Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Characters/Dobby
From Wikibooks, the open-content textbooks collection
| Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter - Character | |
| Dobby | |
|---|---|
| Gender | Male |
| Hair color | None |
| Eye color | Green |
| Related Family | Unknown |
| Loyalty | Malfoy family; later Harry and Albus Dumbledore |
Contents |
[edit] Overview
Dobby was once the House Elf of the Malfoy family, and guarded many of their secrets. Apparently, according to the author, his birthday is 28 June.
[edit] Role in the Books
[edit] Chamber of Secrets
Dobby came to the Dursley's house to warn Harry that he should not return to Hogwarts for his second year studies. Dobby thought it would be too dangerous for Harry. Dobby admitted that he had been blocking Harry's mail; he had believed that if Harry got no lettters from his friends, he would think his friends were false and would not want to go back to them.
Dobby then locked the barrier at Platform Nine and Three Quarters in hopes that if Harry was unable to make it onto the Hogwarts Express, he would be unable to go to school. Harry and Ron thwart this by using Ron's dad's flying car.
Dobby bewitched one of the bludgers to repeatedly attack Harry in the Quidditch match against Slytherin; visiting Harry in the Hospital Wing that night, he admitted that he had hoped that it would injure Harry enough to cause him to be sent home. It is during this visit that he also explains how a house-elf can be freed, and admits that the Chamber had been opened before.
At the end of this book, Lucius Malfoy brings Dobby with him to the school, thus confirming that he is the house-elf of the Malfoy family. Dobby hints to Harry where Riddle's diary had come from; Harry confronts Lucius with this in front of Professor Dumbledore. Harry shortly afterwards tricks Lucius Malfoy into accidentally releasing Dobby from service to the Malfoys by presenting an article of clothing to Dobby, who promptly saves Harry from Malfoy's wrath at having his servant freed.
[edit] Goblet of Fire
Dobby spent at least a year searching for a family who would pay him wages to be their House-Elf, something which is unheard of in the wizarding world. Eventually, Professor Dumbledore agreed to pay Dobby one Galleon per week to work at Hogwarts – he had offered more, but Dobby bargained him down. When we see Dobby in the Hogwarts kitchens, he has just entered Dumbledore's service at the school, along with Winky.
At Christmas, Dobby wakes Harry up leaning over him in his bed; Harry presents Dobby with a pair of socks (the ones which had been cushioning his pocket Sneakoscope for years. Ron also gives Dobby a pair of socks and a jumper (US: sweater). In return, Dobby gives Harry a pair of socks; they are hand-knit by Dobby himself.
Dobby happens to overhear Professor McGonagall and Professor Moody discussing the Second Task of the Triwizard Tournament, and discovers that Harry will need some Gillyweed to save "his Wheezy" (Ron Weasley); so he steals some from Professor Snape's office and gives it to Harry, waking him up where he had fallen asleep in the library mere minutes before the task is due to start.
Harry later visits the Hogwarts kitchens with Ron and Hermione, to thank Dobby with a gift of socks for his help in the second Task. Ron takes the opportunity to secure some additional food for Sirius Black, who at the time is living in a cave outside Hogsmeade.
[edit] Order of the Phoenix
When Professor Grubbly-Plank has healed Hedwig, Dobby brings her back to Harry. Harry is of course pleased to get Hedwig back, and speaks with Dobby for a while about how he and Winky are doing. Harry at this point is trying to find a place where the Defence Association, as it was then known, can practice, and he asks Dobby if he knows of any such place. Dobby, surprisingly, does, and tells Harry about the Room of Requirement, or the Come And Go Room. He has used it several times when he needed a place for Winky to dry out. He volunteers to show it to Harry, but Harry decides he is too tired, and it is too late at night; instead, he asks Dobby to tell him how to get in.
Dobby manages, somehow, to get into the room before the last meeting of Dumbledore's Army before Christmas, and decorates it with embarrassing Christmas decorations – baubles reading "Have a Very Harry Christmas", for instance. Harry does manage to get it largely cleaned up before the rest of the D. A. arrive.
Against direct orders from Professor Umbridge, Dobby makes his way into the Room of Requirement to warn the D.A. that Umbridge is coming. Because he has violated orders, he as usual feels a need to punish himself; he does this by charging headfirst into the wall. Harry does prevent him from injuring himself further. Harry is able to spread the word quickly enough that the only person actually caught is himself.
[edit] Half-Blood Prince
At one point, Harry feels the need to have Draco Malfoy trailed, to find out where he is going. He summons Kreacher, who appears entangled with Dobby – evidently they had been involved in a fight when Harry summoned Kreacher. Dobby volunteers to track Malfoy as well.
Shortly thereafter, Kreacher and Dobby return to report to Harry. Kreacher's report seems to be largely praise for Malfoy and his pure blood, and abuse for Harry, but Dobby is able to report that Malfoy had been spending time in the Room of Requirement.
[edit] Deathly Hallows
Harry sees a blue eye in the Magic Mirror he carries around with him, and asks it to send help. Shortly, Dobby apparates into the basement cell at Malfoy Manor where Harry, Ron, Ollivander, Luna Lovegood, and Dean Thomas are being held. Dobby is apparently extremely nervous at being in the Malfoy home, where he was so cruelly treated before Harry won him his freedom. Harry asks him to take Luna, Dean, and Ollivander to Shell Cottage. The noise of Dobby Disapparating attracts attention from upstairs; Wormtail is sent down to the cell to investigate, and Ron and Harry start to overpower him. Harry calls on the life debt that Wormtail owes him, and he hesitates; the silver hand that Lord Voldemort had given Wormtail senses this hesitation, and reading it as disloyalty, chokes Wormtail to death.
Harry and Ron proceed upstairs to try and save Hermione and Griphook. Though disarmed, Bellatrix Lestrange produces a silver knife and threatens Hermione with it; she has Draco collect the wands. Shortly afterwards, Dobby re-appears and causes the chandelier to fall on Bellatrix; gathering all the wands Draco is holding, Harry takes Griphook and Dobby, and Ron takes Hermione, and together they Apparate to Shell Cottage. As Harry is Disapparating, however, he sees Bellatrix throwing her knife; arriving at Shell Cottage, he finds that the thrown knife has hit Dobby, killing him.
Harry then digs a grave for Dobby, and buries him, near a tree on the grounds of Shell Cottage.
Later, Aberforth Dumbledore asks where Dobby was, saying that he had expected Dobby to be traveling with Harry; Harry tells him that he was killed by Bellatrix. Aberforth is dismayed; he says he "liked that elf."
[edit] Strengths
Dobby is very loyal to the people he cares about. He did what the Malfoys told him to do because he had no choice. Dobby still tries unsuccessfully in the second book to protect Harry. He later helps Harry in the Second Task in Goblet of Fire, tells him about the Room of Requirement, warns the DA, and tails Draco Malfoy for him. He is also loyal to Dumbledore who employs him, and helps his friend Winky when she is drunk. He is also a hard worker. Dobby is also a very grateful person. In general, he is a good friend to have around.
[edit] Weaknesses
Like all house-elves, certain subtleties of human behavior are beyond his understanding; his speech pattern, for instance is somewhat immature: he will speak in the third person, apparently unable to master the subtleties of "I" and "you". He is completely subservient, seeming to exist only to take orders from one wizard or another. He does have a will of his own, reflected in his being able to try and warn Harry away fom Hogwarts against his owner's wishes, but he has to make a supreme effort to allow that will to express itself, and because he is going against the wishes of his owner, he must punish himself. He has internalized his subservience so much that he will punish himself without being told to, if he finds himself doing something which he believes his owners might not like.
[edit] Relationships with Other Characters
He is a good friend to Harry Potter ever since Harry engineered his freedom from the Malfoys. Before that, he had some sort of respect for Harry, given he thinks he is saving Harry by stopping him from getting to Hogwarts in his second year. Dobby says that this is because of Harry's defeating Lord Voldemort; house-elves were really very badly treated when he was around. "Of course, Dobby is still treated very badly...", he goes on to say; but Harry is respected because of what he did for the general House-Elf population. Dobby also comes to admire Ron when he receives one of Ron's Christmas sweaters.
[edit] Analysis
It is possible that Rowling has used the relationship between Harry and Dobby to send a message to the reader. This message teaches of equality of all and uses the difference in species to comment on racism. This is reflected later in Order of the Phoenix where Dumbledore describes the Fountain of Magical Brethren as "lying".
