Hermione Granger and the power of knowledge

You probably have seen a lot of memes on the Internet in the last couple of years. Often these are made to joke about or ridicule something. Some of them are really fun and clever and some of them just do not seem to understand the thing they are trying to ridicule. Like this Harry Potter one I came across awhile ago:

If you do not know who she is. The girl sitting on the books is Emma Watson who plays the part of Hermione Granger, one of the main characters in the Harry Potter books by J.K. Rowling.

In the third book: Prisoner of Azkaban, she has chosen so many subjects that she needs to time-travel to be able to get to all of her classes. Time-traveling always brings an ambivalence to stories because it gives the characters a tool to go back and remake everything. This fact has also become memes which say that someone could have gone back to save Harry's parents since Harry and Hermione could go back to save the hippogriff Buckbeak.

I will not go further into this here, but I have always tought about it like they created a parallel timeline in which they do things they had already done once. Why? Because they actually interact with themselves. Harry thinks he sees his father casting a patronus to save himself, Hermione and Sirius Black, but he really sees his future self casting it.

Now back to the meme above posted on Mugglenet's facebook page. I usually like the Mugglenet's indept analysis of the books and the films. Therefore I was a little surprised to see both the meme together with the comment "She still needs to sort out her priorities"a hint to a conversation between Ron and Hermione in the first film, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

The standpoint does not surprise me. Our society today seems to have a huge disregard for knowledge and this is dangerous! Knowledge is actually a very powerful weapon against hate and ignorance. This is also one of the greater themes in the Harry Potter books, which is very clear if you bothered to read and reflect on them. Harry defeats the evil Lord Voldemort not because he is stronger or more powerful. He defeats him because he has taken the time to do research beforehand, This is what the 6th book Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is all about! Him and Albus Dumbledore exploring where Voldemort comes from. This means he has gained knowledge that Voldemort is to insensitive (and egocentric) to care about. Harry has also reflected on this knowledge, which means he understands the situation (and who is the owner of the Elder Wand).

Unfortunatelly this theme has been reduced to barely nothing in the films and the 6th film is more devoted to the "love square" Harry-Hermione-Ron-Lavender which I have long wonder if it is an influence from the Twilight films that were released at the same time.

Harry Potter are really smart books and they have a lot to teach us if we really reflect on what they want to get across to us. Hermione is also one of the best role models for young people of both genders. She is often seen as nerdy and a little weird because she wants to spend so much time studying, but I think it is so great to see a female character interested in gaining knowledge more or less just because she thinks it is fun to learn! She is not portrayed as a geek everyone wants to bully either but a multifaceted character who sometimes is downright cool! She also uses her knowledge and understanding to her great advantage. I think it is great that Albus Dumbledore and McGonagall goes to such length to encourage her throughout the books.