April 27, 2009
The Moment That Dumbledore Died
I was in a subway holding the book, terrified as I watched the shocking scene.
“Dumbledore began to cower as though invisible torturers surrounded him; his flailing hand almost knocked the refilled goblet from Harry’s trembling hands as he moaned, ‘Don’t hurt them, don’t hurt them, please, please, it’s my fault, hurt me instead…Make it stop, make it stop, I want to die!’” (HBP 572-573).
I sprinted home, got into bed, and lay there reading in complete suspense as to what would happen next.
As the release of the film “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” approaches, I continue to think back to my first experience reading “Half-Blood Prince”: how I was mesmerized during Harry’s private lessons with Dumbledore, intrigued and frightened by the concept of horcruxes, delighted when Harry finally snogs Ginny, and horrified as Harry is forced to move with Dumbledore on a march towards death; a march that starts as Harry and Dumbledore leave the Cave and ends when Snape enters the top of the Astronomy Tower, surrounded by Death Eaters with Dumbledore weak and on the ground.
And here we were. The great moment of truth that we had been moving towards ever since that mysterious teacher with “greasy black hair, a hooked nose, and sallow skin” looked “straight into Harry’s eyes” (Sorcerer’s Stone 126) during Harry’s first opening feast and as Dumbledore begged for help, what would be proven true: Dumbledore’s belief in Snape’s goodness or Harry’s wavering suspicions that Snape was really a Death Eater?
“Snape raised his wand and pointed it directly at Dumbledore.
“’Avada Kedavra!’
“A jet of green light shot from the end of Snape’s wand and hit Dumbledore squarely in the chest. Harry’s scream of horror never left him; silent and unmoving, he was forced to watch as Dumbledore was blasted into the air. For a split second, he seemed to hang suspended beneath the shining skull, and then he fell backward, like a great rag doll, over the battlements and out of sight” (HBP 596).
My eyes transfixed to the page, my mind in shock, my voice half whispering, half shrieking, “It can’t be!,” I stared at the book as if the world had ended. It was as if every stuffed animal that ever made me feel warm and cozy and safe was slashed and burned before my face. The gods that had guarded me had fallen. The world as I knew it was over. And all of the grief and trauma that you and I went through with Harry did not prepare us for this.
Just one year before, we watched as Harry witnessed his beloved godfather Sirius Black, slip from the world of the living to the world “behind the veil” (Order of the Phoenix 806). A year before that, we witnessed with Harry the murder of his friend and rival Cedric Diggory and “…stared into Cedric’s face, at his open gray eyes, blank and expressionless as the windows of a deserted house” (Goblet of Fire 638).A year before that, we watched the ruthless killing of Harry’s mother played again and again in Harry’s mind.
And while we and Harry had been through so much together, even with all of that trauma and loss , as we approached Dumbledore’s corpse with Harry “there was still no preparation for seeing him here, spread-eagled, broken: the greatest wizard Harry had ever, or would ever, meet” (HBP 608).
Dumbledore was dead.
RESPONSE (please respond to any one or all three of these in as little or great of detail as you’d like):
1- Please tell us about your experience at this moment in Harry Potter.
2- Tell us of a moment in your life (please remember to only talk about what you feel safe discussing) that was, like this moment, of tremendous shock.
3- Tell us of a moment in the world where it seemed that the shock and loss were too great to bear.
Brigid Courtney
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Hi Andrew! I know the awful terrible feeling I wanted to die right there myself.. I had a conviction that Snape was good, that Dumbledore was dying, and had sent for Snape because he and Snape knew what had to be done.. Your line about the stuffed animals got to me because I love stuffed animals (ask Mark!) my heart was ripped out.. I can’t be I can;t be something will come to light Then my heart suddenly broke for Snape who is a healer.. The look on his face must have been at his own horror at what he was doing for he was also pledged to help Drace.. what a joblldouble agent are protecting these two boys.. handfuls to be sure…I was assualted by a family “friend” and meither one of my parents would do anything about it.. (said I was on my own to stay away from him) 9-11 hit me terrible hard.. I didn’t know anyone who was in the towers and planes, but we have sisters in new york down on Fulton street. I was in change of the convent and of course couldn’t reach them.. We also had sisters on an American airline flight at that time.. Imagine my horror to think it could be them, it was not but the horror of that day will always stick with me
Grace
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1-I closed the book at that point, completely numb. Then I read on, in denial, thinking “Ha! We’re going to get all sad about this and he’s going to show up in Book 7 and it’ll all be a ruse; this isn’t real. This couldn’t be real…” But at the same time, the common sense voice in my head said, “Yes, this is real. Jo’s always said that death is real in her books. He’s not coming back.” And by the time I got to his funeral, I was bawling.
2- A friend of a friend, someone I knew but didn’t know very well, killed himself by jumping in front of a train. That was hard. There was sadness, of course, and a feeling of guilt, like “Could I have done or said anything that would have made a difference?” I was on my way home when it happened. I was stuck in my car on one side of the railroad tracks, and I was getting angry that whatever it was that was blocking the tracks was taking so long. I had no idea…
3- The attack at VA Tech in 2007 devastated me. I found out on my way out of the Communications building at school; it was all over the screens. I missed all my classes that day and the next. I stayed home and cried, and prayed, and just sat there, glued to the news, chilled to the bone.
Laura
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1. I barely remember HBP, but what I do remember is this: My family had (annoyingly) planned a vacation to Yellowstone, leaving the day of HBP’s release. I managed to postpone the trip long enough to get the book and spent the entire drive there reading. By the time we arrived at Yellowstone, did a little sightseeing, and got to the hotel, I had gotten a shaky call from my best friend, basically screaming into the phone “OMGOMGOMG the end! Dumbledore! OMGOMG! No – I’m not going to say anything…” and then hanging up. I finished reading around midnight in the hotel room, with both parents sleeping, and I distinctly remember staring into the darkness wondering what *it* meant… knowing that everything had changed. My mom didn’t want to be spoiled, so I had to rant to my dad (who doesn’t read the books) for an hour the next day just to get it off my chest.
2) A similar moment of shock came when I heard from my mother that my cousin had died in a motorcycle accident. My aunt (his mother) was staying with us at the time, and I had heard some commotion as I slept in that morning, then heard her leaving loudly, but didn’t think much of it. Little did I know her life had been shattered!
3) I was camping with my school when 9-11 hit, so it was a shock for me to come back after a week, having missed the main event – so to speak – and deal with the fallout. More recently then that, though, I found it a great shock when Heath Ledger died. Not to sound shallow in talking about an actor, but to see someone who was just part of the world, especially as I had recently seen Knight’s Tale for the first time, and who had great promise (I had been hearing about Dark Knight) ripped from the world… that was hard to fathom.
Liz M
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1) I was in my bedroom reading. I, like a lot of people, was already pretty sure Dumbledore was going to die ever since the book covers came out. I know from experience that characters who suddenly become more prominent often die (i.e. Sirius). And there had been the betting fiasco. And the old wizard often dies in stories anyway. So I wasn’t shocked by that (still cried a bit). But I was shocked that it was Snape who did it. That caught me completely off guard, I never expected it for a moment, and I remember gleefully thinking something along the lines of, “OMG, she’s done it again! The fans have spent who knows how long figuring out all her tricks and techniques and ways of dropping clues and yet she’s STILL managed to surprise them. Wow.”
2) I’m not sure I can remember any moments of great shock in my life. Moments of sadness, but not really shock.
3) Princess Diana dying. People were really shocked about that, and devestated. I came downstairs that morning and found Mum crying in front of the TV, and I asked what was wrong and she told me. I hadn’t actually known much about her, or that she was so beloved, but I soon found out everything there was to know about her with all the programmes about her that aired and from watching the news.