Harry Potter and the Predicament that Revealed Him to be a Selfish Little Prick

For those of us who believe that chess, and not Harry Potter worship, is the only acceptable “geek pursuit” for people who still want to be regarded as essentially normal (I’m sorry, but standing in line for seventeen hours dressed as a Hogwart automatically disqualifies you, even if you’re nine), the first installment in the series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, stuck a thorn in our collective side. In the book (which my girlfriend at the time forced me to read), and again in the movie (which my sister forced me to see), Harry and his dweeby friends match wits, in a climactic battle, with some sort of magical force that, if memory serves, can telekinetically transport enormous chess pieces with the skill of a Grandmaster but cannot think of a simpler way to vanquish three 11-year-olds. (The scene is reminiscent of the famous match between a knight and Death in the (recently)-late, great Ingmar Bergman’s Seventh Seal, except that Harry et al.’s duel is not a metaphor representing life’s profoundest mysteries, and also it was directed by the guy who made Bicentennial Man.)

When the chess studs of the world saw that scene, they nearly punched holes through their computer monitors (and they would have, too, if those monitors did not serve as their sole conduits to the outside world). In merging what some still perceive as a pastime for “nerds,” “dweebs,” “geeks,” “losers,” “antisocial misanthropes,” “bald hairy fatties,” and “28-year-old virgins” with the youngest member of the Holy Triad of Obsessive Geekdom (Lord of the Rings, or “LOTR,” and Star Wars being the founding members), J.K. Rowling set us board-game heroes back two or three decades, maybe more. How many handsome, charismatic pawn-pushers will it now take to return the King’s Game to the badass status it enjoyed pre-Potter? No muggle knows.

What all those Harry Potter geeks who are not also chess geeks (and I pity the adolescent who is both) do not know is that a close examination of the climactic game in The Sorcerer’s Stone exposes their hero as a pusillanimous little wanker. In last Sunday’s New York Times’s chess column, Dylan Loeb McClain analyzes the game from the crucial point (the “Sorcerer’s Stone Position”) at which Harry and his fellow whelps have to nerdily strategize their way out of what appears to be certain defeat. Those who remember the film will recall that Harry comes up with the solution, ordering Ron (as a Black knight -- a subconscious homage to Bergman, perhaps?) to sacrifice himself for the good of all wizardkind. As McClain reveals, however, there was a faster way to win: Harry (as a Black bishop -- a subconscious nod to the kid-friendly Catholic Church, perhaps?) could have sacrificed himself instead! McClain seems blasé about the decision (“2…Bc5 wins faster, but Harry gets axed”), probably because he cannot use the phrase “self-serving bastard” in a family newspaper, but the rest of us know better. Harry had a choice: a) martyr himself in the name of Wizardly Honor and endgame expediency, not to mention the cutting of a decidedly mediocre movie by several seconds, b) or sacrifice his best friend. He chose (b), the poltroonish prick. If that cowardice had come to light earlier, you can bet I wouldn’t have been the only muggle rooting for Voldemort in the final installment.