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I was making a comment on ![[livejournal.com profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
arwencordelia's essay about Dumbledore and went off on this slight tangent about
At this point it's almost kind of a joke in HP how you can ruin a child through too much encouragement. This probably comes from a number of things--we do live in an age where people have a ridiculous idea about self-esteem, sometimes to the point where you'd think anything less than praising everything a child does is abuse. There's also the fairy tale satisfaction of spoiled kids getting nothing while the kids who suffer (as the child reading is presumed to suffer in his own mind) because others are jealous are ultimately rewarded. As I said in my comment, I do find it kind of strange when Dumbledore's comment that Harry had to live with the Dursleys because otherwise he'd have been a "pampered prince" is totally correct and reasonable, as if there's no way Harry could have been raised by a loving wizard family and not been hideous, or as if there's no alternative choices besides Abused/Humble and Cherished/Spoiled. He could have been brought up in humble circumstances without abuse, for instance. Or had guardians who were strict but not cruel. Or raised by Muggles and therefore ignorant but not despised. Okay, for lots of reasons the fairy tale over the top-ness of canon is more satisfying. Still, you wind up with this kind of funny stylized world where everything is almost split between us kids who have it rough but are cool and those kids who get everything and are total assholes--which is perhaps how the world comes across to a lot of kids in their more self-pitying moments.
There are a number of ironies here not really explored. For instance, the fact that Voldemort possibly saved Harry from being a prick, and should we perhaps assume that a Harry raised by James and Lily would not have been as powerful or as admirable? And what does it say about the immediate repulsion Harry feels when he meets somebody like Draco Malfoy when Dumbledore appears to be saying that all Harry would have had to do in order to become another little "pampered prince" was be raised in the Wizarding World? Then there's also that neat little have-your-cake-and-eat-it-to quality to Harry's experience at Hogwarts. He has a lot of bad experiences, of course, but he also gets some moments of primal satisfaction when he gets attention, gifts or privileges denied to others. Presumably we're to see Harry as having earned these rare treats through suffering, but it's kind of funny that Dumbledore says Harry really needed to be raised in by the Dursleys to keep from being spoiled, only to be thrilled to be able to give him an invisibility cloak, allow him a broom, and-most obviously-turn a leaving feast for the whole school into a surprise for Harry and his friends even if it means dissing a quarter of the school. Harry’s moments of being special are outweighed by his suffering, whereas, for instance, anything like suffering Draco experiences is outweighed by his being spoiled.
Anyway, what I really found myself doing in thinking along these lines was thinking of Neville. Neville and Harry are paralleled a lot in the books, obviously. In OotP we're pretty much requested to compare them and think how one could very well have been the other. But I was thinking specifically about Neville's family. Neville, too, was raised in a harsh environment, though it was different from Harry's. The main thing Harry had going for him, I think, was that while he did have the Dursleys constantly berating him he also always had this ideal family to hold on to in his head. He didn't *want* to be the Dursleys and preferred to imagine his real parents were far better and would appreciate him. In fact, this again throws a sort of kink in the idea that Harry was made *humble* by the Dursleys, because let's face it, Harry knows he's superior to them even before the Hogwarts letter confirms it. He's been raised to expect unfair treatment and bad luck and be treated like dirt, but he doesn't believe he deserves this treatment.
Neville, of course, is another story. Unlike Harry, Neville does consider himself to be amongst family growing up. While the Dursleys reject James and Lily and claim they're just as bad as Harry is (or as good as Harry is, to us), the Longbottoms appear to love Frank and Alice and feel Neville will never live up to them. Harry has all trace of his parents hidden from him, but keeps naturally being like them (black hair, green eyes, natural flier, sense of adventure, alleged swaggering). In OotP Harry even gets to the point where he can criticize his father. Neville, meanwhile, seems to have grown up with his father always before him. Mrs. Longbottom appears to compare the two all the time--Frank was her beloved child, Neville the screw up. He both is and is not her son, because he is her son's son. In a rather wonderful symbolic idea, the Longbottoms *are not dead.* They are living dead, bodies blankly staring that are unable to give Neville any love or help but capable of demanding help and love from him. They're also kept alive by Neville's Grandmother, as opposed to Neville himself. Harry imagines what his parents were like based on what he needs; Neville is constantly told what they were in order to criticize him. In the same book where Harry begins to separate himself from his parents (his dad was a jerk, his mum had bad taste in men) we see Neville acting as a parent to his mother and avenging his parents’ attack with Bellatrix. Then, of course, there's Neville's wand being his father's. That's probably the most obvious symbol for how Neville's background is used against him.
In fairy tales I know Bruno Bettleheim suggests that the neat thing about the wicked stepmother is she neatly splits the idea of mother in two. A child can hate the stepmother who punishes and denies and is mean while still retaining the "good mother" who is his/her own as a memory. Harry and Neville are a great example of this. Harry can hate the Dursleys and Petunia without any guilt. Neville really can’t do the same to his grandmother—and he certainly can’t ever be angry at his poor parents for anything. All the anger he feels seems to be turned inward, though in OotP it seemed he might be following Harry’s lead and finding appropriate targets for it in bad people. (Sirius, of course, is a whole other story, as is probably Hagrid.)
I don't know where I'm going with this. I don't think these things in canon are saying something about different types of family...it's more like it takes different aspects of all families and splits them up. Like, being made to feel like a screw-up is something that happens in lots of families, not all of them unhealthy. Probably most kids, even those with loving parents, sometimes feel like they're just not living up to whatever they're supposed to be, or feel under pressure to achieve. Similarly, young kids have always identified with hapless Cinderella-characters like Harry and Neville. And plenty of those kids (us) have probably also had moments of being bratty and wanting lots of stuff and probably not getting it, or of being jealous of the kids we imagined did get it. But the narrative often separates these things for effect--anybody who's talked to me, for instance, probably knows that the Malfoy Borgin&Burkes scene to me is like watching Draco be treated very much like Harry and Neville, and some of Lucius' remarks really get my hackles up. It's not that the scene changes Draco other scenes, but to me it's part of a coherent, realistic and not unsympathetic character. Yet in that scene I often hear the parent defended in ways that Vernon or Neville’s Gran would, imo, not be. I'd say the one other time this sort of thing happens is often with Harry and Snape, where some people feel that Harry is bratty enough in Snape's class (or they like Snape enough or dislike Harry enough) to justify Snape's insults.
It's just all how you look at things, or something. Because in the real world, while there certainly are awful and abusive parents, it's obviously rarely so simple as "cool kid whose suffered" vs. "mean jerk who has not." The attitudes of the Dursleys towards Harry, and of the Longbottoms towards Neville, and the Dursleys towards Dudley, etc., are probably often just part of a far more complex relationship.
arwencordelia's essay about Dumbledore and went off on this slight tangent about At this point it's almost kind of a joke in HP how you can ruin a child through too much encouragement. This probably comes from a number of things--we do live in an age where people have a ridiculous idea about self-esteem, sometimes to the point where you'd think anything less than praising everything a child does is abuse. There's also the fairy tale satisfaction of spoiled kids getting nothing while the kids who suffer (as the child reading is presumed to suffer in his own mind) because others are jealous are ultimately rewarded. As I said in my comment, I do find it kind of strange when Dumbledore's comment that Harry had to live with the Dursleys because otherwise he'd have been a "pampered prince" is totally correct and reasonable, as if there's no way Harry could have been raised by a loving wizard family and not been hideous, or as if there's no alternative choices besides Abused/Humble and Cherished/Spoiled. He could have been brought up in humble circumstances without abuse, for instance. Or had guardians who were strict but not cruel. Or raised by Muggles and therefore ignorant but not despised. Okay, for lots of reasons the fairy tale over the top-ness of canon is more satisfying. Still, you wind up with this kind of funny stylized world where everything is almost split between us kids who have it rough but are cool and those kids who get everything and are total assholes--which is perhaps how the world comes across to a lot of kids in their more self-pitying moments.
There are a number of ironies here not really explored. For instance, the fact that Voldemort possibly saved Harry from being a prick, and should we perhaps assume that a Harry raised by James and Lily would not have been as powerful or as admirable? And what does it say about the immediate repulsion Harry feels when he meets somebody like Draco Malfoy when Dumbledore appears to be saying that all Harry would have had to do in order to become another little "pampered prince" was be raised in the Wizarding World? Then there's also that neat little have-your-cake-and-eat-it-to quality to Harry's experience at Hogwarts. He has a lot of bad experiences, of course, but he also gets some moments of primal satisfaction when he gets attention, gifts or privileges denied to others. Presumably we're to see Harry as having earned these rare treats through suffering, but it's kind of funny that Dumbledore says Harry really needed to be raised in by the Dursleys to keep from being spoiled, only to be thrilled to be able to give him an invisibility cloak, allow him a broom, and-most obviously-turn a leaving feast for the whole school into a surprise for Harry and his friends even if it means dissing a quarter of the school. Harry’s moments of being special are outweighed by his suffering, whereas, for instance, anything like suffering Draco experiences is outweighed by his being spoiled.
Anyway, what I really found myself doing in thinking along these lines was thinking of Neville. Neville and Harry are paralleled a lot in the books, obviously. In OotP we're pretty much requested to compare them and think how one could very well have been the other. But I was thinking specifically about Neville's family. Neville, too, was raised in a harsh environment, though it was different from Harry's. The main thing Harry had going for him, I think, was that while he did have the Dursleys constantly berating him he also always had this ideal family to hold on to in his head. He didn't *want* to be the Dursleys and preferred to imagine his real parents were far better and would appreciate him. In fact, this again throws a sort of kink in the idea that Harry was made *humble* by the Dursleys, because let's face it, Harry knows he's superior to them even before the Hogwarts letter confirms it. He's been raised to expect unfair treatment and bad luck and be treated like dirt, but he doesn't believe he deserves this treatment.
Neville, of course, is another story. Unlike Harry, Neville does consider himself to be amongst family growing up. While the Dursleys reject James and Lily and claim they're just as bad as Harry is (or as good as Harry is, to us), the Longbottoms appear to love Frank and Alice and feel Neville will never live up to them. Harry has all trace of his parents hidden from him, but keeps naturally being like them (black hair, green eyes, natural flier, sense of adventure, alleged swaggering). In OotP Harry even gets to the point where he can criticize his father. Neville, meanwhile, seems to have grown up with his father always before him. Mrs. Longbottom appears to compare the two all the time--Frank was her beloved child, Neville the screw up. He both is and is not her son, because he is her son's son. In a rather wonderful symbolic idea, the Longbottoms *are not dead.* They are living dead, bodies blankly staring that are unable to give Neville any love or help but capable of demanding help and love from him. They're also kept alive by Neville's Grandmother, as opposed to Neville himself. Harry imagines what his parents were like based on what he needs; Neville is constantly told what they were in order to criticize him. In the same book where Harry begins to separate himself from his parents (his dad was a jerk, his mum had bad taste in men) we see Neville acting as a parent to his mother and avenging his parents’ attack with Bellatrix. Then, of course, there's Neville's wand being his father's. That's probably the most obvious symbol for how Neville's background is used against him.
In fairy tales I know Bruno Bettleheim suggests that the neat thing about the wicked stepmother is she neatly splits the idea of mother in two. A child can hate the stepmother who punishes and denies and is mean while still retaining the "good mother" who is his/her own as a memory. Harry and Neville are a great example of this. Harry can hate the Dursleys and Petunia without any guilt. Neville really can’t do the same to his grandmother—and he certainly can’t ever be angry at his poor parents for anything. All the anger he feels seems to be turned inward, though in OotP it seemed he might be following Harry’s lead and finding appropriate targets for it in bad people. (Sirius, of course, is a whole other story, as is probably Hagrid.)
I don't know where I'm going with this. I don't think these things in canon are saying something about different types of family...it's more like it takes different aspects of all families and splits them up. Like, being made to feel like a screw-up is something that happens in lots of families, not all of them unhealthy. Probably most kids, even those with loving parents, sometimes feel like they're just not living up to whatever they're supposed to be, or feel under pressure to achieve. Similarly, young kids have always identified with hapless Cinderella-characters like Harry and Neville. And plenty of those kids (us) have probably also had moments of being bratty and wanting lots of stuff and probably not getting it, or of being jealous of the kids we imagined did get it. But the narrative often separates these things for effect--anybody who's talked to me, for instance, probably knows that the Malfoy Borgin&Burkes scene to me is like watching Draco be treated very much like Harry and Neville, and some of Lucius' remarks really get my hackles up. It's not that the scene changes Draco other scenes, but to me it's part of a coherent, realistic and not unsympathetic character. Yet in that scene I often hear the parent defended in ways that Vernon or Neville’s Gran would, imo, not be. I'd say the one other time this sort of thing happens is often with Harry and Snape, where some people feel that Harry is bratty enough in Snape's class (or they like Snape enough or dislike Harry enough) to justify Snape's insults.
It's just all how you look at things, or something. Because in the real world, while there certainly are awful and abusive parents, it's obviously rarely so simple as "cool kid whose suffered" vs. "mean jerk who has not." The attitudes of the Dursleys towards Harry, and of the Longbottoms towards Neville, and the Dursleys towards Dudley, etc., are probably often just part of a far more complex relationship.
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