Pensieve > As They Would Have Done For You

I've been thinking about this on and off for a while now, and I finally gave in and decided to write something about Peter. Now, before I get the life flamed out of me, just read.

Peter Pettigrew is the least liked character in all of Harry Potter fandom, and it is hard to say anything about him that is positive. But how does a person turn out as such? There must be some reasoning behind it. A person does not suddenly get up one morning and decide to betray his closest friends to the most evil wizard of the ages.

In Prisoner of Azkaban Pettigrew makes the excuse that it was the only thing he could do with Voldemort taking over as he was back in the late 1970's. He is a very timid man, scared of everything that may hurt him and surronding himself with friends that can protect him. One wonders why he was put into Gryffindor in the first place, if he was this scared. It is also curious that while he was great friends with the other three boys all through school, protected and encouraged by them, he could so easily throw away that trust. In a world going mad, it is usually a person's friends and family that are one's strength and support.

Now he is hated by all that know he is still alive, what he truly is, but who hates him the most? Because of what he did, Harry grew up without his parents, Sirius was sent to Azkaban, and others were saddened by the deaths of James and Lily, but I believe that Snape may hate him just as much. Snape, who was the Marauders' arch-nemesis all through school, may detest him a great deal for what he threw away. As an ex-Death Eater, he is in a very dangerous position, but he is also very alone. No one likes him much, and one has to wonder if he ever thought about what Pettigrew had done to the good friends who had taken him in, and try himself to figure out why the little man had done it.

It certainly was not for power, for Pettigrew still has little. He is Voldemort's gopher, picked on and kicked about, but not killed. Maybe that is why he did it, to live. But was it worth it? Having forsaken the only friends he had, he gained only darkness and emptiness in the service of one of the evilest creatures in the history of the Wizarding and Muggle worlds alike. What does he think about at night, lying awake, alone in the darkness? Perhaps he dreams of happier days, much like anyone else in this period of uncertainty, for he is only human. Humans are prone to make mistakes, both big and small. In all of the world, he is probably the one that mourns his greatest mistake the most.

So what do I really think of Peter Pettigrew? When I first read the books, I hated him with the passion that most other readers hate him. He handed one of his best friends and that friend's family over to Voldemort in order to survive, and he acted as a spy for a year before. He helped Voldemort regain his body over a decade later. But upon further consideration, I think he is just a sad shell of a man, pining for the good old days before he destroyed the only happiness he ever knew, all for the sake of survival.

*edited July 7, 2003*

Some new information regarding the four boys during their school days has surfaced in the fifth book. Considering the way Sirius and James acted like total prats during their teenage years--as most boys, and even girls, are apt to do--it's not surprising that they'd let little Peter follow them around, praising them the way he did. But I still think that they were all close friends. He wasn't just there for them to feed their huge egos. And it's still not an excuse to essentially murder the only people that seemed to care about you.