Robert Gray
Well-Known Member
Yes but even mildly suggesting her failure to lock down her private diary makes her complicit in Harold's anger is tantamount to telling someone who was raped that they shouldn't have worn such provocative clothing. Harold's anger is his own. He didn't need her diary to become bitter. He had already read the situation accurately enough which is why he violated her diary in the first place.
Love would be a too strong a word. I never saw any evidence that Harold loved Frannie. In fact, we get a direct look into his thoughts and how he views her through a lens that sounds like entitlement. This time I get the girl. Had it been a different pretty girl Harold ended up with at the start, I expect he would have simply applied the same fixation on her. Harold was in love with Harold and sought validation of this by wanting others to show him the interest and deference that he believed he deserved. Harold believes himself to be in love with Frannie, but his actions don't really support that notion.
Let's jump books for a moment. Consider Ben from It. Consider how he feels about Beverly. He is also an outcast. Until the Losers entered his life, Ben was defined by a loneliness he wasn't even aware of. Ben sends Beverly a lovely Haiku and doesn't sign it. He knows she will probably assume some other boy wrote it, but that is ok with Ben. It will be marked in her memory, and for him that is enough. This is because Ben loves her. When he sees the chemistry between her and Bill it hurts him, but he doesn't hold it against her (or Bill). It doesn't stop him from standing up for her.
So let's compare Harold and Ben, disregarding the age difference because I don't think that is important to what we are trying to define. Both are male, highly intelligent outsiders who are largely ignored (and in some cases tormented) by their peers. Both are well read, logical, and have knack for fixing things. While neither come from money, they have never known real want either. It seems their basic needs are looked after. Both boys (as both are really children) encounter a horrible, life-changing crisis. Said crisis brings them into danger and into a new group of people. Both of them have a tabula rasa moment, wherein they can redefine themselves. Both boys fates become entwined with a beautiful girl... but that is where their paths diverge.
Harold wants Frannie and names himself her protector. He sees Frannie as his chance to become how he always saw himself without other people getting in the way. She is emblematic of a "win" which will erase all his past failures. Everything he values about Frannie in what he says or what we see in his mind is shot through the prism of self-worship. By contrast Ben sees Beverly as beautiful and very nice. We see in his thoughts that he measures her not merely by her looks but also by how she compares to other girls like Greta and Sally whom he thinks are conceited snots. Where Harold feels entitlement, Ben's simply daydreams. He understands his own failings, i.e. his weight. He wants to do nice things for Beverly even if it never profits himself. His desire to defend her isn't contingent upon anything. Moreover, when Bill (his Stu) enters the scene, it doesn't cause him to swear vengeance.
I don't. Motivation is what is important to me. Harold wasn't upset by the catastrophe. If anything, he saw it as the best thing that ever happened to him. You cannot build a castle on a foundation of sand. You cannot build a good person out one who gleefully sees the deaths of Billions as his personal, fresh start. Harold's real challenge, and it was one he understood, was to accept his own failings both past and present. It was something he was unwilling to do even though he intellectually knew the truth. What is worse, we saw him become a productive member of his new community. This means he could interact with others and play nice. He could "pass" when he wanted to do so. He had the option to fake it until he made it.
