Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapter 5.

 

Hmmm, interesting. I just couldn't remember her ever mentioning a love potion.

 

Perhaps she made it but didn't use it? Lol

 

I, too, always had a gnawing little feeling that Riddle Sr. was implied to have been a bit of a bad guy in the books.

For the record, it is pure speculation on Dumbledore's part that Merope intentionally set Tom Sr. free, rather than him getting away because she goofed up. He doesn't really know if Tom knew she was pregnant. He doesn't even know whether she used the Imperius or a love potion... as if those were the only two options, anyway. There are other less drastic measures she could have used, like a Confundus charm or Unctuous Unction, that might have given her some degree of power over him (enough to keep him around until she could conceive, perhaps), if not to the same degree as those more famous options.

So maybe it was a potion and maybe he broke free because she quit giving it to him (thinking he'd have really fallen for her by then*) and maybe he knew about the baby before he left her but maybe he didn't. :|

Spoiler

(*But it could just as easily have been because she screwed up the spell or potion because she was an almost completely untrained witch. Or because she was so blissfully happy to have her man, be away from her rotten family, and have means for the first time in her life, that she forgot his next dose...)

At any rate, I always felt like the books treated him with, at best, neutrality or mild disdain, when he was clearly the victim of a premeditated and protracted series of rapes; unless anyone believes she got pregnant on the first try and never laid a hand on her fairy tale prince ever again.

Somehow I doubt that, when he was finally able to come to his senses and realized that he'd spent months being held mentally captive, raped by a demented, obviously inbred, and no doubt socially maladjusted woman, his first thought was, "If it's she's pregnant, I'd better stick around to raise the offspring. The child will no doubt be a real winner, given the mother's visibly excellent breeding... not many people can look north and southwest at the same exact fucking time. As a victim of long-term mental and physical assault, that would be a great use of my time and resources. I definitely deserve to be saddled with that sort of burden."

He may have never even known, but even if he did...

That's a thought. Canon does have a distinct case of Rich People = Bad People.

And the ones who aren't outright stated as being rich are shown to have been corrupted in their pursuit of wealth, like Fudge and Bagman. I mean, come on... the latter's surname even implies he's a thief.

Harry is said to be "well off" but no one lumps him in with the rich assholes because, first and foremost, we spend plenty of time getting to know him, and second, he's being treated like a combination slave and 'malformed head-case they keep hidden away in the attic' when we first truly meet him.

He never really benefits from that wealth within the books, and he never acts like a spoiled rich kid. Nearly the only thing he buys is snack food on the train to Hogwarts, and he shares much of that with his brand new friend, Ron.

Spoiler

The movie, in its typical 'slightly missed the mark' sort of way, does make this a bit more of a rich kid moment by having Harry tell the trolley lady he'll "take the lot!" and whip out a handful of gold, which Ron gawks at.

In all fairness, though, he did clearly do it, for the most part, to take pity on Ron and his sandwich.

This contrasts with the book, where Harry buys a large selection of snacks, simply because he's hungry and is probably glorying in having the money and opportunity to buy something, and the option to eat his fill, for the first time ever.

It's only after he buys all of this for himself that he finds out Ron neither likes nor wants the sandwiches he mentioned a moment before. To Harry's credit, though, he then immediately offers to trade with Ron (seemingly aware that Ron would be more likely to accept a trade than a handout), even though Harry obviously never intended to eat the sandwich he traded for.

I guess it evens out. The movie makes altruism his primary motivation for buying the snacks, but has him do so with a cocky line, while the book has him buying a pile of stuff for himself, only sharing it after the fact, but without the, "I'm rich, bitch! Just leave the trolley here, 'cause I'm makin' it rain!"

Justin Finch-Fletchley is implied to be wealthy, given his double-barreled name and comments about being headed for Eton, but we see so little of him in the books that his being rich might have sailed over some readers' heads. While nowhere near Malfoy-caliber douchebaggery, Justin (even with his limited page time) still manages to accuse Harry of trying to kill him

What?

That's just- Wow. That is some interpretation of the text, right there, especially given that he barely even speaks in the books.

Disdain for people in poverty?
It's his female companion who calls the Gaunt house a hovel and an eyesore, asking why it hasn't been cleared away. Tom at least has the charity to call it a cottage and merely points out that his family doesn't own it. He refers to Gaunt as a tramp, which is a simple statement of fact, and probably kinder than a lot of other things Tom could have called him.

Certain kind of stupidity?
Tom also says that Morfin is insane, which is undeniably true, and that the locals all seem to have stories about him - which is another statement of fact.

Merope clearly wasn't completely right in the head, either, and had at least one of the same physical defects as her brother, but Riddle never mentions her and certainly doesn't disparage her. Marvolo and Morfin aren't the simple kid that hangs out on the village common, talking to the horses and the water pump, they are violent and criminally insane, and so Tom mentions them in this vein.

You also have to take the time period into account and not look at it through the lens of twenty-first century enlightenment. Mental illnesses weren't well researched or very well understood in that era. Treatment was mostly limited to hiding the individual in the attic so their existence didn't humiliate the family, chucking the patient into an asylum (maybe for a lobotomy), or maybe killing them at birth if the physical aspect of their defects were obvious and extensive enough.

Tom's attitude toward the Gaunts was about as charitable as one could expect back then, especially considering that...

1. As part of the upper strata of society, Tom could have afforded to be as big a dick to the lower class as he wanted.
2. He lived nearby and traveled past their house on a regular basis, and thus would have had to put up with their insane hillbilly horseshit quite often. Morfin hit him with a hex on at least one occasion. Suddenly breaking out in boils as he passed their house was probably at least a little suspicious to Tom, as coincidences go.
3. If the locals had even the slightest inkling that the reason for the Gaunts' 'unique issues' was linked to generations of deliberate and unrepentant incestuous couplings, the family would have been absolute social pariahs on a level where Tom would have been considered nice if he only spat on them as he rode by!

Where they could hear?
While Tom's companion could see enough to think the property was an eyesore, the description of the area would seem to indicate it would be hard to actually get a good view of the house, so they probably wouldn't see if anyone is listening or if any windows were open. The lane they were riding down was surrounded by "high, tangled, hedgerows." And the path leading to the Gaunts was "bordered by higher and wilder hedgerows," while the house itself sat in a "patch of dark trees." "...the old trees ahead cast deep, dark, cool shadows, and it was a few seconds before Harry's eyes discerned the building half-hidden amongst the tangle of trunks." "...trees growing nearby, blocking all light and the view of the valley below."

And apparently Merope has no problem spying on Tom through the hedge without being seen.

It's possible all Tom's companion saw was the roof with the tiles missing and the rafters showing. Mistaken or not, they may have thought they had plenty of privacy when they spoke.


The only vaguely unkind thing we know for a fact that he did was joining his female companion in laughing at Ogden, when he ran into Tom's horse, because (as clueless wizards tend to do) Ogden was dressed like a circus clown. "...wearing the strange assortment of clothes ... a frock coat and spats over a striped one-piece bathing costume."

Even Harry, who was very familiar with this phenomenon among purebloods, thought of the getup as "bizarre," but I guess Tom was a horrible person for laughing when unexpectedly confronted out of the blue by a man who appeared out of nowhere, apparently deliberately dressed like he'd never seen clothes before.

He clearly got what was coming to him when he was mind-controlled, publicly humiliated, probably forced to alienate his family, raped, and later murdered by the son he was forced to sire. :facepalm

And the Malfoys got what was coming to them when- Oh shit, wait, nothing happened to them.

 

I did mention that I may have exaggerated somewhat to calling Tom a 'piece of shit'. I didn't read the books for a while so I was working off memory, not exactly analysing each bit. OP asked for an opinion, and I gave mine. I just got a bad impression of Tom Snr a few years back and that's just how I remembered him. Reading it back over again, I see where you all are coming from.

And I never did say that I believe he deserved everything that happened to him. Fate was quite cruel to him in what it dished out. I wouldn't wish it onto anyone.

 

It was the exaggerated nature of what you said that caught my eye... for better or worse.

Friendly word of warning, though: You can only push a hyperbolic statement so far, unless you're clearly joking. If you're not, there's always the chance someone will come along and expect you to back up your statement.

But your post did give me the motivation to go back and analyze "each bit." I mostly do this to explore and solidify in my mind my own position on the matter at hand, and it's part of the reason any posts of mine that involve analysis of canon tend to ramble on: I'm working it out for myself.

This process is useful for me because my memory is... well, it is what it is. For the record, I remembered almost none of the details of the scenes I talked about.

Standard sarcastic and hyperbolic closer to put things in perspective. Feel free to pay it no mind, unless it edifies, enlightens, or entertains you to do otherwise.

 

I'm kind of figuring out now that how I should phrase things before my own comment comes around to swing a punch at me

 

Yes, without a shadow of a doubt.

Who knows exactly how much Tom actually lost with this association with Merope? He called Cecilia "darling", an intimate term of an endearment for a man to call a woman at the time, suggesting they may well have been together. Considering he lived at home with his parents in his forties, there was no mention of another wife or children or of the Riddle House having any known heir, I think it is safe to say that he never remarried - and probably thought he wasn't able to as he didn't know that Merope had died. He probably lost her as well as his self-respect and freedom.

I would not be surprised if he was incredibly paranoid and untrusting after this considering that he was drugged. He seemed to be on speaking terms with the townsfolk during the time of Ogden's visit to Little Hangleton as he was familiar with the gossip in the main town. Perhaps Tom being even more "snobbish and rude" than his parents occurred because of this trauma and not in spite of it.

To be raped is a horrible, horrible thing to happen but to actually physically lose nearly a year of your life after an abduction and being forced to love someone you have no feelings for is horrific. Tom had absolutely no say and no choice in what happened to him - he was not even aware of the existence of wizards and magic and what the Gaunt's did to him was far worse than anything that he did to them - which was describe Marvolo as a tramp to Cecilia (he was) and Morfin mad, which is kind considering he nailed snakes to his door.

Were the shoe on the other foot and Morfin had done this to Cecilia, then the horror and revulsion would be quite rightly felt. Nor would anyone blame Cecilia for not wanting to have the child that reminded her of the ordeal. However, Tom was a white, wealthy male and it is often believed that these people can never be victims.

Even if he had regretted abandoning Tom in the cold light of day, he would have been unable to find Merope as she had died nor would he have any way of finding the child - or even knowing the child's gender.

Merope was not a psychopath - she had a conscience. She was quite a pathetic person whose moral compass was completely skewed because she never really saw Tom as a person, he was an ideal to her. She wanted something from him that he could never give her and this obsession completed blighted her sense of right and wrong for a long time. However, her actions were horrific and she is a rapist. Her actions can be explained and I have nothing but sympathy for the horrific suffering her father and brother forced her to endure but there is no excuse for her actions.

To make it worse, Tom was then murdered (and possibly forced to watch his parents and subjected to God-knows-what as he died with a look of horror on his face) by the son he never had a choice in having and later had his grave and his house defiled by said son. He posthumously ends up taking the blame for how his mass-murdering, genocidal son turned out, not only by said son but also by Dumbledore whose attitude seems that he thought Tom was unreasonable by abandoning Merope and who has learned nothing by this story by allowing Love Potions - which are date rape drugs - into his school.

I am also fascinated to know what kind of conversation Tom had with his son when he found him. Voldemort seems either unaware or in denial regarding the true circumstances of his birth - he states his father abandoned his mother because he "didn't like magic" and because he found out his "wife was a witch". While both of these are partially true (I'm sure he didn't like magic after what it had done to him), it doesn't really attack the real reasons and it seems to me that Voldemort only believes what he wants to believe about his father and believing he was just a cold-hearted person who hated his world is far easier than facing reality.

I think he's one of the biggest victims in the story. At least a lot of the other victims in the story went down by their own choices. He had no say on being dragged into this.

 

I'm sure the son of the local lord in the 20s telling his community that a weak, frail, impoverished woman who lived in a hovel and whose only living relatives were in jail raped him and held him hostage for like a year would go over well.

Frankly, no one would believe he wasn't just having a dalliance with a girl that caught his eye. There's no accounting for taste after all.

There's very little Tom Sr could have realistically done, and without knowing the truth of what he knew and didn't about the baby (whether he knew it existed) we can't judge him on not trying to take care of the kid.

Say he did know, that Merope did tell him before he left, what was he to do? He knew nothing about magic. For all he knew, the moment he even came close he'd be ensnared again, or maybe the kid was an abomination, inhuman.

Hell, for all we know, perhaps he did try to find him. When LV found him, he was already in a state of mind to categorize anything Tom Sr could say in defense of himself as 'bullshit'.

 

Even s a kid I'd never got the impression that he was anything other than a victim. Probably an asshole regardless but still always felt sorry for the guy. Well, at least when we found out aboit Merope's rape shenanigans.

JKR really played it on thick with the whole love potion angle in HBP. Do you guys think she was trying to inject some social commentary? She is pretty vocal about... Everything ever.

 

I think JKR kind of implied that Riddle Sr was a jerk that ran off when the kid came. But in reality he really got screwed over by Merope with the whole love potion debacle.

 

How much of the portrayal of Tom Sr do you think is due to JK Rowling's personal situation as a single mother?

 

I think the narrative probably changed between the Chamber of Secrets and the Half-Blood Prince. Voldemort's father probably did leave because of Merope being a witch in the original idea behind Voldemort, making Voldemort somewhat of a tragic story, but JKR wanted to make Voldemort more twisted-ly evil and monstrous by way of the love potion story line, which made Tom the father a victim nearly through and through. Hence why there is a sort of disconnect between the early ideas behind Tom Riddle (the father) and the images of him in later books.

 

Honestly, I agree with you. He was justified in his actions for leaving her, and I'm not saying it what happened after the abandonment was good. But, does anyone think it's right for a rape victim to be forced to stay and raise a child that, technically, shouldn't exist.

 

I don't think that as a child (even in those one-sided moments that all children know) I saw him as a particularly evil or even misguided character - yes, he is rich, but what does that have to do with it? Yes, he is reported as having been handsome, but again, what does that have to do with it? Ultimately, while Merope no doubt suffered and became a victim in her own right due to his 'abandonment' of her and Tom Jr., he was well within his rights to try to escape the obviously confusing and traumatic experience. After all, as a Muggle he would have had no real knowledge of witchcraft other than myth and fable. Imagine what he must have felt once she decided to relieve him of the love potion's effects (because she believed that he would truly love her then)! He'd had no control over his own actions or thoughts!

Then again, Merope had her reasons. Generally, inbreeding doesn't go very well, and she is a rather classic example of the shortcomings of such a habit. Mental illness, is what I'd describe her situation as, in the least.

But no, I don't feel that the way Rowling wrote Tom Sr.'s character was ever entirely critical or cruel towards him. I think it was simply a case of multiple victims of the same crime (metaphorical and literal).