I have to admit, I am delighted that J.K. Rowling has decided to use her latest Harry Potter storylet to assign to Hermione a more clear, more public future.
Don't get me wrong. I have absolutely nothing against the idea of a man or a woman deciding that his or her best destiny is to commit his/her life to staying home to raise a family. One of the people I admire most in this world, my mother, did exactly that.
But I did indeed feel a somewhat disappointed when I read the Epilogue of The Deathly Hallows for the first time and discovered that Rowling had given no indication of a public life for Hermione.
Hermione is a singularly fine character in the Harry Potter books. She is moral and ethical and hard working. She is, in many ways, the conscience of the male characters in the book and, at times, her fastidious devotion to rules makes her the object of appropriate teasing.
She is caring and nurturing and lovely to her friends and to strangers too.
On the other hand, however, Hermione is much much more. She is brilliant and creative and brave. She is eloquent and clever and thoughtful.
She is witty and fun.
She is one of my favourite characters in literature. Where I find Harry often a little bit overwrought and Ron sometimes silly and unlikeable, Hermione is well described and well rounded. She is a fully realized human being, with both strengths and weaknesses. She is real and believable, an amazing accomplishment in an imaginative world of magic.
If there is one thing I find hard to accept, it is that Hermione ends up with Ron.
But at least she ends up, thanks to J.K.'s new article, with a future befitting of her, as a wife, a mother and a public leader.
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