Hermione was an awesome, awesome strong female. I remember feeling sorry for her wayyy back in 1 because I was always the smart-but-socially-awkward girl, but then she took what she had and made it into something amazing. I did admire her loyalty always, and the fact that she stayed with Harry when Ron left - that was really telling. She obviously has a strong drive to do the right thing (and she is very much a stickler for the rules at times) until it comes to protecting those she cares about. From letting Harry and Ron cheat off her essays to stealing from Snape's stores to erasing her parents' memories, it is interesting to watch how her morality develops.
I hope that made sense. It's late and I'm a bit tired. So...sorry if you read that and think, "what?"
I think the characters' ambiguous morality is something that separates Harry Potter from a lot of other fantasty series. A lot of the characters don't do what they do because it's the right thing, like the Fellowship volunteering to go to Mordor, they do it because they're personally affected by it. There's a lot of selfishness, but also a lot of love, and I think it makes the story both more realistic and more interesting.
As to Hermione, a friend of mine, one who is far better-spoken than I am, recently said that in many ways Hermione is the Sam to Harry's Frodo. She keeps him going, she points him in the right direction, but she's doing it because of her devotion to him and Ron, and to save 'the Shire'-- her own little part of the world -- her parents? The muggleborns? IDK, but I thought it was an interesting analogy.
Ahh, I'd never thought of that before, but you're right - they are all pretty selfish, and part of me wonders if Harry would have even gone after Voldemort if he'd still had parents. I mean, I guess he would have been in the Order, since his parents were, but his loss definitely played a large role in the fact that he wanted to kill Voldemort.
I love that analogy - she totally is! She tries to do everything she can for him short of killing Voldemort herself. I suppose she's doing it for the muggleborns, because she's faced some of that prejudice in her time and was rightfully sickened by it. In a way, she also lost her parents to the war, so there's probably that, too.
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She obviously has a strong drive to do the right thing (and she is very much a stickler for the rules at times) until it comes to protecting those she cares about. From letting Harry and Ron cheat off her essays to stealing from Snape's stores to erasing her parents' memories, it is interesting to watch how her morality develops.
I hope that made sense. It's late and I'm a bit tired. So...sorry if you read that and think, "what?"
Reply
I think the characters' ambiguous morality is something that separates Harry Potter from a lot of other fantasty series. A lot of the characters don't do what they do because it's the right thing, like the Fellowship volunteering to go to Mordor, they do it because they're personally affected by it. There's a lot of selfishness, but also a lot of love, and I think it makes the story both more realistic and more interesting.
As to Hermione, a friend of mine, one who is far better-spoken than I am, recently said that in many ways Hermione is the Sam to Harry's Frodo. She keeps him going, she points him in the right direction, but she's doing it because of her devotion to him and Ron, and to save 'the Shire'-- her own little part of the world -- her parents? The muggleborns? IDK, but I thought it was an interesting analogy.
Reply
I love that analogy - she totally is! She tries to do everything she can for him short of killing Voldemort herself. I suppose she's doing it for the muggleborns, because she's faced some of that prejudice in her time and was rightfully sickened by it. In a way, she also lost her parents to the war, so there's probably that, too.
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