A Worse State… Case in Point, Gellert?
In a comment on sunnyskywalker’s post about Horcruxes, marionros wrote:
Off topic, but this I would think this attitude ("look how good I am at self-control, I'm so awesome! It proves that I'm the right person to own the Deadly Hallows/direct the coming war/do whatever I please") a far better reason for why Dumbledore didn't have sex his entire life than the 'he had fallen in love with Grindlewald who made him flirt with racial dominance and so he knew he couldn't be trusted with love' crap Rowlings peddles.
I answered:
Also, of course, most practitioners of chosen-celibacy tend to think that their choice, doesn't just show, but makes them morally and spiritually superior to the rest of us.
If you read my newest fic "training," though, you'll see I agree, marianros, with the sentiment that Albus couldn't be trusted with love. What was it Aberforth said? "Funny thing, how many of the people my brother cared about very much ended up in a worse state than if he'd left 'em well alone."
And then it occurred to me: might that also be true of Gellert?
Who corrupted whom?
First off, regarding racial dominance: Jo’s wizards don’t ever flirt with that idea, they are firmly wedded to it. All of them. Every faction that we see.
Their arguments are over whether to allow Muggles to know we’re being ruled by our superiors.
Remember that the prime minister was not given even a courtesy vote (still less a veto) over the import of extremely dangerous magical creatures for the sake of a Wizarding sports event! Nor is any Muggle who notices (or is the victim of) magic so much as given a choice between Obliviation or voluntarysilence. Nor is any Muggle, even those allowed in the know (family of wizards), given any opportunity to seek either compensation or justice if harmed by magic. The Dursleys were not afforded the opportunity to lay charges before the Wizengamot against either Hagrid or the twins for assaulting their child. (Arthur was gracious enough to shrink Dudley’s tongue before the boy choked to death for his sons’ entertainment, and also to repair the damage he himself caused battering his way uninvited into the Dursleys’ home, but that’s because he’s a notorious Muggle-lover. He could legally have left them to correct any problems themselves, as long as no Muggles not-in the know were thereby alerted to the existence of magic.) We know this, because the Dursleys had to have Dudley’s tail surgically removed. And that little altercation between Sirius and Peter? There must have been extensive property damage, and Muggles injured as well as twelve killed, if the incident was passed off as a gas explosion. Raise your hands, please, if you believe for a moment that St. Mungo’s healed the injured, or the Ministry reimbursed the property owners for their losses. In fact, we know that they did not; in HBP 1 Fudge took formal responsibility for various events the Prime Minister had previously believed to be natural disasters, and no offer of financial or magical aid was made. Homeowners who faced that “hurricane” were given Obliviation, not magical treatment of their injuries or magical help rebuilding their homes.
No, there’s never been any disagreement among wizards over whether to rule over their inferiors. The arguments have been over the appropriate means.
Ought wizards to mind-rape any Muggle who notices magic, and then sneer at Muggles for our ignorance? Or ought wizards to come out into the open, leave our minds alone, and make us accept a benevolent overrule, clearly sanctioned by natural law, by our congenital superiors and lords? (Also known as a dictatorship imposed by force.)
Oh, and also arguments over to what extent the Wizarding World should admit those with inborn ability but base blood. That’s argued too, as it must be any time an aristocracy also claims to be a meritocracy, to hold power because of its innate superiority over those ruled.
Note, please, that if Secrecy were ended, one consequence could theoretically be that if a non-magical person were directly harmed by a magical one, s/he might have some right to seek redress. Even if our rights were severely limited and wizards grossly privileged over us, we might have some.
Under Seclusion, we have none. Ask Petunia.
It all reminds me of some of the arguments that raged among early nineteenth-century slaveowners. Some of the Caribbean ones argued, ah, we’re the more benevolent masters. We convert all our slaves to Catholicism, so their temporal servitude is for the ultimate good of their souls! And we educate the brightest ones. You Protestant Americans make slave literacy illegal, and you’re afraid to let your slaves near your own Bible, lest they read the wrong bits…. While some of the Americans retorted, at least we feed our slaves! You make them grow their own food, as well as labor in your cane fields! Aren’t we kinder than you, to provide them with food….
I kid you not, there’s a whole literature out there about how benevolent, as well as justified, one’s local version of “the peculiar institution” was.
Reminds me a lot of Arthur Weasley, chuckling tolerantly about how we Muggles don’t want to know about magic, bless our dim little souls.
*
So, back to Gellert. He certainly can’t be blamed for making Albus “flirt with racial dominance.”
It’s not even certain that world conquest was his idea.
It might have been Albus’s originally.
What do we know of Gellert before he was influenced by Albus? Well, Rita’s book states:
The name of Grindelwald is justly famous. In a list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizards of All Time, he would miss out on the top spot only because You-Know-Who arrived, a generation later, to steal his crown. As Grindelwald never extended his campaign of terror to Britain, however, the details of his rise to power are not widely known here.
Educated at Durmstrang, a school famous even then for its unfortunate tolerance of the Dark Arts, Grindelwald showed himself quite as precociously brilliant as Dumbledore. Rather than channel his abilities into the attainment of awards and prizes, however, Gellert Grindelwald devoted himself to other pursuits. At sixteen years old, even Durmstrang felt it could no longer turn a blind eye to the twisted experiments of Gellert Grindelwald, and he was expelled….
“He seemed a charming boy to me,” babbles Bathilda, “whatever he became later.” (DH18)
So. Gellert was expelled from Durmstrang, and if even a Dark Arts loving place like that thought he went too far, the imagination recoils at what he must have been up to! A few pages later Rita added one detail, “Grindelwald, expelled from Durmstrang for near-fatal attacks upon fellow students….”
But why is Rita sparing us the lurid details? “The details of his rise to power” might not be widely known in Britain, but surely the Continent is better informed? Surely some European Skeeter-equivalent published a tell-all book in 1945, which has since been debunked by a positive deluge of more reputable biographies and studies?
I mean, what are translation charms for? Someone out there has published an exact description of the offence(s) for which young Gellert was expelled from school. If Rita isn’t including the gory details, it’s not because they are too heinous to be named-it’s because they don’t help her case here, that Albus clasped to his bosom someone who was already a monster.
The only other information we have on the reason for the expulsion is the hint Albus says in his letter:
And from this is follows that where we meet resistance, we must use only the force that is necessary and no more. (This was your mistake at Durmstrang! But I do not complain, because if you had not been expelled, we would never have met.)
So according to Albus’s understanding, Gellert was expelled for using more force than was necessary in an altercation. You know, like Harry Potter should have been for using Sectumsempra on Draco (and Draco for attempting the Cruciatus, if his wand proved that that’s what he was doing-and Harry again, the year before, for using the Cruciatus on Bellatrix).
Now, it’s true I don’t like Potter that much. But you haven’t heard me claim that canon!Harry is a top contender for Most Dangerous Dark Wizard of All Time. Nor do I claim that title for the Weasley twins, who should likewise have been expelled for performing “twisted experiments” on eleven-year-olds. Or for Sirius, who should have been expelled (as, under a different Hogwarts headmaster, Hagrid was) for endangering fellow students by exposing them to Class XXXXX dangerous creatures. Or for Draco, who should have been expelled (and worse) for murder attempts that badly injured and only barely failed to kill two of his fellow students.
Rita Skeeter implied that Durmstrang tolerates worse crimes from its students than Hogwarts, and that therefore anything that crossed its line of acceptable behavior must have been horrific indeed. But given how low a bar Dumbledore set, it can scarcely be true that Durmstrang students got away with worse.
Moreover, there is one last thing we do know about Durmstrang, besides that it teaches the Dark Arts openly, rather than teaching abhorrence for the discipline while surreptitiously incorporating some of its spells in other parts of the curriculum.
Durmstrang doesn’t admit “riff-raff.” (per Draco, GoF11)
That means potential victims among one’s fellow students are probably all well-connected. Either related to someone influential, or at least related to someone in the service of someone who is.
Unlike the Marauders, Gellert probably didn’t have the option of taking for his chief target an impoverished half-blood with no family to defend him when his headmaster did not.
The offence for which Gellert was expelled might have been a murder attempt, true. On the evidence we have. It equally might have been a “prank” like Sirius’s lighthearted effort to get Snivellus scared by-or eaten by==Remus. It might have been an experiment gone innocently wrong, like the one that killed Luna’s mother. It might even have been an honorable duel, but using too powerful (or unauthorized) of a spell, and/or against an opponent whose family was more powerful than the Grindelwalds and which chose to take exception when he injured their scion more than they felt was acceptable.
Gellert might well have been expelled for something which, yes, was expulsion worthy. In a school with decent standards for student behavior. But which, at Hogwarts for the last forty years, might well have been winked at, at least unless the victim’s family was in a position to kick up a fuss. The fact that Rita chose to withhold the shocking details rather suggests as much.
Further, the fact that Gellert was sent off all the way to England until tempers cooled really does suggest, doesn’t it, that he might have offended someone of importance back home?
Though, of course, we know that he chose specifically to visit Aunt Batty in Godric’s Hollow because he was interested in the Deathly Hallows. So interested, in fact, that he had already taken the Quester’s symbol as his own. And we know that that interest continued: he subsequently found the Elder Wand.
And stole it, stunning Gregorovich rather than killing him to gain the mastery.
But interest in the Hallows is not evil. Xeno Lovegood is another who doesn’t manage to make my list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizard of All Time.
Stealing the Deathstick was unethical, but it surely was not proof that Gellert was a torture-loving murderous psychopath like Tom. In fact, Stunning Gregorovich, when murder was the known method of transferring the wand’s allegiance, rather strongly suggests the opposite.
What else do we know of Gellert’s subsequent career? What, precisely, did he do to be placed, per Rita, second from the top of the list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizards of All Time?
”He killed many people, my grandfather, for instance,” said Viktor Krum.
That is, he had the temerity to start an all-out war among Continental wizards over how best to rule over their subject Muggles. He not only shed Wizarding blood in this dispute, he also built a prison (not, apparently, guarded by Dementors) to lock up his political enemies.
And then he did the absolutely unforgivable thing: having started this war, he lost it.
How would Rita be talking about this dedicated, visionary statesman if he had won?
Now, we do know of one actual crime that Gellert committed: at age sixteen, in a fight over the future of his first serious relationship, he lost his temper after Aberforth escalated their argument to actual attack. And he cast the Cruciatus.
That’s bad. Seriously bad.
But unlike with Harry Potter, we’re not told that he ever did it again. Unlike with Tom Riddle, we’re not told that he ever did it in cold blood.
So unlike with either of them, it’s possible that Gellert learned his lesson and never did cast it again. That he sincerely repented of having used it at all.
Further, Aberforth admitted that he drew first, but he didn’t tell us what he cast. Young Ab might not have been bookish, but he was a Dumbledore, and the same age as Gellert. We don’t know how badly he hurt Gellert, or whether Gellert was even in his right mind when he cast that counter-curse. (Though to retaliate with the Cruciatus really was inexcusable.)
But again, we’re not told that Gellert ever cast it again. All the other crimes laid to his account were political. He started a movement to end Secrecy, and then a Wizarding civil war over the issue. Many wizards died in that war, and the winners, naturally, ascribe all the blame, all the deaths, to Gellert.
But where did his politics come from?
When he arrived at his Aunt Bathilda’s, his obsession was the Hallows. An obsession shared by his new-found friend, who however had no particular interest in the Cloak. Albus said to Harry (DH 35), “And the Cloak… somehow, we never discussed the Cloak much, Harry. Both of us could conceal ourselves well enough without the Cloak, the true magic of which, of course, is that it can be used to protect and shield others as well as its owner…. our interest in the Cloak was mainly that it completed the Trio.”
And yet, Albus had stated two pages earlier, “He wanted to come to Godric’s Hollow, as I am sure you have guessed, because of the grave of Ignotus Peverell. He wanted to explore the place the third brother had died.”
Excuse me? Gellert was looking for the Cloak FIRST because he had no interest in it? How does that one work?
No, it was Albus who had no interest whatsoever in, nor use for, an object whose supposed virtue was that it could “protect and shield others as well as its owner.”
To Gellert, it was the subject of his initial Quest.
But his new friend was only interested in the other two Hallows, and Gellert let himself be persuaded that they were more important.
His new friend, after all, was even smarter than he, the first he’d ever met who could claim that. Two years older and wiser, and with, already, an international reputation!
Who was more likely to influence who, here?
Now look at the beginning of that infamous letter from Albus:
Gellert-
Your point about Wizard dominance being FOR THE MUGGLE’S OWN GOOD-this, I think, is the crucial point. Yes, we have been given power and yes, that power gives us the right to rule, but it also gives us responsibilities over the ruled. We must stress this point, it will be the foundation stone upon which we build…. We seize control FOR THE GREATER GOOD.
Look again. Which boy had been arguing that (magical) power gave wizards a natural right to rule over their inferiors, and which said that, after all, it would be for the Muggles’ good too, really?
Remind me too, which boy was saddled with the care of a mad and magically incontinent little sister, who had (so ran the family story) been driven to that state by a Muggle assault?
I read the letter initially as indicating that young Gellert, trying to seduce his lover to his dreams of world domination, had the bright idea of getting Albus to go along by that specious “for their own good” argument, and Albus in relief took and ran with the idea.
But it works even better in the other direction-Albus the natural rights/ power advocate, seizing on his younger lover’s halting justification and improving upon it.
Note particularly the words Albus quotes back initially to Gellert: “Your point about Wizard dominance being FOR THE MUGGLE’S OWN GOOD”
Dominance is a very interesting word. It can mean rule or control. It can also mean pre-eminence, superiority, acknowledged influence. One can dominate with moral suasion, or brilliant logic.
Or by violence, of course.
Someone advocating Wizard “dominance” is not necessarily committed to the idea of violently establishing a dictatorship over Muggles.
Someone turning “dominance” into “seizing control” and “ruling,” into using “the force that is necessary” against “resistance,” is.
Which boy said what? Well, we have Albus’s letter to tell us.
And of course the terrible finale to Gellert’s idyllic summer romance would only have served to engrave the principles Albus had taught him in Gellert’s mind. Ultimately, the Statute of Secrecy was to blame for all of it. (Especially if Gellert is, er, avoiding attributing any significant blame to himself.) When Aberforth confronted him with the possible loss of his lover and his dream, look what Aberforth said Gellert answered:
“Didn’t I understand, my poor sister wouldn’t have to be hidden once they’d changed the world, and led the wizards out of hiding, and taught the Muggles their place?”
That is, if only he and Albus had already brought about the new order they had envisioned, none of that-the argument, the fight, the death, the estrangement-could have happened.
Indeed, when he came to brood on it further, Albus had only been saddled with his sister because of Kendra’s death. Which had only happened because Kendra couldn’t get proper medical help for Ariana, or assistance in controlling her magic, because Ariana’s condition made her a danger to Secrecy. If not for the Statute of Secrecy, Kendra would surely have still been alive. Perhaps even, Ariana might have been cured, if only Kendra had not so feared running foul of that Statute that she hid her even from healers.
Going further still (since I’m sure Albus had told him the sad tale of how Ariana came to be the way she was), if Muggles had known about magic, and respected it as they ought, Ariana would never have been injured in the first place. And her father, never sent to Azkaban for taking vengeance on her attackers.
So the Statute of Secrecy was to blame for all of it, for every tragedy in Albus’s life. And for Albus cutting him off now.
His friend, in grief and guilt over that final, fatal curse, insisted on giving up all his dreams and his lover in expiation. Gellert could understand that emotional reaction. But Gellert himself was confirmed in the correctness of Albus’s earlier analysis.
Secrecy destroyed Wizards’ lives. He had seen it. A whole family! Three untimely dead, two traumatized and never to fulfill their full potential, and one of those the most brilliant and powerful wizard Gellert had ever met. All destroyed, in the name of hiding magic from Muggles.
Seclusion must be abandoned, and a proper, Wizard-ruled order instituted, no matter how high the short-term cost.
Off topic, but this I would think this attitude ("look how good I am at self-control, I'm so awesome! It proves that I'm the right person to own the Deadly Hallows/direct the coming war/do whatever I please") a far better reason for why Dumbledore didn't have sex his entire life than the 'he had fallen in love with Grindlewald who made him flirt with racial dominance and so he knew he couldn't be trusted with love' crap Rowlings peddles.
I answered:
Also, of course, most practitioners of chosen-celibacy tend to think that their choice, doesn't just show, but makes them morally and spiritually superior to the rest of us.
If you read my newest fic "training," though, you'll see I agree, marianros, with the sentiment that Albus couldn't be trusted with love. What was it Aberforth said? "Funny thing, how many of the people my brother cared about very much ended up in a worse state than if he'd left 'em well alone."
And then it occurred to me: might that also be true of Gellert?
Who corrupted whom?
First off, regarding racial dominance: Jo’s wizards don’t ever flirt with that idea, they are firmly wedded to it. All of them. Every faction that we see.
Their arguments are over whether to allow Muggles to know we’re being ruled by our superiors.
Remember that the prime minister was not given even a courtesy vote (still less a veto) over the import of extremely dangerous magical creatures for the sake of a Wizarding sports event! Nor is any Muggle who notices (or is the victim of) magic so much as given a choice between Obliviation or voluntarysilence. Nor is any Muggle, even those allowed in the know (family of wizards), given any opportunity to seek either compensation or justice if harmed by magic. The Dursleys were not afforded the opportunity to lay charges before the Wizengamot against either Hagrid or the twins for assaulting their child. (Arthur was gracious enough to shrink Dudley’s tongue before the boy choked to death for his sons’ entertainment, and also to repair the damage he himself caused battering his way uninvited into the Dursleys’ home, but that’s because he’s a notorious Muggle-lover. He could legally have left them to correct any problems themselves, as long as no Muggles not-in the know were thereby alerted to the existence of magic.) We know this, because the Dursleys had to have Dudley’s tail surgically removed. And that little altercation between Sirius and Peter? There must have been extensive property damage, and Muggles injured as well as twelve killed, if the incident was passed off as a gas explosion. Raise your hands, please, if you believe for a moment that St. Mungo’s healed the injured, or the Ministry reimbursed the property owners for their losses. In fact, we know that they did not; in HBP 1 Fudge took formal responsibility for various events the Prime Minister had previously believed to be natural disasters, and no offer of financial or magical aid was made. Homeowners who faced that “hurricane” were given Obliviation, not magical treatment of their injuries or magical help rebuilding their homes.
No, there’s never been any disagreement among wizards over whether to rule over their inferiors. The arguments have been over the appropriate means.
Ought wizards to mind-rape any Muggle who notices magic, and then sneer at Muggles for our ignorance? Or ought wizards to come out into the open, leave our minds alone, and make us accept a benevolent overrule, clearly sanctioned by natural law, by our congenital superiors and lords? (Also known as a dictatorship imposed by force.)
Oh, and also arguments over to what extent the Wizarding World should admit those with inborn ability but base blood. That’s argued too, as it must be any time an aristocracy also claims to be a meritocracy, to hold power because of its innate superiority over those ruled.
Note, please, that if Secrecy were ended, one consequence could theoretically be that if a non-magical person were directly harmed by a magical one, s/he might have some right to seek redress. Even if our rights were severely limited and wizards grossly privileged over us, we might have some.
Under Seclusion, we have none. Ask Petunia.
It all reminds me of some of the arguments that raged among early nineteenth-century slaveowners. Some of the Caribbean ones argued, ah, we’re the more benevolent masters. We convert all our slaves to Catholicism, so their temporal servitude is for the ultimate good of their souls! And we educate the brightest ones. You Protestant Americans make slave literacy illegal, and you’re afraid to let your slaves near your own Bible, lest they read the wrong bits…. While some of the Americans retorted, at least we feed our slaves! You make them grow their own food, as well as labor in your cane fields! Aren’t we kinder than you, to provide them with food….
I kid you not, there’s a whole literature out there about how benevolent, as well as justified, one’s local version of “the peculiar institution” was.
Reminds me a lot of Arthur Weasley, chuckling tolerantly about how we Muggles don’t want to know about magic, bless our dim little souls.
*
So, back to Gellert. He certainly can’t be blamed for making Albus “flirt with racial dominance.”
It’s not even certain that world conquest was his idea.
It might have been Albus’s originally.
What do we know of Gellert before he was influenced by Albus? Well, Rita’s book states:
The name of Grindelwald is justly famous. In a list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizards of All Time, he would miss out on the top spot only because You-Know-Who arrived, a generation later, to steal his crown. As Grindelwald never extended his campaign of terror to Britain, however, the details of his rise to power are not widely known here.
Educated at Durmstrang, a school famous even then for its unfortunate tolerance of the Dark Arts, Grindelwald showed himself quite as precociously brilliant as Dumbledore. Rather than channel his abilities into the attainment of awards and prizes, however, Gellert Grindelwald devoted himself to other pursuits. At sixteen years old, even Durmstrang felt it could no longer turn a blind eye to the twisted experiments of Gellert Grindelwald, and he was expelled….
“He seemed a charming boy to me,” babbles Bathilda, “whatever he became later.” (DH18)
So. Gellert was expelled from Durmstrang, and if even a Dark Arts loving place like that thought he went too far, the imagination recoils at what he must have been up to! A few pages later Rita added one detail, “Grindelwald, expelled from Durmstrang for near-fatal attacks upon fellow students….”
But why is Rita sparing us the lurid details? “The details of his rise to power” might not be widely known in Britain, but surely the Continent is better informed? Surely some European Skeeter-equivalent published a tell-all book in 1945, which has since been debunked by a positive deluge of more reputable biographies and studies?
I mean, what are translation charms for? Someone out there has published an exact description of the offence(s) for which young Gellert was expelled from school. If Rita isn’t including the gory details, it’s not because they are too heinous to be named-it’s because they don’t help her case here, that Albus clasped to his bosom someone who was already a monster.
The only other information we have on the reason for the expulsion is the hint Albus says in his letter:
And from this is follows that where we meet resistance, we must use only the force that is necessary and no more. (This was your mistake at Durmstrang! But I do not complain, because if you had not been expelled, we would never have met.)
So according to Albus’s understanding, Gellert was expelled for using more force than was necessary in an altercation. You know, like Harry Potter should have been for using Sectumsempra on Draco (and Draco for attempting the Cruciatus, if his wand proved that that’s what he was doing-and Harry again, the year before, for using the Cruciatus on Bellatrix).
Now, it’s true I don’t like Potter that much. But you haven’t heard me claim that canon!Harry is a top contender for Most Dangerous Dark Wizard of All Time. Nor do I claim that title for the Weasley twins, who should likewise have been expelled for performing “twisted experiments” on eleven-year-olds. Or for Sirius, who should have been expelled (as, under a different Hogwarts headmaster, Hagrid was) for endangering fellow students by exposing them to Class XXXXX dangerous creatures. Or for Draco, who should have been expelled (and worse) for murder attempts that badly injured and only barely failed to kill two of his fellow students.
Rita Skeeter implied that Durmstrang tolerates worse crimes from its students than Hogwarts, and that therefore anything that crossed its line of acceptable behavior must have been horrific indeed. But given how low a bar Dumbledore set, it can scarcely be true that Durmstrang students got away with worse.
Moreover, there is one last thing we do know about Durmstrang, besides that it teaches the Dark Arts openly, rather than teaching abhorrence for the discipline while surreptitiously incorporating some of its spells in other parts of the curriculum.
Durmstrang doesn’t admit “riff-raff.” (per Draco, GoF11)
That means potential victims among one’s fellow students are probably all well-connected. Either related to someone influential, or at least related to someone in the service of someone who is.
Unlike the Marauders, Gellert probably didn’t have the option of taking for his chief target an impoverished half-blood with no family to defend him when his headmaster did not.
The offence for which Gellert was expelled might have been a murder attempt, true. On the evidence we have. It equally might have been a “prank” like Sirius’s lighthearted effort to get Snivellus scared by-or eaten by==Remus. It might have been an experiment gone innocently wrong, like the one that killed Luna’s mother. It might even have been an honorable duel, but using too powerful (or unauthorized) of a spell, and/or against an opponent whose family was more powerful than the Grindelwalds and which chose to take exception when he injured their scion more than they felt was acceptable.
Gellert might well have been expelled for something which, yes, was expulsion worthy. In a school with decent standards for student behavior. But which, at Hogwarts for the last forty years, might well have been winked at, at least unless the victim’s family was in a position to kick up a fuss. The fact that Rita chose to withhold the shocking details rather suggests as much.
Further, the fact that Gellert was sent off all the way to England until tempers cooled really does suggest, doesn’t it, that he might have offended someone of importance back home?
Though, of course, we know that he chose specifically to visit Aunt Batty in Godric’s Hollow because he was interested in the Deathly Hallows. So interested, in fact, that he had already taken the Quester’s symbol as his own. And we know that that interest continued: he subsequently found the Elder Wand.
And stole it, stunning Gregorovich rather than killing him to gain the mastery.
But interest in the Hallows is not evil. Xeno Lovegood is another who doesn’t manage to make my list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizard of All Time.
Stealing the Deathstick was unethical, but it surely was not proof that Gellert was a torture-loving murderous psychopath like Tom. In fact, Stunning Gregorovich, when murder was the known method of transferring the wand’s allegiance, rather strongly suggests the opposite.
What else do we know of Gellert’s subsequent career? What, precisely, did he do to be placed, per Rita, second from the top of the list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizards of All Time?
”He killed many people, my grandfather, for instance,” said Viktor Krum.
That is, he had the temerity to start an all-out war among Continental wizards over how best to rule over their subject Muggles. He not only shed Wizarding blood in this dispute, he also built a prison (not, apparently, guarded by Dementors) to lock up his political enemies.
And then he did the absolutely unforgivable thing: having started this war, he lost it.
How would Rita be talking about this dedicated, visionary statesman if he had won?
Now, we do know of one actual crime that Gellert committed: at age sixteen, in a fight over the future of his first serious relationship, he lost his temper after Aberforth escalated their argument to actual attack. And he cast the Cruciatus.
That’s bad. Seriously bad.
But unlike with Harry Potter, we’re not told that he ever did it again. Unlike with Tom Riddle, we’re not told that he ever did it in cold blood.
So unlike with either of them, it’s possible that Gellert learned his lesson and never did cast it again. That he sincerely repented of having used it at all.
Further, Aberforth admitted that he drew first, but he didn’t tell us what he cast. Young Ab might not have been bookish, but he was a Dumbledore, and the same age as Gellert. We don’t know how badly he hurt Gellert, or whether Gellert was even in his right mind when he cast that counter-curse. (Though to retaliate with the Cruciatus really was inexcusable.)
But again, we’re not told that Gellert ever cast it again. All the other crimes laid to his account were political. He started a movement to end Secrecy, and then a Wizarding civil war over the issue. Many wizards died in that war, and the winners, naturally, ascribe all the blame, all the deaths, to Gellert.
But where did his politics come from?
When he arrived at his Aunt Bathilda’s, his obsession was the Hallows. An obsession shared by his new-found friend, who however had no particular interest in the Cloak. Albus said to Harry (DH 35), “And the Cloak… somehow, we never discussed the Cloak much, Harry. Both of us could conceal ourselves well enough without the Cloak, the true magic of which, of course, is that it can be used to protect and shield others as well as its owner…. our interest in the Cloak was mainly that it completed the Trio.”
And yet, Albus had stated two pages earlier, “He wanted to come to Godric’s Hollow, as I am sure you have guessed, because of the grave of Ignotus Peverell. He wanted to explore the place the third brother had died.”
Excuse me? Gellert was looking for the Cloak FIRST because he had no interest in it? How does that one work?
No, it was Albus who had no interest whatsoever in, nor use for, an object whose supposed virtue was that it could “protect and shield others as well as its owner.”
To Gellert, it was the subject of his initial Quest.
But his new friend was only interested in the other two Hallows, and Gellert let himself be persuaded that they were more important.
His new friend, after all, was even smarter than he, the first he’d ever met who could claim that. Two years older and wiser, and with, already, an international reputation!
Who was more likely to influence who, here?
Now look at the beginning of that infamous letter from Albus:
Gellert-
Your point about Wizard dominance being FOR THE MUGGLE’S OWN GOOD-this, I think, is the crucial point. Yes, we have been given power and yes, that power gives us the right to rule, but it also gives us responsibilities over the ruled. We must stress this point, it will be the foundation stone upon which we build…. We seize control FOR THE GREATER GOOD.
Look again. Which boy had been arguing that (magical) power gave wizards a natural right to rule over their inferiors, and which said that, after all, it would be for the Muggles’ good too, really?
Remind me too, which boy was saddled with the care of a mad and magically incontinent little sister, who had (so ran the family story) been driven to that state by a Muggle assault?
I read the letter initially as indicating that young Gellert, trying to seduce his lover to his dreams of world domination, had the bright idea of getting Albus to go along by that specious “for their own good” argument, and Albus in relief took and ran with the idea.
But it works even better in the other direction-Albus the natural rights/ power advocate, seizing on his younger lover’s halting justification and improving upon it.
Note particularly the words Albus quotes back initially to Gellert: “Your point about Wizard dominance being FOR THE MUGGLE’S OWN GOOD”
Dominance is a very interesting word. It can mean rule or control. It can also mean pre-eminence, superiority, acknowledged influence. One can dominate with moral suasion, or brilliant logic.
Or by violence, of course.
Someone advocating Wizard “dominance” is not necessarily committed to the idea of violently establishing a dictatorship over Muggles.
Someone turning “dominance” into “seizing control” and “ruling,” into using “the force that is necessary” against “resistance,” is.
Which boy said what? Well, we have Albus’s letter to tell us.
And of course the terrible finale to Gellert’s idyllic summer romance would only have served to engrave the principles Albus had taught him in Gellert’s mind. Ultimately, the Statute of Secrecy was to blame for all of it. (Especially if Gellert is, er, avoiding attributing any significant blame to himself.) When Aberforth confronted him with the possible loss of his lover and his dream, look what Aberforth said Gellert answered:
“Didn’t I understand, my poor sister wouldn’t have to be hidden once they’d changed the world, and led the wizards out of hiding, and taught the Muggles their place?”
That is, if only he and Albus had already brought about the new order they had envisioned, none of that-the argument, the fight, the death, the estrangement-could have happened.
Indeed, when he came to brood on it further, Albus had only been saddled with his sister because of Kendra’s death. Which had only happened because Kendra couldn’t get proper medical help for Ariana, or assistance in controlling her magic, because Ariana’s condition made her a danger to Secrecy. If not for the Statute of Secrecy, Kendra would surely have still been alive. Perhaps even, Ariana might have been cured, if only Kendra had not so feared running foul of that Statute that she hid her even from healers.
Going further still (since I’m sure Albus had told him the sad tale of how Ariana came to be the way she was), if Muggles had known about magic, and respected it as they ought, Ariana would never have been injured in the first place. And her father, never sent to Azkaban for taking vengeance on her attackers.
So the Statute of Secrecy was to blame for all of it, for every tragedy in Albus’s life. And for Albus cutting him off now.
His friend, in grief and guilt over that final, fatal curse, insisted on giving up all his dreams and his lover in expiation. Gellert could understand that emotional reaction. But Gellert himself was confirmed in the correctness of Albus’s earlier analysis.
Secrecy destroyed Wizards’ lives. He had seen it. A whole family! Three untimely dead, two traumatized and never to fulfill their full potential, and one of those the most brilliant and powerful wizard Gellert had ever met. All destroyed, in the name of hiding magic from Muggles.
Seclusion must be abandoned, and a proper, Wizard-ruled order instituted, no matter how high the short-term cost.