From the Files of Dr. Dumbledore

The Case of Harry P., Week 4:

Harry's delusions are a labyrinth of tangled memories and sinister symbols… No wonder, then, that a labyrinth, with a dark secret at the center, is central to his hallucinations as well.

Harry speaks of a "maze", but what he describes is a labyrinth. A maze has no center. It is designed to confuse, to bewilder, to lead astray; but a labyrinth has a center, a hidden heart, that the wanderer must find. What is at the center of the phantasmagoric labyrinth Harry's mind has constructed to protect its secret?

Harry has nightmares about Voldemort, and his scar is hurting. In his dream, he sees Voldemort killing an old man, and Harry is next... Harry attends the Quidditch World Cup with Hermione and the Weasleys. But someone conjures the Dark Mark, Voldemort's own sign, consisting of a skull with a serpent protruding from its mouth. As terror ensues, a family of four Muggles is turned upside down in the air by Voldemort's death eaters. Back at Hogwarts, they encounter a strange new teacher, the one-eyed, one-legged Alastor Moody. Moody has a magical all-seeing eye instead of the one he has lost, hence he is nicknamed "Mad-Eye". The eccentric Moody becomes Harry's new mentor. Moody teaches the students about the "unforgivable curses": The Imperius curse that controls the mind, the Cruciatus curse that tortures, and the Killing curse ("Avada Kedavra") that kills .The fabled Triwizard Tournament will take place at Hogwarts. Students from two other schools, Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, will visit Hogwarts for the year. The magical Goblet of Fire will select one student from each school to compete. But the goblet unexpectedly picks a fourth champion: Harry himself. Harry must compete against the handsome and popular Cedric Diggory from Hogwarts, the beautiful Fleur Delacour from Beaxbatons, and the sports star Viktor Krum from Durmstrang. Harry communicates secretly with Sirius, whose head magically shows up in the common room fire. In the First Task of the Triwizard Tournament, the champions have to retrieve a golden egg guarded by a dragon. Harry needs a partner for the Yule Ball and invites the lovely Cho Chang, but she is going with Cedric instead. Harry ends up going to the ball with Parvati Patil, but he fails to pay attention to her. Ron's date with Parvati's twin sister, Padma, is equally unsuccessful. Harry has to find a way to open the golden dragon's egg; Cedric tells him to open it under water. In the Second Task, Harry has to rescue Ron from under the lake, but he wants to rescue Hermione, Cho, and Fleur's sister as well. Harry learns more about the past from looking into a magical tank in Dumbledore's office, the Pensieve. He learns that the ministry official Barty Crouch turned his own son over to the dementors for being on Voldemort's side. In the Third Task, the champions enter a maze. They are attacked by monsters, and Harry answers the riddle of the sphinx. Harry and Cedric reach the Triwizard Cup simultaneously. But the cup is a portkey, a device that magically transports them both elsewhere. They find themselves in a graveyard where Tom Riddle's father is buried. Voldemort appears, and orders Cedric killed ("Kill the spare!"). Voldemort regains his physical body with the help of the betrayer Peter Pettigrew, who dips the shapeless baby-like Voldemort into a cauldron that holds Voldemort's father's bone, Peter's hand, and Harry's blood. Harry and Voldmort duel, but Harry receives help from his dead parents and is able to escape. He brings the dead Cedric back to Hogwarts with him. Then Harry discovers that Moody is not who he seems to be; he is actually Barty Crouch's son who has assumed Moody's form through drinking the magical Polyjuice Potion. Barty Crouch Jr. has killed his own father in revenge for his father's heartless abandonment, and will now kill Harry. But Harry is rescued at the last minute by McGonagall, Dumbledore, and Snape. Dumbledore tells the students that they must know the truth about Cedric's death: He was killed by Voldemort.

Ah, the number four again! The fourfold father figure of the marauders, and now the four champions as well! I think Harry mentioned, too, that the imaginary Hogwarts has four mythical founders? But Harry's psyche always seems to divide these groups of four into three and one: The three that are good, and the one that is evil. Three of the marauders are good, but Peter is the betrayer. Three of the Hogwarts founders are good, but Slytherin is evil. There is one among the four who does not belong, the outsider. Three champions lived, but Cedric had to die… Kill the spare… Why? So the group of four can be restored to the perfect three? It is interesting that the family of Muggles turned upside down by the death eaters at the World Cup is a family of four. Some evil has arrived, something that turns the family upside down… Is it his own family Harry is thinking about, perhaps?

Dudley. Harry's little brother is the fourth member of their family, the one who by his very existence disturbed the ideal trinity of father, mother, and son. Is this why Harry's mind is obsessed with the idea of the fourth as the intruder, the outsider, the betrayer, because of the jealousy and hatred he feels towards his brother? Is he secretly wishing that Dudley will die, so he can yet again be alone with his mother and father? The Triwizard Tournament… According to its name, this competition should include three wizards, and yet there is a fourth… Always one extra, one that doesn't belong. What does this mean?

Who are the four champions? Do they represent four aspects of Harry himself? Cedric is perhaps Harry's idealized alter ego, the other Hogwarts champion, the other Quidditch player, the other rival for Cho's affections, similar to Harry in all things, but better… Viktor Krum is yet another Quidditch seeker, but sterner, more gruff – a harsher side of Harry? Viktor, the victorious one. And then there is the enchanting Fleur – Harry's female side, perhaps?

Or perhaps the four champions represent the four members of Harry's family: Perhaps Cedric is a representation of Dudley, Harry's much to perfect little brother. Viktor. Another V name, like Vernon and Voldemort… Does Viktor Krum, like the Uncle Vernon, represent Harry's father? And then there is the lovely Fleur of course… Fleur. The flower. A flower like Lily?

Harry's hallucinations are becoming increasingly complex and intricate. Multiple characters seem to represent the same ideas.

Harry goes to the Yule ball with Parvati, and his friend and alter ego Ron with her double, Padma. According to ancient Hindu myths, Parvati, the mother goddess, is married to Shiva, the god of destruction. She is furious with her husband for beheading her son, and demands that he finds the child a new head, the head of an elephant. The protective mother and the destructive father… Now, that's interesting! Especially considering that Parvati's identical sister is named after a flower. "Padma", the ancient Indian word for lotus flower or water lily. Lily…

And then we have Alastor Moody, the mentor who is a murderer in disguise… Alastor… An avenging spirit in Greek mythology, I believe? Perhaps that is why Mad-Eye Moody is missing an eye; his very appearance recalls the old saying "An eye for an eye…". But Mad-Eye Moody is not what he seems. He is the abandoned son, who seeks revenge on his father. He kills his father, like Tom Riddle kills his. Is Moody simply Tom Riddle's doppelganger? Or Harry's?

Avada Kedavra, the killing curse. Harry's erudition continues to amaze me. He even knows some ancient Aramaic! Not bad! Abada k'dabra, "may it be destroyed as I speak..."

But I am an old man with many books, Harry, and I know that Avada Kedavra was never a killing curse. This formula was used often enough in ancient Aramaic magical texts, but it was a healing spell. The ancient healers used these words to destroy the diseases that afflicted the sick and the suffering. How curious, then, that the healing formula has turned into a killing curse in Harry's mind... How can healing become murder?

Murder… Murder seems to play an increasingly important part in Harry's hallucinations: Cedric, Harry's double, his ideal self, is killed, and both Barty Crouch Jr. and Tom Riddle murder their fathers… What's behind this dwelling on patricide, the murder of the father?

And the Riddle of the Sphinx, too! In his hallucinations, Harry must answer the riddle of the Sphinx, right before he is whisked away to a graveyard where Voldemort's murdered father lies buried! Interesting, Harry…

I seem to recall that there was a famous literary character who had to answer the riddle of the Sphinx, shortly before he went on to kill his own father. Oedipus, who murdered his father and married his mother… And in his guilt upon discovering what he had done, he poked his eyes out… (Is the one-eyed Moody perhaps a symbol of this oedipal impulse as well?)

That Harry subconsciously hates his father is clear, but why does he hate him? What crime has his father committed?

The Triwizard tournament is rich in symbolism as well, sinister as well as erotic. The Triwizard cup itself, the ultimate goal of the quest, is a Grail-like vessel. As in the Arthurian Grail legends, the chosen "knights" must overcome great dangers in their search for the cup. Curiously, there is a great deal of birth imagery surrounding this quest in Harry's mind.

Harry risks his life to snatch the golden egg from a fire-breathing dragon. A dragon that guards its eggs must be female, a mother guarding its offspring. But one of the eggs is different from the others, golden in color. What does this egg contain? A baby dragon, one would have thought, but no: It contains a secret, a clue.

But the secret cannot be accessed directly; its voice can only be heard under water, or its words will be nothing but an unbearable scream. Why under water? Perhaps water represents an otherworld of sorts? A realm of death? In the second task, Harry must save innocent victims from what he believes to be death by water. The waters of the womb?

The cup itself is an ancient womb symbol, which puts Harry and Cedric's vying for this vessel into a rather interesting light. Are they sexual rivals, perhaps? But this cup is not what it seems; it throws the two rivals into the hands of the waiting Voldemort.

And then Voldemort himself is born, from a different vessel, from a more sinister Grail: He emerges from the cauldron, from the dark womb, born from blood, born from sacrifice.

Voldemort wishes to kill Harry, but he fails. Harry is protected by his mother's love. Who, or what, is Voldemort? A distortion of James? Or some dark aspect of Harry's own psyche, a long forgotten guilt, telling him he deserves to die… for what? What have you done, Harry?

Whatever the truth is, Harry's subconscious seems to be willing to let me help him find it. I am fascinated by the image of the Pensieve he believes I have in my possession, the magical vessel that helps us look, together, into the past. And he seems to find some comfort in his belief that I refuse to let the murder of Cedric Diggory remain forgotten. If only I understood what this represents…

And then there is the figure of Snape again, always there to hurt Harry, but to rescue him in the end. If only I understood what Snape stood for, I could get to the bottom of this mystery…