Outing Dumbledore...

As you may have read here, author J. K. Rowling announced this weekend that Dumbledore, the preeminent wizard in her Harry Potter series, is gay. Now, before we go too far down this path, let me make a few disclaimers...

1. I read every Harry Potter book, out loud--the first few with all three kids and wife and home, the last ones just to my son.

2. I enjoyed them as literature, and am not a part of the thinking that they are "of the Devil" because they use magic and wizardry (spells, potions, etc.), any more than fairy tales that had witches or magic were of the Devil.

3. Ms. Rowling's literary feat is to be commended, and will most likely last for quite some time.

That said, she has fallen under the sway of the majority's view that being "gay" is about who you are, not what you do. She never wrote one word in any of the seven books that gives evidence that Dumbledore engaged in any "gay" behavior, nor did he ever express any romantic words to anyone, male or female. He was in turn noble, kind, sometimes inscrutable, wise, fallible, taciturn, loyal, and methodically slow. He expressed rage, confusion, pain, equanimity, love, and a whole range of other emotions. He was never romantic. Neither were any of the other teachers at Hogwarts (anybody remember Professor McGonagall swooning for anyone?). She may have intended to create him as "gay," but what was written didn't make him gay. In the linked article, she tries to say that Dumbledore's delay in fighting his nemesis was due to the love they had shared as younger wizards. To which I say, this looks like Ms. Rowling's attempt to score more points after finishing her work rather than being true to her original ideas about giving children meaningful literature. She knew that if she had written anything along the lines she is now proclaiming, it would have upset more than a few loyal fans--and I'm not talking just about Christian opposition, since she has already acknowledged that she has turned some of them off and doesn't care.

Ms. Rowling, you are a wonderful author of a marvelous set of books. Leave well enough alone. We don't need authorial suggestion beyond authorial manuscript. We'll stick with what you actually wrote.