(continued)
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This foundation of sacrificial love enabled Harry to survive 10 years of neglect and abuse from his Dursley relatives after his parents were killed. Such love may have contributed to his rejecting the Sorting Hat offer to place him in Slytherin House in order to seek greatness, preferring instead Gryffindor House, noted for the courage and bravery Harry must show in crisis after crisis throughout the novels. Nor is it only his parents’ love that offers Harry a basic immunity to evil’s power. Mrs. Weasley, caring mother of six children, also provides nurturing love and affection to Harry. In the second novel, Harry stays with the Weasleys after being rescued from the oppressive Dursleys by the Weasley twins and their brother, Harry’s best friend, Ron. Mrs. Weasley greets him warmly, “I’m very pleased to see you, Harry dear . . . Come in and have some breakfast.” No wonder Harry exclaims to Ron, “This is the best house I’ve ever been in,” because “everybody there seemed to like him.” At novel’s end, after rescuing the Weasley daughter, Ginny, from Voldemort, Harry is “swept into Mrs. Weasley’s tight embrace.” Late in book four, Mrs.Weasley bends down and puts her arms around Harry as he lies in bed, unable to sleep because he had not been able to save a fellow student from Voldemort’s power. At 14, Harry “had no memory of ever being hugged like this, as though by a mother.” The Weasleys, poor as wizard families go, are rich in love and caring, in contrast to the status-conscious Dursleys who are ashamed of Harry and his magical birthright. The Weasley parents’ love and nurture of their own children also contrasts with the proud Malfoys, who jeer at them and seek to protect their superior pure-blood lineage at all costs, even if that means serving Voldemort. |
The snobbery in the Malfoy family passes down to their son, Draco, the same “bad faith” their name means. They abuse servants, seek to remove Dumbledore as headmaster because he believes in second chances and allows mixed-blood students, and spoil their son as much as the Dursleys spoil Harry’s cousin Dudley – by overindulgence and ignoring his bullying tactics. No wonder Draco Malfoy uses bully friends Crabbe and Goyle to intimidate other students at Hogwarts, and becomes Harry’s enemy out of jealousy and family pride. The negative consequence of failed family values is conspicuous in Barty
Crouch, who turned to Voldemort after his father’s ambition to advance
in the Ministry of Magic caused him to neglect his son. When Barty is
on trial for serving Voldemort, his father shows no mercy on him, responding
to his pleas with the politically motivated phrase: “You are no
son of mine! I have no son.” No wonder young Crouch wants to kill
Harry so Voldemort, with whom he now presumes to be “closer than
a son,” will reward and praise him. His loyalty to the evil father-substitute
came about because they both had “very disappointing fathers,”
suffered “the indignity of being named after those fathers,”
then had “the very great pleasure . . . of killing [those] fathers
to ensure the continued rise of the Dark Order!” These terrible
words of revenge against fathers are confirmed when Voldemort counsels
Harry to also join him.
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