OOTP Chapter Twenty-Seven: "The Centaur and the Sneak"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* First of all, sorry this is so late, I'm afraid I've been a bit busy preparing to go back to university.

* This is the chapter in which Hermione officially crosses the line from “occasionally strident and self-righteous but on the whole likeable and sympathetic character” to “dangerous sociopath”.

* “‘A gorgeous centaur...’ sighed Parvati.” I must say that, given the, erm, associations of centaurs in classical mythology, this sort of thing rather creeps me out. Is JKR aware of the implications of what she’s writing? Or did she just throw it in without bothering to think it through?

* Hermione’s dropping dark hints about what Umbridge is going to do, revealing the plot like any good author avatar would.

* So Harry can remember the names of centaurs he met once four years ago, but in DH he won’t be able to remember a face from a picture from one chapter to the next. *coughplotconveniencecough*

* Wow, centaurs sure are arrogant and condescending people. No wonder Dumbledore felt enough of an affinity with Firenze to hire him as a teacher. He recognises a kindred spirit when he sees one.

* If I were JKR, I’d be hesitant to dignify the wizarding conflicts with the term “war”. They’re more like gang wars than what most people would think of as warfare. Which is why epic fantasy doesn’t really mix with a “secret magical people in this world” plot. Epic fantasy generally centres around mighty empires, big wars and bloody battles, but these things are generally quite noticeable, and any wizards fighting in large-scale conflicts would be found out pretty quickly. So the wizarding war pretty much has to be low-key to make it plausible that Muggles wouldn’t know about it, and the end result is that we get a lot of build-up and very little payoff.

* Firenze spends the whole lesson teaching them something which he doesn’t expect them to do anyway, and which is anyway a bit uncertain and useless. So he’s about as good as the average Hogwarts teacher, then.

* “Indeed, Harry sometimes wondered how Umbridge was going to react when all the members of the DA received ‘Outstanding’ in their Defence Against the Dark Arts OWLs.” Only kidding, Harry will be the only one to get an “Outstanding” mark, because he’s a Mary Sue just the most awesome DADA student ever.

* Although everybody always goes on about how smart Hermione is, and from what we see of her she doesn’t seem noticeably worse in DADA than she does in other subjects, so if she only got an “E” in her Defence OWL, that’s probably because Harry’s not a very good teacher... :p

* Seamus’ Patronus “was definitely something hairy”. *mind goes into the gutter*

* Hermione’s Patronus is an otter, even though she’s one of the least otter-like people in the series. On a Doylist level, this is probably because JKR’s favourite animal is the otter, so her author avatar will have one as her Patronus, obviously. On a Watsonian level, perhaps Patronuses don’t represent what your personality is like, but what you need to guard you and keep you out of trouble. So Hermione’s is an otter because she needs fun-loving people around her to stop her getting too serious about everything, Ron’s is a weasel because he needs smart people to compensate for his mental inadequacy, and Harry’s is a stag because he needs a proper father-figure to help him, not an abusive one like Uncle Vernon or a scheming and manipulative one like Dumbledore. Patronuses which change when somebody falls in love show that their caster needs to be loved by their intended in order to feel happy and secure again.

* Dobby appears, wearing “his usual eight woollen hats”. I quite like the suggestion that it was this sight that made Hermione drop her SPEW activities, as she saw that her hats were all going to this one elf, and that they were therefore pretty useless from a freeing people standpoint. (Can anybody remember if SPEW is brought up again in this book?)

* Umbridge is here! I bet it’s times like this that the DA wish they had a second, secret entrance from the ROR. That way they could slip away while Umbridge and her cronies sat uselessly in front of the main entrance.

* Draco’s concealed “beneath an ugly dragon-shaped vase”, to match his ugly and monstrous soul.

* Umbridge has “an indecent excitement in her voice”. I wonder if this is how Hermione would sound to those on the receiving end of her little schemes.

* When I first read this scene, I didn’t really mind the “Sneak” curse, because I just sort of assumed that Madam Pomfrey managed to find a way of removing them after a couple of weeks. Then we found out that she still had the scars years later and... yikes.

* Not only is that extremely vindictive, but it doesn’t actually help the DA in any way. It didn’t stop them being betrayed in the first place, and it didn’t alert them to the fact that Umbridge was coming to get them. If this had been a one-off incident and the curse hadn’t been permanent, I’d be inclined to put it down to youthful lack of thought, but when you compare it to some of Hermione’s other actions (her treatment of Rita Skeeter, or sending those canaries after Ron), it seems like a rather worrying pattern is starting to emerge...

* Minerva gets all self-righteous about Willy Widdershins being let off. I wonder whether she feels the same about Mundungus Fletcher, or whether petty crooks are OK just as long as they’re on her side.

* Also, she’s not above a bit of petty corruption herself, since she lets Gryffindor Quidditch players off homework when a match is coming up.

* So Kingsley memory-wipes Marietta to stop her telling. You know, this is exactly the sort of mentality that leads DEs to Imperius people and get them to do their bidding: not caring about your victims’ autonomy, just violating their minds when it’s convenient to do so.

* Also, if they are going to mind-wipe Marietta, why not do it to Percy, Fudge and Umbridge too? That would get them out of trouble entirely.

* And really guys, Umbridge has a list of DA members and access to Veritaserum. Obliviating one witness shouldn’t be enough.

* I’m surprised Umbridge thought she could get away with manhandling students like that in front of Dumbledore. I mean, that man’s just so concerned about his students’ welfare.

* Hermione left the membership list pinned to the ROR wall. Well done, Hermione. Not that any DA members will point out this idiocy to her. Nor will they point out the fact that her defensive jinx was (a) vindictive and useless, and (b) not told about to them when they joined up. Maybe they’re all worried she’ll brand the word “COMPLAINER” across their forehead if they speak up.

* Dumbledore taking the rap is all very noble and everything, but I don’t see how it’s meant to help. Fudge can still charge the pupils with attending, even if they didn’t organise it, and now Dumbledore’s ensured that he’s going to be on the run and unable to give them any help.

* Face-scarring aside, I actually quite liked this chapter. It was quite well-paced, and I never really felt like I was wading through pages of filler. It will be interesting to see if the other chapters will be more like this now the book’s reaching its climax, or whether the quality will slip back down again.

Comments

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

But doesn't it seem strange that she doesn't seem to care what happens to her parents and all the other people that she grew up with? I mean, even before the cruelty in book 7, we see her pretty much ditching her family almost every summer to go hang out with her wizarding friends. Think about how that must have felt for them, to have their daughter keep choosing to go somewhere where they either can't get or aren't welcome (I wonder if Mrs. Weasley would be able to keep her prejudiced comments to herself if they visited?). They don't seem to be dictatorial enough parents to forbid her going, but the pain would still surely be there. And in all that time, she barely even thinks of them or mentions them- it's almost like she's already absorbed the wizarding perceptions that they can't be worthwhile people, since they are only muggles. Even if they are the muggles who cared for her, loved her and raised her for more than half of her life.

I'm sorry, but I can't just excuse her callousness here. This is not the behavior of a compassionate person.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

we see her pretty much ditching her family almost every summer to go hang out with her wizarding friends.

Sure ... but we're not told how long it's for. We just know that Hermione was present at the Burrow before Harry turned up sometimes.

We also know that Hermione also had time with her parents, going overseas for holidays and the like. Some time with them, some with the Weasleys, nothing wrong there.

But doesn't it seem strange that she doesn't seem to care what happens to her parents

But she does; her voice catches a couple of times when she talks about the 'Wendells', she's clearly distressed:

Wendell and Monica Wilkins don’t know that they’ve got a daughter, you see.”

Hermione’s eyes were swimming with tears again.

THE POOR GIRL!!

No callousness here. You're stretching things beyond the breaking point in trying to paint Hermione badly.

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, Madderbrad, but I just can't sympathize. Tears or no tears, she violated her own parents' memories, treating them as if they were not smart enough to make there own choices when it's made clear that they are both intelligent, well-educated people. Memories are one of the most important things that any person can have. They influence everything that we do, and in a sense they are part of our identity. Hermione had absolutely no right to make that call, and that she does such a thing clearly shows how much she has imbibed the noxious values of the Wizarding World. I can't forgive her for that.

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

Besides, if the Deatheaters had decided to torture them for information, what would they have found out? That they were Hermione's parents? It's pretty obvious that the DE's just randomly attacked muggles anyways, so what good did stealing their memories do? It isn't like she told them much anyways. If she had talked to them like the rational adults that they are rather than making executive decisions, they still could have fled to Australia, but not have suffered the indignity of a 17 or 18 year old girl deciding that just because she had magic that she knew best.

[sunnyskywalker]

Maybe that Harry liked treacle tart, thus giving Voldemort the idea for a cunning poisoning plot? She didn't tell them about the Horcruxes, right? So they're covered on that angle.

Plus, a simple lie would have worked to get them out of the country away from Voldemort, if that's what she was worried about. Just, "Mum, Dad, Voldemort's getting scary and will probably target all three of us because of our connection to Harry, so we should flee the country while Prophecy Boy takes care of things. We should split up so we couldn't all be caught at once. You guys go to Australia, and I'll hop on a plane to that tropical place Sirius stayed at for a while and back Harry up from a distance by doing research on some magical theory that might be important." And then she could just go on the camping trip and maybe send an occasional letter with a seashell she picked up on one of their invisible trips into town.

But what she did assumes that they can't make any decisions for themselves (because what, they're stupid Muggles?), and also is a pretty terrible risk, considering she's never done this before, and we know Memory Charms can cause permanent damage - if done too often even by professionals who do Memory Charms for a living, for certain, and I don't think it's too much of a stretch that performing an immensely difficult charm like erasing parts of 18 years of memory could be done improperly and cause damage too. So, she's possibly damaged her parents permanently, when simply lying would have accomplished the same task. (As it turned out, Voldemort didn't even torture the readily-accessible Weasleys to lure Harry out or get information on him, so the Grangers probably would have been perfectly safe at home, but I will let Hermione off the hook for not predicting Voldemort would be that dumb.)

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Oh, I quite agree with you about memories being the essence of who we are. Hermione essentially 'killed' her parents by altering her memories.

But doing so doesn't show that she is the the cold callous sociopath that has been suggested here. No, she's an arrogant superior witch who has run roughshod over her parent's freedom, maybe (only for their own good, of course) but I do think it's a whole different category of offence than "Hermione Granger, sociopath". You're trying to hit Hermione with charge #2 while I'm defending her on charge #1.

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

She might not be a sociopath in that sense, but she definitely is still a monster. I wouldn't be surprised if she grew up to be another Umbridge.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Umbridge plied her evil for personal advancement, in the support of racist/xenophobic ideals and out of personal sadism.

Hermione Granger mind-wiped her parents so Voldemort couldn't 'track them down', so they would be kept 'safe and happy'.

No way will Hermione Granger grow into another Umbridge!

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

Alternatively, Umbridge did her evil because she knew best for the Wizarding World (and out of personal sadism). Hermione mindwiped her parents, Confunded McLaggen, signed up the DA to a magical contract without their knowledge, and attempted to non-consensually free the elves because she knew best for those poor little creatures not deserving of agency. Also, the long duration (and if we count the interviews, permanence) of Marietta's scarring, her brutal avian attack on Ron, and her amusement at Umbridge's PTSD are... not incompatible with a degree of personal sadism. Sure, she doesn't indulge in it as often as Umbridge, but who knows what she might become over time?

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Sure, she doesn't indulge in it as often as Umbridge, but who knows what she might become over time?

That's just it. Some people here are saying "wow, Hermione did some things that a sociopath would do OMG THAT MEANS HERMIONE GRANGER IS A SOCIOPATH!!!". No. Hermione did a lot of things that a sociopath WOULDN'T do also.

"Over time", sure, Hermione might become a sociopath - I mean, in the canon she's married to Ron, so (a) anything could happen and (b) her marriage might drive her to it :-) - but it's very very unlikely. As likely has Harry becoming a dark lord (let's face it, he's really too incompetent to become a dark lord), Ron the Minister of Magic, etc.

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

"Over time", sure, Hermione might become a sociopath - I mean, in the canon she's married to Ron, so (a) anything could happen and (b) her marriage might drive her to it :-) - but it's very very unlikely.

Not necessarily. The vast majority of people engage in those behaviors that are reinforced by others. If Hermione gets rewarded or praised for hurting and humiliating others, taking over their lives without their consent, etc, she could very well have the empathic part of her personality diminished and the tyrannical part developed. In another 20 or 30 years she could be just like Umbridge. We have no idea what Umbridge was like when she was a teen. She may have been just like Hermione.

BTW, people don't become sociopaths/psychopaths as adults. They develop that way while they're growing up, but can't be formally diagnosed until they're at least 18 and have displayed the requisite behaviors for several years.

As likely has Harry becoming a dark lord (let's face it, he's really too incompetent to become a dark lord), Ron the Minister of Magic, etc.

I agree they couldn't on their own. They'd make great figureheads, though. I can see either of them being manipulated by a sufficiently clever person into doing just about anything. It worked for Dumbledore, after all. ;-)

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

If Hermione gets rewarded or praised for hurting and humiliating others, taking over their lives without their consent, etc -

Aha! But she wasn't so rewarded! We never saw her gloating over Marietta's scarring, or smirking over Umbridge's centaur punishment (other than laughing with Ginny in the medical wing the day after). She's not still knitting for house elves (in fact pro-Hermione fans regret that S.P.E.W. seemed to die after book #5). She ISN'T praised for those things she did.

So there's little chance of her evolving into a future Umbridge. And certainly no sign of it.

As likely has Harry becoming a dark lord (let's face it, he's really too incompetent to become a dark lord), Ron the Minister of Magic, etc.

I agree they couldn't on their own. They'd make great figureheads, though. I can see either of them being manipulated by a sufficiently clever person into doing just about anything.

Someone like ... HERMIONE GRANGER, yeah? :-)

[lynn-waterfall.livejournal.com]

She wasn't rewarded? She didn't earn the approval of her friends for branding Marietta, or for getting rid of Umbridge? Harry and Ron seemed amused and pleased by Umbridge's traumatized state in the end. That's positive feedback that she's doing something right.

Yes, and she does give up on S.P.E.W. after a couple of years. A couple of years in which she isn't praised for it. Correlation is not causation, of course, but it doesn't go *against* that pattern, certainly.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

"As likely has Harry becoming a dark lord (let's face it, he's really too incompetent to become a dark lord),"

Ordinarily I'd be inclined to agree with you, but given what we see of the rest of the wizarding world... :p

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Hee. :-)

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

The wording of that quote does not at all rule out the interpretation that her distress is over the fact that *they forgot her.* That she had to make her parents forget *her.* I.e. that she's still think about *herself* and her distress stems from that fact, rather than from the way she treated *other people.* The quote is ambiguous - it neither proves nor disproves your assertion, but it can be worked into an argument against your view as well as into your argument. By itself it doesn't prove she felt much empathy for her parents.

Also, the fact of Hermione's decision to treat them that way instead of *talking* to them, combined with her utter lack ever of any sign of regret that she did not talk to them first, supports the interpretation that her distress here is mainly coming from a place of self-centeredness. Doesn't mean it's not real distress, but presence of distress alone does not necessarily equal proof of empathy.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I think you're wrong.

Case #1, Hermione's distressed at what she did to her parents, how they've been affected by the war. Our girl is shown to be an empathic loving witch, the 'sociopath' charge is defeated.

Case #2, you say she's thinking about *herself*. Fine ... but the distress she feels for *herself* is bouncing off the love she has for her parents; it's indirect proof of her feelings, one step removed. Put it the other way - if she was a cold callous sociopath with no feelings for her parents then I can't see why she'd be distressed thinking about them *or* herself after the mind wiping.

So I do think that, either way, the Wendell episode shows that Hermione was a loving feeling girl as far removed from a 'sociopath' as one can get.

[sunnyskywalker]

Dudley might be distressed if his parents forgot about him, but that also might be because he is no longer their precious Duddykins who knows he's the center of their universe and will be doted on and flattered, not because he loves them deeply.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

We have canon evidence that Dudley thought along those lines. There's absolutely nothing like that for Hermione. You're trying to invent reasons where none exist, bring things in completely out of the cold and try and shoehorn them into the white space between the lines.

And anyway, if Hermione was a monster who thought only of her own feelings, wouldn't she keep her parents around, in that case? Putting her selfish desire to be 'doted on and flattered' ahead of protecting them?

[sunnyskywalker]

I'm just pointing out that being upset that her parents don't remember her does not have one and only one possible cause, which is what you seem to be arguing. Not that she's Dudley's clone, just that it's possibly that perfectly wonderful love is not the only thing that might make her tear up. And we do see her focusing on the fact that they (a) know "quite a bit" about Harry and that (b) they no longer remember her, rather than worrying about whether her spell worked properly, whether they'll be okay, or anything like that. She is never mentioned at any later point as doing or saying anything to indicate that she's even thinking of them during their downtime in the tent when they have nothing else to do but worry about people they know, either.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I think you're over-extended here.

Firstly your suggesting that Hermione might have 'another cause' for tearing up over her parents, which shows that she's not the empathic girl we're shown ... and the reason she's not the empathic girl we're shown is because she's tearing up (over another cause) for her parents. It's circular reasoning. Or put it like this - yes, her tearing up *could* be due to a less than salubrious reason ... but if that reason is shown absolutely no-where else in the text, if there's no pointer anywhere else to suggest that Hermione doesn't simply love her parents - something that is *understood* in a story like this unless shown otherwise, for starters, not to mention everything else we see ... then you really don't have a case.

we do see her focusing on the fact that they (a) know "quite a bit" about Harry -

Which shows how close she is to her parents, right? A colder, unfeeling girl who is all "give me, give me" is much less likely to involve her parents in her life and tell her about it.

And we do see her focusing on the fact that they ... (b) they no longer remember her, rather than worrying about whether her spell worked properly

But if they no longer remember her then the spell DID work properly!

She is never mentioned at any later point as doing or saying anything to indicate that she's even thinking of them during their downtime in the tent when they have nothing else to do but worry about people they know, either.

How do we know that? Bloody Harry was so callously concentrating on his own despair, so uncaring of his best friend's feelings, she could have been sobbing over her parents' predicament and we would never know.

Incidentally, that was a neat bit of canon correction that they did in the second-last movie, wasn't it? A couple of times we were SHOWN that Hermione was thinking about her parents, in how she would unconsciously make decisions based on her life with them. I thought that was pretty good/clever of the movies (sometimes a great lens for highlighting Rowling's shortcomings). Anyway, the movie people answered you on this point, Sunny!

[sunnyskywalker]

You're the one reasoning that example x is clearly an instance of Hermione's compassion as supported by example y, which is supported by example x all over the place. All I'm saying is that getting a bit teary that they don't remember her is not 100% unambiguous proof that she loves them very deeply, and that given she had other options to protect them which would not involve destroying their personalities, I think it's fair to question whether that is her sole motive, at least.

The spell might not work properly in that they forget, but permanently, when clearly it's supposed to be reversible. Since we never see or hear about her reversing it, or see the Grangers in the epilogue, we have no way of knowing whether she succeeded in that part of the spell.

Also, her explanation about them knowing a lot about Harry doesn't really hold up. What would they know that Voldemort would want? That he likes treacle tart, doesn't do his homework until the last minute, and likes Ginny? Voldemort already knows most of that (partly due to hanging out in Harry's head for unspecified periods of time in OotP), or could get it from dozens of other sources who had actually met Harry. Just kidnap Colin Creevey, or Ginny herself. What need for the Grangers, who barely saw the kid once five years ago? It doesn't seem likely either that they know anything useful or that Voldemort would believe they would. So either Hermione is a total idiot (not likely), or that is actually not one of her reasons for mind-wiping them. And if she's not telling the truth about it being a motivating factor, we have no reason to assume she's telling the truth about the fact that she's told them "quite a bit" either.

Bits in a movie that some other people wrote which JKR may or may not have known about in advance or approved of can't fill in for the book's deficiencies. If you want book!canon and movie!canon to be true simultaneously, then you have to believe that both Marietta and Cho turned in the DA at the same time, which is clearly not the case in either source alone. So it's one at a time, but not both ;-)

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Very well said.