J.K. Rowling Doesn’t Understand The Love For Draco Malfoy

The 12 days of Christmas truck on at Pottermore, this time with the gift of Draco Malfoy's backstory and possible redemption. It all comes with a massive reality check from J.K. Rowling, though. The author wants to stress that although Malfoy became more tolerant towards Muggles as he got older, he's not "concealing a heart of gold under all that sneering prejudice."

Rowling seems to hope that fleshing out Draco's backstory will reinforce the fact that he remains a man of questionable character, one for whom she will never understand why readers fall.

"Draco remains a person of dubious morality in the seven published books, and I have often had cause to remark on how unnerved I have been by the number of girls who fell for this particular fictional character,” Rowling writes. She notes that actor Tom Felton "plays Draco brilliantly in the films and, ironically, is about the nicest person you could meet."

Still, Rowling wants to douse those daydreams of Malfoy as an anti-hero with sexy, bad-boy appeal. "Draco has all the dark glamour of the anti-hero; girls are very apt to romanticize such people. All of this left me in the unenviable position of pouring cold common sense on ardent readers’ daydreams, as I told them, rather severely, that Draco was not concealing a heart of gold under all that sneering and prejudice and that no, he and Harry were not destined to end up best friends."

Rowling's new Malfoy tale may not offer the character a complete redemption and best friendship with hero Harry Potter, but the author does give Draco's hard edges some smoothing. According to the newest Pottermore tale, he followed in his father's footsteps in terms of growing up independently wealthy without the need to work, but together with wife Astoria Greengrass, the Malfoys are raising their son Scorpius to be much more inclusive and tolerant of Muggles and half-bloods.

"As Astoria refused to raise...Scorpius in the belief that Muggles were scum, family gatherings were often fraught with tension," Rowling writes. It sounds like the main lesson from today's story is that wizards are just like us: Actively striving to eradicate racism with each generation, even if it means some awkward holiday dinners. (The Guardian)