It’s been let out of the closet: Dumbledore was gay.
Obviously, when I read about this, I thought (as many did) that it is “too much information.” It’s something Harry Potter fans do not need to know. Moreover, now that this information has been let out, it’s going to be repeated often, and I am waiting for fundamentalists to use this as another reason to reject the series. I would not be surprised if some label him a “paedophile.”
It is unlikely such people, who have not read the books will truly understand how this can help us understand the complicated (and fallen) character of Dumbledore. In the last book, he was revealed to have a very checkered past. When Harry finds this out, he is deeply affected, even resentful. Yet, as this brilliant analysis (both the original article and later comments by the author found on BabyBlueOnline) points out, this revelation about Dumbledore makes us understand that past much more:
We learn in Deathly Hallows– after six books – that Albus Dumbledore in fact is NOT the best “mentor to the prototypical adolescent.” This revelation to Harry is devastating – Dumbledore’s infactuation with Grindelwald – now in all its complexities – caused the death of an innocent girl’s life, a death that haunted Dumbledore for the rest of his life. In fact, in Half-Blood Prince, when Dumbledore has the horrific visions in the cave, he is reliving that period of his life with Grindewald. This is not the positive remaking of a myth for the gay community. I would encourage those who are calling this a triumph to read the book first then make your case. Harry has to “break” from Dumbledore during the course of the seventh book and he has a huge confrontation with the “dead” Dumbledore in King’s Cross near the end of the book (sorry, spoilers, but what can I tell you?). Dumbledore is all about choices and he chooses not to live out his same-sex attractions, he instead choses a celibate life, which is what evangelicals preach.
Revealing Dumbledore was gay might not have been the best idea, but it does help the reader to understand the complex character Dumbledore actually was. It explains why he was, in his youth, capable ignoring Grindelwold’s evil; but more important, it is the taint of that relationship which continues with Dumbledore the rest of his life and explains even the consequentionalist plan he created to deal with the threat of Voldemort — willing to sacrifice and use people if it were for “the greater good.”
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