Why did J. K. Rowling choose to downplay dragons?

Question

Wherever I see dragons in fantasy works, they are portrayed as very powerful creatures. They can decimate entire armies without taking much damage. Even powerful kingdoms avoid them at all costs. The Hobbit (and Tolkien's other works) and Game of Thrones immediately come to mind.

But, in Harry Potter, even school kids could defeat a dragon. Yeah, they are powerful, but not powerful enough to be feared by the entire wizarding world.

Why did J.K. Rowling choose to downplay dragons? Has she ever mentioned anything about it?

"They can decimate entire armies without taking much damages." You haven't read the Natural History of Dragons by Lady Trent series authored by Marie Brennan, then. :) — Lexible, Dec 08 '18 at 01:51
@MrLister I wonder why you didn't show gif of the same scene showing all three dragons.. — user931, Dec 08 '18 at 09:55
@Lexible That actually dovetails nicely with Kevin's answer. Brennan's series isn't high fantasy - it's a Victorian adventure fiction. It's as if Charles Dickens fictionalized Charles Darwin's adventures, but with dragons instead of finches. — R.M., Dec 08 '18 at 16:37
The question comes to mind if Voldemort would have been capable of "recruiting" any dragons in his battle against Hogwarts. In being difficult to defeat, a dragon would have been a effective weapon in the final battle. — doneal24, Dec 08 '18 at 20:44
I'd like to point out that there are no "standards" dragons. There's a lot of different dragons for a lot of different stories and none can be called "the real dragon". Dragons can be big (or not), be scally (or not), be strong (or not), be smart (or not), use magic (or not), fly (or not). So outside the fact that JK Rowling's dragon aren't really weak in the first place (see @Bellatrix answer), there can't really be any notion of "downplay" as there are no universal dragon to compare to. — Jemox, Dec 10 '18 at 14:11
Are we ignoring the obvious, "Rowling is boring and not a good fantasy author"? — GreySage, Dec 10 '18 at 19:57
As Bellatrix points out, none of the students were tasked with defeating a dragon, just getting past it long enough to grab the egg. And, we're making an assumption that the dragons weren't juveniles themselves. — John Bode, Dec 10 '18 at 20:07
Both Glaurung and Smaug, while powerful, are killed by a single man (designated hero, special circumstances, extra help, ok... but still by a single man). Glaurung can cast Memory Charms but he can't fly: if I were him, I'd feel a bit... downplayed :) — Teem Porary, Dec 11 '18 at 14:32

score 105 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 16 '20 at 09:31

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She didn't choose to violate genre conventions. She doesn't read fantasy in the first place, and Harry Potter wasn't intended as a (high) fantasy.

In an interview with The New York Times, J. K. Rowling said the following:

Any literary genre you simply can’t be bothered with?

“Can’t be bothered with” isn’t a phrase I’d use, because my reading tastes are pretty catholic [lowercase in original]. I don’t read “chick lit,” fantasy or science fiction but I’ll give any book a chance if it’s lying there and I’ve got half an hour to kill.[...]

She also didn't consider Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone a work of fantasy until after she'd written it. Another answer to the linked question contains numerous additional quotations indicating that Rowling doesn't like or read fantasy, so I'm going to consider that a well-established fact.

Given that Rowling does not read fantasy, we have to interpret Harry Potter in the broader context of English literature rather than as an intentional work of high fantasy. Comparisons with The Hobbit and other works in Tolkien's legendarium are particularly inapt, because those works spawned a literary and cultural canon which Rowling has intentionally avoided.

Dragons are, of course, fearsome creatures. But there is also a longstanding tradition, far older than Tolkien, of individual knights slaying them. Probably the earliest surviving example which can be called "English" in any sense is Beowulf, but of course there are numerous more modern examples. The dragons used in the Triwizard Tournament are a continuation of that literary trope. The "knights" are schoolchildren because the protagonists are schoolchildren. Finally, they didn't actually slay the dragons. They just had to retrieve an egg.

Turning to broader genre differences, it's clear that Rowling was intent on writing a "civilized" world, in which humans have a substantial level of control over magic. The dragons (and various other magical creatures) are kept as pets. The elves are enslaved. The goblins once rebelled, but now they merely run the economy. Why? Because Rowling was not writing a fantasy in which "anything can happen." She was writing a boarding school story which just so happened to be set in a magical environment. Boarding school stories can have a substantial level of mischief (think of Harry and company sneaking around with the invisibility cloak), but a common baseline assumption is that the school is mostly safe and mostly a civilized environment, in which children need only moderate adult supervision.

edited Jun 16 '20 at 09:31

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answered Dec 08 '18 at 01:53

Kevin

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I mean, it's still fantasy in all practical senses, even if Rowling doesn't like that label or have it in mind while writing. That it's not a Tolkien knockoff doesn't change this. – Adamant Dec 08 '18 at 02:28
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@Adamant: Yes, it is a fantasy. But it's not high fantasy, which is a more specific genre. "Fantasy" is a very broad term and it's not fair to expect Rowling to follow genre conventions which she never read or aspired to. – Kevin Dec 08 '18 at 02:29
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Re: "pretty catholic [lowercase in original]": I'm not sure why you felt the need to specify "lowercase in original"; no one capitalizes this sense of the word "catholic", so there's no reason to call special attention to the fact that the Times wrote it in the normal way. You might almost as well follow your quotation with [correct spelling and punctuation in original]. :-P – ruakh Dec 08 '18 at 05:20
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@ruakh: You know that and I know that, but some hypothetical person clicking the edit button six months from now might not know that and try to "help." – Kevin Dec 08 '18 at 05:23
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This is an important answer. Post Tolkien, readers of fantasy expect worldbuilding in a way which stands up to at least casual scrutiny - who grows the food for the city, where does its money come from, and so on. Not knowing fantasy, Rowling was utterly unfamiliar with the concept. There was some retconning in later books, and some points where she just acknowledged it didn't make sense. This is why fanfic like HPMOR has been written by people who do understand fantasy conventions (and basic science) as a what-might-have-been. – Graham Dec 08 '18 at 11:33
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@Kevin And yet it is fair to hold her to higher standards on worldbuilding, because every novel needs a fictional setting which can withstand casual inspection, regardless of genre. Her plotting of course is very good indeed, and her writing style is perfectly pitched for her target audience; but her worldbuilding doesn't withstand the average junior school kid asking "but why...?" :) – Graham Dec 08 '18 at 11:39
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Actually, a good bit of the humor in the book comes from the fact that, for a boarding school, Hogwarts is absurdly dangerous. – Kyralessa Dec 08 '18 at 13:41
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@Graham - Rowling's worldbuilding isn't the best, but it's actually quite decent. – Adamant Dec 08 '18 at 17:10
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There are traditions far older than Tolkien... links to a research topic that got revived by Tolkien in 30s. I find this funny and ironic. – Bakuriu Dec 08 '18 at 21:03
Let us continue this discussion in chat. – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 02:36
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@Graham "Her plotting of course is very good indeed." Actually her plotting is along the lines "Some ridiculous things happen for no obvious reason, no way out, Deus ex Machina, Harry Potter lives again." – QuestionAuthority Dec 09 '18 at 18:09
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@Graham "...because every novel needs a fictional setting which can withstand casual inspection, regardless of genre..." Nonsense. Every novel need be enjoyable to the reader, and nothing more. It is thoroughly possible for a novel to succeed at this with an utterly ludicrous premise or total lack of feasible worldbuilding. – CGriffin Dec 10 '18 at 15:18
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“The dragons are kept as pets” — Yeh bring ’ome one dragon egg, and yeh’re forever branded! – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 10 '18 at 17:57
While overall a very good point, Rowling has also listed the legend of the Knight of the Round Table to be a major influence of her work. So even though her dragons need not to follow all the fantasy tropes, one could still expect them to be similar to dragons of that story. – Alexis Dec 10 '18 at 20:07
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@Alexis: I would characterize King Arthur as so old that it qualifies as "general English literature" rather than fantasy. I certainly wouldn't call it "high fantasy" because it's intended to be set in the real world (i.e. Arthur is king of Britain, not some fantasy land). – Kevin Dec 10 '18 at 22:11
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@Kevin Oh absolutely. What I meant is that ruling out fantasy as an inspiration doesn't rule out dragons fitting certain stereotypes. – Alexis Dec 10 '18 at 22:14
I apologize, I just re-read your answer more carefully and that's already addressed – Alexis Dec 10 '18 at 22:15

score 52 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 08 '18 at 01:53

Dragons in Harry Potter are indeed powerful.

Though it’s true that dragons were used in one of the tasks of the Triwizard Tournament competed in by schoolchildren, dragons were shown to be powerful creatures. The task wasn’t actually to defeat a dragon, just to retrieve an egg guarded by one. To defeat a dragon, Sirius Black says would need about six wizards working together.

“There’s a way, Harry. Don’t be tempted to try a Stunning Spell – dragons are strong and too powerfully magical to be knocked out by a single Stunner. You need about half-a-dozen wizards at a time to overcome a dragon –”
_{^{- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Chapter 19 (The Hungarian Horntail)}}

Dragons are also classified as XXXXX, the highest of the Ministry’s danger classifications, which means known wizard killer/impossible to train or domesticate.

“DRAGON
M.O.M. Classification: XXXXX

Probably the most famous of all magical beasts, dragons are among the most difficult to hide. The female is generally larger and more aggressive than the male, though neither should be approached by any but highly skilled and trained wizards.”
_{^{- Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them}}

Though dragons may be portrayed as stronger in other works, they’re not portrayed as weak in the Harry Potter series. As for why they’re not portrayed as even more powerful, that may be because dragons aren’t as large a part of the story as they are in other works.

Right. Muggles with nothing more advanced than medieval weapons would have little chance to fight a dragon. — leftaroundabout, Dec 08 '18 at 19:16
@leftaroundabout unless they had good stories to tell before becoming dragon chow. — CPHPython, Dec 10 '18 at 17:23
Sirius doesn’t even say that defeating a dragon requires about six wizards – that’s just for overcoming it. Stunning the dragon is temporary, hardly defeat. Unless I’m misremembering, we don’t actually see even a single reference to actual slaying of dragons in the Potterverse. We see them subdued, but never slain (except inasmuch as there are gloves made from dragon hide, which was presumably not given up voluntarily). — Janus Bahs Jacquet, Dec 10 '18 at 18:00

score 11 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 09 '18 at 01:33

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They can decimate entire armies without taking much damages

They could decimate entire medieval armies without taking much damage. They would be less successful against a fighter plane or two. There is nothing about the traditional fantasy dragon that would give it much of a chance against a modern military.

Now if muggle authorities can handle dragons, it would be something of an embarrassment to the wizarding world if they could not also deal with dragons. That would make the whole wizarding thing much less awesome. It's true that muggles do a lot of things better than wizards, but dragon slaying is too much.

There is also the general principle that if you don't want an unstoppable monster to be the focus of your story, you don't have one period.

answered Dec 09 '18 at 01:33

James Hollis

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That really depends on the dragon. – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 02:07
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@Adamant Sgt. Maj. James Dever, the military technical advisor for 2014 Godzilla movie, has opined that the US military could stop a real life Godzilla. There aren't many fictional dragons bigger than that. https://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/134526-US-Military-Confident-it-Could-Stop-a-Real-Life-Godzilla-Attack – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 10:34
@JamesHollis That makes the assumption that a bigger dragon would be more dangerous; which, while probably true in a given setting, probably does not remain true between different works - for example, a comparison of Smaug, a D&D Ancient Red Dragon and Godzilla may be quite difficult. – Dec 09 '18 at 12:29
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@Rogem Smaug boasted about having armor equivalent to ten shields. If we upgrade the (usually wooden or hide) medieval shield to plate armor, ten of those might be 1 inch of steel in total. He's far from invincible. Consider the A-10 Warthog, an enormous Gatling gun with a plane built around it, designed to destroy tanks. Can you name a dragon that could prevail against an A-10? – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 15:16
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@JamesHollis It's not entirely up to the firepower: Smaug could simply choose to stay underground in a suitably hollowed out urban center, i.e. metro or sewer tunnels. Some D&D dragons could transform into civilians or rodents and thus hide among the local populace, and becoming rather impervious to appropriate levels of firepower. – Dec 09 '18 at 15:33
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@Rogem The military can also hide, and they are very efficient at it. A dragon that can turn into a mouse or become outright invisible will not benefit from this ability if it is killed by a supersonic aircraft that it did not hear approaching (admittedly the A10 is not supersonic) or by some random grunt with a FIM-92 Stinger. The military can also demolish tunnels. – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 16:12
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@JamesHollis You're missing the point; a smart dragon has the option of only engaging the military when it so chooses - which may well be never. Sure, the military has all the firepower in the world, but they cannot just start attacking their own populace in hopes of catching the dragon, nor do they have the option of keeping armed planes constantly in the air for the dragon's appearance across the entire continent. Just look at what the response times are for mass shooters, and now consider a creature that can disappear almost into thin air before a response can be organized. – Dec 09 '18 at 16:19
@Rogem Actually I'm getting side tracked. D&D dragons are far more powerful than dragons in popular fictional works. They are not representative at all. Sure, if you're talking about dragons that can turn invisible, fight while invisible, cast absolute death, make that A-10 Gatling gun damage itself, cast force walls, resurrect their fallen comrades, teleport etc, the military might have a hard time. But in popular fiction, they usually have just 2 magical abilities, fire breathing and the ability to fly despite being enormous. Name a dragon from a book, movie or folklore that's that powerful – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 16:57
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@JamesHollis Chinese dragons, who are almost definitely even more powerful. – Dec 09 '18 at 17:08
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Godzilla isn't typically considered a dragon, but I would note that it typically eats nuclear missiles for lunch. The technical advisor is not so universally optimistic in the article as in the title, either. First he says they'd "definitely be successful", then "we'd give it our best, and hope he would go down in a day or two." (The whole US military vs one opponent, and he hopes they can defeat them! In a day or two!) – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 17:11
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There are books where dragons are nothing more than animals, such as Harry Potter (where they have some magic). There are books where dragons are boats, or a title (Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica). There are books where dragons are genius scientists (Seraphina). – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 17:25
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There are books where dragons are as large as continents (The Iron Man) or as small as dogs (Nightrunner series). There are books where they have no powers beyond whatever is necessary to sustain their biology (The Spiderwick Chronicles), and books where they have a host of dangerous powers (Tortall series, anything based on D&D) . There are books where they're virtually unkillable (Unlimited Fafnir), and books where they're quite fragile. – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 17:30
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In short, I'm not sure it's possible to make a general conclusion about what dragons are or aren't, or are or are not capable of. A dragon that's the size of a cat, flightless, biologically normal, and as intelligent as a lizard is a totally different threat from a dragon that is the size of a truck, nigh invulnerable, stuffed with magic powers, and smarter than Magnus Carlsen. – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 17:38
There are numerous works of fiction where a single dragon-size creature could eradicate Earth inhabitants: Sahaquiel from Evangelion, Godzilla Earth from Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters (300 m tall, 100,000 tons), Colossus from the The Cloverfield Paradox (6500 ft tall), Huge Titans from Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (several kilometers tall), Summa-verminoth from Solo: A Star Wars Story, etc. – Cœur Dec 09 '18 at 18:16
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@Adamant Yeah, I have noticed that dragons have been defined as virtually anything over various fictional works, just as there have been vegetarian vampires, gods in the form of small tortoises that are helpless when placed upside down, and swords that are effective against robots with guns. But you have to ignore most of that. If a discussion about dragons must start by asking whether they are animal, vegetable or mineral, "dragon" ceases to be a meaningful word. – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 18:48
I will grant you that the eastern, godlike dragon is well known, and that Norse mythology does have a world ending dragon (not just in Skyrim). I don't think such dragons have a place in the Harry Potter Universe though. You can't have eastern dragons without also having eastern mysticism (if they provably exist you have to show them respect) and the world ending ones violate the rule about not having an unstoppable monster if it's not the focus of your story. – James Hollis Dec 09 '18 at 19:32
@JamesHollis - Exactly. I believe it's not meaningful to speak as if there were any rule that applied to dragons in fantasy. There may be trends - indeed there certainly are - but there are no rules. Moreover, anything that talks about dragons in fantasy in general may have little application to any particular book, such as Harry Potter. – Adamant Dec 09 '18 at 19:44
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@JamesHollis "Sgt. Maj. James Dever" - is that as opposed to No-Maj? :-) – Rand al'Thor Dec 10 '18 at 10:23

Joel Coehoorn · Answer 4 · 2018-12-11T15:41:36.910

Harry Potter takes place in the modern era, rather than medieval times, where the natural world has over centuries become "civilized".

Dragons are indeed powerful, and it's because of this power they are downplayed in the Harry Potter stories. In fact, dragons were so powerful they disrupted the spread of the noble wizard and muggle, and as a result were slowly hunted and pushed to the brink of extinction, much like North American Bison. By the time we meet Harry Potter, they're just not something one is ever likely to encounter in the normal course of things. If not for the work of Dumbledore and Nicholas Flamel finding ways to make Dragons at least somewhat useful, they might be gone completely.

Dragons in fantasy works ... can decimate entire armies without taking much damage.

True, true. But so could wizards. For the tournament, the dragon is chained and at least partially trained, and the goal is merely to steal from it rather than defeat it. And these aren't just children. The tournament is only open those at least 17 years of age... practically adults.

EvilSnack · Answer 5 · 2018-12-09T19:32:04.787

It should also be considered that in the Harry Potter universe, what Muggles "know" about the magical world is often distorted or downright false.

HP gnomes look nothing like the gnomes in that coffee-table book from a few decades back, elves look nothing like Galadriel, and so forth.

In the case of dragons, we have intelligent and articulate dragons in Muggle fiction (such as Smaug in The Hobbit), but in the HP universe dragons' intellect is on the same order as that of lower animals. So more has been changed other than their raw power and ferocity.

Why did J. K. Rowling choose to downplay dragons?

5 Answers5

Dragons in Harry Potter are indeed powerful.

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