In the Harry Potter series, we have, obviously, Harry Potter as our main character and hero, and Tom Riddle – also known as Lord Voldemort, as our villain. They have, however, very similar life stories. How did one end up as the most feared wizard in all of the wizarding world, the epitome of evil, and the other as its exact opposite, representing all the good and bravery in their world? Were their stories written when they were born with their own innate nature? Or did their upbringings force them into the path they went down? Did the trauma have to happen for these characters to come into being? To become extraordinary – in their own particular ways? Is it nature or nurture that forms the characters into their roles?
For neither of them is the answer obvious, but for Harry Potter, it is clear that his nature of goodness overshadowed the childhood of abuse he went through, while with Lord Voldemort, it’s a bit more complicated than that. From his background of Marvolo, Morfin, and Merope that we discover in the sixth book of the series, The Half-Blood Prince, we realize that he did in fact have very lousy genes; but then again, considering his mother did run away in hopes of a better future for herself, it once again brings into question whether Voldemort actually had a more overpowering evil nature or a relatively fine one.
From what Dumbledore reveals in The Half-Blood Prince, we could reasonably infer that Voldemort did in fact have psychopathic tendencies, killing animals as a child, torturing the other children in his orphanage. And so, after learning that he is a psychopath, it is easy to assume that Voldemort was destined to be the villain, but as Katie Heany reveals in her conversation with a woman diagnosed with psychopathy in The Cut, a psychopath is definitely able to lead a normal life as she does and is not necessarily destined to be a killer – it is not inevitable – they do however have it easier with their lack of regret and muffled emotions; it’s still a matter of choice and Tom Riddle made all the decisions that made him the villain of the story.
Our experiences during our lives help shape us into the people we are going to become, and that is where these two characters’ trauma during their childhood come into play. It is easier to form a conclusion on Harry Potter, who is for us as inherently good, while Tom Riddle is more convoluted, with a more murky nature than the one prescribed for Harry. From what we learn of Harry’s parents, Harry’s goodness is inherited from them – mostly his mother – which trumps his nurture, while for Tom Riddle it seems as though his childhood of neglect combined with his psychopathic tendencies and rotten genes reveal that his is more of a mixture of the two.
In essence, we can’t really end up with an answer of whether it is actually the character’s nature or nurture that allows them to become either the hero or the villain of the story, but it is their traumatic experience that causes their particular nurture which either highlights or neglects their own nature. We can however come out knowing that the trauma that the characters experience in their early life does make them into the people they turn out to be, but it is not necessarily what makes them extraordinary; it depends mostly on the story line, and in Harry’s case, it is the trauma that makes him extraordinary, marking him as ‘the boy who lived’ because of the death of his parents and the manner in which they died.
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