I don't think JKR did a good job of portraying the fear the Dursley's supposedly felt at the possibility of social stigma (I think that's how I want to say that). She painted them with far too broad a brush in the first few books (and I agree, the fat hatred got to be a bit much) and honestly had trouble refining their characters at all as the overall storyline progressed. Which is why I think they only made token appearances in the last few books; JKR had made them too over the top and EVUL!!11!! to Harry that as the "real" evil of the book started to come out, she could do nothing with the Dursley's to make them actually believable, IMO.
Dudley suddenly seeing the light and shaking Harry's hand in the last (?) book didn't feel true to me because we'd seen little to no growth between the cousins to see why that happened. I guess it was to show that even someone as "dim" as Dudley could realize the world was at risk, so now Harry really did need to save everyone. I don't know. I think JKR needed a "petty" evil to start things off before showing us how little that mattered once the real big bad guy was brought on stage. And on a meta-level, it shows the difference between a first book and a seventh book in terms of writing style.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2011-05-17 02:15 pm (UTC)Dudley suddenly seeing the light and shaking Harry's hand in the last (?) book didn't feel true to me because we'd seen little to no growth between the cousins to see why that happened. I guess it was to show that even someone as "dim" as Dudley could realize the world was at risk, so now Harry really did need to save everyone. I don't know. I think JKR needed a "petty" evil to start things off before showing us how little that mattered once the real big bad guy was brought on stage. And on a meta-level, it shows the difference between a first book and a seventh book in terms of writing style.