Talk to me about Peter Pettigrew...

[mymischiefmanaged]

Okay so as some of you know because I can't stop going on about it, I've recently started writing a marauders novel-length fic and I am EXCITED about it. I love the marauders as we see them in canon and I love that we have enough freedom to make them our own. BUT I'm hitting a block every time I try to figure out how Peter fits into it all 

We know from canon that all four of the marauders were inseparable at school and that they loved each other. Sirius and Remus argue that Peter should have died for James like the rest of them would have died for Peter. But at the same time we know that the other three marauders were all exceptional in their own way, and that even at school Peter seemed in awe of James and Sirius and struggled to keep up (as evidenced in Snape's memory). 

When I try to write their friendships, I find that I end up doing one of three things re. Peter:

1. Forget about him all-together and accidentally write enormous chapters as if he isn't even there
2. Write him in as a friend but then feel I haven't been true to canon, which I hate when it comes to characterisation
3. Write him in and feel I've done justice to the way he appears in canon, but then don't find my own writing convincing because I don't see why the others would have befriended him

I'd love to hear whether anyone else has had this problem and hopefully hear your solutions because I just can't figure it out! 

Thank youuu if you've bothered to read my rambles and thank you even more if you have any suggestions,

Emma xxxx

EDIT: I posted this here because it links to a story I'm writing, but now I'm wondering if it should belong in the Harry Potter talk section of this site. Please let me know if I should move it! 

[crowsb4bros]

I love stories that keep Peter in. He was a good friend of theirs and deserves recognition even if he was a rat. I prefer his characterization as someone who has pretty severe anxiety so it makes sense that the only people who ever really knew him would be his close friends that sorta adopted him. With anxiety he might second guess himself so even if he is smart, he might come across as bumbling or even mediocre on tests so teachers wouldn't pay him much mind. I usually give him the backstory of being a true friend until he believes that the war is going to come for someone he loves (usually an overbearing mother) and I think with a concept like that you can have your peter and keep the betrayer too. 

[grumpy cat]

i kinda headcanon him as being quite cunning (in canon we basically only see him after he's spent 12ish years as a rat which...was probably not good for his faculties) but agree about anxiety like paula mentioned. and so he's able to be more comfortable around the marauders, more himself and they see the peter that most of the school/world doesn't. with betrayal i think it was a matter of him being manipulated into thinking everyone else is turning against him and those he loves/his family. when you add that up to the anxiety and stress of war and his innate insecurity/feelings of maybe being 'less than' the rest of the marauders, the leap from friend to betrayer is easier to imagine, though i still struggle with it sometimes.

[PinsandKneazles]

The only way I can rationalise Peter's betrayal in my mind is a gradual drifting away from the Marauders, over the period of several years. They left school in '78 and the Potters were killed in '81 which would be a long enough period for Peter to have been influenced strongly enough to change sides. In my mind, Peter can't have been targeted by Voldemort's supporters until after he left school; it would have been almost impossible for him to have played the role of spy and Marauder at the same time whilst at Hogwarts, as James/Sirius would have surely noticed (being the smartest in their year and all). Maybe James and Sirius weren't that nice to Peter, or subconsciously superior, which caused Peter to harbour feelings of resentment and ally himself with the enemy? He was passing information on the Potters to Voldemort for over a year before they died. I'm guessing there must have been some sort of grudge towards James and possibly Sirius too, otherwise I'm sure if forced to play spy, he would have found a way to without harming his friends.

I wish Peter had been given a physical profile closer to that of the other Marauders, rather than being the short one of mediocre intelligence. I feel JKR short-changed him all round tbh and never really considered how he would have actually fitted into that group for the whole of his school life.

[grumpy cat]

15 minutes ago, PinsandKneazles said:

of mediocre intelligence

i don't think he'd be so successful as a spy if he wasn't cunning/intelligent

[PinsandKneazles]

2 minutes ago, grumpy cat said:

i don't think he'd be so successful as a spy if he wasn't cunning/intelligent

Sorry - I'll elaborate. I guess I was specifically thinking of Peter's academic intelligence. What we learn of him is that he required help from his peers to keep pace with them at school. However, someone doesn't have to be academically gifted to be cunning.

[grumpy cat]

1 minute ago, PinsandKneazles said:

Sorry - I'll elaborate. I guess I was specifically thinking of Peter's academic intelligence. What we learn of him is that he required help from his peers to keep pace with them at school. However, someone doesn't have to be academically gifted to be cunning.

oh yeah, i definitely agree with you on that. jkr by default made him difficult to envision as being friends with the marauders, even without being a traitor

[PinsandKneazles]

9 minutes ago, grumpy cat said:

jkr by default made him difficult to envision as being friends with the marauders, even without being a traitor

Yes, he was a poor fit for that group whichever way we look at it.

 

[crowsb4bros]

Building off what they said ^ what if the distancing came from coupling? James and Lily were probably moon eyes at each other, but if you ship Sirius and Remus that would leave Peter the odd man out. Being a fifth wheel could be really alienating if he already feels a bit like an afterthought. 

[mymischiefmanaged]

Yeah I think the intelligence thing is really interesting, because everything we hear about him (from teachers/marauders/voldemort) implies that he's weak and foolish, but then nobody suspected that he was the spy. @grumpy cat I think you're right and his intelligence is closer to cunning, although I suppose that opens up questions about why he ended up in Gryffindor rather than Slytherin, given that he's also plainly very focused on his own survival.

But yes @PinsandKneazles and @crowsb4bros - I guess there's time for him to have drifted away from him and different reasons why that might have been. The coupling thing is a really good point. Maybe James would have quite liked having Peter around admiring him as a teenager but once he was married and growing up I doubt he'd have found it so appealing.

This is all giving me lots of food for thought. I think it takes some time to figure Peter out but maybe the fact he's hard to understand makes him more interesting.

[PinsandKneazles]

I just find it very hard to imagine that Peter turned spy without some kind of bad feeling towards James/Sirius, y'know? I can see how his friends all coupling off would maybe have left him out, but I'm not sure it would be quite enough for him to betray his friends.

 

[crowsb4bros]

5 minutes ago, mymischiefmanaged said:

I think you're right and his intelligence is closer to cunning

too soon? 

[Guest Noelle Zingarella]

is it possible that after school, peter became convinced that voldemort's side was right? maybe not about blood purity, but what if he agreed with voldemort that wizards shouldn't have to hide from muggles? or what if he didn't really agree with voldemort, but thought that voldemort was ultimately going to win--and that by continuing to oppose him they were prolonging a futile war that would result in more and more deaths? 

i guess i'm trying to say that i wonder if he betrayed his friends b/c he became convinced that there was a higher cause. that would fit in with his gryffindor-ness. a slytherin would not betray their people for a cause--but a gryffindor might.

[mymischiefmanaged]

16 minutes ago, Noelle Zingarella said:

is it possible that after school, peter became convinced that voldemort's side was right? maybe not about blood purity, but what if he agreed with voldemort that wizards shouldn't have to hide from muggles? or what if he didn't really agree with voldemort, but thought that voldemort was ultimately going to win--and that by continuing to oppose him they were prolonging a futile war that would result in more and more deaths? 

i guess i'm trying to say that i wonder if he betrayed his friends b/c he became convinced that there was a higher cause. that would fit in with his gryffindor-ness. a slytherin would not betray their people for a cause--but a gryffindor might.

I don't know I always got the impression he turned to Voldemort more for self-preservation than for ideology, although I suppose he might not have been as repulsed by Voldemort's ideals than his friends were. But I see your point that if he believed in the cause that would explain his betrayal 

[felicis-purpure]

I don't have a particularly strong headcanon about Peter, but, for what it's worth, it's less of a betrayal if they weren't really friends--narratively, at least. If the guy who's always hanging around being a third wheel and saying kind of weird things turns around and betrays you, it's not... that surprising. I guess it could count as foreshadowing to some extent, but I think part of what makes him a little bit compelling for me is that he was their friend--they would have mutually considered each other friends--and then, at some point, things changed. Enough to make the wound he left larger for Sirius and Remus than the ones made by all the other people who sided with Voldemort.

That said, I don't like him a lot as a person and if I ever write something with him in it, I will be thinking 'VILLAIN BACKSTORY' the whole time.

[ImaRavenclaw]

The others make really interesting points and I totally feel for you Emma! One of the reasons that I do not really write marauders stories is because there's not lots of information about them but you always feel like you're doing something wrong and not doing them justice... At least I feel that way. 

Peter honestly irritates me as a character and I don't like to read him, so I find that your first way of writing him rings true to me. Remember that inseparable doesn't necessarily mean "best friends." Remus and Sirius might feel that they would have done anything for him if he hadn't betrayed their other friends, but memories can be skewed over time. For me, he sort of comes across as a friend, but more lackey or apprentice. Like, he's close, but more in the group as opposed to as an individual friend. Like, Remus, Sirius, and James can all hang together like dudes and it's never weird, but it would be strange for James and Peter to just hang without the other two (unless they were off somewhere shagging, who knows lol.) I find that group dynamics with someone can be very different. I know that in high school you would always see the same group of people together, but whenever they weren't at school, On Instagram you'd only see 4 out of 5 of them constantly. 

When he's done well as a character I don't mind him and it's nice to have him included. But the other thing to think about is that, Peter never really feels on the same level as the other three. Even though we want everyone to be equal, it's realistic that at eleven you're not going to have that same "we've been friends since we were smol" dynamic. I remember entering sixth grade (barely hahaha I'm getting way too old) and having people be really picky about their friends. Everyone was super strategic about who was going to make them go higher on the ladder of popularity. This seems like something that James and Sirius would definitely be thinking about, especially with their cruel treatment of Severus (even if he wasn't a Slytherin I feel as though it would have persisted.) I see Remus as more kind hearted, so maybe he's the reason that Peter ever had a shot in their group. I think that what people see from the outside certainly doesn't always reflect what's really going on, on the inside of a group.