickly assess the situation. Harry notices this all throughout the conversation, that her eyes or speech don’t really get blurry or slurred.
And DD’s interaction with Riddle is masterful. The epitome of courtesy, sternness, propriety, and generosity. Riddle is a case study in a nascent sociopath. He knew right & wrong. He was more than likely taught manners. But he thought it all beneath him.
I agree that this is classic Dumbledore, just not the way you mean it Travis: the end justifies the means. And question all you want – just don’t question my decisions and my actions.
But I’m not that concerned about the legal and moral implications of forgery and getting Mrs. C drunk. Agree with revgeorge here: much better for all if Tom Riddle moves to Hogwarts.
But ask yourself, revgeorge what it means to know “right from wrong” if it has absolutely no impact on your actions, except to avoid detection. I’d argue that right and wrong are meaningless concepts for a psychopath, just the bleatings of the powerless.
Which is the question: Is Riddle a pyschopath, who doesn’t know right from wrong, & thus is not morally culpable for his actions or is he a sociopath, one who knows right & wrong but just doesn’t care or thinks those things are for others?
What does LV say in HPPS? “There is no good or evil; only power & those to weak to use it.”
Gotta love D’s plum-colored velvet suit. Very flamboyant. When he walks in the monochrome orphanage with its black and white tile and gray uniforms, he appears like an exotic “giraffe.”
Mrs. Cole is a lot more appreciative of D’s gin than the Dursleys were of the mead!
As I recall in GOF, Trelawney asks if she is correct to say Harry was born in the dead of winter (to which he says no, he was born in July). Here we learn Riddle was born New Year’s Eve, in the winter. To the extent Trelawney was reacting to anything for real, she must have been reacting to the bit of Voldemort’s soul attached to Harry (another one of my examples of predictions Trelawney actually has right, in a sense).
Appalling to read of Riddle being a funny baby who hardly ever cried. Crying is a baby’s main method of communication. This implies he was somehow a self-sufficient, unconnected baby. Never needed anyone, even as a baby. Presumably the orphanage staff fed him formula and changed his diapers and clothed him properly. He just had no want as a baby for any particular human interaction. Chilling.
There’s an irony in Riddle’s fear that Dumbledore has come to put him in an insane asylum, as he ends up laughing insanely during the final battle with Harry in bk 7.
Compare “He stumbled forward and sat down on the bed again, staring at his hands, his head bowed as though in prayer” (Riddle upon learning what he can do is magic) with “Every eye was fixed upon Voldemort, who stood with his head bowed, and his white hands folded over the Elder Wand in front of him. He might have been praying, . . .” (waiting for Harry to come sacrifice himself, DH 702).
Dumbledore tells Riddle he is a wizard. “Riddle lifted his head. His face was transfigured: There was a wild happiness upon it, yet for some reason it did not make him better looking” — contrast with Grindelwald’s wild laughing happiness in DH in the photos with D or stealing the Elder Wand from Gregorovitch. “[O]n the contrary, his finely carved features seemed somehow rougher, his expression almost bestial.”–this foreshadows the later memories where his features are blurred, hollowed, less handsome with each successive murder and is consistent with the snakelike features of his old age. These changes remind me of the reverse of The Portrait of Dorian Gray. Instead of Dorian Gray’s sins being reflected only in a painting, Voldemort’s sins are reflected in his own looks and the look of his soul.
Riddle shows he can mimic politeness and the trappings of society when he snaps to after Dumbledore says to address him as either Professor or Sir. D tells him “you should know that Hogwarts can expel students, and the Ministry of Magic . . . will punish lawbreakers still more severely. All new wizards must accept that, in entering our world, the abide by our laws.” Riddle’s face remains impassive, but I suspect he’s thinking about how to attain power and change the laws to suit his purposes.
When D suggests Riddle ask for Tom the barman at the Leaky Cauldron, easy to remember because he shares Riddle’s name, “Riddle gave an irritable twitch, as though trying to displace an irksome fly.” When Dumbledore tells Snape after Lily’s death that her boy survives, “With a tiny jerk of the head, Snape seemed to flick off an irksome fly.” (DH 678) Riddle hates the idea of being connected to someone else just because they happen to share a name. Snape hates the idea of Lily’s (Potter’s) son being connected to him, as if Harry were a substitute for Lily. Riddle’s annoyance stems from love of self, whereas Snape’s stems from a narrow love of Lily which, at least at the time, doesn’t extend to those dear to her.
I think that the repeated use of the term ‘like an irksome fly” and the prayer imagery just shows that JKR is not the best stylist out there: she uses stereotyped imagery, and she does tend to repeat herself. So be it. Her many talents dwarf her deficiencies.
But again with the “narrow love”, cousin to “obsessive love”. Talk about damning with faint praise. But I”ll wait for Travis’ promised post on this issue.
About the psychopathy / sociopathy distinction: clinically, there is no difference between those terms. They are both used to describe someone who has a constellation of traits: he or she is typically selfish, callous, manipulative, narcissistic (a sense of superiority and entitlement), a good liar, impulsive, irresponsible (doesn’t take care of his or her obligations or promises), emotionally reactive (gets irritated or angry easily) and tends to get into trouble with the law. Different “psychopaths” can have more or less of these traits: not all psychopaths are the same. There are people who argue that psychopathy is in itself a trait. Others would argue that it’s a coming together of different traits. So when a person is selfish and callous and manipulative and impulsive, we call him a “psychopath”.
Now if you look at Voldemort, you can see that he has some of these traits, but not all. He is certainly callous and self-centered and manipulative. A convincing liar. Narcissistic. Emotionally reactive? A bit. But he’s certainly not impulsive, and I suspect, not irresponsible. In my world, we’d say that he’s got the core personality traits but not the associated life-style factors.
The idea of knowing the difference between right and wrong isn’t central to the definition. Everyone – except a madman, and psychopaths are not mad, despite the “psycho” in the term – knows the difference between right and wrong. What makes people behave morally is regard for the consequences – to oneself, to others, to one’s internal standards about how one should behave. Psychopaths typically have little or no regard for consequences that don’t impact on them immediately. No internal standards. Call that a conscience if you wish.
So, is LV morally culpable for his actions? Or to put it in terms of JKR’s work, are his choices his to make or are they dictated by factors beyond his control? I would think JKR is saying that LV is responsible for his actions, & part of that responsibility is in recognizing the effects of your actions on others.
I wasn’t using “narrow” in the same way as “obsessive” or to say that’s all Snape’s love ever was. I said “at the time.” At the time of Lily’s death he IS focused only on her. He loves her deeply and passionately, he risked his life to try to protect her, and he is absolutely shattered by her death and by the fact that his actions indirectly caused it, but AT THAT TIME he doesn’t care about anyone else, not even himself. It is only with the passage of time and especially during Harry’s years at Hogwarts and when forced back into the Death Eaters’ ambit that he broadens and expands his love to encompass others (even if he won’t publicly admit it or show it). His agreement with Dumbledore to protect Harry “for Lily” is his first step along this path.
Do we credit Rowling with excellent writing or is she only using cant phrases? She’s managed to weave many layers of meaning into the series, craft a gripping story, and combine humor, horror, and the supernatural. Do we then discount the repetition of a phrase as poor writing or do we explore whether she means something by it?
These lines stand out to me in this chapter
…“It was impossible to tell what he was thinking; his face remained quite blank as he put the little cache of stolen objects back into the cardboard box. When he had finished, he turned to Dumbledore and said baldly, “I haven’t got any money…” JKR mostly writes from Harry’s perspective and his point of view here in the world of the pensive this is Dumbledore’s memory and his point of view that we all see with harry.
Also the praise “It was impossible to tell what (Tom) was thinking” was the Professor Legilimens probing to see inside of Tom’s thoughts? Before in the memory Dumbledore says to Tom regarding the box of trophies …“You will return them to their owners with your apologies,” said Dumbledore calmly, putting his wand back into his jacket. (“I shall know whether it has been done)…
When Tom and the Professor say good-bye we read … “His tone was casual but his (eyes moved curiously over Riddle’s face). They stood for a moment, (man and boy, staring at each other). Then the handshake was broken… Legilimens’ get more success when eye contact or face to face is employed. I find all this fascinating that magical folk have a leg up on us muggles when it comes to spying – investigating – information gathering.
revgeorge, I think the answer to the question of Voldemort’s culpability depends on which position you take up. Someone who sees him primarily as a product of his social environment or of his inherited genes (or a combination of both) will plead diminished responsibility, while someone who believes that every human being has a choice of his own free will from the first to the last moment of his life will probably find him 100% guilty. For someone who believes in predestination, culpability may not even be an issue at all.
Perhaps it is so difficult to decide whether Voldemort is culpable or not because he is a fictional character designed by JKR who seems to take up each position mentioned above.
If I imagine Voldemort as being a real person, I tend to believe that everything derives from the fact that he was never able to develop a human relationship to anybody. If he had a choice, he made his decisions before he was eleven years old. As Lily Luna pointed out, even as a baby he never needed anybody. He never loved, never felt compassion, never longed for something greater than himself – as far as we know. He was intelligent and he could tell right from wrong, but only in terms of law and social conventions. He did not have a conscience, as Red Rocker said. He was completely incapable to understand ethical values because he just could not relate to them.
So: Is a megalomaniac wizard mass murderer – an orphan of incestuous ancestry who never experienced love, fathered under the influence of a love potion – culpable? I don’t dare to judge. The main thing is that people have to be protected from him, I think.
Rena, you make some excellent comments. But the logical inconsistency lies in your last paragraph. You don’t dare judge. And yet you do judge that people have to be protected from LV.
Neither Voldemort nor his Death Eaters would make the judgment that people should be protected from LV. Voldemort’s philosophy seems summed up in his first conversation with Harry: “There is no good or evil, only power.” So, whoever has the power determines what is right or wrong or what the prevailing metanarrative will be. Who knew LV was so PoMo!
So, unless we can grapple with questions of morality & moral culpability we’re kind of left with just Voldemort’s position, it all depends on who’s in control.
LV is certainly an interesting case study for examination because JKR really made him a rather dualistic character, one in whom we could say his choices matter & yet in another way say his choices were already made for him. If he never felt love or compassion or need or whatever from the moment he was born, then we cannot say anything he did was wrong since he only acted from his nature. We can only engage in a power struggle with him.
And I’m not quite sure that’s the point JKR is trying to make. After all, Dumbledore acts, at least, as if he thinks Riddle could have the capacity for choosing in a different way than he so far has. So, just some thoughts rattling around in my head. They probably are just echoes of what we’ve already discussed about Voldemort. They were just brought to the surface again by this chapter.
I remember discussing this on another thread recently – but then we’ve been over it many times. It has endless fascination.
His genes and his early childhood environment could only take Voldemort so far: he was probably never going to be a warm or caring person. He was probably always going to be a selfish, narcissistic sob who would use his power for his own ends, not to better others or the world.
But there is quite a distance from being your average psychopath to being someone whose appetite for murdering others is only matched by his enthusiasm for destroying his own soul. It wasn’t his genes and his abandonment by his mother that made Tom Riddle into what he became – it was himself. He made himself what he was.
Of course this is true for most of us. We don’t all have an infinite number of choices about where we end up in life – a child growing up in the slums of Calcutta, for example, is probably not going to be the president of the United States. But we all move towards what we want. And how we move towards that, and how strongly, and how we treat others along the way, all that determines our destiny.
Which is sort of Dumbledore’s message too. And Gandalf’s.
“Which is sort of Dumbledore’s message too. And Gandalf’s.”
Red Rocker, exactly!
revgeorge I had to think when you write “Who knew LV was so PoMo!” does that mean PostModern?
Robert, yes, it means PostModern. I was trying to be facetious.
regeorge got-it thanks
This is not in answer to anyone’s comments, but just an aside. The Riddle ancestry, while not as gross or incestuous as the Gaunts, was every bit as haughty, self-centered, imperious, and disliked according to village opinion. A real double-whammy of an inheritance. Perhaps the most dangerous of his Riddle inheritances, however, was his good looks, which got him much farther at Hogwarts and in his years at Borgin and Burke’s than if he had resembled his mother. It’s one of several examples in the series of the danger of judging a book by it’s cover.
revgeorge wrote: ”
Which is the question: Is Riddle a pyschopath, who doesn’t know right from wrong, & thus is not morally culpable for his actions or is he a sociopath, one who knows right & wrong but just doesn’t care or thinks those things are for others?
What does LV say in HPPS? “There is no good or evil; only power & those to weak to use it.””
I’m thinking that Voldemort maybe made is decisions early on in life that removed choice from his later life. He conciously set off down a path leading to reduced humanity, choice, life and moral awareness. I think that by making himself less human he reduced his ability to make human decisions. So, he was morally culpable for the decisions while he was still fully human and those decisions turned him into an embodyment of evil that needed destruction. You don’t, after all, try to rehabilitate a disease- you destroy it.
revgeorge, I don’t even hesitate to judge Voldemorts deeds as evil. But I don’t dare judge if he, being the person he is, can be considered ultimately responsible. korg20000bc managed to put into one sentence what I tried to express verbosely: “Voldemort maybe made his decisions early on in life that removed choice from his later life.” Which leads to the question if an 11-year-old (or younger) is culpable for having made the choices he made.
Rena, I suppose it depends on whether one believes in original sin or not. But even if one doesn’t, quite a few people believe in an age of accountability that begins around 7 or 8 when children begin to be responsible for their actions & know good from evil.
Also it’s only a fairly recent invention that we’ve extended childhood out to 18 years or so & decreed that no one can make a binding legal contract before that age. For most of human history adulthood began at around 13-14 years of age with various rites of passage.
Voldemort didn’t truly begin to make decisions that couldn’t be undone or mitigated until he was around 15 or 16 when he murdered his father & grandparents & Moaning Myrtle.
Plus, if Voldemort was on trial for his crimes & you were seated on the jury & the defense used an insanity plea, you would have to make a judgment of whether or not he was culpable for his crimes. Not responsible, that wouldn’t be under question. But culpable. Did he know what he was doing & the rightness & wrongness of those actions.
I teach in a middle school and see lots of 11 year olds who have been making hugely wrong choices for years. Some of them, if they had the power of young Tom Riddle, would probably be just as bad as he (at age 11). They are not held responsible for their actions. yet. It is heartbreaking.
Several interesting ideas here: that we are not morally accountable until a certain age – 7, 8, 11 – and in many jurisdictions 17 or 18; the idea that earlier choices take away the availability of later choices – that our road is set as early as 15 or 16 or even as early as 11; and the very interesting idea indeed, that responsibility/accountability is diminished because of earlier choices.
I’d agree with the first one. We can see this in the view towards “child soldiers”, whom we don’t hold as accountable for the atrocities they commit. Although society does tend to be vengeful, and even in my very liberal country, sometimes tries 14 year olds as if they were adults and capable of adult decision making.
The second idea, that earlier choices limit later ones is a complex one. People can always change – that’s a bit of a mantra for me. But not everyone is as capable of change. And certainly, the longer you live a certain way, the more entrenched your habits, for the better or the worse, the longer it would take to change those habits.
Can Tom Riddle change? In theory, yes. But in practice? Highly unlikely. He has followed his heart’s desire so relentlessly and for such a long time that for him to step back from that is almost inconceivable.
The last question is one that the courts have been trying to answer ever since the Macnaughton decision back in the 19th century: when is a man not responsible for his actions because of some kind of mental disorder? It’s the question of lack of diminished responsibilty due to insanity. It’s a pretty safe guess to say that most juries would not find Voldemort not responsible. And this even though his creator calls the sound of his laughter “insane”.
Personally, I agree that every decision he made limited his future options. But I don’t think that’s different from any of us. The roads we take open up other roads, and the roads we don’t take make other roads less likely. I don’t think this is the same as diminishing responsibility/accountability for the choices we make further down the road. That would be the same as arguing that because I chose to read The Philosopher’s Stone way back, I’m less accountable for spending time on this blog, or even writing what I’m writing now.
On a slight tangent, this discussion reminds me of an O Henry story I just read ( re-read): The Cop and the Anthem.
Soapy is a vagrant, a street person we’d call him nowadays. He’s trying very hard to commit a minor misdemeanour so he’ll be sent to jail for the winter rather than trying to survive out in the street. His attempts are not very successful. That evening he comes upon an old church and hears the organist practicing:
And the anthem that the organist played cemented Soapy to the iron fence, for he had known it well in the days when his life contained such things as mothers and roses and ambitions and friends and immaculate thoughts and collars.
The conjunction of Soapy’s receptive state of mind and the influence about the old church wrought a sudden and wonderful change in his soul. He viewed with swift horror the pit into which he had tumbled, the degraded days, unworthy desires, dead hopes, wrecked faculties and base motives that made up his existence.
And also in a moment his heart responded thrillingly to this novel mood. An instantenous and strong impulse moved him to battel with his desperate fate He would pull himself out of the mire; he would make aman of himself again; he would conquer the evil that had taken possession of him.
This being O. Henry, the story doesn’t end quite the way you’d expect, but it’s a very well imagined litany of things which keep a man “mired” and the things which help pull him out.
Red Rocker,
Your post is interesting.
I think Voldemort is a special case. He has deliberately denatured himself by the soul splitting horcrux process. He made himself less than human and I think that “choice” is a human trait/gift/ability. I’m suggesting that after the horcrux making process he’d been rendered incapable of choosing other than the course he’d set upon.
Red Rocker, yes, that’s what they mean by an “O Henry ending.” You don’t quite get what you expect. A story that’s cute & sad at the same time.
I think perhaps we’ve been sidetracked a bit by moral culpability, & for that I apologize. I, for instance, would never say that I could judge someone’s state of salvation, since I can’t look into people’s hearts. But we can judge their actions & statements.
And a person’s actions & statements can give a pretty clear indication into their hearts. All of Voldemort’s actions & his pronouncements indicate what his inward heart is. Plus, perhaps a big difference between someone who is truly insane & someone who is simply psychopathic or sociopathic, is that the truly insane person can’t hide very well their insanity, because they’re not consciously recognizing that they are insane. They simply act. Whereas someone like a serial killer we might call insane but yet he could be a very urban intellectual person & someone who is excellent at hiding who he is & what he does.
An example I remember from being a Nebraska football fan is a running back in the late ’80’s or early ’90’s who suffered from schizophrenic paranoia. When he was on his medication he was fine. But then since he felt fine he would stop taking his medication & then he’d have an episode where he’d strip off his clothes & run around the city attacking anyone who got in his way. It was rather easy to tell he was insane in the sense that he did not know what he was doing. He eventually ended up getting in a tussle with two policewomen & getting shot & paralyzed.
The point I’m trying to make, if any, is that a truly insane person is one who cannot distinguish reality from fantasy, doesn’t know what they’re doing, & more than likely is easy to spot & stop.
Whereas someone like Voldemort, whom we could call insane in a loose sense, and who may have certain psychiatric disorders & certain sociological influences, still knows what he is doing, can take steps to hide it, & doesn’t care, as opposed to not knowing, about the consequences of his actions.
Now, as for the ability of children to know right from wrong, well, that is the job of parents & other authorities to instill in them that knowledge. I suppose if someone had been raised totally without any morals or guidance or discipline, we could perhaps excuse them a bit more since they never would have known what was acceptable & unacceptable behavior.
But I don’t think this applies to Voldemort because I’m quite sure the orphanage never taught that it was okay to bully & steal & sass your elders
Korg, what you suggest is a possibility. It doesn’t thrill me, however, because it implies that beyond a certain point , the common rules of human conduct don’t apply. The problem is, if the characters’ actions are not regulated by the rules of emotion and motivation that we recognize, if they are no longer acting human, we can no longer empathize with them. They may as well be mad. And they are no longer very interesting.
From that perspective, Voldemort’s supposed inability to choose to act other than he does is not compelling human drama.
Now of course Voldemort does appear, to a certain extent, to have moved beyond the normal rules of human conduct. Perhaps that is why he seems so uninteresting as a villain. On the other hand, we can still see some normal human motivations and dynamics in him: he doesn’t want to admit he could be wrong, he feels fear – but does not acknowledge it.
What I’m trying to say – not very coherently – is that the question of responsibility/culpability is only interesting if the protagonist is more human than not. Otherwise, it’s about as interesting as observing the moral choices of a snake.
Red Rocker,
I wasn’t trying to suggest it went any further that Voldemort himself. I think it a magic-caused situation that is anapplicable to the rest of humanity. Voldemort, I think we’ve discussed previously, is rather a two-dimensional character who lacks the depth or other arch-villians. He seemed a more complex character when he was young Tom Riddle- less so as Lord Voldemort. I think this is reflected in the de-humanising decisions he made.
Red Rocker, I agree that Voldemort isn’t a terribly interesting villain. I would much rather meet him in a dark alley then Greyback or Bellatrix. Voldemort would only just kill me.
I thought about my problems with Voldemort’s culpability. I would usually argue – as most of you – that social environment, parental care and education may play a major role but basically a man’s choices determine his destiny. In the case of Voldemort I received the impression that JKR presented him as ‘born evil’ (despite the background information she gave us), and as such I can not relate culpability or responsibility to him.
This is a really fascinating discussion of a very intriguing chapter. I love the double dose of Dumbledore, and the courteous, cautious way in which he deals with Tom, who is so clearly a very unusual child, and so totally different from Harry was when he found out about Hogwarts. Throughout most of their interview, Tom is pretty rude, but Dumbledore gives him the benefit of the doubt while also gently steering him toward correct behavior. His interaction with Mrs. Cole is rather amusing, albeit undoubtedly manipulative. Still, he treats her with respect – and she certainly isn’t objecting to his liquid refreshment…
I love the purple suit and the line “The mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ.” It almost seems like she’s teasing us, knowing that some of us will be reading great significance into every little thing in her books and that sometimes she won’t have meant it to have any importance beyond its immediate context. What’s the quote? “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar”? Kinda seems to fit here, for Harry but especially for readers.
You know, something Lily Luna said above really struck me as just fabulously awesome with respect to the larger scope of the series: “When he walks in the monochrome orphanage with its black and white tile and gray uniforms…” Don’t know why, but that statement gave me a flash of insight to the series’ as a whole. That brief description of the orphanage (black and white tile) and its uniforms (gray) jumped out at me as being also a very fitting description of the framework for the series.
Within the books/story, we are given concepts that when contemplated in the abstract/big picture sense we tend to think of as very “black-&-white” (i.e. “fixed”, absolute, etc.): good vs. evil, love vs. hate, wrong vs. right. Yet when it comes to the day-to-day living out of the those grander, absolute concepts, things tend to start turning many shades of gray rather quickly. That is as true of the real world as it is for her literary one.
Can’t really say why but just something about that description struck me as also being a great illustration/symbol of the framework for the story. The black & white tiles of the orphanage being representative of the larger themes within the story and the gray uniforms representing the characters acting/acting out within it.
Hmm… can’t quite make up my mind, though, whether “exotic giraffes” are the moments/characters who move their actions/the story past the gray, in one or both directions? Or whether they just have better fashion sense, lol!
Thanks, Lily Luna!
As to whether LV was capable of choice, despite his much diminished humanity, I think we must consider the one who came to know him best in the personal sense through mind-sharing–Harry. He believed LV capable. He suggested LV repent, as a genuine possibility; LV refused–a moral choice.
Have to say I agree with you on that one, AF.
Didn’t even AD say in the King’s Cross scene that there might still be hope for old Voldy? That it was still possible – despite being a shriveled up, wretched remainder of a soul-like object – that he still had a chance to change? Harry took that knowledge into his final confrontation with Voldy and offered it to him… and Voldy rejected it… utterly. Still, a choice… and not necessarily his “fated” destiny.
You’re welcome, Hermione Luna (comment 29). We loonies (Lunas) have to stick together!
DD in his plum suit completely breaks the black/white/gray mold. Into the drab monochrome prison of the orphanage he introduces the richness of life, of a world of color. Yet Riddle values only one color: the worst aspects of Slytherin green: serpents, green AKs, evil green potions. And what he values in these are only the ways in which they can hurt or kill his enemies. Red also symbolizes to him only the humiliation of his enemies, the spilling of their blood. Riddle/LV takes no pleasure in color or in the world, only in the darkest dark, in humiliating and controlling others, in killing, and in power.
Hee… yes we loonies (Lunas) do, lol! I just adore the character of Luna; she’s my second favorite in the whole series (the first being Snape).
I have noticed that color is a very important symbol throughout the series; though, it wasn’t until stumbling across this site that I realized there was a very specific “link” to it beyond the author’s own imaginative symbolic creations. The whole alchemical nature of it just fascinates me and I want to gain more knowledge on this specific facet.
Yeah… Riddle/LV is really the classic, larger-than-life, ultimate sociopath, isn’t he? Just eeww.