I thought Dumbledore was spot on. He said to the Dursleys what I’ve been wanting someone to say for a long while - you’re a trio of fuck-ups with little decency. I love Dumbledore, and enjoyed getting a big dose of him in HBP.
And come off the gay relationships. Rowling hasn’t written anyone in that way yet, does anyone really expect to see it happen?
I haven’t yet read it all. I’m up to where Harry discovers the HBP signature on the textbook.
Ponderables:
This has little to do with the current book directly, but the old saw "There wasn’t a witch or wizard who went bad who wasn’t in Slytherin " - whoever said it was factually wrong (Wormtail wasn’t in Slytherin, was he?) and should have “known” the statement wasn’t true, as popular opinion held that Sirius Black went bad (and he was in Gryffindor.) Still, we can chalk this up to hyperbole, I suppose.
I don’t think Harry is a Horcrux, just from what I’ve gathered here - superficially, it’s too pat, and leads to an almost inescapably bleak ending. As far as the story itself, it does seem that Voldemort has tried to kill Harry several times - and not in any special way that would allow retrieval of the soul. So if Harry’s a Horcrux, it would almost have to be that he is an unintentional one.
I think Snape’s entirely up in the air at this point. Could be good, could be bad, could be playing both sides against the other. What I do know is that up until this point, Dumbledore has been demonstratably playing everyone involved like a cheap fiddle. He is head and shoulders above everyone else as a strategist. He always knows just what’s going on, and what needs to be done. I find it hard to believe that he was caught unawares by anything Snape did in this one.
I liked the seven potions predicting the new teacher idea, but maybe it foreshadows something else. Voldemort’s appearances, perhaps? The two corresponding to Nettle Wine only feature young Tom Riddle, in diary or flashback form, as far as I recall. Does Voldy appear in Book 3? Of course, this theory would seem to suggest Voldy isn’t in Book 7, so maybe that’s just preposterous…
That was Hagrid, in Philosopher’s Stone, when he fetches Harry and brings him to Diagon Alley to buy his books. At the time, obviously, no one knows that Peter Pettigrew was a Death Eater. But it is still incorrect since Sirius Black was in Griffindor (a fact that JK Rowling has said in interviews, but that is not mentioned explicitly in any book as far as I can tell.)
I think it would have been more logical and interesting if the four Marauders were from the four schools of Hogwarts: James Potter - Gryffindor; Remus Lupin - Ravenclaw; Peter Pettigrew - Hufflepuff; Sirius Black - Slytherin.
Going back to book 6, something I meant to say before and forgot:
One of my favourite parts of the book is the chapter where Snape again shows his skill at getting under someone’s skin. When he uses this power against Sirius or Harry it wasn’t as fun, but I was laughing at his nice put-downs of Bellatrix, when she starts bragging once again about how she’s the only truly loyal death-eater and the rest of them are traitors.
Snape: “Yes, rotting in prison was very useful to Voldemort - NOT! At least spare us the constant kvetching about how life in Azkaban was so hard, I’m sure even the big V is getting tired of it.”
I know that I would want Snape on my side if I was arguing in The BBQ Pit.
That’s why I offered the possibility that I’m just clueless. I never remember details like that.
I’m sure there are about a thousand reasons why I am wrong (haven’t had a chance to re-read the book yet), but I think that the potion that Dumbledore drank WAS the horcrux.
We still haven’t heard the whole story about the injury which damaged Dumbledore’s hand.
How does this grab you:
Dumbledore is weak and thus his wand hand becomes injured — OR (and I know that this is a stretch) Dumbledore ALLOWED his wand hand to become injured so that his ability to do magic would be weakened. (I’ll explain why in a minute.)
So – Dumbledore drinks the horcrux and demands death for obvious reasons. He’s taking a big chance here, letting part of Voldemort take over such a powerful wizard, but he can’t trust the job to anyone else.
He lets – actually REQUIRES – Snape to kill him.
The phoenix immolation burns the Voldemort out of him.
He reappears in some exalted form.
(Note that Snape’s first name, Severus, belonged to a Roman general who was notoriously ruthless in warfare and was instrumental in the fall of Jerusalem. In short, Snape knows how to do what has to be done.
Actually, I believe that Snape loves Dumbledore as much as Harry does.)
Gotta go – I’m at work.
Right, as I said, it’s still incorrect as Sirius Black is in Gryffindor.
It was mentioned in Book 6, explicitly. (When Sluggy was reminiscing about having the whole Black clan in Slytherin, save one)
Excellent catch. RAB, if he’s who we think it is, indeed must be dead if #12 goes to Harry. Right?
I didn’t say it wasn’t perfectly understandable. It kind of makes Lily more interesting. The female characters in the series often seem like ciphers. It’s interesting to think of Lily using an obvious, unrequited crush that way.
Do you see James as the Bonder of the Unbreakable Vow? I would have loved to be a fly on the wall for that one…Snape would have been gagging the whole time.
What’s bugging me:
Other past Hogwarts students have been able to work out some rather amazing things:
James Potter, Sirius, Remus: Secret passages, short cuts, other Hogwarts secrets, Marauders’ Map, AND James and Sirius figure out how to become animagi.
Severus Snape: Appears to revolutionize potions brewing and invents his own spells.
Tom Riddle: Horcruxes, other devilish things.
Fred and George: All of their joke materials; the swamp.
What comparable things have Harry, Ron, and Hermione done? True, while they have solved some tricky mysteries and done some heroic deeds, their accomplishments haven’t really been all that noteworthy. Basically they’ve used only what they’ve been taught and have not modified what they’ve learned.
Why does this bug me? Well, with Dumbledore dead (or at least only mostly dead) and with Snape no longer able to needle Harry into really working on his occlumancy skills, Harry, Ron, and Hermione don’t seem to have the magical abilities needed to find hidden horcruxes and fight talented death eaters (they’ve been rather successful against untalented D.E.'s previously, I agree).
So it looks to me we’re headed to a book 7 that is either going to have to be even longer than OotP so as to get H, R, and H much more talented and to get the loose ends tied up (not that that’s a bad thing given the way the writing has improved throughout the series) OR we’re going to get a book that leaves open various plot holes and doesn’t live up to the expectations generated by the success of the previous books.
Other random opinions:
Interesting that Harry’s folks’ place was called Godric’s (as in Gryffindor) Hollow. This is probably important (pardon me if that’s been specifically addressed previously).
As others have said: As Voldemort has tried to off Harry several times previously, he cannot be a horcrux.
Dumbledore probably has faked his own death to draw out Voldemort and lull him into making mistakes. He won’t reveal this bit of magic until after Harry has defeated Voldemort.
Snape will be rehabilitated. He probably won’t survive.
I don’t have books to check at the moment, but if it has not yet already been ruled out, Harry is a descendant of Gryffindor.
Questions:
Who was James Potter? Who was Lily? Who were his grandparents? What did they do? What was the charm that Lily put on Harry to save him, and how does it work?
I originally though the Half-Blood Prince was Snape after reading the textbook, but I then changed my opinion to Voldemort (because I didn’t see James using Snape’s own spell, altough maybe it was funny to him). Obviously, my initial idea was more correct. Snape actually looks like a Quadruple Agent!
I admit, I’m not really a fan of the Horcrux thing. It seems way too pat. Honestly, Voldemort, I think, would never have split his essence up like that. Better to find a more reliable method of immortality. I do think that Harry is a Horcrux, albeit inadvertantly. And Voldemort doesn’t know that Harry is. Harry will not die, nor will he completely lose his powers (he might be weakened a bit, but nothing too serious). And Dumbledore even notes that Voldemort probably couldn’t sense his own Horcruxes anymore.
I really got annoyed in this book because I wanted to slap Dumbledore upside the head. It was blatantly obvious that Harry really needed to know why Snape was trustworthy. I also think Snape was, in fact, working for Dumbledore. In fact, I wonder if Dumbledore did not, in fact, order Snape to kill him under certain circumstances?
This book was not really all that great, but the ending was top-notch. It’s too bad that the rest of the book was so repetitive and random. Dumbledore is dead, but at the least I’m very certain he would have prepared for the possibility. And knowing Dumbledore, he would have prepared very, very well. Dumbledore may be dead, but he will nevertheless watch over Harry.
That may be. At the least, I think he was shown Voldemort wiping everyone else out, tormenting him with the one event he really feared. But it also seemed to have really weakened him physically.
You now, my impression was that Lily may not have known that her sacrifice would protect Harry in the future. When Dumbledore explains Lily’s sacrifice to Harry, I seem to remember him saying this was very old magic. For some reason, I interpreted that to mean that Lily’s sacrifice was purposeful, but she didn’t know her sacrifice would have a tangible reward. Anyone else?
I think Ron, though he has been exposed to magic all his life, is having a hard time coming into his own out of the shadow of his extremely successful siblings. He has shown that with confidence, he can do some pretty cool stuff (like his Quidditch Keeping).
Harry has had no exposure to things magical, so he was really at ground zero during first year. He has learned lots of stuff, especially DADA stuff, and this year, in HBP’s Potions Book.
Hermione started from ground zero, too, but she is an over achiever from way back and is always coming up with spells and hexes no one else knws (setting fire to Snape’s claok in SS, the acne curse in OotP).
Maybe the magical education at Hogwarts is incredibly vertical. By that I mean that you really only start learning the seriously powerful stuff at NEWT level. This would give the trio two years to flower into kick-butt wizards.
Also, in the trio’s defense, they have been distracted every year with something dire. I don’t think that applies eaqually to the others who have made great magical strides early. Just a thought.
FTR, I’m leaning toward most of my participation being in the other thread. Probably foolish to make that a firm predictin, but there you are. I’m oppping in here right now to make the observation that several people have referred to the PM in Chapter One as Tony Blair.
The narrative in this book begins in 1996. John Major was occupying Number Ten, Downing St. until May 2, 1997.
But they had their first NEWT year, right? Ron and Hermione weren’t involved in memory trips and horcrux hunting, (and Hermione missed some serious snogging) so they (or she, at least) should have had time to tinker if they wanted to. Occlumancy was shown to be very important in OotP, but Harry never even worked on it one time, neither did Ron and Hermione. Didn’t need to is one argument, but when Dumbledore said he’d be giving Harry personal lessons, occlumancy was what I’d envisioned they’d do.
True. However, when Harry and Dumbledore went to get the locket, Harry couldn’t have gotten past the hidden door, found where the boat was hidden, summoned the boat, and warded off the inferi. If the other horcruxes are as carefully hidden, how’s he going to find them on his own, or with Ron and Hermione’s help?
The book also makes reference to the PM’s predecessor being a man. (The quote is one of Fudge’s comments, something along the lines of “You’re taking this better than your predecessor. He tries to throw me out the window!”) Major’s predecessor was Margaret Thatcher. I suppose you could argue that Fudge mistakenly thought Thatcher was a man, hence the term “he” but I’m not they type to buy that and I don’t think Rowling is either.
Further, the PM mentioned in the book stayed PM all the way through to the events of the current book, which disqualifies Major.
Good point. I don’t think they can do it alone, either. They are going to need major help.
Perhaps HP&tPS took place in the verry very near future.
I dunno. I find it underused in the books. If I had an invisibility cloak, I’d have used it all the time. Though it may have made a more boring story in the earlier books if he had.
I didn’t get that feel. I saw it that Malfoy didn’t really want to kill anyone. He talks the talk, but can’t walk to the walk, so to speak. He was just a scared boy who doesn’t want his mother and father killed by the Dark Lord. But when push comes to shove, he couldn’t do it. That’s why he almost turned (lowering his wand) before the Death Eaters storm up to the roof.
Well Quidditch shows me that Rowling has no experience with sports. The lack of second sting, I can somewhat get around by the fact there is an entire house to choose backups from, but if someone gets injured, they play without. No sport has that! And, of course, the game is seriously unbalanced, with the Snitch getting you 150 points.
Perhaps, but she claims she’s never read 'em. She says she isn’t into fantasy and she’ll probably never revisit it again after Book 7. At least in the Time Magazine article this week they quote her saying so.
OK, gang, we have two Harry Potter threads, both pretty long, both having many similar posts and posters.
If you wish, I can merge them; I’ve started a separate thread to get your votes. Go to Harry Potter - one thread or two? vote here to vote.
In the meantime, I’m going to close this one, and send you to the other one, just so that we have less confusion. OK? The other one is Harry Potter (open spoilers)