Andromeda Tonks (née Black)

[Black_Dust]

Any thoughts on why she (and i guess Sirius too) decied to go against her family's beliefs and values? Did she have a "difficult" mother or father like Siruis? Or a bad experince? Were her parents perhaps "nicer" than Siruis'? (or dead?)

That's it for now, but i'd sure appreciate whatever opions you have on these topic!

[Padfoot Patronus]

Why did Andromeda decide to go against her family believes and values?

Consider for a moment Sirius’ response when James said he thought Sirius “seemed all right”.

“Sirius grinned.

Maybe I’ll break the tradition.”

-DH, American edition, P.671

Imagine, for a moment what it would really like to be in a family with certain very strict and fervent believes. Think about yours or a normal family, there must be something like education or marriages, abortion, religion, that would often come up as a very forceful topic of debate. You are part of the new generation and your mind is influenced and moulded to think about that concept differently.

Sirius and Andromeda are part of the wealthy, upper-class socialites, influential family, who are most often the trendsetters, leaders than followers. Their kids are taught to be a certain way from the start. At dinners they aren’t supposed to talk and only listen to the adults go on about status, the new Ministerial regimes, what ought to be and what ought not to be.

Why did Andromeda decide to go against her family believes and values? Living in a situation I just sketched, its hard to have an idea like something-isn’t-right-in-what-Mum-just-said to simply appear out of nowhere.

Your points are helpful:

A bad experience: perhaps something they saw, someone being tortured, a Muggle-raiding… Or something they heard? Remember words can say a lot more people and situation than the conversation originally intends.

A bad personal experience: imagine what happens at socialite parties. Andromeda might be the part of the whole drawing, but she may by nature dislike some things. The way Mrs Malfoy talks or how Mr Nott’s son dresses. And the worst thing about these parties or at home too, is being compared to Bella, the prim and proper Mama’s girl. She’s the one who always sits with Mrs Malfoy and nods at a comment she makes.

The most possible reason in my opinion: Ted Tonks. While all the above could be true or false, it is also possible that Andromeda might not have changed until after she went to Hogwarts.

Hope that helped!


- Akay

[Marauder by Midnight]

Your second question belongs better in a Narcissa Malfoy thread since you are ascertaining her reaction. If you could please redirect that question in the appropriate thread, that would be most helpful. Should someone else want to see opinions on Narcissa's reaction (that's a very good question), they would find it easier in the Narcissa thread and not in the Andromeda thread

[Black_Dust]

ok sure i'll switch it, sorry!

And Akay, you have some really great ideas there, thanks! Any other opinions?

[hermy_loves_ron]

I'm going to agree that it was probably Ted Tonks. When you've been brainwashed from such a young age, it's not easy to one day just think randomly : "Mummy and Daddy's ideas are wrong! We're all equal and blah blah..." You get the point. I would think it would take something big to change that, and the most likely (and canon) explaination we have is that of Ted--maybe she met him at Hogwarts, got to know him (reluctantly, if she knew his blood status, or with no preconconceptions if she didn't), found he wasn't a bad person, he was just as nice and smart and whatever as the purebloods she knew. And then she really liked him, and then she fell in love with him... As Dumbledore says, love can be a pretty powerful thing.

Sirius, as evidenced from Deathly Hallows, was having different thoughts from the start. That was most likely just because of his personality--he was a rebel, an individual, thought for himself, etc. I think it would have been more of a turning point for Andromeda then it would have been for Sirius, who was probably always the black sheep (white sheep, actually ).

Just my two knuts!
~Analisa

[snowybella]

I agree a lot with Analisa. But because Jo was so was vague about the Andromeda ordeal, I think it just allows for a lot of creative writing. ^_^

I mainly think of her breaking of from the pureblood norm in a couple of ways.

You could go with the ‘Sirius’ way- where Andromeda was rebellious from the start and grew up just as Sirius had, being ostracized from the family, etc. It can certainly explain how she turned out so differently, that it was just in her nature to be so independent even at a young age. The problem I see with that, however, is that in the book she was specifically blasted off the tapestry for marrying a muggle-born. That suggests to me that, like how Sirius running away was what finally got him blasted off which was the cherry, so to speak. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that that says that she wasn’t so obviously shaky from the beginning, and the marriage was a little more shocking than Sirius’ running away. I could be totally wrong, again, but that was how I interpreted it. I think her description as having a ‘slightly haughty’ look in DH made me more firm on that- it seemed like she was still showing, however small, signs that she once lived as a ‘disciplined’ pureblood.

A much more interesting path to her eventual ‘betrayal’, I think, is where she was only just a little bit shaky from the beginning- not out-rightly so like Sirius, but more subtly. On the concept of both Sirius’ and Andromeda’s parents, as I heard brought up somewhere, I disagree with a little. While I do think the parents were cruel, I think they were apathetic- in the way that they only accepted their children so long as they please them, and then didn’t show any sadness when said children had left, but I don’t think that they went out of their way to act unnecessarily cruel to them from the start. If they already disapproved of their children, then the cruelty would show full force, but not before, was my idea. (Bellatrix, I think, would need to have parents who are apathetic enough but take enough interest to nurture in her such a strong Pure-blood mania, as well as a little bit of insanity.) So I would think that when she goes to Hogwarts, the influence of all the different people that she’d meet would kind of soften her a little bit and then Ted would be what delivers the kind of final blow (sounds like I’m describing her death).

There are no doubt so many more, but these two are some of the more notable ones, I think. As to her house, I’d suspect Slytherin- not all terrible people are in Slytherin and though I can picture her in nearly any house with such little information, I think Slytherin would be understandable as well. But really any house would do- apart from Hufflepuff maybe, because I think pureblood fanatics would automatically disown anybody going into such a nice house. ^_^

I hope this helped!

Beth: Great analysis of Andromeda's character. 5 points.

[kritchen]

I wouldn't say that I'm an expert on Andromeda Tonks (nee Black), but I have written several things including her and Ted Tonks. They're my OTP.

I really think that Andromeda was simply born with a different mindset than those in her family. She wouldn't have rebelled until the last possible moment, choosing to be subtle in her slight disagreements. I don't think she would have known anything, but the values her family put into her head from the start until she started going to Hogwarts.

Having Bella as an older sister, as well, was probably a big influence on Dromeda. I rather think Bella was a bit of a mix between Snape, Draco, and Crabbe & Goyle; incredibly talented and intelligent, but also powerful and strong mentally and physically. In saying this, I rather think Bella might have been a slight terror to her fellow students. That likely influenced Dromeda's views as well. I'm sure she was confident and sure of her family's beliefs when she arrived. After a year or two, I'm also sure that she'd become more open and willing for new things. I've always viewed her as more open minded than the others in her family. Where her sisters may have seen a Mudblood, she saw a kind and interesting person. I'm sure however that this took years to occur. I think she would have done her best to be true to her family, until something happened that made it impossible any longer; such as falling in love, or discovering a harsh secret.

I suspect as well that her family knew next to nothing until the very end when she made that final betrayal to them. I imagine the scene where her Aunt finds out to be weeks after the fact that she married. Please note that this is all very open for interpretation and this is simply the way I view her life. If you want a bit more, and yes this is shameless self-promotion, I've written several things centered around the pair of Andromeda and Ted Tonks. The writings generally promote what I've all said here. I hope I helped you some.

Beth: insightful post with a very good look at her family background. 5 points.

[Pidwigeon13]

I think it might not have been simply Ted which changed her because if she was like her other sisters why would he even talk to her? I think there's been something that Andromeda has realized that the others haven’t; maybe she was more thoughtful as Bellatrix is very passionate and wholehearted about things and Narcissa probably would have just agreed with their parents beliefs without much argument.

She had been sorted into Slytherin although maybe she asked to be so she wasn't disowned; maybe she really felt she didn't belong there, like she was different from them. Then she might have gone in search of other company such as Ted, she would have been allot more open minded then and gradually changed her mindset.

But that's just my opinion.

[hermy_loves_ron]

So, Sirius and Andromeda are the "rebellious" ones of the family...along with, I suppose the other five blasted off the bit of family tree we have seen: muggle marriers, muggle supporters, a squib, blood-traitor marriers, and the runaway supporters. So how were any of them really different? Part personality, part experience. Those who married someone the Black family didn't approve of, like Andromeda, probably just plain fell in love. The squib, of course, couldn't help it, and Sirius's uncle probably just really liked the boy.

But we have to remember Andromeda wasn't quite as rebellious as Sirius, or at least not openly so. She was most likely sorted into Slytherin, as far as we know. That doesn't make her a bad person, obviously, but she fit into the Black ideals in that way. In DH, though a kind woman, she's a bit haughty for the breif time that we see her. It may be a mixture of indignation at being thought of as her estranged sister and worry for her daughter, but she wasn't overly friendly. One of the big points is that she--and Ted, as well--doesn't approve of her daughter marrying a werewolf.

We aren't given a lot of information on this. We don't know how vocal she or Ted were in their opinions on Remus Lupin, exactly how friendly or afraid they were. But I think it does somewhat illustrate what outcasts werewolves are in the Wizarding world, and how much prejudice there are against them. We hear about Remus not being able to get a job, but the people we see him around are extremely open-minded, so we don't see much of it firsthand. We don't here, either, but this is Tonk's parents. This goes to show that prejudice is everywhere, and you don't have to be a Death Eater to have it. Everybody has that bit of prejudice in them.

So if Andromeda grew up with her families ideals most likely drilled into her very hard, especially with Bellatrix as an older sister, harbors some prejudices, was Sorted into Slytherin, and has a tendency to act a bit haughty, why did she rebel? I'm going to have to go back to what I said earlier: she fell in love. However she met Ted, whatever preconceptions she had when she did, she came to love a muggleborn. This probably led her to realize how terrible her family's ideals were, especially if her personality was a bit towards that all along. I don't think it was an easy decision to split from them completely, and it probably took a long time for her to come around to it, but in the end she knew what she had to do.

She may have even had regrets about it in later life, when Ted, Tonks and Remus were all dead. But I'm guessing Teddy kept her going--cute little turquoise-haired baby.

My two knuts get longer every day.

~Analisa

[andromeda_tonks]

I love Andromeda, hence my user name . I think that she must have quite a strong character, because she had Bella as a sister, and she must be pretty over-powering when you live in the same house as her day after day. This suggests to me that she probably didn't rebel until she got to Hogwarts.

Remember that we only know the Andromeda's aunt blasted her off the tapestry when she married Ted Tonks. How much did she know about what Andromeda did/said before she married Ted? Might Andromeda's parents have hushed up any rebelliousness, so as not to disgrace the family? I mean, suppose one summer Andromeda comes back for the holidays with her head full of new ideas about purebloods and muggleborns being equal. She may confront her parents about their ideals, or maybe she hears a discussion which she feels is unfair to muggleborns and defends them. Either way, I doubt that her dad would immediately tell his sister that Andromeda had picked up some strange ideas at school, it would be humiliating for him.

Or maybe Andromeda questioned what she had been taught because it was taught so firmly. Maybe she went through a rebellious stage, many teenagers do.

I have also just remembered something else. Sirius said that Andromeda was his favourite cousin. Maybe there was something different about her right from the start after all. Or maybe *idea strikes* it was Sirius who was an influence on Andromeda? Or encouraged her to ignore the fact that Ted was a muggleborn if she liked him?

Anyway, I think that there's maybe more to this than meets the eye. More than just Andromeda meets Ted and decides everything that she's ever been taught is wrong, I mean.

~Meda~