Yin and Yang: Arthur Weasley and Lucius Malfoy

“We have a very different idea of what disgraces the name of wizard, Malfoy.”

A pretty excellently delivered line by Mark Williams punctuates the mutual distain Arthur Weasley and Lucius Malfoy has for the other, in the semi-modern fantasy world still having notions of dignity and class pride.

Poverty and fraternisation with perceived ‘lesser’ people is cause for Lucius to distain Arthur heavily, and (unfortunately as in real British life) social judgment is on the side of distain for the poor. Lucius’s disgrace is no less obvious to Arthur, for reasons that make sense when made plainly and especially in hindsight. Lucius assisted what was ultimately a revolutionary movement replete with death squads, twisted notions of supremacy, and claimed he was bewitched to escape justice for his crimes. His ability to still slither through a society he sympathised with destroying, money being his only real asset and still continuing to bully others is an obvious cause for disgust.

Mr Weasley and Mr Malfoy hate each other, to the point of brawling physically with each other, and their backgrounds and appearances alone will always set one another in opposition. It is less certain whether Arthur would dislike the serpent cane and manor of his rival colleague, but Lucius certainly hates Arthur’s frugality, colourful dress, his DIY life and interest in non-magical folk or unknown technology. Attacking his intelligence and claiming Arthur to be a joke is the deflection and “throwing meat to the wolves” we see in many workplaces, especially ones run by systems, dynasties, and corporations. There must be the butt of a joke, Arthur Weasley is a useful one to the Malfoys because after all, in London is it not so much easier to make fun of the misuse of Muggle artefacts, than be indignant that a Death Eater and certain sympathiser walked unscathed from a war replete with assassination, torture and murder?

Their familial honour, while not called such by either is very much evident in both men. Both are servants of the government, political radicals, and familiar with the houses and bloodlines of their society. As Rowling’s series grows, building up a society you see in her first sequel what an adult wizard male looks like, how they live and how the competitive and retroactively unpleasant rivalry between school houses leads to a similar political partisanship. Mr Weasley is an interesting case, being the only wholly positive adult male role model in Rowling’s entire series, and a sense of care must have been given in his conception as she originally intended to kill Arthur off.

An affable, underfoot and quite silly man blasting his way through the Dursley’s chimney in the books, inviting his son’s best friend to his home, cheerfully henpecked and bringing back money to care for his large family gives an immediate impression of the underdog. A reader may never recognise that Arthur is just as high class as Malfoy if you are considering ancestry, he works for the government as a civil servant, with a true belief in safeguarding a group of people who are ignorant and unaware of the dangers of magic, but is not self-serious and performs experiments even laid up in a hospital bed. Both Lucius and Arthur love their wives and their sons, but it is clearer that the Weasley household is a warm household rather than a cold one. It can be inferred that perhaps Ginny’s love for sport, or Fred and George’s ability with charming mundane objects was partially inspired by their father, and their confidence from their mother.

So, in typical fashion for this series, the well-meaning individual is attacked brutally by a monster, is nearly killed, and in the shadow war that emerges has Malfoy’s political distain turned against him. His own ambitious son berates him, castigates him and abandons his family for politics. It’s a low blow, a nasty series of events mirroring the political pressure and academic corruption which is the main antagonist of The Order of the Phoenix.

While Arthur suffers, Lucius is always obeyed by the son he lavishes with gifts, but is clearly never to speak back to or question him. He cultivates his influence, and eventually makes his move with the old guard of the first war. Clearly a general in their movement, pride creating of itself position, he arrives at the Department of Mysteries a besieger of the place with allies, rather than quietly protecting it alone like his rival. When Malfoy is arrested, it is described as something he must be quite grateful for, which shows how awfully this failure he rightfully deserved was. The latter Harry Potter boots ask philosophical questions and make the villains less one dimensional, and as Mr Weasley is no longer a joke and the reader finds small catharsis in a darker setting, Mr Malfoy is clearly made the lowest of the low and hatred for Draco Malfoy becomes pity, as the psychological damage of what Lucius exposed him to becomes the focal mystery of The Half Blood Prince.

It is worth noting after the intersecting change of these men’s fortunes, Arthur Weasley becomes respected and promoted because of his conviction and how the times caught up to his innovative worldview, and he does not have a psychological wound to his ego (though Arthur obviously suffers melancholy like everyone affected by the war). Lucius is robbed of his pride, convictions, and station by becoming a prisoner in his own home, the despised host of Voldemort and the Death Eaters he privately wanted to have supreme power. Those thugs, lunatics and sycophants treat him worse than he tried to treat the Weasleys, his vision of the future briefly came to pass, and it was an awful one. He failed most crucially as a father, his own son made a disposable assassin while still a teenager, branded and indoctrinated for his failure and his politics. Mr Weasley loses his son, and emerges like the other Hogwarts defenders as someone hardened, but aware of their responsibility to the future, with loved ones around them. The last sighting of Lucius is what we see when pride is stripped away, both he and Narcissa screaming for their child, uncaring of the war and utterly submissive to their primal love of family.

Both Mr Malfoy and Mr Weasley are products of their society, politics, one war that began when they were young and the civil strife which curdles into a battle for the country. Each are peripheral characters, with reaching effects as fathers for good or ill. Each is a mirror to the other purely on the basis of their personalities, and their own standards of conduct. In the end, it’s a straightforward depiction of the effect the parental generation can have on the future, how one feels proud as a father and as a man, whether that pride is merited, and who are we, when facing trying times give our heart and focus to our spouses and children?