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Ok, that opening statement will definitely rankle quite a few people I’m sure. I read an essay a while back by Phoenixwriter who suggested that Hermione was the opposite of Voldemort. And that Love was the main plot of the books. It was a very interesting and appealing theory, that immediately clicked something deep inside me and set my mind to whirling.
I am mainly using that essay as my jumping off point here, and supporting it with my viewpoints on canon.
We, along with Harry, found out quite a good deal in OoP about his past, and his destiny (for lack of a better word). He found out that he was going to have to be the one to destroy/overcome Voldemort, that no one else was going to be able to do it; not even Dumbledore.
He also found out the means he had to be able to do it. And an explanation as to how he has been able to escape Voldemort, who should be as of now, the more powerful of the two.
Love.
Now, we knew before that his mother’s love saved him when he was a baby. She used, as Dumbledore tells us, an ancient magic to shield him. Does that mean she actually took her wand and preformed a charm? I don’t think so. I think that she employed that ancient magic everyday of young Harry’s life. She loved him. It’s as simple as that.
There is a pattern that shows in every plot of every book. That pattern is love.
PS/SS Here is where we learn about his mother’s love saving him, but that is somewhat of a subplot for the book that foreshadows the point of the overall series plot. The main plot on love starts when we see Harry, without love, come into the wizarding world, where he is adored. He returns the love to this world when he shows his determination to save it, even if those actions cause him to be banned from it forever. We have several other subplots of love in this book that explore friendship, with both Ron and Hermione, and a love/respect for an adult, Dumbledore. Ultimately, it is Lily and Hermione’s love that gave Harry the strength he needed to defeat Voldemort for the second time in his life. The room before he meets Voldemort!Quirrell, he is embraced by Hermione, and she tells him that he’s a great wizard. He carries this with him to find Quirrell in the inner chamber with the Mirror. His mother’s love, combined with Hermione’s gives him the strength he needed to hold off Quirrell. Voldemort fully recognized that Harry’s mother left a protection of love around him, when he couldn’t touch Harry in this confrontation. He forced Quirrell to do it anyway, and lost.
COS This main plot is more subtle than any of the others. We see Harry fighting Riddle in order to save the school, and those that have been petrified, again in love. Several of the smaller love subplots explored in this book are, hero crushes with Ginny, hero worship with Colin, and crushes on teachers with Hermione and Lockhart. Hermione again plays a major role in helping Harry to defeat Voldemort/Riddle at the end. She gives him all the clues that he needs to figure out what she had, even when petrified. First, she helps him to rule out Malfoy as the culprit using the Polyjuice potion (brewing it, and breaking about a million rules), secondly, her explanations to him about Salazar Slytherin’s being a parseltongue help him to realize what it is that he’s hearing, and that he’s not crazy, and finally she provides him with the final clue he needs to put things all together…Pipes, the way the monster was getting around the castle, and the probable place where the entrance to the chamber would be found. Her motivation, love.
POA The main love plot here is finding love for a surrogate parent, or Godfather. Parental love is something that Harry desperately needs and wants, but doesn’t have. Sirius provides that for him. The subplots are love for a teacher, Lupin, and love for animals and pets. Hermione’s love for Harry once again becomes the vessel for Harry defeating his demons. First, she cries for help, seeing Harry being beaten by the tree, and suffering cuts and bruises herself. Crookshanks answers her cry and prods the knot allowing them all to enter and get to the Shrieking Shack. Once inside, she defends Harry along with Ron by assaulting Black and then scraping their wands away from him. When Harry is going to kill Black, she sobs, and then is so silent that Harry notes it when he is standing there listening to Ron’s breathing. At her first chance to change the situation she does so, screaming for help when they hear footsteps, and effectively stopping Harry from his present course. Then, she attacks Lupin revealing his weakness to save Harry from him when she thinks he’s a danger to them. After which, she immediately takes on Snape when he shows his presence. She accompanies him without Harry requesting her to, to face the dementors and save Sirius. And of course, she provided the means to save Sirius and Buckbeak with the Time Turner. She broke rules, laws, and faced teacher’s wrath, murderers, death, and imprisonment all for Harry, because she loves him.
GOF Goblet of Fire explores the love of friends and family as the main plot. A large subplot of love is the adolescent crushing that happens in every school. Other subplots are love of the public, love of parental figures, and love of possessions. Hermione figures largely in all the subplots, but is also in the main plot. Her unfailing loyalty to Harry, and her help and worry in getting him through the Tri-Wizard tournament ultimately helped him to defeat Voldemort yet again. She helped him master the summoning charm he used to escape, the expelliarmus charm he used to save his life, and the practice dueling that he used to get away. Voldemort now knows that he can touch Harry, and therefore has conquered the lasting impression that Harry’s mother left. Yet, he has violated that ancient magic in some way. That is what the triumph in Dumbledore’s eye meant. He recognized this fact. What exactly that is, we aren’t yet sure, but we can be sure there’s something. My theory is that it is Hermione’s love. I’ll expound more on this later. The love he felt from Hermione, and his friends, his parents, Fawkes, and Dumbledore, and even from all the shadows from the wand when they emerge, gave Harry the strength, courage and power to force those beads of light back to Voldemort and keep them there overpowering him. This foreshadows what is to come. Harry’s power of love is stronger than Voldemort’s power of evil, dark forces, and hatred.
OOP The main love plot here is basically one of family, though it is kind of hard to sort out from all the subplots going on. Subplots include, love of institution, love of power, love of position, love of truth, and love of self, or self-esteem. Hermione again shows her unwavering loyalty to Harry, this time under the barrage of his frustrated yelling, which is another essay topic in and of itself. She tries to help him achieve his goals, and save his loved-ones. Through her love for him, she saves his life from Umbridge, and helps him get to the MoM and Department of Mysteries room that he needs. Harry’s love for Hermione is what saves him ultimately in this particular plot though. His concern for her and Sirius causes him to be present when Voldemort appears. Sirius’ death causes him such pain, that he allows the hatred in, enough to throw unforgivable curses at his enemy. Voldemort’s possession of him was thwarted by love. I believe this to be his love for Hermione, the only other person he was mortally scared for that day. Whose face he thinks of and gives him the strength for his patronus, the will to live. In SS/PS Voldemort cannot touch Harry’s skin, or touch him on the outside, because of love. In GOF he overcame that obstacle, and was able to touch Harry’s face. In OoP we see that he didn’t totally overcome the whole thing though, as the love surging through Harry keeps him from touching, or possessing him on the inside.
So the overall pattern that we see, is Harry encompassing everyone with his love, and receiving theirs in turn. Yet, as the series progresses, his love is narrowing down to specific people, each book bringing that field down to a focus, that will eventually land on one person, and utilize the most powerful kind of love. That one person will be Hermione.
Hermione’s Love Progresses.
Hermione seems infatuated with Harry right from the moment they meet on the train. She’s subtle about it though, and it’s not a hero worship infatuation we see in other places, but a certain draw that keeps her with him. It’s so strong, that she stays even when Ron repeatedly insults her and demands that she go away.
Harry returns this draw in a subtler way. He obviously thinks of her, when it is not obvious that he should. He is the one who remembers she’s in danger from the troll and convinces Ron they need to save her. He is the one who is willing to put the past behind them and make it up with her when he gets his Firebolt back, recognizing her intended motives.
Hermione is in tune with Harry right away. She is so into him that she changes her focus of nervous chatter to his interests without hesitation or request. We see this in PS/SS when they’re waiting to be sorted. She chatters about all the spells she’s learned, and when Harry looks at the ceiling quietly wishing she’d shut up as it was making him nervous, she immediately changes the topic of her lecture to the enchanted ceiling that he is looking at.
She’s so worried about Harry all the time that she doesn’t even notice when Ron has been repeatedly hurt, because she’s watching, or caring for, Harry. One of the first times this happens is in the Quidditch match when Ron and Neville take on Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle. Hermione is too busy watching an as yet uninjured Harry go after the snitch, that she doesn’t even realize that Ron and Neville are being beaten up right behind and beside her, even right under her chair. Another instance is when Ron is hurt at the end of POA, he chains himself to Pettigrew and Lupin and they start out to get back to Hogwarts. Ron has a broken leg, yet Hermione chooses to walk by Harry, who is not seriously injured in any way. She chooses to go on with Harry at the end of the chess challenge instead of staying with Ron who might be mortally wounded. When Harry and Ron are estranged, she chooses to spend her time with Harry, leaving Ron to stay with Fred and George. When Harry is in trouble, or injured, she cares so much that she leaves fingernail marks in her face, openly cries, flings herself onto him, and kisses him.
Hermione, without regard to anyone else acts with Harry’s best interests in mind, even when it’s detrimental to her other relationships. Even when it’s detrimental to their relationship, she sticks to what will be for his ultimate good, whether it’s her actions with the Firebolt, or her words in OoP telling him to think about what Voldemort is planning. This shows itself in her subconscious actions as well, when she jumps to the conclusion that Harry is the prefect, and when she goes with Harry and Hagrid rather than stay to watch Ron’s Quidditch match. (I’d really like to have seen anyone pull her away when it was Harry that was playing)
She’s by his side whenever he needs her. She’s by him when he’s nervous for the sorting, ostracized by the school, facing dementors, researching new charms, and taking on Voldemort’s followers. She’s by his side when he doesn’t know he needs her, uplifting him when he needs courage, encouraging him when he feels down, doing what’s best for him even when he disagrees, comforting him when he feels alone, and reigning him in when he needs it.
Harry immediately and without question, request, or hesitation, saves Hermione over everyone else time and time again. She leans on him for this support, both literally and figuratively at different times; when she’s whimpering in fright in the Shrieking Shack, or confronting Grawp, or when she’s standing ready to fight beside him facing dementors or death eaters. He thinks of her, first to save her from trouble, second to save himself from trouble. Her personage gives him the advice he needs when he’s worried, sick, or in trouble. Her voice is what he hears in his dreams, and his subconscious. She is the only one that he listens to, as McGonagall points out to us in OoP, and he listens to her without question.
There are so many instances of them supporting each other throughout all the books. Many times they act without the other having asked for help, many times seeming to read each others’ minds and galvanize into action simultaneously. The worry and concern they show for each other overpowers all their other responsibilities and relationships.
This is not romantic love. This is a deep bond. It progresses slowly, growing as the series advances. In the beginning, it’s not yet even a friendship. Book one sees it progress to a friendship level, as the story proceeds. Book two strengthens this bond and the friendship. Book three progresses the friendship to a deeper level. Book four shows the loyalty she encompasses in this friendship. Book five is when this friendship, this love, goes deeper, and starts to bud into something more romantic. It will continue in this vein throughout the next two books, budding little by little into a deeper and deeper love, until it blossoms fully into that true romantic love that we know is there.
Harry needs this for many reasons. One is obvious; he needs love to survive, as do all human beings. He needs love for his emotional well being, and it’s almost more important for him to find an all encompassing true love because of his past neglect and abuse. But, he needs this love in order to shut out all his hate, so that he will be able to defeat Voldemort.
In order to do that, the love will have to be that all encompassing true love, that overcomes and surpasses all of life’s hurts, prejudices, unfairness, meanness, baseness, and hate. In OoP we saw how weak Harry became when he allowed the hatred to overcome him. He was unable to learn. He kept hurting those he loves the most. He lashed out at those trying to help him. He was not able to act efficiently, or productively all year, or during the battle. He let the death eaters’ taunts get to him, and trigger his ill-planned actions.
He will need more preparation before he can face and defeat Voldemort. This is where Dumbledore fits in. He has been trying to help Harry be ready magically. He set up obstacles, and provided the means for Harry to face and defeat them. He has been shaping and conditioning Harry from the time he was orphaned till now for this one goal.
I believe he also has a hand in helping Harry to find this love that is such an integral and important part of the plan. It is a very subtle influence to be sure. Hermione is not a plaything to trifle with, neither is love. But I think Dumbledore saw that this bond existed and is helping it to grow.
This explains the strange passage in COS that I could never before reconcile. When Hermione is petrified, McGonagall comes and asks Harry to accompany her, yet she shows no intention of getting Ron. When he comes running, she seems about to turn him away, but then relents saying maybe he’d better come as well. Ron is Hermione’s friend too, and though I personally thought that Harry was closer to Hermione than Ron, to all outward appearances, they’re all close friends. Why was McGonagall concerned only about taking Harry? If McGonagall was acting on orders from Dumbledore, then it makes sense. Anything else leaves a lot of question marks.
Hermione’s slowly and gently growing friendship and love, endorsed by Dumbledore and Harry himself is what is ultimately going to help him defeat Voldemort. This is what he needs, and that is why it will have to happen. No other girl in canon shares this deep bond and rapport with him. No other person will be able to help him in all the ways that Hermione does, emotionally, mentally, physically, and metaphysically.
The door sealed in the Department of Mysteries, melted a knife that was guaranteed to open any lock. I believe this door lead to the room containing Love; one of life’s most powerful mysteries, and the key to Voldemort’s defeat. Love has already been Harry’s key to defeating Voldemort five times. But it was done without Harry knowing exactly how to use it. When he understands this power, he’ll be ready for the final showdown, ready to go on the offensive instead of just the defensive. Harry was not yet ready to enter that door. He needs more grooming. Hermione and Dumbledore will help him out with this, and the HMS Pumpkin Pie will sail into canon and over Voldemort’s island of hatred.
Look out Voldemort, I don’t know if you can swim, but the bay is full of sharks!
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