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elanor_xFinally, my favorite DH chapter! Yay!
In the previous recap I mentioned that on the first read, when Hermione created a wreath of Christmas roses to lay on the grave, my first thought was: "But what if somebody is watching them?" At the same time I discarded the thought, deeming myself paranoid. But this chapter starts with Hermione telling Harry somebody was watching them from the bushes and was bound to know they weren't Muggles because of the flowers.
Harry thinks the rustle and a "little eddy of dislodged snow in the bush" were created by a cat or a bird, since a DE would have killed them by now. I guess he's already forgotten Snape shouting during his escape to another DE that Voldemort forbade them to kill HP, and Hermione wasn't there, so she can't remind him of the fact. I've just checked and in the café DEs tried to capture, but not kill them too.
We're supposed to understand that the creature in the bushes was Nagini, which is great and exciting to me, but unfortunately creates another plot hole. Voldemort was sure they would visit the village and thus left there the snake with instructions, but how could it know they were in the graveyard that day? May be due to both Harry & Nagini being Horcruxes, it felt Harry's presence. I prefer the option that the snake waited for them in Bathilda's house during the day, took walks every night to hunt and accidently stumbled upon them in the graveyard. After seeing them laying flowers on Potters' grave, it was a matter of putting 2 & 2 together.
When they're on the dark street again, Hermione asks Harry how they are going to find Bathilda's house. I am surprised she expects him to have a plan. Also, guess in the weeks of preparation for this visit they didn't have time to think about such insignificant detail. In their place I would just knock on the door of a Muggle house and ask. Fortunately, Bathilda will soon appear & lead them to her house herself. Isn't it a bit like Harry being helped in the tournament by Crouch or lead to the sword by Snape's Patronus? I mean that our heroes seem more passive this way – after sitting in the tent for weeks all they need to do is to show up and then other people (or snakes) will make things work.
But first we get to look at Harry's parents' ruined cottage. They are curious why nobody's rebuilt it, with Harry even wondering whether it's like the injuries from Dark Magic, which can't be fixed. Harry grasped the rusted gate, wishing to hold some part of the house (which was touching), and a sign rose out of the ground:
"This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters and as a reminder of the violence that tore apart their family".
You know, if the house had been completely forsaken and left standing there simply since nobody wanted to live in the place with such horrible, potentially dangerous history, it would have been more touching. "Potentially dangerous" since remember the old gardener Frank from the first chapter of GoF? People could be afraid of DEs or Voldemort harming the new inhabitants, DEs torturing them into madness like Neville's parents in the mistaken belief they knew some secret or of V's ghost haunting the place.
Isn't it ironic the way this house is preserved, the saviors' statue built, but Harry is left to be abused by the Dursleys as much as they wish and nobody really cares about him, except DD, who has ulterior motives? (Sirius was the only adult, who had a certain personal relationship with Harry, and seemed to care, but he was quickly dealt with). Hmm, now I found something additional in HP books, which is just like real life.
Hermione is "indignant" people left magical graffiti on the sign wishing Harry good luck. I am with Harry, who is glad they did. This year he's Undesirable Number One and I choose to be slightly optimistic and believe that the most recent messages were left by people this year, who while not being able to change things themselves, wanted to show their support in case Harry visited the place.
Harry's speech about the graffiti "It's brilliant. I'm glad they did. I …" is cut short by the appearance of an extremely old woman. Harry "knew instinctively" she wouldn't turn into any of the cottages she was passing. Another sign of Harry/Nagini connection or just Harry's IITS intuition? Probably the latter.
Harry felt the woman knew who and where they were despite the Cloak and the potion, even though "by all the rules of normal magic" she wasn't supposed to. Did DD see through the Cloak in the books too or only in
OMG! I know how Nagini could know where they were without special Horcrux connection with Harry. In the graveyard they were not under the Cloak, while Nagini took its' night walk, then it took Bathilda's body and went to the cottage because of common sense, from distance it could see the sign, which Harry rose from the ground, and near them "Bathilda" knew exactly where they stood because of … thermoception.
From wiki:
A particularly specialized form of thermoception is used by Crotalinae (pit viper) and Boidae (boa) snakes, which can effectively see the infrared radiation emitted by hot objects. The snake's face has a pair of holes, or pits, lined with temperature sensors. The sensors indirectly detect infrared radiation by its heating effect on the skin inside the pit. They can work out which part of the pit is hottest, and therefore the direction of the heat source, which could be a warm-blooded prey animal. By combining information from both pits, the snake can also estimate the distance of the object and perhaps even the size.
Dumbledore-ish power indeed! LOL!
After the woman beckoned thrice and nodded in response to Harry's "Are you Bathilda?" (way to give the suspect the right answer to the question, Harry), they decided to follow her to her house "through a garden nearly as overgrown as the one they had just left". I would take it as another hint something was amiss, but don't think Bathilda, a lonely old woman, took good care of the garden, while she was alive either. Perhaps it's told to create the right atmosphere.
V probably used advanced magic to allow Nagini make the woman open the front door with a key among other things since we've never seen Nagini itself being capable of magic.
"She smelled bad, or perhaps it was her house: Harry wrinkled his nose as they sidled past her and pulled off the Cloak".
Sometimes Rowling can pull off being chilling, when you know what she's talking about.
I remember thinking on the first read that the bad smell was from Moody's body, which Bathilda hid at her house to prevent DEs from mutilating it. Isn't it strange? During your first read, when did you start to suspect something? Did you guess what was going on before Rowling revealed it?
Bathilda peered into Harry's face and the thing inside the locket "had woken", Harry could feel it pulsing through the cold gold. Harry wondered whether it sensed that "the thing that would destroy it was near", meaning the Horcrux sensing the Basilisk venom in the Gryffindor's sword, while really it was 2 Horcruxes sensing each other. Awesome!
OK, slightly less awesome since Harry!Horcrux doesn't notice anything yet because IITS.
"Bathilda shuffled past them, pushing Hermione aside as though she hadn't seen her, and vanished into… a sitting room".
Another hint at Bathilda feeling where Harry stood, but not Hermione? Who cares? I stick to my theory about Nagini seeing through Bathilda's eyes somehow, and even if not, then using thermoception, so Hermione's location wasn't a mystery. Nagini simply couldn't care less whether it pushed Hermione or not, that's what I am saying.
Hermione is afraid, but Harry calms her down by saying they could easily overpower Bathilda because of her size (despite size being the least dangerous thing, when dealing with wizards) and that he knew from Muriel she "wasn't all there".
"Come!" called Bathilda from the next room.
Hermione jumped and clutched Harry's arm.
"It's okay", said Harry reassuringly, and he led the way into the sitting room.
I read people wondering how they didn't understand Bathilda spoke snake and checked what was going on. Harry didn't understand which language he used because he's Harry. Bathilda talked with him only when they went to another room and "come" was the only word that was uttered in Hermione's presence. Hermione heard a strange, unintelligible sound from another room. No wonder she didn't understand what exactly she heard, but supposed it was a combination of her nervousness and Bathilda talking like Kenny from
Harry notes Bathilda seems to have forgotten how to do magic since she lights candles by hand, and kindly offers to help her, for some reason lighting candles with the matches too. Has Harry too forgotten to do magic? Ah, it's to make him notice half a dozen photographs "missing from the largest and most ornate frames", which were stolen by Rita, and, most importantly, a photograph of teenage DD & GG. Harry and Hermione ask who the person with DD is and why she asked them to come, but Bathilda only gestures for Harry to follow her upstairs.
"Lead the way," Harry told Bathilda.
She seemed to understand…
I guess Harry uses human speech since Hermione in the same room notices nothing and Nagini uses common sense again. Or it could be their special connection, but the first solution is much more elegant and I've already made myself sick with thoughts about special, connected to Harry things.
In the low-ceilinged, horribly smelling and completely dark [Bathilda closed the door] bedroom, Bathilda asked Harry whether he was Potter, ignored his question whether she had got anything for him twice and just closed her eyes. Several things happened at once:
"Harry's scar prickled painfully; the Horcrux twitched… the room dissolved momentarily. He felt a leap of joy and spoke in a high, cold voice: Hold him!
Harry swayed where he stood… he did not know what had just happened.
"Have you got anything for me?" he asked for a third time, much louder."
Is it me or is Harry super-dense here for plot purposes even according to his own standards? His scar had prickled when V was near since DH & "a high, cold voice" could belong only to one person in HP universe. Happiness + "Hold him!" what could it mean? At least, he asked the third time "much louder" and didn't want to look away from Bathilda, when she told him to go to the dressing table in the corner with heaps of dirty laundry on it. True, no thought of V crossed his head before the snake appeared, but it's still some consolation.
I remember being surprised and frightened once in this book – when Harry looked away in search of the sword for a moment and the snake got out of the body.
The snake attacks, Hermione runs into the room, they fight Nagini for a while (Yes, Hermione is harder to kill than Snape for it). Then Harry & Hermione jump out of the window just in time for Voldemort to glimpse them vanishing from the room's window: "and he screamed with rage, a scream… that echoed across the dark gardens over the church bells ringing in Christmas Day". Parallelism with killing Harry's parents at Christmas?
Voldemort remembers almost dying and wondering why he felt unbearable pain, if he had no body, "didn't pain cease with death, didn't it go…". Oh, you don't know what waits you in the future, Tom.
And Harry sees flashback of that fateful night 16 years ago, which I loved, having being curious since the first book.
We see V gliding along on a wet & windy night with a "sense of purpose and power and rightness in him that he always knew on these occasions". Err, rightness since he believes other people deserve being killed?
A small boy's "Nice costume, mister!" to V was amusing, but V's thoughts, when the boy saw his face and ran away in fright, made my flesh creep: "Beneath the robe he fingered the handle of his wand… One simple movement and the child would never reach his mother… but unnecessary, quite unnecessary…" I would like to hope that in RL nobody in one's right mind would think like that, but unfortunately am not sure. I was even surprised the child got away alive. After 7 books I still don't understand how developed V's serial-killer tendencies were. Do you? Did he want to kill most people he saw, who weren't DEs?
In case you missed how much our villain hates children, later we're told that when he pointed the wand into Harry's face to cast the killing curse and the child began to cry: "It had seen that he wasn't James. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small ones whining in the orphanage". I read somewhere that referring to newborns as "it" was normal, or am I mistaken? In any case, notice how V sees himself as a person, but crying, frightened child as a thing to be disposed of, as "it"?
Now I see teenage V spending summers at the orphanage, brooding with rage against small children, who cry at nights, and the staff, which asked him to help looking after them.
"Is your school for intellectually or alternately gifted children, Tom?"
"One simple movement and… but unnecessary, quite unnecessary… Anger is for weaker souls than me. Arrr, who am I kidding? Damn that Dumbledore!"
Somebody should write a fic like that.
Voldemort makes less noise "than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement" as he approaches the cottage, but when he wants to open the door, it "burst open", warning Potters of the intrusion. I guess it's his dramatic nature, which kicked in again. Fortunately for him, the Potters won't use wands anyway.
People were disappointed and talked how it was stupid for James to leave his wand on the sofa and try to hold V off without it (V laughed at the idea before killing James too), but I think in JKR's eyes loosing a fight with V would be emasculating for James and since she had to kill him, the only way for James to loose the fight with his honor intact was to make him wandless. When poor James told Lily "It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off!", he probably didn't remember whether he had the wand or not. Also, hold him off? Did James expect to loose?
I suspect even JKR doesn't know why Lily had no wand upon her either or didn't quickly take it after being warned of the danger.
After the curse rebounded: "The snake rustled on the filthy, cluttered floor, and he had killed the boy, and yet he was the boy" – feeling a part of him in Harry.
We return to V standing at the broken window of Bathilda's house and seeing "something incredible" on the floor, the smashed photograph of the unknown thief he was seeking. And Harry gains consciousness in the tent.
The snake bit him, but Hermione cleaned the wound and put some dittany on it, so he'll be okay. So V was stupid enough to forbid Nagini to kill Harry. If he didn't, Harry would have already been dead. Just a thought, both Nagini & new!V have parts of original TR soul in them, so from that pov V killing Harry & Nagini killing Harry aren't that different and the prophecy could still come true.
Harry tells Hermione what happened- "Lupin said there would be magic we'd never imagined". Oh, Harry. Preserving the corpse in not the best possible state (Lenin is preserved better, without the horrible smell, at least) is not advanced magic. It's V being let to be slightly smarter than he usually is. That's why the chapter was so scary & effective. Of course, he can't become too smart and let Nagini kill you because the book would end. Or may be then we would get Ron, Hermione & Neville destroying Horcruxes, while Harry would spend a couple of months on the station with DD and come back exactly where he returns from the dead in the book. Better not kill Harry, Nagini. The last thing this book needs is more DD.
Harry finds out his wand was broken and the chapter ends with him wondering how he was supposed to get a new one with Ollivander kidnapped & Gregorovitch dead. Hmm, may be go ask Fleur about the best French wand makers and travel with her to buy a wand? Other British wand makers?
I have "The Magical Worlds of HP" by David Golbert and since Nagini played a big role in this chapter decided to write a bit about it:
Naga is Sanskrit for snake, and nag is the word for snake in several modern languages. In Buddhism and Hinduism, nagas are a race of semi-divine snakes with great powers. Female nagas are known as nagini. They live in a beautiful underground city. Some have many heads. On the head of naga king Vasuki is a brilliant jewel, Nagamani, which has miraculous healing powers. Vasuki was used by the gods to churn the ocean to create Amrita, an elixir of immortality. Not coincidentally, this is just what Voldemort seeks.
Nagas share an interesting connection with the basilisk. Just as roosters are the enemy of a basilisk, the constant foe of the naga is Garuda, a powerful mythical bird.
Garuda Fighting Nagini
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no subject
Date: 2009-03-01 03:14 pm (UTC)If Voldy did it, Bathilda's corpse had to have been an Inferus, since snakes have no mechanism for turning keys or for walking - Nagini, even if magical, would have to have envisioned concepts she could not have ever felt or known.
Did you guess what was going on before Rowling revealed it?
No, like you I was surprised when Nagini shed Bathilda's skin. This scene showed what Rowling was capable of doing, and I did enjoy it. Creepy is good.
... the thing inside the locket "had woken"...
Another part of this scene that echoes Rowling's better work. Too bad more effort in this direction wasn't put into the rest of the book, especially in the camping scenes.
(Yes, Hermione is harder to kill than Snape for it [Nagini])
IITS. *sigh*
Parallelism with killing Harry's parents at Christmas?
They were killed at Hallowe'en, two months earlier in the year. Maybe the contrast is that Hallowe'en is supposed to be a creepy and frightening day when the dead walk etc., so James and Lily die at this time, while Christmas is full of hope and Harry and Hermione live.
I read somewhere that referring to newborns as "it" was normal, or am I mistaken?
Referring to a small child as an "it" instead of by a gender-specific pronoun used to be done quite often. In the past, both boys and girls were dressed alike until a certain age. I have a picture of my late uncle at two, in 1907, dressed in a frilly dress with a lace collar. My father beside him, at five, is in a smock and short trousers (see icon). My uncle's hair is short and swept to the side like a little boy's, but he's dressed as a girl. I can understand people preferring to say 'it' in those days!
People were disappointed and talked how it was stupid for James to leave his wand on the sofa and try to hold V off without it...
I was disappointed. It seemed to me that James was so arrogant about his ability to sense loyalty that he endangered himself and his family. Voldy could have disarmed him instead - wouldn't that have been ironic, his using Harry's "signature spell" as the prelude to murdering Harry's parents?
The snake bit him, but Hermione cleaned the wound and put some dittany on it, so he'll be okay.
Making the whole snake thing all sorts of wrong. Arthur Weasley's wounds were difficult to cure (let alone the venom!) but here Hermione can do what St. Mungo's best couldn't do in weeks or months. Also, where were her Mad Healing Skillz when Snape was bitten? Oh. Yeah. Hermione Sue comes and goes at the whim of the plot.
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Date: 2009-03-01 10:19 pm (UTC)Very nice idea. I am sure JKR thought about this symbolism too.
Referring to a small child as an "it" instead of by a gender-specific pronoun used to be done quite often.
Because of not being a native speaker, "it" was connected in my head with things, not people. Doing the recap I all the time wanted to use "she" to describe Nagini, since due to its' intelligence it is more like a person than like a table or an animal to me. The same can be said about house-elves. (But the bit about V not seeing Harry as a person is still right, since he generally doesn't see others as people.)
I was disappointed. It seemed to me that James was so arrogant about his ability to sense loyalty that he endangered himself and his family.
I see it somewhat differently. James was arrogant, yes, but he looks more trusting and naive to me here. Lily mentions Peter in her letter as "Wormy" and seems to see him as a friend, not unlike Lupin. I think James saw him as a friend too. When one chooses to trust people, one opens himself to betrayal. The other possibility is to live like V or DD, who imo doesn't trust anybody either. James was barely out of school then and believed in his friends. His young age should be taken into account. May be Sirius has almost broken the door several times in the past, when there were important or bad news. So James expected to see somebody from the Order with a message and understood he was mistaken too late.
Voldy disarming James would be like symbolic castration. JKR would never bring herself to writing such a thing. Remember Lucius's reaction to V's request in HBP to use his wand?
Also, where were her Mad Healing Skillz when Snape was bitten? Oh. Yeah. Hermione Sue comes and goes at the whim of the plot.
I think it's just that Nagini inflicts as much damage as it's told. It's told only to hold Harry, so doesn't really harm him badly. Arthur was bitten to get him out of the way, not caring whether he died, but not specially trying to kill him either, and he recovers after a while with good treatment. It was ordered to kill Snape and thus mortally wounded him.
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Date: 2009-03-02 09:29 pm (UTC)Ah. Russian, right? People don't use "it" for a child as much any more, but it used to be pretty common. If you read some of the older books, like by the Brontes or maybe Dickens, you'll run across it.
I think Nagini is a female. There's no problem with using gender pronouns for animals in English if you do know the animal's sex.
James was arrogant, yes, but he looks more trusting and naive to me here.
It's a war. He's been targeted by LV. There is a known leak in the Order. James, Lily and friends all seem to think it may be someone close, hence the switch after publicly declaring Sirius to be the Secret Keeper. Sure he trusted his friends (wrongly) - and one wonders if he missed obvious signs in Peter since in the one sure interaction we see between them he doesn't pay much attention to Peter (all that glee over hurting or embarrassing someone - even Sirius said Peter was about wetting himself). If it's just James on his own, then he has the room to make a mistake. But it wasn't just James, it was Lily and, worse, their infant son. The arrogance comes in not being cautious, in slipping up. He died for his mistake, but so did his wife, and his son was orphaned. This is a very heavy price for ignoring danger signals, IMO.
When one chooses to trust people, one opens himself to betrayal.
Being cautious is not opposed to trusting people. One can be cautious but still have fundamental trust. Things can go wrong, things can happen. They were aware that the SK might be tortured, that was a reason given for the switch. Sirius would be the decoy so if someone tried to get the secret out of him, he would die and not be able to tell because he isn't SK. But if the DEs figured that out, they'd go for Peter next, and Peter could be swayed by torture - Sirius seemed to say as much, they all seemed to believe that. Worst-case scenario as far as James was concerned was that Sirius was captured and killed, then Peter, who, instead of dying, would at least be tempted to give the secret away if not give the secret outright from fear or pain. Since they were keeping the identity of the SK a secret with all this subterfuge, it's probable that only Sirius, Peter, Lily and James could find the Potters and/or their house, so if Sirius was captured and killed and then Peter captured, no one would be able to tell them. In circumstances such as those, it's better to be on one's guard than to trust that one's friends are still safe.
Though, I tend to agree with montavilla - Rowling wanted to up the pathos by showing James already disarmed.
The whole symbolic castration thing, though - James was already disarmed, already symbolically castrated, when he went to meet LV. Not having his wand castrated him. Hm. Maybe that's one level of upset over this whole scenario.
Arthur was bitten to get him out of the way, not caring whether he died, but not specially trying to kill him either...
Nagini wanted to kill him. Harry rode along on that dining-out experience. He enjoyed the bones crushing in his jaws (channeling Nagini, obviously), he enjoyed the blood, the damage. Nagini was working on the level of a feeding animal. Feeding animals kill.
Rowling said she meant to kill off Arthur in book 5 but couldn't do it after all so she killed off Remus (one father for another) instead. Arthur's wounds were supposed to have killed him. This is, IMO at least, a case of IITS.
Anyway, even if Snape was doomed, we saw no heroic attempt at saving someone they believed to be on the Bad Side. Heroes save people. Even bad guys, or they at least try. Hermione didn't even try, didn't lift a finger or her wand. I admit that I don't like Hermione. I don't like the thing with Marietta, I don't like the thing with Rita Skeeter, I don't like this, and there are other things I can think of when I'm not actually trying to tell someone about them (don't you hate that?). Hermione doing bad stuff to other people as if she's some avenging angel just plays badly for me.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 02:33 pm (UTC)The whole symbolic castration thing, though - James was already disarmed, already symbolically castrated, when he went to meet LV.
In JKR's eyes not having a wand = too trusting (V thinks that in this chapter, so most likely that's what readers are supposed to think too).
Otherwise, James would be shown as worse fighter, unable to protect his family despite having the same weapon as his opponent. There is a difference between loosing a duel and being killed with a saber (despite being great at fencing!), when somebody breaks into your dining-room. At least, that's what I think JKR thinks.
Arthur dying would be much more interesting than killing Lupin off-screen. We would see how Ron and other Weasleys reacted. Harry would loose his special place as the most suffering person in the Trio because his parents were killed. Ron probably wouldn't leave them in DH. May be JKR didn't want to kill 2 important characters in the same book? She talked about wanting to make her books truly dark and how writers have to be merciless killers, yet didn't do it herself.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-04 01:46 pm (UTC)***I think that was part of the reason, she talked about it in some interview.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-04 02:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-04 03:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-02 05:11 am (UTC)**
I see it somewhat differently. James was arrogant, yes, but he looks more trusting and naive to me here.
I thought that JKR was simply trying to up the pathos by showing a sweet, trusting moment from James just before he was killed. I was never very invested in James and Lily as characters (Marauder fics that focused on Lily/James kind of bored me). So, I never bothered to try and imagine their life in Godric's Hollow or what happened that fateful night. Consequently, it doesn't bother me a whit that James dies without a wand in his hand.
I agree that JKR probably thought it dramatically more effective to have James die without raising his wand and didn't want to "symbolically castrate" him. (I like that!)
The effect it has (for me) is to make both James and Lily more ordinary than we had previously viewed them. Which I think is a fine idea. I think that JKR wanted to convey the idea that ordinary people can be heroes. She wanted Harry to be a fairly ordinary bloke who is "chosen" by others--but not really by himself until he makes the decision to go into the woods.
But it's as though she wanted to do that and couldn't quite manage it. You can't be both ordinary and the youngest seeker in a century, who wins every game he manages to get through in a conscious state, and who gets a personal apology from the Headmaster for not getting the prefect badge. Likewise, she wants James and Lily to be ordinary parents, but then they also had to be citizen warriors who fought in an elite organization, were "brilliant" at school, popular, and rich.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-02 07:35 pm (UTC)- Citizen warriors who fought in an elite organization? True, but there were other people in the Order too, like partisans in the RL.
- "Brilliant" at school? No signs of either of them (or Sirius, who is described similarly) inventing new spells like Snape, let alone being on DD's or V's level. We've never seen adult Sirius being exceptionally gifted. Not that he was a bad wizard, but more on Bellatrix's and Lucius's level than on V's (or even Moody's?). I've always seen Harry's parents this way too - gifted but not geniuses.
Besides, I believe people exaggerated their specialness to Harry since:
- They were very brave people, who were horribly killed and (by a fluke) stopped V for a while.
- The people, who talk to Harry about them, were their friends. Who would tell to an orphan his parents were anything but extraordinary great, when they were very good?
- Other people, like Slughorn, wanted to flatter Harry in order to get something from him. Slughorn liked Lily, but he tried to add Harry to his collection of ex-students in HBP too.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 04:20 pm (UTC)Yes, people did exaggerate their specialness to Harry. But, in defense of James, he did manage to become an animagus without teacher help, and the Marauders did create the Marauders' Map. Also, James was Head Boy--although I'm not sure that really means anything other than being a favorite with the Headmaster.
I got the idea that Slughorn genuinely found Lily a brilliant potions student--although, I also got a very strong pervy vibe from him towards students of both genders. He seemed as taken with her "cheek" as her skill.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-04 01:44 pm (UTC)Getting pervy vibes from Sluggy? Definitely. Be as brilliant as you like, Sluggy wouldn't care much if he didn't like your personality as well, and/or you had influential relatives. Yes, Severus, I'm talking to you.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-06 01:08 pm (UTC)I think that JKR wanted to convey the idea that ordinary people can be heroes.
I really fail to see how they were any more heroic than lots of other people killed by the DEs. Yes, they tried to protect their child - well, the Malfoys and the Dursleys would have done so, too. All of which makes the adulation heaped on the Potters all the more inexplicable and annoying.
I was never invested in them as characters, in fact they seemed rather repulsive to me, with their judgmental, hypocritical and bullying ways. I was invested in the concept of the war against LV and the underground resistance groups, though.
So, for me, for there to be even a sliver of justification for their Rep, the Potters had to be effective resistance fighters, who saved other people, etc. I.e. truly heroes.
But both their death scene and Lily's letter clearly demonstrated that even in this area, the Potters were nothing but posturing drones.
I mean, had we ever seen any of the trio _not_ having their wands on their persons? Even as firsties? Or being as indiscreet as that letter?
Re: being naive and trusting - how could one be sure that even the closest friend would be able to withstand torture at LV's hands? I mean, usually information-gathering from torture fails because it is difficult/impossible to sift through lies and because the human frame can only stand so much, but LV had none of these limitations.
And there was a huge flaw in the plan that Sirius the decoy knew who the SK was and where he was hiding. And LV would only need to legilimens him to learn it.
Not to mention that after DH it turned out that the Potters could have been their own SKs and thus idiotically endangered their friends for nothing.
BTW, why was LV using the snake, when it didn't seem immune to magic or anything? I never understood this, since it looks that unless the wizard is taken by surprise (Arthur) or prevented from fighting back (Snape), there isn't much it can do. How was it supposed to detain Harry without savaging him, exactly?
no subject
Date: 2009-03-06 02:29 pm (UTC)the Potters had to be effective resistance fighters, who saved other people, etc. I.e. truly heroes.
Order members' job was to kill V and imprison his supporters, who did most of the murders, thus saving numerous lives. According to the prophecy - "born to those who have thrice defied him" - the Potters thrice destroyed (?) V's plans similar to Neville's parents. Hmm, has nobody ever asked JKR what they did, if she knows that, of course? Imo they were more effective than many other OoTF members (*) & most likely thrice defying saved lives too.
(*) We see people like Hagrid and Fletcher the thief in the Order in OotF.
And there was a huge flaw in the plan that Sirius the decoy knew who the SK was and where he was hiding. And LV would only need to legilimens him to learn it.
Didn't think about that before. Sirius was all "I would've died before betraying my friends" (and he would), but he overlooked Legilimency. Unless he knew it, being raised as a Black untill 16. His cousin, Bellatrix knew it, why wouldn't Sirius know it too? We don't know one way or another from the books.
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Date: 2009-03-07 04:30 pm (UTC)So, because of coincidence, basically. Yes, this fits the whole framework, sadly.
Re: the defying, given their demonstrated ineptitude, I now kind of think that it was all based on deus ex machina too, just like Harry's exploits. At no point were people the Potters may have saved or their heroic deeds mentioned in any detail and given the new OoTP's general uselessness... well.
At no point was it even hinted that Sirius knew Occlumency and even if he did, the same points about torture and mind-altering potions would apply as by a straight interrogation. Since LV didn't labor under limitations of RL torture, he could eventually learn anything from anybody, I imagine.
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Date: 2009-03-08 04:46 pm (UTC)Which.... huh? What's the point of having an organization based on an anti-Muggleborn agenda if you're going to ask Muggleborn witches to join up? That's like having a clubhouse with a "no girls allowed" sign on it, but letting in the girl down the street because she's pretty.
Which I think you could go, because that sort of contradiction can and did happen--but I think you need to explain it a bit more than Hermione's HBP line about the Death Eaters letting in half-bloods because there weren't enough pure bloods left.
But, then, JKR didn't include it in the books, so she doesn't really need to explain it (the Lily and James thing, I mean).
I was always curious about the "thrice defied" thing, though, because I wondered if Harry and Neville were really the only candidates. How could Dumbledore know that definitively?
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Date: 2009-03-08 08:34 pm (UTC)Which.... huh?
Right. So even Voldy was taken in by Lily's Super Speshulness and Patented Loving Heart. Probably envied Snape his friendship for her, probably enjoyed AKing James just to get at Lily and give her a chance to live so he could attempt to look like a Mighty Gryffindor and save the damsel. For all the craziness of "asking them to join", that's what it amounts to.
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Date: 2009-03-08 09:44 pm (UTC)Indeed. Personally, I always thought that Peter must have been Muggleborn, to avoid suspicion so completely. But if he was, then it would have been a very special case.
Asking Lily to join the DEs long before LV had an inkling about the prophecy or that she'd be involved in it seems to be a huge "Huh?!" indeed.
Personally, I am now inclined to think that the 3 "defiances" were along the lines of:
1. joined the OoTP, which basically amounted to speaking bad things about the LV and his DEs since no more actual _deeds_ of any member except for Moody, who was also an Auror, were ever mentioned.
And both the death scene and Lily's letter amply demonstrated the Potters complete ineptitude as resistance fighters.
The uselessness of new OoTP was the nail in the coffin where the image of the Potters and their hangers-on as heroic resistance fighters was concerned, IMHO.
2. Married, polluting James' pureblood ancestry which was against LV's views
3. ? Funded some Muggleborn-oriented program perhaps?
It certainly was better than nothing, and majority of people in similar RL circumstances did even less... but heroic struggle against LV it was not, either. YMMV.
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Date: 2009-03-02 10:52 am (UTC)***How would the wizworld in general know Harry was abused? All they knew was that The Mighty DD had him growing up in a safe place.
OMG! I know how Nagini could know where they were without special Horcrux connection with Harry. In the graveyard they were not under the Cloak, while Nagini took its' night walk, then it took Bathilda's body and went to the cottage because of common sense, from distance it could see the sign, which Harry rose from the ground, and near them "Bathilda" knew exactly where they stood because of … thermoception.
***Yes, but does JKR know this? :-P
People were disappointed and talked how it was stupid for James to leave his wand on the sofa and try to hold V off without it
***Or he just panicked.
I suspect even JKR doesn't know why Lily had no wand upon her either or didn't quickly take it after being warned of the danger.
***Same here. Your extremely powerful mortal enemy storms into your house, hell-bent to kill you and your child. And the only way he could find your location was being told by your close friend, by torture or betrayal.
So V was stupid enough to forbid Nagini to kill Harry.
***Stands to reason. In true Super-Villain stupidity Voldie forbade anyone but himself killing Harry. Or we'd only have one book in the series.
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Date: 2009-03-02 06:52 pm (UTC)I generally thought about the irony in the situation. In PS we're told wizards greeted Harry on the street, yet he didn't even know he was a wizard. Harry has never hidden his relatives' abuse, yet no adult really tried to help him. Nobody bothered to check whether everything was okay, while presenting him as a hero or a madman in newspapers at the same time.
Yes, but does JKR know this? :-P
She wrote so much about snakes in her books that she almost certainly is aware of this well-known fact. And if not, who cares? Let's let the book to speak for itself. As we are forced almost always to do, since most writers died long ago. In 50 more years which child will know that DD was gay or what JKR knew about snakes?
Or he just panicked.
I thought that too and then invented a theory that Sirius used to bang in like that, when something horrible happened. So James expected to see his best friend, once again bringing bad news, and saw you know whom instead. I know, it sounds sort of lame & wanky, but I loved this chapter and the flashback so much that I want to force everything make sense. Then imo he panicked a bit too, yes.
And the only way he could find your location was being told by your close friend, by torture or betrayal.
Since you can't use Legilimency to force the secret out of Secret Keeper's mind, betrayal is a given.
Stands to reason. In true Super-Villain stupidity Voldie forbade anyone but himself killing Harry. Or we'd only have one book in the series.
Or one chapter.
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Date: 2009-03-02 07:46 pm (UTC)***Thought so, but was too lazy to look it up. :-)
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Date: 2009-03-03 12:01 am (UTC)particularly as wizards make such a big deal of being armed at all times - they're even allowed to have a wand for Quidditch, so long as they don't use it, and in the MoM they register a wand, but don't confiscate it - imagine a defendant in a courtroom with a pistol in his belt!
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Date: 2009-03-03 01:55 pm (UTC)Forgot about Harry keeping his wand at the trial. But, I suspect, only since he was underage, accused of something minor and, the last but not the least, HARRY POTTER & DD's protege. In GoF we saw how Ludo Bagman was cleared of all charges (being a popular Quidditch player helped). Bellatrix certainly wasn't let to have a wand. Or Crouch Jr.
Re: Quidditch. What if your broom started misbehaving or was broken in the air? Disapparating or casting another spell (or other players doing that) would save a life. Without wands they are like Muggles, high in the air with only a broom to hold them. The game would be even more dangerous.