Can the matriarch of the Malfoy family be seen in a different light? Unravel the complexities of Narcissa Malfoy's character with me, Professor Julian Wamble, as we dissect her life's choices, from the fierce protection of her son to her covert defiance. Our discussion probes the depths of her role as a pureblood within the Malfoy legacy, considering how her actions may reflect on the entire Slytherin house. This character study invites you to question the thin line between victim and accomplice, diving into Narcissa's psyche and the strategic choices that define her path. We tackle the burning question: is Narcissa Malfoy a hero? Reflecting on her pivotal lie to Voldemort, we explore the multi-faceted nature of heroism and the possibility of redemption for characters entrenched in moral ambiguity.
This philosophical journey through Narcissa Malfoy's narrative promises to leave you contemplating the intricate dance between duty, family, and self-preservation.
Join Patreon FOR FREE to Chat about this episode!
A Special THANK YOU!!! to the Deep Divers on Patreon for their support:
Denni, LaKeisha, and Vicky !!! :)
Lucius Malfoy Survey
Can the matriarch of the Malfoy family be seen in a different light? Unravel the complexities of Narcissa Malfoy's character with me, Professor Julian Wamble, as we dissect her life's choices, from the fierce protection of her son to her covert defiance. Our discussion probes the depths of her role as a pureblood within the Malfoy legacy, considering how her actions may reflect on the entire Slytherin house. This character study invites you to question the thin line between victim and accomplice, diving into Narcissa's psyche and the strategic choices that define her path. We tackle the burning question: is Narcissa Malfoy a hero? Reflecting on her pivotal lie to Voldemort, we explore the multi-faceted nature of heroism and the possibility of redemption for characters entrenched in moral ambiguity.
This philosophical journey through Narcissa Malfoy's narrative promises to leave you contemplating the intricate dance between duty, family, and self-preservation.
Join Patreon FOR FREE to Chat about this episode!
A Special THANK YOU!!! to the Deep Divers on Patreon for their support:
Denni, LaKeisha, and Vicky !!! :)
Lucius Malfoy Survey
Welcome to Critical Magic Theory, where we deconstruct the wizarding world of Harry Potter, because loving something does not mean you can't be critical of it. I am Professor Julian Womble and today, oh today, we are talking about Narcissa Malfoy. Y'all, I am so excited about this. Someone wrote in the comments, like does Narcissa even warrant a full episode because she's kind of a periphery character? The answer to that question is yes, and you will see why I am so excited to dive into this character. Have you ever wondered whether Narcissa is a Death Eater or just a Death Eater sympathizer, or how Narcissa's relationship with her sisters informs how she lives her own life? We're going to get into that. And is Narcissa a hero for the part she plays in bringing down Voldemort, y'all? I couldn't be more excited to dive into all of this with you all.
Speaker 1:But first, you all know what you have to do. We're stretching, we are doing high knees, we are stretching our quads. I don't know why, because we're just moving our shoulders, but it's probably good practice just to stay limber in general. I don't know. I was at a 60th wedding anniversary this past weekend and the bride, anyways, she's 80 years old and she was dropping it low and I thought to myself goals. Since then, I have decided that I have to stretch all the time because I need to be 80 years old and being able to drop it low. And she picked it up y'all. And that's like, that's a feat, because, like you know, I'll drop it low. Am I getting up or am I rolling around? Who is to say, anyways, that was a tangent, anyways, it's time to bop along to the theme song.
Speaker 1:Let's go. We need to talk about Harry Potter. Thank you, I hope that you danced, I hope you didn't pull a muscle and I hope that you are ready to dive into Narcissa. Before we get into the Malfoy of it all, I have to first thank the first crop of chronic overthinkers from the Patreon for their support, and I wrote down their names and I hope that I don't butcher any of them, because that would be embarrassing for me. So I want to thank Cassandra, cassidy, christina, dr, donna, eric, eve Heather, jim, janice, kelsey, kristen I thought I was like this is in alphabetical order, but I think that that's just how Patreon does it.
Speaker 1:Anyways, kristen, leah, leah. Sorry, I'm going to just give you both. Salma C Fox, whitney Xemena I went and looked up online how to say that because you won't catch me looking crazy, yulia. And now this one I'm going to mess up just because I don't know how to pronounce the last word, so please just forgive me. Charge it to my head, not to my heart. The joy of Lique. It's L-I-Q-U-E and I said we're just going to make it fancy, and so we did. I want to thank them for their support.
Speaker 1:Also, speaking of the Patreon, feel free to join the Patreon for free. Oh, you see what I did there, so that you can join us for the post-episode conversations, I will be posting a question and it'll be open to everyone, no matter if you're doing a paid subscription or not. It will be open to you. For those of you who are and are thinking about doing a paid subscription, let me tell you something. The way that y'all's responses have brought up so much for me about Narcissa and the number of bonus episodes and like mini episodes that are going to come out of this particular character is crazy, especially considering the fact that she is not someone that we see a lot, especially considering the fact that she is not someone that we see a lot. So, if you have the opportunity or you've been thinking about it or toying with it. Just join for free, join the conversation and then you can just see whether or not it's for you or not, and that's totally okay. But I don't want this episode to be too long and it's going to be so difficult, so we're going to dive in.
Speaker 1:So, as always, I want to begin with one of my favorite Narcissa moments, and since we don't really get a lot of her, I wasn't difficult to choose. But first off, harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is my favorite book, and part of the reason why I love it so much is one because I love the first chapter with the other minister, but also I love the second chapter, spinner's End. And I particularly love Narcissa in this chapter because I love the fact that she stands up to Bellatrix. Up to this moment, we've seen Bellatrix as this kind of maniacal, very adept witch who kind of runs the show and is, you know, the right hand person for Voldemort, and it is fascinating then to see her sister, who we didn't know until this chapter, was actually her sister stand up to her, call her out for her madness and her antics and basically be like girl. I do not care what you have to say. I'm here I'm going to protect my child, and whether or not you like that is not my problem. And then she goes even further and basically blasphemes against Voldemort in front of Bellatrix and just knows like, well, what are you going to do about it, bella? And that, to me, is just so incredible and I really think it kind of, in the brief moment that we get to see her like this tells us a very specific kind of story in a lot of ways about the duality of Narcissa. Right, because we get to see this ferocity, and then when she's with Lucius and in other contexts, we don't necessarily see the same level of fervor explicitly, right, it's kind of brimming beneath the surface and I don't know about you all, but there's something about that that I really just it just hits for me every single time, and so that is my favorite moment for Narcissa.
Speaker 1:So when I asked you all what word best describes Narcissa, the top three were selfish, protective, loyal. This does the thing of really setting us up for a lot of the things that we're going to be talking about throughout the entirety of this episode with regard to Narcissa, because two of these words are words that we would use to describe other characters that we would consider to be quote-unquote good. And then the selfishness is something that I think kind of strikes a chord with us, particularly when it comes to purebloods, particularly when it comes to Slytherins. And yet these are the top three words.
Speaker 1:For Narcissa, the loyalty is something that we do get to see her display a lot, particularly when it comes to Draco and Lucius and her family just broadly construed. We get to see how protective she is again in that scene with Bellatrix and Snape. We get to see the lengths she is willing to go to protect Draco. And then this idea of selfishness kind of stands in the face of these other two words. But also not because her loyalty is the reason why she behaves selfishly, and so we see her behave in ways that come off as altruistic and forward thinking in terms of someone who has the level of pureblood supremacist beliefs that she has. And really it's because it serves the purpose of protecting Draco, it serves the purpose of protecting the family name, it serves the purpose of keeping their family intact, and so she's going to do whatever she has to do in order to make sure that's the case.
Speaker 1:There is a lot of conversation that you all had in your comments, both here and the survey on Instagram and on TikTok, about the role that intentions plays and how we assess who Narcissa is and whether or not some of the things that she did is really worthy of the praise that some of us give her, and I find that so, so fascinating, and so it makes sense to me in some ways that these are the words that we would choose for her, and what I love about them is that it really complicates the way that we see her, because not all the words are positive, and then the one negative word it actually has positive outcomes. I'm so excited because I think that there's so much there to unpack and many of you touched on this in your comments that we're about to get into with the arithmancy lesson, and I think it would be a fun little game to count how many times I say excited in this episode, because I'm saying it a lot, but it's because I am so. Anyways, the first question on the arithmancy lesson for today is is Narcissa Malfoy a good person? We had about 412 responses and of those responses, about 61% said no, about 28% said don't know and only 12% said yes, and I think that this kind of makes sense to us to the degree that we recognize that Narcissa is again a character who, for the most part, doesn't do a lot of good things.
Speaker 1:She isn't fighting on the side of good, and this kind of manifests in the comments. Someone wrote it's pretty easy for me to say she's not a good person. She openly espouses a supremacist ideology and actively fights on Voldemort's side. She ultimately doesn't defect. She does what she needs to do to save her son. Now this will be kind of a recurring theme for us because one of Narcissa's main calling cards is her role as a mother and particularly the lanes to which she's willing to go for her son. And I think it's interesting to juxtapose the idea of what all of that means with how we understand her as a good person. Someone else wrote I don't think Narcissa was a bad person. I think she grew up with prejudices against muggles and half-bloods and could never really have her own opinion.
Speaker 1:Now I am not necessarily convinced by this particular line of argumentation. And again, this is a theme that comes up for us throughout some of these comments and throughout a lot of the way that we've come to understand Narcissa as a character, lot of the way that we've come to understand Narcissa as a character and, to be honest, y'all, I don't love it, because I think it does remove a level of agency and it also absolves her from things that she doesn't deserve absolution for. We can reconcile the fact that Narcissa is a person who did a good thing or who did a thing that had a good outcome, and I think that part of what we're going to have to grapple with later on in the episode is what this all means in terms of our perceptions of her as a hero. But, at the end of the day, in the same way that we could look at some of the Weasleys, like Fred and George or even Molly, and highlight the fact that they are problematic on a number of dimensions, but still give them the grace to say, yes, but they are good people, I think we can do the same thing for Narcissa, but in the inverse, and acknowledge the fact that, yes, she did a really good thing that led to the downfall of Voldemort, but, on the whole, that does not absolve her from all of the things that she espoused, all the things that she silently supported, all the things that she allowed to take place, and I don't think that the answer to this or trying to reconcile. It is by taking away her agency or taking away the part that she actively paid in some of these things. And so I think that one of the amazing things about where we're moving into now with some of these characters is that now we're having to ask ourselves deeper questions, because the Weasleys, from Harry's perspective, were good people, so we saw them that way, but now we're moving into characters that are making particular choices that we don't agree with for the side that we don't agree with, and now we have to really figure out what does it actually mean to be a good person? And now we have to really figure out what does it actually mean to be a good person? And I don't know about y'all, but that is a journey that I'm ready to go on. Is Narcissa Malfoy a good mother? Now there's a stronger bit of consensus here in the positive direction, with 71% of us saying yes, about 18% saying no and about 11% saying don't know.
Speaker 1:Someone wrote Out. Of the above questions, the one I answered most quickly and without thought was is she a good mother? My answer is yes, if only because all of the actions we see her take are, for the most part because of Draco and his well-being. Someone else wrote I think she is a very devoted and caring, loving mother, which is evident by her unbreakable vow with Snape, but her thoughts are always focused on one thing her son. The real question is does she love her son? Is that what we are seeing? Or are we seeing a person concerned with the survival of her family lineage and pureblood background? What a question.
Speaker 1:Someone else wrote she's not a good mother in the sense that she raised a selfish and entitled boy like Draco. Well, and then there's that when we think of Narcissa, we think of the sacrifices that she makes as a mother. We think of the moment where she asked if Draco is at the castle. We think of the unbreakable vow with Snape. We think of all of these instances where she is putting herself, her wellbeing, her life on the line for the sake of her child. And it's easy for us to turn around and say, yes, she is a good mother. For those reasons and that tracks within the kind of broader scheme of these books we see moms who are willing to make these choices. We see Molly and the not my daughter, you bitch moment. We see Lily literally putting herself in front of Harry when Voldemort comes to Godric's Hollow.
Speaker 1:This idea of moms as individuals who are making sacrifice for their children is such a major theme within these books, but I also think it's so fascinating that other people's reflections reflect the sentiment put forth in the latter comment, which is that could she be a good mom if she is raising a child like Draco, if she is raising a child who is bought into pure blood supremacy, if she's raising a child who uses epithets against other people? Is that the mark of a good mother? I wonder, and this is an interesting question for us to think about is it possible that she can be a good mother because she has done all of these things and sacrificed all of these things for her child, but didn't necessarily raise her child in a way that reflects our own ideals and our own moral values, even though they do reflect hers? And, to be fair, she raised Draco the same way that she was raised, and I think we would be remiss to take the fact that she stood in the face of Voldemort as a rejection of pureblood supremacist beliefs. I don't think that that's what we're witnessing in that moment at all. I don't think that she thinks that the way she was raised is bad. I don't think that she buys into the idea that somehow she's trapped in this. I think that she is a pureblood supremacist and she raised her child to be one. I think that she also recognizes that the actions and behaviors of this one man, ie Voldemort, are standing in the way of her family's happiness, and that's why she makes these choices, and I think that that's where we can see some of the kind of conflict.
Speaker 1:But I don't think that we should take the actions that she does as a rejection of this ideology. No, she's protecting her family. She is loyal to her family. She raised Malfoy gosh. She raised Draco, the way that she was raised. How do we reconcile this idea of how she was raised with our own understandings of what quote-unquote good looks like, and at what point would we have expected her to do something different?
Speaker 1:Is Narcissa Malfoy a good wife? About 67% of us said yes, about 8% of us said no and 25% of us said don't know. Now, this is an interesting question, because we really don't get to see her be a spouse in any active way. Much of what we get to see is this notion of this kind of passive partner, and this comes up in some of your comments, right? Someone wrote she's a good wife because she stays loyal to her husband. In some sense it almost seems as if she joined the dark side because she saw what happened to Andromeda and was scared what might happen to her if she didn't join. Someone else wrote she is also a good wife if we consider the traditional traits associated in marriage, such as loyalty to her husband, caring for her family and simply making sure the household runs.
Speaker 1:Do we have enough input to say what her relationship with Lucius is like? No, but the brief glimpse we get in book seven when Harry and company are at the manor shows us she might not have been as smitten with Voldemort's actions as Harry originally believed. So, as the comments allude to, we really don't get to see a lot of Narcissa as an active partner in her relationship with Lucius, and many of you just touched on the idea that her presence suggests a level of loyalty. And then, when Lucius is in Azkaban, we still see her kind of carrying on the mantle on a number of dimensions of the Malfoy name. When we conceptualize what it means to be a pureblood wife, we really only have Narcissa and Molly, and in both of these marriages.
Speaker 1:It's a very traditional kind of understanding of the stand by your man. Vibe right, just a little vocal for you all, because I think that what both Narcissa and Molly show us is that, no matter what, who your partner is is who they're going to be, and you are going to stand by them. We don't necessarily see that from Bellatrix, but we also don't really see Rodolphus very often either, so we don't know what he's up to or what they're about. We do, though, get to see Bellatrix be that level of loyal to Voldemort, who I think she probably wishes was her man, but that's a different story for a different day. Okay, we're not getting into that. So loyalty seems to be a hallmark for pureblood wives, and Narcissa embodies that in very meaningful ways, even when her husband is absent.
Speaker 1:But, again, I'm not comfortable with the assertion that she joined Voldemort and his ilk because of Lucius. I think it removes a level of ability from Narcissa, and I think that she believes what they all believe. Maybe she doesn't want to go out and kind of sully her hands with all the actions that they're taking, but, y'all, she is a pureblood supremacist, and that is a hill that I'm ready to stand on. Okay, because and I don't think that you know standing by her man means that she's standing by him because she doesn't believe what he believes. I think she does believe what he believes.
Speaker 1:To me, her loyalty to Lucius is the thing that keeps her from grabbing Draco and running off somewhere when everything kind of goes haywire. I think that it has nothing to do with her beliefs or her buy-in to the dark side. I think it has everything to do with what Voldemort's return means for her family, her comfort and her livelihood. And that is where she has issues. It's not with the belief structure that Voldemort is espousing. It is with the fact that him being back means that everybody is out here risking it all, and they have a child and a life and status and privilege and prestige and all that goes out the window. And to me, the loyalty that she has comes into play in terms of her staying there with him in the midst of all of that. So remember last episode when I was like, oh, we'll have a question that people on Patreon will pick and then I'll put it on the survey. I mean, it turns out you have to have people on the Patreon in order to do that, and we're still growing and I knew that I didn't have time, so what we did instead was people on Patreon recommended a question and then I asked them, said question and so Cassandra asked the question is Narcissa a good Slytherin? And about 83% of the people on Patreon thus far said yes and 13% said no.
Speaker 1:And Eve wrote I feel like most people remember the emphasis on ambition, but less so the importance of cunning and Slytherins who are cunning and willing to approach their ambition in more roundabout ways that may involve deceit or ways that the other houses may not approve of but still get results. I agree, caring about and protecting Narcissa's family could have been her ambition, but the bravery to do that in spite of and in the midst of Voldemort's indiscriminate violence would place her squarely in Gryffindor territory. Except, the specific steps she takes to accomplish those goals are extremely cunning. Her solutions are built on invasion, diversion and deceit evasion, diversion and deceit. Cassandra echoes that when she writes. I do believe she is a good slytherin in that she has pride in her family unit and an ambition to see them succeed as a whole, while there are many other traits, such as loyalty, almost to a fault, to lucius and draco, as well as bravery, by lying to voldemort. I think narcissus willingness to do whatever means resources necessary to achieve her goals is why she's an exceptional Slytherin. And then Eric refutes this by saying I do not think she's a good Slytherin.
Speaker 1:I don't think Narcissa is particularly good at anything. As I said in the survey, I think she is largely a passive aristocrat who just goes along to get along and to not lose her station in society. Get along and to not lose her station in society. I think this is a really interesting dynamic because I think, on one hand, what we're able to see is something that we all recognize in Slytherins, which is doing whatever it takes to get what you want, and we see Narcissa doing that. And I think what I also really enjoy about these comments is that it highlights a reality from other houses right Loyalty, which is something that we tend to associate with Hufflepuff's, bravery, which we tend to associate with Gryffindor's. And then there is this kind of cunning, right, and so that we see Narcissa kind of utilizing all of these things to do what she needs to do. And then I also do think that Eric is onto something in that I think that she is someone who is very not interested in losing her station. But I do think that that desire is the very thing that kind of makes her a good Slytherin, because she's willing to do whatever it takes to make sure that she doesn't, and she's willing to go above and beyond to ensure that she is not going to be demoted in any social space.
Speaker 1:One of my favorite scenes in the movies that isn't necessarily in the books is when Voldemort brings Harry's body back to Hogwarts and Harry kind of jumps out of Hagrid's arms and everyone's kind of running around not knowing what to do and Narcissa, lucius and Draco walk across the bridge and look back and they're like bye y'all. And I love that because that was her goal. That's what she wanted to do. She wanted to get her family together and get the heck out of Dodge, and I think that in some ways right, her desire to maintain her social standing is one of the chief motivations outside of her family for why she does what she does and why she navigates the space the way that she does, and so I think that in a lot of ways, this idea of maintenance of social status very much gels well with why she is a good Slytherin, and that is a perfect segue into the next question, which is is Narcissa Malfoy a good pureblood? About 59% said yes, about 25% said no and about 16% said don't know. Now, you all know that this is my favorite question, although this week I have another favorite question, mostly because it's chaos, and you all know that I love chaos.
Speaker 1:Someone wrote I feel she's a good pureblood in the sense that she acts in a way that is expected of her. And someone else wrote I feel she's a good pureblood in the sense that she acts in a way that is expected of her. And someone else wrote personally, I think Narcissa is one of the best examples of a good pureblood. She does not reject her status, as we see with some others, nor does she actively damage the pureblood reputation by publicly engaging in hateful rhetoric. It was always my opinion that purebloods like Bellatrix and Lucius were actively harming their own blood status in the long run by associating it with fear and hatred. Narcissa knows she benefits from the existing system and endeavors to maintain that power, and manages to do so in a way so that no one is ever truly sure if she's a death eater or not. And that's why she's a good Slytherin y'all, because she keeps her cards close to her chest.
Speaker 1:I think that this question is the easiest it's been, because we recognize that Narcissa is a pureblood supremacist. And I really like these comments because I think that what they highlight is what a pureblood structure means to someone like Narcissa, someone who is socialized to see herself as superior and operates and moves throughout the wizarding world with the belief of that. And it also highlights this kind of dichotomy between how one can operate as a pureblood supremacist. And I think that what the latter comment points to is the fact that Narcissa does not move in a way that is aggressive and she doesn't operate from a space of like. I am better than you and I need to tell you Everything is silent, right, it's all in the looks.
Speaker 1:When Harry first sees her, he kind of notices that she has a very haughty expression, but she doesn't really say anything when they see each other at the Quidditch World Cup. But she doesn't have to right, because she has that very kind of what we would consider, in our own kind of language, old money vibes, right when she's like I have nothing to prove to anybody. I'm pure blood, I'm married to pure blood, I got a pure blood child, I'm good. I have nothing to prove to you. I don't need to try to intimidate you, that's beneath me. I'm not. I don't need to try to intimidate you, that's beneath me, I don't have to work that hard.
Speaker 1:And it's so fascinating because it really does strike me that Bellatrix and Lucius are very kind of nouveau in the way that they assert themselves as if they have something to prove. And Voldemort is the same. But that's a whole other, different story. Narcissa really occupies a space as a pureblood where she's like I really just don't need to do anything, I'm me, I as a pureblood where she's like I really just don't need to do anything. I'm me, I've got money, I'm good. And I think it is very fascinating because so much of that is exploded when Voldemort comes back.
Speaker 1:And now all of a sudden there is this kind of very front-facing notion of purebloodedness, when in the past I think that what we would probably observe from pure blood supremacists of old is that it was something that you talked about at parties. It was something that you didn't go around telling people. You certainly weren't going to massive sporting events and having a good time torturing non-magical people. That's very gauche, it seems, and it seems very below Narcissa, and I think this is where we see the idea of loyalty and this idea of what it means to be a pure-blood wife really jump out and jump to the fore, because I think that Lucius wants everybody to know who he is and what he's about. Lucius wants everyone to be whispering about how he was connected with dark wizards. Lucius doesn't care, and I think that Narcissa stands by him in all all of that, but what is so clear is that she herself is like these people don't need to be out here knowing my business, and lucius is like actually, I want them to, and we know that draco is that way. Draco is just so gaudy and wants everyone to know all of the things, and they want people to know that they are better than them. Narcissa doesn't care what you believe, though, whereas Lucius is like I want you to believe not only that I am better than you, but I am in league with one of the most powerful dark wizards ever, and I want you. You won't say it to my face, but I want you to believe that, and I think that Narcissa stands by that, even though it probably goes against the way that she thinks that things should be done and how you go about having power. She still does it because she's like that's my man, I'm going to stick beside him.
Speaker 1:Is Narcissa Malfoy a hero? About 66% of us said no, about 22% of us said yes and about 13% of us said don't know Y'all. This is my favorite question this week, namely because it is outrageously, outrageously divisive and, as I said before, I love chaos. Okay, I'm a Gemini, my season is coming and I just feel like a little bit of chaos never hurt nobody. And this is a really, really tricky question.
Speaker 1:And it's even more incredible to think about because, for the past few weeks that we've been going through and looking at the Weasleys, it's been so easy for us to pretty much declare everyone except for Percy is heroic in their own right, and that's due in large part to the fact that they are fighting for the side of good in this right. They are fighting against Voldemort, they are making sacrifices for the greater good, they are doing things that they don't have to because they're purebloods in a society that benefits and privileges them, and yet and still, they are putting their lives on the line. But now we have someone who is not doing any of that right. She is someone who is occupying a space where she actively is working against what the Weasleys are fighting for, and still there is this complication, because she makes a sacrifice at the end of these books that turns the tide and that complicates the entire narrative about who she is and what it means to be a hero, because before we were able to match intention with actions with most of the Weasleys, but now we have actions that stand in the face of intentions. And what do we do? And that is why I am living for this particular question. It's pushing us a bit and I think that what you will see in some of these responses is that kind of conflict.
Speaker 1:Someone wrote I would have loved to say she was a hero for standing up to Voldemort, but she didn't do it because it was the right. Someone else wrote. Someone else wrote it was for a selfish motive, protecting her son as she should. So she technically isn't a hero, I guess. Someone else wrote I think you can be a hero without trying or intending to be one, and you can be a hero to just one person and not to the masses. The parent that saves their child from death becomes their child's hero, and someone else mentioned this on my Instagram A person who I actually went to college with, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 1:But when I posed a question on TikTok and Instagram, someone wrote to whom are they a hero? And I thought, ah, that is fascinating because it's not something that we have been confronted with right. We weren't asking, we were approaching heroism from a very objective space. When it came to the Weasleys, it wasn't a question of who they were a hero to. It was like oh, you're doing the thing you are working on behalf of bringing Voldemort down. You are standing in the face of kind of your own socialization in a lot of respects and sacrificing yourself. You are a hero. That is what it means to be heroic. And now we are faced with these other questions and a lot of other qualifiers. Right, you know, does one's intention have to be right in order for them to be a hero? Does one have to be kind of a broad hero, or can you be a hero to a specific person? And how do we reconcile that? Someone else wrote heroism can be self-serving. Becker 2004 and Eagley 2005,. Come on citations. Both explain the desire to achieve a goal at a risk of oneself. According to their personal value system, means that you are a hero. Her values are simply different.
Speaker 1:In some other comments on TikTok and Instagram, people made even more distinction, saying that a person could do a heroic thing, but that does not make them a hero, and that captures where I'm at with this. I think that, in the same way that Narcissa can be a bad person who does things that lead to good outcomes, I think she can be someone who is self-serving and doing it for reasons that have nothing to do with the greater good, but that doesn't necessarily take away from the act itself being heroic. And a lot of people said things like I don't think she's a hero, she's just a mother and she's just doing what any mother would do for their child. I'm not going to sell Narcissa Short on this. I don't necessarily agree with that assertion, because if Bellatrix was a mother in this situation, she absolutely would not have done that, and she makes that clear in Spinner's End that this is not something that she would have done. And I think that we're spoiled in these books because we get to see a lot of moms being good mothers, who are making all of these sacrifices, but the reality of the situation is is that there are a lot of people, a lot of parents, a lot of guardians, who would not do what Narcissa did, and the fact that she did do that is outrageously brave and heroic.
Speaker 1:I think, if we look across different lores, if we look at mythology, our favorite heroes are not always doing things for the greater good. Sometimes they are doing it for selfish acts and the outcomes happen to help other people. Sometimes they're choosing, you know, to go and find the love of their life instead of going and saving some village somewhere. Sometimes they're having to make these hard choices and the thing that makes them feel heroic to us, even in those situations, is the self-sacrifice, it is the seemingly lack of concern for their own physical well-being, even if the outcome gives them what they want in the end. And to me, narcissa is no different in that respect but don't get me wrong, she's no different in that respect but she's still Death Eater, adjacent at best. And so that doesn't undo it, doesn't negate the ideology, it doesn't negate the other actions, it doesn't negate how complicit she has been. None of that is negated in the actions that she takes here.
Speaker 1:And I think that that is also so important because sometimes, when we think of heroism and the way that we've talked about it in past episodes it feels very zero sum. It feels very much like, even if you do one good thing this one time, that it kind of you're disqualified from being a hero. And what Narcissa offers us here is the ability to recognize that one can do a heroic act. One can be a hero to a specific person and that can be what it is and that can live in the same space as all of the other mess, madness, absurdity and destruction that you might have been doing in other contexts. That's really important, specifically as we move forward, thinking about who gets to be a hero, and I think in other contexts it's going to be a lot easier for us to say yes or to say no, but in other spaces we're going to have to grapple with this and I think what Narcissa has done for us as we move forward with these questions is really expanded the scope of our understanding of heroism and to that I say thank you, narcissa, thank you, girl.
Speaker 1:Is Narcissa Malfoy a good sister? About 43% of us said no, about 23% of us said yes and about 34% of us said no. I'm going to admit that I really did not see the high levels of no coming. And then I remembered Andromeda. And I remembered because in my mind I was simply thinking of her with Bellatrix in Spinner's End. And then, as I was reading through your comments, it occurred to me oh right, there's like a whole other sister who has been completely exiled and estranged from the family because she married a muggle-born person. Someone wrote, I think that I can most confidently say that she's not a good sister. There's no evidence of her having had trouble with cutting off Andromeda, though I like to believe it was hard for her. But even with Bellatrix, I don't think that her loyalty to her would have been unshakable. Someone else wrote as for the sister question, I think the black sisters had a very complicated relationship of which we don't see much in the books. By all accounts, the three girls were close while growing up, but in adulthood the strain between them was too hard. And then someone else wrote planned for her life because she had seen how horribly things went for her sisters if they disobeyed.
Speaker 1:One thing that kind of stands out to me about pureblood families, as we've come to understand them, is that there is this very weird kind of Hunger Games-ian, trademarked, copywritten way of thinking about what it means to be part of a family. So we know that the Weasleys all had a lot of love in the house. But there was also this very kind of every person for themselves vibe. Everyone was trying to get as much attention in whatever way they could and live up to some kind of amorphous, seemingly unattainable standard that was set for them, mostly by Molly. And I think we kind of see this here with the Black sisters, insofar that we see all of them kind of navigating the world in very different ways. But we see, particularly if we look at Andromeda, who is Tonks' mom for those of us who are maybe movie watchers and we didn't get to meet her in the movies. But this is Tonks' mother and she is the third of the three sisters Narcissa, bellatrix and Andromeda.
Speaker 1:And I think that what is fascinating here is that Andromeda makes a choice to kind of defect from the family and marries Ted Tonks, who is a muggle-born wizard who we also don't meet in the movies, and so she's kind of cast out of the family. And then we see Bellatrix, who we actually have no sense of whether or not the kind of unhingedness that becomes her trademark throughout the books and the movies is something that happened while she was away, but I think we also get a sense that she wasn't quite all the way present even before she went to Azkaban, because of what she did to the Longbottoms. If we keep going with this train of thought that everything within these pureblood families is really some sort of weird competition, then I think one of the comments kind of touches on the idea of being successful, or I would even say like Narcissa won right, like she beat out Bellatrix, because not only is she married to a pureblood but she has a child, so she gets and it's a boy, right, so he gets, to continue on the Malfoy line. Andromeda is completely estranged from the family and then Bellatrix has no children and so and I'm sorry y'all for the cursed child stans out there. I'm not acknowledging that in this particular dialogue.
Speaker 1:So that's a different conversation for a different day, a different episode, and so canonically, within the seven books that we are currently working, she is without child and so in a lot of ways, narcissa is the kind of superior child. She's been able to do all of the things that we know are important to purebloods, particularly because pureblood families are dying out in very high numbers because of the high amounts of inbreeding right. Families are dying out in very high numbers because of the high amounts of inbreeding right. And so she's able to manage to have a very healthy, competent child who kind of follows in the footsteps of his father. So that when we think about whether or not she's a good sister, I think the answer to the question of is she a good pureblood?
Speaker 1:Kind of conflicts with this right, because in order for her to do some of the things that she's been able to accomplish, that means she has to jettison her sister Andromeda, because she can't afford to have any blood traitors in the family, and she kind of has to stand in the face of even Bellatrix when it comes to kind of being loyal to the family. That gives her the kinds of status and prestige and cachet that she gets with the Malfoy name. And so it's hard to be a good sibling and be a good pureblood at the same time, especially when so much of the society is based on particularly, it strikes me, for pureblood women what you are able to produce both biologically but also socially. And Narcissa is playing the game in a way that Bellatrix isn't, because Bellatrix is not at all concerned about any of that, she's just trying to get every bit of affection she can get out of Voldemort, and Andromeda isn't even in the game anymore, and so a lot of the way that I think Narcissa approaches her sisterhood is through the lens of if you can benefit me and what I'm doing, then sure, but the moment that you stand in the face of what is best for me and mine is the moment that we're going to have an issue, and I think we see that in a number of moments, not necessarily with Andromeda, but certainly with Bellatrix.
Speaker 1:So now we've reached the moment in the episode where I'm going to reflect on Narcissa, and the thing that I want to talk about is really a question of where the narrative of Narcissa being this kind of victim of circumstance, this defenseless lady, really came from. And it's not even the things that I just read in the comments. In some ways, what I read in the comments are kind of buoyed by my own experience reading fan fiction, particularly Germione fics, where Narcissa is either this kind of older, aristocratic lady who really just wants Draco to get married and settle down but also had to change her ways because post-war she kind of, you know, is recognizing the error of her ways or at least, is trying to keep up appearances that she's changed the error of her ways, but also, in some other ones, right, she's a victim. She is, you know, in a relationship with Lucius, who's kind of a psychopath and has, you know, doesn't treat her particularly well.
Speaker 1:And there is this sense that she does not play an active role in her own life, that she is just kind of a ship out on the water being buffeted to and fro by the structural norms and the obligations of being a pureblood woman, and that she herself doesn't really occupy a space of agency. And I don't know y'all, I really have a hard time with this because I don't really know where it comes from, especially, as I said earlier, when we see her occupy a space that really requires a lot of forethought, a lot of cunning and a lot of thinking through the decisions that she's going to make. And especially when Lucius is locked up in Azkaban and she has to be the one to survive, she's got to be the one to keep Draco alive. At that moment she is no longer just a woman who's like whatever my man wants is what we're going to do. She is the head of the house.
Speaker 1:I know Draco probably thought he was because he got the tat, but we all know that Narcissa was the one running that show and I think we got to give her her flowers in this regard. And I just find it so fascinating that so much of the narrative surrounding her is a narrative of helplessness and a narrative of well, she didn't really get to make that many decisions because she kind of just did whatever her parents wanted. And she didn't really get to do all of these things because she was afraid that, you know, what happened to Andromeda would happen to her, and I don't know where we're getting that from.
Speaker 1:I don't know if this is just a trope that came up in fan fiction, if it's something that helps us really try to understand why she makes the choices that she makes in the end. I just don't understand it, and I really do think it kind of does the character a disservice, because it really does remove a lot of the brilliance that comes along with being a woman in a society that does not give you any advantages whatsoever, even as a pureblood, and when you are no longer able to just depend on your husband to be the face of things and in fact your husband becomes persona non grata, both within death eater circles but also in broader societal circles, and you still have to navigate that space and you still have to hold your head up high and pretend like everything is fine Y'all. That is not something that someone who has no say in their lives, that's not something that they're able to do and we see Narcissa do that in the canonical text and so I just don't understand, kind of, where we came up with this idea that she is a victim. In my mind, these moments and the decisions that she makes are really just the byproduct of her silence and consequences for the actions of her and her family, and that is where she has to figure out how she's gonna navigate that space. She's not helpless, because a helpless person doesn't stand up in the face of a homicidal maniac and lie to his face. That person also doesn't then like go get their kid and dip out Like. That's not the face of a helpless person.
Speaker 1:And I think that, when we think about what was said in the question surrounding whether or not she was a good Slytherin, her cunning and the strategic nature with which she operates really resonates with me, both in terms of being a woman who has to navigate male-dominated spaces and what that then means for the things that you have to know and how many moves ahead you have to be in front of them in order to survive, specifically when you are a part of a social class that is so focused on your biological ability to produce heirs that you really have no other agency. And yet somehow you have to assert yourself. And we see Narcissa making these choices and doing this over and over and over again, whether it be lying to Voldemort, whether it be going behind Voldemort's back, going behind Draco's back, going behind Lucius's back and dragging Bellatrix along to go and make a deal with Snape to protect her son. Again, those are not the acts of someone who doesn't have any say in the life that they live. I think we would be remiss to not highlight the fact that Narcissa is a very capable person and even in the pages that we get with her, which are not a lot of them we get a sense of just how she's been able to maintain and the importance of that maintenance, both for her but also for her child. And y'all we have to acknowledge it, we have to call it out Y'all we did it, we made it through Narcissa Malfoy.
Speaker 1:I told you there was going to be a lot of things for us to talk about and, honestly, she didn't disappoint, and neither did you, and I am so happy and grateful that we are on this journey together. I was recording the other day and I thought to myself God, I'm actually so fortunate to be able to do this and I am so grateful that you all are willing to come on this journey with me. Don't forget that you can join the Patreon for free so that you can be part of the conversation that we're gonna have about this episode, because, as you all experienced, there's a lot to unpack and a lot of things to discuss, and it's all going to go down there In the next episode. Y'all we are talking about Luscious Locks, lucius and I can't do a blowout like him because I don't have any hair but we are going to be getting into all of the other things and I cannot wait. I'm so, so, so looking forward to it. So so so looking forward to it.
Speaker 1:This has been another episode of Critical Magic Theory. I'm Professor Julian Womble, and if you enjoyed today's episode, first off, thank you. Please feel free to rate, like, subscribe, follow, do all the things that Ones does where pods are cast. If you'd like to keep in touch, please feel free to join our Patreon for free and chat with me. If you want to get extra perks and all kinds of things, there are many options for you to take part in on that Patreon as well. If you would like to follow me on social media, please feel free to do so on TikTok at ProfW P-R-O-F-W, and on Instagram at ProfJW. Please feel free to go to our website, criticalmagictheorycom, or send me an email at criticalmagictheory at gmailcom.
Speaker 1:I'm bopping real quick. I'm bopping real quick. Special thanks to my friends Mark Miller and Niles Luther for the music. All right, y'all. We are going to be talking about Lucius in the next episode. The survey link will be in the summary notes for today, as well as a link to the Patreon. See you all in two weeks. Until then, be critical and stay magical, my friends. Bye.