Last Friday, the world was rocked by one of the most stunning authorial announcements in history, when Harry Potter penmother J.K. Rowling casually revealed that Albus (Percival Wulfric Brian) Dumbledore, the greatest wizard of our time and a hero of the first order, is a homosexual.

When asked during an event at Carnegie Hall whether Dumbledore had ever fallen in love, Rowling replied “I always thought of [him] as gay.” Silence filled the hall, followed by a roar of applause, followed by the greatest wave of blog chatter and Listserv speculation since Larry Craig fell into the toilet. Articles in Time, USA Today and other papers chortled about the “bombshell,” and a search for “Dumbledore + gay” in Technorati’s blog catalog on Wednesday yielded nearly as many hits as a search for “California + wildfires.” Rowling herself was shocked by the overwhelming response, commenting on Friday that “If I’d known it would make you so happy, I would have announced it years ago!”

It is far too easy to undervalue the magnitude of what Rowling has done. Knowingly or not, her seven words may have jumpstarted a quiet cultural revolution.

The Potter books and films are (and will remain) one the most widely read stories of all time. Their miracle is their universal accessibility—they are loved by toddlers, teens, hippies, yuppies. And besides Potter himself, Albus Dumbledore is arguably the central figure of the entire saga—the only wizard whom Voldemort fears, the man who pulls all the strings, from page one to page zillion, to make sure that Harry can achieve his prophesied potential. Reading the book, Dumbledore becomes our grandfather, our protector, a God figure. To say we love him does not even come close.

And now, quite suddenly, we learn that the recipient of all of our earnest faith and affection has been a frou-frou all along! Especially for Americans, this comes as utter shock. Dumbledore has suddenly become the best-known gay icon… ever. Never mind Da Vinci, Warhol, Allen Ginsberg, Freddy Mercury—these eccentrics and geniuses we can ignore. But Dumbledore will change our image of homosexuality forever.

Yes, people might balk at Rowling’s audacity to “out” a character after the books have already been published. But it is precisely because Rowling has waited this long that her revelation will have such a great effect. She has tricked the homophobes into loving and mourning for a man whom they would have just as easily dismissed as monster or freak had they known his secret earlier. She has implicitly shown that sexuality need not be the defining characteristic of a wizard, that it does not correspond to some standard stereotype—and in doing so, she has moved beyond “gay pride” and towards true acceptance.

Indeed, if any popular figure (fictional or not) has the power to lend a new level of legitimacy to homosexuality in mainstream culture, it is Dumbledore. The sheer amount of thought and discussion that his sexuality is causing, and will continue to cause, is bringing us closer towards understanding homosexuality as a visible part of the human experience, rather than murky taboo or narrow stereotype.

Even more importantly, because of Rowling, a generation of children will now grow up with a broader—and less negative—awareness of homosexuality. That schoolyard snipe, “You’re so gay!” now has new, Dumbledorian meaning. Facebook groups are already popping up: “If Gay Marriage is Good Enough for Dumbledore, it’s Good Enough for America.” And Rowling has very likely given a new degree of hope and comfort to thousands of sexually confused and isolated young adults who thought that no one, let alone one of their literary heroes, could share their experience.

With her revelation, Rowling has established more clearly than ever that she has cultural power. Now if only she could just let slip Hermione’s opposition to the genocide in Darfur...



Michael Segal ’09, a Crimson editorial editor, is a biochemical sciences concentrator in Cabot House.