Question regarding Dumbledore

[wook77]

Ok, question for the flist and any who can answer it.

Long rambling intro: I was re-reading Chapter 26 of HBP last night to do research on the cave and Inferi.

When I was reading... the below caught my eye. (directly quoted from page 572 of the American Version)

And obediently, Dumbledore drank, as though it was an antidote Harry offered him, but upon draining the goblet, he sank to his knees, shaking uncontrollably.

"It's all my fault, all my fault," he sobbed. "Please make it stop, I know I did wrong, oh please make it stop and I'll never, never again..."

What do you think Dumbledore did? Is this about Harry's parents? Is this about Snape? Is this about Malfoy? Is this about Aberforth's goat?



I honestly don't know what i think. I really dislike evil!Dumbledore so I don't think that it's all about how he did something extremely awful and evil.

Instead, I think it's something that he honestly regrets. Either his inability to act quickly enough to save Harry's parents. That seems a reasonable explanation but my curiosity is saying that I'm wrong on that one.

Is this about Snape somehow? Is it Dumbledore's "fault" that Snape is forced to go back to the DE's and he's regretting that now?


What are your thoughts and feelings on this?

Comments

[incapricious.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I'd always thought that maybe whatever that potion was, it made the drinker see the worst thing they could ever see, not necessarily see something that had really happened. Sort of like the reverse of the Mirror of Erised. It's some sort of torture that makes Dumbledore think something is happening, like students being tortured or Voldmort taking over the world or ... I don't know.

*ponders more*

But the way he is talking in a lot of that scene always reminded me of a child, so perhaps the potion makes one relive a traumatic childhood experience, or relive one of Tom Riddle's childhood experiences as if it were one's own.

[yaycoffee.livejournal.com]

Yeah... that's kind of what I thought about it, too. I don't think what Dumbledore was reacting to was a real thing. I think it was some sort of VERY BAD hallucination.

I also noticed the childlike-ness of his dialogue there...

... I guess I never could really figure it out beyond WHOA... CREEEEEEEEEEEPY. That scene REALLY makes my skin crawl.

[incapricious.livejournal.com]

Yeah, me too. I re-read it after reading this post and got all creeped out again. *shivers*

Although... thinking about it is making me want to write a fic from Dumbledore's POV of that scene. See if I can make his reactions make sense, given the context of whatever effects the stuff has on him.

Gah. Maybe I should just look for fics about that, as I'm sure there are many. There can't not be.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Ohhh, I hadn't thought of that. So it could've been that Dumbledore was seeing all his failures or something?

The traumatic childhood thing as well. I shall ponder this some more because they're really good thoughts.