Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban

The Harry Potter series has never been one to shy away from frightening situations. In the first novels, Harry and his friends battled giant snakes, trolls, and even the Dark Lord Voldemort. Still, Rowling uses The Prisoner of Azkaban to tackle the idea that facing one’s fears may require a variety of methods. Professor Lupin introduces a boggart on the first day of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Boggarts assume the form of what people fear the most, and although most of the students have generic fears of monsters or scary images from a horror story, some of the forms the boggart chooses to take are more complex and surprising.

Lupin’s boggart, for example, changes into the moon when it sees Lupin. The full moon represents the time of the month when Lupin becomes a werewolf, and therefore it represents the moment he feels the most dangerous and out-of-control. For Lupin, facing his fears means coming to terms with the fact that he will always be a werewolf, and although there are steps he can take to try to keep himself and his students safe, he lives with the fear that he is really a monster at his core. Lupin combats this fear by doing his best to be responsible, even when it hurts him, such as when he decides to resign from Hogwarts. Harry notices that when Lupin faces the boggart, he “almost lazily” dismisses the silvery moon, which hints that Lupin has mostly come to terms with his worst fear. Lupin’s preferred method of tackling his fear is acceptance.

Neville Longbottom’s boggart takes the form of Professor Snape. He is terrified of Snape because Snape, a habitual bully, often looks for opportunities to embarrass Neville. Lupin encourages Neville to imagine Snape dressed in Neville’s grandmother’s clothes, which replaces his fear with laughter. Lupin urges his students to find a way to transform their worst fear into something to laugh at, which is another method of facing one’s fears. By making light of a frightening situation, a person may come to no longer fear something or someone.

In Harry’s case, however, the boggart becomes a dementor, which is not something he can accept or make light of. Instead, Harry must fight his fear and defeat it with truth. Lupin remarks that because Harry’s boggart would become a dementor, “what you fear most of all is—fear” (155). Dementors represent darkness and terror, and Harry must learn to cling to hope and joy if he is to overcome his boggart. Not all fears can be handled the same way but facing them down can be freeing and fulfilling in the long run.

Throughout The Prisoner of Azkaban, Rowling delves into the concept of injustice. The final mission in the novel—Harry and Hermione’s adventure with the Time-Turner—highlights three separate examples of injustice and how they must be corrected. Rowling, therefore, uses this final adventure to show that sometimes a little rule-breaking is necessary to ensure that justice is served.

Harry and Hermione’s first mission is to rescue Buckbeak from his planned execution. Buckbeak’s trial and appeal are examples of how the justice system can be broken to the point of creating injustice. Although Malfoy is the one who broke the rules, insulted Buckbeak, and got himself hurt, Hagrid knows that the Committee responsible for the ruling is “in Lucius Malfoy’s pocket” (293), and there will be no justice for Buckbeak. Harry and Hermione go against the ruling by rescuing Buckbeak from the pumpkin patch before he can be executed, and Hagrid is delighted to know that his beloved hippogriff will get a second chance at life.

The dementors are forbidden from performing the Dementor’s Kiss unless instructed to do so, but this does not stop them from attempting it on Harry, who is innocent. Although Harry promises Hermione that he will follow the rules of the Time-Turner and that he’s “not going to try and interfere” (410) with events that have already happened, he steps in and rescues their past selves from the dementors. An injustice was playing out before Harry’s eyes, and he knew he had to break the rules to stop it.

Finally, Harry and Hermione fly Buckbeak up to the room of the castle where Sirius is being held prisoner. Although Harry and Hermione know that Black is an innocent man, Dumbledore warns them, “There is not a shred of proof to support Black’s story, except [Harry and Hermione’s] word— and the word of two thirteen-year-old wizards will not convince anybody” (392). A mountain of evidence is stacked against Black, and because Harry and Hermione know the truth, they take it upon themselves to rescue Black and send him off to safety with Buckbeak. If the Ministry of Magic ever found out what they did, they would be in serious trouble, but sometimes correcting an injustice requires breaking the rules.